Chapter 13: The Injuries of Both

The falling rocks entombed his family, community, and all he knew. His ears were deafened by the colossal crashes and his eyes by the humungous dust clouds. He couldn't hear anything or see anything, and he felt as if he was coughing up blood, trying to free his throat from those all-encompassing streams and plumes of rocks and dirt, hellbent on suffocating him. He watched his home fall into a giant heap of dust, crushed under his own weight. He looked up towards the cloudy, grey skies, and saw a swarm of tiny, grey dots under the cloud cover. He needed to rescue his family. He stood to sprint towards them, only to see the first of the burning, red flames to fall from the sky.

He awoke. The sun had not arisen. He laid awake, blanket thrown aside, for the rest of the night.

The morning, his forth day at the facility, the newly named Jasper had learned over breakfast from under the glaring, wrathful eyes of Doctor Johnstone, occurred just like