PEGASI AUTUMN - Chapter 14
26 Oct 2017Jemine Caesar
The fire was so massive that it created a breeze in the corridor, sucking in the surrounding oxygen to sustain itself. The station’s administrators couldn’t turn off the level’s airflow without suffocating hundreds, nor could they seal its blast doors without trapping hundreds more. Thus, the green-tipped fires burned unabated.Marrakech Morgan stood amid the chaos, a glass of wine in her hand and a secret smile on her lips. Her hair danced in the hot wind as the fire danced in her eyes. Even now, reports of other blasts were coming in. Hab blocks, power stations, utility lines- all over the station, superheated plasma charges had annihilated everything around them. Clair Dock itself was stricken.
But that wasn’t what was on Marra’s mind.
The boardroom, too, had been attacked. It was now utterly inhospitable, the picture window blasted away and everything that hadn’t been bolted down ejected into space. Even as Marra watched, radio chatter around her went back and forth, furiously trying to verify the High Council’s fate.
All around her, emergency crews struggled to combat the fire. It was hopeless. What fire-suppression technology Exotica ever had was annihilated in the blast, and neither chemicals nor simple water were enough to stem the flames. At her side, Apollonia beheld the spectacle, horror in her eyes and hands over her mouth. Not a single person had made it out alive.
The story continues here...