Doors?

Automatic.

Emergency doors?

Don't know where they are.

Air?

Ventilation?

Ventilation.

Ventilation!

Spinning around in my mind I feel, hear and touch anything to find it.

There! My Curse hones in on it.

My hands touch the floor, which is the ceiling, beneath me and I pull myself towards the cabin. Monstrous pains viciously claw at my hip and the top of my right leg. I hold in my stabbing screams and drag my bloodied body onwards. Slam! Got it. I pull my hand away almost immediately, it's burning hot. I gulp as the tsunami wave of heat hits me, my face feels like it's peeling away but I scavenge and claw at the walls and sides surrounding the door. I desperately hope the air duct will be ripped away from under my fingers any second. I feel Megan's breath closer, her voice is weak, shaky and terrified,

“What is it?” I have no time to reply, I just scrape and hit the carriage with all my force. She joins me going above where I am scratching at.

Jolt.

Rip.

The wall starts to come away and my fingers fold into thegaps.

I'VE FOUND IT!

I pull with both my hands and all my strength. Bending my spine back and putting my whole weight onto it. I manage to yank the air duct off and by doing so ramming it into my forehead. I throw it away and it hits the opposite side of the carriage with a bang and clatters onto the floor. The banging from my fellow classmates ceases and Megan speaks,

“Kai you did it! I can feel air on my arm” Megan calls out next to me. I can almost feel her arm reaching for mine but I don’t reach back. Instead I freeze, every part of my body is broken and crippled from the weight that I had put onto it.

“Kai?” Megan asked with a weight in her voice of worry. Her fingers touch the underside of my hand.

Go, find a door. Get everyone out. I tap on her finger weakly. There is knocking and banging as Megan goes into the air duct and starts making her way out. The heat strokes my face gently and I can hear voices calling out to me, asking me what's going on. But they are faint and my senses are failing.

I fall back and hit the floor. Thump. Cries come and people call out. I drift off, back into Kirk on a hot summers day, the rope between my fingers and the distant sound of Ella Walker's beautiful singing fills my ears. My body is shaking and twitching and the fire I can feel like a dragon getting ever closer. But there she is, her voice like silk, exotic yet familiar. I hear a distant thud and voices shouting, crying and screaming. Flowing through the crowd sending everyone into a trance, a soft, warm blanket falls over me. Hands grab me by my shoulders, the agony sweeps through my body as I am hauled away from my position. Paralysed all I can do is feel the notes as they sweep through me, healing my bloodied trembling body as it lies out on the hot sand.