It was my birthday when the world exploded. I think it was around 8:45 AM. I came to a few hours later draped across the piece of rubble that was the concrete bench I had been sitting on. I thought I had gone blind for a few seconds, but it was actually just so dusty in the cavern that was once the room I sat in I couldn’t see. Also, the lights had gone off which hadn’t helped. It took a few seconds for the fog in my head to clear and a few more for it to stop ringing, but when I saw what was around me I wished it never had.

If I were to describe it in one word it’d be chaos. Complete and utter fucking chaos. Paper was everywhere, electrical lines were flapping around erratically, I saw a man who had lost his hand trying to wrestle it back from a dog: it was well and truly nuts. Everywhere I looked people were standing in a daze, thousand-yard stares looking nowhere. Whenever I close my eyes I see that scene.

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I was helping first responders rescue people from out of the rubble that was once city hall when I first saw him. He was standing amongst the debris, people streaming all around him and he was just standing there. I looked him dead in the eyes and I knew the second we made contact that he had done this.

I ran over to him, or tried to run –turns out I had a piece of rebar stuck in my leg that I wouldn’t find out about for a little while– and tackled him to the floor. I stared down into his eyes again and I saw the truth I had seen before.

I screamed at him. “WHAT DID YOU DO!”

Then I punched him.

He looked back at me with an insane glint in his eye, “Where is Timothy?”