I keep expecting to see headlights behind me as I blaze down the canyon road towards Salt Lake, but they never appear. Speaking of lights, for the first time in months I can see the moon. There’s stars as well. On top of that the southeastern sky is lit with a strange orange and green aurora borealis, no doubt residual effects from the massive impact. It’s a whole light show up there.

What a night.

The pain in my arm revs back up. Mostly in my forearm. It’s hard to grip the steering wheel so I drive left handed. I flip a light on so I can get a really good look at my palm, and oh boy is it weird. When I wiggle my fingers the tissue moves in unnatural ways. Definitely has the feel of scar tissue, but it looks less like a scar and more like a, well … the first thing that comes to mind is a bologna sandwich stuffed into a palm sized clam, among other things. I’m going to stop there and let your imagination run wild with that.

As the mountains part and the lights of the Salt Lake Valley come into view, my arm is on fire. The muscles and bones feel like they’re fighting for dominance under the flesh. The skin prickles in waves of numbness and needles. The pain ebbs and flows. For moments it’s almost sickeningly unbearable, then it vanishes into a numbing whisper.

I weigh the pros and cons of going to the emergency room. Heavy painkillers could probably help. Maybe. I may have to disclose the true nature of the wound’s origins and that could have any number of unintended consequences, least of which may involve more entanglements with men in black. What a treat that would be. Of course, lying about the thing could have consequences as well. I’m not sure anyone has ever treated alien-zapped hand syndrome before.

By the time I hit the I-80 highway, the pain is so overwhelming a deep part of my mind considers veering off a bridge. But the rational part of my mind takes over and I find myself headed towards St. Mark’s. Hospital.

I’m surprised to see so many cars out this late. My clock says it’s 4:58 am. Lots of them seem to be heading in the direction of the hospital too, but why? Oh, duh. I couldn’t have been the only one affected by the blowback of the impact. I pass by a series of office buildings off to the side of the highway and notice most of the windows are blown out. The moon reflects off of shattered glass all over parking lots.

I pull off onto the exit and the hospital comes into view. I can see lots of lights and commotion in the various parking lots in the medical complex. Cops are in an intersection directing people to makeshift triage centers across the street currently being erected. I see a line of cars being directed to the University of Utah football stadium a few blocks away. I hesitate joining the fray but find myself caught up in a line of honking cars, moving at a snail’s pace. Some are pulling off to the side of the road and making their way on foot, so I follow suit. There isn't much of an alternative. I join a small cluster of distressed families and we make our way to the hospital only to be turned away and directed to the stadium. The line outside the stadium is moving quickly. The moans and groans of the injured grow louder as we pass through the under-structure and into the turf dressed field. The stadium lights are on full blaze and hundreds of medical partitions are being set up in a half-hazard fashion.

Groups of people are laid out on the ground waiting for treatment. There’s hundreds of them. Medical professionals, and those claiming to be, scurry around doing what they can. A man holds a bleeding boy, desperately searching for help. I get the urge to try and help him but I’m not sure how, and he passes into a crowd out of my reach. I feel helpless, especially since I can’t help myself. The pain spikes, but not for long. Just long enough to knock me off my feet for a few minutes. When it subsides and I find myself able to breathe again. Then I find myself helping a group of elderly women make their way to a corner where lawn chairs are propped open. A fight breaks out in the northwest corner of the field but settles as soon as it starts. A mother can’t find her child and enlists me in the search. Next thing I know I’m marching around, calling for Timmy Tellmon. Timmy, she says, is wearing a bright green t-shirt with the ninja turtles on it with matching pajama bottoms. I climb the stadium seats to get a better view and find a spec of green curled up along the bottom of the south end wall in front of a row of mounted VIP stadium chairs. I run down and find the kid. He’s maybe four. When I pick him up my arm rages in pain again and I almost drop him. After it settles, I hustle back to where I originally met his mother. She’s only a few yards away still yelling for little Timmy. When she sees us she bursts into tears. She’s so thankful that she brings me to where the rest of her family is waiting to be admitted inside one of the larger treatment areas, and lets me cut.

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Part of the makeshift structure looks like it should have a canvas ceiling, but was never completed. The result of a hasty setup, no doubt. There’s rows of cots pressed up against the canvas walls. Almost all of them are filled with bodies in all various states of trauma.

A middle-aged woman approaches me. “Where are you hurt?

I’m clenching my shoulder. “My arm is killing me.”

She looks me up and down. “Just your arm? You’re covered in blood.”

I look down at myself. Oh yeah. “That’s … not mine.” In any other circumstance, a slew of questions would have followed that comment, but she simply nods her head. “I just need some heavy painkillers, I think,” I say. “Something really strong.”

“Please take a seat over there,” she says, and points to a cooler in the corner next to a rollaway medical tray. “Next please!”

I make my way over and take a seat. A thin partition divides me from an old bearded man sitting on a stepstool. But that doesn’t stop him from attempting to make conversation. He peaks around the partition and eyes me. There’s a bandage over his left eye.

“Evening,” says the man in a deep growly voice.

“Oh. Hello.”

He clears his throat. “You wouldn’t happen to have a cell phone on you, by chance, now would you? I've lost mine and I’ve got family down south and I don’t know if … if they’re okay.”

“Uh … sure,” I say, hesitantly. I pull it out, unlock it, and hand it to him.

“Thank you. Won’t take too long.”

I watch him dial then disappear behind the partition. I sigh, then find myself examining my hand and forearm again. The pain is there but it’s currently at a low hum.

“Something wrong with your arm?”

I look up to find the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen standing there. She pulls an upside down plastic crate from under a table and sits on it in front of me. She’s got hot pink scrubs on and her black hair is up in a messy bun. Even without makeup, and in the harsh stadium lights, she’s stunningly attractive. I find myself stuttering out a response.

“I … yeah. It’s, uh, killing me. Well, it comes and goes. Right now it’s not, you know, bad. But every now and then I’ll get this searing pain.”

“Where?”

“Where what? Oh, Just, I don’t know. All over my arm.” I make a general gesture from shoulder to fingertip.

She grabs my forearm and squeezes it. I flinch, but more out of anticipation than actual pain. She examines my bicep then my elbow, squeezing and bending, testing the tendons and ligaments.

“I don’t see anything obviously wrong. Nothing feels torn or broken. What happened?”

“I, uh, touched something,” I say, with a raised eyebrow. Yes, I know how stupid and vague that sounds as soon as it comes out of my mouth. “Something hot. No, not hot, I think … I think it was electrical. There’s lots of tingling and numbness.”

She lifts an eyebrow, then turns my hand over to reveal the scar. Her face scrunches up and she runs a finger over the slit down the middle. It sends tingles all over me, and not in a bad way this time.

“What’s this?”

“That,” I say, pausing to think. “Is … a good reason to buy a pair of gloves.”

“This isn’t recent, is it? Looks like you’ve had it a while.”

“You’d be surprised.”

“It feels unusually hot and moist. What did you … touch?”

I blink. For a moment my brain gets caught on the words “hot” and “moist” before I manage a response.

“It … was dark,” I say.

Amazing, isn’t it? The male instinct to reproduce. It always takes prerogative. Even in the thralls of physical pain and with the whole world literally falling apart around us.

“I’m going to need you to be a little more specific,” she says, smiling, gripping my hand and bending my wrist, checking its mobility.

I smile back. I’m about to respond when her face suddenly contorts and she lets out a gasp. A gasp that twists in her throat and crescendos into a scream. She stands up and stumbles backwards in a panic. At the same moment I realize my fingertips are wet. I look at my hand, my fingers sprinkled with blood.

She screams again and holds up her hand. Or, the stump where her hand once was. It's completely gone, severed at the wrist. Her missing limb is nowhere to be found.