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Despite the fact that Piper lucked out from Zeke carrying her (by way of not lagging behind and dying a fiery, tortured death), it was also unfortunate in that she was the very first one to reach the door - with her head.

"Ow," came the grunt as she was used as a human battering ram. Then came more pressure as she was not only shoved into the door, but squished between it and Zeke. She let out a slight yelp as it swung open, the cold air stinging her skin with the sudden temperature change. As soon as the door swung open, she plunged forward towards the ground and met a rather rough landing.

She grunted, coughing as fresh air filled her lungs and then was promptly knocked out of it as she hit the ground. Her body rolled over immediately, eyes blinking and watery from the smoke inside, although she had seemed particularly unaware of most of it at the time. It wasn't until she rolled over that she saw the blazing flames licking the windows of the dormitories overhead and charring the side of the building. "Oh god," she whispered, her whimsical nature suddenly sobered and an uncharacteristic look of horror on her face, "there really is a fire."

She reached out, grabbing for Zeke, even as she was unable to tear her eyes away from the building. It didn't occur to her that she should get up or move farther away from the flaming building, too entranced with the fact that she had actually just been in it.

They'd made it. They'd made it. Everything was smoke and heat, but the doors were visible enough, and he saw clearly as Zeke and Piper made it out. There were two, at least, plus himself. Sue was so close to being there as well, just a few more yards --

He stopped, suddenly. Stopped, turned, cursed out, "One minute, I see somebody!"

It was the truth. A broken table was smoldering, and there was a shape still on it. He could barely see through the smoke - only enough to know that there was only a little fire there. Whoever it was must have passed out from the smoke - he couldn't leave them there!

Pulling up the neck of his pajama shirt over his face in an attempt to filter out the air, Sue charged over. The smoke was in his eyes here, but he had no doubt it was a person he was seeing. "Get up," he shouted as he approached, "get up, wake up, we've got to get out of here!" His arm grabbed for theirs, trying to yank them away from the smothering heat. His fingers slipped on some sort of slickness, though, so he cursed and tried again, both hands this time.

This was more effective, brutally yanking the person away from the table - but they simply spilled onto the ground at their feet, unmoving. It was only now that Sue discovered what had slipped over his fingers before - it was the skin of the corpse sloughing off. Sue's hands and arms were covered now with a hot, black stickiness that was bits and pieces of a person, someone once his classmate now made unrecognizable by the flames.

The charred meat of the body struck the ground, and Sue ran. And this time, he did not let himself be diverted from the door - he went flying out and kept running, until his feet tripped and he sprawled out onto the grass, gasping and gagging. Don't throw up, he tried to order himself, bring up a hand to cover his mouth--

A hand, he soon realized, that was still covered in corpse stink.

Sue was going to be busy revisiting his dinner for some time, it seemed.

**note Alease is in a SD so she might die there, if she does and she also dies here the SD is her real death

It was Bartholomew that woke him up. Nihls wasn't normally a heavy sleeper, but after the adventures the other night and slamming his toes into every immovable object in the room, he'd been fairly well conked out until Bartholomew, apparently more sensitive than he was to the sound of the fire, let off the cat version of a bellow in his ear.
"Uh? Wha?" He jerked upright, fumbling for the light switch, but for some reason, it wasn't as dark as it should be.
It also smelled strange, choking even.
Bartholomew yowled again, clinging onto his PJ's with a force that suggested the cat either had no idea, or didn't care, that his claws were damn pointy.
As it sunk in what was happening, Nihls wasn't sure he cared either, grabbing for his glassess in a panic, and shoving them on his nose as he wrapped an arm around the cat with his other hand.
OHGODTHEBUILDINGWASONFIRE.
He wondered wildly if Sue had made it out, but was it even safe to check? Wasn't there something about making fire spread faster if you opened a door?
OHGODOHGODOHGOD....
His heart was pounding wildly as he irrationally considered grabbing his books, or his uniform, but Bartholomew's panic grounded him in reality.
Window. Get to the Window. Stumbling over his bedclothes he staggered out of bed and lunged for the window, awkwardly shoving it open with one hand. There was plenty more smoke outside. Enough to make his eyes tear up, and his throat feel like it was on fire, but if they could get beyond that...
He almost threw himself out the window, rolling protectively as he hit the grass, which felt shockingly cold compared to the hot roil of smoke from the burning building.
He could feel it though, the fire, which meant it had gotten alarmingly close before he'd noticed. How long had Bartholomew been trying to wake him up?
Still clutching the cat like a lifeline, he pulled himself to his feet and staggered blindly away from the building, smoke stung eyes streaming, too shocked and afraid to even feel the claws that were dug into his skin.
THEBUILDINGISONFIRE. ITS ON FIRE.
The thought kept repeating itself over and over in his mind as he blindly sought distance from the building.

It was 1am. For most students, that meant sleep – a dream, perhaps, some snoring. For others, it meant sneaking out of a bedroom to dart down happily to the room of some other student, to do things that should probably not see the light of day. It was the normal heartbeat of a school full of teenagers; it bubbled with hormones and awkwardness like a babbling brook of prepubescent carp.

For Fallon Iva Novette-Naim, it meant only one thing: organizing marbles.

Ever since the wave of bacterial meningitis had swept through the school in a deadly wave, Fallon had been… off. Her usual puzzle regime was stepped up to two puzzles a day. She cooked so much that the skin on her fingertips had worn down from handling hot pans. Her blouses were starched so thoroughly they were practically cardboard. Entire Tupperware containers were filled to the brim with painstakingly cross-stitched flowers and leaves and small paisley shapes. She even decided to purchase a steam cleaner for her rug and habitually vacuumed her entire room, applying twice the effort in the spot where the rotted corpse had fallen out of her closet during her date with Serenade.

Kneeling on the carpet, she let her eyes flicker to that spot. The closet. The blood in the sink had been terrible, but it was not so serious that Fallon couldn’t partition it off in her brain with large DO NOT CROSS emergency tape wrapped around it. The skull faces on her puzzle had been a cruel surprise, but no more jarring than when Andeon did any number of stupid pranks at Fallon’s expense. No – it was the body in the closet. Serenade had been there too, and from the look of terror that the two girls shared, Fallon knew that this was not a hallucination. When she was a child, Fallon used to imagine things all the time – things that weren’t there. It would be silly things: a giant red stain on her parents white carpet, splattered red sauce all over the stove, something red and puffy dragging a thick trail from her bedroom to the back porch. Always red, always filthy. Her head would grow hot, heart thumping wildly, and Fallon – as young as five years old – would rush to the pantry to grab every cleaning supply known to man so that she could scrub until her finger bled. Then her parents would come home to find their little girl trying to clean up a stain that wasn’t there, all the while dragging her own blood across the carpet. With time, Fallon learned to control her impulses, but she still saw things from time to time, things that weren’t there.

Lifting one hand to the tall clear vase that housed 1/3 of her marbles, Fallon felt her fingers tremble. She curled her hand back to her chest, rubbing at it with her thumb. No. Don’t shake. Get it under control. A woman in control does not shake. Three tall vases sat on the ground in front of her, each filled with different amounts of sage, turquoise, magenta, and clear marbles. Any time someone might visit the room, the marbles would be in a different order, seemingly random, based on whatever mood Fallon was in at that time. She raised her eyes to the vases, fought to smile. So perfect, so orderly. They always did what she said, they always were waiting for her, they never disappointed. Beside Fallon on the pale purple bedspread, the remaining marbles sat in four neat Tupperware containers and waited for her attention. Once she organized these, Fallon was certain she would feel better, more in control. With each dropped glass marble, she felt a weight slip out of her fingertips, a comfortable feeling settling back into her chest. Yes, this was what she needed. She needed this.

Stretching her hand wide, Fallon lifted the marble again, dropping it with a sharp c***k in to the waiting vase. Behind her, the electric kettle began to whir. The girl hopped up from her position by the marbles, long pajama pants covering most of her bare feet, and crossed over to her desk. She set a single clear mug on the counter and dropped a few pinches of leaves into the cup. Her hand reached for the electric kettle – and then she stopped.

Fallon tilted her chin up ever-so-slightly and sniffed.
Once, twice, three times.
Her eyes fell back to the electric kettle.
Fallon resumed pouring her cup of tea.

The building was on fire, and Fallon knew it the moment she allowed herself to focus on the wafting drizzle of smoke feeding slowly into her vents. She had the nose of a bloodhound; it was almost supernatural. Without trying, Fallon could name the ingredients of every meal that her schoolmates cooked – regardless of what floor they were on. It was a freakish thing, and as a teen, her uncle jokingly gave her the book Perfume by Patrick Suskind. It told the story of the boy who had such a strong nose that he had the ability to make the best perfume in the world – using the essence of murdered women. Uncle Laurents had meant it as a joke, but Fallon did not take it as one. She loved every word of the book, dog-earing all the pages in the manic way she always did and subjecting her parents to nightly readings at the dinner table. The family had to endure months of Fallon highlighting the skill and beautiful creative thought of Jean-Baptiste, the story’s young anti-hero, who understood that great art takes sacrifice. Fallon would never forget the way her mother looked at her and said, “Yes, my love, but Jean-Baptiste is a murderer.” It was as if she believed that fact could actually undo the genius of his work. Standing beside her desk, sipping tea, Fallon wondered idly what Jean-Baptiste would do if she smelled his home on fire. Would he run? Or would he remain to sample the bouquet? It was a silly thought, and one that kept Fallon from dealing with the helplessness of her current predicament.

This was not a good time for a fire. She had already started her tea, and so there could be no stopping. She had already started her marbles, and so there could be no stopping. She was already in her pajamas with no makeup and would need to dress properly before exiting her room. These were all things that took time – and Fallon never rushed. The corner of her mouth twitched uncomfortably, heart beat rising steadily. She sipped at her tea for a few painful moments and then set it gently on a hand-knitted coaster. In the background, the smell of smoke rose in plumes in her unconscious, and she felt it whisper closer and closer like the hand of death.

Freed from her tea regime, Fallon crossed briskly to the marbles. She lifted the first one, hand shaking and paused. Breathe, breathe. She tried again, hand steadied, and began to distribute each marble one at a time. The two people who lived inside of Fallon battled with each other. One told her to run – and to scream for those whose lives she cared about: Leonette, Andeon, Serenade, Yvette, Pierrette… Fallon wasn’t sure she could call all of them friends, but she was not ambivalent to their deaths. That was enough for her. And then – standing beside that voice, there stood another. A louder voice. It told her to organize marbles. It told her to keep her breathing even. It warned her in a voice low and ominous of all the terror that would befall her if she did not keep her system, if she did not preserve order. When she tried to take a step back, it slid up beside her, wrapping its cool hand around her wrist and forcing her to lift each marble and drop it in a specific place. A deadly dance, and one that she lived with every day. The other part of her mind faded quietly into the background, replaced by nothingness. Fallon was not a person. Fallon was a meat machine driven by an internal operator who did not care about who Fallon was, or about the value of her life. It told her to do things a certain way, and to punish those who did not follow her. And like a leaf reaching toward the sun, the young teen bent easily under its sway.

The smoke was rising thickly now, reaching in from the vent in her carpet. It had started on the first floor? That was no good. The heat that cooked the floor beneath her began to warm her carpet, bringing drops of sweat to her forehead. She reached for her nightstand and pulled out a white rag, padded lightly at her forehead. In the minutes it took Fallon to organize her marbles, the fire had crawled up through the stairwell and invaded the second floor. By the time she rose from her spot, fingers trembling, and crossed to her door, it was already too late. She touched the metal once, and her fingers hissed. Her hand jerked backward, but Fallon could not stop. She had to touch it twice more. The second time, tears stung her eyes from the pain, and on the third, she gripped and tried to turn. Flakes of her skin stayed behind on the doorknob. Lifting her marred hand to her face, Fallon watched as ribbons of red flowed freely from the wounds, encircling her wrist like a bracelet. There would be no exiting through the door. Glancing to the window, she could see the orange-red blur of flame licking up the window frame.

There were no other exits.

Fallon stood there for a moment, hand trickling blood onto her shirt where she held it. Okay, okay. The fire was coming. She could not control that. But there were others things here, other things for her to do. Moving slowly to the desk, Fallon retrieved an ace bandage and slowly wrapped her hand, neck prickling from the waves of heat moving in through her bedroom. The smoke made her cough, but she did not react other than a few shudders, covering her mouth gently. Next, she moved to her closet, stripping down out of her bloodied pajamas and sliding into a purple dress – her favorite. She had worn it the first time she met Leonette and was certain it was the only reason the girl had paid her any mind. Slipping in to a pair of heels, Fallon crossed to the mirror, slowly applying makeup. All around her, the walls seemed to hiss. It took her a matter of moments, and then she crossed back to the center of the room, looking at the paradise she had created.

Everything was just where she wanted it. Everything was in its place. And there she was – dressed perfectly in the center of a perfect room. She was imprisoned by this place, by the compulsions that made her create it, and now – by a fire. It made sense, she thought, in some perverted reality. Fallon did not think of her parents. She hardly thought of her friends. She thought only of her rising heartbeat, the fury burning behind her eyes. A fire was going to destroy it all. There was no fire extinguisher in her room; it had not been allowed. She did not have enough flour to snuff out the magnitude of the flames. Everything she had worked to create would be consumed by flame.

Her chest rose unevenly, and her fists clenched at her sides. The movement made Fallon let out a quiet whimper, her hand bleeding through the bandage. What else could she do? A puzzle, maybe. Start some needlework. As if in response, the floor fell away in the corner of her room, taking with it her desk. The electric kettle hung from its cord attached to the wall, thumping out an uneven beat. The floor swayed, and Fallon jumped toward her closet, landing on her knees. The room took on an unnatural rhythm, a beat that Fallon could not follow, and she clamped her hands over her ears and screamed, ”STOP IT!” to an empty room. She could not die in discord. She could not spend her last moments losing her mind.

Staggering to her feet, Fallon stumbled to her nightstand, to the metronome that sat beside it. It always calmed her down. A painted nail unhooked the metal lever, and it began to tick steadily in the background. Yes. Tick, tick, tick, tick, tick. Fallon's eyes dropped to half-lids, her breathing slowing. She could not move from the metronome, could not watch her paradise melt around her. Another shattering crack, and her bed slid down into the hole in the floor, half her room sucked down into the flame. She gasped and grabbed the metronome from the nightstand moments before it too fell down. Fallon scooted backwards on her knees, back pressed up against the closet door. The metronome sat like a heavy weight in her hands, adding a beat to the disorder plaguing Fallon. She closed her eyes; she tried to put herself in to the metronome, to imagine herself as a tiny beat on a sheet of music.

Her eyes popped open sharply, only to glance down at the metal ceiling fan that had skewered her through the stomach. Oh – when had that happened? Fallon let her mouth fall open, blood rushing warm and fast down her dress. Flames climbed up the walls and crawled across her ceiling. The marbles she had organized were thrown to the floor, scattering wherever they could. Most fell down the slowly growing hole in her floor. Fallon wanted desperately to release her rage, to tear someone else limb from limb, but there was no one here. Only her and the flames.

Tilting her head back to the closet, Fallon tried to laugh, but stopped short, the pain in her stomach sucking out the sound. She had never thought much about how she would die. Consumed by flames and cooked alive? If there was a God, it was a cruel, ironic, uncaring figure. A person who was willing to force her to watch the thing she cared most about dismantled before her eyes, to force her to be burned to death, and to give her no companionship. Fallon set the metronome down on the ground beside her. There was only one support beam left, and when it burned enough to fall, Fallon would plunge in to darkness. She just had to wait.

A stray hand reached up to her neck, fingering the silver Star of David charm that always dangled there. Fallon loved Judaism as an institution, but it was the God behind it that she had some misgivings about. Moments from death, would she find her utopia? Would she feel a hand wrench her from the darkness? Sitting there in the burning room, she thought now of the God that she struggled with, the uncomfortableness of being controlled by another being. In Judaism, there is gigul and ha'atakah – reincarnation and transmigration. Before returning to God, a Jewish soul may be transmigrated and reincarnated anywhere from three to one thousand times, continuously moving until its work is achieved. Fallon believed her life had not been fulfilled. For one, she needed to reorganize her room once the fire was out, and for two, she had a purpose, a drive, a desire. She had no idea what it was towards, but passion boiled beneath her icy exterior, a passion that needed to be released. There was dybbuk too; perhaps she would just possess the body of another? Perhaps she could live inside of Serenade, or Miss Johnson, or Leonette?

Closing her eyes, she tried to imagine herself out of her surroundings. She tried to put herself in a plain white room full of things to be organized. In that place, she tried to add the faces of those women she adored. Beautiful faces, beautiful people. Miss Johnson crouched behind her, pulling back her hair. Leonette came to her side, resting a hot hand on her shoulder. Serenade came to her other side and repeated the motion. Quiet little Yvette hovered timidly at her feet. Then Pierrette came in, and Abeline was there too. Even Laney Sutton with her stupid potted plant. They all surrounded her, kneeling beside her. They smiled and pressed scorching fingers into her flesh. They smiled and dug in their nails. They smiled and wrapped their arms around her. Together, Fallon and the women fell into darkness, the splintering of wood echoing around them, wrapped in each other's arm.

Fallon fell in to the room below her. The metronome had melted. Her necklace, too, had melted, fusing onto her skin as a silver star in the center of her chest. Would it serve as a pass into a heaven? Fallon could not find it in herself to believe it to be true. She could not find the reserves to hope anymore, not when everything she had created was destroyed, not when all control was lost to something as simple as fire. As the last whispers of life drifted from her, Fallon fought to tap her fingers against the ground to keep the pace. Her heart beat slowed, fell out of rhythm. Her chest sputtered weakly. Blood gurgled in chunky pops from her abdomen. Her own body rebelled against her. When Fallon finally felt the whiteness in her head pop, she did not feel peace. She did not feel sadness. She felt only disappointment, and the look froze in her eyes for a moment before her entire body was swallowed up by the fire.

“Snuzzles! Snuzzles where are you!”

The fire had woken Andeon from a rare sober slumber, jolting him awake as smoke seeped beneath his door, thin fingers rising to cloud the ceiling with a continually thickening fog of poison. He'd paid no mind to dressing, springing from his bed in little more than a pair of Transformers boxers (Megatron, of course) and the pair of home-knit socks. The same pair he had worn every night for the past three years. The socks his mother had knit for him on the last Christmas that she'd still considered him her son. They were full of holes now, but he had refused Fallon's offers to mend them many times. They were just fine with their frays and holes, a last reminder he had of the home he'd lost. And a reminder of the home he'd gained.

The home that was now burning.

The shoebox beneath his bed was empty, a hollow shell of torn-up tissue and gnawed cardboard. The dishcloth that served as Snuzzles blanket lay still upon the floor, and Andeon's heart sank when he lifted it to find only an empty patch of carpet. How often had Snuzzles pulled this prank only to be hiding under that cloth? To jump out from the closet. To scuttle out from beneath the mattress and click up at him in a way that sound so very much like laughter?

The closet was empty, nothing but dirty laundry and a stack of dirtier magazines left to comfort him. Andeon eyed the magazines thoughtfully in a moment of weakness, before shaking off the temptation. There was no time for that. He had a heacrab to find. He snatched his glasses off the nightstand.

No Snuzzles in the drawers.

No Snuzzles under the mattress.

No Snuzzles anywhere.

In a state of panic, Andeon ripped open the door that lead into the smoky, uncomfortably hot hallway. The fire was well down the hall, lighting up the smoke that filled the otherwise dark corridor. The effect was that of a glowing orange haze, floating eerily ahead of the flame, filling his lungs and stinging his eyes as thought to warn him. As though to say, Andeon Boskovic, this is how you will die.

The door was only a few feet away, already ajar, through which only a few students seemed to be rushing towards the cool, crisp air and the safety of the world outside. But Snuzzles was not outside. Snuzzles never went outside on his own. Snuzzles did not leave the dormitory without his Andeon to watch over him, without his Andeon's shoulder to ride on, his hair to nest in. He was small and needed protecting, Andeon was reckless and fragile and needed watching; he did not go out without his Andeon, and Andeon did not go out without his Snuzzles.

He would not go out without his Snuzzles.

“You silly little monster,” Andeon sighed, bringing a hand up to cover his mouth as he charged for the stairs. The path was relatively clear, the building still caught in the earliest stages of burning, and with a great deal of second-takes as he watched the fire slowly crawl up the walls, Andeon charged up the stairwell to the place where he knew Snuzzles would be; the girls' floor. The floor where Andeon had been training him to steal panties and put random objects in Fallon's room to drive her crazy. He always found Snuzzles there, carrying out tasks that would make his Andeon happy.

And, of course, the little youma was there.

There, at the end of the hallway, Snuzzles was running into a door. He threw his tough little body against the door, clicked wildly, and then threw himself against it again. The door was not giving, not against the meager attempts of the Tiniest Youma, but Snuzzles seemed determined to get in that door. Wham. Wham. Wham. Again he threw himself, screeing pitifully when the door continued to not give way. He stood on his hindmost legs, the rest of them scratching loudly at the wood as though trying to bore a hole straight through. Whatever was in that room, Snuzzles wanted it.

“Snuzzles! You get all nine-thousand of those legs over here right now!” Andeon screamed into the hall. He could feel the floor growing warmer beneath his bare feet, and the longer it burned, the more screaming he heard. Andeon charged down the as of yet unburnt hallway, looking into rooms that had already been abandoned by his classmates. It was a relief when he saw some of his friends doors ajar, their beds empty, covers tossed aside. It meant they were safe. It meant that perhaps Yvette had gotten out. Maybe Mackenzie would be outside waiting for him. Maybe Fallon-

Fallon.

It was Fallon's door against which Snuzzles was throwing himself, desperately struggling to get in. Andeon broke into a run, coming to a sudden halt as he reached it. Snuzzles raced up Andeon's bare leg, over his back, and took up residence upon one shoulder. Even as Andeon was grabbing the locked knob with one hand, pounding wildly on the door with the other, he knew why Snuzzles was so wildly trying to get into that room.

Fallon was in that room.

The girl Andeon had mercilessly tortured with his pranks and jokes.

The girl Andeon had given a hundred different nicknames to.

The girl who forgave him for every stupid comment, just as he forgave her for every stupid obsession.

The girl he waited hours to take to the movies, watching her rearrange those god damn marbles until the movie had long since ended.

The girl he took out to ice cream afterwards, just to watch her separate the sprinkles by color and shape and size.

The girl who made Barren Pines feel like home.

His Fallon was in that room.

“FALLON! OPEN THE ******** DOOR!” Andeon screamed, pounding wildly with both fists. The smoke had filled the hall now, and Andeon could see brilliant orange behind the small window of the stairwell door. The bland gray paint peeled away; it would be only moments before the fire ate through, before he wouldn't have time to pull Fallon out and carry her crazy a** off to safety.

Fallon, who was a slave to her compulsions.

“GOD DAMNIT FALLON. YOU'RE GOING TO ******** DIE. OPEN THE GOD DAMNED DOOR.”

He could hear the marbles plinking into the vases, just barely audible over his own screaming. Smoke filled his lungs, stung at his eyes, and again he heard that warning; Andeon Boskovic, this is how you will die.

And that was fine. That was fine, as long as Fallon did not. He threw his shoulder against the door, but the solid frame did not so much as splinter. It did not creak, and it certainly did not give way. The tears that ran down Andeon's cheeks were more than a result of smoke and heat, they were ripped from his eyes by a panic that made his chest tighten, that made his lungs burn more fiercely than any smoke. His limbs ached as the fire crept down the hallway, as he listened to the sounds of Fallon moving around her room. He could hear the metronome, hear the closet door open and close, hear the way she gave into the compulsions he had failed to help her overcome.

Fallon, who accepted him for everything he was; good and bad and guilty.

“Fallon, please...” Andeon pleaded. His face was pressed against the door, tears running down his cheeks. Weakly he pounded, exhausting his energy as he begged her to see reason. “Come on, Fells... come on. I need you.”

It would be the first, and likely the last, time that Andeon would ever admit to such a thing. Admit that he was weak and vulnerable. Admit that he was scared. Admit that he missed his mother, missed Jakob, missed his family. Admit that when it came down to it, past the jokes and the wit and the bravado, he was a boy who desperately missed his life. A boy who still blamed himself for a crime he never meant to commit. A boy who needed someone else to forgive him, because he could never, ever forgive himself.

“Please, Fells...”

Fallon, who he could not save.

It was too late now. The fire was racing down the hall, consuming everything it touched. Snuzzles clicked loudly in his ear, urging him away from the door. He could feel the skin on his side burning, and were it not for the thick haze of smoke, he might be able to see it turning red. It was with a loud, wordless scream and a fist throw against the door hard enough to make his knuckles bleed that Andeon dropped to the floor, crawling beneath the smoke. The stairwell was already consumed by fire, but the window in one of the abandoned bedroom held some hope. He turned in one, forced open the window, and climbed out. It was a long fall, broken only by fortunately placed shrubbery and pure luck. He fell, crying, into the crisp, lonely night.

When all was said and done, Andeon sat upon the grass with the handful of survivors. His mostly bare body shivered in the cool evening air, but he did not notice the cold. He did not notice the vicious burn that spanned the length of his ribcage or the bleeding knuckles. He did not notice the other students as they held one another or as they cried. He only watched the window of Fallon's room.

Fallon, who had been his friend.

He watched as the flame licked at her window, watched as the glass bubbled and oozed.

Fallon, who had been like a sister.

He watched the building begin to collapse. Snuzzles screed a long, mourning sound, lost in the roar of the fire. Andeon watched, cradling the miserable little youma in his arms, hugging the grotesque little thing to his chest as though it was the only comfort left in the world. He brushed away tears and watched as the fire destroyed everything he'd known. He watched, utterly and pathetically helpless, as the fire stole Fallon away.

Fallon, who he had loved.

((Jon got a 16 or so a few pages back, so here's the RP bit!))

He smelled burning. He smelled fire. To most people, these were scents that meant 'alarm' or 'danger' or 'trouble'. To Jon, however, this was standard fare.

...he had a joint in one hand. It was slowly burning down between his fingers, the smoke filling his lungs, hissed out between his nose, the scent of MJ filling his room and clinging against the bedsheets, his books, the rug. Everything else was second to that.

It usually smelled like there was something burning in Jon's room. Nothing new there.

The problem was when the television cut out.

By then, of course, the fire had started licking its way up the stairs, caressing against his door. He should have heard the shouting of students in the halls as they tried to escape, the pitter-patter of feet above him, but these telltale sounds had been dimmed by the air of good-natured comfort that turned the world around Jon into a haze. He felt wonderful. There was no paranoia today, no concern, just a sense of rightness and comfort.

The smoke slowly started to smell wrong, as he stared at the static and snow and then the black of a television once the power had cut out entirely. For the first time in years, he found himself drawing breath and coughing as the smoke filled his lungs, tears streaming down his face, his skin hot and uncomfortable, itchy.

He finally went for the door, a little dazed, dizzy, short of breath, and the knob was hot enough to leave his hand singed. Ten seconds before the feel of charred flesh made him gasp, his eyes turned down to the burn across his hand, attention sliding to the flicker of fire under his door.

The wood went up. His rug went up. The smokes mixed and turned it into a hotbox, not an inferno of flames but a thick mess of smoke that sapped away the oxygen. Jon was still trying to figure out what the hell was going on when his knees went out, he collapsed to the floor in a dead faint.

He still hadn't figured it out when the inferno came to consume him, char flesh and burn away the oily mess of his hair, catch his stash hidden under the mattress. The smells of flesh and herb mingled. The mix was startlingly pleasant.