April 9, 2037

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I had trouble sleeping that night. Fires raged outside my window, casting a bright red light that danced across my room, and there was a lot of yelling. I thought I even heard the occasional gunshot.

I grabbed the corners of my blanket and pulled them up to my face. My mind was racing, synchronized with my heartbeat. People weren't supposed to be like this. People were supposed to teach you, and take care of you, and say hi to you in the hallway when you passed them. People were supposed to be our friends, and our neighbors, our coworkers. Not our mortal enemies.

I heard the door creak open around midnight, and my little sister, Keira, came into the room, holding her stuffed bear, who was now missing an arm.

"I can't sleep, Sammy," she said. Her chin quivered. "What's going on? What are the bad people doing?"

It broke my heart to see Keira like this. She must have felt so lost, so alone, and she was only six. I let her climb into bed with me, and I tried comforting her.

"I don't really know. But we're going to be just fine," I said, not completely believing it myself. I knew I had to stay strong, though, for her sake at the very least. "Father says we have to stay together. No matter what happens." She looked up at me with her brown puppy-dog eyes and smiled.

"I'm sorry about your bear," I said.

"It's okay," she replied. "And her name's Bella." I put my arm over her to comfort her, and she nestled her head into my chest. That was the last moment my sister and I shared before we were torn apart.

Before death and tragedy met us at every turn.

An alarm pierced the air, releasing a noise that sounded like a horrific fusion between a guttural cry and a shriek. Its blare crippled my thoughts, and caused my heart to race. The black smoke billowed throughout the room, filling my lungs. The coughing began almost instantly, like the tears that spilled into my eyes. I grabbed Keira's hand, and we ran.

I don't know why, but I instinctively grabbed my backpack as we ran. Luckily, it was light, so I had no problem carrying it on my back.

I stared straight ahead as we stumbled out my bedroom door and down the stairs, eyes wide with terror, and watched flames lick across the wall, enveloping and burning everything in their path with fierce determination.

It was getting harder to breathe and I felt my skin burning up; I needed oxygen and quickly. Before it would be too late.

A sickening thud reverberated around us, and Keira fell to the ground, breathing heavily. I froze in my tracks. A mask of fear was plastered on her face. "Keira!" I tried to yell her name, but no sound came out.

I grasped Keira's hand, for my comfort just as much as hers, and tried to pull her up. A river of tears were running down both our cheeks, as if we thought it would be enough to put out the fire. I held on to her hand for dear life, until I slowly felt it slip away. No, I can't, I thought desperately. Please no...I won't...let you...go...

That one moment was dragged out into what felt like years. I could hear the pleading in her brown puppy-dog eyes. Sammy, don't let go. Please, Sammy. Please.

Please don't leave me, Sammy.

Our world was being engulfed in fire and darkness. It was burning, until it would be beyond recognition, nothing but a smoldering wreckage left to wither away. Our lives were changing in front of our eyes.

"Don't leave me!" I screamed hysterically, dragging her limp body across the ground. Keira's grip loosened and she smiled sadly at me, as if saying goodbye.

Her hand fell away, drifting down towards the ground.

A flaming plank of wood fell from the ceiling, missing me by a few inches; the house looked like it was about to collapse, and thick smoke filled my eyes with tears and obscured my vision.

Fear. Terror. That's all I felt. All I could feel. My life was in peril, and everything was being torn away from me.

I felt a large hand squeeze my shoulder, and my father grabbed me with a vice-like grip and pulled me towards the door. I fought and kicked, trying to free myself, trying to go back to Keira. "Keira!" I yelled. "Keira! I won't go! I won't leave!"

My father threw me onto his shoulders, carrying me towards the door. He rammed his shoulder into the wood planks that he had nailed in earlier that evening; once, twice, then on the third time the door flew open and hit the ground. He carried me out and I fell to the ground, coughing and gasping for air. He ran back in, presumably to look for Keira. But I knew it would be in vain.

My naturally blond hair was stained black with smoke. I still had trouble breathing; my lungs felt like they were about to collapse.

Keira... I thought in misery. The weight of what had just happened began to sink in. What have I done?

My head pounded with frustration, grief, and anger. I was alive, but only because I left her. I abandoned her. I was a coward. She deserved to live. Not me.

I sat on the ground outside my house in silence, just watching the carnage. I watched my house, the only home I had ever known, burn in a fiery inferno. I knew Keira and my father were in there somewhere, alive or, far more likely, dead. No firefighters or policemen would come to help us, they were much too busy dealing with the rioters and looters. Or all dead. Either way, we were all alone.

The words all alone echoed through my head, until the thoughts hit at once.

The grief surged through my veins. The smoke still stung my lungs, but I didn't notice. Tears began to spill onto the charred grass. I fell apart at the seams, picturing her face. Trying to grasp every detail, contain it, before it flew away and left my mind permanently.

That's when I saw him.

He was taller, and if I had to guess, I'd say he was just a teenager. His face was covered by a hood, and his hands, clutching a pack of matches, were singed. But the most important thing was the fact that he was holding a pack of matches. He had lit the match that killed my sister and destroyed my house.

My blood boiled, and without thinking, I stood up and ran after him. Even though he was easily twice my size and weight, I was determined to hurt him for what he had done to me.

Once he saw me, a scrawny, 12-year-old kid charging towards him, he looked confused for a moment, then dropped the matches and ran as well. But I was determined. The world spun as I picked up speed, and miraculously, he began to lose energy. He looked back to see if I had somehow managed to keep up to him; his fatal mistake. I leapt at his legs, throwing him off balance and causing him to topple forward. I felt my hands reach for his hood as if they were out of my control, and I threw it back, sitting on his legs to keep him down.

I only saw his face for a brief moment, but it was enough. I saw his narrow grey eyes, his messy pitch-black hair, and, most clearly, a scar running across his forehead.
He looked scared, innocent even, but that didn't do anything to quench my anger. My fists moved on their own; they wanted revenge, and they would get it. Time moved in a blur; all I remember now was a lot of blood and fear, from the both of us. I couldn't think, I could only act.

The teenager's face was contorted and blood streamed from his nose. And although he struggled and thrashed, my anger was too strong. I don't know how much damage I would have done had my father not burst out the door of the flaming building at that moment. I let go of my sister's killer, got up and walked towards my father in a trance. My heart stung like it was being punctured when I saw his empty arms.

My father fell to the ground, sobbing, and pulled me into an embrace. What was red-hot anger moments before boiled down to nothing but a cold chill. I cried a thousand tears on his shoulder, dimly aware of the void inside my heart. We sat there together for a time staring at the remnants of our lives, knowing that nothing would ever be the same.

For some reason, I couldn't stop thinking about what I'd done to the teenager. I don't know why my stomach churned. What right did he have to burn down and destroy everything I've ever loved? But deep down something kept nagging at me, and as hard as I tried to ignore it, it was persistent.

After everything I had gone through, and during everything I was soon about to go through, my last moments with Keira haunted my thoughts. We're going to be just fine. Father says we have to stay together.

No matter what happens.

That day I made a promise to myself. I would make sure the aliens got what they deserved; an eternity in hell. And I would personally see it through.