Saturday November 5th, 12:30 a.m.

Concepts like exhaustion, cold, and guilt didn't apply to Christopher. Gracie did. While the others were stressed about the thugs brandishing guns, Christopher had noted an orange glow on the horizon. A glow that looked suspiciously like a fire, a fire in the general vicinity of Kate's house.

Christopher remembered the blistering heat he felt in Kate's living room. He started to recite prime numbers to help clear his mind. The facts as they presented themselves were as such: Christopher could do things that defied human explanation, Jessica Kinghorn had changed irrevocably before Tony's thug had ended her existence, and Lancet Falls was descending into chaos at a breakneck pace. Securing Gracie's safety was on the forefront of Christopher's mind. When he was assured of her wellbeing, Christopher would return and help young Jordan and Diana.

At other times, he may have felt guilt. He felt quite fond of that Jordan girl. He sensed in her a kinship that was unparalleled with other humans, and he supposed that Diana was also his responsibility in the absence of her parents, but Gracie trumped them both in the hierarchy of needs.

I'm sure they will understand once I explain to them that I really didn't have a choice in the matter.

Christopher had foregone using the roads and sidewalks of Lancet Falls. The straight line distance between his position and that of Kate's house took a route through expanses of open fields and various backyards of residents of the town. Most of these backyards did not possess fences. Issues like personal property did not apply to a town with a good foundation of trust and integrity.

In days gone by, Kate had made him watch a movie called Ferris Bueller's Day Off. When he watched it, he always sympathized with the main character's best friend, Cameron Frye. He seemed to be the only one of them that realized the gravity of their collective situation, but today Christopher felt like the protagonist of the story as he traversed the property of his various neighbors.

Every once and awhile, motion detector lights went off, but no one seemed to pay him any notice. On the streets, he could see people running around and connecting their mouths together.

There must be some holiday that I'm not privy to.

Christopher shunted the bizarre sight into the back of his mind as he got closer to his goal, because Kate's house was most certainly on fire. The fire wasn't a full blown blaze, but it was enough that the first floor of Kate's house was engulfed by a blistering heat that Christopher felt even from a distance.

At this point, he would have expected a meltdown, but he couldn't afford one at this juncture. The efforts of Lancet Falls' fire department were woefully ineffectual. Lancet Falls had not experienced a fire like this in its entire history. When he and Kate had Gracie, he'd studied any natural disaster that could befall their family, and residential fire had been nowhere on the list.

He hadn't been able to prepare them.

Christopher did not have any control of the phenomenon that occurred in times of stress like the police cruiser or the Jessica Kinghorn incident. It seemed to trigger in times of desperate need. He felt like rushing into a burning building qualified. Regardless, he would do what was necessary even if it resulted in his physical harm. Christopher was sure of one thing, he did not want to live in a world that was absent of Gracie's smile.

The men wearing flame retardant suits the murky yellow of an iron tetrachloro complex were holding a hose spewing high pressure water at the fire. The only thing the water seemed to be doing was keeping the fire from spreading any further. It did nothing to diminish the flames that currently existed. The foundations of the house creaked and groaned in symphony with the roaring and crackling of the fire. At this rate, the house would fall in on itself, and if Gracie hadn't already perished, she would in the ensuing collapse.

Christopher professed not to know how long a human being could survive in these conditions, but he knew that fires consumed oxygen in order to propagate themselves at a steady rate. He also knew if there was a high smoke density, it would choke block the respiration of alveoli of Gracie and Kate even if they were spared the flames.

"How many of your people are inside, and how many survivors have been retrieved and rushed to the hospital?" Christopher asked.

"None, we're understaffed. It's all we can do to keep this fucker from taking over the whole town let alone being able to send any men in," a woman said, her voice muffled by her mask.

"What are the chances of survival for the residents inside?"

"Anyone on the main floor is DOA, but someone on the top floor could have a chance if the temperatures there are under 200, but if I were a betting gal. I'd say none of em' got a snowball's chance in Hell in there, pardon my French. But I'm just talking out of my ass here. I ain't ever seen a fire like this before. Even before we got here, it hadn't done much spreading. It looks like a steady blaze there in the middle, but it doesn't have much interest in spreading. It's like there's a source in the middle that's maintaining itself without any accelerant."

At another time, Christopher would have been consumed with academic curiosity, but tonight he had to catalogue it with the other unexplainable phenomena of the day.

"I can help," Christopher said.

He saw the woman raise a dark eyebrow that had been drawn on by makeup.

"You ain't certified. I can't be held responsible for the death of a civie," the woman said.

Christopher abhorred lying, but the situation demanded quick and decisive action, "I obtained my CPR and fire certification in Boise, Idaho with the intent to work for the Bureau of Land Management, but my wife and I relocated here on account of a family illness."

She stared at him for a long time, valuable time that shouldn't be wasted, but Christopher knew if he attempted this feat without the proper protection he would suffer first degree burns in his respiratory tract in a matter of moments.

The woman nodded and said, "Get this guy suited up and make it fast!"

Christopher didn't like the how heavy the suit felt on his body, or how constricting the mask felt on his face. In normal circumstances, he would have been paranoid that the mask would suffocate him, or that oxygen deprivation would irreparably damage his brain, but those fates paled in comparison to what Gracie must be experiencing.

"You hold the hose here, Stotts and are gonna mount a rescue operation."

Christopher was no longer at the woman's side. The second his outfit had been put on, he'd dashed the length of the lawn, and shouldered open the front door.

The fragile wood collapsed against the force of his body. The house groaned in protest, and the archway above his head splintered, a crack splitting it down the middle, but the house held. Christopher sprinted up the steps to Gracie's room. He still counted them as he went; the prime numbers gave him an inexplicable amount of comfort.

Christopher heard a sound he construed as coughing, but it was hard to hear anything over the din of the flames. Smoke hung thick in the air, and Christopher hoped beyond hope that Gracie had the instinct to cover her mouth to shield her from the worst of the fumes, preferably a comforter. The thick fabric would block all but the most tenacious smoke particles.

The upstairs was in worse condition than Christopher had anticipated. Each of Christopher's footsteps was followed by a depression in the carpet. The floor could give way at any moment, plunging him into the inferno below.

The heat on his face was blistering, and Christopher could imagine the heat rupturing his tympanic membrane in his ear canal. He ignored thinking about all the things that could be breaking down in the intense temperatures. He'd passed the point of no return.

The pressure inside of him that he felt when he emitted the violet wave of light was absent, but so far he hadn't needed it. Bypassing the living room where the blaze raged the greatest had been the most prudent choice.

Wanting to minimize the structural damage he would cause, Christopher kicked the door in an effort to dislocate it from its housing, so the door would open with minimal impact on the overall foundation of the home. The door burst open like cheap plywood, and Christopher plunged inside.

A section of floor crumpled behind him, but the rest of the second floor held on. A lump was underneath the comforter with planets and rockets that Gracie had insisted he buy. She'd always showed a keen interest in science. Christopher crossed the room, throwing caution to the wind. The house screeched in answer, another section collapsing somewhere Christopher couldn't see, but it sounded like it came from the direction he'd just come.

Probing with his hands, Christopher felt something solid underneath the comforter. It flinched in response to his touch. He wanted to tell her that everything was going to be alright, but the mask and the fire would've muffled the attempt. Instead, he scooped his daughter into his arms.

Christopher's actions were having increasingly deleterious effects on the house, and he didn't like the betting on the probability of being to able to jump back the way he'd come over a hole in the ground. His landing would destabilize the floor and cause of a cascade of collapses that he would be powerless to stop.

One course of action remained viable and it would come with a risk to his person if he was to keep Gracie safe.

With his free hand, he unlatched Gracie's bedroom window. He could feel the heated plastic through his gloves. Christopher lashed out with a foot at the screen. His foot tore through the screen on his first attempt, but the second attempt he placed his blow at the bottom. The tumbled to the ground below, and Christopher was soon to follow.

The physics of this situation were not in his favor, but he jumped anyways. At two stories high, he had a chance to escape severe damage, but that did little to ease his misgivings. Christopher twisted in midair so that his back was parallel with the grass below. It was a small blessing Kate's mother had neglected to mow the lawn; the grass may do a little bit to cushion the blow to his spinal cord. He closed his eyes and the ground rushed to meet him an instant later.

Breath whooshed out of his body, and Christopher gasped for oxygen that he could not acquire fast enough. He threw off the mask, and gulped in heat-blasted air, but at that moment he didn't care. Pain had flared in his back, but he hadn't heard anything crack. Christopher tried to wiggle his toes, and thought they'd responded, but it was hard to tell through his sneakers. He'd heard firsthand accounts of individuals that thought they'd still retained function in their limbs even after their paralysis.

His arms seemed to be in working order as he lifted the comforter from his daughter's face. Gracie's face looking peaceful with her eyes closed, and Christopher gave her a kiss on her forehead and two cheeks. Burns had spared her face, and Christopher smiled.

The action was accompanied by a searing pain. The skin that had been exposed to the heat felt like it split from the strain of his smile. From the feel, Christopher had suffered two degrees burns that had shriveled and burned away some of the skin on his face, but the fact he could feel it still was a good sign. The fire had not burned away his nerve endings.

Christopher tore off his gloves and placed his index and middle finger against the skin under Gracie's chin. Her carotid artery beat at a pace that bordered on tachycardia, but it didn't appear to be irregular. He breathed a sigh of relief that drew out a bout of coughing.

He tried to pull himself to his feet and movement of his legs sent seething waves of pain that radiated from his back to his legs. Christopher had retained function in his legs, but still suffered a spinal injury more than likely a slipped disc. After the events of this evening, he would need to seek out a physician and explore the extent of the damage, but not now.

Christopher thought he heard agonized sobbing piercing the roar of the fire. Gracie's safety had been secured. He would have to breach his restraining order once again to try and save the occupants of the house. It wasn't entirely selfless. He imagined being a hero would look favorable in the eyes of the courts.

Maybe Kate will forgive me. 

He took one last inhale of fresh air, before putting on his mask and glove again. Still holding Gracie, Christopher carried her to the fire truck, and placed her in the bed.

"Watch her with your life," Christopher said. 

The woman looked at Christopher with wide eyes, but she nodded. At that, Christopher turned to head back into the house. The sharp movement sent another fresh wave of pain down his spine.

Adrenaline should take care of most of the pain until I complete my objective.

Christopher jumped through the open portal into the waiting area. Kate's mother was no longer guarding the living room, but the blast of heat remained with an intensity that made the other seem like a cool breeze in comparison.

The crying was louder now, and Christopher's heart sank when he realized that it was coming from the living room. Would saving them be a mercy or a curse? Even if they did survive, the quality of life of severe burn victims was nonexistent.

When Christopher squinted through his protective eyewear, he banished that notion. He also banished the notion that Kate or her mother survived.

A woman was kneeling in the middle of the living room next to two supine shapes on the floor. They had the rough size and shape of humans, but that's where all similarities ended. Christopher could not identify any distinguishable limbs or facial features that would reveal their identities, but by process of eliminations, he could conclude that the two blackened, brittle shapes were Kate and her mother.

A halo of the purest white light surrounded the crying woman. She appeared to be unharmed and unaffected by the flames roaring around her. She did not notice Christopher in the archway. 

Her sadness consumed her. Based on the layers of coloration of the fire, Christopher could conclude that the fire was emanating from a single source that happened to be where the woman was standing. As strange as it seemed, this woman was the source. Waves of heat distorted the air between them, but Christopher recognized her anyways.

Rachel Durant. Kate's best friend.

Rachel and Kate had became friends long into their adult lives. Ms. Durant and Kate both spent a good majority of their time in the library and became companions based on their common interests. Rachel had never cared for Christopher much. She grew increasingly irritated with him when he asked her about her lupus and her various medications and their interactions.

Christopher contemplated calling out to her, but thought better of it. The last person she would want to talk to in a vulnerable moment was Christopher, and the last person Christopher wanted to talk to was the woman responsible for the death of his wife. He turned to leave, but she called out to him.

"Christopher is that you?"

"You killed them," he muttered under his breath, but she heard him.

"I didn't mean to!" She shrieked with a fresh burst of sobs.

Christopher turned to face her. He noted a temperature increase tied to her outburst.

Maybe I'm not going crazy.

"Last night, there was this violet light, and when I woke up, my body felt like it was on fire. I didn't know who else to turn to, so I went here. The heat in my body, I just wanted to let it go. I tried to hold back the flames, but I needed to let out the heat."

It was hard to hear her through all the crying and crackling of fire, but Christopher understood that her body had underwent a process that had changed her on a physiological level in a way that was previously unprecedented in science.

Except for Mus Magnus.

He didn't know what to say, so he stood there waiting for her to continue. Christopher was not adept in making people feel better, and he wasn't sure that he wanted to make her feel better. Murderers should not get to feel good.

"You should have held it in," he stated, "We all feel pain, it's not fair to let it out on anyone else."

This was very similar to a similar speech Dr. Lewis had given him three months ago.

"You don't understand!" She yelled back, her voice cracking.

"I wish I didn't understand, but I do," he said, "The merciful thing would be for you to end your existence if you cannot live with the pain."

"You mean kill myself?"

"Unless you can think of a better alternative. It is selfish for you to continue like this."

'You're a heartless bastard!"

Christopher felt like the conversation was over, so he left.

The woman firefighter looked at Christopher with a frown, "Jesus! You look like hot shit, we need to get you to the hospital."

"I suggest you get Gracie to a hospital, preferably the one in Twin Falls. Tell them you know me, Christopher Stroud. I still have something else to do tonight."

"Was there anyone else in there?"

"Yes, but it was somebody not worth saving. She started the fire."

"Buttars! Christensen! We've got a live one in there! How close are the other counties?"

They were still shouting orders to each other as Christopher loped off into the distance; his destination, the Nueva Vista Drive-In.