Neko sobbed into Kali's shoulders, and Kali only stared stunned, letting her.

He'd killed someone.

It was more than his mind could take, and after the adrenaline and tension left his muscles, he sorely wilted, leaning back and laying down on the floor as Neko huddled beside him. He rolled around to face her, needing to see her grief to prove just how terrible of a person he was; but she was not frowning as she cried. She was smiling, laughing even, tears rolling down her raised, flushed cheeks. Kali thought for certain she had gone crazy or was having an adverse reaction to the situation;

She pulled him in and hugged him tighter, "Thank you. Thank you. Thank you."

"What... did he do to you?"

"Everything." She sobbed, "He did everything to me. It's over at last. I tried... so hard to get help... Nobody ever listened. But you helped. You fixed everything. It's all over now."

He had no idea what to say, and ended up very stiffly patting her back, and, in an awkward monotone voice, "There, there." After a moment, the two felt relaxed enough to stand, helping one another to their feet. With no words, merely a thick, burdening silence, and through the stench of blood, the two gathered several plastic bags and filled them with supplies, then tenderly stepped over the man's body and carefully walked down the slick road, arms outstretched for balance and slow, short steps. They maneuvered around the vehicle and across the blindingly white, icy road.

As they walked, teeth chattering, Kali hesitantly asked, "Why hadn't you gotten help?"

"I had tried, believe me."

"I could have helped."

Neko scoffed, "What could you have done?"

He shrugged, "My parents are good, strong people. They could have acted."

"You don't understand. I've been trapped."

"I may not understand, but Brian will."

She looked up at him with glassy, bright eyes, where snow reflected, "Brian?"

"He's in a similar position."

"But you haven't helped him?"

"Nothing illegal has occured."

"So he says." Her words rang in his ears, and he faced forward with a saddening determination and dread. Kali pressed on silently with wide eyes clouded with emotion.

They eventually reached the school's doors, upon which they knocked heavily, and Brian quickly opened them with a concerned expression, "I thought you'd never return! That took forever! Way too long! Never leave me here by myself again!"

Kali allowed himself a short laugh, but Neko only seemed bothered. Brian helped them both carry their plastic yellow bags of supplies upstairs and into the familiar classroom, which they had all decided without a word would be their 'base' for their stay at the school. There, Kali let out a tense breath that had been held for way too long, and he slunk to the cold floor with his back against a cement wall. Neko followed suit on the opposite wall, and they eyed each other warily, clearly exhausted and low.

Sensing the tension, Brian glanced at both of them and, "Uhh... What's up?" Kali only sighed heavily, and Brian instinctively sat down beside him, eyeing him curiously and with worry. He glanced at Kali, eyeing him up and down, and then stopped when nearing his hands and arms, where streaks of congealed blood sat. "Kali," Brian said lowly, "What happened?"

"Leave us alone!" Neko called, brimming with trembling, overwhelming rage.

"Yo, I was just trying to comfort you guys. Clearly something bad happened. I just want to be here for you..." Kali gently sighed again and leaned his head gently on Brian's shoulder. Brian stiffened, red-faced, but then relaxed and leaned into Kali as well. They took comfort in one another's relaxed, trusting warmth, even despite the diagreements and confusion and immaturity. In spite of the circumstances and trauma and cold, there was a certain delicate intimacy among the three that had slowly begun to turn into warmth and trust; Neko proved this in a single moment of innocent purity, letting the anger slip away, as she stood with a heave and sarcastically, begdrudgingly sauntered over to the boys, where she sat close beside and huddled, basking in the newly found emotion and an unfamilair sense of dazzling security. It was a moment basked in the warmth against the cold, and, with the air of importance and fear, Kali wondered how long they could survive. He leaned over and reached out an arm for a few of the plastic bags closest to him, of which he pulled towards himself. The boy pulled a blanket from one, which he used to cover all three of them, Neko on his left and Brian on his right by the door. The white outside burned through the window and stared at Kali tauntingly. Kali huddled in the blanket as he dug through another plastic bag, finding bags of chips and a few canned goods. Brian took one with a thanks, and Neko took the other, expressionless. Then, a doubting silence.

Brian, "What are you guys waiting for? Gonna say grace? I haven't eaten in what feels like months!" He ripped open the lid to the can with a sharp, echoing rib, the gross sound of thin metal sliding against thin metal. He tossed the lid aside and drank the soup as if it was, in, fact, a drink. Kali and Neko followed suit with a similiar desperate aggression; stomachs unsatisfied, they all went for another and then another, and then bottled water to wash it down; the water was icy cold and momentary piercing headaches soon followed. The three gathered a few more blankets to layer on the floor and on themselves, huddling together beneath the tender fabrics. It was oddly cosy; the four of them close, sharing body heat, the heat of which was trapped by layers all around them. Kali and Neko relaxed gently, and yet, Kali's mind get him exhausted, replaying the earlier events. The blood on his hands was still there. He wondered if it would ever wash off. He felt the overwhelming urge to scrub his hands clean, but he knew the room grew colder with every passing minute, and to leave the group would present a risk of hypothermia or frostbite. His and Neko's travel outside had been risky, even without the dangerous man involved.

Brian was asleep within minutes, and Neko was, too. Kali wasn't sure of exactly how she was able to sleep after what they had seen, but he came to decide that perhaps she had seen worse, and that thought kept him reeling. He stayed wide-eyed and awake, staring achingly at the ceiling, trembling slightly with a tight grip on the blanket over him. The events played on repeat in his head; how had this gotten so out of control? He just wanted things to go back to normal. He wanted everything to be normal again. He pressed his eyes closed, but again, no sleep came, and Kali's head only pounded.

This snow storm changed all three of their lives forever, and it had only been a few days.

He sighed, finally deciding to stand up, to which the cold, stagnant air immediately pierced through his clothes and into his skin, sending electric trails down his spine. He shivered and crossed his arms to hold in any ounce of warmth, and then walked slowly over to the window. He eyed the small red, torn-up vehicle that still sat quietly on the icy road, and he raised an eyebrow in consideration. Kali shifted his feet, looking back at his friends that had fallen asleep with ease. Neko's visible face was calm in a manner he hadn't recognised before. She seemed to be at peace. Brian's expression mirrored hers. They were both at ease, both contented despite the situation.

Kali was not contented. In fact, he was disgruntled he was so discontented. Frustrated and determined, he turned back to look at the car, resting temptingly on a blindingly white, reflective surface. Neko had said the car was all-wheel drive. Kali gave one last sparing look to his friends, and then left the room.

He was not an innocent person. He would have to do this on his own. He could never let Brian see the bloodied man, nor let Neko near her oppressor again.

The messy-haired boy made his way down the icy staircase and then out the main glass doors to the school. He was aware he may not be able to get back inside. The vehicle sat perfectly still, the snow dazzling around it with the bright sun reflecting off the metallic red surface of it, and then bouncing off of the white in a brilliant spectacle. Kali held his breath unknowingly as he tread from the front of the school doors to the vehicle, careful so as not to fall. A soft snow was falling at the moment, and the sun peaked through dark, rolling clouds, which would surely bring more freezing rain soon. He had very little time to accomplish his goal if he wanted to beat the rain and ice. His feet shifted through the thick snow, and he slowly but surely made his way towards the all-too-familiar convienence store. The front doors were shattered, glass shards covering the icy pavement, dusted by fresh falling snowflakes like powdered sugar. The glass pieces reflected the sun's white rays beautifully and in multiple locations, refracting light and casting light spots and triangles on the ground beneath them. Kali took a deep breath, tensing his muscles in preparation, stepping forward with fear and caution. The air was cold but dense and smelled sickly of human blood.

On the floor, he saw the familiar man. Then, he began his search. It took all of his willpower to not vomit at the sight of the dead man, of the blood that had congealed and coolled on the floor. Actually, he did throw up, right outside the broken doors of the square building. Kali wiped his mouth, determined and ill, then repeated his tender, guilty steps forward which had been retraced. He crouched, careful for his knees to not touch the dried, thick scarlet, and then his hands slowly came close to the man. From here, his hands and arms extended, and he could see them clearly, and it was visible just how terribly and violently they were shaking. He had blood on these hands, now. These thin, pale, trembling hands. The tears began to pour. He began to melt, his body finding limpness and his head finding said hands, hanging in them, gentle, broken sobs escaping his throat. His hands were red-stained from the day's earlier events. How had it only been a day? The aching moment had stretched for what felt like years. Terrible, terrible years. His breaths were short and fast-paced.

He choked, and calmed, breathing deeply, forcing himself to focus, forcing his blurred, teary vision to straighten and tune in. He took one more shaky breath, shuddering, and then stared at the large dead man once again. How had he done this?

No, no. Push those thoughts away.

Kali's trembling hands painfully, slowly reached out once again, hovering in the freezing air above the cold body. Then, they ever so slowly lowered, inch by inch, until his fingers brushed against the body's stiff clothes. The hands paused there, half hovering, sustained in mid-air, and half leaning against the dead man's form. Kali found himself gently tugging at the clothes of the man, gently lining his stiff palms across the body in search of something glowing and important. His hands were pink and white with no bits of tan, no bits of warmth. His fingers were thick, stiff, and barely able to move. Yet, he maneuevered them the way a blind man manuevers a vehicle: without precision. Still, they moved nonetheless, they moved hardly and stiffly and coldly. Eventually, digging through cold pockets with a look of absolute, horrendous disgust painted across his exhausted face, Kali found the key. No, really- he was searching for the car keys. They had been too startled, too traumatised to even think about such a thing prior. But now, despite Kali's apparent emotional affliction, he was able to think at least halfway clearly. Some thoughts raced, melted, and fogged in his sore, pounding head, leaking out of him in the form of thick, twinkling tears, or breaking from his body in choking, quiet sobs. He didn't even notice them, instead hyper-fixating upon the freezing, shimmering metal piece in his hands. It was his, but he hadn't earned it.

He never earned anything, except maybe being stuck in this snow, freezing and trapped with blood on his hands. He would agree that he had earned those terrible things. He was deserving of such, Kali would convince himself. I deserve these terrible things, he would affirm repeatedly, unwilling to see the damage that such negative and false affirmations could inflict upon a growing adolescent. He accepted these terrible, coincidental events as karma for his mere existence, as if he somehow was not worth the space he took up, not worth the air he breathed.

He took the jingling keys and slowly stood, his legs aching as he did so. They were numb and cold and sore. He was numb and cold and sore. The whole world seemed numb and cold and sore. Still, he forced himself to move for the sake of his friends. He had to get help for them. Now was his opportunity to somehow redeem himself in their eyes, as if he needed redemption, and as if he wasn't already redeemed to them for anything bad he could ever possibly do.

He paused for a moment, not to consider the fallacy tumbling in his head, but rather to consider that he had unthinkingly internally called Neko a friend. He wondered if this was true, and then decided, in his delirious, pre-hypothermal, emotional state, that it must be. His body had begun to cool to dangerous temperatures, but he kept up and moving, which provided him a bit of saving grace.

One problem. Kali has no idea how to drive.

Well, he would figure it out. Probably.

He was not confident as he stood fully and his feet pointed towards the poorly-maintained vehicle. But he was determined. For himself, for his friends. He was determined. He wondered off-handedly at this point if he should find them, talk to them about this, and bring them with him, but he stiffened in remembering he had not alerted them that he would be leaving, a crucial mistake on his part, and so the doors to the school would be locked with nobody inside awake to open them.

He'd have to do this quickly and return quickly. Before the icy rain began to fall and began to blanket the city in thick, painful ice once again. Then, escape and rescue would be too out of reach. Carefully and hesitantly, as if there was somebody inside preparing to charge him, Kali unlocked the driver's door with the key and then pulled himself into the vehicle. The seat was cold, and his pants were cold, and so the back of his thighs were cold. The steering wheel was cold to his hands' touch. His hands and arms were stiff. The vehicle smelled like pot and alcohol and every seat except for the driver's seat was covered in fast-food trash. He closed the door with a loud thud, a,d propped his seat up and forward as far as it would go using levers on the side of the fabric chair. Now, he could clearly see the ice-covered road, and easily and comfortably reach the pedals. Kali was not totally unfamiliar with cars like this one; he had done a few driving lessons with his parents in their small, similar cars. Following the instructions that they had attentively given him, he checked the rearview mirror next, adjusting it so that he could see. Then he pulled the car out of break, to which it began to slowly roll backwards.

Then, with as much ease and fragility as possible, he slowly tapped a shoe to the gas pedal.

Immediately, the vehicle lurched forward, and Kali was tossed with it, thwacking his forehead on the leather of the steering wheel, giving him an awful pounding migraine. He groaned, his foot on the breaks now, holding the vehicle in place as he tenderly rubbed the sore spot. Apparently, he had forgotten to clip his seatbelt. He did so, kicking himself silently for forgetting such a crucial aspect of driving. Then, he inhaled slowly, his hands trembling slightly, and he moved his foot and put a bit of pressure on the gas pedal. Again, the sensitive vehicle lurched forward, ice and snow crunching beneath the tires. The vehicle was finally beginning to feel warm. Kali felt no less stiff, but he expected to thaw out soon. This time, no halting break was applied, and instead Kali slowly tested out the speed of the vehicle and allowed it to smoothly roll forward at about 10 miles per hour. He upped the speed just slightly, and suddenly was cruising smoothly along the barren, empty boulevard. There were no vehicles, no animals, and no people in sight. He drove carefully, but being a new driver, his eyes didn't know where to look other than the road in front of him. If not for the lack of vehicles, he easily would have crashed, paying no mind to his side mirrors or to the absence behind him. Turning the wheel was also a struggle with such stiff, cold, hard-to-move limbs and appendiges. Still, he could clearly feel the warmth seeping in, hopefully loosening his bones. In fact, he began to sweat, his skin pounding and sending out waves of heat, but he was too focused on driving to take off any layers- which, in turn, saved his life, for he had not thought to turn on any heater inside of the vehicle.

He drove down the familiar road and made about two turns, driving across about 15 miles to his house, which took a little more than an hour, considering the aching pace he drove at and the fragility of the vehicle on ice. He was careful in all aspects, and thus, slow and steady won the race. He dared not try to turn the vehicle on ice to pull into a drive. He parked the car on the side of the road, and then trodded carefully across a pavement walkway to the front door of his beautiful, beautiful home. Arms outstretched, he walked slowly, careful not to fall on the cement. He knocked on the door.

All of the things were flooding in. He was terribly hot, now, aching hot, and began to strip out of his layered clothes right there on the doorstep. He wondered briefly why he was here. Where was he? Then, he remembered. He was shaking intensively, vibrating from every appendage not with cold but with excitement, with hope, with faith. Mostly with absolutely unbearable relief and excitement. This was it. He was saved. There was hope. Now, only to get back to the school to save his friends. Oh, he was exhausted and delirious both.

The door open and blistering heat flooded over him. He even took a step backwards, covering his face as if it was a hot wind. His mom began to cry before he did, and he began not long after.

She sobbed, running forward to hug him tight and pull him into the home, "Oh, Kali! What happened?" She wrapped heavy arms around him, closing the door behind him. He fell into her arms, unable to pull away, and instead he relaxed in her heat. In fact, he relaxed very much so, and collapsed unconscious right then and there.

He awoke on the familiar, soft couch, the smell of nutmeg from a candle reaching him. Their fireplace was running, cackling fire burning wood, smoke fuming from the spout in their roof outside. It smelled nice. He was suddenly warm- weirdly warm. A real, genuine warm he hadn't felt in days. It wasn't a warm caused by hypothermia. It was a real, fireplace warm. He smiled and his dusty eyes began to tear. His face was flushed, peachy and pink with dotted freckles showing a brown instead of a grey. Colour seemed to return and his wide eyes were blue and his round face was pink and his messy hair was brown. He sat up slowly, aching and sore from the recent over-exertion.

"Mom?" He called gently. He heard her footsteps immediately, thumping quietly to his direction, followed by his dad's heavier steps.

She walked over and saw him and smiled with a painful glee, sitting on the floor beside the couch, "You're okay. You're safe. What happened? Where did you go?"

He rubbed his temples, "It's a bit blurry. But we got trapped in the school. I..." He didn't want to say he stole a car from a dude he'd killed, and so instead he just said, "I drove here to get help. My friends are still at the school. We have to help them."

"Brian?"

"And Neko."

"Neko? The one that bullies you?"

"She's helped us survive these past few days," Kali pleaded. "She's my friend now."

His mom shook off her bewilderment, and instead strictly said, "No. You were brittle and cold when you got here yesterday."

"Yesterday?!" Kali jumped to his feet, turning to the nearest window in the livingroom, which was covered by a blanket to prevent heat from escaping.

"You can't go back out there," she said, "You are severely ill. It's..." Her voice cracked, dark hair strands falling from behind her ears to in front of her face as her head lowered and darkened. "It's a miracle you're alive, Kali. Don't throw that away. The police will get to your friends. We can't do anything."

"The freezing rain, did it come?"

"What?"

His voice was loud, angry, dominant for the first time ever. He was fast, "Last night, did the freezing rain come?"

"Yes," she said, "It rained, it froze."

"No, no. I have to get back. I was supposed to rescue them. That's why I drove out here! I didn't know where to go! I wanted to rescue them!" He was standing over her, yelling frantically, waving his hands, tears rolling down his cheeks. His father loomed over him then, a broad, wide figure, heavy-set just as Kali was, but much more intimidating.

"Don't yell at your mother," he said with authority, "She's been stressed out of her mind because of you!"

That single, final word rang in Kali's ears. Because of him. Because of me. He was at fault for all of the terrible things once again. He collapsed, breaking down, his legs unable to hold his weight. He was a failure, suddenly, in all aspects. He fell to his knees.

"Don't do this to us," his mother said, "It's a disaster! We thought you were dead!"

"Did you even try?"

His dad's gruff, heavy voice, "Excuse you?"

"Did you even try to look for me?" Kali shouted. His voice was raised and thin, built on nothing but the high-pitched whine of a child throwing a tantrum.

"How could we?" His dad said, voice slowly raising, "How could we look for you in this weather, and risk our own lives? How dare you say that to us, Kali. You're going to be grounded if you keep this up!"

His mother plead, "Kali, just settle down."

"No," he said.

And his mother's tears waned and shifted to anger at his insubordination, "You do as we say, when we say it," she said sternly, followed by a pathetic sniffle.

"You didn't even search for me."

"We went to the police. We did everything we could!" She said.

His dad followed up, "The police said they were searching."

"And you weren't. Strangers were searching for me, but my parents weren't!"

"Look outside!" His dad was officially yelling, hands balled into fists, anger pouring from him, seeping, "We couldn't go out! Everyone had to stay indoors!"

"You didn't look for me!" Kali repeated, crying profusely, choking on his own sobs, his own spit, his own tears, seeming to drown in them, "You didn't look for me! You didn't look for me!" His once well-constructed argument and pronounced words failed to desperation, to begging, to pleading, to crying. He failed under the weight of it all. He failed, in the end. In the end, he failed. "You didn't even look for me! You didn't even look for me!" He repeated pathetically, crying, howling, with giant, gaping gasps in between phrases. The panic attack set in and exhausted his body quickly, his breathing a thousand miled per hour, his heartbeat racing like a horses' hooves. "You didn't even look for me! For your son! You didn't even try to look for me!" He repeated it as if it was an affirmation. He repeated it as if to instill in his mind and his parents' minds that there was nothing else to exist. Somehow, it didn't hurt enough, and in his breathless hysteria, he began repeatedly, "You don't even care! You don't even care! You don't even care!"

He had always kept his cool. But in that moment, he broke. He was overwhelmed with the power of his emotions, with the way they knocked him off his feet and pummeled the wind out of him and left him choking on his own tears, his own blood. He was desperate. Desperate was the only word to describe him. To describe these emotions. It was a whirlwind, powerful, cold and hot at the same time. Heat flashes, then shivers of cold. Deep inhales in between jutting, "You don't even care! You don't even care!" Pummeling those words so far back into his skull that he would believe them for eternity. He spoke them repeatedly out loud to his oppressors, as if somehow his agony would entice them to grab the words out of his mouth and replace them with better ones. He desperately wanted them to try, but they didn't, and he knew that they wouldn't. He also knew that if they did happen to try, it would make no difference. In his stubbornness, his mind about himself could not be changed.

Although, from a distance, one could recognise how he allowed redemption for villanous Neko, and yet never for himself. No matter how innocent, he was never innocent enough. He was somehow always guilty of one wrongdoing, one mistake, one misstep, even before any of this story took place. He believed he deserved to die for his crimes of being socially awkward and getting occassional B's instead of A's, for not being absolutely perfect in all aspects and 100% loved by every breathing human being on the planet.

He broke down, but his hysteria gradually slowed. He was given space to breathe, and his breathing gradually returned to normal. The loneliness was more present than ever, and his parents still did not see him. They were angry, and he felt their anger and their authority. But at this point, if he could do anything to redeem himself, he would- and so, their authority was ignored out of spite for their betrayal to him. That evening, he laid down in his room, and his parents expected and thought he was asleep. He laid in his familiar bed with an ache for home, with an ache for normal and consistency. But his mission could not be objurned just yet. When his parents let him rest, they closed the door and turned out his lights, and that was when he left, climbing out of one of his windows. It felt like willingly walking into hell, with that burning cold whipping into his face. Sure enough, the ice had since doubled, including a hefty layer atop of the red car.

Kali was determined. But, he was scared. He paused, halfway in and halfway out. His legs had been thrown over the window-seal and into the cold, crisp air, but his head remained inside the warmth and safety of his home.

"What am I doing?" he whispered. "I can't do this. I will never make it. They're better off without me, anyways." But if I don't go, he reasoned silently, then Brian and Neko will think I abandoned them on purpose. And so, he inhaled deeply and stepped completely out through the window, carefully sliding it shut behind him. His feet found ice in the front yard, and he jumped from the short ledge, planting his feet in it, to which he quickly fell and slid across the yard on his butt. He would have laughed about it, had it not been so strangely terrifying. The sun was already beginning to set. Had he really been asleep for that long? He was losing way too much time!

And yet, Kali still seemed to stall.

Was going home really what was best for Brian and Neko? He'd considered all that he knew, all that he had learned. They both, unlike him, faced abusive situations at home. Would they even want to go home, if they didn't have to for a few more days? Even if it was just another week that they could stay away from their abusive homes, shouldn't Kali give them that week? It was a moral dilemma. A part of him also considered that perhaps they'd hate him if he brought them back home. Would they hate him more if he stayed in his cosy home, and didn't try to search for them- if he did exactly to them what his parents did to him?

Kali could not just forget about them. He had to at least let them know that there was an option for them. Or, maybe they could come home with him until the storm was over, where there was heat and food. He wondered, as he slowly walked towards the vehicle, upholding stiff balance, why no vehicles had been seen, why no police officers had driven past the school at a slow pace to search. He wondered why the roads were so empty. The ice posed a threat, but he did not yet understand just how much of a threat it was.

In fact, he was so oblivious to the dangers of thick, heavy ice, that he got back into the stolen vehicle and confidently drove it down the slick road, in which his tires held no grip. Since the powerlines had been all but destroyed, power outages were prevalent in the area, putting thousands of people within the city at high risk for hypothermia and frostbite without any means of heating their all-electric homes. Only a few people had working wood or gas stoves, and even fewer had working generators. After just a few days, many could be found dead in their homes. Kali didn't think about the morbidity of the mortality rates from such a severe disaster event. He only thought about what he had to do next. And, in turn, he definitely was not thinking about the rescue efforts that were going about as the storm upped its game. He had yet to see a vehicle on the ice-covered road that wasn't empty and unfunctional, and so, he did not remain wary of them.

This would be a mistake.

He was driving with eyes on the prize, heading towards Infidelity High. No doubt, his parents were on his tail, running out the front door of their home and shouting incessantly and worriedly as soon as they saw that vehicle's headlights turn on. But Kali would stop for no-one, and his parents would not chase him in their own car; no, they would sadly return to their home and cry, perhaps in worry or frustration, and simply hope for Kali's safe return.

Kali was frustrated and angered at their behaviour. How could they not have looked for him?

Unwarily, his foot pressed harder against the gas pedal, and the car moved faster ahead. There were lights ahead. Kali was angry. His fists were tight on the steering wheel, knuckles white and face flushed, eyes watery and brows furrowed. He was angry like never before, and he was reckless. The lights ahead were dimmed by fog and hardly visible in the odd evening light, the sun setting and the sky, being cloudy, turning dim and pale. Blue eyes found the lights ahead, confused and rather delirious in the cold and angst. What are they?

A large vehicle was in the road, a long ladder up to a still-intact powerline and a person sitting in the metal white cup on the end, using a small pickaxe to chip away at the powerful ice accumulation on the electrical line in hopes of preserving it and ridding it of the weight. There was plenty of room for Kali to drive past. The white and blue truck was large, similar to a firetruck, and with dazzling, flashing lights on top, too. Despite its size, it was pulled over, and Kali could easily manuever around. He turned the wheel gently, forgetting at which the much-too-fast speed he seemed to be going. At the gentle turn of the wheel, the front and back wheels of the vehicle followed, and the car began to drift against his will.

It slid with a loud, ear-hurting screech. It slide across the concrete road, now thick with tall, smooth, slippery ice, the tires doing nothing to connect to the road. Kali panicked and made the poor decision to slam on the brakes, in which the vehicle began to spin out violently and much worse than before. He was pinned back to his seat with the force, screaming and crying for no ears to hear- well, except for the electric company worker, who turned and looked with wide, scared eyes as the small red vehicle spun loudly and bowled straight in his direction. Ice and rain and snow flicked off of it and off of the road in a small, misty, icy hurricane. The colour of the car was faded and muted beneath the density of the spiraling precipitation. It was out of control, and in only a few seconds, had spun down the entire road and pummeled right into the large electric-company vehicle.

Kali could hear the glass on all sides of him shatter and shower him. The sides of the car crumpled inwards and the screeching of metal on metal was hear. His head stung, and he was sure he'd hit it on the wheel. The air bag inflated with a poof, smothering him.

It had happened extremely fast and in a blur.