𝐏𝐑𝐎𝐋𝐎𝐆𝐔𝐄 — shattered

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 𝐄𝐌𝐈𝐋𝐈𝐀 𝐂𝐋𝐄𝐌𝐄𝐍𝐓𝐄 still couldn't quite understand how she got out of the explosion alive. Bruce, all big, green and protruding with muscles and rage... Well, his escape hadn't been a shock to anyone; but a woman with no muscle on her bones, and no mutation to help her... Everyone was left bewildered to find her soot free form amongst the rubble and ash that once resembled the lab.

 There were things that happened after the explosion, things that Emilia couldn't explain. Things around her seemed to break and shatter like the most fragile of things.

 She could recall being alone as she worked on whatever Bruce had left for her, the lights had been dim, a light breeze from the fan jostling her hair before she shrieked and almost fell from her stool as the sound of shattering glass erupted from behind her.

 Glass from a beaker laid on the tiles of the laboratory, shattered into a thousand pieces. It had been neatly tucked away on its shelf with the other dozen clean beakers, a layer of dust had grown on the glass for she and Bruce only ever picked the ones at the very centre of the shelf... so how it had fallen from its place after months of going unused was an utter mystery.

 There were other things too, pencils rolling to the floor and clattering beside her foot upon times that Emilia had been engrossed in her writing. Times where the droplets from the sink flowed faster than usual. Little things that caused Emilia to pause with furrowed brows, but ultimately ignore.

 Just as she did with that... feeling in the pit of her stomach before each little event.

 Nonetheless, despite the little things that caused the brilliant woman to jerk and shriek, she continued on. Her job, the thing she had devoted herself to was helping Bruce; he wished for nothing more than to rid himself of the green beast that threatened to overtake his body the second his heartbeat thudded a little faster than usual.

 This, however, hadn't deterred Emilia from publishing her books, not at all. She had published two in the time between finishing her education, and working alongside Bruce; The Basics of Particle Physics, and The History of Us: Our Genetic Ancestry.

 Royalties filled her bank account, as did the funding from the project she and Bruce had been working on; she was comfortable, more than comfortable.

 From publishing to lecturing, to working in the dimly lit lab from dusk until dawn... Emilia was happy; this was what she wanted. To learn and to teach, and to help her parents live happy and comfortable lives.

 She couldn't have prepared for the second explosion that occurred just eight months after the first.

 It had been raining, Emilia remembered that much, she'd been wearing joggers and a sweatshirt, her hair pulled into what resembled a nest upon her head.

 She'd been in her lab, the one she and Bruce shared inside the bustling building. She could remember passing other people on her way, smiling to some, nodding to others.

 She'd taken her seat after donning her white coat and goggles, ready to begin her day as droplets of heavy raid pounded against the window in a symphony of soothing sounds.

 It smelt like chemicals, as ever, her book was on page four hundred and twenty-two, her pencil needed sharpening.

 The tiniest details were ingrained in her mind.

 An hour passed, and then another and another. Lines upon lines of words, facts and equations were written in almost unintelligible writing, the pages of her books had been flipped and the information printed upon the tea-stained pages were seared into her head.

 And then, whilst the rain outside continued to patter against the window and part the grey clouds high in the sky, in the very midst of her frustration upon finding a roadblock in her work, a switch flipped.

 She missed it. With hands clawing at her hair and with eyes squeezed shut in annoyance and irritation, she missed it as the switch that controlled the gas turned on.

 And as a huff slipped from her dry lips, the lightbulb shattered, leaving glass to trickle from the ceiling and land upon the white tiles of the lab.

 Emilia had rolled her eyes and slid from her seat, ready to find the dustpan to sweep it up.

 Once the glass had been thrown into the bin and she had wiped her hands upon her stained lab coat, her eyes widened.

 The smell of gas permeated her senses and before she could even take a single hastened step, the light switch that rested just beside the window to the room flipped.

 The smell of gas and smoke surrounded her; red, amber and yellow filled her sight, obscuring the people that had been walking to and from different rooms opposite the windows.

 It was futile, to think she'd escape, it was nonsensical to throw her hands up as though they'd protect her from the flames that were sure to take out the top floor of the building.

 Heat licked at the skin of her face, her cheeks turning rosy as they grew closer and closer until...

 She had opened her eyes, bewildered that blistering heat had yet to swallow her whole. There, before her very eyes, was a wall of flames that refused to touch her, as though she were the danger.

 Her heart had thudded so violently that she'd been certain it'd burst from the bones that caged it.

 Emilia had absolutely no idea what the hell had happened but what she did know was that she never wanted to hear those screams ever again.

 The screams of the people that had once bustled around the building with wide eyes that thirsted for knowledge, the very people who smiled and nodded her way before going off to develop medicines and technology that would help make the world a better place.

 Their screams were seared into her skin like a branding, the fire hadn't scorched her, but those cries cut her far deeper than the flames ever could have.

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 It had been months since the second explosion and the nightmares that consisted of nothing but amber flames and sickening screams plagued Emilia every night.

 Those around her could tell; surviving two explosions couldn't have been light on the heart nor soul. Bruce, ever the gentle giant, did his best to console the panic attacks that would sporadically occur, he did what he could to reassure Emilia that it was not her fault... But was that right?

 What happened that day was beyond lucky. It was a miracle that she survived. The only questions that had been on her mind were: 'why did I survive?' 'Why me?'

 Because despite the blissful ignorance Emilia wished she could hide within... she knew something was wrong with her. The beakers breaking and the pencils rolling away, those tiny things could be brushed aside; but now?

 Surviving one explosion, only to witness the makings of another and escape from its fiery grasp was not a miracle. Not just because of the nightmares, or the panic attacks and nights filled with shaking breaths and endless tears whilst screams rattled inside her mind.

 That wasn't a miracle, it was something more.

 Emilia, poor broken Emilia had truly believed her unlucky streak had ended. She thought that she could finally begin to recover from everything that weighed her shoulders down... she was so very wrong.

 The day had begun with sunlight streaming into her window, brushing her skin like a spotlight to wake her.

 Her third book was to be released, and it was the day she would finally tell her parents, her loving parents that she was gifting them a new home. She couldn't wait to see the smiles stretching at their lips when they finally realised they no longer had to struggle.

 Her father wouldn't have to work, her mother could rest her aching bones that grew ever brittle with each passing year; they were an older couple, opting to only bring Emilia into the world when they had been certain they could truly care for her.

 You could never meet kinder people. The Clemente family opened their doors for strangers who had no shelter, for people who had empty stomachs and weary souls. They gave every penny they saved to those less fortunate than themselves; and it was finally time for Emilia, on behalf of both herself and the strangers her parents had cared for, to give back, to thank them.

 Work had passed swiftly, and though she never spoke it aloud, she could see the grin upon Bruce's face... one that matched her own; it seemed that her mood was infatuating, and it spread to anybody who was met with the sight of stretched lips and high rosy cheeks.

 The reveal hadn't gone as planned.

 Maria Clemente had shaken her head at her daughter's gift, curses of both Spanish and English flying from her lips as the mother and daughter argued and argued.

 Maria Clemente was content with her life and her home but Emilia simply wished to show her parents the kindness that they so often spread.

 She wanted to give back, she needed to.

 Emilia's face grew ever redder as her mother continued on, refusing the gift with the very same stubbornness that had passed on to Emilia.

 Behind Maria upon the stove, bubbled away the vegetable stew that had been cooking for a majority of the day; a large steel pot ready for the entire neighbourhood to dip into. The flame beneath it danced and flickered, growing bigger and bigger with every shout that spewed from the Clemente family.

 None of them had been paying attention when the dial upon the stove slowly twisted, the arrow pointing to a growing flame.

 It was like everything had slowed, that time had stopped when the flame on the stovetop crawled through the air like a beast and wrapped its form around Maria.

 No noise fell from Emilia's lips, her body, though warming with each flicker of the growing flames stayed frozen in place.

 Ringing filled her senses. She could see her father yelling for her to move whilst his hand reached out to push her away but she simply stumbled and heaved for breath.

 Her nightmares, the ones filled with heat, gas and screams had come to life once again, and she couldn't do a damn thing.

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 She could remember everything. From the neighbours storming into the house, to the cold grasp that clamped around her wrist. She had been dragged outside, her shoes scuffing against the wooden flooring of the decking, her body had been nothing more than a rag-doll.

 The smell of smoke had seeped into her clothes, she could smell it with the tiniest breath.

 Only when the sound of sirens permeated the nighttime air did Emilia finally snap from her petrified gaze. The noise of the night and the sight of a burning home finally reached her and she had jolted forward.

 Emilia had screamed for her parents, she screamed so loud that noise mingled with the sirens and the two were almost impossible to tell apart. Her cheeks had grown wet, tears streaming down them and pushing their way through the soot that marred her skin.

 When the news of her parent's demise reached her ears... she couldn't breathe. It happened again, she knew she had done something to cause that explosion all those months ago, she'd just been too scared to admit it, to question it; and now her parents were dead.

 So much blood was on her hands, blood on the hands that had been used to teach, to heal and to save; now she was nothing but... She was nothing but a murderer.

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 The days... The weeks and the few months that followed were empty.

 Emilia was empty.

 Mindless wandering around the world, distancing herself from the place she tainted. Motels and hotels, eating alone and screaming with each breeze that spurred on the sea.

 There wasn't a time her cheeks were dry, there wasn't a time where salt couldn't be tasted on her tongue. It was as though her eyes were permanently red, tinged with sadness and utter shame. Her throat, no matter how much tea, lemon and honey she drank, was raw and painful from the sobbing that was hushed by an unfamiliar pillowcase.

 Broken wasn't the word to describe her, shattered. Emilia was shattered into a thousand tiny little pieces; pieces that were hidden and missing; she'd never be whole again.

 There were whispers on her travels. Whispers of a place that opened its door to the broken and kept them tucked away until they were whole once again... the Kamar-Taj.

 Three separate times she'd heard that name and the smiles that had spouted it... It was her last resort... Her only resort. If they couldn't fix her, then perhaps it'd be time to say goodbye to what little she had left.

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28-04-21