Leva dropped inside the house as flames began to billow out of the walls.  The hallway was full of smoke, the air thick and gray.  In the corner of the destroyed kitchen, Anna was crying, curled into a fetal ball.  Jordan fell onto his back in the middle of the kitchen, blood spilling out over and draining through the bullet holes in the splintered wooden floor. 

            Carol entered and, seeing the extent of Jordan’s injuries, screamed.  A horrible, ghastly sound, she howled in utter panic.  She lunged at her husband, hysterical and knocked Leva aside as she clutched to him.  She screamed his name and tried to pull him close. 

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            Leva made it to the kitchen area at the rear of the house and collapsed.  She fell onto the floor that had been ripped to splinters by gunfire.  Fewer bullets occupied the air in here, but only because so many had already chewed through the walls, floor, and cabinets. 

            Leva set Anna down in the corner, the child awkwardly posed having been picked up mid-panic during a gunshot.  Leva simply laid her on her back and then rose, looking through the windows at the back of the house.  In the backyard, she saw Jordan and Carol looking into the house in utter horror.  But while Carol watched in total confusion and terrified shock, Jordan had a different look on his face. 

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            Leva carried Anna to the door.  The eight-year-old girl was heavy enough but moving through the stopped time made carrying her almost impossible.  Worse, bullets hung in the air like spinning death.  Leva tried to slip herself and the young girl through the open space, but doing so brought her in the path of the bullet.  She barely touched the tiny fragment of metal that hung suspended but doing so connected with an agonizing pain. 

            Leva dropped Anna and grabbed her arm, gasping.  The difficulty breathing when time was stopped seemed to magnify the hurt and her head spun.  Panting grew worse and her vision began to black out.  Leva rolled onto her stomach and started to lose consciousness. 

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            Walking in Slow Time, as Leva had come to call it, wasn’t exactly difficult but there was definitely a unique resistance to it.  It felt not unlike walking through water, only without the buoyancy.  Likewise, breathing wasn’t nearly as troubled as when she stopped time, but it was still something that took effort. 

            As she walked into the kitchen at the back of the house, she looked for Anna.  Not seeing her, she down the hall of the narrow house.  The hall itself was barely twice her width and with no lights overhead, the shadows seemed to engulf her. 

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            Navy Lieutenant Sam Ashemore turned the picture towards him.  It sat on the only piece of furniture in the room; a light blue two-drawer bedside table.  A worthless bit of featureless charm before the bombs had fallen, it was little more than an oversized tchotchke.  Now, it was an expression of success and comfort in a world lacking in both of those. 

            The picture was a family photo.  Three generations, it appeared.  Four grandparents, a number of adults, and then a set of children ranging from toddlers to tweens.  The photo had been folded repeatedly.  Some of the creases had even begun to rip entirely.  It was threadbare and faded.  It had survived life after the bombs in back pockets and at the bottom of backpacks.  It was a treasured piece of home, long after home was lost. 

            And Ashemore didn’t know who in that picture he’d killed when he’d taken over the house. 

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