Awakening on a blood-soaked pentagram with a skull and thorns drawn out of it, Theo's eyes fluttered open to a nightmarish sight. The bodies of other children lay sprawled across the hexagonal platform, their throats slit, eyes frozen in terror. The air stank of iron and rot.
Clutching his head as a sharp pain throbbed through his skull, his vision spun wildly. He staggered, breaths shallow, heart pounding in his chest. The world slowly steadied as the pain ebbed, but the horror around him only sharpened.
He stumbled back, trembling, his feet slipping in the sticky pool of blood. It wasn't the first time he'd seen death,life in the slums had hardened him,but never like this. The sheer concentration of death paralyzed him with dread.
His skin turned clammy, sweat drenching his clothes as his face drained of color. A surge of panic tore through him. He spun on his heel and bolted toward the wooden bridge connecting the platform to the tunnel beyond.
"What… What is this?!" His mind screamed as he shot a glance over his shoulder, the bloody platform burned into his memory. He stumbled into the short stone tunnel leading to a narrow staircase, his ragged breaths echoing in the gloom.
"Where… where am I?" Theo whispered to himself, clutching the rough wall as he climbed the steps.
But unease gnawed at him, bile rising in his throat. Why was he the only one left alive? Why him? "That's why they kidnapped kids? Even… me?"
His eyes darted back to the platform below. The intricate, blood-soaked drawing on the floor sent a chill down his spine. "What is that… that symbol?"
His thoughts tangled as his shaking hand reached for the door handle. Without thinking, he shoved it open. The wooden door groaned, its rusted hinges screeching like metal tearing against metal.
A wave of thick, acrid smoke billowed into the tunnel, stinging his eyes and filling his lungs. He doubled over, coughing violently, pulling his tattered sleeve over his mouth. Squinting against the haze, Theo pushed forward into the dim room beyond.
The room was bare and suffocating: a table, two chairs facing each other, wooden walls and floor, and a narrow staircase leading up to a hatch above. He didn't linger.
Scrambling up the stairs, he shoved the wooden cover open. Cool night air rushed in, mingling with the choking smoke as he hauled himself out.
But the relief was short-lived.
The world outside was aflame.
Theo froze, blinking against the sting in his eyes. Heat slammed into him like a solid wall. His skin burned, and for a heartbeat he didn't understand why.
Then he saw it.
The slums,every ramshackle building, every crooked alley,were ablaze. Towers of fire roared into the sky. Bodies lay strewn across the ground, some slashed in half, others piled like firewood and set alight.
The stench of burning flesh clawed at his throat. He gagged, his stomach twisting.
In the flickering inferno, he caught glimpses of faces,mangled, charred, but still recognizable. Faces of people he'd seen huddling in the alleys, fellow homeless children, men and women who had shared scraps of bread with him.
"What…?"
The word slipped from his lips, small and broken.
Confusion churned with terror. The world had turned into a nightmare, and there was no waking from it.