Gone

When I heard the gunshot, I knew it was over. I could almost imagine the smell of the smoke escaping the barrel, tingling in my nose. Listening to the conversation had been gut-wrenching. There was nothing I could do, nothing at all, except listen and wait. Tearing the headset away from my head I was up on my feet and running before I knew what I was doing. I was probably one of the first to know the extent of the situation, to know exactly what happened. In short, people got hurt, people died, but in the worst way possible we won. If you can even call what happened ‘winning’, the mission was still a success; the threat was eliminated. In even simpler terms: three people entered that room alive, and now, there was only one still breathing.

I had to step over bodies and weave past the stray officer or paramedic to reach the end of the corridor, but even once I reached a junction I didn’t need telling where to go, all I had to do was follow the screaming.

When I reached the door, flung from its hinges, it revealed a room in ruins. Flames, sparks, blood. I could hear footsteps behind me, pulling at my attention but it wasn’t strong enough to drag my eyes away from the scene in front of me: a body lay sprawled across the floor, bullet hole in his forehead, and mere feet away from, that the legs of another body began, laid in a pool of blood. A trembling figure was knelt beside the second body, arms wrapped desperately around them, rocking ever so slightly. The figure had their back to me and the bodies face was obscured but I already knew what had happened; before my headset had clattered to the floor, before my feet had spurred into action. The gathering crowd behind me knew as well.

Turning to face the people behind me, I barely kept myself from flinching as another agonised scream erupts from inside the room. The officer closest to me makes a start forward, but I raise a hand to his chest, shaking my head. The paramedic stood at his heel meets my eye for a moment.

“Don’t.” My voice wavers slightly, but I don’t remove my hand from his chest, “Just don’t.”