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Cara is thrown around like a rag doll. Limbs flailing in the waters uncaring control. No air or room to breathe, or a lull for her to think. She couldn’t open her eyes for fear they'd be slashed out. The wave had caught her as she ran and thrown her from her feet and into its flow. She wonders what thrashing waters would send her into: concrete? a lamppost? a ummoored car?
Her body hurtles through what must be a street, though it’s all the same with your eyes closed and your head underwater. She had not been the only thing swept up. Though she’s weathering it worse than the objects all around her. Discomfort morphs into pain as the seconds underwater tick by. How long has it been?
Her heart beats like it’s going to burst and join the killer water. The debris feels like bullets whipping past. Something jams her side like a spike- maybe a broken bikelock or a loose wire. Then a ricochet off her hip- a box or a brick? It’s game-like; figuring out what had been upended and swept away. Their collision courses intercept with hers as they hurtle through flooded streets.
The barrage is endless and on all sides. Which way is up? Without the aid of her eyes, she couldn't say for sure.
She can feel the pressure in her head now- like her skull’s inflating. Like something is being ground against the back of her brow bone in an attempt to drill its way out.
The unfairness. The horrible, insurmountable Injustice of it. Drowning in a wave of people drowning. For anyone to brave this at all. Though we did it ourselves. Living on the coast, you think we'd learn a thing or two about–
She has to open her eyes. Curling up won't save her. There was no hiding from the wave, and what if they did get slashed out? What if some glass, wire, brick, or bone came whizzing past her in the tumble? Smacked into her face and tore the eyes from her skull?
Better an eyeless corpse than a complacent one.
Something in her hind brain screams against her opening eyelids. Slowly, painfully, black-red is replaced by the brown-grey of the water.
The flood rushes endlessly. It's no clear lake or mirror. Murky with dirt from all over, shop floors and paved streets. Asphalt and the sea floor.
The dirt and saltwater burn her eyes as she fights to keep them open. But finally, she can see what she was surrounded by. A bike, a desk, a novel, a suitcase. T-shirts and socks– a lone shoe. A school bag and a phone banging against a box of beers. An underwater world revealed in clouded clarity. Awe-inspiring, if Cara could think past the explosion of pain in her head, chest and throat. She cast her eyes around.
Light! Somewhere above her there must be a sky. A surface to be broken. Cara tried to swim. Horrible short movements; she tries to drag an uncooperative hip joint and useless arms into step with one another.
There was very little efficiency to her movements. It felt impossible to get her banged-up body to move all at once. Impossible to keep going as a wave of junk whizzed past. She feels something sharp scrape a long line across her thigh, burning as dirt-filled water rushes into the wound.
There's no point in assessing the damage. She's lucky it's not her torso. That her liver hadn't been skewered or her ribs cracked. She can only think about the light. Far up above her - endlessly moving further and further away. She saw light and needed air. Waves of pain crashed onto her skull like the wave at Nimmo’s pier.
She moves against the weight of the water. Kicks and swipes and drags her numb fingers through the onslaught. Arms. Legs. Left. Right. Stinging cuts clip the skin of her face, her legs, her chest. But it was no distraction for the urge to open her mouth and fill her lungs. Even knowing that all that was there to be taken in was dirt-thickened, blood-tinged water.
It went on forever, until it didn't.
Her fingers skim the surface, an impossible taste of freedom. Her right hand shoots out of the water, then her left. A shock of freezing air hits her wet skin. She thrashes both her arms out and under again, dragging her head out of the water's maw. Her face breaks the surface and she pulled in a breath that was only half air. Spluttering, she tastes salt and the metallic quality of the cloudy water. She finds purchase in the churning surface. She flails her arms and tries with all her might to breathe.
The whole world smells like petricour, and all she can see is the sky. The cold light of the clouds blind her. She squints as the current pulls her along. She tries to battle the grimy film out of her eyes with sheer force of will and an excess of blinking.
Her newfound visual clarity gives her little to be cheerful about.
Water on all sides, a river made of city streets. The storefronts are only distinguishable by the tops of their signs. She can see a hint of the stone that topped the Spanish arch far behind her, but the water had swelled so high it covers the arch itself. Cars float along merrily, upended and bobbing like bath toys. Clumps of newspapers and cloth form papier-mache patches across the surface. A suitcase tumbles alongside her, some poor fools’ luggage is gonna end up in Eyer Square-
It takes a second to comprehend how close the suitcase is. She blinks blearily at it, blood rushing in her ears. Close and buoyant. Cara's arms are frozen lead, utterly impossible to move as she tries to grab onto the suitcase just out of reach.
Something about her desperation must translate to hysterical strength– she throws herself at the suitcase. She bridges the gap but faces a new problem as she tries to get a grip on the thing. It wobbles under impact, overturning. She slips and slides as she tries to gain a grip, clumps of wet hair slapping against her face. The suitcase thrashes on the water's surface. She tries desperately to steady it. Hands slipping on the slick plastic. The current is pulling her in the opposite direction. Her fingers skitter off the surface. Her nails bend. She feels a crack as one breaks down to the bed. A drop of blood is whipped away into the water as quickly as it squeezes out of her skin.
She bites back a sob of exhaustion. She doesn't know what to do. Or what had happened, or how she’ll stay afloat for much longer with her tiring arms. Her blind grasping seems to go on forever- a desperate scramble to stop the thing from toppling over and out of her reach. Then, she feels it. A disruption to the suitcases' smooth seams, a handle. She grabs it and pulls. Dragging the thing to float on its side. Gripping the edge she hoists herself up and over. The air knocks out of her lungs as her chest falls flat on top of it. Finally, she's steady.
Her back is hit with bracing cold as the wet fabric of her t-shirt makes contact with the frigid air. She rests her cheek on the plastic, chest heaving. Her eyes roam, dully taking in her surroundings. She's made it some distance from the pier, floating closer to the city's centre by the moment.
The water was moving so fast- so relentlessly, Cara felt herself shuttled down one of the narrow streets further inland that this flood had no right to go. She'd be at Eyer Square soon. A rough laugh rattles its way out of her.
Above her, she hears a harsh chopping sound. It was unlike the cacophony of water around her. She raises her head up from where it's smushed against the plastic. There's a little black dot in the sky. Her vision blurred as she tried to focus. She squints—
Closer.
It’s getting closer!