Pandemonium

What does the missile see before it strikes?

Can it see the teddy bear suspended in the air, looking lifelessly at the sky with button eyes and a stitched smile?

Perhaps there is a white rabbit in a wicker carrying case. Very real. Very calm. Waiting for its owner to take them somewhere beyond. Look closely. You can see its red eyes before the flash.

There’s a woman there who hasn’t slept in two days. She is just closing her eyes to the world and expecting to open them again. Soon.

The train waits at the station. A conductor looks beyond the crowd to the ceramic-tiled roofs of the city. He wonders what has become of his adult children. He almost blows his whistle.

Does the missile see? See the life that moves to live? See the future that lies miles west carefully balanced on the 1.520mm gauge tracks?

The teddy bear lands in the girl's hands. She holds it like a baby she one day hopes to have.

Then there is light and heat and pressure and hell, pure hell, Pandemonium incarnate, fire and screams.