Yellow flakes spiraled down from above to settle on the city like the ash of some great holocaust. The yellowness that filled the air wasn't the pure color of a sunflower but rather a corrupted yellow like rancid butter. Near the ground, the dancing motes…

I hopped over a pair of the ash-filled streams, so contaminated that the clear water of my childhood had become an opaque gray. The air wasn't much better but it was getting clearer. The sun behind the smoky sky was still such an angry red that I could fe…