Shannon
#1 of Words
A tiny scene that has been bouncing around in my head for a couple weeks.
Part of a much larger universe that I haven't bothered to commit to paper, and perhaps never will.
[edit] added a bit more to help it along. That will teach me to post stuff at 6:AM.
What remained of her body, had been laid out on an examination table.
Pausing at the door, he took in the carnage before him. The once sterile room now smelled of roasted meat, burnt hair, and explosive residue. He had seen far worse in the war, but that had been decades ago.
Glancing down at his data pad, he saw that it had successfully synchronized with the local police network, and had begun filling the screen with the official incident report. The door automatically sliding shut behind him as he proceeded into the room and to the table.
Based on the damage to the body, the blast must have originated low and to her left. That part of the report appeared entirely accurate.
Her left arm, torn clean from the shoulder, had not been located. The left leg below the hip was also missing, though her left foot had been recovered. Almost comically, it stood upright at the end of the table with a few centimeters of shin bone protruding from the shattered ankle. The right leg, apart from scorching and shrapnel damage, was comparatively untouched from toes to hip. Above that, only an empty pelvis and spinal column were visible leading to a hollow rib cage.
The armored flight jacket, now shattered and tattered, had kept most of her upper torso intact, along with the only remaining indication that the owner was female. The right arm below the elbow had been stripped of flesh, leaving only bone and burnt tendons in tightly constricted position.
The face was nearly unrecognizable. Skin on the left side had been peeled away, leaving only exposed skull and jaw. The right side was harder to look at. It still had skin, but it was in tatters, with the lips hanging askew and a ragged hole in the cheek leaving the teeth exposed. The thought occurred to him that it would look less gruesome if it were in the same condition as the left. The right ear was remarkably untouched, with a small metal stud visible at the tip.
Her picture stared back at him from the data pad, a green jeweled stud in her right ear, matching the color of her eyes. The stone was now missing, matching the now empty sockets that stared up at the ceiling.
Thankfully there was little blood. The thermal blast from the explosion had taken care of that inconvenience.
"It must have been very close, and very large." he thought to himself.
The report listed 'mining explosives', which was plausible considering the location of the event, but the scale of the blast suggested otherwise. The entire house had been destroyed, along with the burnt out hull of a unidentified vehicle, found upside down several meters away.
"Too large." he said aloud to the empty room.
Tossing the data pad onto the table, he took a seat on a nearby stool.
Looking again at what remained of one of his finest students, he muttered "Damn it, Shannon. What did you do, to end up like this?"
The speaker on the pad gave a small burst of static and a female voice replied, "I'd rather not talk about it."