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So quick, how some fall – so narrow the border between life and death You could trip and stumble over it The way Fletcher lies there in the round, as if he were siht such a fragile object could cause sothe body in the sudden quiet of the battlefield when a concussion of air knocks him backwards into the mud It is only afterwards that he hears the raucous thunder of the explosion itself – as though sound were not a herald but an afterthought

Black s at the end of the row

Moses, his ears ringing, claoes and he is knocked down once more

And now the world is muffled near to deafness What he can hear is his own heart beating, his teeth clacking against one another The dead, who have no concept of self-protection, re their heads slowly towards the fire to gaze withcolours They will stand, ulfed them – Moses has seen it And so it happens now to one dead wo She catches fire, her dressforward, surprised,to put herself out She collapses to a sitting position, mystified finally by the abo her own arm to see the way the fire enrobes it – until at last the heat boils her brain and she falls, stinking, to the ground

Abraham, Moses says It could be a whisper or a shout – he does not know, because he cannot hear his oords

Hell falls on the place and Moses has not found his brother He does not even look behind hi to hi for his only kin A suitable end – it’s what men wish for, finally

There’s a third explosion – not another of the low buildings this tiantuan metal towers The explosion at the base causes the tower to lean, crippled, suspended for a le – then, with a strain and break of metal joints that Moses can feel in his sternuround

That’s when he sees Abraha crazy fronizes the boots The tooled leather cowboy boots his brother has always been so proud of He would polish the the and a spit shine A man, soot afla brother to the ground and rolls hio out

Abe! Moses says It’s me It’s your brother Abe!

There is no response, but Moses can see that he’s still alive He takes a fistful of mud and slathers it as a salve over the melted and charred face and neck of his brother He does not knohat else to do, and such an act feels proper to nature

Another building explodes now, this one very near

Moses sees his brother’s lips move

I can’t hear you Abe, Moses says I can’t hear nothin We got to get You ready?

Moses lifts the slack body of his brother and slings it over his shoulder Then he runs He runs towards the tree line at the base of the hill Another explosion shakes the earth behind hi is on fire now – the heat of the valley, he can see it in the shivering air

Then he’s cliht of his brother’s body on his shoulder, pulling hi short and ragged Twoleft to destroy? A point must come when the forces of destruction must be stymied by their own coainst the trunk of a tree, only for a ain he does not look to see He keeps his eyes focused on the bright snowy rim of the hilltop Then he shifts Abrahaher he clis of the valley There he stops in a sently in the snow Moses can hardly breathe, but he falls to his hands and knees to check on Abraham His brother’s face, he sees now, is melted away – and one of the eyes is open, and he doesn’t see

Moses leans down and puts his ear to Abraham’s mouth, and he takes the wrist to find the pulse But there’s nothing

He can’t even catch his breath long enough to curse his brother for dying

Instead he sits back against a tree trunk and listens to the crackling inferno in the valley below – still h the treetops, and he drinks in the cold air like an elixir

He licks his lips There are things to say and no one in the world to say them to Not even God – who is about his business on the wonders of the world and doesn’t – should not – take tis of one bereft man

So instead he talks to the charred body of his brother

She lied, he says She lied to me, Abe And I almost took trust in it Sha sounds down in the valley, as of a series of s It will take days for the valley to burn itself out couess it’s lucky for you you died, Abe, he says This world, it was too easy for you to get into trouble in