David stumbled, losing his balance as the car roared to life. It screamed away down the road pelting him with sharp rocks as it went. His bare knees skidded onto the drive when he fell, gravel bits embedding themselves into his skin and quickly drawing blood.
He still hadn't looked away from the speeding car. Away from the boy he had let be taken by those monsters. How could he have just let them take him. They hit him and he had let it happen.
Useless.
Tears streamed down his face, trapping the dust cloud in their wet tracks leaving him grey and dirty. He struggled to his feet, Gwen's hand heavy on his shoulder as the car disappeared into the thick trees.
He looked over his remaining campers. The children were shaken, frozen looking down the road after Max. Nikki was crying and Neil looked as if he was about to throw up. He wanted to reassure them. To tell them everything was going to be okay. That Max would be okay, but there was nothing he could say. He felt empty.
Gwen looked over the sorry lot and took charge. David certainly wasn't going to. "You lot get to the mess hall. Right now you little shits," she waved to the large building behind the tables.
There was a general chorus of rebellion at the idea. The campers protesting being shut away from all the excitement when the heart stopping sound of metal being torn apart reached them. Several thundering screeches followed before the cacophony of sound ended with a heavy thud.
The silence that followed that final thud was the loudest thing David had ever heard.
For a long moment no one moved. No one breathed… And then there was chaos.
Nikki gave a chilling howl, head thrown back as tear cascaded from her pink eyes.
Neil screamed at her, at David, at the world.
The other campers crashed back into sound, shouting their confusion, demanding answers and actions.
David turned away from them, their noise meaningless right now.
Max.
David bolted.
Gwen screamed.
Campers rioted.
David ignored it all. Legs pumping he sprinted down the drive after the sound. After Max. His gut twisted. His heart pounded. His mind was blank, blinded by fear.
There was smoke ahead of him. Dark gray streaks curling up into the bright blue sky.
Max.
He kept running. His legs burned. He wasn't sure if he was breathing anymore, his lungs were aflame.
He could smell the wreck before he saw it. The oily sickly smell of rubber and fuel sticking in his nose, clogging in the back of his throat. Choking him with their wrongness.
The car was barely even a car anymore, nothing but a smoking hunk of twisted metal with wheels spinning wildly and a myriad of pipes and gears exposed to the sky in a way that had never been intended.
What had been the bonnet was crumpled while the roof and far side of what remained of the car were pinned into a giant old pine. The tree had wrapped itself around the metal, accepting it into its wooded embrace.
Reaching the wreck a surge of adrenaline filled David's tall body.
Max!
Useless.
No! Max!
David scaled the exposed underbelly, balancing himself atop the wreck he looked down through the dark tinted door window. Cracks weaved through the dark glass like spiderwebs and beneath them, terrifyingly still, was the boy in the blue hood.
Max!
Max?!
MAX!
"MAX!" David didn't know when he had started shouting the boy's name but he couldn't stop now, "MAX! MAX MOVE!"
The child didn't stir. Through the windows the blue hood was turning dark. Bright red blood dripped from Max's chin down along his neck staining the fabric.
"Max talk to me. Please Max. Just move. Max please! I'm coming Max. Hold on. Max hold on!" David babbled, a stream of noise, chattering away to distract himself.
He kept on talking. Desperately trying to keep his mind from slipping towards the dark terrifying possibilities of what he would find when he reached the boy. Pulling off his necktie he unrolled the old yellow shirt and wrapped it around his hand.
"I'm sorry Max. If you can hear me, keep your eyes shut. Max keep them shut!"
Pulling his hand back he punched at the window. It shattered, the cobwebbing of cracks giving under the pressure.
Glass rained down on Max's prone form and still he didn't move.
David kept going, pressing at the last remnants of the window until only the rubber covered steel frame remained.
Stretching down into the crumpled wreck David brushed shards of glass off Max and pulled aside the terrifyingly tight seat belt. Bracing one hand against a seat he reached out for Max. Grabbing tight onto the neck of his blue hoodie he flinched at the wet feel of the fabric horrified by the source of that sticky wetness.
Carefully, ever so carefully, he lifted Max. The boy dangling lifelessly below him as he pulled him from of the car.
As soon as he was free of the window frame David pulled the boy close. Holding Max to his chest David felt for a pulse as his own heart raced drowning out any other sound he listened for a breath. Anything. Anything that would tell him Max was still alive. That he wasn't too late.
The smallest gasp ghosted past his cheek and his heart stopped. Waiting. Refusing to beat again until a second fluttering breath reached him. David cried holding Max tight, ignoring the blood seeping into his camp top from a long cut along Max's cheek.
Max held firm against his chest with one hand David climbed down from the car and quickly moved them away as dark black smoke began to rise from the engine. Billowing up into the blue sky the ominous plume was stark against the peace of Lake Lilac.
Tenderly David laid Max down in some thick pine needles, well clear of the smoking car. Kneeling beside the boy David hovered watching, heart in his throat and stomach joining it, until Max moved.
It wasn't much. A small frown, brow furrowing in pain as he started to come to. Followed by the wrinkling of his brown nose, the burning smell permeating the air reached them and burned their lungs. Finally a half focused teal eye opened and slid over David's face before quickly closing again.
David cried, or maybe he hadn't stopped crying he wasn't sure and he didn't care. Fat tears dripped onto Max's face from his overwhelming relief. He was so caught up in Max and Max being alive that he didn't notice the sharp ticking coming from the engine until the taps were coming each second.
Head whipping to once again stare at the car David listened at the metal protested, creaking and ticking as the heat contained within it rose and the pressure built. Shooting to his feet David left Max safely in the pine needles and ran back to the wreck.
Climbing back onto the upturned car David tried the handle for the front door, fighting desperately to ignore the urge to flee the ticking car. The door stuck fast, warped metal unwilling to budge for David's urgent tugs.
Looking down into the car David saw Mrs Jones slumped forwards over the dashboard. Blood and shards of glass decorated her previously meticulous black braid. She wasn't moving. He wasn't even sure if she was breathing. There was so much blood, too much blood.
Behind her David caught a glimpse of Mr Jones and he immediately wished he hadn't.
The man was covered in blood, most of it seemed to be his own judging from the multiple cuts in his face and stained tears in his jacket and shirt. There was also no way that his arm should have been able to form that angle. Surely nothing in the human body was meant to bend that way. Half hidden by Mrs Jones and the gear stick white bone jutted out of his leg. The exposed shards jutted out through his pants and over his knee in a way that made David sick deep in his stomach.
He kept trying the door. He considered the window but there was no way he was going to be able to pull an adult out through the window like he had with Max.
David was debating whether he could kick in the safety glass of the partly collapsed windscreen when the black smoke pouring from the engine gave way to flickering orange flames.
The car's metal frame was warming quickly as the flames travelled within the machinery. It wasn't long before David had to abandon his efforts at the door as the the pipes running along the car's underside began burning his bare legs. Leaping off the car with a high pitched yelp he backed away, looking for another option. Another way to help Max's parents.
He was overcome with the need and inability to help. The flames that had been licking at the engine roared upwards as the gas tank caught light.
The intensity of the fire caused him to stumble back with a swear. Eyes darting over the flaming wreck David searched for another entry point when he heard a whimper and looked back to where Max was lying. No. Sitting.
Max was awake.
The boy was sitting staring in shock at the car. Blood dripped from his face and his eyes were wide, teal irises nearly lost in shocked white. Before his eyes the car was swallowed by flames, his parents were still trapped inside, lost to the fire.
David was at the boy's side in an instant. Using his gangly body David knelt before Max, shielding him from the sight even if he could do nothing about the sizzling and popping that assaulted their ears as paint melted, leather burned and metal screamed in protest.
David wrapped his arms around Max. Tears streaming down his face he pressed the trembling boy into his soot and oil covered camp shirt.
"I've got you Max. I'm so sorry. Max, oh Max I'm sorry," David cried rocking slightly. Whether he was trying to calm himself or Max he wasn't sure. Probably a bit of both. They both needed the comfort.
The distant sound of sirens approaching Camp Campbell was for once a blessing. David scooped up Max, holding the boy in his arms tightly he shuffled them both even further from the burning wreck as the old pine it rested against reached its breaking point and began to smoke and flame.
With an angry crackle the tree's sap ignited. Fire raced through the pine branches weaving its way higher and higher more quickly than either of them could see until the tree became a towering beacon of light and smoke. A terrible message exclaiming what had happened, drawing the police to them and screaming to Lake Lilac of the tragedy that had taken place.
Sitting a distance away from the burning mess David held Max close to his chest as red and blue lights flickered through the trees. The police would be here soon. He hoped Gwen had thought to call for an ambulance as well, they were going to need one.
The cut on Max's cheek didn't seem to be bleeding so fiercely anymore and other than what looked like a broken wrist from the way the boy's hand was swelling he was safe.
That was all David could think about now; Max was safe.
He had looked after his camper. He had done everything he could.
It still wasn't enough.