"NO!"
But there was nothing he could do about it as the building trembled, its supports unable to compensate, and it came down.
Virgil, helmeted and kitted out in his exo-suit withstood the shockwave and the cloud of concrete dust, but his brothers didn't.
No, his brothers were underneath all that still settling rubble, caught trying to rescue a family from the parking garage beneath.
No, no, no, no, no, nooooooooooooo!
John on comms screaming at him. One and Two covered in dust in the distance.
This wasn't supposed to be happening.
He moved.
The exo-suit was his. It was made for him. Only for him. It was an extension of his natural abilities. It gave him strength to do what needed to be done.
And it was done.
John was still yelling at him, but Virgil only registered two words in five. Location of his brothers. Condition of his brothers.
His brothers.
Concrete flew. The grate of phantom dust between his teeth.
"Scott? Gordon? Alan? Can you hear me?"
No answer.
"Virgil!"
Tonnes and tonnes of crumbled concrete before he found anything.
A limp hand.
Not a brother. Not a brother.
Emergency personnel swarmed around him and the woman, dead or alive was taken away.
"Virgil!"
More concrete and steel. His brothers.
He kept digging.
"Virgil!"
"John, I have to find them!" Have to…have to…
Someone grabbed him.
"No, I have to find them!" He shoved the hands away, but the concrete beneath his feet began to give way. "Scott?! Gordon?! Allie!"
He was falling.
"No! Nonononononononoooo!"
"VIRGIL!"
Those hands caught him again and he startled to find himself on the floor.
A cold floor.
Dim lighting.
The worried turquoise eyes of his middle brother as he held him in his lap.
His lap?
His brain stumbled and he realised he was on a hospital floor in a room full of beds.
"Virgil? You okay?" Allie?
A blink and he found his little brother looking over the edge of the closest bed, eyes as worried as John's.
"Ummm…"
"You were dreaming." John's melodious voice was soft and reassuring. "You fell off the chair."
"Scott? Gordon?"
"They are all safe. You got them out. A few broken bones, but they're going to be fine."
His heart was pounding so hard.
On the floor.
In his little brother's lap.
Terror slipped into embarrassment.
Shit.
"Hey." John's voice was still soft. "You're okay."
No, he wasn't.
He tried to get up, but John held him a moment longer and whispered in his ear. "They are going to be okay." A gentle squeeze that had Virgil frowning, and his brother let him go.
Virgil stumbled to his feet to find both Gordon and Scott patched and bandaged, still asleep and little Allie staring up at him with wide eyes, a leg in plaster. Wavering, he made it back to the plastic chair he had apparently fallen from as John unfolded from the floor.
Alan grabbed Virgil's arm. "Are you okay?"
A shift of his shoulders. "Yeah. Don't worry, Allie. It was just a dream."
John's eyes caught his.
"Just a dream."
-o-o-o-
