Title: Nightmares

Genre: Drama

Author: soultoast

Rating: PG-13

Spoilers: "Twilight."

Pairings: none.

Disclaimer: I have a new back pack, but alas, there was not a deed to Paramount in my Christmas stocking.

Author's Note:  Sorry it took so long to update.  My computer malfunctioned, so I sent it in for servicing and it did not return until mid December, at which point I was at home, the land of bad computers and crappy internet connections.  As always, please read and review.

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The acrid smell stung his nostrils. A thought drifted across his mind, whispering to him; they're all gone.  He started across the black land and checked his scanner.  The map on his scanner told him the truth he feared.

"This is where I played football with my dad."  The charred black earth before him was littered with ash.  The Florida wind blew, stirring the dry remains.  The heat of the weapon had been so intense that it was impossible to determine which ashes had even been human.

The scarred land was striped of all landmarks.  If it weren't for his scanner, he wouldn't have been able to recognize his childhood home.  He turned and gazed out at what had once been the ocean; now it existed only as a black crater.  The churning in his stomach traveled into his throat.  He fell to his knees and vomited onto the charred earth.  He'd been here less than a year ago; there had been green grass that had given way to sand dunes that slipped into the glittering sea.  Now it was gone, all of it.  His family, his friends, everything; there were no remains to be buried, and no land for them to be buried in.  He was alone.  He couldn't save his sister, and he'd failed his family.  He turned towards the sun.  It mocked him as it cast down life-sustaining rays onto the barren planet.  They were gone.

Trip jerked to consciousness.  The cool dark room and the calm hum of the engines soothed him as the panic in he chest subsided.  He starred into the darkness; what had scared him, what had he been dreaming of?  He drew his knees up to his chest, resting his forehead on them.  He shut his eyes and tried to peer into his subconscious, searching for a thread from his dream.  As the stars flew past his windows, a single thought floated back to his brain.

They're gone. 

His dream flooded his brain; the destruction of Earth and his family, the burned remains.  The pain hit his chest, the memory of the stench churning his stomach.  He swallowed the nausea as tears pricked his eyes.  He felt the bile rising in his throat and he rushed to his bathroom.  He dropped to his knees and wretched into the toilet.  He wouldn't allow that to happen.  Some dreams would not come true.   It wasn't true, his dream hadn't happened yet.  He repeated the facts like a mantra, trying to maintain a semblance of calm.  A sob ripped from his throat as he collapsed onto the bathroom floor.  Earth hadn't been destroyed, his parents were still alive, but the pain remained.  He cried in his dark room, alone, the smell of burned ash lingering in his mind.