07-03-2026, 02:30 PM
The interior is almost entirely fire now.
Flames coil across the ceiling like serpents. The air is so hot it feels impossible to breathe.
He finds the eighth woman crawling toward the doorway, disoriented and half-blind.
He lifts her and pushes forward.
The roof groans above them.
Something enormous cracks.
They burst into the rain just as a burning beam crashes down behind them.
Eight.
The roof above him begins making deep groaning sounds, the heavy beams cracking under the heat.
Villagers scream at him not to go back.
But he hears another voice.
A woman crying somewhere deeper inside the burning structure.
One more.
There is still one more.
Arjun stumbles through flames that should not be burning this fiercely in the rain.
The fire moves strangely.
Not like ordinary fire.
It spreads in sudden leaps, almost as if it knows where to go.
Almost as if it is searching.
And somewhere beyond the roar of the flames, Arjun hears the distant echo of something Amma Lakshmi said earlier:
“The island appears when it wishes to be found.”
He runs back into the collapsing building.
At this point even he knows it’s madness.
The heat is unbearable.
The fire feels almost alive now, twisting, reaching, blocking his path like it wants to keep him inside.
But he forces his way deeper.
And there,
There he sees her.
Pressed against the back wall.
The ninth woman.
Flames circle her like a cage.
Her eyes meet his through the smoke.
For one impossible moment she doesn’t look afraid.
She looks certain.
As if she knew he would come.
He doesn’t know how he reaches her.
Arjun doesn’t think.
He doesn’t remember crossing the burning floor.
He only remembers grabbing her arm,
He charges through the fire, grabs her hand, pulls her close.
“Hold on!”
Pulling her toward him, lifting her with the last strength left in his body.
He wraps an arm around her securely and runs.
Flames coil across the ceiling like serpents. The air is so hot it feels impossible to breathe.
He finds the eighth woman crawling toward the doorway, disoriented and half-blind.
He lifts her and pushes forward.
The roof groans above them.
Something enormous cracks.
They burst into the rain just as a burning beam crashes down behind them.
Eight.
The roof above him begins making deep groaning sounds, the heavy beams cracking under the heat.
Villagers scream at him not to go back.
But he hears another voice.
A woman crying somewhere deeper inside the burning structure.
One more.
There is still one more.
Arjun stumbles through flames that should not be burning this fiercely in the rain.
The fire moves strangely.
Not like ordinary fire.
It spreads in sudden leaps, almost as if it knows where to go.
Almost as if it is searching.
And somewhere beyond the roar of the flames, Arjun hears the distant echo of something Amma Lakshmi said earlier:
“The island appears when it wishes to be found.”
He runs back into the collapsing building.
At this point even he knows it’s madness.
The heat is unbearable.
The fire feels almost alive now, twisting, reaching, blocking his path like it wants to keep him inside.
But he forces his way deeper.
And there,
There he sees her.
Pressed against the back wall.
The ninth woman.
Flames circle her like a cage.
Her eyes meet his through the smoke.
For one impossible moment she doesn’t look afraid.
She looks certain.
As if she knew he would come.
He doesn’t know how he reaches her.
Arjun doesn’t think.
He doesn’t remember crossing the burning floor.
He only remembers grabbing her arm,
He charges through the fire, grabs her hand, pulls her close.
“Hold on!”
Pulling her toward him, lifting her with the last strength left in his body.
He wraps an arm around her securely and runs.
![[+]](https://xossipy.com/themes/sharepoint/collapse_collapsed.png)