SEVENTY-EIGHT | AWOKEN

At first, I did not wish to cling to the light. My eyes tried to open, tried to stare blearily up at the stars, and I yanked them shut. The dark was simple: no pain, no morality, no consciousness. I ached to return, but then I realised that the presence of pain meant something incredible.

I was alive. Somehow, I had survived.

I worked my jaw. My mouth was dry, my tongue pressed to the back of my front teeth. I licked my lips. My head burned, my temples throbbing, one far worse than the other. I shifted, rocking to one side, and my neck soared with pain. Then came a stab in my side, and a flame licking my wrist. Everything was agony, and life did not seem worth the hurt.

As I let myself sink back into the darkness, my woozy head lolling against something warm and firm, I heard a voice. It rocked, waves crashing in the night, and then I realised that the sounds were not one and the same, but two separate noises. T