Continuing on with my day I was assigned to escorted the group of fifth-graders through the East Asian antiquities section, maintaining a precise three feet of distance between myself and the children. Twenty-two students, two teachers, one parent volunteer. The teachers looked exhausted. The children vibrated with the barely contained energy of youth.
"This ceremonial mask dates back to the Heian period of Japan," I explained, gesturing to the glass case without touching it. "Notice the intricate gold leaf work around the eyes. Each piece took artisans months to complete."
A girl with braids raised her hand. "Were they for parties?"
"No," I replied. "They were used in religious ceremonies to connect with spirits of ancestors. The Japanese believed the masks allowed humans to channel divine energy."
I moved the group along methodically, maintaining our schedule. Three minutes per exhibit. No backtracking. Maximum educational efficiency.
"Does anyone know what material this vase is made from?" I asked, pointing to a blue-and-white piece behind glass.
"Porcelain!" shouted a boy near the back.
I nodded once. "Correct. This particular type is called kaolin clay. The Chinese perfected this technique centuries before Europeans discovered the process."
My thoughts drifted briefly to Mrs. Liang and her kindness drew out the years I have worked here. The memory created an unusual warmth in my chest that I quickly suppressed. Focus on the task at hand.
"Now, if you'll follow me to the—"
The floor lurched beneath my feet. The children's excited chatter transformed instantly into confused murmurs.
Then came the second wave—stronger, violent. Display cases rattled. The lights flickered, then went out completely. Emergency lights activated, casting everything in an eerie red glow.
"Earthquake!" someone screamed.
Glass shattered as a nearby display case toppled. The children's screams echoed off the marble floors and high ceilings, amplifying the chaos.
I assessed the situation in seconds. The main exit was thirty meters away. Too far. The emergency exit behind the Tang Dynasty exhibit was closer—fifteen meters. Structural integrity of the ceiling appeared compromised based on the falling debris.
"STOP!" My voice cut through the panic, louder and more commanding than I'd ever used before. The group froze, eyes wide with fear.
"Follow me to the emergency exit. NOW. Stay together. Do not run."
I grabbed the nearest child's hand—a small girl frozen in terror—and pointed to the glowing exit sign.
"Teachers, take the rear. Everyone move. NOW."
I led the group toward the emergency exit, my mind calculating the safest path through falling debris. The children moved with surprising order, their fear making them compliant rather than chaotic. Good.
Another tremor hit. Stronger. The building groaned around us.
"Stay close to the wall," I commanded, gesturing sharply. "The support beams are strongest there."
A large piece of plaster crashed down ten feet ahead, blocking our path. I pivoted instantly.
"Change of direction. This way." I pointed toward a narrow service corridor. "Single file. Quickly."
The teachers looked to me with naked relief in their eyes. I didn't need their gratitude. I needed their cooperation.
An elderly security guard stumbled into view from around the corner, disoriented and clutching his arm. His uniform was covered in white dust.
"Sir, are you injured?" I asked, keeping my voice level despite the building literally falling apart around us.
"I—I think I fell. My arm..."
I assessed him quickly. No visible blood. Likely a sprain, not a break.
"You'll need to come with us." I took his uninjured arm and steadied him. "Can you walk?"
He nodded shakily.
"Good. Stay between the children and the second teacher."
The dust thickened in the air, making it difficult to see more than fifteen feet ahead. Several children began to cough.
"Cover your mouths with your shirts," I instructed. "Breathe through the fabric."
A thunderous crack split the air above us. I looked up to see a ceiling beam shift.
"MOVE!" I shouted, pushing the closest children forward just as chunks of ceiling crashed down where they'd been standing seconds before.
The emergency exit was now visible at the end of the corridor, its red light cutting through the dust.
"Almost there. Do not stop."
I counted heads as we moved. Twenty-two children. Two teachers. One parent. One security guard. All accounted for. No casualties.
The floor trembled again beneath our feet, but I kept my balance, one hand on the wall, the other guiding a small boy who had started to hyperventilate.
"Focus on the door," I told him firmly. "Just the door."
We reached the emergency exit doors. The security guard pushed them open, revealing the museum's courtyard. Sunlight pierced through the dust cloud, momentarily blinding me. People streamed from other parts of the building, their faces masks of panic and relief.
"Everyone outside. Move away from the building structure," I ordered, my voice cutting through the chaos.
I counted again as they exited. Twenty-two children. Two teachers. One parent. One security guard. Everyone accounted for.
I followed the last child through the doorway when movement in my peripheral vision caught my attention. Across the lobby, Mrs. Liang stumbled backward as a wave of panicked visitors rushed toward the main entrance. She reached for a column but missed.
Her small frame hit the marble floor hard. A man in a business suit stepped on her outstretched hand without noticing. Another nearly trampled her head.
Something inside me shifted. A crack in my carefully constructed wall.
Without calculating risks or weighing options, I pushed back into the building. My body moved before my mind could argue. Debris fell around me as I cut through the crowd, moving against the tide of fleeing visitors.
"Move!" I shouted, shoving a man twice my size out of my path.
Mrs. Liang lay curled on her side, one arm protecting her head as feet thundered past her. Blood trickled from a cut on her forehead. Her glasses lay shattered beside her.
I dropped to my knees beside her and threw my body over hers as a shield. Someone's knee connected with my back. I absorbed the impact without flinching.
"I've got you," I said, my voice strange in my own ears—urgent, emotional.
Her eyes widened in recognition. "Jennifer?"
The floor trembled again. I wrapped my arms around her small shoulders and helped her to a sitting position. Her body felt fragile, bird-like beneath my hands.
"Can you stand?" I asked, already positioning myself to bear her weight.
She nodded weakly. I lifted her to her feet as another aftershock hit, making us both stagger. I steadied her against my side, one arm firmly around her waist.
"Lean on me," I instructed, already plotting our path to the nearest exit.
I half-carried Mrs. Liang through the chaos, her small frame leaning heavily against mine. The main entrance loomed ahead—a rectangle of blinding daylight cutting through the dust-filled air. Twenty feet away. Freedom. Safety.
"Almost there," I assured her, adjusting my grip around her waist. Her breath came in short, pained gasps. The cut on her forehead had stopped bleeding, but her eyes were unfocused, possibly concussed.
People streamed past us, some bumping our shoulders in their panic. I turned my body to shield Mrs. Liang from the worst of it. The building groaned around us—a living thing in its death throes.
"Jennifer..." Mrs. Liang whispered, stumbling. "My husband... he was coming to meet me for lunch."
"He'll be outside," I said with certainty I didn't feel. "Just a few more steps."
We reached the bottleneck at the doors where the crowd compressed. Mrs. Liang winced as someone jostled her injured arm.
"Wait here," I instructed, propping her against a relatively stable column. "I'll clear a path."
I stepped forward, forcing my way between panicked visitors, creating space for us to pass through. "Make way!" I shouted, pushing back against the tide. "Injured woman coming through!"
The crowd parted reluctantly. I turned back toward Mrs. Liang, reaching for her.
That's when I heard it—a deafening crack from above.
Time slowed. My eyes tracked upward to see a massive section of ornate ceiling breaking free. Plaster, wood, and steel—hundreds of pounds of it—tearing loose directly above where Mrs. Liang stood.
I didn't think. Didn't calculate. Didn't weigh options.
I lunged forward, my hands connecting with her shoulders, shoving her with all my strength toward the doorway.
She stumbled forward with a surprised cry—straight into the arms of an elderly man who had just pushed his way inside. Her husband. His face registered shock, then recognition as he caught her.
I had time for one last thought: At least she's safe.
Then the world crashed down.
Pain exploded across my back, driving me to the floor. My chest compressed under impossible weight. Something warm and wet spread beneath me. The taste of copper filled my mouth.
Through dust and blood, I saw Mrs. Liang's face contort in horror. Her scream seemed distant, underwater. Her husband held her back as she reached toward me, his own face ashen.
"Jennifer! JENNIFER!"
I tried to respond but couldn't find my voice. Couldn't feel my legs. Couldn't feel much of anything below my chest.
Hands appeared, trying to shift the rubble. Someone shouted for help. Mrs. Liang fought against her husband's restraining arms, tears cutting clean tracks through the dust on her face.
"Let me go! We have to help her! She saved me!"
My vision darkened at the edges. Each breath came shorter than the last. Something wet bubbled in my throat when I tried to inhale.
"Please," Mrs. Liang sobbed as her husband pulled her back, away from the unstable debris. "Please, no..."
I wanted to tell her it was okay. That I'd made my choice. That for once in my life, I'd acted without thinking, without weighing consequences.
For once, I'd simply felt.
Darkness swelled at the edges of my vision, pressing inward. Strange, how quiet everything became. The screams, the rumbling of the building, the chaos—all faded to a distant hum.
I tasted blood. Copper and salt.
My lungs struggled against the weight crushing my chest. Each breath shorter, shallower than the last. Breathing shouldn't be this much work.
A face appeared above me—someone I didn't recognize. Their mouth moved, but I couldn't make out the words. More faces joined. Hands reached toward the debris pinning me down, then pulled back as something shifted.
Too dangerous to move it. I understood that much.
Mrs. Liang's face appeared in the gap between strangers. Tears streaked through the dust on her cheeks. Her lips formed my name over and over.
"Jennifer. Jennifer."
I wanted to tell her not to cry. That I was fine. But my mouth wouldn't cooperate.
My mind drifted, surprisingly calm. I thought of Mrs. Liang's office, that small sanctuary where she'd insisted I join her for lunch every Tuesday. How uncomfortable I'd been at first. How I'd analyzed her motives, searching for the angle, the hidden agenda.
There never was one.
Just warm soup in delicate bowls. Quiet conversation that never demanded more than I could give. The way she'd slip an extra cookie onto my plate when she thought I wasn't looking.
And Mr. Liang, who'd stop by sometimes to bring his wife fresh flowers. How he'd bow slightly when greeting me, that small gesture of respect I'd never known how to respond to.
They'd given me something I couldn't name. Something I hadn't known I needed.
A place. Not just a physical space, but a place in someone's life where I belonged, if only for an hour each week.
They'd never asked for anything in return.
The pressure on my chest increased. Breathing became optional. The darkness crept closer.
I felt my lips curve upward—the ghost of a smile. My final thought was simple, clear as crystal:
This is right.
Through the darkening tunnel of my vision, something caught my eye. A strange movement where there shouldn't be any.
Behind the crowd of concerned faces, past the crumbled ceiling and twisted metal, a display case had somehow remained intact. Inside it, the ancient Chinese orb—the one I'd lectured about just yesterday. The "Sphere of Eternal Return," dating back to the Zhou Dynasty. Scholars had debated its purpose for centuries.
It was... glowing?
The black, twisted surface of the orb began to pulse with an inner light—first deep red, then shifting to violet, then a blue so bright it hurt my eyes. No one else seemed to notice. They were all focused on me, on the debris, on the hopelessness of my situation.
But I saw it clearly. The orb trembled in its case, vibrating with increasing intensity until the glass should have shattered—yet it remained intact, as if the vibrations existed in some other dimension.
The shape of the artifact began to change, twisting into forms I couldn't name—spirals, geometric patterns impossible in three dimensions, shapes that hurt my mind to look at. It flowed like liquid, then crystallized, then became something else entirely.
My dying brain must be hallucinating. That was the logical explanation.
Yet it felt more real than the pain in my chest, more real than the blood pooling beneath me.
The orb pulsed once more—a blinding flash that somehow didn't draw anyone's attention but mine. Then it simply... vanished. The display case stood empty.
A heartbeat later, I felt something cold and electric enter my body. Not through my skin—through my very existence. It spread like ice water through my veins, reaching every cell, every atom.
The pain vanished. The pressure on my chest no longer mattered. I felt myself being pulled inward, compressed into a single point of consciousness.
Mrs. Liang's tear-streaked face was the last thing I saw as my eyes closed.
Then—nothing.