Under Grey Skies - Chapter 2
Posted on Wed Sep 23rd, 2026 @ 9:17am by Blake Hayes
2,462 words; about a 12 minute read
Mission:
Fallout
Location: Tisch Hospital - 550 1st Avenue, New York
Timeline: 18th and 19th July 2026
The storm had passed, but Blake could still hear it. Not the thunder. Not the rain hammering against the pavement or the distant crackle of lightning splitting the Manhattan skyline. Those sounds had faded, leaving behind the wail of sirens, the frantic shouts of emergency responders, and the terrible, hollow silence that had settled somewhere deep inside him. He could still feel the storm, though, it lingered beneath his skin, a faint, restless pressure that made the hairs on his arms stand on end. The air around him smelled of wet, smoke and ozone. Hailstones lay scattered across the street, some no larger than pebbles, others the size of golf balls, melting in the rainwater that streamed through the rubble.
Blake barely noticed any of it.
He was on his knees in the middle of the street, his arms wrapped around Lily's small body.
"Come on, sweetheart," he whispered, brushing damp hair away from her forehead. "Come on. Daddy's here."
Her eyes remained closed.
A paramedic knelt beside him, speaking with an urgency Blake couldn't quite process. There were hands reaching for Lily, gloved fingers checking her pulse, a medical bag being dragged across the wet pavement.
"Sir, we need to take her."
"No."
"Sir, please. We need to—"
"She's my daughter."
The words came out harsher than he intended. His arms tightened around her instinctively, as though he could somehow keep the world from taking her simply by holding on.
A hand settled on his shoulder and a quiet voice said "Blake."
It was Connie. He looked up at her. Her face was pale beneath the streaks of dirt and blood, a cut above her eyebrow still bleeding. Her eyes were red and swollen, fixed on Lily. "Please," she whispered. "Let them help her."
For a moment, he couldn't move but slowly, with a trembling breath, Blake loosened his hold. The paramedics lifted Lily onto a stretcher. Blake watched them work, watched the oxygen mask being secured over her face, watched one of them begin chest compressions as they hurried towards the ambulance.
He tried to stand, to follow her but his legs gave way beneath him. Connie caught his arm, but neither of them said anything. They simply stood there, watching as the ambulance doors slammed shut.
Blake reached for her hand.
She took it and together, they followed in silence.
When they reached the hospital it seemed it was too bright, it was the first thing Blake noticed when the ambulance doors opened and the paramedics rushed Lily inside. The lights overhead were harsh and unforgiving, illuminating every stain on his clothes, every smear of blood on his hands.
He followed the stretcher until a nurse stepped in front of him.
"Sir, you need to wait here."
"I'm going with her."
"Your daughter is being taken into trauma. The doctors need room to work."
"Then I'll stay out of the way but I'm going with her."
"Blake", Connie's voice stopped him.
He turned towards her. She stood a few feet behind him, her arms wrapped tightly around herself. She looked smaller than he remembered, lost in the chaos of the emergency department.
"They'll help her," she said, though the words sounded more like a plea than reassurance while his own gaze remained on the doors through which Lily had disappeared. He wanted to believe her, he wanted to believe that the storm had been enough. That the lightning, the wind, the hailstones, all that terrible power he'd unleashed, had somehow bought his daughter another chance.
But the memory of Lily lying motionless on the pavement would not leave him, neither would the sound of the gunshots.
He looked down at his hands. They were shaking and time became something meaningless.
Blake sat in a plastic chair outside the trauma unit, his elbows resting on his knees and his hands clasped so tightly that his knuckles had turned white. Someone had given him a towel to wipe the blood and rain from his face, but he hadn't used it. He couldn't bring himself to look at the stains on his sleeves. Connie sat beside him, her injured forehead now bandaged and every so often, she glanced towards the doors, as though she could will them to open.
Neither spoke much.
What was there to say?
Blake had spent years convincing himself that his secret was something he could control. That if he kept his head down, did his job, and never gave anyone a reason to look too closely, he could live a normal life. He had believed that hiding his mutation would keep the people he loved safe.
Now Lily was behind those doors, fighting for her life, and he had no idea whether his powers had saved anyone at all.
He closed his eyes as a silent tear cut a path down his cheek, creating a single line a clear skin free of the grim of the day. He could see her in the coffee shop, standing beside Connie, her little face lighting up when she'd spotted him.
'Daddy!', he heard it as clearly as if she were still standing in front of him.
He remembered the way she'd thrown her arms around his waist, the way she'd looked up at him with that infectious smile. He remembered promising he'd be at her birthday party on Saturday.
He'd promised.
A door opened and Blake was on his feet before the nurse had finished stepping into the corridor.
"How is she?"
The nurse glanced at him, then at Connie.
"The doctors are still working on her. They're doing everything they can."
"Can I see her?"
"Not yet. I'm sorry."
Blake nodded, though he barely heard the rest and just as quickly the Nurse was gone, the door closed behind her.
He sank back into the chair, dragging both hands over his face. Connie reached for him. Her fingers found his, and he held on, for a while, that was all either of them could do.
A few hours later...
The first time Blake was allowed to see Lily, she looked impossibly small.
The machines surrounding her seemed enormous against her little frame. A ventilator rose and fell with a steady mechanical rhythm. Bandages covered her chest and shoulder, and her face was pale beneath the dim light.
He approached the bed slowly, almost afraid that moving too quickly might somehow disturb her.
"Hey, Lil."
His voice cracked.
He cleared his throat and tried again.
"Hey, sweetheart. It's Daddy."
She didn't move.
Blake pulled a chair close and sat down, taking her hand between both of his. Her fingers were warm, and for a moment, that simple fact gave him something to cling to.
"Your mum's here. She's okay. Bit of a bump on her head, but you know your mum. Nothing keeps her down for long."
He tried to smile but it didn't last.
"I know I said I'd be at your party on Saturday. And I will be, all right? We'll have pancakes. Whatever you want. Chocolate chips, strawberries, that ridiculous amount of syrup you like."
His thumb moved gently over her knuckles.
"You just need to wake up for me."
The monitor continued its steady rhythm.
Blake leaned closer, lowering his voice.
"I know you're tired, sweetheart. I know. But I need you to keep fighting, okay? Just a little longer."
His eyes burned as he looked at her small face, searching for some sign that she could hear him. A twitch of her fingers. A movement beneath her eyelids. Anything.
"I love you, Lily."
He bowed his head, pressing her hand against his forehead.
"I love you so much."
For a long time, he stayed there, speaking softly about ordinary things. The things they'd do when she got better. The places they'd go. The birthday cake she'd choose. He told her about the dog she'd been asking for, promising that perhaps they could finally talk about it. He made promises he had no idea how to keep and all the while, he held her hand, terrified that if he let go, he might lose her.
The hours crawled by.
Connie took her turn at Lily's bedside, sitting close and whispering to her daughter. Blake watched from the doorway, unable to bear the sight of Connie crying, yet unable to leave her alone with it.
They had not been a couple for some time. Their marriage had ended beneath the weight of secrets and fear, and there were wounds between them that neither had ever quite managed to heal.
But Lily had always been theirs.
And now, in the sterile quiet of the hospital room, the distance between them seemed meaningless.
Blake approached Connie and rested a hand on her shoulder.
She looked up at him, her face crumpling.
"I should've held on to her," she whispered.
Blake shook his head immediately.
"No."
"If I'd just—"
"No, Connie."
His voice was gentle but firm. "None of this was your fault."
She pressed her hands over her mouth, trying to contain the sob that escaped her. Blake knelt beside her chair and wrapped his arms around her. For a moment, she resisted, her body rigid with grief. Then she folded into him, clutching the back of his shirt as though she might fall apart without something to hold on to and all he could do was hold her. He wanted to tell her everything would be okay. That Lily would wake up. That they'd take her home, and somehow, someday, this would become a terrible memory they could speak about without breaking, but he couldn't say it because he no longer believed it.
The following evening
Blake had been standing by the hospital window, watching the city lights shimmer through the lingering rain. Connie had fallen asleep in a chair nearby, exhausted from the previous day's ordeal, the room the Hospital had provided them next to Lily's, a home away from home. The silence in it was broken when a doctor entered the room. Blake turned and he knew, some part of him knew before the doctor said a word.
"I'm sorry," the man began.
Blake shook his head.
"No."
The doctor stopped.
"No," Blake repeated, taking a step backwards. "Don't."
"We did everything we could."
"No."
Connie stirred at the sound of his voice. She opened her eyes, looked towards the doctor, and immediately began to cry.
Blake stood perfectly still.
The words that followed seemed to come from somewhere far away. Complications. Internal bleeding. Her heart. They had tried to revive her but hadn't been able to and now Lily was gone.
For several seconds, Blake couldn't breathe. He stared at the doctor, waiting for him to correct himself. To say there had been a mistake. To tell him that Lily was still in surgery, that there was still something they could do but the doctor lowered his eyes and Connie broke, her sob tore through the room, raw and desperate. Blake turned towards her, but when he tried to move, his knees buckled.
He caught himself against the wall.
"No," he whispered.
The word barely made a sound as he slid down until he was sitting on the floor, his hands covering his face.
He had faced gunfire. He had run into burning buildings. He had stood in the middle of a storm powerful enough to tear apart a city street.
None of it had prepared him for this.
He couldn't save her, he couldn't save his little girl and for the first time since the storm had answered his rage, Blake wished with every fibre of his being that he had never possessed a single ounce of power.
He didn't remember how long he stayed on the floor. At some point, Connie had knelt beside him. Her arms wrapped around his shoulders, and he leaned into her, his face pressed against her neck but neither of them spoke.
There were no words that could make this better. No reassurance that could soften the edges of what had happened. No promise that could bring Lily back.
Eventually, a nurse came to tell them they could spend some time with their daughter.
Blake rose slowly, his legs felt weak, his body strangely disconnected from him. He followed Connie into Lily's room, where the machines had been silenced and the ventilator removed.
The room was quieter now.
Too quiet.
Blake approached the bed and sat beside her, taking her hand once more, it was still warm.
He stared at her for a long time, trying to understand how someone who had filled his entire world with so much life could now lie so still.
He brushed a strand of hair from her forehead.
"Hey, sweetheart."
His voice was barely audible.
"I'm here."
He swallowed hard.
"I'm sorry."
The words came out before he could stop them.
"I'm so, so sorry."
His shoulders began to shake.
"I should've been faster. I should've got you out. I should've—"
He stopped, unable to finish.
There was no end to the things he could blame himself for. Every second before the attack. Every decision. Every year he'd spent hiding from his own abilities. He had spent twelve years terrified of what he might do if he ever lost control, he had never considered that all that fear, all that restraint, might still not be enough to protect the people he loved.
He bent forward and pressed a trembling kiss to Lily's forehead.
"I love you," he whispered. "Daddy loves you."
The city could be seen from the window in Lily's room, it was damp and cold beneath a low ceiling of cloud. Traffic moved through the streets, people hurried past, and somewhere nearby, a siren wailed.
The world had continued.
Blake couldn't understand how and for one moment, he couldn't move.
He thought of Lily's birthday party.
The pancakes.
The promise he'd made.
A tear slipped down his cheek, and he wiped it away with the heel of his free hand. It made no difference. Another followed.
He looked up at the sky through the window. He could feel the atmosphere above him, the faint pressure of the clouds, the moisture suspended in the air. His powers stirred in response to the grief that had hollowed him out and for a brief, terrible moment, he wanted to unleash them again, to make the sky scream as loudly as he wanted to but instead, he closed his eyes.
Blake Hayes had spent twelve years afraid of what he might become if he ever let go.
Now, with Lily gone, he was terrified of what remained.
And somewhere above Manhattan, beyond the low grey clouds, the last remnants of the storm drifted away.
TO BE CONTINUED...
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