Down below, Clive, Kendul, and Marcton sat huddled near each other underground, waiting to die. When the first nuke hit, they were vaporized instantly.
The mushroom cloud rose up, engulfing Henry’s legs.
At about forty thousand feet, the tiny dead people in his hands forgotten, the worldchanging machine known as Henry Kyllo dropped his arms to his sides and opened his hands. Faye’s and Milo’s bodies tumbled down, down through the night sky. Swallowed up by the devastation below.
Henry rose up and expanded into the stratosphere still.
Fifty thousand. Eighty thousand. A hundred thousand feet.
Henry looked around him at this height, saw the curvature of the world. And it seemed very, very small to him.
Small and worthless.
Henry grew more, out into space.
Beyond the moon.
Beyond the sun.
Beyond the solar system.
He grew and grew until the universe knew nothing but Him.