The voice was small. Broken. Barely audible above the screams of the dying adults.
But Anya heard it.
She turned, and her laughter died in her throat.
Mika was looking at her.
He was barely recognizable. Half his body was gone—torn away by the adults' teeth.
His nose was missing. His lips were gone. His scalp had been ripped from his skull.
His chest itself was an open cavity, his ribs visible through the torn flesh, his organs exposed to the air.
His left arm and right leg had been completely consumed, and what remained of his other limbs had been stripped to the bone.
He should have been dead. By any rational measure, he was dead.
But his eyes were open and...he was smiling.
He didn't have lips anymore, so the smile was more of a suggestion than an expression.
But Anya had spent her whole life learning to read Mika's face, and she could see it clearly. He was smiling at her. Even now. Even after everything.
