Dazed in the wake of the overwhelming singularity we had triggered, we once again found ourselves thrust back into reality and the terrible cauldron of fire that our actions had wrought. With echoes of the eruption still shrieking in our blasted eardrums, the very structure in which we now stood seemed to buckle and heave as though it were gasping for life itself, spitting a hideous rain of brimstone as fiery penance for our blasphemies.

Each collision tore sheets from the gantry beneath us, shearing steel in a flurry of white-hot embers. The flames rose to lick at us, speeding our heels as we first glimpsed it through the wilting haze – a tumbling arc of sentient fire, wheeling in place as it forged a terrible momentum. It seemed to fix us in its sights. It spun once. Twice. And then it was upon us.