Connection: Chapter 4

Consciousness returned slowly, imperceptibly. A dull throbbing headache kept syncopation with his pulse. The wind tickled his face. He lifted his head an inch and then relaxed the neck muscles again. The back of his head was wet. He reached to touch it, but his arms refused the signal from his brain. Somehow he was still alive. He urged his unwilling body to move. No luck. He opened his eyes. The voluminous dark sky was visible through the heavy snow. A flake went in his eye. Snow! The snow saved my life. But how? Even snow couldn't cushion a drop from that distance. He summoned his strength and succeeded in rolling sideways. All around him banks of white sloped upwards. Although pain crisscrossed his lower back in intricate patterns he sat up. What in the name of...? A narrow strip of snow ended in black nothingness on both sides. When he raised himself further, he understood. He had fallen directly onto the slab roof of the skywalk, six stories above ground.

Exposure to the icy weather was taking its toll. The main priority was to get back inside the building. It struck him as mildly ironic that he was in danger of both burning and freezing to death. He stood up. His eye caught a shiny plate almost in the middle of the bridge. Maybe it's a service hatch or something. He trudged towards it and knocked off the snow. It was his laptop, apparently undamaged. Continuing in the direction of the South Tower, he found himself in front of a glass window on the seventh floor. He had sacrificed his laptop in the heat of the moment, but he would not do it again. Stuck seventy feet up, he jogged back to the small crater his impact had made and picked up the severed fire hose. His legs ached as he ran. With one end firmly in his hand, he whirled the solid steel tip over his body like a cowboy and hurled it through the dark window.