A Peculiar Time in 1944 - A Millard Fanfic (Miss Peregrine's Home) #wattys2020

Chapter 95

"I'm the one who should be thanking you." {Miss Alma Lefay Peregrine, pg 433 book 3}

"Let's be on our way." Miss Peregrine said taking Claire's hand and leading them away, "We don't want to be here fifty four seconds from now!" In spite of their exhaustion they ran, pushed faster by the giant shadow that fell over them as Caul grew nearer and the crack widened. They rushed through the door that led back to Caul's tower, but the loops shaking had begun to weaken the structure.

"We have to escape the tower." Miss Peregrine said.

"We're too high!" cried Miss Wren, "We'll never make it to the bottom in time."

"There's an open deck above us." Jake pointed out.

"We'll jump!" Emma shouted heading for the deck. "I can float us, I'm strong enough!"

The tower rocked and ceiling tiles crashed down around them as cracks spidered through the floor. They ran up the sloping hallway, then out into open air and what remained of the day. They were so high that below them they could see the entire span of Devil's Acre, the black tinders of Smoking Street, then further off the Ditch snaking along the loop's edge like a ring of scum. One by one the ymbrynes turned into birds ready to help however they could. Emma grabbed the rail tightly and Jake helped remove her big clunky shoes then he grabbed onto her feet, Horace grabbed his, Olive next, then Enoch, then Aurora, Millard and Nim and Perplexus, Hugh followed after with Claire then the twins then Joel-Peter, then Melina. Addison and Mira were taking up the end each one dangling off Melina's feet. Emma let go of the rail and began to float them up into the sky, they didn't move too quickly so Miss Peregrine in her falcon form hooked her talons through the back of Emma's dress and lifted as best she could. The other ymbrynes hooked onto clothes here and there and flapped furiously adding whatever lift they could. Addison and Mira's paws had just left the tower when the shaking had become too much and it began to crumble. It happened quickly, collapsing in on itself, the top section seeming to implode as if it had been sucked into the collapsing loop. After that the rest tumbled down in a huge cloud of dust and debris, the sound like a million bricks being poured into a quarry. Then they were all falling slowly as their weight and the ymbrynes exhaustion brought them down to the ground. They landed softly away from the wreckage touching down in the courtyard. Emma fell and rolled onto her back breathing like she'd just ran a marathon, Jake holding her so she wouldn't float away, then her eyes got big and she pointed up.

"Look!" In the air behind them where the top of the tower had been spun a small vortex of shimmering silver like a miniature hurricane. It was the last of the collapsing loop and they all watched almost hypnotized as it shrank spinning faster and faster. When it became too small to see one last sound echoed from it.

"ALMAAAAAAAAA. . . . " and then the whirlwind winded out sucking Caul's voice away with it.

AURORA POV

After the loop collapsed and the tower fell there was still chaos all around and work to be done. So the ymbrynes, despite their bruises, exhaustion and sprains set to work doing what ymbrynes do best – create order. The compound was searched for hidden wights, Sharon and his brothers were recruited to create a makeshift jail for them and happily got to work singing while they hammered. The wights prisons and laboratories were emptied and their machines of terror smashed. The subjects of their experiments were brought out into the open and attended to. Aurora did all she could, trying to use her gift sparingly not only to be sure she had enough to help all but to also calm Millard who hovered just behind her nervously. Dozens more peculiars were freed from another cell block , some who emerged in a daze while others couldn't stop thanking those who had saved them. It was impossible not to be affected by it as Aurora tended to a little girl maybe a year older than Claire who had tears streaming down her face making clear trails through the grime on her face as she kept saying gratefully, "You don't know what you did. You don't know."