9 Days Before

The cityscape bustled with shimmering lights, threads of rain pattering on the structure from their impact.

Vehicles of all types swarm the city streets, waving pools of water onto the sidewalks, flowering up on walking pedestrians holding up their umbrellas, while others hold up suit-cases for a sense of shelter as they scatter into buildings.

Construction workers buzz with efficiency as the rain combusts on their yellow safety helmets.

Within neighboring buildings, civilians hum with life, going about their nightly routine: playing games, reading books, watching television, or settling down for bed.

In a particularly large apartment building, the resident shifts through channels, landing on the news advising the storm's category, without much interest—they switch the channel; playing a movie.

They flop on their couch, getting comfortable as the rain pelts their large glass window towards the left of them, making a series of lines as the raindrops skid down.

Outside; the Tower sits in silence with the ambient pattering of rain, surrounding it with a veil of mystery, any individual peering at its silhouette could concur.

Within the tower, Eve works diligently on the project that her fever dream had instructed, hypnotically fixated with it, being detached from reality around her.

Deeper into the Tower, patients alike sit in an eerie silence engulfed by darkness—their eyes peeled open as they stare catatonically in the open darkness, seemingly lost within distant thoughts.

Panning outside, the storm shapes; intracloud lightning sheets the city with its illumination. The buildings shimmer, sparkling a rough reflection of the bolts, muffled thunder within the clouds stretches towards the landscape after the rolling lightning tails its end and another begins.

Cloud-to-cloud lightning swells, emitting a thunderbolt crashing down towards a rod on a building's rooftop, bursting with a loud crackle.

Rain accumulates to a rough downpour, the city sidewalks become bare, having citizens sheltering in their homes or supportive residences.

In the construction zone, workers are tagged to continue their business despite the growing storm, leaving a sense of frustration in their chest, accompanying grim expressions.

One of them stops to peer at the glowing clouds rippling with illumination, admiring one of nature's brutal beauties.

The worker squints their eyes, having a sort of haze to them—feeling a small lingering dread around them, they shake it off as one of their co-workers tugs at their shoulder bringing them back to work.

"It's annoying that we have to work in this weather!" The other man yells over the roar of rain.

"Just gotta suck it up new guy!" A crossing co-worker comes with more equipment, bringing its contents to a lift.

The new-comer sighs and keeps the rest of his complaints to himself, carrying on with their work.

Behind the flowing crew, a collection of intracloud lightning reverberates through the darkened sky, its colliding light displays distant trees of the forest.

Illumination frames a worsening concealment over the foliage with its thinner sheeted clouds spiriting over the city.

The trembling intracloud lightning priests, with flickers of bolts grasping onto the horizon.

Within the forest, there's a sickening pressure of lightning causing the surrounding area to be blanketed with its light, mimicking the portrait of sunlight.

Bolts hit the ground, projecting dirt particles into the air, the strike's crackle vibrates through the trees.

Moments of silence struck the area, yet lightning continues to turmoil above—not even the echoes of raindrops can be heard.

Away from the forest, sits an aggravated Sameria; Shifting through paperwork, eyeing glimmering television screens detailing information about the current storm, and aggressively barking orders through her communication devices.

The tension gets torn by an erupting power outage, expanding throughout the city; Sameria and others around continue to be solidified into the dark while parts of the city flicker back on.

Sameria and the others around her pursue the plan to get their power rolling again.

Inside the facility deep underground, the electronic equipment within the watching post observing over the shrouded figure pulsates—reflecting the power outages that are happening on ground level.

The mimicking sun flooding into the room puts up a fight to stay on, causing the covered individual to turn their head towards the flickering spot light, the lights pitches staining the engulfing fabric over their face.

From a co-worker's panic, they race out of the room to the generator room that has a collection pressed up against the walls.

Turning the closest one on, he looks up seeing the lights and equipment start to hum with life, letting out a sigh of relief as he strolls back into the project room.

Once inside the room, he sees his partner taking notes of the figures' reaction towards the occurrence.

Back on ground level, the city's newscast updates civilians about the power outages, predicting that there will be more to come as the storm's lifespan rages on.

Citizens within their homes lay out candles to prepare; meanwhile the working crew has dwindled to half of its members, having them being issued to take their leave, while those who stayed being rewarded with extra pay as they continue their labor with a generator to keep the flow at a steady pace.

Nearby neighbors without backup generators proceed to place candles for the next power-cut to emerge.

With one of the neighboring homes sanctuarying a family, wondering if this storm will last all night as the news stations keep information about the storm mildly; only covering the circus of power outages and the category - everything else remains up in the air.

The father of the family considers the floating information to be rather peculiar, having the experience of other storms logistics being more fomented than this current one; as he thinks about this in motion of gently laying down candles in their kitchen, a phantom memory lapse with his current divergence.

Flooding of information about a particular storm, placed at the seams between four days ago; a harsh violent storm stagnated life within it as well around it.

Before the father could emerge himself into the memory, a root of lightning came crackling down, hitting nearby, it's deafening boom caused him to jump, startling him from his daze, dwelling about the figmented memory.

He had fumbled a candle, knocking it to the ground from the sudden fright, the quaking crackle bringing him back, dispelling the memory no more than a fictional scene off of a T.V show as he resumes his task.

Lightning outside swells within the skies, substituting the city's light source with blues and purples, with parts of flashes intertwining the two colors, accompanying a balance of white to its canvas that is the city.

The family's power struggles to stay on, as the dancing lights waltz within their house, painting the interior with its brush, expanding the lightning's portrait into the safety of the family's home; watching them in silence.

Their children convert into the living room with the mother, having the oldest amongst them gravitating towards the father; he watches his father pan his vision around the room, following the awe of dark pastel illumination from the lightning to outside.

He approaches his father cautiously, observing his movements; pinching the kitchen blinds open, "take a look at this…" His father, William; perks his head slightly upward to get a better view before he pitches his vision towards his son, Vermil; beckoning him with a casual gesture.

Vermil treads lightly towards him, lifting himself up onto the counter; William allows this to be the only time he can 'counter surf' so he can get a better picture of the lightning's orchestra.

Vermil expands the blinds, fitting his vision perfectly between them, Vermil's gaze pans the deserted neighborhood as his eyes dazzle with the reflection of the lightning's expeditious choreography.

"You see that?" Williams' astonishment brings his son to peek up at the clouds, seeing the master of the illumination's puppet strings, his dad awestruck as the both of them watch the body of lightning puppeteering the ballet underneath.

Vermil shares the breathtaking performance with his father, the two are glued to the spot.

From the side of them; outside the small cut out section that leads to the living room, William's wife, Millie, gently strolls into the kitchen with their daughter Hailey that's clinging onto her knitted sweater.

"I guess we don't need the candles…" Millie's soft spoken voice whispers into the silent kitchen, William drifts his attention onto his wife, his expression still stricken with awe. "I guess not" his mouth morphing into a gentle smile, Millie embraces a comforting warmness, sharing a smile with her husband.

"Hey—do we still have that old recorder still laying around?" William keeps the smile, mixing it with an idea to record the storm, casually giving Millie a soft finger gun point.

"Yeah, I believe it's still upstairs in our closet" she says with a whispering conformation, the smell of ionization drifts into the kitchen, Vermil and Hailey also take notice of the clutching ionized air.

"Hey dad, what's that smell?" Vermil raises the question, Hailey looking up at her mother with the same bewildering question.

Millie looks down at her with a mothers smile and lifts her up off of her feet, carrying her with supporting arms.

"That, I believe is the air being ionized by the lightning" William answers the question, looking at his wife for approval, she nods her head, confirming he has gotten it right—for the most part.

"Did we close the bedroom window, Hun?" He says with a speculating glance, Millie darts her eyes to the upper left then towards the upper right.

"I don't think we did, I'll go check right now—and while we're at it we can get the recorder from the closet." Millie widens her eyes, thinking that the rain had spelled its way inside, then changing her expression to a lighter manner, looking at Hailey as she continues onto the previous question with a change of tone towards her voice.

"I'll get some extra blankets from storage so we can cuddle up in the living room" William and Millie exchange an expression Vermil has only seen when the two of them are brewing up something exciting—such as the time they went on a trip to one of the most popular amusement parks.

He thinks to himself that they could be building some kind of blanket fortress to lighten the tension of the storm outside, no matter how astonishing it was—it was still cradling an ominous tone.

Millie adventures upstairs, holding Hailey as she goes.

She reaches the upstairs master bedroom, seeing the window that's next to their fine established bed basking in the lightning disposition, its sheets and blankets comfortably made.

Millie slowly strolls towards the open window, getting a good whiff of the ionized gasses outside; to her vision, she sees tiny dark specks spewing inside. When she reaches the window to close it, the particles dissipate, making her question what she saw.

With the strong odor of ionization, she closes the window, blocking the dense gasses from getting inside.

"Momma, did you see those dark dots?!" Hailey had asked, pointing her vision around to capture more within her sight.

"I think it was just the lights playing tricks on our eyes" Millie answers the question, smiling at Hailey as she turns around to grab the recorder from the closet.

Reaching the closet door, she slides it with her open hand. Creating a tumbling of noises as the door connects to the other end, skidding her hand on the closest wall of the closet—finding the light switch with a gentle reach.

The closet lights flicker, illustrating the contents inside with a warm hue.

"At least it's working." she mutters to herself, Hailey perking her head towards her mother from looking around, attempting to understand what she said.

Millie squats down, gently laying Hailey onto her feet to begin foraging for the recorder. Hailey does a soft stride away from her mother to curiously examine the lightning exhibition, watching it with sparked eyes of awestruck.

The mother lifts up some boxes, scourging inside of the ones she had placed beside her, moving objects while pulling out others to get better insight if the recorder is within.

However her search is uneventful—unable to find the electronics, she perks up from kneeling down, taking her scrummage towards the shelf above.

With out-reached panning hands, her right searching hand bumps into a box, with a gasp of excitement, she picks the box up, stabilizing herself by her tippy-toes, bringing it down with a small grunt.

The box sat comfortably in her hands after Millie skidded her fingertips across them, gently exercising it.

She huddles towards their bed, placing the box on the nicely fitted sheets.

Portrait from the lightning grasps her vision, bringing her to glimpse towards the window — seeing her daughter struck with a paralyzing posture, her head peering upwards, observing the lightning's pictorial coil with dedication, unseen from Millie's perspective.

"Sweaty?" She silkily says, panning her vision downward to open the box for a moment before taking it towards Hailey once more, Millie forms concern, her forehead creasing. "Hun?" Her captivating worry lifts her from the box, making her step softly towards her immobilized daughter.

The air within the room thickens with a sense of otherworldly eeriness, mystifying the sudden tension. "Hey" Millie says sweatenedly, touching Hailey's shoulder, the unobserving lights from the closet softly mimic fluctuating morse-code, bathing a surreal pale at the entrance.

Millie inched her perception closer towards her daughter's face, trying to gather Hailey's attention, but she continued to stare deeply at the lightning's 'atilogwu', her astonished eyes reflecting its complicated dance.

"Hailey, sweaty.." Her mothers concerned voice was singing with a speck of fear, giving her a soft jerk.

Lightning's illuminations varnish their complexion.

The mimicry of morse code moderately changes into a different oscillate, forming a new structure of cryptography, taking on an aura of wanting to communicate. Although the mother is occupied with bring her daughter back to reality.

With a ghastly movement, Hailey turns her head slowly towards Millie—keeping the doll-like expression.

"Mom…they're trying to talk to me." She says calmly . Millie furled her brow in response, "Who is." Saying inquisitively

Hailey breaks her emotionless gaze, trying to recollect on the experience, wanting to tell her mother but she can't convey the communication of an unknown language, with flustering emotions, she starts crying.

Millie picks Hailey up with a mothers worry, patting her daughter's back, perplexity took hold of her, cycling through the unnerving experience; her daughter facing the pitching hue of the closet light.

Seeing it, her cries softened, curiosity replaced the emotion, her mother doing a series of gentle bounces, trying to comfort her.

Having thoughts boiling, Millie looked up–trying to see what her daughter was freakishly memorized about; her eye caught a swelling of collected lightning bolts known as 'spider lightning', reverberating in a singular spot.

Ghostmarks ripple her skin, putting her patting motion on Hailey to a halt, she feels the nap of her neck with a freed hand, feeling no disturbance that goosebumps cause; A numbing atmosphere sheathes her.

The soft beating light from the closet, echoes a conjunction of characteristics. It's fluctuations seemingly knowing that Hailey is observing, she sees a change towards it pitched into a desperate state.

Hailey stops biting her fingernails, "Momma"

"Momma.." She repeats softly.

"Yes dear?" Millie stops the gentle bounces again, having an ear on her daughter's words, "lights." She simply states, pointing towards the transmitting bulbs.

Millie glances over her shoulder, observing her daughter's arm lifting up; she pivots around to face the cryptographic lights. Her daughter twists herself around, accompanying her mothers inspection.

The bulbs halt their tone, shifting back into gentle cryptography.

She gently strolls towards the closet, seeing its fluctuating dance through the gaps of the door; bathing their carpeted floor with a soft warmth.

Upon getting closer to the opening, she leans to peak at the bulbs.

Millie scoots herself towards the bed, looking down to avoid the cluttered mess from her search, she gazes back up; the speaking lights captivate her intrigued mind.

Hailey and her mother both drift off, a faint voice can be heard within the distant background of their psyche.

Her intrigue brings her closer to the lights, the voice pinches its volume, but it's still unintelligible.

"Hun!?" Millie flinches in concert with Williams voice breaking their sirens dazed; looking over towards the hallway - "Did you find the recorder!?" His alluring voice, booming towards their bedroom.

Millie looks over at the bed, seeing the box with the tape recorder - "yeah, I'm bringing it downstairs right now!" Her daze, faintly shadowing behind her.

Millie takes a moment to glance back at the lights, bemused, seeing them cast a solid warm ray.

She double blinks, escaping the event in the belief that it was just her, but her daughter is still focused on the lights, Millie treads to the recorder, picking it up from within its container and heads towards downstairs.

"What about the lights?" Hailey was still curious, "Don't mind the lights, sweaty." Her mother responds, taking their stride down the flight of stairs.

"It was probably just the storm." She finishes, the two continue their wobble down the flight.

"Ah, thanks Hun." William comes up to them, seeing Hailey's invested gaze looking up the stairs; Millie hands him the tape recorder.

"Something up?" He ponders, pointing towards their daughter's fascination.

"Oh, she's just curious about the lights circuiting" she waves off their experience, William darts his vision to the both of them before strolling towards the blanket fortress.

"Hey, what do you say about joining your brother and father?" She leads Hailey towards the fortress.

After losing connection to the upstairs, Hailey looks over at the blanket fortress and gasps.

"Yeah, why don't you, go in there and enjoy what your dad set up for you two." Millie places Hailey on her feet, tucking her left bang in-between her ear; Hailey nods, then giggles as she strolls off into the fortress's entrance.

Millie smiles as she watches her daughter enter the fortress, leaving the incident behind them; she walks over to the living room mirror, seeing her husband recording the sky.

"Just look at this." He whispers, having a sixth sense that Millie is behind him; she gently places both hands on his shoulder, giving it a gentle massage.

"I've never seen anything like this before." He astonishes, taking a glance at his wife; his delight showing on his face.

"Gotta see it." His finger tapped on the glass, pointing towards the sky.

Millie inches closer to him, then hunches forward, seeing the brilliant performance; although it is astonishing, she can't get over the feeling like their being watched in every angle imaginable - a swathe of gazes.

In the same motion of her tearing her gaze from the sight, thunder centipedes across the skies.

"What is that, the second time we heard thunder throughout this storm?" He questions, placing the recorder onto a furniture piece - keeping its gaze towards the skies.

Millie's dermis trembles, causing her to shrug her shoulders; crawling goose-flesh slowly travels its way up her spine, creeping up towards the middle section of her nap.

William stops his excitement, worried about Millie's sudden motions.

"Are you having an episode - do I need to go get the medication?" Before he could comfort her, his wife took a step back, hunching over with her arms folded.

"No…no, I'll be okay - just.." she closes her eyes, trying to find order. "I just think, " she looks at her husband's eyes, who's detailing every bit of her – trying to see a resolve.

"I'm sorry - I'm going to go sit on the sofa, cuddle up a bit." Millie laces over the issue, passing her worried husband.

"Alright, just let me know if you need anything - I'll come straight away." William looks at her passing figure, seeing her lightly treading towards the sofa.

William sighs, his face still yearns with worry.

He goes over to the recorder; inspecting the time lapse, seeing it within a healthy frame-rate, it brings him a tinge of joy into his concerns.

Taking another glance at the skies – the lightning's concert is still at high, his captivation still proceeds, wondering if he's recording a record breaking storm.

Over at the sofa, Millie's ears muffle their children's voices, locking her into another daze, she instinctively bites at her finger nails, feeling the goose-flesh twitching at the nap.

With hypnotic eyes, she halts her habits to feel her neck, in correlation to her touch, the dusk living room begins to fill with the same pitched particles Hailey and her have seen upstairs.

Millie jolts up, but everything around her emerged with the particles, casting dark fog.

Her head quivers, feeling the goosebumps quake towards her checks; her breath deepens, resembling cold shock.

Millie's muscles expand, her fingers stretching - locking into position.

Faint footsteps from the upstairs escalate down, with every patter the volume rises. In moments the taps of feet spot behind her frozen frame - the cold shock reintroduces itself.

Sirens begin to howl down the street.

Millie gasps for air, frantically looking around the living room, she's back to sitting down on the sofa, she pans her vision around again, seeing everything back to normal; the muffled voices of her children become clear.

Her breath steadily relaxes as she twists herself around towards the entrance of the flight of stairs, seeing its darkened complexion.

{●}

Chandra escaped upstairs, her curiosity driving her to explore the building; leaving the huddled pair downstairs on their nest of sleeping bags.

Adventuring the hallway, she notices the rooms closer to the stairs had been abandoned in a rush, scanning them with detailed eyes.

She lingers over towards the room wrapped in paint, scanning it top to bottom; completely polished.

Chandra folds her brow, giving the illustrated room a curious gaze. " this explains why," she says aloud, gently touching the glass, recalling Mivel's pants printing splotches of paint.

She does an attempt to peak her inquisitive gaze into the room, trying to see why he had obstructed the view.

In moments of nearly getting a peak-able viewpoint, a scream jolts through the empty building, making its way upstairs. Chandra snaps her view towards the stairs, a faint echo of Mivel reaches her beyond the shadowed flight.

Chandra tears her curiosity from the painted room, making her way through the upstairs corridor to enter downstairs.

Another frantic scream reverberates into her ears, following a yell from Mivel saying her name.

She forms her pace into a jog.

Reaching the stairs the voices of the two voices become crystal; Chandra scales downstairs.

"Rin! - Rin!" Mivel says repetitively, "Rin - wake up!" Chandra reaches the nest, seeing Mivel shaking Rin as he repeats her name.

Chandra places her feet onto the clumped sleeping bags; creating lines of indentations, Mivel takes his frantic posture and beams it towards Chandra, "I don't know what to do - she won't wake up!" His eyes convey urgency.

She gets within arms length of the two, Rins breathing is heavy - her complexion sweating feverishly.

"She just wanted to get some sleep!" His chords quaking, his recollection drifting towards the nightmare she had told him about.

Chandra puts up her palm, stopping Mivel "it's okay, we'll figure this out."

Her gaze scans Rin's fever, seeing her closed eyes tightening, Rin's head shakes, "No!, No!" Chandra takes her posture back, simultaneously, Rin's hand flings towards hers; gripping it tightly.

Chandra can feel the clamminess of her tightening hand around her wrist, "it's okay" she says softly, attempting to place her free hand on Rin.

Rin jolts up, her eyes flinging up; she frantically looks around the room - her hand still clutching onto Chandra's wrist.

"Rin!" Mivel shouts, wanting to comfort her but Chandra steps in - giving him another opened palm.

Mivel looks at Chandra with discern, "let her come back." She simply states to him.

Rin's breathing steadies, she takes a moment to look at them both; her epidermis pale as the moon, her eyes widened with fear.

Her gaze drifts down towards the sleeping bag.

Lightning drums across the ceiling, snapping Rin's view up in a frantic state.

"What's going on?" Chandra says softly, almost sounding like their school counselor.

Rin takes her gaze, peering it into Chandra's eyes. "I had another one…" she looks over at Mivel, whose eyes widen in response.

"Another, what?" Chandra inquires, keeping the therapist's tone.

Mivel brings his recollection into words, "Another night terror." He points his gaze up towards Chandra; intensity marking his face.

"It was different this time, but - " Rin chokes up, releasing her grip on Chandra's wrist to swipe away, forming tears. Chandra lightly places her hand on her thigh.

Rin brings her hands down; her vision to a distant haze. "There was snow, lots of snow…people were shoulder-to-shoulder." Her vision formed into the terror she experienced.

Chandra's left eye squints, recalling something familiar with Dealix, who she still wants to find.

"There were these large gray structures" Rin shakes her head, closing her eyes from the image, but the imagery persists.

Her eyes reopening, staring at Chandra "it was so - so….cold - but, my - but I, just stood there" She struggles with the words - her eyes drifts down into haze "I heard cries of pains, but - I just couldn't do anything…it was this sort of, numbness."

Lightning bursts outside, its deafening crack elongated in the empty room; in reaction, Rin starts to shiver, Chandra scans her trembling body, taking off her coat, she wraps it around her quaking frame.

"When I was able to - able to gather strength, I saw…everyone gathered in a circled formation; cradled by the structure…and when I heard the cries repeat that's when I heard - saw lightning arching off of these domed walls..." She motions the curvature with a hypnotic spell.

Chandra darts her vision towards the lower right, recalling the details; it was Dealix's story he had written for a class creative writing assignment, dating a few weeks back before all this had happened.

"Was there a person in the very middle…" her recollection slipping out within soft hushes, Rin's distant gaze shifts towards Chandra.

"Yes… " Rin observes the other piece to the experience, "that's where the cries were coming from…" She looks down, " it was the boy…” trying to find the name, but it’s lost within a dark clouded section of her mind.

Her face crunched in effort to remember.

Chandra looks to the side, her inner eye reading Dealix's story, then shifts towards the incident with Korith, wondering if it all connects, wondering if it's the same boy.

{●}

Clysita, and the rest of the crew vagabonded back towards their objective, dropping their two guests along with half of their equipment behind for the remainder of the mission, it was imperative for them.

Their objective; classified archives holding up in a different Tower.

Ael pushes forward towards Clysita, who's guiding the rest of the way. "How far are we?" He muffles to the side of her, side eyeing the device.

"three kilometers, if we stay on this route." She tears her gaze from the device, looking up at the silhouettes of buildings, the storm above painting clarity of the frontal horizon.

Aelive nods, taking his gaze up towards the orchestrated clouds above, "you think we'll make it before the rain drops down on us again?" He scans the rave above him, leading his vision towards the marker.

Lightning spiders on the underside of the clouds, connecting a bolt towards an outlet. "It's rather quiet…" he makes the remark, feeling the itch of ominous residue.

"If we keep the pace we're going we'll be caught, but if we hurry, I think we could make it." Clyista arranging her focus between Ael and the device.

Aelive pivots to the rest of the group, giving them a gesture to speed up their pace, the members remove their sluggish walk, gradually catching up with the two.

"Once we get there, we'll split up, if it's like the others, the corridors will be big." Her pace going faster, the little display of numbers inching down on the device's tiny screen.

Aelive does a confirming nod, picking up his pace as well, "have you noticed the streets are empty?" His voice oscillated from the momentum.

"Probably from the storm, they issued an alert for it - so I wouldn't be surprised." Clysita darts her vision towards her device from looking ahead, she does a series of taps on the smooth screen.

"Okay, but what about the guards?" Aelive scanning the streets, seeing the lack of presence. Clysita pans her view back and around, noting that he's right - there does seem to be an absence of tower guards roaming the streets compared to earlier.

Tower guards are known to stick through patrol even during alerts.

"I can see how that can be a concern, but right now it's helping us." Clysita reaches in her pocket, pulling out another device. "Here, use this once we get there." She hands the device to Ael, he looks at it. " trackers?" Clysita nods.

"It'll help us mark escape routes," she pauses, turning down an alley way. "What I want you and the rest, is to go along the sides, place the trackers on any route you deem as an escape." She says gesturing.

"Why can't I go in there with you?" He debates, Clysita stops, having him back track to face her, "because I can trust you to lead the others while I'm gone." She points towards the tail, "and plus I wouldn't know what to do if we got caught" Aelive, shifts his stances, looking at the upper left.

"We'll do what we always do." He says looking back towards her, his face in a deep inquiry.

"This is different." Without letting Aelive to discuss further, she enters her pace again, Aelive looks down at the wet cement, his eyes squinting of annoyance. With an exhale he follows right behind her.

"Why does she always have to do this alone?" He mutters to himself, catching up with her.

With a few turns and twists, they've made it back onto the streets. Having a straight shot towards the Tower, Clysita readies herself, doing a few hand exercises as they walk.

Aelive stays quiet, noticing the tinge of her nervousness, he wants to speak up, but he's sure Clysita won't listen.

She has made up her mind, and once she's done that, good luck getting through to her, even if it could possibly help her out in the long run, but that could only be inside his head.

Aelive dips his gaze towards the trackers, having an idea that comes to mind. He takes one of them; popping them out from their little nooks, he takes out his own device and sets a corresponding signal to one another, then sneakily plants it on Clysita.

Just in case… His concern for her reaches out, planning against any unfavorable odds that'll come

As they walk the sidewalk, the silhouette of the Tower becomes larger, entailing that they're getting closer by the minute.

Aelive brings the case holding the trackers to his back pocket, firmly placing them inside.

He does a swift jog, catching up with Clyista, reaching the tower that was imminent for them. The Tower grows larger than before, just within 2 kilometers and they'll reach the sky scraping Tower.

Its resounding size creates a thick atmosphere on their objective.

Clysita has worked undercover inside one of the Towers, but the vague feeling of being swallowed by something far greater than her was still present within her mind, she lets out a deep accumulated exhale.

Aelive sighs inside, wishing that he could accompany her within the Tower, maybe then she would feel less stressed, however she doesn't want anything bad happening to him, but that's impractical - given the fact he just went undercover to investigate their process towards patients; what he now understands are "blanked" projects.

He would have gotten closer to finding out more information, but seeing the lifeless treatment had his skin boiling.

He darts a look at Clysita, her focus strong on her plans within her mind's eye as she watches the expanding silhouette of the Tower.

Maybe there's something else; something other than them being caught while digging through their archives - an unknown article that she's keeping from him, or maybe he's digging at a substance that isn't there.

One of the team members behind them, Siol catches up with the two. "You, Aelive, and Dimer will set trackers along any deeming escape routes while I'm in there." Clysita looks at Siol, then pans her gaze back towards the Tower.

"Then what." Siol does a slight shake of his head, closing his eyes softly to picture the scene.

"After that, you'll impersonate a guard - try to figure out where they went." Aelive, does a quiver of a glare; Siol confirms his order with a nod.

"Aelive, you can accompany him. Radio me with any details you can scavenge" Ael does a rough nod, "I'm not sure I'm right for the job - they already know my face." Clysita peers her eyes to the upper right, thinking about the valid point.

Clysita's device shivers in her pocket, she takes it out - 1 meter, is displayed within the ethereal screen. She does a series of tacs on the screen, communicating with it; within the silent conversation the device hums bringing detailed blueprints of the Tower, along with any other information that might be useful.

"See, you don't need us to put trackers" Clysita looks over at Siol, seeing him give a slight smirk. "Its better to be over prepared" She simply states back to him.

"Plus, eyes on the ground can see details the other cannot" Clysita raises the device up and gives it a little shake; displaying the screen.

Aelive looks over at Siol, who's smirk had turned into a frown of some kind. Siol shrugs and agrees with what she said, "Ael, hand me my set" he opens his palm towards him.

Ael reaches for his back pocket; pulling out the trackers, Siol notices that one is missing, but dismisses it immediately. His palm gets filled with his set of trackers, gently covers them; putting them inside his jacket pocket.

Dimer catches up with the group, Clysita informs him of the plan while Aelive hands him his trackers.

The Tower's frame reflects the cryptography of the lightning's illumination overhead; the group looks up at the darkened Giant, preparing themselves for the plan. Clysita does a recap, having everyone listening intently.

After the recap, the group nods and goes their designated route. Before Aelive does the same, he places his hand on Clysita's shoulder, she turns around - his eyes steadily gazing into her eyes.

"Be careful - if anything happens, bring yourself first." He lays his hand off of her shoulder, continuing down his path before Clysita can make another remark on how she'll be fine and that she's done this before.

Clysita takes a deep breath, letting it out as she enters the Tower from a panel.

Lightning batters off to the side, recoiling like a giant serpent within the ocean; watching the crew unfold within observable silence.

Clysita breaches the other end with a kick towards the panel, entering a corridor within the Towers body.

Her hands grip the entrance, pulling herself forward; her head poking out from within the shadows. Clysita darts her vision left-to-right before exiting the small opening.

Her feet echoing through the dusked, empty corridors.

She does a final look around before crouch walking to her marked location, she grips the side of the wall, removing herself from view.

Pressed up against the wall, she takes her device out - its surreal gaze basking her with a blue tinted glow. The map swivels towards the route she needs to make, marking it with a red pin-dot, removing the previous one in response towards her progression.

Clysita takes the device and buries it within her jacket pocket as she maneuvers the corridors like she's playing hide and seek.

She brings her hand towards the branching turn, prompting her head outwards to get a peek if any guards are patrolling; having her peaked head lower to the ground to increase the chances of going unseen.

"It's quiet." She mutters to herself, bringing her body around the turn.

"Where's all the guards?" She repeats within hush tones, swiftly moving towards a close door; taking a glance through the window, seeing the absences.

With a smooth motion, she slips out another gadget within her pockets; putting the thin strip between the door.

Click.

She presses a button on the lower half, with a muffled clank the door opens; prompting her to go inside, bringing the gadget to her pockets; it folds with collective clicks.

Clysita silently closes the door behind her, turning around to climb the stairs, her feet silently pressing upwards.

With a few turns, she's made it to the upper floor, she digs in her pocket to bring out the map, repeating the communicative tacs to signal the next pin-drop, following a scuffle to seal the device away.

Clysita makes her way through the upper levels, seeing a repeating pattern of vacancy.

Her suspicions rise as she ventures the corridors, "shouldn't I have come across a guard or two by now?" She mutters to the open space; she dips to the right, going into another section. Her device hums signalling that she's close to the room occupied with thousands - if not, billions of stored information.

"Where are they?" She slides a snaking hand; opening a door into a vast bridge.

As she walks the bridge leading towards the main entrance holding billions of archives, the blue ethereal lights fluctuate, creating a booming echo throughout the expanded space.

She pans her vision around, following the echo; a shiver races across her vertebra, within the dimly lit background an unknown force watches her.

With her focus regaining on the objective, she darts herself towards the entrance, her boots speaking to the air; opening the sealed door with her flatted device. Shoving it between the frame and the door itself, she skims it along the tight thin spaces; making a series of clicks as she repeats the process.

Clysita brings her hands out, rays of blues and whites seep out between the cracks as she pushes the large door into the room.

Her breath loosens as a sense of astonishment races through her chest; Clysita's body being painted with a surreal occupant from the hues, her eyes scanning the vast matrix of mechanical lights.

The Tower she went undercover in doesn't compare against the celestial simulacrum, that she's being enveloped in.

Stepping into the stellar garden, Clysita walks with a calming demeanor; the door suddenly closes behind her, interrupting her composer.

She twists her body to scan the closed door; her eyes tighten with a squint, seeing nothing out of the unordinary besides the lingering component she felt back on the bridge.

Clysita proceeds with caution; feeling eyes blanketing her back, causing her to glance over her shoulders as she strides towards a small obelisk that caught her attention.

The silhouette of eyes accompanying her.

Upon closer inspection, the machinery resembling an obelisks lights up, emitting a screen on its complexion.

She scans the screen with an ambivalence of bewilderment and astonishment, the technology before her doesn't match anything she has ever saw.

"What else are you keeping from us..?" She wonders out-loud, her epidermis sprinkled with goose-flesh as she touches the screen.

The obelisk reacts towards her touch, almost as if it's welcoming her. "Can't be that easy - can it?"

Whispering of an unknown language plucks into her ear; imagery races within her mind - resembling instructions.

Clysita makes an observation that it's not coming from in front of her, but seemingly behind her, resembling a foreign pressure; wanting her to delve into the secrets that the obelisk contains.

Her nap of the neck trembles, having her cradle it with her left hand.

"How is this even possible…" She questions the unknown.

With a few swipes of her hand, she opens electronic structures, listing ancient myths she once read as a child.

With intrigue, she touches the title with her finger pointer; the screen changes - birthing a holographic screen; her eyes dart, panning the screen before her as she reads.

The story before her is familiar, but the overall portrayal is different; when she had read this as a child, it was no more than some fairy tale - no more than a story to tell children to fuel their creative minds about "mannerisms", to get lost in an aspect of magic, or even comic book powers.

However, this acts more as a detailed description of a history lesson.

"The story…" Clysita looks down, her eyes displaying skepticism.

"The story I've read must have been a formulated plan - a plan to feed to the masses." She darts her vision back to the story, scanning the dark silhouettes of words.

As she scrolls, she hits a familiar name. "Eve…?" Her recollection takes her back to the science worker within the Tower.

Skimming the sentence, she stops on the word "mother."

Before she could read any further, the voices screech into her ears; her head throbs, she clutches her ears, crouching down to escape, but the screech pierce the comfort, bringing a resemblance to screech she heard that day.

Series of memories flood her psyche; picturing the boy known as Crowley; the scene where he first got introduced, the quality around him was different at the time; a gesture gets highlighted within her mind, seeing him sheltering his neck.

The scene resumes, his vision darts upwards. Peering daggers at her, at the moment she thought it was just an awkward glance of a teen just trying to tell them about the screech, but as the recollection folds towards his eyes - the atmosphere around him becomes foreign.

Within a subtle moment, the screeching halts - leaving an image stained into her mind's eye, the image being.

"His eyes.." She looks at the image, her eyes in a distant fog.

She snaps out of it, simultaneously a resounding quake spreads throughout the Tower, matching muffled howls of sirens from outside.

Clysita feverishly darts her vision around, wondering if guards will come into the room at any moment.

She does a quick maneuver, bringing her map out, panning it outward to capture the markers her team has left; to her demise, the expected blinking red dots are nowhere to be found within the map.

With an exasperated grunt, she dips the device in her pocket, hauling out the door - to her surprise there's not a guard in sight.

{●}

"Mommy, what's happening!?" Hailey yells over the sirens, bolting towards her mother, whose eyes are wide; staring outside.

William looks at the window, startled by the sudden cries of the sirens - his vision darts to a house across the street, seeing their neighbors stepping out onto the street; looking up at the skies.

The sirens stop.

"Dad!" Vermil comes rushing towards him, he grabs his son, bringing him close. "What's going on dad?" He looks up at him, seeing his dad fixated on their neighbors slowly coming out of their houses, accompanying the first family on the streets.

"Dad!" Vermil shakes him. William tosses his gaze towards his son, "I don't know." His balefulness, still expressing.

"Mommy!" Hailey tugs at Millie's sweater, trying to grab her attention, but she's still frozen in place.

A rapid wave of thunder reverberates through the streets, causing William and his children to flinch.

"Holy shit!" He lets out, he peers back into the streets, their neighbors still eyeing the sky; their jaws dropping, their eyes resembling moons.

With a growing intrigue, he paces out the door. "Dad?!" Vermil tries to capture him, but the pull is too strong - leading him to bolt after his father.

William steps onto the street with the others, "What's going on?!" He attempted to gather answers, but the neighbor simply pointed towards the sky.

Vermil's eyes fold; curious - he looks to where he's pointing, matching his father, "Dad…" he says nervously. His father stuck within a series of thoughts; staring at the same violent dance as his son.

Back inside the house, Hailey pleads for her mother to look at her; with a final tug on her sweater, she snaps out of it.

Her face tensioned with determination, reality coming back to her; picking up Hailey with an adrenaline strength, cradling her with a single arm as she rushes outside.

"Get your ass in the house right now!" She yells to the two, "we need to seek shelter imminently!" She follows up with her demand.

Thunder continuously convulses; shivering sounds cultivate it's audience's ears, bringing them to shelter their eardrums - almost as if it's responding to Millie's demands.

Vermil, tries to call for his dad, but it's lost, the yells of their neighbors and all other sounds seemingly vanish within the cacophony.

Birds flutter to escape, animals race across the streets running in terror as the unyielding turmoil.

The scent of ionized gasses came suddenly and abruptly into the city, light posts outside and lights alike emit halos around their bulbs from the density of ionization.

Inside, Vermil's compass spins feverishly on his bedroom drawer, Williams recorder short circuits, power starts to fluctuate within intense bursts accompanying shivering halos, eventually conjuring a blackout across the city, basking his compass into darkness.

Outside, the streets bathe in a strobe of electric blue-purple illumination from the relentless lightning.

Houses start to sway, trees start to rattle, and the ground itself begins to quiver- knocking citizens onto their knees; reality's frame starts to shudder within their perspective.

In their surroundings, a faint dark static appears, almost taking on a silhouette of a body.

The convulsion becomes a screech, almost as though reality is howling in a manner of intense pain.

Citizens within the city begin to lose their breath, the ionization replacing breathable air by seconds.

Vermil struggles to breath, sluggishly grasping at his father for aid.

The skies screeches becomes unbearable, locking people in a statue like fashion, their skin erupting with goose-flesh, their hairs in an perpetual stand, while others froze in posture of gripping at their ears, while others that were paralyzed were forced to stare at the forming lightning; the streets of Lypheon become thick with an eerie, ominous atmosphere.

Lightning congeals into a giant immortal sprite, resembling that of an aurora; above the immortal lightning sprite, a darkened aurora shapes, creating the illusion of reality tearing in half - the atmosphere changing into an undying malevolency.

Sand, pieces of "earth", and anything loose get tugged by it's magnetic field, suspending them into the air; poltergeisting in the immortal sprite's gaze.

As the lightning aurora rages on, dark branches emerge from the surrounding black aura, crackling across the skies.

Bolts from the immortal convulses outward, connecting to the suspended debris, transforming it into a larger fulgurite finger, reaching up towards the immortal sprite.

Paralyzed velern's lungs collapse, releasing dark particles into the air - thousands of thin dark pillars can be seen from the outskirts of the city, the screech forms into a bloodcurdling roar as citizens begin to float into air, their paralyzed state suspends by an unseen force; letting them convulse.

Lightning fails; striking the quivering bodies, repeating the process of that day at the school. Failing bodies plummet to the ground, resembling lifeless shells.

Another shivering strike lashes out to the suspended debris, having the large formulated fulgurite merging with the floating bodies: arms reaching out, legs sticking outward, heads with abyssal sockets framed within the fulgurite finger.

At the construction site, the type 5 fulgurite monolith resonates with life, having a hypnotic audience circling its body, casting a surreal ominous quality within the air.

Branches of converging lightning ripple down, finishing the large malevolent fulgurite structure, taking on the same appearance as Eve's night terror.

The dark fractures expand, opening a torrential tsunami of abyssal fog; the dark tidal engulfs the family and the rest of the Velerns on the street, the wave quickly envelops the city into total darkness.

Underground, the facility starts to flood with abyssal fog; panic arises, workers quickly seal off the shrouded figure from harm’s way. Swirls of grasping fog tendrils curl on itself as it gets blocked from the tightly sealed door.

Faint distorted shrieking echoes throughout the engulfing city.

Haunted by screams - Myuu

https://youtu.be/uSxM2IIABRg?si=dm1e2Q5AA4Wvoceu