One Of Ten Thousand
Characters: Raven Xavier, Ben Westwood, Alex Summers
Date & Time: July 26th, 3am
Setting: Outside on the grounds
Summary: The sky is catching fire and the whole world is going to burn
Rating: PG-13 (possibility of higher as things progress)
Status: Closed for now though will be open for additional interaction later.
There is a great deal of unmapped country within us which would have to be taken into account in an explanation of our gusts and storms. - George Eliot
It began with a gathering weight, a heaviness in the air that spoke of release as honest as prophecy. What had been an open, gentle morning gave way to a still afternoon that grew even quieter as it edged on toward evening, a sense of tense waiting bleeding into every face of the world. Even the trees seemed different, reaching up toward the sky like arms raised in psalms of wanting to a benevolent guide. The dryness of summer beat like flint against the rolling stone of the heavens and it was only a matter of patience to produce a spark. Elsewhere, people shut their louvers and brought in laundry off the line in anticipation of the knife that would surely cut the humid blanket and release a downpour of relief.
Ben watched from the open window of his room as the clouds set in, solemn-faced creatures in dark coats with unrelenting purpose. Like undertakers they crept across the wide expanse, making darker the dying light of day until it was impossible to tell whether the sun had set or been suffocated. It did not matter, really, except in the way that one was an orderly end and the other violent and still. Soon enough they gnashed their teeth and bellowed in great thundering roars and the sky opened up and wept, and wept, and wept.
The storm began in a torrential rush but it stepped lightly, only drenching the earth below. Ben lay on his bed with eyes held tightly shut and waited. This was just a teasing blow, he knew, because there was more in this fury than stored waters; he could feel the rolling electrical waves behind held back, could feel their snorting, eager breaths in the marrow of his bones like a bruising ache and he knew they would come as surely as the sun would rise. The first strike landed close enough to the mansion to rattle loose fixings. Ben gasped and sat up, sweating and shaking and feeling a part of himself tearing away in answer. The second, third, fourth hit in rapid succession right outside his window, drawn like rats to the piper, and this time he could taste the well of them underneath his tongue, hot and iron-rich and mean. He knew they would not stop, would keep trying to seek him out as surely as lost children and when the fifth bolt came roaring down and shattered against the stone beneath his window frame, the boy swore and stumbled from his bed on bare feet that led him frantically along the corridor, down down down the stairs and across the cold marble of the foyer until he was bursting out the door and into the night.
Within minutes Ben was drenched, the thin linen of his pajamas clinging to his reedy frame as he spluttered and slipped down the lawn and put distance between himself and the mansion. In spite of the sodden conditions, the hair on his arms still prickled happily, and Ben imagined he could hear a satisfied chuckle softly sound in the dark air, as though he had given some powerful deity exactly what it wanted.
It was freezing but he had no choice: if he stayed inside, the cold electrical fire would continue to blast away at the mansion. Someone would get hurt. Out here he had only himself to worry about.