(no subject)
Rena sat curled in the huge chair by the window, fingers wrapped around a steaming mug staring out across the Midian skyline. Tea, she didn't usually drink it, but people said it was soothing. Somehow, the red haze that hung over the city was soothing as well. Familiar. Home. She turned attention drawn by a small sound from the sleeping form on the bed. She watched him until he calmed, breathing returning to that slow steady rhythm. Was he having nightmares too? She couldn't help wondering.
Slowly she slid out of the chair and onto the floor. On her knees, she bent over the small table and the book lying there. She'd recovered it the night before, from the bottom of a chest in her room. Fingers traced the gold lettering on the cover. It had been given to her as a girl, by someone who was well meaning, but hadn't had the guts to really help her. She'd read it, knew the pages and the text intimately, but she'd never found anything of herself in there. But now...now a memory tugged at her. Changed. She opened it slowly and began skimming, first one letter and then the next. She poured over it as he slept, searching for that small bit of text that was tugging at her memory. When she finally found it, she felt as if the air had suddenly been sucked out of the room.
Behold, I tell you a mystery. We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we will be changed.
She remembered the trumpeting sound of Laz's cry. "HUMANS FIRST" and the blood. The screaming that filled her ears as they died around her. Her own agony as Masha's blood splattered her. Smoke, then suddenly the voices of the dead, coming back to life. She knew now what had happened, but all she knew in that moment was that the dead were rising around her.
Changed. All of them changed ...some so subtly others might not even notice, with others it was glaringly obvious to anyone who saw them. She knew she'd been changed in ways she couldn't comprehend yet.
Death has been swallowed up in victory.
She closed the book and reached for the mug and crawled back into the chair, curling in a tight ball. The tea was cold now, but she drank anyway, watching the sky turn from blood red to a warmer crimson as the sun rose. She never thought she's miss that sky, but she had.
Slowly she slid out of the chair and onto the floor. On her knees, she bent over the small table and the book lying there. She'd recovered it the night before, from the bottom of a chest in her room. Fingers traced the gold lettering on the cover. It had been given to her as a girl, by someone who was well meaning, but hadn't had the guts to really help her. She'd read it, knew the pages and the text intimately, but she'd never found anything of herself in there. But now...now a memory tugged at her. Changed. She opened it slowly and began skimming, first one letter and then the next. She poured over it as he slept, searching for that small bit of text that was tugging at her memory. When she finally found it, she felt as if the air had suddenly been sucked out of the room.
Behold, I tell you a mystery. We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we will be changed.
She remembered the trumpeting sound of Laz's cry. "HUMANS FIRST" and the blood. The screaming that filled her ears as they died around her. Her own agony as Masha's blood splattered her. Smoke, then suddenly the voices of the dead, coming back to life. She knew now what had happened, but all she knew in that moment was that the dead were rising around her.
Changed. All of them changed ...some so subtly others might not even notice, with others it was glaringly obvious to anyone who saw them. She knew she'd been changed in ways she couldn't comprehend yet.
Death has been swallowed up in victory.
She closed the book and reached for the mug and crawled back into the chair, curling in a tight ball. The tea was cold now, but she drank anyway, watching the sky turn from blood red to a warmer crimson as the sun rose. She never thought she's miss that sky, but she had.