Clutching at my cup of tea I stare out the window of my apartment, my eyes glued to the storm raging outside. While wild weather wasn't uncommon this time of year this sudden bout of thunder and lightning was different. It had apparently come from nowhere, with the weather bureau tripping over themselves to explain why we had gone from a warm albeit cloudy day to the storm of the year.
Watching the rain through the window, while usually calming, caused no small amount of fear in me. Trees down at street level were being stripped bare by a mixture of the heavy pelting rain and the striking blasts of constant wind, lamp posts and streetlights leaning and listing as they too struggle under the onslaught.
Sipping at my tea I reach out to touch the windows in my kitchen, my fingers grazing over the chipping paint around the frame. I can feel the whole structure rattle and shake as it holds the elements back, a cold sweat running down my neck as I wonder how much of this weather my aging apartment could endure.
Deciding to try and take my mind off of the nightmare weather outside I head to my living room, dropping down on the couch carefully as to not spill the searing hot drink in my mug. Turning on the TV I'm met with a fragmented and unstable signal, the news coming through in bursts between scratchy static.
"We're still unsure...BZZZT...commend that everyone stay...BZZZT...doors...BZZZT...orm appears to be...BZZZT...size and inten..." the newscaster explains, her voice shaking as the occasionally booming thunderclap sounds out overhead. The signal rapidly cuts in and out before one final blast of thunder rings out above the studio as the feed cuts.
As the [NO SIGNAL FOUND] text bounces around my TV screen I got wide-eyed, immediately lurching for my laptop on the coffee table. As I reach out to touch the bulky computer I feel my finger get stung by static from the casing, a hissing wince escaping my lips as I shake it off and pull the computer closer.
Before I can hit the power button lightning flashes just outside the kitchen window, the powerful thunderclap that follows hammering my apartment along with the sound of buzzing and crackling outside. In an instant my TV turns off, the light in the kitchen quickly following suit.
"Must have hit a power line" I mutter, chuckling nervously at just how close that one had been. "Maybe a transformer? But those are pretty loud..." I muse, turning my attention to my laptop in the hopes of distracting myself further.
Booting up the portable computer doesn't get very far at all. The screen flickers slightly as the bios appear on screen, the white text on the black background doing very little to light up my living room. The start-up immediately fails, my computer failing to read anything on the hard drive as it asks for an installer for an operating system.
I can only look at the computer in confusion and bit of fear, the thought of my hard drives being wiped amping up my anxiety over all the lost documents and passwords. Quickly shutting the computer down I try to boot it up again, though the second time I don't even see the black text. The LCD screen glows as if it is on but simply remains black as it acts as the world's worst lamp.
"God damn it" I sigh, slamming the screen shut as I realize that this would just be another problem I'd need to fix even if I could barely afford it. My savings had been taking a severe pounding since I lost my job at the college, and this was just another issue that I didn't need.
In the din of the apartment the only source of light is the storm raging outside. The lightning feels as though it is growing closer and closer by the minute as well as increasing in the frequency of the bright flashes that consume the street outside. Deciding not the let the potential storm of the century go to waste I take my tea and head back to the window, deciding to enjoy the show outside.
Looking down at the footpath and road below I notice just how many leaves have been stripped from the trees lining the road. The gutters are blocked and the roads are flooded, the cars parked on either side having been coated in foliage to such an extreme that they look more like sculptures than the vehicles they were.
Suddenly, movement catches my attention from the corner of my eye. I watch as a man races down the street, his suit jacket raised over his head in an attempt to protect him from the pounding rain. He staggers and slides as the wind whips at him, the water covering the street doing little to help him maintain his grip or balance. For a minute I'm filled with a little sense of schadenfreude, the sight of someone being stuck even momentarily in the rain as they fight the wind like a mime causing me to chuckle like the bad person I am.
However, the amusement quickly dissipates as a bright flash of lightning strikes down at the man. It's only for a moment, the after image burning into my mind well after the incident takes place. I watch as the streak of light seemingly pierces the man, much as one would expect in such a dreadful situation. However, immediately after, it almost appears as the lightning retracts back into the clouds along with a glowing silhouette of the man impaled on the end.
Watching as his smoking form crumples to the ground I freeze up, my mind racing to piece together what I had seen in the shock. Before I can go to get my phone, hoping to call for help, I watch as another bolt crashes down into the neighboring building across the street. The flash of light appears to slam in through one of the windows, shattering those either side of it, before yet again retreating with another faint human-shaped glow at the end.
My jaw drops as I watch more the seemingly intelligent lightning tear through the neighboring building, the heavy wind assisting in pulling the building apart and pulling the place down after the flashes of light find their marks.
My heart pounds in my chest faster than ever before, I feel an animalistic need to run spread through my body as fight or flight kicks in. However, I can only stand in shock and pure terror as my legs shake beneath me. Before I can overcome the fear holding me in place a loud crack of thunder rings out just outside my building, shattering the window and spraying me with glass.
I don't have too long to check for injuries, despite the stabbing pain creeping over my body, as before I know it as a flash of light fills my vision. There is a sudden burst of searing pain before...nothing, no sensation whatsoever. It's almost like a dream, my mind simply floating along in a sea of darkness. It's oddly calming, though the fear that had been coursing through me still clutches and claws at my mind as it is all I am left with.
I don't have long to linger on these thoughts though. I get the sense I'm moving somewhere, even in the completely empty and featureless void I had found myself in. In the distance I begin to see small fragments of light, some stationary while others race along with me in the same direction. Try as I might I can't make any sense of it, the lack of panicked breath or rapid heartbeat doing little to make me less fearful.
I watch as the moving lights slowly vanish into thin air one by one, their indistinct forms squashing slightly as if meeting resistance before simply ceasing to be. My panicked thoughts grow and grow, I have no doubt that I would be hyperventilating if I had the ability to breathe. Suddenly I feel myself stop, the sense of motion ending abruptly as pressure builds behind me. The sound of a weak heartbeat fills my mind, shallow sleeping breathes quickly following suit. As I listen to the sounds I can almost swear they belong to me, though it feels like a trick of the mind in this otherwise empty place.
After a few more seconds I feel the pressure reach a fever pitch, my indistinct form lurching forwards as something gives way and my waking thoughts simply cease as I'm taken by restful sleep...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
While no one on Earth would know it, instead classifying the destruction of the city and much more as the 'Storm of the Millenium', the destructive weather was no accident. Our world was not alone, with parallel realities residing alongside ours, out of reach and out of contact. While some out there knew of these other worlds, most were content in knowing they would have little to no contact or information on these other realms.
However, the knowledge of these other worlds is what drove the events that lead to that fated night.
In one far-off world an ongoing problem had reached apocalyptic proportions. Despite all their magic and power the kingdoms of Ardenalur had been noticing a distinct population decline for centuries. Not only were less pregnancies occurring overall, but those that did resulted in more complications and stillbirths. The issue transcended race with even the long-lived elves, the fast-breeding goblins, the egglaying lizard-folk and harpies, and even the mysterious pseudo-construct elementals struggling to grow or even maintain their populations.
Over the years a secret society was formed between many of the factions, guilds, tribes, and kingdoms around the world with the sole goal of finding out what was causing this world-spanning crisis. The society, known as the Council of Magi, spent decades and centuries researching and scrying in an attempt to find the answer before eventually finding the worrying cause.
Each soul in their world moved from death to life and back to death in a cyclical manner, a closed-loop with limited ability to form and create new souls for an expanding population. What the Magi discovered rocked them to their very core, that the souls as they moved through this cycle grew weaker and more fragile over the millennia. While some were lucky to not feel the effects of this entropy others instead degraded, either eventually shattering and disappearing into the eternal aether or leaving the person they resided in a bland and barely alive individual just listing through their life.
With fields going fallow, towns on the verge of population collapse, tribes no longer able to maintain their traditions, and kingdoms unable to find craftsmen or tradespeople to fill necessary roles a desperate plan was created. If the souls made a closed loop, more would simply need to be added. After more experimentation the Magi had little to no success with repairing or generating new souls artificially, however, in this research they observed that their prize existed in worlds beyond their own.
In one final desperate act the Council of Magi, along with leaders around the world, agreed that the best measure was to merely take what they could not create or heal. The 'Storm of the Millenium' was the result of this act, a bridge between the worlds designed to strip out the souls of this one's inhabitants.
What happened to these souls afterward was a mixed bag, though one that was planned ahead of time. While some would be placed back into the cycle naturally, hopefully resolving the problems with replenishing their population naturally, many would be brought straight into bodies around Ardenalur.
Some would find homes in those who already existed, those with weak and fragile souls on the brink of destruction. These weakened souls would be consumed and subsumed into the incoming soul, hopefully fusing the two beings and providing the necessary spark of life they had lacked their whole life.
Others would need new bodies to inhabit not already shambling about in an emotionless dreary daze. To this end the Council of Magi prepared an additional ritual, one that would create new hosts for the souls before drawing them in. A subtle glamour was to accompany these bodies, giving those around them a vague sense of familiarity despite having never seen them before in an effort to properly integrate these brand new people into their new communities effectively.
After years of work preparing all anyone involved could do was wait and hope their plan would work.
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