Michael Landry sat behind his desk with his hand massaging his temple. He drew a long sigh as he read the report again, “So we have no clue where this ‘Radiance’ came from?”
“No sir.”
“Mark, what do you think about this?”
Mark Jones tried to stand straighter than his spine would allow. At 24, he was the youngest agent in this branch; he had been here a week and was assigned to Special Agent Landry. His 6- foot frame was already imposing as he stood over his superior’s desk looking down at him and the report that had just been issued to them. “I don’t think it was a terrorist attack like they are reporting.”
“What makes you say that?”
“Well, we don’t even know what caused this. We are getting reports around the world that this happened simultaneously , meaning unless we are dealing with a large scale terrorist group with bigger resources than the US government I think we could rule that out. Also our intel is showing that there are no large scale casualties anywhere as a direct result of this.” Michael was stunned, he hadn’t counted on Mark to have this much forethought.
“Exactly what I was thinking.” Michael stood and walked around to Mark, placing a hand on his shoulder. “And that is what you are going to tell the rest of the team.” Mark tensed as panic flooded his mind. A sharp pop sounded in the enclosed office, as Michael’s hand flew off of Mark’s shoulder sparks filled the gap between them.
“Shit!”, Michaels hand was an angry red, threatening to blister at any moment. “What the hell was that?”
“I don’t know sir,” Mark backed away, shaking with fear. More blue sparks jumped between his fingers as his panicked mind whirled in fear of what was happening. His mind shot back early this morning to the nightmare, being struck by lightning over and over again. Mark turned and ran. As he rushed out the door into the hallway he brushed past several people and they each gave a surprised shout when they felt the jolt of electricity pass to them.
Mark’s mind spiraled as he ran through the hall to the stairway, he was scared and confused as to why this was happening. Does this have something to do with that horrible nightmare? he thought as he made his way to the roof of the building. He calmed down when he reached the roof, the sparks stopped coming from his hands but a series of scars crossed down his arms. Like Lichtenberg figures running down his arms cutting off at his shoulders. Mark sighed and pulled out a Newport from the pack and lit it. Taking a long pull on the cigarette, he exhaled.
“You know those will kill you, right?”
Mark spun to see Michael walking up to him, he quickly threw the cigarette on the ground and stomped it out. He stood straighter, “Sorry sir, it’s the only habit I can’t break.” He turned away in guilt.
“Don’t worry about it too much kid.” They stood silent for a while, “You know, you remind me a lot of myself when I was a newbie, always wanting to prove myself. Well, I was in white collar crimes when I first started and I couldn’t shock people, so maybe not exactly like you but you get the point.”
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Another silence overtook them as they stood and looked down at the people rushing in and out of the building. After ten minutes had passed Michael cleared his throat and broke the silence.
“Dress nice tonight and bring a bottle of wine.” He handed Mark one of his business cards, on the back was an address written in pen. Surprised by the sudden invite, Mark took the card reverently
“Yes sir!” Mark and Michael went back inside to address a new piece of information.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
As Tom carried Sam to the nurses office, he thought back to the sword she was holding right before she passed out. The handle was charred black, and crumbled to ash when he touched it. Now as he propped Sam up he noticed her skin was uncomfortably hot to the touch, but she didn’t look uncomfortable. When they reached the nurse’s office Tom laid Sam down in one of the beds and texted Kat,
“Are yall still in the student council room?”
“Yeah why?”
“Tell Nessa to go to the nurses office Sam passed out at practice today”
“Omg what happened?”
“Idk but tell Nessa to get here”
“Okay”
Sam had regained consciousness, her eyes fluttered open. Tom pocketed his phone and turned to face her.
“What happened? Where are we?”
“You passed out after I asked if you had a weird dream this morning.” Tom stared her down from the chair next to the bed. “What did you dream of?”
“Can we not talk about this?”
“How can we not talk about it! You turned that handle to ash!” Tom’s heated words were only met with a withering gaze. “Look, I know how you feel. I had one of those nightmares too, all the blood in my body leaked out of me. I felt so cold and lifeless.” Tom looked at her with a haunted look, he trembled just remembering the horrid dream. Sam could see how scared he was, she felt the same way.
“I burned from inside out, and became a sea of fire.” She whispered, disturbed by the memory of fire and ash. She could still feel the heat and taste the bitter powder that rained down from the sky. She was so lost in thought that she couldn’t feel the heat rising from her chest and flowing down to her hands. The blanket that was draped over her caught fire, but she felt no heat.
“What the fuck!” Tom jumped up from the chair and yanked the blanket off of Sam, stomping on the fire till it was snuffed. The door flew open and a mirror image of Sam ran in.
“What happened? Is everyone all right?”
Vanessa Pierce was Sam’s identical twin. Tom had known them for 4 years now, and they couldn’t be more different. Sam was very outgoing and spoke her mind, while Vanessa liked to fade into the background.
“Nessa, did Sam say anything about a dream or nightmare she had this morning?”
“Yeah why, what does this have to do with you stomping out a blanket on fire?” Vanessa moved over to the bed to comfort her sister, but when she touched her shoulder Sam grabbed her arm. A scream ripped its way out of Vanessa's throat as a handprint melted itself onto her forearm. Tom rushed over to them and managed to get Sam’s hand away from her sister, at this point Sam had come back to her senses
“Nessa? What are you doing here? What happened?” Horror dawned on her face as she looked at her sister's arm, and then to Tom and the blanket. A chill ran down her spine as she stammered, “W-what’s happening to me.” She started to cry.
“Sam, calm down.” Tom stated firmly, “You both need to come over tonight. I’ll tell Quinton and Kat to come over as well. We need to talk about the nightmares.” Tom then pulled out his phone and texted his friends and called his mom and informed her that his friends would be coming over for dinner. Tonight was going to be a long night.