I remember a time when we didn't have to fear waking up.

I remember a time when there was hope for tomorrow.

A time where we could look forward to the future.

A time when there was a future.

That time is gone now. And it is never, ever, going to come back.

We were too careless, too ignorant. We let peace and luxury lull us into a trance. 

We became complacent, and evil reigned.

Our planet is in its death throes. Pollution and urbanization are rampant, choking this planet's life force. The corporations that rule the earth divert the attention of the populace so that they cannot be blamed. Things keep getting worse and worse, the corporations and politicians are preparing to escape and rise from the wreckage while the world dies.

It is too late for us. We sowed the seeds of our own destruction.

It is the time to reap what we've sown.

June 2nd 6:30am 20XX

My eyes snapped open, and I nearly leaped out of my bed. I stared wildly around the room, then sighed with relief as I recognized the peeling paint on the cramped walls of my bedroom. I had just woken up from the most frightening nightmare I had ever had, but the strange thing is I could barely remember what happened in it. All I remembered was a booming voice telling me something, and a heavy rain all around me. But what had it said?

I layed back down. There was still a little bit of time before I would have to get up for work. I wanted to savor the comfort of my bed one last time before I went away to work on the oil rig.

As I stared up at the ceilling, I kept trying to remember the dream, but it was way too vague of a memory.

"Markus, it's time to get up," a soft voice calls from outside of the bedroom.

I dragged myself out of bed and dressed into the same clothes I had worn for the past week. I found myself laughing at how in the time before, people had more clothes than they knew what to do with. Now there was no way you would spend money on clothes unless you absolutely had to. We certainly couldn't afford any more, with us owning a single bedroom apartment with a kitchen and bathroom. The bedroom couldn't even really be called a bed "room" as it only had enough room for the matress.

I stepped out into the kitchen, the only other room in the house other than the bathroom, to see my wife, Jessica, making me breakfast. She turns to me and smiles, "Good morning!"

I couldn't stop myself from smiling back, "Good morning." I don't know how she always managed to act so cheerful in these times. No matter how bad things have gotten, she's always been there for me, even in the mess the world's in now.

My eyes scanned the kitchen. My son Aaron's bed was up against the wall. Whenever he was here, he would sleep in the kitchen but more often then not he would sleep at the school. Of course I wouldn't get to see him on my last day here for a while. There was a meal waiting for me on the dinner table.

"I cooked you a big breakfast," Jessica said, "Since you're going to be away for a while and all."

I sat down to eat. An actual fried egg was on the plate, instead of a processed one. "Jessica, you didn't have to..."

"It's your last day here, so I wanted to get you something special, don't worry about it!" she winked as she sat down with me.

We talked about meaningless things as we sat at the table. Jessica told me that the department store she worked at was actually seeing a rise in business. She was in a pretty good mood about it, thought it was likely that it wouldn't go out of business like so many of the non-giga-corporation owned stores around. She was always looking for the positives.

I was startled as an alarm went off on the watch my father had given me before he passed away.

"Oh my, is it time for you to go already?" Jessica asked.

"Looks like it..." I kissed her on the lips, "Goodbye Jessica, I'll miss you. Good luck at work and tell Aaron I love him."

"Be safe. And if you ever get sad, just remember that I'm cheering for you back at home!" she said and gave me a big smile.

I laughed, then quickly ran to grab my coat and put on my steel-toe boots. I couldn't afford to be late for work.

Jessica tapped me on the shoulder, "Oh yeah, I forgot to tell you. There was a letter here for you this morning, from a name I don't recognize. Here!" She handed me the letter.

The sending address said it was from Edward Peaks. That was a name I hadn't seen in a long time. Edward was a good friend of my dad's, and though I never really knew what he did for a living, I knew that he was actually pretty wealthy. I had been to his place a few times when my dad had gone to visit him. I remember everytime he would let me look through his massive library, and even take a few books home sometimes. The last time I had seen him was my father's funeral, but I didn't really get the chance to speak with him at the time. I wonder what he wanted? That would have to wait though, I'd read it when I went to bed at the oil rig. I tucked it in my coat pocket.

Right as I put my hand on the door knob, the phone rang.

Jessica picked up the phone, "Hello? Yeah, he's still here. Okay. Here he is."

She handed me the phone, "Hello?"

"Hey Mark," a rough male voice answered. It was Mike Kelsey, my best friend since high school and one of my co-workers at the oil rig. Despite everything that's happened, he hasn't changed one bit. "We got a message from the big guys. You don't go to work until next week."

My eyes widened, "Why not?"

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

"You mean ya don't know? The storm, man. It's cancelled cause of the big storm that's comin," he replied, shocked.

"What storm?"

There was a pause, "Man, the media's all over it. A storm just whipped up out of nowhere off the coast of Canada a few days ago. One of the worst storms in a while. She's goin' fast too, it'll be here in two days or so."

"It must be pretty big, I can't remember them ever cancelling work because of the weather."

"Mhmm, the thing's huge. Turn on a radio and listen to the reports why dontch'a. I mean... if you still have a radio."

"Will do, Mike."

"Alright buddy, see ya around. Good luck."

"See you," I hung up the phone.

"Work's cancelled, why?" Jessica asked. Her expression was a balance between happiness and worry. No work would mean I could spend time with Aaron and her, but no work also meant no money.

"There's a storm. A really huge one apparently. Here, I'll turn on the radio..."

The radio buzzed for a moment as I turned it on, then a male announcer's voice sounded from the speaker, "-and meterologists claim that this is one of the biggest tropical storms in recent history. Areas that are hit will exprience heavy rainfall, high winds, lightning and heavy fog. The storm is expected to hit Maine by tonight and shows no signs of ending. Experts fear that his will have a large impact on our country's economy. We'll bring you more information as it comes in, so please stay tuned..."

I switched the radio off, "I'll have to find some odd jobs for the next two weeks..." I muttered.

Jessica was silent for a moment, she looked like she was struggling over something, then it seemed like she made a decision, "Markus... why don't you spend some time with Aaron this week?"

"But Jessica, I have to bring in some money. We'll lose too much if I don't work for those two weeks," as much as I wanted to spend some time with my son, we needed money.

"Then just do something with him for a few days. He misses you, you know. You barely ever see him."

I sighed. Maybe I could, we could hold off for a few days, "Alright. We'll go camping tonight and tomorrow before the storm hits."

"Excellent! Alright, I'm off to work." She hugged me, and then she was out the door.

June 2nd 12:00pm 20XX

As the day went on, a nagging curiosity took over me and I decided to head to one of the restaurants with a TV to see video coverage of the storm. I navigated my way through the apartment complex and opened the door to step outside. The light momentarily blinded me. It was surprisingly clear out that day, somewhat of a rare occurrence in these times. I was used to seeing constant grey clouds blocking out the blue of the sky, but today you couldn't even imagine that a violent storm was on its way here. I almost took a deep breath in, but thought better of it. The air in this city wasn't fresh like it used to be. Whenever I breathed in, it was quick and shallow. Despite that, I couldn't mask the stench of chemicals, smoke and garbage.

When I was young, this city lived up to its name of Arborline. It used to be green and full of life, with trees planted all around. Now all that's left is the withered stumps of dead trees. Gone was the vibrant colors of the past, now all that remained was the dull gray of concrete and asphalt.

I walked slowly, keeping my eyes fixed on the sky. For some reason, I had a certain feeling that this would be the last clear sky in a long, long time.

The restaurant wasn't far from where we lived, so it didn't take me long to get there. I walked in and greeted the man at the desk, who immediately asked me what I wanted. I wasn't particularly hungry and I just came for the TV. I just asked for a water, which I still had to pay for. There were about three groups sitting down to eat throughout the restaurant. I sat at a table facing the television.

A female reporter was talking, with an image of the current location of the storm behind her. Jesus. It had already made it to Maine. She talked about its estimated time of arrival and then images of the destruction left in the storm's wake came on the screen. As the images appeared one after the other, she talked about the effort by first responders to find survivors. Dear God, I knew it was big but I didn't think it would be this big. Images flashed of skyscrapers toppled over, huge piles of rubble and strangely, huge holes in the ground. She said that the holes were sink holes, but I had a feeling that wasn't what they were. Just how strong was the storm? The camera shifted to a male reporter, with a young woman seated across from him for an interview. The young woman looked like she hadn't slept in days, and her eyes were red from crying. She looked insane.

"Here we have a survivor of the storm that volunteered to speak with us. What was it like to be in this storm, Cassandra?"

She paused for a moment, and then spoke up. Her voice quivered and quaked as she spoke, "It was... terrifying. The most scared I've ever been in my entire life. If it wasn't for my father telling us to go in the basement, I don't think we would have survived. When we woke up the next day, our entire house was gone!"

The reporter politely nodded as the woman spoke, then when she was finished asked a question I found strange. "Other survivors have stated they've heard strange things as the storm passed, did you hear anything strange?"

The woman paused again, this time she seemed like she didn't want to answer. She lowered her head.

"Anything at all?" The reporter asked again.

The woman shook her head, as if waking herself from a trance, and then spoke again. "W-Well, in the middle of the night, right when the storm was at its worst... I heard something that woke me up." She shuddered.

"And what was it that you heard?" the reporter pushed.

"A loud noise. It was... so loud. It was a long rumbling that shook the entire house and the ground around me. At first I thought it was thunder, but it didn't sound like thunder. It sounded... almost like a... whale, or something... Right after, the ground shook again and I heard a bunch of crashes outside. Somehow, everyone else slept through it. But I was wide awake."

I heard a few gasps around the room.

The reporter nodded. "This sounds very similar to what many other survivors report. Was there anything else you may have heard?"

The color faded from the woman's face. Though people had been chatting in the restaurant before, now their attention was focused on the television.

The reporter, who had been pushy the entire interview, finally seemed to show some sympathy, "Are you okay, Cassandra? If you want we can-"

"The screams. Oh God.... the screams..." her voice faltered for a moment, "I heard screams. But they... They weren't human! No, they couldn't be." Her face twisted with terror. She wasn't looking at the reporter anymore; she was just looking off into empty space.

"They definitely weren't human!" She screamed suddenly. "But then... But then what were they...? They were so terrifying. So loud. Not like any person.... Not like any animal.... The screams! And then the laughing.... oh God no..." She kept going on and on until she was almost incomprehensible. The reporter made a hand signal at the camera, and the screen cut to black.

The restaurant was completely silent. I didn't feel too good. I felt like vomiting, actually. But despite how I felt, I didn't want to leave. No I couldn't leave even if I wanted to. I needed to figure out what was going on. Just what in the hell was that?

A moment later, the screen lit up again. A different reporter spoke "We're sorry for the interruption, but now we're back with more information on the storm" A spectrogram appeared on the screen. "Somebody managed to get an audio recording of the sound that some survivors have been reporting. We will now play it for you"

The audio quality was poor, but I could hear it well enough. It started off just like the woman had described: a rumbling. It was very deep and low pitched. If I had to compare it to something, it sounded like a mix between a loud motor and a whale. It made me feel very unnerved. Suddenly, the sound rose in volume to the point where I almost covered my ears. The sound cut off and it showed the reporter again.

"It is usually only reported by those that were in or near the very center of the storm. Extensive research is going in to the cause of the noise and other anomalies reported, but at this moment we have no leads"

That sick feeling came back again, much stronger this time. I had to get up and go to the restroom to splash some water on my face. I stared in the mirror for a long moment, my skin was as pale as a ghost. What in the literal hell was that sound. What even could have caused that? And then there was the screams that the woman had been raving about, what was going on?

Still feeling sick, I made my way out of the restaurant. The reporter was talking to another survivor, but I didn't pay much attention to it. I was still thinking about what that woman said.

Just what was this storm?