In the Shadow of the Mountain

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"Yeah gimme the breakfast combo platter and a coffee, but please be sure they scramble the eggs real good... the white bits disgust me," Perry said as the waitress took down the ball-snatcher's 'water and fries' order. Ballsnatcher obviously was looking like he wanted him and the rich guy to order too.

As soon as no one was watching their table too closely, Perry began snatching the sugar packets and jellies, disappearing them into his wet coat pockets for later.

"So..." he said, eyeing the two as his hands worked busily, "My name's Perry. Seeing how we are apparently all in this together, we'd best to get to know each other. We'd also probably open this and see what that guy was on about."

Perry opened the envelope and poured out the contents for his new friends (hey, they were springing for food after all!) to see.
 
Ander frowned, finding the envelope out of his hands. Now how had that happened? He looked at the other two, then up to the waitress. "Just give me some toast, please. Hey, oh, we're out of jelly. Can you bring some more of that, too?" Ander looked run down, moreso than even running through the rain and being shaken by a crazy man could account for. In fact, he was slumping in his seat in a way nearly identical to Perry's.

As the bum introduced himself and opened the envelope, Ander held up a hand, too late. "Don't you think we should be more-" He sighed. What did it matter? "My name's Ander." He would have asked their tablemate his name, but the contents of the envelope clattering to the table distracted him. It was a thumb drive, nothing more. The device was blue in color, with a black cap and pocket clip. It had no writing, imprints, or remarkable variation in color. It wass slightly scuffed on one corner, where it looks as though someone's keys have rubbed against it. A chill ran through Ander upon seeing it. THIS was what the man had been afraid of getting killed over? An unlabeled thumb drive that had seen better days?

Ander reached for it, picking it up and looking it over. "I get the feeling things just got a lot more complicated than they were. Maybe we should head back to the park and find the others who were after the ball."
 
The contents of the package was pretty underwhelming, it made Harry feel a bit silly about having felt paranoid about the package. It was kind of a relief actually but Harry didn't forget what a big deal the dude had made of it.

Harry ran his fingers through his hair in a contemplative gesture."More than likely whatever's on that drive involves them too. And my name is Harry, nice to meet you guys." After a few minutes the food arrived in either a Styrofoam box or a paper bag. Harry took some bills from his pocket to pay for the food and left it with the bill and he gestured for Perry to let him out, a couple of fries held between his fingers in preparation to eat them.
 
Perry doesn't move. It is not missed that the ballsnatcher... harry... that's too funny.

Perry giggles a bit at his mental revelation.

"You're not going anywhere Mr. Ballsnatcher" he says, hoping that someone else gets the juvenile joke that is so very obvious to him, "We've got a few things to work out. You, Ander was it? I'm guessing by the fact that you're wearing more and better clothes than me... and none of them are the same article... plus the cellphone and keys in your pocket... that you're a man of means. You got a computer?"

Without waiting Perry turns to Harry, "And you, where you got to go so fast? Afraid of sitting with a bum for a while? Hm?" Perry give's him 'the eye', "If we're in this together, then what are you in such a rush to leave for? Also, thanks for the breakfast."
 
Ander sighed and nodded slowly in answer to the question. "I have a few at home. I suppose you want to go there?" He turned the thumb drive over in his hand again, considering. He pocketed it, quickly eating the toast he was given. He felt like he needed food, and had a sneaking suspicion he wouldn't get any for a while after they left, but maybe he was just being overly worried.

"Though I'd reckon we really ought to wait until the rain slacks off." This day was a disaster, and Ander really didn't want to take these two to his home. He'd never get the house clean and chances were that half his things would go missing if he let these two in. Still, they did seem to be in this together. Ander looked over at the water beading up and running in rivulets down the window. There sure was a lot of lightning going on outside. Was the storm still centered near the park?

"Hrm. This has to be related to that damn globe. Which means all those other people are involved, too. So I am going." He grabbed a napkin and scribbled his address on it, handing it over to Perry. "Meet me there when the storm dies down. Both of you." He waited for an answer for a moment, clearly ready to walk out the door as soon as he had one, rain or no rain.
 
Harry was moderately annoyed. He chewed on the fries while looking at Perry through the lenses of his glasses then wiped his fingers on a napkin and looked out the window to consider the harsh rain and lightning. "I guess I am a bit hasty to get to the bottom of this-" he turned to look at Perry "-it has nothing to do with you smelling like a sewer." He put another couple of fries in his mouth, chewed them and swallowed. "And you're welcome."

Harry reached into a pocket of his jacket, pulling out a pad of paper and a pen as Anders presented his address on the napkin. Scrawling down the address, he started trying to memorize it in case he was some how separated from from his notepad. Once he had it all written down he stuffed the pad and pen back into the inside pocket of his jacket. "That dude seemed pretty scared, that drive must be very important." Harry was emphatic on how important the drive seemed. "Watch yourself out there."
 
The lightning creature struggled against the pinning power of Rich's voice, but as long as the man kept up that sonic shout, it remained held and helpless. As Annabel approached, the hair on her body would stand up. The twisted bit of metal was hot, and only the powers of Rich's voice kept her from suffering horrid shocks. As it was, the gloves started to melt on her hands from the heat of the metal.

The rain poured down, and thunder began to roll almost nonstop. It sounded... strange. Almost like chanting. As she pulled, it grew clearer.

"The unpure shall be cleansed. The abominations will be taken from this Earth. The unpure shall be cleansed." The chanting was coming closer, threatening to drown out the note holding the creature. That note was pressing on Annabel, too, and she was in danger of falling against the creature. Where it touched the tree, splinters of singed wood cracked in miniature explosions and sap boiled and popped. Chunks pelted the poor girl, and sap clung to hair and skin.

Finally, the chunk of metal came free! As soon as it did, the creature expended its last energy on the tree, splitting it nearly in half. The chanting faded, the skies began to clear.

Meanwhile, the police were arriving at the diner. One car arrived, and the pair of police started to briefly question those in the restaurant about the strange man who'd vanished out the back door.
 
'This was the opportunity he needed!' thought Perry, 'what better than mysterious potential danger for an in with this guy!"

"I'll just come with," he says, slipping out of the booth, unperturbed by the 'sewer' comment. He knew better. He smelled nothing like a sewer... a dumpster maybe...
 
Wow, was that ever hot! And not 'hot' in the sense of a mouth-watering man but rather in the sense of a thousand burning suns. Within seconds of her hands making contact with the lightning creature's core, Annabel was distressed to feel her gloves growing warm and malleable, like playdough. And of course it was no easy task she had because not only was her equipment malfunctioning but Mr. Keyboard's strange siren attack was starting to backfire as well. Against her will she was being pushed closer to the creature and she could feel on her skin the heat it generated, like the beginning of a sunburn.

Her skin itching from the intense heat and the static making her hair poof out like a defensive cat were the least of her worries though because she also had to contend with wood cinders and molten drops of sap from the tree the creature was apparently melting. If she stayed like this much longer, she'd probably lose the skin on her hands, and she wasn't too partial to that strange bodiless chanting either.

So with a foot raised and planted on the tree trunk to brace herself, Annabel gave one more hearty yank and dislodged the metal core successfully, if a little dramatically. With a startled squeak, her arms flew up over her head from the sudden loss of anchor and she landed hard on her back. The impact would have sent the metal core tumbling away but it was firmly attached to her melted gloves.

"Well..." Annabel voiced, still on her back, panting and trying her best to catch her wind. "That was fun." She let out a shaky laugh, staring up at the sky that was steadily clearing. It'd already stopped raining.

And then there was a loud creaking from the tree as the weakened trunk buckled under the weight. With a loud crack, the thin strand of wood gave way and the top half of the tree came crashing down on top of Annabel. Or it would have, if she hadn't rolled out of the way in time.

All those years of her cousins rolling her up in carpets had finally paid off.
 
There was barely any time to really adjust. Trying to catch his breath, a tree almost crushed him. Rich slid an extra seven feet on the saturated ground. So much rain had fallen that it looked like he jumped into a pool. Water shot up his nose, and the fedora fell off. Choking, he turned back to the roller.

"Looks like we kicked some villainy in the nuts. Are you okay? Anything broken?"

The fedora was in need of a wash. So the rest, but the concern was for the woman and the old hat. Water flapped off, as it was shaken. A hand was offered to break ice of a potential new friend. Rich had only lived here for less than 30 days, and he was in real need of friendly face..
 
Lydia slammed on the brakes to her truck, bringing it to a sudden halt as the tree crashed down inches from her bumper. She sat frozen for a moment, gasping and sweating, gripping the steering wheel until she left indentations in the plastic. She'd barely gotten her eyes back on the road, hearing the weird sound of the thunder before the skies cleared. Were the skies talking? It couldn't be possible! But then again, it shouldn't have been possible for her truck to stop dead on a half-flooded road. Was the weather always like this here?

"Is everybody okay?" she called as she finally climbed out of the truck, her own voice a little hysterical. Running her hands through her hair in agitation, she thought about how close she'd just come to death.

She'd had that weird dream again, and it left her with that familiar, scared feeling. She'd gone for a run to clear her head instead of going back to sleep and had worked up more of a sweat than she'd planned. She was too sweaty and gross to go to the show like this! What kind of impression would that have made? So she had to shower and wash her hair and ended up running a few minutes behind by the time she'd loaded up her truck and tied down the tarp. Good thing, too, or her brand new equipment would've been ruined by now. But that would've made precious difference if she'd been crushed!

But now the problem was, how to move this tree out of the way? It wasn't too big, maybe they could push it. She looked back again to the two who looked like they'd been swimming in the field.
 
"More like bodyslammed it from the top rope," Annabel laughed up at Mr. Keyboard, raising an arm to take the offered hand. Watery mud cascaded from her hair and clothes as she was pulled to her feet and she had to admit the scene reminded her of pouring chocolate milk. Although...she was positive she didn't want to see if it tasted as similar as it looked. She'd learned better in the third grade.

Once on her feet though, she wasted a few seconds trying to shake the metal core loose from her left hand's mangled rubber glove with little result. Sighing, she took to peeling the glove off, wincing as patches of skin came with it, leaving raw spots behind. Healing would take a stronger spell than the one she'd used to make the gloves and she honestly didn't have the energy right now. It would have to wait.

Tucking the gloves and the metal chunk into her waterlogged satchel, the young witch glanced up in time to see a new face heading their way. "Hello~!" she called, waving an arm over her head. "Everything is A-okay here!" she reported with a smile, though it quickly vanished, replaced with a look of realization. "Oh! My umbrella!" A quick glance around the muddy field brought her attention to the tree, more specifically the plastic U-shaped umbrella handle sticking out from under the trunk. "Oh...."

A look of utter tragedy upon her face, as if her dog had just died, bottom lip quivering a little, Annabel turned back to the other two and said, "I guess we should go to the restaurant then..." If her memory served her right, that was where Mr. Sandwich had said he was going, taking that glowing ball with him.
 
Ander nodded, concentrating for a moment, trying to block out the feelings of irritation that seemed to issue from Harry. "You could just come with us, you know. Probably safer to stick together." He shrugged, smiling wearily at Perry and leading the way back out into the rain. The police, however, stopped the men for a moment. Thankfully, they knew Ander.

"You friends with this vagrant, sir?"

"I am. Don't worry, I'll make sure he has a job and is off the streets by Monday."

The police nodded, seemingly reassured that this was not the bum they were looking for, and went on their way.

Ander sighed, tiredly starting for the park. The walk was unpleasant, and about halfway there, the intense flashes of lightning died off and the rain seemed to fade away as quickly as it had come. They only had a few blocks to go, and Ander could feel a strange tangle of emotions coming from near the park. He broke into a run, ignoring the puddles he was splashing through. The scene was chaotic. A tree across the road, two people soaked and mudcovered, and a third person climbing out of a truck. He thought he recognized the two mud covered people from earlier in the day.

"What happened here? Is everyone alright?"
 
"I'll be along in a while, I'm going think and eat." Harry watched Perry and Ander leave after talking to the cops. The cops talked to a couple more people, Harry observed them ask a couple questions as he ate his fries. One of the people the cops talked to pointed toward the booth he was sitting at. Harry looked down at his fries before the cops could catch him looking. Ah jeez. They approached him and entered the range of his radar.

They asked him about the guy that had come on, Harry only told them that the dude stared at him uncomfortably and babbled some nonsense then took off. He said that's all that happened, the cops looked unsatisfied but left. Harry hurried up and finished his fries, deciding it was time to catch up with Ander and Perry. Pocketing the bottle of water he stood up and walked toward the door, waving to his waitress friend on the way out.

Harry wondered if the people were still at the park, they probably weren't because the rain most likely turned the place into a swamp. There wasn't any more lightning and Harry removed his glasses to wipe off the last couple drops of rain. Pretty odd weather, so suddenly it had started to rain and so hard. Looking farther down the road he saw a fuzzy scene. It wasn't until he got his glasses back on did everything get clear again. It seemed a tree had fallen into the road and it seemed there were people standing around it. That's all he could make out even with his glasses on. He lengthened his stride.
 
Rich chuckled at her response. Her pro-wrestling reference mad him rather happy that he helped her up. One thing that unnerved him was seeing the skin come off the palm. The nose crinkled and hands were clinched, at the sight. Open wounds like that were not something he was ever used to. Ironically, the knowledge to actually treat it was in the memory banks. The woman didn't seem to care to much, so Rich stayed silent and figured that it would take care of itself.

Mud and grass had found its way to places that he forgot existed. The cold had began to really take its toll. It was like he temporarily had the power to become a prune. If he didn't get inside soon, there would a good chance of illness or worse.

He stayed back a bit as his new acquaintance and a bystander began a conversation. Rich realized that what they had down was not something they should advertise. He also realized that the keyboard was misplaced again. That was a little upsetting.

"We are okay, sir. How is everyone else?" he asked

Rich wanted to avoid talking about the turn of events. If he had to talk, then there would be no choice. However, there was no real reason to trusr anyone. No reason, except for the woman who had teamed up with him.
 
Seeing that everyone was okay, Lydia turned her mind back to the problem of the tree. She still needed to get into the park to see if the show was still happening and if she could set up her booth.

"Um, anybody want to help move this tree?" she said, loud enough for those around to hear her. "We could try to push it, I don't think it's too big, or I have my truck if we could get a chain. I really need to get into the park..."

The whole situation felt really weird. What had happened to the tree? She'd seen lightning strikes on trees before, and they usually didn't end with a tree splitting and falling. They usually just exploded as all the sap boils at once. That seemed pretty consistent with where the trunk actually broke, but the whole thing just seemed wrong. This whole day was giving her a tight feeling in her gut. Something definitely out of the ordinary had just happened, but everybody seemed so at ease with it. She couldn't tell if that was a show, or what, but nobody seemed to be asking any questions beyond making sure everyone was alright.

So she said it.

"What the hell just happened? With this storm and everything?"
 
The new girl seemed quite intent on getting to the show. Annabel felt terrible to have to be the bearer of bad news for this woman. "Well... I don't think I'd be much help moving the tree," she stated, holding up her injured hands with an apologetic frown on her lips. "Not to mention... I'm pretty sure the show is canceled," she quickly added, casting a glance over her shoulder as if she were double-checking. You know, just in case she was wrong.

Feeling the full weight of that spell now, Annabel shuffled closer to the tree and sank down onto the trunk for a makeshift bench, wiping a stray lock of hair from her face with the back of her hand, only to smear mud across her forehead. And when she heard Truck Lady inquire about the recent events, she of course replied with the truth. "Marcus and Danica had a fight." She smiled up at the other two, her eyelids feeling strangely as if they had weights attached to them. Not exercising weights. That would be painful. They'd probably tear her lids right off! No, more like fishing line weights. Those were smaller in size but still mildly heavy. Easier to attach to one's eyelids too, with tape of course. Glue was far too risky.

What was she thinking about?

Oh yeah.

She forced her eyes to remain open, though it really was a struggle, and after staring at Truck Lady for a few long seconds it occured to her that the woman was familiar. But who...? "Oh! I know you! You're the lady who has the health food shop, right?" she gasped, an arm outstretched, finger pointed at the other woman. "But... I don't think I've met you before," she added, making a sad face at Mr. Keyboard. And come to think of it, where was his keyboard? Hopefully it hadn't befallen the same fate as her umbrella.

A sudden wave of exhaustion hit her then and, arm still outstretched, finger still pointing, she passed out, toppling backwards off of the tree and landed in the mud with a 'SPLAT!', legs hooked on the trunk in what was probably a most humorous display.
 
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Another paper littered the rooftop, threatening to roll away slowly into the abyss of sky. The paper didn't hold no real value, as was the case with all of the other papers that were scattered around her. If they held some sort of value, they would still be intact in her roughly bound notebook placed in her lap.


Hajori took her drawing very seriously. If she was off by even the tiniest inch of her idea for the picture, her hand would grip the page fiercely, ripping it straight from it's 'tendon' and would be crumbled crudely into a ball. Today was a very bad day, due to the sight of balled paper around her. It was finally decided that she would not leave that rooftop until her picture was finished. Her clothing shop was closed for today, but it's roof wasn't. Hajori was working when she wasn't working, as always.


Her finger twitched as it hovered slowly above the blank page of her notebook. Jori didn't even know what she was about to do anymore. With a sigh, she forced herself to realize the deafening grasp on her notebook, setting it lightly aside. Instead of torturing herself, she found pleasure in gazing off of the rooftop instead. The roof wasn't up high enough for her, to be honest. If she could detect a pedestrains eye color from the distance away from them that she held then, then she wasn't elevated high enough. It's not really isolation if you can make out the people under you, her voice whispered in her own head. Jori rubbed softly at her left, brown eye, which was stinging due to gazing at a blank sheet of paper for a long period of time.

Then, suddenly, there were screams and yelps from the park a small ways away from her store. Finally sitting up on her her legs, crossing them through one another, Hajori finally got a glimpse of a few teens in the park, one of them covered completely in mud. She lifted an eyebrow and continued to survey the area. Reminiscence usually didn't have gathering like these. Especially after the storm at hit. Then again, Hajori didn't want to be cooped up in the dark shop of hers, so when sunlight was peaking through again, she decided to hit the roof and draw sketches of her potential outfits...but the noise was bothering her.

Finally, Hajori sighed heavily under her breath and jumped from the roof onto the trash can to the right of the shop, making her way to the park. There was a thought that the kids would react the wrong way at her sudden appearance, but she was used to that by now, wasn't she? Hajori was a few feet away from the kids and wrinkled her nose at the girl in the mud, looking to the others, then back to her.

"...Is everything alright?"she asked, placing a hand on her hip.​
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Perry saw the woman's hand first... 'oh god' he thought as he picked out the patches that had come away when she obviously had tried to remove the rubber that had burned on... 'I'm going to be sick... find something else to focus on!'

Perry blanched as a wave of queasiness shook through him at the vivid thought of her injuries as he looked for something else, anything else, to fixate on. There was a burnt, twisted piece of scrap metal with the remnants of the rubber gloves being put into her satchel... it had once been important... some sort of value to it, but not any more. And her hands... oh god!

Perry stood away from the rest, not offering or even hinting at the prospect of help. He scanned the scene hoping against hope that he could distract his hyper-aware mind from the scene of her injury. He soaked in every detail he could and compared them with what he had seen before... windows, rooftops, trees, grass... it was overwhelming, but at least he wasn't focusing on...

'Splat!' he heard what could only have been someone falling in the mud. Filing away those things he had managed to pick up with his scan, he jerked his vision down where the hurt woman *shudder* where she had passed out into the mud. He quickly picked up what he could of the other people's reactions and dispositions before trying desperately to ignore the skin-crawl-making wounds.
 
Harry had observed the girl falling backwards from her sitting position and broke into a jog. As he approached he realized it was the girl from earlier he had shared the bench with. Startled by the clatter from a nearby alleyway, he whipped around to see a mostly normal looking young woman. She seemed normal enough, not like some assassin or what ever might be coming after the thumb drive. But there was that old saying about books and covers.

Deeming the chick as a concerned bystander, Harry relaxed and looked over the people that were here. It was the same people he saw from earlier, Ander, Perry, and the others who had went after the ball. Except there were two extra, the girl from the alley and the chick who he assumed the truck belonged to.

Harry knelt down and carefully helped the girl out of the mud, he noticed the burns and bits of rubber stuck to her hands but was mystified as to where they came from. He picked her up and sat her on the less-damp sidewalk with her back against the fallen tree. He wiped the mud from his hand and patted the girls cheek. "Hey, you alright?". He looked around at everyone without voicing the question of 'What happened?'
 
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