XXXI
The Potent Storm
~~~

Wednesday, June 6th
🎈

He's in that all too familiar state of being awake, only with his eyes closed. He didn't want to open them.

"Gar!" Rita calls from downstairs. "We're leaving!"

"Ok!" Then his eyes snap open and he rockets out of his bed. "LEAVING?" He practically kicks open the trap door and flies down the stairs. "What for?!?"

"We told you last night." Steve claims.

"Steve I was on a completely different planet last night."

"We have to go to work today," Rita starts.

"And we won't be back until tomorrow morning." Steve finishes.

"Why?! You said you took off of work today!"

"Well we did, but something came up." Steve states.

"For both of you??"

"I know. That's what I said. Both of our bosses want us at work today. You know how Alex is." Rita says.

"'No excuses...' But Maya was always super nice!"

"It's not Maya, it's the higher ups. There's a big meeting or something happening and everyone that can needs to be there. So unless you're on vacation or someone's dying..."

"But I'm going to die Steve! Isn't that enough?!"

"Alright, Gar stop exaggerating. You'll be fine." Steve says.

"Why don't you find someone to hang out with today. Just to get your mind off things."

"Mmm..." he groans uneasily.

"Bye, Gar." Steve walks out the door, but Rita stays behind and kisses him lightly on the forehead.

"Love you." She stops in the door frame. "Just try not to think about it ok? It's one day. One day and it's over." She gives a meek smile and then closes and locks the door, leaving Gar by himself in his shorts and a t-shirt.

"Haven't heard anyone say that in a while..."

After grabbing his phone and making some amalgamation of food for himself, he goes upstairs to shower and get dressed.

Dick, Kori, Raven, Vic, Wally, Jinx, Terra

Is anyone free today

He types reluctantly.

Dick
No sorry. Kori and I are going to visit a college

Kori
I was not aware of this until yesterday 😠

Vic
nah. Jackie's got this dumb convention she wants to go to

Wally
Js phone is broken so she's dragging me to get it fixed. You know that takes forever man

Terra
I am
but not until like three

Does anyone know what Raven's doing?

Kori
No, she is upset with me at the moment

Vic
What did you do

Kori
It is not important

Wally
Not to be mean gar but why would you ask in the first place

Idek man
im desperate ok
Rita and Steve both left for
work and they weren't supposed to
I cant be by myself

Vic
Damn, maybe ask one of your gamer friends or something
jak's obviously not free but maybe one of the others are

i guess it wouldn't hurt to try

The Manticores🎮

Yo anyone free

Myra
Lol you need me again

I would like that yes

Myra
Sorry dude. Parents grounded me because I stayed up late playing video games too many days in a row
It happens often

Callum
I'm leaving for Hawaii today
Plane's taking of now
Bye

Adam
My stupid mom
Need I say more

Myra
You're literally going to college
Why does she still dictate what you do

Adam
In her words: "I'm asserting as much power as I can before you leave so you'll always have me in the back of my mind before you do something stupid"
Because that makes sense

Tony
No sorry im not

Jackie
Vic's taking me to a convention
Sorry gar

Mike
Sorry no

Jack
I've got nothin to do
my parents are out of town

He let out his bated breath. Maybe today would go better than he expected.

Jack
Crap
Nvm gar
I'm getting a call from the parents of the kid I babysit

Myra
Since when the hell did you start babysitting?

Jack
Way before I met any of you
Since like middle school
It's just never interfered with practice
Gotta make that college money somehow
Why are you asking anyways gar
Bored?

Sure let's go with that. He thinks.

Yeah

Jack
Lol ok then
just play some games or something
It's better than nothing

Myra
Besides
It's better to stay inside today
and you know not die of heatstroke

Yeah
Thanks Jack
not like I got much of a choice

I bet Raven's the only one not doing anything today. Damn... He guesses.

With a sigh and a grunt, he finishes getting dressed and decides to go outside for a walk. He doesn't trust himself to drive. He never does on his birthday.

He stuffs his hands in the pockets of his jean shorts. His white tank top reflects all of the light from the sun above him.

It's 110° outside. The record was broken today, He got a notification on his phone about it; he blatantly ignored it. He pretty much had the idea of what the reporters were going to say anyway. "Stay inside. Drink a lot of water." He can do one of those two things.

So he walks. He walks right in front of Raven's house. The car isn't there. Arella must be at work now. He could just go and knock on the door. Just a few little knocks is all he needs.

His feet go on autopilot and make for the door. Now he's standing at the door, right hand pressed up against it.

He clenches his fist as if something's inside; A precious item, a valuable gem, some fragile object that if it dropped it would shatter into thousands of microscopic pieces. Though, all those thousands of microscopic pieces would reflect the same thing: Gar. Gar and his opened hand, looking down at the opulent bit of the world he just destroyed.

Is it nervousness? Or is it fear?

He drops his hand, and the little reality within it. Of course, it reflects. Reflects everything. To it's left, to it's right, far, near, under it, and most notably, above it. The image — the blonde boy with dazed blue eyes — above it is especially clear.

His eyes continue to be locked on the door.

He takes a step backwards, then turns around and goes down the steps as calm eyes watch him through the window.

I can't do it.

He turns into the city, purposely taking the back roads.

"Damn why didn't I take the car? It's too hot to be walking out here." He wasn't going to double back now.

Nobody's around. Everyone's smart. This is stupid. Why did I think this was a good idea?

He reaches an intersection and blindly crosses. The traffic light is invisible. The the crossing signal is invisible. All cars are invisible. Everything except for the road itself.

That is, until a driver slams her fist onto her horn and her right foot crashes into the break petal.

The environment pops back into existence. Including an expensive looking Mercedes who's nose is just shy of an inch or two from his legs.

"Hey!! What the hell do you think you're doing?! Move, kid!" The comely woman belted from her window.

He pulls up the edge of his mouth slightly and glares at the woman before dismissing her with a careless wave of his hand.

The woman honks again in disgust and drives onward.

"Oh my God!" Gar snaps around to find a woman, slightly taller than him, worrying over him. It was evident in her face. "Are you ok?!"

"What? I– yeah I'm fine. I'm still standing here aren't I?" He plasters a facetious smile on his face in place of a frown.

"Thank God..." she sighs with overwhelming relief. "You should be careful when you're crossing a busy road like this you know. You crossed when the light turned green! You could've been– are you alright?" She noticed his confused yet interested gaze. He was observing her, studying her. As if to answer a question.

"I-I'm sorry, ma'am, you just look like someone I used to know."

The woman's hair is a smooth chesnut brown, neat and clean, all wrapped up into a ponytail by a single blue hair tie. Her eyes are a vivid sky color, much like Gar's. Nothing is abnormal about her.

"Uh, if you don't mind me asking, what's your name?"

"Oh I don't mind at all! It's Marie." All of the color from him drains instantly. He looks like he's seen a ghost.

"Honey, what's going on?? Why'd you jump out of the car like that??" A man came up behind her.

"This boy almost got hit by a car, Mark. I wanted to see if he was alright."

Gar shifts his eyes to the man. He looks just like him. Hair, eyes, the whole package.

"...Mark?"

He clamps his eyes shut for a good 30 seconds. In that 30 seconds was an endless motion of cacophonous noise. But after shaking his head and opening his eyes, the couple speak to him again. "You good, kid? You're not looking too hot."

"What...did you say your names were again?"

"Laurie and Jack..." The woman states with an atom of uncertainty.

He's hearing things?

He's hearing things.

What's...wrong with me?

"Ok...I'm sorry I just remembered something I forgot to do. Thanks for worrying, but I'm fine." He flashes an incredibly believable smile at them and walks off.

Oh my God did I just...they look so much like Mom and Dad...

He does a quick double take, but forces himself to look and continue onward.

Don't look at them! He yells at himself in his head, scolding himself.

He can't tell if their sweating is from the blistering heat or if it's from his brain doing whatever it just did to him.

I should get some food. I need to eat something...

He spots a pizzeria from across the street and right before he goes in his reflection slaps him right in the face.

He still looks so pale. His tan skin looks completely washed out. It may just be the way the window reflects him, but he looks sickly.

He enters anyways. As he expects, eyes are on him. All of them. But that's only because whenever anyone enters there's a tiny little bell that rings out. Not because of his appearance.

Trying to make himself look at least half way decent, he naturally combs his fingers through his hair in an effort to at least get the green tips away from his eyes.

"Hello." The cold looking man greets.

"Uh, hi, just give me a plain slice please." Gar asks.

"You look like a bottle of milk." The man mentions curtly.

"Yeah... thanks." Way to go, genius. You can see the blatantly obvious!

"One slice?" His thick Italian accent is almost weighing on Gar. Beating down on him. The man has a condescendence to him. He looks quite older, his voice is gruff, and his eyes look like they're judging your each and every move.

"Yes." As soon as the man moves away — with little more than an "Ok" — what's behind him is revealed.

It's a brick oven. It is open to anyone and everyone. The crackle of the fire is resonating the most with him. Again, his environment disappears. Him and the fire is all that's left. The crackles and pops are echoed, rapidly entering his ears.

The fire nears him. The gap closes by the second. Then, in one flash of absolute terror, and flames errupt into an inferno that surrounds him. The fire however, is still closing the gap. Getting closer and closer, now so close that the heat around him is immense. He feels it within himself rather than on his skin, but regardless it still hurts. All the pain of a raging fire is inside rather than on the surface.

Stop!! Stop go away! Make it stop!!

His screams are worse than the ones he made in the backyard of his house that one night. The night Raven found his pills. How worse?

Undescribably worse.

But nobody can hear him.

Nobody can hear him. Nobody's around to even care.

He gives a few deep, thick coughs. The ones you make when your lungs are filled to your throat with smoke, and all the burning in your throat that comes with it.

One final cough, and it's all done. Finishing with a grand lightning strike.

"Wha...?" He says breathily. His heart is pounding so much that he can hear it in his ears.

He's in an alley, and now it's pouring. He's completely drenched.

He looks around, utterly confused. He's sitting on the ground with his knees pressed tightly against his chest.

"How did I–" he gets cut off by another strikingly potent thunder clap preceding a lightning strike of the same nature. Only this time it's much more gripping. The world around him is cacophonous. Car horns, people yelling, police sirens, all the sounds of a normal city, masked by the transparent veil of sound that is this thunderous storm. "I should get home..."

The rain drops are the size of dimes and inflict pain every time one splats onto his skin.

What happened to me? Wasn't I ordering pizza? Gah...everything hurts...why am I in so much pain?

He looks up at the sky only to have a myriad of giant drops promptly careen into his face, causing him to flick his head back down and keep moving.

He runs and runs, cutting through alleys and across yards to get home.

It wasn't supposed to rain. Where is this coming from? God all of the roads are flooding. Kinda glad I didn't take my car...

As every Californian roadway within a 5 mile radius of Jump City continues to flood, he splashes through the watery streets.

Until a force stops him. Almost like an invisible wall in a video game.

He turns his head to his right, and Tony Roth stands before him.

"Gah!!" Jumping back, Tony dissolves away, and behind him shows his location.

His old house. Not the one that the city rebuilt oh no, the one one that he grew up in. The familiar version.

The one that burned to the ground at Tony's hands ten years ago.

The one he lost close to everything in.

His sanity, and his parents.

Even in this rain it somehow burst into flames. It's like the rain isn't even there. The inferno isn't consuming the house however. It's continuing to stand strong like there is no fire.

A bone chilling, bloodcurdling scream echoes out of the house in a haze. Following it is little Gar's pained cries for his parents.

It's no longer just the rain drops that are making Gar's face wet.

A hand touches his shoulder.

"You remember? All that pain, that fear you felt. Are you feeling it yet?" Jumping the opposite direction he loses his balance and falls into the puddle in front of him. Staring down at him is Tony, again seemingly appearing from nowhere. "Or have you just been feeling it ever since then?"

"I..."

"I love it when I leave people speechless. It always means I've made an impact." Tony replies with a devilish grin pinned to his face.

GarHe sits slackjawed, but manages to get a sentence forward.

"G-go a-away! You can't do anything to me!!"

"I can't?" He squats down and puts his hands on his knees. "Then what's this?" He asks stretching out his hand to the mess ahead of him. Gar fights the urge to look back. He clenches his eyes shut, pushing more tears and rain water from his eyes. "If I can't do anything to you, then where's Mama? Daddy?"

"SHUT UP!!" He splashes Tony with water and he dissolves again.

Using a good minute to process the fact that Tony disappeared again, he turns around, realizing the sound of the fire burning is gone. It is, but the house — the one that hardly looked like it was being affected by the fire within it — is now nothing more than a smoldering pile of ash.

He shakes his head as he rises from the puddle and runs down the street.

A quick, gentle yet rushed gasp is let out as he passes. Eyes locked on him as he heads farther and farther down the water logged street. The creaks of the wooden steps pale in comparison to the sounds of the rain on them.

Another pair of splashes joins the symphonic mess of sounds that is this rainstorm.

"No no no no..." he keeps repeating under his breath. He can hardly hear himself.

He struggles to get his keys from his pockets that are plastered to his skin along with everything on his body. Slipping a few times and the lock turns and he goes in. Quickly slamming the door, he bolts upstairs to his room.

A hand catches the door before it shuts all the way.

Once he gets to the attic he slams the trap door shut, locks it, and makes a b-line to his bathroom.

He wraps the towel around himself and sits cross-legged on the floor.

"No no this is all just a bad dream. It'll go away it'll go away..." He clutches his head, pulling so tight on his hair that it begins to hurt.

"Garrrrfiielld..." a melodic voice sings. His heart stops. It's the most terrifying singing he's ever heard. "Answer her, Logan."

"Ike?!?! Get the hell out of my–" Ike walks through the door hand in hand with Domino.

The door did not open. It is still locked.

"House..."

"Afternoon Gar." He has trouble deciding whether to cower in fear or give them his signature glare. So he does a mix of both.

"Leave me alone... please..."

"Why? Are they bothering you?" Tony comes out from the wall and stands beside the twins. Gar's immediate instinct is to scramble backwards until he his something hard. Which ends up being the bathtub.

All it did was put another foot between them.

"I can't do this... please leave..." He pleads. He shuts his eyes. "Please...leave me alone for once...Please!"

"You...want us to leave?" He pauses. That voice, one of the ones that haunt him every year...

No...

A compassionate hand touches his head.

"We're not leaving, sport." That's the other voice.

Not again...

He looks up and there his parents are. Standing there hand in hand with eachother. Domino, Ike, and Tony are all gone. It's just the three of them now. Mom, dad, and son.

Marie looks hurt, but Mark is friendly, loving. Marie soon takes on the same sentiment in the form of a meek smile.

Stop it...

"We'll always be here." Marie claims.

Stop torturing me...

"Just like last year,"

Every single year...

"And the year before," Mark continues.

Go away!!

"We'll always be by your side." They say harmoniously.

"GO AWAY!!"

They disappear as if Gar's shout blew them away.

"You push everyone away don't you?"

"Shut up!! Shut up, Tony!!"

"Rita, Steve, your friends, your own mother and father,"

"Don't you dare!!"

"Raven,"

He swipes at the air aimlessly. His disembodied voice chuckles in delight of his apparent stupidity.

"You don't know anything! You're not real! You're in jail and never coming back!"

"How do you know?"

"Because I'm not as gullible as you think! I know what is and isn't real! I've gone through this ten times now!"

"But does that make it any easier? Does it make it any less real for you?"

"..."

"That's what I thought. This won't ever stop following you, Gar." Even though the voice is coming from nowhere, it sounds like it's right in his ear. "Just like I'll never stop following you."

"No no NO!! Stop! QUIT HAUNTING ME!!"

His eyes are like faucets. They won't stop running. He stares blankly at the empty door, realizing how quiet it is. The sound of the rain outside slowly trickles back in, alleviating some of the absolutely deafening silence. But that's it. Just the sounds. His lights aren't even on.

Unlike faucets though, when he breaks down the water doesn't stop flowing. He sits on the bathroom floor in his own puddle of water and tears.

Soon a loud banging begins to add itself to the sounds, including the calling of his name with it.

A crash of lightning and a flash.

He bawls. He tucks his knees into his body, then his head into his knees and hugs them.

Why does this happen to me? Why can't I have my parents? Why can't I have Raven?

Why can't I have anything?

Do I...even...deserve any of that?

His cries, for as much as he's crying, are barely audible.

Until he screams out.

The scream is...horrid, terrifying.

He sounds like he's dying.

The door swings open.

Someone followed him home.

She's just as drenched as he is.

She runs to his side.

She doesn't say a word. Not a single one.

She helps him up, and he looks at her in surprise.

She quiets him, then helps him out of the bathroom.

She sits him down against his bed since he's too wet to lay in the bed, and she sits next to him.

They sit there exchanging no words. Only the sounds of the heavy rain.

The heavy rain of the potent storm.

Word Count: 3577