Calm Before the Storm

The day started innocently enough, people woke up and went about their morning routines, parents made their way to work and children made their way to school. There was no indication that today would be the day that everything changed. A few raised eyebrows were given when various people attempted to contact loved ones, but generally, no alarm was raised as the jobs they worked gave a fair enough reason for their silence.

The sleepy town came alive as the sun rose in the sky, the previously deserted streets filling with the hustle and bustle of the morning commute, and the sidewalks and trails once again played host to bicyclists, joggers and nature enthusiasts. If any noticed the strange absence of the homeless, none made comment, or, if they did, it was only in passing before they once again went about their way, back in their own world.

This continued for a while before, just like every day, it slowed down and then became barely a trickle of activity, generally those who had slept through alarms or had family emergencies or the like. And while some were on their way to various family doctors, it so happened that on that particular morning, no one got hurt enough to warrant a visit to the hospital. Even if someone had gone there, however, by the time they arrived, they would have found a flurry of activity as those who were arriving to relieve their graveyard shift compatriots arrived to an empty building. So strange and impossible was this occurrence that none of the assembled doctors, nurses, and other hospital workers even thought to call the police, not that it would have done them much good. As it happened, this scene was repeated in two other places, namely the police station and the fire station. Unfortunately, none of them thought to check on the others; if they had, they might have at least had a small warning that something big was coming.

The first indication to the people of the town that something was wrong was when the ground suddenly began to tremble, growing in intensity for the briefest of moments, before settling down once again. Except it did more than that. In the aftermath of the small quake, people began to notice something: the silence. After the shaking had subsided, there was no resumption of the normal sounds of urban wildlife that the inhabitants were so used to. No birds called from trees, no insects buzzed in the air. In fact, the air itself seemed to have stilled, stifling in its stillness, as if the world had taken a breath and was holding it in, bated, waiting for something to happen. People everywhere cautiously looked around, trying to find the cause for the stillness, even as that small part of their brains, the one leftover from the time when man was not the most dangerous thing on the planet by far, was whimpering in fear, before screaming for them to run, fast and without looking back, for it knew even if they didn't consciously realize it yet, that they were no longer the apex predator anymore. Sadly, none of them followed that screaming instinct, instead holding as still as the air, waiting and watching, bodies wound tighter than bowstrings, eyes and ears straining for any hint of the unseen danger that was surrounding them.

At the local high school, the students were doing the same, glancing nervously around, unknowingly emulating their working peers as they too waited for something, anything, to happen.

And then the screaming began.

And the ground erupted in front of them.