Alexandria's Genesis

End of a Friendship

The sun streams down on them through the bright green leaves high above them. Alexandria lay on a rock with her hands behind her head as she stares at the blue, nearly cloudless sky. Aleissia and Avrel sit on the edge of the rock, watching the waves of the lake below. Nikal had ventured downward to the lake to see it closer. Sevantei sits in a crook in the rock, curled into himself. His expression was blank, but none of them noticed.

There was a light wind, and the lake sparkled with the sun beating down. Birds chirped in the late spring day. Across the lake, two hikers in colorful jackets wave at the quintet. Avrel and Aleissia wave back. Then they carried on their way. Aleissia leans her head onto Avrel's shoulder. Nikal starts skipping rocks. Unsuccessfully. She tries her best but can't get the amazing multiple bounces that Alexandria kept talking about.

Alexandria pops out for a second and comes back with a picnic basket. Aleissia calls up Nikal, and Avrel shoves Sevantei to get his attention. They all sat on the boulder and unpacked their lunches. A PB&J, a salami sandwich, some apples and oranges, some other items, and of course some treats. Aleissia was so enthralled to have an authentic picnic that she saw pictures of.

Avrel grabs a red apple out of the box and bites into it. As soon as he bit into it, he hears something odd, a slight disturbance. He looks to the direction of the sound. Nothing. Just trees.

He turns back to the group. Apparently no one else heard it. Ok, whatever.

He takes another bite of his apple. There it is, again! he thinks. He darts his eyes to the source of the buzz, in a different place now, seeing nothing but the hill with trees on it. He also saw a small twinkle, but that was obviously just his eye messing with him. But when he turned back to the group now, Alexandria had stopped eating and started listening as well. Sevantei looked even more odd. His eyes were wide open and his hand was still in the same shape as when he was holding his sandwich, but it had dropped to the blanket. His breathing was heavy.

Before he could ask Sevantei what was wrong, or take a bite into his apple, he saw the twinkle in front of him, and heard it even more clearly. Actually, the flicker looked more like static on the television screens than a twinkle.

"Guys," Avrel says calmly. Aleissia and Nikal notice something's up as well. The static shot around at increasing frequency, now.

Sevantei slowly stands up. Two static sparks appear around them and disappear again. Then even more. Sevantei slowly moves his feet, moving forward ever so gradually. Alexandria shoots up to try to get Sevantei's attention, but Sevantei's mind was already gone. She looked behind her to see a ball of static sustaining itself.

"Uh, Alex?" Aleissia asks, completely befuddled by what was happening.

Alexandria turns back sharply to stop Sevantei, but he was nowhere in her sight. Nikal knew what happened. Sevantei dash around Alexandria much faster than he should have. Alexandria whips her head back to the static, to see Sevantei in between them.

"Sevantei, get away from that," Alexandria tries to negotiate. Sevantei doesn't seem to have heard.

Sevantei turns his head around in a crooked fashion. A wide crazy grin is on his face. Then he slowly spins his body towards the group.

"Y'know somethin'?" Sevantei says. "You guys are my best friends. I can't have anyone or anything hurting you, now can I? But don't worry, I can fix all this. I'll save all of you, don't you worry."

"Stop. Stop right now, Sevantei. I don't know what you're talking about but that thing is dangerous. Do not go near it," Alexandria tries to convince Sevantei.

His expression turns grim, if not angry. He starts to walk backwards. The closer he got, the more static appeared, and the more hideous the hissing was.

"STOP RIGHT NOW OR I'LL HAVE TO STOP YOU MYSELF!" Alexandria yells at him. Avrel noticed that Alexandria was not standing strong. Her stance was stiff and off kilter. She was terrified. Distressed about this unknown activity that was destroying reality around them.

"You'll be safe now," Sevantei says in a hushed tone.

He takes a large step back and their reality falters. sparking from the one bit of static, like a ball of electricity, everything it touched became monochrome and stopped moving. 

Sevantei disappears through the static and so does the gray. Everything moves again, and returns to its natural color.

"Sevantei?" Nikal shudders.

"Are we safe?" Avrel wonders.

"Is it over?" Aleissia asks.

Alexandria turns back around to face them all. The look on her face said that she was morbidly afraid, too. A moment of silence follows. Then the static rushes at them all at once. It surges around them until they were completely surrounded with surging, hissing static. Everything went eerily quiet. Nothing moved. Everything was gray. There was no noise, besides the four of them. They look at each other.

They could all feel it. Time had stopped. The only thing left moving was them. Aleissia rushes to Avrel's embrace, and Nikal sits down, covering her mouth with her hands. Alexandria looks up to the sky, now dull and gray.

"How far," she mutters to herself, anxiously. Her fingers shift around as she clutches her fists tightly. "How far have you gone." Her expression turns to sheer anger as she jumps into the vortex, leaving the three of them alone. She had forgotten about them in that moment and switched back to her solo mentality. They didn't exist to her anymore. Their friendship, at least for now, was over. They stood there in shock, completely silent. 

Then Nikal mutters a final word before letting out her silent tears.

"Sevantei..."