Chapter 1: The world looks white
The air felt wrong. [Caelus knew something was wrong that day.]
It was a feeling unlike any other, like a certain uncomfortability coursing through his nerves. Perhaps the colours were a twinge more vibrant. Perhaps the air was a molecule denser. Perhaps his body was a degree colder.
He turned on the faucet, and the water gushed down into the glass, foaming ever so slightly.
The water took his mind off the abnormality for a fleeting moment, until it returned a second later.
He sighed under his breath, setting the glass down on the white marble with a clink.
"I can't put my mind on it,” He muttered. “I'm not sick, it's the same time I wake up, and everything else is right.”
The feeling was like a novice pianist observing a piano that is ever so slightly out of tune. He knew something was wrong, but not what.
The house was quiet, like usual. Stelle was still asleep, like usual, and he had to make breakfast, as usual.
He hesitated, then clanked down the pan anyway.
The click and lighting up of the stove could be heard. A flat periwinkle flame jutted out from its orifices, blending with a scintilla of tangerine from the base.
Oil sizzled onto the pan, and his nails dug into an eggshell, cracking it open and spilling its contents onto the primed pan with a sputtering splat.
Footsteps thudded down the hall. Irregular.
He glanced back for a second to see Stelle. Rubbing one of her amber eyes, she liberated a gaping yawn. She was still in her pajamas, donning a white shirt with subtle unreadable text, and loose grey pants with stripes of varying lengths and angles.
Her hair was a tad longer than shoulder length, flowing in irregular layers, and feathering out unevenly. A few strands intruded upon her face, gathering between the eyes, and a couple more barely hugging her neck. A piece of idiot hair curled stubbornly up top, bobbing along as she approached Caelus.
Her skin, particularly her face, was a smidgen more vibrant than his. Where his visage was slightly pale, hers seemed to hide a peach undertone.
Caelus brought his focus back to the pan after just a second, then was reminded about the strange air, and opened his mouth to speak.
“Why’s the air so thick?” She murmured.
“Yeah, I noticed that too.”
He mindlessly moved the ladle along the half cooked scrambled egg.
“We eat scrambled eggs almost every day, can’t ya… just…”
She sighed, leaving her sentence incomplete, glancing down as something distracted her.
“My phone isn’t turning on…” She muttered
Caelus glanced over.
The screen was black. She pressed the power button five or six times. No response.
“Try on mine. It’s over—”
She was already sauntering over, still in her half asleep state, causing her to be less alert about this than Caelus.
“Yours is also off. Did ya forget to charge?”
Brows furrowing, Caelus stared through the pan, lost in thought, while Stelle tried turning on their phones a few more times, eyes narrowing slightly each passing second. The crackling and sputtering of the egg on the pan, it seemed, was not enough to snap him back.
The eggs were slightly browning now, releasing the scent of slightly burnt butter.
Snapping back, he quickly clicked off the stove, and slid the eggs off onto a plate beside.
Stelle turned the kitchen faucet on, and splashed a palmful of naturally foamy water onto her face, a few cool, stray particles catching Caelus in the crossfire.
He was too distracted to say something about it.
Setting the plate-ful of four unevenly scrambled onto the table with a clack, he set a plate out for both him and Stelle.
Before seating herself, the now more alert Stelle took a glance outside the living room window.
“It’s thicker and whiter outside, almost like a mist. Our phones aren’t turning on either.” She remarked, her voice more awake now.
She didn’t see him nod, but she knew he did.
“This isn’t normal.”
“Clearly,” she added. “But let’s eat first. It might go away soon.”
Sliding into the chair across Caelus, she grabbed a fork and began to dig into her share of the eggs.
“Bread after this?” She asked.
“Yeah, what else?”
“The jam finished yesterday, y’know.”
“We still have butter.”
“Maybe let me cook sometime. You’d worship my food if I got a chance.” Stelle added, smirking.
Her smirk faded quicker than usual.
Caelus tried to force a smile, but it came out crooked.
“Anything else odd you noticed?” He asked.
“Today just feels wrong,” She replied through a mouthful. “Ignoring the phones, n’all.”
“That doesn’t… help. We need to find out what is wrong.”
“Calm down Caelus, it’s not a big deal. Just turn yourself off and back on.”
“You mean… a nap?”
“Presicely.” She lifted herself up with her empty plate.
“You’ve barely eaten, what about bread?” He questioned, brows furrowed.
“Later. Even the food doesn’t taste right.”
She exited the kitchen, already ambling over to her room upstairs. Her phone still lay on the table.
Caelus opened his mouth to speak, but then shut it. She wouldn’t listen anyway.
She began climbing the flight of stairs.
Glancing back, she watched Caelus trying to turn his phone back on, frustration showing in his narrowed eyes and tightening lips.
He had obsidian hair, the same shade as hers, with an especially stubborn piece of idiot hair, shaped just like hers’. His eyes held the same amber, though boasting a more vibrant, deeper shade. The way his lips pressed together when he was frustrated, or the way his brows lowered and eyes squinted were just like hers.
After all, they were twins.
But on some days, Stelle felt like Caelus was a mirror version of her, just male and with shorter hair.
Seeing him get irked like this, she wondered why she wasn’t acting the very same.
She hesitated going back up for a second, then gathered enough resistance to carry herself up.
Her socked feet thumped gently against the wooden stairs.
As she grabbed the chilly steel ball and began turning it, a strange sound started in the back of her head.
Unnoticeable at first.
But it seemed to get more perceptible.
A faint ringing, accompanied by distorted static.
She froze, rigid, mouth almost closed, but also almost open.
Her grip around the doorknob tightened.
She thought she was imagining things.
{More nervousness here}
“Do you hear that?” Came Caelus’s voice from below, sounding both alert and beset.
Stelle’s footsteps thudded back down, faster this time.
The disquieting drone in their heads gradually became more distinct…
Until…
“It stopped.” She remarked.
Caelus’s hands which were on his ears slowly pulled apart and fell to his sides.
Caelus rose from his chair, looking around for potential sources of the noise.
Stelle aided too. But her eyes caught a glimpse of something he didn’t seem to notice.
“The fog outside, it’s… gotten thicker.”
Caelus snapped around.
He pinched the bridge of his nose.
“What the hell is going on today?” He muttered under his breath.
{Stelle stepped towards the door
{He saw
{“What’re you—” He spoke, but it was incomplete. He had lurched forward before he could articulate himself, grabbing the sleeve of Stelle’s shirt, his grip firm.
{“I’m not just going to stand here. That’d only make all of this worse.”
{She articulated they needed to go out and see, or it’ll increase stress}
{He disagrees at first}
Her head corked to the side, and she gave a faint smirk. “If I hadn’t reached for this, you would’ve done so yourself five seconds later.”
{His firm gaze did little to tilt the needle of her mind.}
She flung the door open, dragging him out with her restrained arm as well.
“Stelle, wait—”
The door shut behind them.
In pallid white air they stood, on the streets in front of their abode. The mist obscured the neighboring houses, the objects on the street, and everything else beyond 5 feet.
Dawn had cracked the horizons not more than an hour ago. Not a sound barring their shuffling of feet and fabric could be heard.
For a moment, they stood transfixed, gazing into the pale shroud in front of them. In all directions.
His grip on her wrist closed tighter, firmer, seemingly subconsciously from him.
He let out a nervous, bewildered laugh. “What the hell? I can’t see a thing.”
She exhaled sharply, her breath quivering a twinge.
“We’re outside. In this… mist. Might as well explore.”
The words rushed out of him. “We can go back. N-no, we should go back!”
Stelle let out a quick exhale, then a brief nod. Her pupils had dilated to the size of mere whales against a white sea.
“Y-yeah let’s.”
They turned towards the door, stepping forward.
Two footsteps.
Then a third.
Almost as if in sync, they both snapped their heads around.
A silhouette stood there.
Black, against a world of white.
Resembling a human form, yet distorted beyond recognition.
Made of black noise, yet woven with infinitely tangling threads.
It slowly tilted its grotesque, yet incomprehensible head down.
The twins stood there, transfixed, staring at, or rather, into this creature. Rapid breaths escaped their slightly gaping mouths in visible puffs of chilly air, hearts hammering against their bosoms.
If it hadn’t moved, the scene could’ve stretched for minutes.
It extended one of its “hands” towards Stelle, who was on the forefront. Not slowly, but suddenly.
She jolted back on instinct.
The staticness had been broken.
A move had been made.
She grasped Caelus’s wrist with adrenaline induced vigor, and wrenched him backwards toward their door.
The door opened.
Its hand extended faster.
They made it inside.
But at that moment, its hand touched hers.
A sensation unlike any other coursed through their nerves, as if they’d been touched by something out of this world.
Their vision flashed black for a millisecond after contact with it.
The door slammed shut.
The hand was gone, but the feeling still coursed through them.
They could only look at each other for but a second, their petrified countenance mirrored…
before their vision went black.
Two, almost synced thuds sounded from the wooden floor.