troublewillfindme

companionwolf asked: Druxy or brontide for EEAE verse. (Bonus points if you combine both.)

Druxy - Something which looks good on the outside, but is actually rotten inside.
Brontide - The low rumbling of distant thunder.

John Bradford has learned not to trust in human decency, that it is a concept wholly dependent upon the existence of civilization and its social contract, a concept that crumbles in the face of the impetus to survive.

So, no, literal white picket fences do not instill in him a sense of confidence.

There is a storm on the horizon, the low rumble of thunder filling the air with the promise of rain. The breeze ruffles the leaves of the trees and something stirs on the edge of the wind.

“It’s gonna be bad,” Sally says. “Can feel it in the air.”

“It’s the south in the summer, Magpie. This is what all storms are like.”

She shakes her head. “This feels different.”

He runs a hand through his hair. “You mean trouble.”

She nods. “Think so. Just a hunch.”

He casts a glance down the tree lined street. Officially, the town shouldn’t exist. They are still at least a day’s tree from the nearest haven, and several more outside of ADVENT territory. Still, he can’t dent the obvious signs of non-alien life.

Another roll of thunder sounds in the distance and he feels it in his chest. Sally fidgets with her braid, eyes fixed on the building clouds.

The odds of being struck by lightning are 1 in 3,000, he tells himself. But then again, the odds of losing the woman you love to alien invaders and being made to watch as everything you’ve ever worked for or loved is reduced to rubble are a hell of a lot lower and those events came to pass all the same.

Perhaps testing their luck is not the best idea.

Sally shifts from foot to foot, her eyes darting from heaven to earth and back again. Her hands fidget with the straps on her pack, in search of something to hold.

“I don’t like either of our choices here,” he says.

“How bad could it be? We made it past an ADVENT checkpoint last month. This doesn’t seem half as dangerous.”

“Houses, lights, electricity: this doesn’t seem odd to you?”

She shrugs. “I’ve got two dead people’s memories in my head. I’ve got a pretty forgiving definition of that word.”

He sighs. “Stay close.”

They’ve made it a few blocks into the town when they first notice the posters, faces staring out at them in silent accusation, wrapped around wooden telephone poles.

They’re new, maybe a few weeks to a few months old at most, written by hand and run off on a copy machine. They look like something out of the world that was, the world before the aliens, and a knot forms in his stomach. There are three or four different posters, each in its own distinct hand, with its own distinct face. An uncle, two children, a godmother, and a nephew are all among the lost.

The hair on the back of his neck stands on end as another, more insistent rumble passes through them.

“This a better fit with your definition of odd?”

She hugs her arms to her chest. “It’s definitely weird, but I don’t think it’s ADVENT. We’re easily 300 miles from the closest city center.”

“That’s what worries me.”

“It’s not gonna matter if we get caught outside when this storm breaks.”

A gust of wind picks up behind them, blowing the stray hairs from Sally’s braid in front of her face.

He tries to think of something glib, something funny. There’s no way she hasn’t picked up on his anxiety, on his concerns about this place. He wants to find something, anything, to reassure her, to reassure himself.

Lightning splits the sky ahead of them, and rain begins to fall.

Maybe he should have taken the 1 in 3,000 odds.