The morning began like every other - gray, quiet, and heavy with the stink of the city's rot.
Aren Vale stood in the loading yard of the Kellmor Estate, hands buried in the deep pockets of his faded jacket, watching the steam curl from his breath. The air was cold enough to bite, but it was a clean bite, sharp and real. Unlike the smiles of the people inside those marble walls.
The delivery truck hadn't arrived yet. He could hear the hum of distant traffic on the main avenue, but here, behind the estate, it was all damp brick and echoing emptiness. A camera on the corner tracked his movements, the lens glinting like a patient eye.
A door opened behind him.
"You," barked a voice. "Unload when it gets here. And don't scratch anything this time."
Aren didn't turn to look. He recognized the nasal twang of Mr. Kellmor's steward - a man who'd never carried anything heavier than a wine glass in his life. The command slid past Aren like rain off glass. No 'please,' no 'thank you,' no trace of the man's own humanity.
It didn't matter. None of them mattered.
"Did you hear me, Vale?" the steward pressed.
Aren gave a slow nod, still not looking at him. That was all the answer he'd get. After a moment, the steward's shoes clicked away, muttering something about "ungrateful trash."
Aren's gaze drifted upward. Past the estate's high stone walls, the sky stretched wide and pale - the washed-out blue of late winter. No clouds, no sun, just a strange, almost metallic sheen to the light. He didn't like it. He'd learned to trust his unease. In this city, being wrong meant being dead.
The truck finally came, rumbling down the narrow back road, brakes squealing as it stopped. Aren stepped forward automatically, swinging open the back and staring at the stack of wooden crates inside.
Each one had gold foil lettering, branding some imported delicacy worth more than he'd earn in a month.
Food for the rich, while the streets outside their gates chewed on moldy bread.
He worked in silence, muscles moving with efficient rhythm. Lift, carry, set down. Lift, carry, set down.
The other laborer on shift - a boy barely eighteen - kept glancing at him, as if waiting for him to speak. Aren didn't.
By the time they finished, his arms ached and his breath was steaming faster in the air. He turned to leave, but the steward reappeared, holding a clipboard like it was a scepter.
"Wait. You're not done," the man said, smirking. "The mistress wants her packages carried inside personally. Can't have the maids breaking their backs."
Aren's jaw tightened. He could tell by the look in the steward's eyes that this was intentional - a petty flex, a reminder of Aren's place. Still, without a word, he picked up the next crate and walked inside.
Inside the estate, the air changed.
Warmth wrapped around him, scented faintly of citrus and expensive polish. The floors gleamed like frozen lakes, each marble tile perfect enough to reflect the chandeliers above. The walls wore paintings - not prints, real oil on canvas - scenes of horses and hunts and landscapes untouched by poverty.
Aren didn't slow to look at any of it. He carried the crate through a maze of hallways until he reached the pantry, setting it down beside an equally ridiculous mountain of supplies. The mistress - a tall woman in a silk dress - was speaking to someone on the phone, her voice low and urgent.
"…Yes, I saw the footage. But it's not here, so it's not our concern," she said, turning away.
Footage? Aren caught the faint reflection of a screen in the polished silver of the counter. It showed what looked like a news feed - a black storm swirling over a foreign city, flashes of lightning inside it, shapes moving in the darkness.
He kept walking.
By midday, the work was done, and Aren was back on the streets.
The estate loomed behind him, its gates shutting with a metallic clank. Out here, the city was all cracked sidewalks and sagging apartment blocks, graffiti scrawled over every flat surface. A wind had picked up, dry and restless, carrying with it the smell of smoke from somewhere far away.
He cut through an alley, stepping over a broken bottle and the remains of a dead pigeon. His stomach growled. He'd eat later - maybe. Hunger didn't bother him the way it did others. Not anymore.
At the corner, an old public TV screen flickered in the window of a pawnshop. Crowds were gathered around, murmuring. Aren slowed enough to glance at it.
The news anchor's voice was tight, professional but strained.
"…unusual atmospheric conditions continue to spread across multiple continents. Scientists remain divided on the cause, though satellite images confirm the expansion of a massive storm system unlike any previously recorded. The phenomenon has - "
The screen cut to shaky footage from a street-level camera.
Black clouds boiling in the sky, blotting out the sun. Shadows moving within them, writhing, almost alive. And then the camera shook violently before going black.
The crowd muttered louder. Some laughed nervously, calling it fake. Others looked at the sky.
Aren kept walking. Aren walked past the crowd, past the flickering TV screen, and into the narrow veins of the city. He'd learned early to keep moving. Stillness drew eyes, and eyes drew trouble.
The trouble usually came in packs.
"Oi. Vale."
The voice came from a shadowed alcove between two shuttered shops. Aren didn't stop, but his ears tightened at the sound. He recognized it - Korrin, a rat with fists too big for his brain, part of one of the smaller gangs that infested the district.
Aren slowed only after he passed the alcove, angling his head enough to see three shapes detach themselves from the wall. Korrin in the middle, two others flanking. All older than him, but not by much. None of them looked hungry. That meant they weren't here to steal food. They were here to prove something.
"You've been skipping the fee," Korrin said, stepping closer. His lip curled into something like a grin. "No one works our block without paying."
Aren met his eyes - flat, expressionless - then glanced at the broken bottle on the ground. His voice was low when he finally spoke.
"This block doesn't belong to you."
The two behind Korrin snickered. One of them spat on the pavement. Korrin's grin widened. "That so? Guess we'll just take what you owe in blood."
The first swing came fast - too fast for someone who didn't know how to fight. But Aren had been here before. Dozens of times. He shifted his weight, letting the fist glance past his shoulder, then drove his elbow into Korrin's ribs. The crack of bone echoed in the alley.
The second thug lunged. Aren pivoted, snatched the broken bottle from the ground, and rammed it forward into the man's thigh. Blood sprayed, hot and metallic in the air. The thug screamed and collapsed.
Korrin staggered, clutching his side, rage twisting his face. He charged again. Aren didn't flinch. His hand snapped upward, grabbing the bigger boy's jaw, and he slammed Korrin's skull against the brick wall. Once. Twice. A third time.
The body sagged. Aren let go.
The alley went quiet except for the wheezing cries of the one on the ground. Aren tossed the broken bottle aside, wiped his hand on his jacket, and walked away.
By the time he reached his building, the fight was already gone from his mind. It was just another day. Another reminder that strength was the only language anyone respected.
He climbed the cracked concrete stairs two at a time, stepping over trash and broken railings until he reached the top floor. His room was little more than a box - one window, one mattress on the floor, a bucket for water, and a knife under the pillow.
He dropped onto the mattress, staring at the ceiling.
Tomorrow would be the same. Work. Hunger. Fights. Oppression. That was life. That was all there was.
But outside, the wind was rising. The light in the sky was dimming, unnaturally fast, like the sun itself was retreating. Somewhere in the city, a siren wailed - long, low, and endless.
Aren closed his eyes. For the first time in years, a sliver of unease coiled in his chest.
He didn't know it yet, but the next time he opened them, the world would be gone.Aren didn't sleep long. He rarely did. The mattress under him was thin, every spring jutting up like a nail. The city never grew quiet, not even at night. Faint voices bled through the walls, a baby crying somewhere below, a drunk cursing at no one in particular.
But it wasn't the noise that kept him awake. It was habit. Sleeping too deeply meant losing teeth, or worse. Even here, at the edge of nothing, people were always waiting to take what wasn't theirs.
He pushed himself up and crossed to the window. The pane was cracked, the glass fogged with grime, but he could still see the streets below. A few lamps flickered, fighting against the dark, casting sickly yellow light on the cracked asphalt. A pack of stray dogs sniffed through a dumpster, ribs showing through patchy fur.
They weren't fighting. Not tonight. Instead, they were restless, snapping at shadows and jerking their heads toward the sky as though they heard something Aren didn't.
His jaw tightened.
Animals always knew first.
He turned away, pacing the small room. He had a stash hidden under a loose floorboard - a few protein bars, a knife with a chipped edge, and a handful of coins not worth the metal they were minted on. That was all he owned. All he had earned in eighteen years of being alive.
Eighteen years, and what did the world give him? Empty bellies. Broken bones. The laughter of the rich echoing over the city walls.
He remembered the Kellmor steward's sneer earlier that day. Ungrateful trash. That was what they saw when they looked at him. Trash. Something to use until it broke, then discard.
He sat on the mattress again, pulling the knife free. He turned it over in his hand, feeling the weight of it. He wasn't attached to it. Tools didn't matter. But this blade had seen him through more nights than most people survived. It was sharp enough. Sharp enough to open a throat, to cut through lies, to prove once again that he wasn't someone to be stepped on.
A shadow crossed the window. Aren froze, head snapping up. For a heartbeat, he thought it was just the dogs again. But when he leaned closer, he saw it.
The moon was gone.
Not hidden behind clouds, not swallowed by weather - gone. The sky had been smeared black, as though someone had taken ink to the heavens. The few lamps below sputtered, struggling to burn, their glow shrinking into themselves.
The dogs had started barking. Not just barking - howling. Desperate, terrified.
Then came the sound.
It wasn't thunder, though it rattled the glass like it. It wasn't wind, though it roared like a hurricane. It was a voice. Not a human voice. Something deeper. Something vast. It spoke in no tongue Aren knew, but he understood it in the marrow of his bones.
The world was ending.
