1 Prologue: "The Figures, Images, and Strings"

IT was a night of howling winds and growling thunders.

The moon was yet to be seen for the clouds, so numerous, trampled it in the skies. The trees are endlessly quarreling while each drop of rain strikes like spikes on the skin.

Miles away from the city, no one ever knew about the people who are about to set the world to revolve around the fingertips of change— change so powerful that science will be forced to abdicate its throne and let the new variable take its place. But to be fair, these people never knew that their unending perseverance will pay off the day this preposterous night came.

"If I had known, I wouldn't have accepted this job," a man said regretfully as he tries to keep up with his fellow worker during the storm.

The other man stopped for a second to glance at him, his hand resting on his waist. "Even if you hadn't known, you still will, Joseph. In what way do you think you can save your daughter if not for this godforsaken job?"

Silenced, Joseph tried to settle his matters with the unresponding wind rather than to Edgar who has been working for the institute two years longer than him. He knew he can't win in an argument which he's already the loser in the first place. He wanted this job. He searched for it. He almost practically begged to be given a job just to earn a sufficient sum to buy her daughter's medicine. "It's for Annie," he thought, encouraging himself to go on, monitoring the perimeters of the institute's facilities.

Joseph is aware that this could be one of the worse jobs to receive. Watching the doctors make their chemicals bubble and using their microscopes to see whatsoever, inhaling that almost suffocating smoke when things went wrong in the laboratory, and enduring the cold in the province he was not even familiar with. He's trying to fight everything that goes against him. For Annie. For the most precious girl in his life who is continuously suffering from a blood disease, he doesn't even know about it. What's certain in his mind is that her days are numbered unless he stops grieving for losing the dream job he once had.

The rage of the weather worsened and if not for their gears, they have been long thrown far by the wind along with leaves and logs. Joseph and Edgar tried to defend themselves for it's like they've reached the core of the storm. The raindrops almost stab their skin, resulting in them to whimper. Their vision became so blurry they can no longer see what's beyond where they're holding on.

"We should go back!" Joseph yelled at Edgar who is busy maintaining his trembling grip on his gears.

"This is no ordinary storm! We'll die at this rate! We should go back!"

However, the other remained still where he struggles to stand his ground. "He must be insane," the first concluded. Who would be so willing to sacrifice their safety just to accomplish a night monitoring shift? Their wage is not even so far from the minimum payment of what city workers get. What's the sense of being put into danger if you won't be there to collect your rewards? He knew Edgar is a strong-willed person but of course, he's not insensitive to realize that this person is also rooting for a purpose not so different from his.

"We have to go back! If we don't we won't be able to go home someday!"

"It's not about the storm! Look!"

Joseph almost wanted to turn his back and leave him in the cold right there and then. How could he see when the rain and the wind lay waste on the place? What kind of idiot would dare stare to the abyss? Even so, with all his strength, Edgar pulled him to his place. "I told you to look!"

"My eyes will hurt if I dare!"

"You idiot! Just look!" and there, the fearful one's eyes landed on the object not so far from them. It was hard to assume but its rough-looking surface pushed him to conclude that it might just be a rock stuck on the land or a huge object which rolled down due to the huge hit of wind and wet soil. But he asked himself, why and how would it be stuck or rolled all this way? Then, he fathomed what Edgar wants them to do: to get close to it and find out.

He wished to back down but the way to the rock would be much better compared to facing the storm itself. Returning without Edgar would most likely put him in a scolding session again with Christine, their supervisor, and reduce his wage. In spite of his frustration and his doubts about the rock, he followed his fellow worker's instructions to get close to it as much as they can.

Little by little, the catastrophe seems to slow down as their steps get closer to the object. The cold breeze faded and warmth starts to embrace their bodies, finally letting them sweat at that moment. The two looked confused at the sudden change of the humidity and temperature, as they could still witness the brutality of the weather meters away. How could this be? There wasn't enough knowledge in the two's minds except for this strange phenomenon surrounding the thing they are about to discover.

"I have a bad feeling about this, pal. I think we should call the others first and ask them to examine it. It could be dangerous," Joseph warned as Edgar puts his gears down nearby to walk towards it.

Edgar could feel it. Its heat and the strong aura that covers it in every direction. It's as if whatever this thing is, it's calling to him. It's calling to him to be discovered and to be seen. Ignoring his companion's warnings, he bravely walked to it like its the smoothest path he has ever taken in his life. The unfamiliar but vibrant feeling hugging him like a mother's embrace. He was so drawn to it that he looks like a horse staring at the only road he sees.

Concerned, Joseph shouted at him multiple times, calling his name repeatedly but to no avail. Edgar's consciousness was already unbothered and seemed to be focused on one goal— to take himself to that thing. The former Joseph would have run to wake him up from the almost-illusion he is under but the reminiscence of his past crawls to stick him where he is.

A blinding light soon illuminates from the portion of land where the object was in. Instead of being afraid, Edgar didn't show any doubt but rather he was more attracted to it. Flashes of amber and lavender shadows are dancing as they shower into the light it gives. They were like celebrating and asking him to join them like hospitable guests. Eventually, figures he could recognize begin to reflect on his pupils. Figures he so long wanted to return to his life. He then lifted his arms, prepared to join the light, the images he so lusts.

Edgar was oblivious. He didn't know what's beyond the desire filling his heart and mind... or even the pit he's about to fall in.

Coward as he is, he called to his friend one last time. It's bizarre to think of him like that when in fact they never really knew each other at all. But in Joseph's heart, no one has ever tried to understand him except Edgar who volunteered to teach him everything this job requires on his first day. It could've been merely an obligation so he could not hinder the rest but for him, it's a help extended by heavens through the now brainwashed Edgar.

Strings of lights with blazing ash smoke spread on the ground. It was beautiful until the sound of crackling made the fearful one's heart beats like drums. "What the f*ck is this?!"

Leaving remains an available option and yet he can't help to not take his eyes off from the victim of the light's grandeur. "Please... stop going near it," he whispered while his feet gives in to the option.

"Please!"

Regardless, Edgar didn't hear a single word, only the symphony of laughter and cheers from the figures projected by the light. He's almost at the edge, unaware of what will happen to him once he takes that last step. He only cared about reuniting to those faces, to those voices.

Before he fell, he said, "It's time to go home."

And his downfall became the most-awaited signal of the light to finally empower its strings to break the surface and wrapping the whole place, the whole city, the whole continent, and absorbing all storms in one flick.