The Odd Blue Light

Like a dog in a loose collar, Sia ran to the campus grounds outside the school building, tightened her grip on Kaia's hand, and began pulling and dragging her behind her.

Upon reaching the school monument in the middle of the field, Sia immediately stopped. Her grip on Kaia's hand tightened further, causing Kaia to writhe in pain.

Exasperated, Sia reached out her hand as if expecting Kaia to hand her something and said, "Give it to me," in a calm voice yet full of spiteful words.

After rushing out of our department's building, Sia's best friend Kaia, who had been following her the entire time, was heavily gasping for air. Kaia unconsciously ignored Sia's statement, causing her to be more agitated.

Surprisingly, after being ignored, Sia clenched her fist and looked down as if heat were about to burst out from her head. "I said, give it to me!" she shouted after gritting her teeth, drawing everyone's attention and making her voice reverberate across the entire campus.

Kaia then widened her gaze, shocked at what Sia was talking about, "What the heck?! Why were you shouting? I can't believe you have this side to you, Ms. Goody Two-Shoes," Kaia replied without thinking, and in disbelief, Kaia's statement later turned into deafening sounds of silence.

Sia, who was currently burning in rage, paused, realizing that her temper had gone out of bounds. However, that hasn't stopped her from getting what she wants.

She aggressively seized Kaia's backpack, removed everything out of it, and hurled it all on the ground. Kaia looked around and saw a burgeoning crowd near them, thinking, "Why the heck is Sia acting this way? What if these people think horribly of us?"

"Where is it? Where did you put it? If somebody finds out about what you did, we're in big danger." Sia, who had been muttering, finally let out something related to her outbursts.

"Where is the book?" Sia asked while sniffling and fumbling through Kaia's belongings as her eyes began to mist up with tears.

Though confused, Kaia reached out for Sia's hand, holding it gently as she looked into her eyes and asked, "What book were you talking about?"

"The one you stole from Mrs. Sanchez's table."

"The one you're criticizing so much during class."

"The reason we're on the run," Sia consecutively answered, whose face flushed red after finding nothing in Kaia's strewn stuff.

Kaia finds it difficult to believe that the friend she has known since she was a little child was concealed behind a snow-white pretense and is now suddenly displaying her obnoxious nature in an unexpected time and place and daring to accuse her of stealing anything.

"She's a real straight shooter of words hidden in plain sight," is what Kaia has in her mind.

Though offended, Kaia laughed into her sleeve, followed by a gentle tap on her friend's shoulder, saying, "So, what you mean to say is, we rushed out of the building to not get caught because you thought I took something from Mrs. Sanchez's desk? Is that right?"

Looking at Sia's guilty eyes for her earlier unspoken attitude toward her, Kaia continued, "And that is also why your sudden pent-up anger exploded out of nowhere."

As Kaia's bosom buddy and knowing Kaia's personality, conscience-stricken Sia, who has been gazing down the entire time, doesn't dare look at Kaia's hostile mood.

Not until Kaia notices something—whispers get loud enough to catch her attention. A blinding blue light flashed across the sky.

And Kaia, who was enraged a minute earlier, grabbed Sia's hand and directly went outside the campus after seeing the afternoon fade into darkness as if all of the day's luminescence had been swept away by the light that emerged from the horizon.

Following the evanescent light, Kaia and Sia sprinted constantly until they reached the road crossings where their house locations diverged in opposite directions. Kaia instantly held her friend's shoulder, forcing her to confront this difficult situation. Sia, who had been buried in contemplation for her misdeed, suddenly realized the situation and looked around; they were already close to their area.

Meanwhile, puzzled bystanders who witnessed the event began to worry, and loud crashes and banging noises could be heard in the distance. The bustling Maharlika main road was now fully veiled in unexplainable, abrupt darkness; all the open lighting that was switched on the instant the odd blue light appeared was now completely worthless; everything was damaged.

"Sia, I know it's too soon, but I think we need to go on our own from now on; we need to be together with our families, and I think that's what we need to do onward," Kaia explained, hanging on to her friend's shoulder and saying her temporary farewell amidst their disagreement.

Sia, who is blankly staring at nothing and is busy looking around and lost in thought, nods as if she understands what Kaia is saying.

After learning her friend's reply, Kaia loosened her grip on Sia's shoulder and walked away slowly in the opposite direction, leaving Sia alone in the middle of the chaos. Kaia ran and disappeared completely from Sia's sight.

Just a turn from the intersection after Kaia and Sia's separation, the earth shook violently, forcing everyone in the vicinity to lose their footing and scramble to shield themselves from the falling debris. The once-high-rise buildings are now swaying in the bustling metropolis like a bunch of gelatos. The road, which should be a safe place for people to run to, is now cracking open, and vehicles are already beginning to tumble into it. It is not a road anymore, but a cliff in the center of the city.

After all the shaking, Kaia, who was on her run, was now lying in the middle of the road, trapped in the dangling live wires. She crept backwards in fear of the sparks and the noise of sizzling cables before realizing she was surrounded. Even though she was terrified, Kaia reached inside her backpack and pulled out her fabric clothes, creating a temporary insulator to free herself from the death sentence that was around her. After hanging every piece of her clothing, she managed to create just enough room for her little figure to slip out.

She then resumed running after all her useless stops every time aftershocks occurred. Until she finally made her way to their village, which seemed empty from that moment on. Kaia dashed inside their house, calling out, "Mom? Dad?" while inspecting every corner of the interior.