Chapter 1 - I just wanted to read my fanfic

sigh.

> Unable to connect. Could not establish a connection to the server

"The internet is down? Again!?" I groaned. I just wanted to read the next chapter of - hmm… that's strange.

How is it 4am already! daylight savings? probably not - it just changed a few days ago... I guess I got distracted. Ugh. Whatever. Maybe tomorrow I'll sleep on time, or maybe I'll get run over by a train. That works too - it's nice to have goals in life after all.

I'm so tired, I wish I didn't have to brush my teeth right now but after 24 years of having to deal with my brain, I know it's not going to have the energy in the morning, and we need to try and maintain the illusion of our sanity to our co-workers. The bare minimum I can do is brush them once a day.

As I walk into the small bathroom of my studio apartment, I look around at all the reminders of my - our - constant failure. The mess that is the blue birds-nest of hair in the mirror; The overflowing bin of used up rolls and dog knows what else; An awkwardly shaped bathtub shower that is covered in so much hair that I'm surprised I have any left; And an endless mess of multiple near-empty bottles of various soaps, shampoos, and other liquids that I should throw away.

I grab my toothbrush. It's electric, but it ran out of charge a long time ago, and we haven't had the energy to find the charger for it.

Let's see… I'm pretty sure I brushed using my right hand last night, so I guess I'll use my left hand this time. "Maybe that'll trick you into enjoying this" I say softly, while looking at my reflection in the mirror. Our reflection. Me and my brain. If only I could convince it to do the things I wanted, instead of the things it allows me. Instead I have to resort to the ol' left-handed trick.

It's been another waste of a day. Instead of cleaning my apartment, booking a dentist appointment, shopping for food, arguing with strangers on the internet, and just generally trying to be a normal fraking human being, I decided to binge read a new fanfic about a Sims family, of all things!

"Life would be so much simpler if I had something to tell me why I was unhappy; when I was hungry; and how much people liked me" I say through a mouthful of toothpaste foam. I have no idea how long I brushed my teeth for, but good enough. Did I even eat today?

"You're such a worthless piece of shit, you know?" I say while staring at my reflection, deep in its eyes. I wonder if staring at my reflection is why I'm no longer absolutely terrible at eye contact. Or maybe it's because I still have nightmares about that job interview where they kept looking behind them because I couldn't hold eye contact. Do reflections have pronouns?

Yeah. I know. Wait. know what?

Oh. Yeah. That I'm a worthless piece of shit. Noted.

I live in London. A capitalistic hellhole teeming with every kind of person you can possibly imagine, including me. The appeal of living here is quickly lost once you realise all of your money goes towards rent, bills, commuting, and sitting in your tiny-ass studio alone while the world passes you by. My family live at least 6 hours away; not as far as I would like, but it's a small comfort.

I climb into bed and check my phone. 4:24 AM. I was exhausted earlier, but after brushing my teeth there's no way I'm going to fall asleep any time soon. I guess we'll just climb into bed and mindlessly scroll every form of social media so we can feel connected to other human beings without experiencing crippling anxiety, or at least get a laugh out of another video of babies falling over.

"How does this always happen"? I say to my seagull plushie, Nora. "I thought things were getting better. I finally moved out of parents place. I finally found a job after university that I actually think I could enjoy. I'm trying so hard. I hope no one at work has noticed yet. I just… want to be normal, you know?"

"Squawk!" I say, imitating the noise of a seagull as I mess with her neck and wings, finding comfort in the soft fabric. something about holding her in my hands, having something to… touch, move, fiddle with; brings me joy.

"Thanks Nora. What would I do without you?"

"Squawk!"

hehe. With a small smile on my face, I unlock my phone and open up TikTok.

> Something went wrong. Try again later.

Huh, TikTok is down? Oh… actually, it looks like it's the mobile network. I guess whatever it is also caused my internet problems earlier. I wonder what happened? What am I meant to do now? Listen to my own late-night thoughts? Oh helllllll no! It's bad enough during the day when I have a million other things distracting me, like food.

I start setting my alarm. I need to be at work by 10 at the latest so I don't miss the daily progress meeting. Ugh. What am I going to say? It's always such a huge waste of time and it just makes me feel lazy. I never know how much detail to go into, and if other people think I'm showing off or trying to pad out the amount of work it seems like I'm doing. On the other hand if I don't specify enough detail, do people think I'm not doing anything all day?

Oh yeah - my alarm. The latest I can wake up is 8am so that I have time for a shit and a shower before getting on the tube. I guess I'll set an alarm for 7:00, 7:30, 7:40, 7:50, and 8:00. I'll also set one for 8:30, because if we go back to sleep at 8:00 we'll at least have a backup and we can skip the shower and just clean up with some wet-wipes instead. "Wouldn't be the first time..."

"Squawk!"

I turn on the fan and point it away from me. It might be November, but I need the white noise to fall asleep. Snuggled up with Nora and battling the endless streams of thoughts and memories of awkward social interactions throughout my life, I finally manage to sleep at some point. Maybe around 5:30 if I'm lucky, giving me a solid 2 and a half hours of sleep, ish.

Classic Lara.

I check my phone. 6:20 AM. Why the frak do I always wake up before my alarm? I snuggle Nora a little tighter, sort out my duvet which yet again has somehow ended up rotated 90 degrees to what it should be, and quickly fall back asleep

Bew ba-baw bee boo boo

"aaaaaaaaaaaaaaa" we… I? say? groan? yes. groan.

> Dismiss

….

Bew ba-baw bee boo boo

> Dismiss

….

Bew ba-baw bee boo boo

> Dismiss

"aaaaaaaaaaaaaaa". just end me already.

7:43 AM, I see on my phone screen as I look at it through my bleary eyes. My head is pounding. Possibly due to sleep deprivation; possibly due to dehydration; but likely both.

I open Reddit. It looks like the mobile network is working again. A silver lining in what will no doubt be another crappy day.

> TIFU by buying a sleeping bag | /r/tifu

> Solar flare disrupts global communications | /r/worldnews

> How long can they stay focused before they get distracted by something else | /r/aww

As much as I want to watch cute and relatable videos of cats, the solar flare catches my attention and I start reading. The comments, that is. I never read the article.

> Scientists are monitoring the sun for further activity. With reports of an abnormally high amount of sun spots, I wonder if this is part of its natural cycle?

> A Solar flare wipes out global communications, and I'm over here waiting to get a text back. Guess even the sun hates me now.

> I hope hospital patients weren't impacted by this, with all the people that need surgery or on life support

My exhaustion fades away as my brain latches on to the news. I quickly sit upright as I continue reading.

"Woah, this is so cool!"

I mean, thousands of people are probably suffering, but the idea of a solar flare powerful enough to affect us is mind boggling. I thought that was just one of those things that was unlikely to ever happen? Space is awesome! There are comments saying it might even be as strong as the Carrington Solar Flare of 1859. Certainly the strongest one we've seen since then.

"Nora… we were born in the wrong era. I want teleporters and space ships and laser guns and neural chips that make me feel happy. Although knowing humanity, we would just ruin it and end up brainwashing the poor that we leave behind on a dead or dying planet while the 1% go off and colonise some other world to exploit. At least we have plumbing and cat memes, I guess."

"Squawk!"

Oh, there's a Slack message from work.

> You may have heard about the solar flare last night which has caused issues with transportation and fallen power cables. The office will be closed. Anyone able to work from home as usual on a Friday should do so. If you were planning to come in and left your laptop at work, contact your manager for further instructions. Attend your meetings as usual. Stay safe.

Ugh. A global catastrophe isn't even enough to save me from those progress meetings.

> To: Matt Alan

> Message: Hey Matt :) I left my laptop at work :sob: I was planning to head in to make up for working at home on Tuesday. Should I use my personal desktop instead? It's a bit far to walk and I'm not sure what public transport is going to be like :'(

- and I really don't wanna go outside, but I decide not to add that. I finally manage to convince my brain to remove our legs from under the warm duvet and on to the floor, lift myself up, and mindlessly start getting ready like the groggy froggy that I am.

I'm not much of a morning shower person. It's bad enough having to transition from in-bed to dressed to commuting-to-work, so to add entering-warm-water and leaving-warm-water-and-being-freezing to that is an extra burden I really don't enjoy, not to mention the anxiety of if I'll have enough time to shower. Unfortunately I didn't have enough time nor energy yesterday. I guess I'll just have to deal with everyone watching me walk into the office late. Ugh.

While my brain is preoccupied with worries about potentially having to work today still, and thinking about the solar flare, I'm able to mechanically automate my routine. I zone out and find myself out of the shower and wrapped in a bath towel, staring at the wall while I daydream about multiple different world-ending scenarios; about how busy and chaotic shopping is going to be with the no-doubt ridiculous amount of hoarding people will be doing that not even my noise-cancelling headphones will be able to save me; and wonder if dust bunnies are bugs or if it's just a cute name of a lump of dust. I should look that up, or maybe I don't want to know.

Bew ba-baw bee boo boo

I hear my phone buzzing from my bedroom/living room/kitchen/overpriced box, eventually bringing me out of my thoughts. I guess I'll just have to suffer listening to my 8:30AM alarm since I forgot to turn it off, and I don't want to leave the bathroom until I'm dry and somewhat dressed, for reasons I can't even explain myself - I live alone after all.

Before long I'm frantically grabbing at my phone to dismiss the alarm in rage. At this point I just want to cry.

Boom. Boom. Boom. BOOM. Boom. Boom. Boom

I stop. Everything stops - well, not my brain; it never seems to shut up. Motionless and in shock for what feels like minutes, I eventually recover long enough to process what just happened, or maybe as a result of being able to process what just happened.

I've lost power, but more importantly, it sounds like there were explosions outside! Did another solar flare hit and blow up more transformers?! - The electrical kind. Well, I suppose they're both electrical but you know what I mean. This story isn't about that.

I finish getting dressed in the bathroom - I had already started after all, and it's not like waiting a few minutes will change anything. It's not like I'm going to rush outside half-naked. If I die, so be it. An attitude I've always held. Fire safety officers fear me! Rawr!

Pulling back my curtain slightly and peeking around the edge of the window - I don't want anyone to see me looking out of my 6th story window, obviously - I see chaos everywhere. There's rubble in the streets, smashed windows, smoke, fire. The streets were packed with stopped cars and fleeing pedestrians looking up at the sky, with the background noise of multiple sirens blaring.

And in the sky I saw… green and purple waves of... smoke? No… an aurora borealis? in London? during the day? that's absofrakinglute insanity.

Blooooody Nooooora…

As time goes by, pacing back and forth while squishing Nora within my arms, I become more and more anxious. I don't know what to do in this situation. Sure, I've read books and watched TV Shows and had plenty of daydreams about zombie-apocalypse-survival scenarios - I hope there are zombies - but it's different when you're confronted with it as your reality. If I stay then I could be in danger of the building collapsing, or a gas explosion, or any number of disasters! If I leave, then I'll have to deal with navigating an untold number of social interactions for which I have no script; no basis of knowledge on which to draw on and understand the complex expectations of the neurovanillas that are even more panicked, chaotic, and emotional than normal! What if they want hugs?

Maybe it's not so bad... It's just a few explosions I'm sure. I hope my sister's okay - and my friends, if I can even call them that. I'm never sure where the blurry lines of friendship begin and end. I should have at least messaged someone when I first heard about that first solar flare earlier, instead of wasting time thinking about dust bunnies.

I grab my backpack. Luckily between my minimalistic lifestyle and my routines from traveling abroad, all I'm really missing is some clothes which I hastily pack.

I check the time. 9:42 AM. Did I really spend an hour pacing back and forth? The first solar flare happened around 4AM, and this solar flare happened around 8:30 AM. Now I'm no scientist, but I don't think I can safely assume it'll be another 3 hours until the next one, if there is a next one. Then again even if a third one hits, would it matter? It looks really bad out there already.

I pack as much as I can, and Nora of course, and I look out my curtains once more. I can see other people peeking out of the windows of the flats near me, so at least I know I'm not alone in my indecisiveness. I could try heading to a colleagues place. It's nearby and he probably didn't leave for work. I hope everyone's doing okay.

As I begin to pull away from the window, the sky begins to… brighten? A wall of light rushes in from the horizon and envelopes me in seconds. I think... it smashed the window? It came almost faster than I can react. I instinctively fall backwards and suddenly, in the span of shielding my eyes from the light - all I see is an endless sea of white surrounding me.

Black letters slowly fill my view amongst the white background. Simultaneously, a monotone voice seems to echo around me, narrating the text.

> System Integration Initiated for #MWG-239-Sol

> Divergent Anomalies Detected on #MWG-239-Sol-C

> Locating…

> …

> You are a divergent anomaly

"Oh. My. Dog. How do I turn on dark mode?"