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A crisp autumn morning, the leaves just beginning to change and the breeze rustling just softly enough not to wake a sleeping boy from his peaceful dream. The phone, however, pretty much did the trick. Varian rolled over in his messy sheets with a soft groan, still half asleep and unwilling to open his eyes despite the relentless chiming from his bedside table.
He picked up the dumb piece of machinery, cursing it in his mind as his hand rubbed messy jet black curls out of his face. The poor kid was blasted in the face with light in the midst of his pitch black room, his phone bathing his face in ghoulish blue light that made his highlights look almost bioluminescent.
Then he read the word Eugene.
Oh hell. His arm flew in a spurt of energy of its own accord slamming the phone back down against the surface. He quickly adjusted himself, becoming as presentable as he could be for just waking up- relax, his brain mumbled in his ear, it’s a call, not a video conference.
“H-hey! Eugene-“
“Varian.” The voice on the other end of the line was a solemn one. It shut the boy up mid sentence, made his throat go painfully dry with anxiety. “Varian… turn on your tv…” Eugene mumbled into the receiving end.
With a shaky hand, the boy reached across his comforter for his discarded remote and lazily bumped the power button. His eyes flickered shut this time at the amount of light he was flashbanged with. “Gahhh- f-fuck, shit!” He stammered, rubbing his eyes as his television set speakers started to explode with thunderous booms.
His sleepy eyes looked up to the fiery news display, molten metal and smoke, reports from onlookers and firefighters, a zooming jet that whirred past his eyes like a flash of lightning- What is happening?? The reporter, as if able to read the kid’s mind, responded from his cable network straight to his ears. “A plane has just collided with the World Trade Center in New York City-“
His thumb bumped the button again and he was left in his lonely room, on a dead line, eyes gazing unfocused into the abyss of darkness. “…is the second one on schedule?”