No-one had seen Charity.

The lightning had cut straight through their irises, and the purple webs of static had flowed offshore to their scleras, like ripples in a pond.

HEIAN CHAPTER TWO BY LOGAN WOLLER 34THPARALLEL MAGAZINE ISSUE 119

The lightning dragged across the night sky, and Chicago lit up in a haze of steel and glass. The heat was rolling up from the equator in red rows on obscure, low-numbered weather channels. Mid-Atlantic accents, held close to grave and serious tone, warned this would be a “sweltering summer”.

On the edge of the city, where the Chicago river is fed by the Calumet liquid system, college students and new professionals escaped to what most people assumed to be Charity’s house. Its bright windows were a lighthouse to the Mazdas coming out of the forest. The night was well under way but still no-one had seen Charity.

Two faces poked between curtains and looked through the window at the parking lot. Mason and Hailey, their cheeks almost pushed together, stared past the river right as the lightning struck. Cut in two by the thunder, they looked briefly away, and suddenly they were looking at each other. The lightning had cut straight through their irises, and the purple webs of static had flowed offshore to their scleras, like ripples in a pond.

Then everything vanished slowly, fading back under the black wings of the night.

The power went, the music stopped, and everyone was looking around in confusion, reaching out to grab whoever was closest to them. Faces slowly emerged from out the darkness, and everyone realized the women they had grabbed, instead of being their college girlfriends, and the men they had grabbed expecting their boyfriends, were different people entirely.

Mason held out his hands and reassured everyone that the power would be back soon. Hailey, right behind him, restated everything he said in a pleasant, laid-back tone.

“Now don’t be scared people. And whatever you do don’t leave. The party is just getting started. And we’re waiting for our guest of honor.” When she said the word honor her hand shot up and landed on her forehead in a military salute. Her body locked in a perfect, straightened posture.