Meanwhile, in another another universe...

******

“C’mon, what’s the deal?!” shouted Stephanie, pressing down on her car as she adjusted and readjusted her seat in nervous twitch. It was only one of many dozens of car horns, an indicator of the gridlock that had engulfed the highway as a result of the rain.

Stephanie punched her horn a few more times in a rhythm, inaudible in the symphony of frustration, but it brought on a scant amount of pleasure anyway.

“UGH!!!” screamed Stephanie, banging her head against the steering wheel as she adjusted her mirror for the seventh time. At this point she might as well put the car in park. Gripping the gearshift, Stephanie struggled getting the metal rod to move.

“Shitty,” Stephanie swore, jiggling it with careful precision until finally it clicked.

Sighing, Stephanie unbuttoned the top of her blouse and put her feet up on the dash as she reclined back in her seat one more time, surely titillating a few imaginations of those fellow drivers who might’ve peered into the window of her vehicle, but her annoyance had inundated her from feeling any embarrassment and shame.

A metallic chime interrupted her reverie, Stephanie’s text tone. Glancing down, she saw that it was a message from Dylan. Hey mom. When are you getting home? :)

Stephanie sighed and moved a bit of hair out of her eyes.

She gripped it in her hands and maneuvered her fingers, quickly drafting her response: I will be a little late. Traffic is backed up.

Dylan replied, Okay I’ll start dinner. See you soon.

Stephanie: Love you :)

As Stephanie hovered her finger above the “Send” button, she winced in pain and dropped her phone between the seat and the median.

“Dammit,” said Stephanie, rubbing her thumb within her fingers from the electrostatic shock. “Weird…”

Retracting her feet from the dashboard, Stephanie squeezed her hand down between the seats and grabbed the phone, pressing the power button again and again to nothing but blackness.

“What the hell? This thing was on 76 percent.”

Tossing it in the passenger seat, Stephanie readjusted her mirror as she returned her jittering fingers to the steering wheel, now with nothing to do to pass the time. Rapping her manicured nails across the leather repeatedly, she glared down at the sea of cars and finally spotted a bit of movement. Traffic was starting to clear!

“Oh, thank God,” she said, gripping the gear shift once again and pushing it forward. Stuck on some of the degraded mechanics, Stephanie once again swore and said to herself, “C’mon…” She looked up at the pulse of movement traveling slowly backwards through the line of cars until –

BOOOOOOOOOM!!!

The horns renewed with vigor. Stephanie grimaced as she adjusted her mirror once again, having caught a glimpse of what happened behind her. Turning, she saw just in time in the distance a pillar of blue light pierce through the clouds before dissipating in the foggy sky.

Stephanie’s heart palpitated. The sound was louder than thunder; it had made her jump. A blown transformer perhaps? It could be… but that didn’t explain the light show.

Stephanie adjusted her mirror once more, and this time she finally began to realize something was seriously wrong. Holding her hand on the mirror in place, Stephanie realized that the object was moving on its own, shifting slightly, squeaking gradually, turning, turning, without any input.

“What… what the Hell?” Stephanie let go of the mirror as it aggressively turned back, as if in anger at Stephanie restricting it. Stephanie’s eyes widened as her gaze expanded, realizing with fright that the entire car was jittering ever so slightly.

“What the?!”

Stephanie unwound her window and jammed her face outside. The movement of the cars ahead continued, but Stephanie’s hyperventilation only increased in pace as she realized that the parked cars themselves were beginning to slide backwards at excruciating speeds on their own, as though being pulled by some electromagnetic force. Behind her an Audi rear-ended a mid-sized Sedan, and both drivers got out to exchange obscenities only to incredulously realize what was happening.

“Oh… oh goodness.”

Stephanie looked up. The gap in traffic had finally reached her, and she breathed a sigh of relief as she yanked on the gear shift.

“Oh… oh no, not now, come on!” Twisting it in her grip, Stephanie took deep breaths as she jiggled and finagled the stick every which way in an effort to change gears to drive. “Work, work dammit! Oh God, oh God,” she whispered. Stephanie had no clue what it was that was happening, but she did not want to be anywhere near the source of that pulse.

Drivers were already exiting their vehicles behind and in front of her, much to Stephanie’s chagrin. She had already considered that calculus, and the option was still there. But right now, what she needed was speed. Stephanie knew not how she knew, all she knew was that something horrible was about to happen, and the only way that she would be able to escape was to leave this place as fast as humanly possible, which could only be accomplished by vehicular assistance.

As if to illustrate her point, another pulse erupted from the spot, and with renewed urgency, Stephanie managed to finally jam the gear shift into place.

“A-ha!” Stephanie cheered, slamming on the gas as she jet through the parked cars and narrowly avoided the mobile vehicles that had the same idea as her.

But her progress was short lived; even as Stephanie increased the pressure with which she pressed down on the gas, her velocity seemed only to slow. “C’mon, go go go!” she hissed, yet still her speed descended from 40 miles per hour to thirty, twenty, ten, until even as she floored it, Stephanie was traveling at a negative speed.

Gritting her teeth, Stephanie kept her foot on the floor as she kept the car stable with the steering wheel. Taking one hand off, Stephanie gingerly used it to unbuckle herself before she unlocked and opened the car door. It too was attracted by the magnetic pulse, and in a jolt of adrenaline, Stephanie kicked open, leaping out of her car and into the field as her vehicle was grasped by this unseen force of energy, flinging impossibly into the air at an angle, colliding with tree branches before disappearing into the nothingness that was the catastrophic wave of concussive energy growing more powerful and powerful with every passing moment.

Stephanie spit grass out of her mouth and got to her knees, wincing as she ripped off her wedding ring and saw it too travel through the air.

“What the hell is going on?!” Stephanie screamed to nobody in particular, a sentiment she shared with every other lucky commuter who abandoned their car in the highway as they piled up over one another – some with people still inside them – and traveled in massive waves to the origin of this electrostatic point. This was concurrent to the quakes; as they traveling inward, something else was coming out. And this something was getting bigger and more powerful with each passing millisecond.

Stephanie got to her feet, barely able to stay stable as she looked to the skies before the answer to her question was made even more indecipherable.

Out past the wall of trees, something was growing.

A big, black ball of taught fabric, Stephanie had to ensure that she wasn’t looking at some sort of balloon, or an explosive cloud of black dust. But no, this was rigid, it was round, and it was at least several a mile away. A distance that was quickly being bridged.

“Holy… holy…” Stephanie knew not what deity she wished to beseech as she took a step back. The black round… thing… was mountainous, appearing like a magical hill. It pushed against the trees, flattening them without care as it rolled through the forest in its expansion, and then, into the street. The cars that had been magnetized to its location were now clearly seen getting pulled in and under its embiggening, flattening into sheets of metal with ear-splittingly horrifying screeches. And it was with this horrifying sight that Stephanie now realized this wasn’t simply some sort of mountain.

She didn’t know what it was exactly… all she could tell was that the first part, the bulbous hill… it looked strikingly like a human butt, wreathed in a black skirt. The skirt was taut, something which made both the bounteous form of its wearer and the heat that the organism emitted clear. That this looked like a human woman laying down on her side was becoming more and more clear to Stephanie, even as she gulped and launched into a sprint across the emptying road, only taking daring looks back with extreme caution.

Stephanie gulped as her perception of the world fell apart; the eldritch circumstances of whatever creature threatened to engulf her entire life were now secondary. She simply needed to get away from here. But where was away? Whatever this was, it was still growing. Stephanie pumped her arms and took deep breaths, remembering her track-and-field lessons from college. Hopped the median wall of the highway and swerved between flying cars and traffic signs, all being caught and bulldozed beneath this woman’s improbably-sized butt. But Stephanie could do nothing except continue running –

CRRRRRRRICKRACKLE!!!

Stephanie did not want to look back this time, but she could tell that this woman had just flattened the median wall.

“Holy shit, holy shit, holy shit, oh my fucking God,” Stephanie decided now was probably the time to adopt a mantra, lest she go entirely insane. The last vestiges of sunlight were being stolen away by the moment. Not from the setting of the sun, but from its eclipse as a wall of flesh grew and expanded, getting larger and more mind-numbingly overwhelming with each passing moment. Its musty heat was coming out in pulses dictated by the heartbeat of this woman. Stephanie dashed into the trees, a haven she hopes. But they were snapped with as much ease as the last time – more so – like the toothpicks they were. Tears flowed from Stephanie’s eyes as she realized with resignation that she was about to die not knowing what she was killed by, or for that matter, who. With a sniff, Stephanie’s paced slowed by perhaps a fraction of a mile per hour.

Stephanie screamed even before she was flattened. The warmth that was nipping at her back became scorching and the anticipation of her fate was utterly unbearable. She wanted nothing more than to get it over with. And with a final trip on a fallen branch, Stephanie got her wish as she was enveloped in darkness. It took merely one moment, and it was over, the blood-red stain nowhere to be found, and likely never would be until Sharon Kingsley opened her eyes.

******

Sharon Kingsley opened her eyes.

The night air was cool and calm, an unorthodox juxtaposition from the confusion and trepidation she felt as she realized she was no longer inside.

“Micahhhhh?”

Sharon rubbed her eyes, remembering the barest inklings of what happened before she woke up. Everything was jumbled, she and Micah were together, there was some sort of box? A flash of light, and then…

It was all falling out. Evaporating by the moment. Sharon’s piercing headache prohibited her from accessing her fine memories. The aftereffects of electrostatic molecular redistributing were making her all wonky, and her higher order thinking was addled. She felt inebriated. All Sharon knew… all she felt that she knew… was that she needed to find her son. And if her son was around here, on this flat empty plane, it should be pretty easy.

“Micahhhhh!?” she called out again, planting her hands on the ground and pushing herself up until she was sitting on her knees. Her hands created dark imprints in the grey-green, surprisingly spongy surface. Sharon peered down at one palm and saw the odd dirt like clods, glinting slightly in the moonlight.

Sharon glanced down once again and raised an eyebrow at the tiny lights that seemed to flicker on and off on the ground beneath her. Some were white-ish, yellowish, grid-like. Others were more wild and red and spreading; these were concentrated near where her knees were diffing into the ground, where her hands had been, as well as all around her body.

Sharon shook her head. She was outside, that was all she knew. Now, she needed to find her son.

Sharon heaved, and brought one foot in front of the other with a world-ending thud. Her bare foot was still coated in nylon, and its outline in the world was clear.

“Dammit, I knew I shouldn’t have taken off my shoes,” said Sharon as she pulled her other sock off, finally freeing one foot after its long day of work and PTA meetings. Sharon stood to height, an immaculate sight of femininity to the terrified observers below, and she took off her other sock.

Resting both bare feet into the spongy surface, Sharon squelched her toes, sighing as she felt the tension in her underside melt away. She knew instinctively that in a strange place, it wasn’t a good idea to walk around barefoot. And yet, she somehow felt that she wasn’t going to be in danger of anything much for as long as she was here.

Sharon took a step, laughing a bit at how perfect print was that remained from the single trot, truly down to a tee. After taking the step, Sharon lowered her gaze and crouched, twirling on her other foot and driving the ball deep into the Earth’s crust, paste-ifying anything that had the slimmest possibility of survival, and she peered at the cavity.

“Goodness… even the ridges of the toe-prints are visible. Hey… what if…”

No, she shouldn’t, Sharon thought.

It would be uncouth. Totally befitting a mature adult like her. But… like… wouldn’t it be sort of funny?

With a curious grin, Sharon collected in her mouth a globule of saliva, and dangled it from between her lips.

The survivors of the carnage watched as the elastic and viscous fluid hung above them like a dwarf moon, radiating the heat and essence of their destroyer. It edged closer and closer to the crater formed by Sharon’s largest toe before it snapped off, drowning the last remnants of that corner of the human world in a flood of biblical proportions.

Sharon giggled as she watched the spit drop perfectly fill the toe print, like a tiny lake.

“Cute…” Then Sharon shook her head, feeling a bit of shame herself as she remembered that the goal was to find her son.

“Micah? Micaaaaaah?!” Sharon screamed as loud as she could, a scream that could be heard across counties and state lines, though Sharon believed herself to be calling to nothing except the moon and the clear sky of stars.

Sharon’s concern soon started to outweigh her curiosity, and her trek brought her hundreds of paces away from where she started. Luckily the sky was clear, and the moonlight easily allowed her to keep track of her footprints, letting Sharon know exactly where she had been. She didn't stop until easily a good three fourths of the vast plains upon which she had woke were covered with prints, and still no Micah.

“That little…” Sharon put a finger to her cheek in concern before locking her eyes on a piece of untouched and pristine gray land on the horizon. If Micah wasn’t here, Sharon thought, then she would go there. She would travel and search for as long as it took before Micah was back in her arms.