Written for the Houses Competition, Year 3 Round 1.
House: Hufflepuff
Year: Prefect
Category: Standard
Prompt: [Sound] Thunder
Word Count: 1345
Betas: Aya, Magi
"Come on, Ali! Get in, it shows a formation about ten miles away on the radar! We don't want to miss it!" Conrad shouted at at his colleague.
Alicia paid him no attention and let the wind whip her hair around fiercely as a strong gust hit and almost blew her from her feet. The loud booming sound of thunder shook the ground like an earthquake, making Alicia jump. After two years of this, she still wasn't used to the severe weather of Oklahoma.
"Spinnet! Are you coming or are you just gonna stand there and let yourself be killed?" a different voice, this time female, yelled at her. Alicia gave in and turned around to face them.
Two figures were calling out to her from a heavily-equipped diesel truck, which led the pack of four similar-looking trucks.
"What the hell are you doing anyways? It's going to start pouring on us any moment now!" another male voice shouted, and if almost on queue, rain started hammering onto the ground from above.
"Everyone get in now; TORNADO WARNING WAS JUST ISSUED! LET'S GET GOING! COME ON SPINNET!" someone shouted from the farthest truck, she recognized the voice to belong to Wyatt. Without further hesitation, Alicia ran into Conrad's truck, and squeezed beside Juliette. The minute that she closed the door, Conrad pressed the gas pedal all the way down, and the truck burst into full speed, Alicia holding on for dear life. She never trusted him driving anyways.
"Got the camera, Sawyer?" Juliette asked the man in the back seat.
He responded with a quiet "Yep". The thunder roared as Alicia looked out the window. The sky was a shade of jet black, only illuminated by the lightning ripping through the sky.
Storms had always fascinated Alicia. Ever since she was a young girl, when she would stare out the window during a thunderstorm and watch the lightning dance through the sky, they had intrigued her. She had wanted to become a meteorologist for all of her childhood, but her dream became unlikely when she got her Hogwarts letter.
She soon found a different passion in the Wizarding World: Quidditch. She found herself loving the feeling of being airborne, the wind whipping through her hair, the thrill of fighting through the other players and scoring. It seemed like the most extreme feeling in the world, but that thought would be put to rest when she started storm chasing.
It was a strange story, how Alicia ended up from chasing Quaffles to roaming Tornado Alley with the VorteX team. After the Battle of Hogwarts, she played a season for the Appleby Arrows, but she just didn't have the same passion for the sport as she did before the war. Seeing a teammate and close friend die in front of you was certainly an unforgettable experience, and not in a good way.
After a year to explore more career options in the Wizarding World but with little success, as she could never find something that she enjoyed doing, she felt ready to give up. She was at the lowest point of her life; she broke up with her long-time boyfriend, her mother had just passed away, and she was broke as hell and was living in her parent's house with her dad.
And, as if it was fate, one day when she was sobbing in her old childhood bedroom, her eye crossed over an old book. "Meteorology and Weather Sciences" was a book that she read cover-to-cover many times. There was a point in time that Alicia could name all the types of clouds from the back of her head, give a detailed description of how lightning works, and could name the characteristics required for a tornado to reach the different levels of the Fujita Scale.
Back before she fell in and out of love with Quidditch, before she lost one of her closest friends,
back when she was happy and carefree.
She stared at the book for a few minutes, remembering how much her mother loved it when she spent the day reading about Climatology, telling her how hurricanes were formed, or correcting the weatherman's mistakes when Alicia's Muggle-born mother would turn on the news on the television. She knew her mother wouldn't want her to give up now. She knew her mother would want her to follow her passion.
So, without hesitation, Alicia picked up the book and opened it, immersing herself in nostalgia and allowing all her former knowledge of the subject come back into her brain. She spent days in her room, studying all her old books over and over, and when she reached the end, she hopped on her mom's old computer and devoted many hours on different websites, submerging herself in all the information she could take.
After she spent so much time of this, she knew what she was to do. She packed her bags, left her wand, and grabbed a plane to the Southern United States. She spent a few days looking for the right place, when she came across the VorteX team.
They were just a small team of ten nobodies, all with similar backstories as her. And just like her, most of them never had any other jobs in the meteorology world, or even had university degrees. Only three of them had ever graduated university with diplomas.
What made Alicia join the team the most is that they didn't judge each other; they just accepted each other and leaned on one another, like a big family. Some of them were mentally ill; some were abused; some were broken.
For the first time since her Quidditch days, Alicia felt as if she belonged.
"THERE IT IS! TO THE WEST!" she heard Madilyn shout over the radio, snapping Alicia out of her trance.
Sure enough, when Alicia glanced out the window, she saw a huge funnel cloud nearing its way to the ground. The lightning struck around the forming twister, illuminating the sky and creating a surreal image that she had the pleasure of seeing almost every day.
"Perfect, that's a beauty. We're gonna stop and get some pictures as it touches down," Juliette spoke into the radio, motioning Conrad to park the truck. As soon as the truck pulled over on the side of the road, Sawyer got out, set up his camera at lightning speed, and was quickly snapping away. The wind whipped Alicia's hair around as the funnel touched down in a farmer's field about three miles away.
"Vivian says they're reporting wind speeds of up to 138 miles an hour," Conrad said as he got out of the truck.
"EF2, hopefully won't cause much damage. Oh, goddamnit, it's hailing!" Alicia shouted over the loud wind and the tornado sirens blaring over in the town nearby. Sawyer quickly wrapped up his camera setup and put it in the backseat as everyone rushed into the truck. The hail quickly turned from the size of tiny beads to the size of a dollar coin. It could cause severe damage, but it was nothing compared to what Alicia has seen before.
She has seen some pretty nasty things before.
She has seen hailstones the size of baseballs.
She has seen houses completely destroyed by EF5 tornadoes.
She has seen families torn apart by losing their homes.
And sometimes, even worse.
It takes a strong person to do what she does. And not physical strength.
She has seen communities devastated by tornado outbreaks.
She has seen wind tearing apart homes.
She had seen cars disappear in the storm right in front of her eyes.
She wishes she had a Galleon, er, dollar for every time she's almost died.
She has come so close to being sucked by a twister, she could barely move due to the wind.
It's a dangerous job.
But she does it, not for the glory, not for the money, not for the risk, but because it makes her happy.
She enjoys the job more than anything.
And this is just a normal day on the job.