The sunrise barely made it through the windows of his room. Lying awake with his hands behind his head, gazing at the sight directly above; something that felt like home. What he was used to doing, every morning, just gazing at the cracked ceiling decorated with drawings of stars, moons and plants, created by himself years ago. Some of the plaster from above sprinkled down on him. His eyes missed nothing; even the tiny particles of dust in the air were observed carefully for a split-second, then allowed to resume floating.
Next door, his parents were attempting to keep the volume down to a minimum, but it obviously wasn't working. Gizelle was curled up in a tight ball, sleeping peacefully beneath the pink frilly dunes of her oversized blanket. Touching her soft brown curls, his brain immediately registered a slight uneasiness in her aura. He shook his head slowly and his memory flashed past with images and sounds from the past few days. Mothers weeping hysterically over the loss of their babies, who could no longer endure the harsh conditions, stale air which contained a barely sufficient amount of oxygen and a strong feeling of doom about to befall them. The situation had evolved from a mere case to an environmental disaster. We were lucky to be alive. No one was safe and yet… the Government were still desperately trying to hush it all up, covering up the death rates and conducting useless talks on how to "protect your family" while frantically searching for the one, and only, way to save their planet. But the truth is there wasn't one. And no-one was brave enough to face up to reality.
He slipped his feet into the old, tattered, mud-stained and long-worn pair of sneakers, which he proudly proclaimed his own. And No, he didn't name them, like Gizelle would. To all her soft toys. Bun-bun the stuffed bunny, Ashley the doll; yeah, there were tons of them. He sat down at the edge of the hill a little way from the place he called home and looked way off into the distance. The picturesque view that had once belonged here had been stolen and replaced with chaos, blackness. Sometimes he felt like nobody understood him. His hands gently combed through the grass and eventually rested on a smooth pebble. Swung his arm far back, then released it. That pebble was just like Gizelle. Perfect. In every way. Her parents always favoured her, not that he'd ever hated that. He loved her, all the same. His fingers brushed against a rugged stone, half-buried in the soil. Just like him, people used to say. Rough, didn't always listen to instructions. And follow them, for that matter. What they meant was, they just didn't know him. How hard can it be to admit what you really think?
Lifting his piercing blue eyes to the endless sky, he watched the clouds drift at a snail's pace across it; except that in his mind, they were speeding as fast as locomotives, geared up for the race of the century. The colours, changed too; at the beginning, everything was what a normal sunrise would be, pale-pinkish, with light streaks of purple and a dash of wall-paper-like yellow. The colour scheme rapidly melted away, and painted over hurriedly were harmless reds which transformed into bright scarlet splotches over the horizon. In a matter of seconds, the sky was pure red and with the clouds aided by the fierce wind now added to the equation, the "heaven" above drew patterns, swirled, ducked, flowed, non-stop… it had turned hellish. A wave of nausea descended on him and he jerked upright, detaching his mind from the horror he'd just seen. Going too far into the future wasn't him. Fate and Future didn't need an extra audience. Time was already lapping it all up.
A siren went off. Its screaming of 'red alert' demanded everyone's attention. It soon faded away and in its place the customary polite voice. He couldn't help imagining it to be tinged with fear and helplessness as it read in the-woman-in-the-elevator-telling-you-what-floor-you-were-on style. "All citizens of Golemn please retreat into your homes or the nearest safe building. I repeat, all citizens of Bolemn please retreat into your homes or the nearest safe building. This is a cause for concern and should be taken seriously. The Ministry of Security and Planetary Police Force has initiated a citywide lockdown. I repeat, the Ministry of Security and Planetary Police Force has initiated a citywide lockdown. Do not leave the establishment you are in and kindly wait for further instructions." Only the last word hung in the air, but the distress warning was burning freshly in every citizen's mind.
The day had come. This day. Judgement day.