• I sit contained beneath these swaying filaments, protected from the black only through their meager shield of flickering light. The darkness forces itself upon us in the night, consuming everything in its consuming grasp. Normally I would be sitting at home, reading my book by the fire, without any cares, any problems; but as I sit quietly at the abandoned station, waiting for the train that will never come, I think to myself how none of this is normal. The box, once for shoes, but now containing God only knows what, sits in my lap, stone-cold with an imposing radiance of its mystery.
    “Where is she?” The wind was growing restless and I am forced to pull my jacket closer to myself. “She said seven o’ clock” I remember it vividly like it happened almost moments ago. “You better be there. Don’t be late!” She was so immature, but I love her. Julie is the only one for me. Her joyful energy just seems to radiate from her, infecting everyone.
    “Hey there Maxy!”
    “Julie, what the hell? You said seven. It’s now…” I looked at my watch my father had given me “…seven thirty!”
    “Ever hear of being casually late?” Ugh she gets on my nerves sometimes, now especially, with all that’s been going on and all. “Anyhoo, I got us a new lead.”
    “Really? Forgive me if I seem skeptical.”
    “Relax. It isn’t going to be like last time. You won’t have to open it again.”
    “Julie I’d rather not tal…”
    “Yeah, yeah, fine, whatever. So are we going or not?” She explains to me that her informant, who’s only known to me as ‘Ouroboros’, and who has given us more leads towards finding my father than we could have found alone, has discovered a relic that may have played a major role in ‘The Rapture’.
    The Rapture was the name given by the ‘Forevers’, those not taken away by a rift, to define the massive disappearance of over ninety-five percent of the earth’s total population. There are theories explaining it, most are religious, but I don’t believe that crap. I think it was the result of a project my father had been collectively working on with his mentors; a safe and clean way to dispose of waste materials into a void, or in another case, a different dimension. They succeeded to make a portal, in a form had been transposed into an everyday normalcy. A shoebox. They nicknamed it ‘Pandora’s Box’ as it unleashed terrors unthought-of of by man as well as opening inter-dimensional seam tears in reality. I now own that very box. The same one, which stole my father from me.
    “So let’s go. I told you the info now get up and move!” Julie pushes me towards the stairs.
    “Hold on Julez, we don’t even know where San Loatoas is.” This was the place where people who’d been taken were ‘seen through visions’. Buncha crap that is.
    “Well we won’t get anywhere by sitting here.” Julie stood a little taller, being stubborn as always.
    “Let’s at least go to the local library first.” I need to know where we were off to before we just ran unknowingly into trouble. “Maybe they still have a working computer we can use to Google it.”
    “Fine.” I know it disappoints her, but I’m not going to take the chance of opening the box again. Mysterious and intriguing as it is, last time I opened it, someone died.