Midnight Calling

❍ 𝟕 - 𝐅𝐨𝐫𝐠𝐨𝐭𝐭𝐞𝐧

Maya materialised in a gust of wind inside her apartment kitchen.

She fell to her knees onto the linoleum and clutched her middle with shaking arms.

The gust had sent the table napkins shooting up to the ceiling like a startled flock of birds. But the squawks and shrieks that trailed in her ears as they fluttered back down were those of the daycare staff and children, who'd just witnessed Zoe's mother vanish into thin air before their very eyes.

Zoe...

Choking back a sob, Maya tried once again to jump to the Circle.

Pain sliced through her and she wailed in both agony and frustration. Her power ricocheted, unleashing violent gusts this time which whirled about the room. The window blinds slammed against the panes over the sink, cracking the glass. Any objects not bolted to the walls or counter were hurled about or toppled over.

The winds stopped. And for a split second, everything airborne froze in mid-air, then dropped with a swish, bang, or thud.

A heavy silence ensued, broken only by Maya's ragged breaths —and the ruffling pages of the Hello Kitty calendar— taking its time spiralling down to the floor. It landed open before her, incredibly still on the correct month.

The star stickers framing Zoe's birthday sparkled in the light.

Maya balled her fists.

The ceiling fixture bulbs exploded.

She dropped forward onto her hands and hissed through clenched teeth, struggling to gather her power.

More blasts whipped through the kitchen.

It wasn't just that she couldn't attain the Circle. Something was happening to the dimensional currents. The temporal streams were falling out of sync. It was the only explanation for the disrupted cosmic winds she drew in with her every attempt.

"Damn you to the Ether, Twenty-fourth! If you hurt Zoe..."

She tried again but stopped short with a retch. It was no use, and the sickening reason why only struck her now. She sat back on her heels with a shiver of cold shock.

Midnight's power formed an impenetrable barrier, a barrier reinforced by a mix of energies she recognised; tendrils of her sisters and brothers' auras, stretched and twisted tight like wire between barbs. Maya swallowed hard.

What in all Existence was wrong with Midnight? Why was he doing this to them?

To what end?

Maya gasped.

The passage of the day was being broken.

The traffic lights... the cell network outages... the internet glitches she witnessed today. Humans were already suffering the indirect effects. But what about the Hours themselves? What would happen to beings whose very existence was predicated upon the flow of Time?

There would be no future. The present would unravel, slip away. Become forgotten to the past.

Forgotten.

She pressed the heels of her hands to her forehead. "Think, think. Have I forgotten anything?"

She bit back a growl and opened her eyes, taking in the wrecked kitchen. Then she glanced down.

The calendar.

Maya grabbed it off the floor. A birthday star sticker fell off the page.

"No! Not my daughter! I can't forget my own child!" But she had. In the last few minutes her thoughts had been focused solely upon her fellow Hours. She had indeed forgotten all about Zoe.