There was an energy in the air, seeming to charge everything around us. Usually this only happened when a storm was on its way, at least that’s what the Elders had said. But they also mentioned something like “clouds”, which, by their description, were nowhere to be seen. The sun beat down, as it always does in this godforsaken place. One sunny day followed by another, for all of memory.

I had been born after The Event, so I only know of things like “rain” or “snow” from stories of the Elders, and the occasional kid my age who wanted to act like they had some forbidden bit of knowledge that made them superior. Apparently, a lot had been different before. Most parents and grandparents would speak of having more than enough. And I mean that broadly, as it was more than enough of anything: food, water, shelter, community, things I had never even heard of and struggled to understand.

Not only was there an odd sensation in the air, but everybody was also acting strangely. It was as if they could feel the same thing as me, but didn’t want to let on that they did. Men and women pushed past me on the dirt street, people whom I knew but wouldn’t stop for a simple greeting or even to make eye contact. This made me uneasy, the town never acted like this. I had surely felt this intangible force before, but I hadn’t started acting strangely afterward. Had I?

I rushed home, seeing that the central road of our settlement was clearing out. It almost seemed like doors and shutters were being slammed closed as I passed by. Perhaps this queer feeling was taking its toll on my senses. It almost felt as though the energy built with each step I took, going from a slight hum to a crackling that I could swear I should be able to see.

Just as I felt that my bones were buzzing with this phantom current, I reached the faded wooden door of my family’s hovel. Nearly falling through the entrance, I threw myself into the dining room to find my parent’s and last surviving uncle sitting in a semicircle facing the doorway.

“Do you guys feel…?” I ask, but my mother interjects.

“The Storm is coming, once again.” I give her a quizzical look but she does not continue.

“It’s been nearly thirty years since the last,” my father adds grimly. “I had hoped to not live to see it again.”

“What is this Storm?” I inquire, anxiety rising in my skinny chest.

“Who will be taken this time?” my uncle says, obvious fear in his voice. “It cannot be me, everyone else of my line has been lost in one way or another.”

Without warning, my father leaps to his feet.

“Then your line ends today!” he screams with a ferocity I thought I would never see out of him. My uncle howls, just as an alien sound grows outside. It is as if some invisible force is flinging sand and grit against the facade of our home.

“The Wind heralds Its arrival!” my mother says in a monotone, as if reciting something reverent.

“You cannot do this!” my uncle shrieks, falling backward out of his chair as my father looms over him. I am frozen with fear and confusion as I watch this horrendous drama unfold. The noise outside becomes a howl not unlike the one my uncle had just uttered, but more hollow somehow.

“It must be this way,” my father mutters. “For the good of our family.”

“I am your family!” my uncle shouts, spittle flying from his lips as tears brim around his red-rimmed eyes. Just then, I hear a loud crash outside and am temporarily blinded by a light so intense I’m not sure I will ever see again.

Deaf and blind, I squirm on the ground and do not realize it is my scream echoing in my ears when my vision returns. I wish it hadn’t, as I see my father laid upon my uncle, his fingers wrapped tightly around his brother’s throat. My uncle’s face is purple and appears swollen as he slaps helplessly at my father’s arms. He flails and his mouth opens and closes silently as his eyes bulge. Tears stream down his discolored face and his tongue seemed to be about to burst out of his mouth. Finally, I felt the weight of the situation.

“No!” I scream, flinging my small body on my father. I may not be strong, but it was enough to loosen his grip. My uncle took a sharp inhale that sounded like glass being dragged across the floor.

“Do not interfere!” my father roars, his face ugly with fury. I feel familiar hands wrap themselves around my midsection.

“It has to be this way,” my mother says in a strained voice. I struggle against her grip but I know it’s futile. My uncle regains his feet but my father is back on the attack. They grapple and throw each other around as the noise outside grows to a deafening din. Just as the house seems to be shaking from whatever was happening outside, the two men crash into the wall. Another flash like before blinds me and when my sight returns this time, my father and uncle are gone, replaced with a hole in the wall. I try to run to them but my mother continues to restrain me.

“It’s better this way,” she says in a tight voice. “Perhaps two offerings from one house will keep the Storm away longer.”

I stare at the hole in the wall, feeling as hollow inside as it. My mother whispers in my ear that in time I will come to understand this and that’s when I realize that it is deathly silent outside. Finally I slip out of my mother’s grasp and approach the new opening, looking out on the changed world. Except nothing has changed. It all appears as it had, but there is no trace of my father or uncle.

I would later learn that at least one person from each dwelling in our small settlement had vanished in one way or another that day. Though my mother had promised I would someday understand, it has been thirty years since then and not a word has been spoken of what happened. My mother died a few months later from an illness that swept through the settlement and I gave up on ever learning my father and uncle’s fates.

Ever since then, I have feared feeling that same sensation I had that fateful morning. It weighs upon me every day as I watch the infinite sky above us, wondering at what had happened that day.