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Episode one: The Event That Started Everything
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[Year: nineteen fifty]
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Morning traffic moved through the streets like any other ordinary day. Vendors shouted prices over one another at crowded market stalls while customers pushed through the sidewalks carrying bags and newspapers.
Radios crackled from open apartment windows, blending with laughter, arguments, car engines, and the constant rhythm of city life.
In Paris, a butcher wiped sweat from his forehead with the back of his wrist while cutting through thick slabs of meat for a growing line of impatient customers. "Take the chicken too if you want a proper dinner," he told an older woman at the counter. "Your husband looks skinny every time he walks past here."
The woman rolled her eyes. "My husband drinks more wine than water. That is his problem, not mine." A few people nearby laughed quietly.
In London, several boys sat on a curb eating popsicles while arguing over a football match from the previous night.
"You are blind if you think that was not a foul," one boy snapped. "It was clean," another argued back immediately. "You just cry every time your team loses." A taxi horn blared nearby.
In New York, soldiers stood near a busy intersection directing morning traffic while buses crawled through packed streets. One younger soldier adjusted the strap beneath his chin and looked toward his partner. "You owe me tea after this shift," he muttered. "I covered your patrol yesterday." "You covered ten minutes," the other soldier replied. "Do not act like it's some big deal man."
Nearby, children chased one another across the sidewalk while street vendors shouted over the noise.
Across the world, life continued in its familiar rhythm.
Then everything stopped.
The sound vanished so suddenly that people froze where they stood. Conversations died mid-sentence. Footsteps halted halfway through crowded crosswalks.
A car stalled in the middle of an intersection, its engine suddenly sounding far too loud against the unnatural silence. Dogs began whining and bolted underneath parked vehicles with tails tucked tightly between their legs.
Babies jolted awake in their strollers, small fists clenching as their faces scrunched red and they began to scream.
The silence pressed against people like a physical weight.
A man near a newspaper stand grabbed the side of his head. "Why does it feel like that?" "I do not know," another answered quietly. "Something is wrong."
Then the sky split open.
A massive rupture tore through the blue sky above the world. People looked up slowly as the opening spread outward layer after layer.
A violent red and black void widening like something forcing itself through reality from the other side.
The light pouring from the rupture felt wrong. Deep red pulses spread through the sky at steady intervals, as if something alive was pushing against the atmosphere. Each wave dimmed the sunlight for a brief second before swelling brighter than before.
The air trembled beneath every pulse. Windows rattled violently. Loose debris skittered across rooftops.
People stopped moving entirely. Shopping bags slipped from numb fingers and crashed onto the pavement. Glass bottles shattered across sidewalks. Several people collapsed to their knees without understanding why, palms pressed desperately against the ground as their fingers spread wide.
In Paris, the butcher's cleaver slipped from his grasp and buried itself into the cutting board. His breathing quickened while sweat rolled down the side of his face. "Why is it hard to breathe?" he whispered. Behind him, one customer began praying quietly.
In New York, one soldier ripped his helmet off and wiped both eyes hard with his sleeve. "What is happening?" he asked sharply. His partner stared upward, frozen. "I... I do not know." The younger soldier grabbed his shoulder aggressively. "Say something!"
Above them, the clouds tore apart. Invisible pressure shoved them outward violently. Their edges blackened and curled while pieces dissolved into ash before reaching the ground. The blue sky was swallowed whole, replaced by a raw red glow that spread across the atmosphere like an open wound.
Then the heat arrived.
A rolling shockwave of burning air slammed through the cities. Street signs bent backward with loud metallic groans before ripping free from their bolts. People were thrown off their feet, arms flailing as they crashed into pavement and storefronts. Panic erupted all at once. Screams tore through the streets as crowds shoved and collided in desperate attempts to escape.
"Run!" "Oh God!" "Take the kids!"
A mother grabbed her son violently by the wrist and dragged him through the crowd while he cried in confusion. Windows cracked across entire blocks, then exploded inward. Glass burst through apartments, offices, restaurants, and packed shops.
People ducked instinctively, raising their arms over their heads. Some dropped flat against the ground. Others screamed as shards sliced into exposed skin, opening thin cuts across cheeks, hands, and foreheads.
Birds fell from the sky by the dozens, their bodies striking rooftops and pavement hard before going still. Dogs barked uncontrollably while pulling against their leashes.
Car alarms blared one after another. Radio towers sparked violently overhead while workers high above the streets clung desperately to railings.
The heat kept rising. Sweat soaked through clothing within minutes. People stepped quickly across scorching pavement while others wrapped shirts around their hands before touching metal railings or car doors.
The air tasted dry and metallic. Every breath scraped painfully against the throat.
Some people doubled over, vomiting violently into gutters. Others dropped to their knees and prayed through tears. Many simply ran without direction, shoving through strangers in blind panic.
Then a single clear bell rang across the world.
Everything stopped.
The pressure vanished instantly. The heat disappeared from the streets. The violent red glow drained from the sky layer by layer until the ordinary blue returned once again.
The world snapped back into place.
Cars sat crooked across intersections with engines sputtering unevenly. Fires crackled from overturned food carts and broken electrical lines.
Glass covered the streets in glittering layers. Bodies remained sprawled where they had fallen moments earlier.
People stood frozen. Chests rose and fell hard. Hands slowly lowered from heads and faces. Some blinked rapidly, trying to steady their vision while the ringing in their ears refused to fade.
Above them was only an ordinary sky. Blue. Quiet. Empty.
As if nothing had happened at all.
But the silence afterward stayed too long. Nobody moved first. Nobody spoke loud enough to break it.
Then the world changed.
A crowded bus rolled through downtown London when a woman near the center aisle suddenly grabbed her chest. Her breathing turned shallow.
Sweat spread across her forehead while her fingers dug into her coat. "Something is wrong with me," she whispered. The man beside her leaned closer. "Ma'am?" Her body jerked violently.
Passengers screamed as she collapsed sideways into the aisle. Faint white light pulsed beneath her skin. Her veins glowed through her arms and neck like heated wires beneath paper-thin flesh. Someone screamed for the driver to stop the bus.
In a crowded nightclub in Los Angeles, a man burst into laughter at a joke before suddenly dropping to both knees. His drink shattered beside him.
He clutched the edge of the counter so hard the wood cracked under his fingers. "What is happening to me?!" Light flickered beneath his skin in uneven pulses. Nearby customers stumbled backward in panic. One woman grabbed her purse and ran toward the exit. "Get away from him!" The man looked down at his own hands in terror.
Then the glass bottles behind the bar exploded all at once.
On a rooftop in Paris, a teenage boy staggered backward, staring at his hands with wet, terrified eyes. "I didn't touch it…" The metal trash can beside him groaned. Its surface peeled apart layer by layer before collapsing into rust-colored dust that spiraled upward and vanished.
The boy stumbled backward in horror before turning and sprinting toward the stairwell.
In London, a woman shoved her taxi door open too hard. The vehicle split cleanly down the middle. Metal screamed as the frame tore apart.
The driver stumbled out onto the street, staring in horror. The woman remained frozen beside it. Her hands would not stop shaking. "What did I do…?"
Not everyone survived. Some people locked up mid-step before collapsing where they stood. Others coughed once and never moved again.
Paramedics arrived too late. They knelt beside bodies that showed no visible injuries, confusion spreading across exhausted faces as they searched desperately for wounds that did not exist.
Those who survived continued changing. Eyes glowed faintly in dark rooms. Floors trembled beneath frightened footsteps. Shadows stretched in directions they should not have.
In New York, children began screaming. Some collapsed onto pavement clutching their stomachs while their bodies convulsed uncontrollably.
Others dug their fingernails into their arms as heat spread through their joints and bones. A boy bit through his own tongue trying not to scream while his mother held his face and cried helplessly.
In Paris, an elderly man dropped his groceries after electricity burst from both of his hands without warning.
Sparks tore through nearby vending machines while pedestrians dove away from the sidewalk. "I did not touch anything!" he shouted desperately. A fruit stand beside him caught fire seconds later.
Nobody understood what was happening.
Scientists appeared on live broadcasts trying to calm the public, but arguments erupted between experts as one suddenly grabbed his head and screamed before collapsing out of frame. The screen cut to static moments later.
Hospitals overflowed before nightfall. Patients crowded hallways and stairwells. Phones rang endlessly behind reception desks with nobody left to answer them.
Governments panicked. Borders closed overnight. Military convoys jammed highways. Sirens screamed through packed streets.
Then came the accidents, and the violence. A police officer shoved a suspect through a storefront window with enough force to bend the metal frame inward.
He staggered backward afterward, staring at his own hands in horror. "I didn't mean to do that…"
The first bank robber did not even understand his power. Bullets passed harmlessly through his body like smoke. He stared at himself in stunned silence before hysterical laughter burst from his throat.
The first killer never meant to kill anyone. He simply grabbed too hard.
And across the world, one thought spread through terrified whispers, desperate prayers, and shaking voices.
"The Red Bloom wasn't a blessing."
Someone else said it louder.
"It was a damn curse."