Another average day

The air conditioner lightly hums as it blows out cold air, streaks of sunlight flow through the curtains and into the boy's face. The boy grumbles and turns over to block the sunlight and cover himself with a blanket, happy that he's in darkness again before he starts to doze off again…

A heavy knocking on the door is heard. A male voice spoke out on the other side.

"Oi! It's almost time for school! Come on!", the boy with a high-pitched voice yelled out to the sleeping boy strongly. 

"Ugh… god dammit…". The boy stirred awake, annoyed as the boy on the other side of the door kept heavily knocking. "Oh, shut up Duke!", the drowsy boy shouts out. He groans as he takes a few seconds, laying on the bed before sitting up and rubs his face. He grumbles to himself: "And I was having such a nice dream too…" 

His short black hair is a mess with a hair strand stuck in his eyelashes as he stretches with a grunt, the door opens and a blonde hair boy wearing a hoodie and a teasing smirk peeks out. "You have seen better days, Eth…". A pillow flew from the annoyed Ethan hand and hit square on Duke face, falling down with a poof.

"Why the hell are you waking me up for? You don't even go to school when your parents aren't here…", Ethan gets off the bed and walks to the closet sluggishly while Duke picks up the pillow that Ethan threw, Ethan throws a question at him "You're going to skip school and play games like always, right?"

Duke mockingly places his free hand on his chest with an exaggerated gasp. "How dare you accuse me, I'll have you know that I have a perfect attendance", Despite acting like he had never skipped school in his life before, he couldn't stop a playful smirk appearing on his face as he's walking to Ethan bed and sat on it, tossing the pillow back at the end of the bed where one head sleep on.

"Jokes aside, I'm not feeling it, you know. Why do we have to attend school when it is quite literally a week before summer vacation, they're not going to teach us anything and just put on boring movies for the rest of the day!", Ethan shrugged "Your parent are paying intuition of our school you know", Duke sigh and rub his head "I know, I know so shut up, I don't really need school, I'm doing plenty well enough as a streamer, even making ton of money" 

Ethan put on his school uniform, although unkempt and mostly not ironed, it suited him, his cleavage is open, showing a thin white t-shirt behind it. Ethan parted his lips to ask Duke a question. "So… you're skipping today's school?" Duke lay down on the bed and stared at the ceiling for a couple of seconds before responding. "Yeah, mum and pop are in another country, like always. So, I'm just going to skip and play games". 

Duke rolls his eyes before sitting up and gazes at Ethan, who is getting ready for school, he remembers when he first met Ethan Raymond at the age of 7, Ethan has unfortunately lost his parent in an accident at a very young age and ended up in the orphanage, where Duke parent decided to adopt Ethan, the reason of adopting Ethan was because Duke was depressed after his dog died. Yes, really. 

Even Duke doesn't know what's going on in his parents' noggins, adopting a kid just because he lost a dog? But in the end, it already happened, so what use is complaining about it now? … And having Ethan around was… Well, they treated each other like real brothers for the next 9 years, it was very fun… "Oi, how about we go to the arcade after school ended… two of us, like good ol time, no?", Ethan words broke Duke out of his daze, his eyes stare at him widely before chuckling. He knows that Ethan would rather hang out with his friends and parkour for fun, but very rarely, would he show consideration to Duke as the youngest brother.

"Sure", Duke smirks. "But you ain't winning against me" Ethan scoffs and gives him the middle finger, "Yeah right~ I'll be going now", Ethan said as he put on his shoes. Duke smirk and return the middle finger back at him. "Sure, see you later", Ethan let out a chuckle as he walks out of his room. Duke parent is very rich, the house, although cozy and nice, still bigger than your average house, you can even fit 20 people in here and still live comfortably. He opens the front door and takes a step out, hot air hits him as the sun beams strongly.

"Jesus, why does it have to be this hot? God dammit…", Ethan sighs and feels relief that he decided to wear light clothing, Cicada buzzing fills the background alongside trees rustling and cars rumbling in the distance, he takes in the fresh air of Elysian Town, before shortly walking toward the direction of the school, which is 20 minutes away. Meanwhile, Duke stretches and moves back to his room to set up streaming and play games all day. He has a wide smirk as he ponders which game to play first… 

Both of them are deeply unaware of the horror that will come during the day, as a wisp of pure black smoke appears far outside the town, it's almost like the light is being absorbed without restraint as the wisp of pure black smoke slowly grows bigger and denser into a cloud… or would it be wise to call it a fog? Since it's on the ground and not in the sky.

…

Loud chatter and laughter are heard as Ethan enters the school, as he walks through the hallway, he feels a heavy arm hang around his neck from behind. "Yo! You're early today", Dave let out his iconic jockey smirk in his jockey jumper and slick back hair, before pulling his arm away and walking beside him. "Me and the boys are planning to have a race after school, parkour edition. Winner gets 100 dollars. How about it, does it pique your interest?", Dave hummed as he placed his hands behind his head in a nonchalant manner.

Ethan chuckled and nodded, "Sure does~ However, I already have a plan after school, sorry dude.", Dave shook his head. "Nah, no prob mate", He smirked teasingly as he leaned forward. "Is it a date with that girl? What is her name? Jessica, right?", Ethan chuckled and shook his head. "Waay off my dude", He snickers. "But I'm free tomorrow for any pranks" Dave smirks as they talk. Both boys chuckled and bantered with each other until they reached the classroom. 

"Man… I wish the world would end, you know, then we wouldn't have any more of this boring school!", Dave complained as Ethan slapped the back of his head. "Yeah, right. You would be the first to die in such a scenario", Dave rubbed the back of his head and was about to protest when the school bell suddenly rang. "Come on, let sit down", Ethan urged Dave as Dave sighs in defeat. Ethan sat in the middle, whereas Dave sat at the back next to the door. Ethan saw a couple of his classmates arriving, John the Class clown, Maria the arrogant beauty and her group of girlfriends, and Nathan, the class artist. Nathan sat beside me while John sat in the front and Maria and her friends sat near the windows.

"Yo, I finished my latest comic, want to check it?", Nathan Spoke to Ethan, Ethan turned his head to him. "That quickly? Damn, sure, give it to me. I'll be your first fan", Ethan let out a wide smile as Nathan chuckle. "What a shame, I thought a hot babe would be my first fan~", He jests with Ethan before placing the comic papers he made in front of Ethan. "Read it after school, I'll listen to your review", Ethan winks at him as a response, before placing the comic into his backpack, shortly after, the door abruptly opens, exposing the irritated class teacher, Gregory. No one likes him, he teaches horribly and is very boring. Very.

Ethan glanced at the fan in the middle of the room above the windows to the outside, "What are you looking at? Even if you look at me, I'm not going to go on a date with you", A arrogant feminine tone made him look down from the fan who isn't activated and at Maria who is beside the windows, Ethan Scoff, "I was looking at the fan, not at you. Don't get caught up in your delusion", Maria scoffs and rolls her eyes as Ethan shouts out to the teacher, "Mr. Gregory, is the fan broken?".

Gregory sigh annoyed and pulled out a controller, he points at the fan and press the button, the fan doesn't start "As you can obviously see…" He spoke with a condescending tone, "The fan is broken… What a great idea to waste up my time, good job!", Gregory scoffs at Ethan as if Ethan was an idiot, Ethan thought: 'What an asshole'.

Gregory proceeds to turn on the projector, putting on some boring movie, which made everyone groans as Gregory smirks, it's almost like he is enjoying the suffering of his students. Time went by, and the sun rose, the temperature in the air grew and without the fan on, everyone was sweating and annoyed. Ethan props his chin on his desk and fan himself; an ice cream would be amazing right now… 

Clock hands continue moving and at 11:59, A massive explosion appears far from the school. The vibrations shook everyone in the class up and fully awake from the boredom, Ethan and the others turned their head at the window, toward the town. Sweat formed on his forehead as his pupil dilate, his breath shudders as he sees a massive pitch-black fog devouring the town and moving at insane speed, there isn't any wind, yet it's this fast. Fear sprouted in him, fear of the unknown and mysteries, before anyone in the class could do or say anything, the pitch-black fog devoured them and Ethan felt like puking, he felt his inside twisted, and his eyes burned all in a second. 

Right after a second, the pitch-black fog disappeared like nothing happened, everyone breathing heavily, Gregory has his hand on his chest as tears fall down, Maria hug herself as she almost puked, Nathan hands shudders and shiver uncontrollably and Dave wheezes as he clutched on his desk. Everyone else is in a similar condition for the next minute…

"W-What the hell was that?", Ethan stood up and stared through the window, expecting to see fog of pitch black, but everything seemed normal… except… 'I don't hear the Cicadas… did the fog affect them too?', Ethan shivers before looking at Nathan and Dave and moves to them. However, the sensation of his inside twisted and his eyes burning was too vivid and made him flinch, he took a deep breath before walking to them.

"W-W-What the fuck was that?! My lungs burn… I never even smoked… what the fuck…", Dave calms his wheezes down and shiver, Nathan clutches his arms as if he thought it was cut off, "You guys… alright?", Ethan spoke out softly and slightly fearful. The two nodded and stood up. Gregory said fearfully and cowardly, "A-All students! G-Go out to the patio and wait in a line! W-We adults will figure out what is going on", Gregory is the first to run out, everyone doesn't buy his words and thinks that he is running away, but there is some truth in there. "He's right… let go out to the patio and find out what's going on", one of the classmates said and shortly after, everyone left the class and out to the patio, the sensation we felt during that second was… horrifying, everyone is afraid and scared of what is going on… As Ethan and others walk through the hallway, he notices that the other classroom is eerily empty. 'They must've gone out to the patio already…'

As everyone arrives at the patio, it's very empty with no souls in sight, Ethan is confused of where the other class went to, and before he could theorize, a high pitch scream from a girl is heard, and she is on the ground, staring at the sky in fear, pointing at it. Everyone instinctively followed the direction where she pointed at and… Ethan breathes shudder as sweats vividly form on his face; there are now two suns in the sky. Dave sprouted out, "I-I didn't actually mean it, I was joking about wanting the world to end…", Ethan shivers as he listens to Dave's words… In the next 30 seconds, everyone barely calmed themselves, but right before they could talk of what the hell was going on. Ethan and the others felt a primal fear that has been deeply ingrained in human DNA since the Stone Age. 

'RUN'