Psycher Chronicles: Chapter 36 A Slight Leak (Patreon)

Chapter 36

A Slight Leak

(Jerome Jacobs)

The world was going crazy. First there was a bright flash of light, and then all the power went out.

Silence.

If Jerome had to describe the sensations, he was feeling it would be silence. His heightened hearing and senses hinted at how wrong the world suddenly was. These were senses that had been enhanced and multiplied over countless generations, until Jerome, one of the strongest wolves of his generation knew how intense his sensations were.

Originally, he thought of his enhanced senses as a curse. As a burden that he and others like him would have to bear. He remembered being frightened of the slight groans the floorboards would make as people made their way throughout the house. He remembered having to be taught to focus past the constant humming and thrumming of computer equipment running idly in the background. He had to accept that some mechanical devices gave off slow and rhythmic ticks to keep alive and active.

Now Jerome knew the exact opposite of that, what the world would sound like if his childhood wish was granted. However, this was not as he wanted, at least not any more, as what he wanted was peace of mind enough to gain the ability to focus through the constant buzzing of electronics. Now that he was older and used to the sounds, he couldn’t help but wish for things to be back.

Picking up his phone from his pocket, he saw that it was dead.

Listening, he tried to hear, only to realize that his father and mother were at his Uncle’s house for some big pack meeting. This meant that he was by himself.

As time ticked by, Jerome found himself wondering just how long the power outage would last.

With a quick glance around, it was clear that the entire neighborhood had been hit by the same power outage, as every other light in the area was out.

Every light, traffic light, and all too early holiday decoration, everything was out.

Pausing, he tried to listen for the sound of the vents coming on, only to realize that they wouldn’t come on without electricity. It was this realization more than anything that caused a mild form of panic to settle in. Panic from having no airflow, panic from being stuck in a house that would not cycle its scents the way it was supposed to.

Feeling suddenly stuck, he found himself opening his window to at least let some fresh air in. Though this too brought in more scents and sounds that spoke of futility. Mundane humans were coming out of their houses and complaining to each other. Cars that had been running apparently dropped dead on the spot. At best one or two people found themselves wrestling with their vehicles as they tried to steer their suddenly dead vehicles from crashing into random objects or locations. Thus quite a few cars were parked randomly in the street.

At this moment, Jerome realized that he had one of two options available to him. First, he could go out and speak to the lowly mundanes that his family had taken refuge in hiding amongst, or he could try to go to sleep. As obviously meeting up with fellow pack mates was off the table at the moment.

With that, Jerome in a semi-reluctance went and laid down on his bed, attempting to at least get a nap out of this situation.

Yet, as he lay down he couldn’t help but toss and turn as different thoughts filled his head. Thoughts on how to grow the pack, how to keep Alishia in check, and most importantly what he should do with his cousin. A cousin who clearly thought herself capable of fulfilling the role of shaman but didn’t seem to have any forms of innovation. That was the thing, he wanted to not only found his own pack, but to have his pack be at the forefront of change. Yet, he didn’t know what changes he wished to enact as he couldn’t find any one definitive way forward. Which was something he felt his shaman should offer, but no one could say anything definitive about how the future would play out.

Yet, despite his hesitations, and constantly twisting thoughts, and the fact that he felt strangely too hot from the lack of air flow and simultaneously too cold from the cool fall breeze coming in from the window, he managed to sleep.

A hard groggy sleep that would only make you more tired once you awoke, but sleep nonetheless. Then it happened.

Beeeep.

Rumble-stop.

The house came to life, then stopped.

For a moment Jerome wondered if he had dreamed of the house suddenly coming to life, but was quickly broken out from that train of thought when he realized that he felt a slight breeze on his face.

Yet, as soon as Jerome found his mind waking up to the sounds, he found that the house was once again silent.

Jerome paused in bed, lying there and wondering if anything had happened. Had he dreamed it all?

From a quick focus of his heightened hearing to the outside world it was clear that electricity had not been turned on. As everything was still quiet.

Then he heard it.

Drip, drip, drip.

Water dripping into a metal sink. One of the most annoying sounds that anyone could be forced to listen to. It was one of those sounds that was so faint that you felt you could almost focus around it, but so insistent that you knew that you couldn’t stop hearing it if it kept up its persistent pace.

Drip, drip, drip, drip.

Now the droplets of water began to flow faster. It was this sudden change in tempo that caused Jerome to rise up with a deep sigh as he found himself walking through the dead and empty house, on his way to the kitchen.

As he moved, he scanned everything with his heightened hearing, trying to see if anything electronic was alive. For a moment he swore that something had happened, that the power had come on at one point during his sleep, but was now debating that with himself.

Still, there was one thing that Jerome was certain of, and that was that the faucet in the kitchen was leaking.

Going down, he wondered how and why the water would still work, even with the power out. Then remembered how water was done on hydraulic power, and thus didn’t really require anything to keep it going.

Going to the sink, Jerome looked at the handle to the faucet and found it in the down, or closed position and just stared for a  second, before going over to touch the faucet handle.

Drip, drip.

The water that was coming out slowed down, but was still pouring out.

“Gah.” Jerome hissed to himself as he pushed down harder.

Drip, drip, drip.

“What the.” Jerome began, as the water was now pouring out faster than before.

Angrily Jerome yanked on the handle, using all of his might, and crack.

Splash.

Water began spraying wildly from a slight crack in the faucet, right where the faucet meets the counter, the sudden yank and pressure of the water coming up caused a micro-fracture to form that was now spreading water everywhere.

Gasp.

Jerome found himself putting up his own hands to stop the water from spraying him directly in the face. At first, he tried to cover the leak, but that only kept the intense stream of water from flying out wildly and instead caused it to hit his hand.

Panicking, Jerome tried to stop everything.

Beep.

Just as Jerome found himself wrestling with the water gushing from the faucet, he heard the microwave that was but four feet away flash and beep to life.

“What?” Jerome found himself confused as he suddenly turned his head towards the microwave, only to find that it was now dead.

Splash!

Jerome wanted to pause to question his senses as he could swear that he just saw the microwave come to life a moment ago, the fact that his eyes were still adjusting to the sudden burst of light was proof that the electricity had been on for at least a moment.

Still, there were bigger issues at hand, like trying to stop the sudden spraying of water.

Jerome found himself trying to wrestle with the pipes, covering the growing fissure with his hand, while reaching out to the towel drawer and trying to find something to wrap around the faucet, while he tried to fix this.

Crack-fwoosh!

Then as he was reaching, Jerome felt a sudden surge of water come up through the pipes, and slam into the faucet. There was so much force that the entire faucet bounced in his head for a moment.

Beep.

At that exact moment, the microwave beeped to life. Only the microwave, nothing else, not the fridge, not the dishwasher, nothing else, save for the microwave.

This time Jerome saw numbers being displayed.

The entire thing was too quick, and he found himself once again distracted by the microwave and failed to notice that the sudden surge of water pressure caused the faucet to completely break apart in his hands, causing metal to slice into his wet and exposed skin.

“AHHH!” Jerome cried out, instantly feeling the pain of deep lacerations in his hand. He looked down, but it was too dark to see how bad everything was.

SPLOOOSHH!

Water sprayed everywhere, wildly showering the kitchen.

Jerome felt his own blood pooling in his hand, as the cuts were just that deep. He looked down, at just the right time to be able to see his hand.

Beep.

As the moment he looked down, is the same moment that the microwave once again beeped back to life.

Rather than turning to see the microwave, he looked down to see his hand, only to find that he had a deep cut going the width of his hand.

Yet, by this point water was spraying so wildly, that he felt a slight pool around his feet.

Not wanting to get too much more water on the floor, Jerome remembered something about the water valves being underneath.

He was about to do that, when he realized that he needed something for his hands.

Working quickly, he once again reached for the towel drawer, pulled out a towel and wrapped it tightly against his hand, before diving under the sink, in a desperate attempt to find the shut off valve.

Unfortunately, everything was too dark to see under the sink. That was, until the microwave once again peeped its displeasure.

Beep, beep.

The microwave once again peeped aggressively, but this was good, as it gave just enough light that Jerome could see the giant ovular metal knob that he had been trained to identify.

Squeak, squeak.

He twisted the valve shut, noting a distinct groaning coming from the pipes as he did so, but with each turn, the geyser of water that was erupting from the pipes slowly stopped, until finally nothing else came out.

With a sigh of relief, Jerome found himself exhaling. Only to realize that he was now firmly in a thin pool of water that coated the entire kitchen floor.

He was about to get out, as he was pondering people he could call to help, only to realize that the power was still out and that his phone was somehow dead.

Beep, beep, beep.

VRROOOMM!

The microwave beeped again, but this time it began running as if it was trying to cook something that was already in there.

With a start, Jerome got up and saw that the microwave was indeed moving, even the little table thing was spinning about, but nothing was in there.

Then with a confused face, he saw that the timer was not dropping, despite flashing constantly as if it was about count down from 13.

Well not 13, as it apparently had the 0 in front.

013.

013.

013.

Jerome kept looking at the counter, wondering why it of all appliances was working. He also wondered why there was no colon separating the minutes from the seconds. He saw all of these things, and then dismissed them, as he heard a strange grinding sound coming from inside the microwave.

Grr.

Then to his shock, he saw the white plastic lining that protected everything beginning to be impeded by an object that looked like a screw coming loose from the top.

As the screw began to drop, bolts of electrical energy began to flash about.

With sudden fear and panic, filling him. Jerome charged forward, grabbing the door of the microwave and forcefully ripping it open, expecting the automatic safety features of the microwave to kick in and to cause the microwave to stop sending out microwaves.

Unfortunately, there was an apparent error in the design of this microwave, for rather than stopping, the pulse of energy increased, bouncing around the container, to the metal spike and right out sending a thousand megawatt blast into the water soaked Jerome, who was still standing in a faint pool of water.

ZZZz-APP!

The force and intensity of the blast didn’t stop immediately, as the current kept going from the microwave. Even Jerome’s increased vitals and health were no match for the sudden surge and near constant stream of energy that poured from the overtaxed microwave into Jerome, and then down and out his body that was acting as a conduit for the electricity that was now burning his insides to pieces.

As he felt his muscles tighten into place, and felt the burn of electricity eroding his insides, the only thing he could see was the flashing numbers of the microwave.

013.

013.

013.

Only at the last moment of his life, did he realize that the blocky numbering system of the microwave made the 0 look really close to a capital D. Then with that one piece of the puzzle, Jerome finally understood the message that was being sent to him, but not the why.

***

Down the street, in the following days, neighbors would note that for some reason the Jacobs had lights flashing at full blast on the morning of the power outage. Those that saw the lights assumed the Jacobs had somehow gotten their auxiliary generators online. Mr. Clements noted that he was about to head over and ask for help, but soon saw that the lights died out, and he assumed it meant that even the auxiliary generator had finally died like everything else.