The alarms sang before the sun. Birds should have followed, but the air outside was silent.

I blinked awake to the shrill beeping and the faint rumble of thunder that did not belong to any storm I knew. Seth rolled over, silencing the clock with one lazy hand, then frowned. The light in the room was wrong.

No sunlight pushed through the curtains. Only a dull glow, like daylight strangled by smoke.

I sat up. “Did we oversleep?”

He crossed to the window and pulled the drapes aside. “It’s morning,” he said, voice tight. “At least… it should be.”

I joined him, clutching the sheet around me. Outside, the sky churned with dark clouds that moved without wind. It wasn’t night, but the light was thick and colorless, as if the world had forgotten how to shine.

Seth’s reflection stared back from the glass, his brow furrowed. “The sun is there,” he whispered. “I can feel it. But something is keeping its light hostage.”

Downstairs, the coffee maker sputtered to life, a defiant sound in the quiet. The hum grounded me for a heartbeat until a cry rose through the air.

Israel.

The sound wasn’t loud or frantic. It was layered, trembling, and strange like an echo from somewhere far beyond the walls. Since the day we met him, he had endured pain in silence, a serenity too deep for any child. But now, that calm fractured. The cry felt older than him, as though Heaven itself had lent it a voice.

The air changed. The floor vibrated beneath our feet, a slow, thrumming pulse that rattled the glass. The cry broke off, swallowed by the silence that followed.

Seth looked at me, every trace of sleep gone. “That wasn’t thunder.”

We pulled on our clothes in a scramble, fingers fumbling with urgency. My heart hammered so hard I could barely breathe. “No. That was the world reacting.”

We rushed to the nursery. Elizabeth was already there, clutching Israel. His skin shimmered faintly gold, the same shade as the Sepulcher’s dust.

Adrian stumbled in behind her. “The lights are flickering throughout the whole house. What’s happening?”

Seth placed a hand over Israel’s heart, his silver breath curling faintly from his fingers. “If this…” he nodded toward the sky, “…has anything to do with Israel or our baby, then it means we’ve drawn a shadow.”

I looked up again. The clouds writhed, folding into slow, deliberate spirals, like something unseen turning its gaze our way. “Or shadows,” I murmured.

We stood side by side, searching the sky for clues until the scent of frying bacon drifted in from the kitchen. Curiosity lost to hunger. I turned toward the smell, crossed the hall, and reached for a bun. That’s when the lights went out.

Seth and I decided to leave the power outage to Alec.  If anyone could sweet-talk a blackout back to life, it was him.

The drive to the hospital felt like traveling through a dream on the verge of ending.
Cars crawled along the highway with headlights burning even though it wasn’t night. The clouds pressed low enough to swallow the tops of buildings.

Every few minutes, something vast passed across the sky.  A shadow within the clouds, shapeless yet intentional. It made the air hum, like the world’s ceiling shifting under strain.

Seth tightened his grip on the steering wheel. “Tell me that’s not a storm.”

“It’s not,” I said softly. “It’s attention.”

Neither of us spoke after that.

When we arrived at the hospital, the corridors were too brightly lit. The lights flickered every few seconds, as if the electricity itself couldn’t decide which side it was on. The nurse guided us into the ultrasound room with quiet efficiency, her eyes darting once to the dark window before closing the door.

Seth stood by the bed, hands shoved deep in his pockets. “So… this is it.” His voice trembled with a grin. “The moment of truth.”

I gave him a look. “You make it sound like a trial.”

“Well,” he glanced at the machine, “there is a monitor, a witness, and potential for panic.”

I smiled despite the lump in my throat. “You’re not helping.”

He came closer, lowering his voice. “I’m trying not to faint. Does that help?”

The doctor smiled politely as she spread the gel. “This will be a bit cold,” she warned.

Seth winced in sympathy. “She wasn’t kidding.”

“Shh,” I whispered, though my heart was racing.

The machine hummed to life, filling the silence with a faint electric buzz. For a moment, the screen showed only static. Then two faint lights appeared, pulsing side by side.

Seth leaned in, brow furrowed. “Is… is that…”

The doctor’s voice softened, reverent now. “Congratulations,” she said. “You’re expecting twins.”

Seth blinked. “Twins. As in… double?”

I stared at the screen, numb and giddy all at once. “Apparently, we don’t do anything halfway.”

He laughed, grabbing my hand, eyes bright. “We’re really doing this?”

“Looks like it,” I said, squeezing back. “Twice.”

I looked at Seth. His eyes were wide, shining, and a breath hitched in his throat, trembling before it found its way out again.

“Twins.” The word trembled in his throat like worship.

I laughed through the tears that slipped free. “Heaven really does have a sense of humor.”

He bent down, pressing a kiss to my forehead. “Or a plan.”

Outside, thunder rolled again, and it was slow, heavy, echoing from nowhere.

The doctor adjusted the monitor, her eyes widening as she studied the screen. “You’re at the end of your first trimester,” she said softly, glancing from the image to my still-flat stomach. “Though I’ll be honest, looking at you, I’m wondering where you’re hiding them.”

I blinked, then looked down at myself. “That makes two of us.”

Seth laughed under his breath and nodded toward the doctor. “I was going to ask the same question, but I like staying alive.”

The doctor smiled, amused. “Well, they’re definitely there. Perfectly healthy, both of them.”

The doctor turned off the machine, but the sound didn’t stop. It vibrated through the walls, through the floor, through us.

Seth’s fingers found mine. “They know,” he whispered.

I didn’t have to ask who they were.

The shadows above the clouds had begun to move.

We reached home by noon, though the sky said otherwise. The clouds hung so thick that daylight was only a rumor; the air itself looked bruised.

As Seth parked, I saw shapes on the lawn.  Some figures were familiar, others not so. Lady Elsa stood near the porch in her usual tailored skirt and crisp blouse, one hand pressed against her chest. Alec and Jamey were arguing quietly beside her, Adrian hovering nearby. The moment Seth opened the car door, the noise stopped.

I hesitated, and he noticed.

He came around to my side, opened the door, and smiled down at me, “Breath Max.  These are friends, not foes.”

As he extends his hand to help me from the car, I place one foot outside and pause, “Given the number of people I sense in the house and the front garden, I gather they heard the news, and I need to know who the culprit is that leaked it.”

Stepping toward the house, and with Seth holding me as if I am disabled, I grab hold of Alec, who stepped forward, shielding me instinctively.  I mutter under my breath at no one, “Great, you too.”

Inside, warmth should have waited. Instead, the air vibrated. A low hum crawled up the walls like bees behind plaster.

After some pleasantries, I hear Aleesha’s voice break the tension. “Uh… you might want to see this.”
She pointed through the window.

The back garden was no longer empty.
Our garden was filled with entities that were shaped with a shadowy human outline.  Their thick, black aura was vibrating off their motionless bodies.  Eyes glued to us or what appeared to be eyes, but all I saw were white orbs.

Jamey just had to say something Jamey, “Now that’s your proper boogeyman.”

Seth exhaled silver, a veil spreading over the walls.  “Why are they just standing there?” he murmured.

Alec stepped forward, shielding me instinctively. His eyes flicked toward the crowd outside, then back to me. “You’ve got half the spirit world camping on your lawn, Max. What exactly did you do this time?”

I brush him off, “Back off, princess, and I did nothing.”  Turning to the crowd, and in a loud voice demanded, “How the heck did all of you find out about the twins?”

This was my last mistake for the day, as everyone, and at the same time, screamed, “Twins.” Yeah, who cares about the ghost parade? We’re having twins!

Before I could answer, Jamey piped up from the kitchen doorway, brandishing a butter knife like a holy relic.
“Well, apparently someone told someone who told everyone that we’re having a baby…” pointing at Samuel, who noticed and instantly moved behind a bulk of a man, “…so congratulations, rumor mill, you’ve outperformed the doom spectacular.”

I turned to stare at him. “You’re joking.  Samuel?”

He held up his free hand. “I may have mentioned it to Samantha. Who may have told Bianca who may have told Tyler? Who…”
Lady Elsa cut in, sighing. “Who told me while I was making tea?”
Jamey winced. “And she told the Judicars. Because, you know, protocol.”

Seth groaned. “So the whole spiritual chain of command knows we’re expecting.”
“Technically,” Jamey said, “they were ecstatic. Until the sky turned into an exorcism painting.”

Aleesha pressed closer to the window. “They’re moving.”

The spirits no longer stood frozen; their faces, if you may call it that, started contorting into something nightmares are made of.  Their chins dropped to their chests, and from their endless mouths came a grating, bone-deep hum. We clutched our ears, but even silence couldn’t save us from knowing what it meant. War.

There are moments when Heaven whispers and moments when it shouts.

This chapter is both. From laughter in the pool to the tremor of thunder at dawn, it marks the first true turning of light into shadow.

The skies are watching, and the Hanged Man’s disciples have begun to crawl from their shadows.

If you enjoyed the divine chaos and Jamey’s eternal hunger, leave a star, comment, or blessing below.

Your support keeps The Living Scripture alive.