Growing up, the Sorairo’s farmhouse had always been a welcome escape from the Quazililea’s cramped two-bedroom apartment. The first time she’d been there, the place had reminded Nellie of the castles of the Moonrise Kingdoms. Towering, spacious, and grand, with each room offering a tremendous view of the groves and foothills outside.  

Max’s room could be found right next to the front door. Compared to Nellie’s, it had always seemed ample and wide, with windows on three walls that allowed for light to filter in at all times of the day. The close proximity to the entrance worked in his favor too since he’d had experiments go awry in the past and needed a quick escape from all of the ensuing smoke. Downstairs you could also find the kitchen, dining, and living room, which featured Arashi’s personal library of Tennkā tomes, gardening books, and astronomical texts. 

They had two sets of stairs too, offering access to the bedrooms upstairs from either side of the house. Arashi’s room rested above the kitchen, beside the stairs there, but Nellie had only seen it in passing. Even when the Tennkā woman was working, or simply gone for the night, Nellie felt weird about going in there. As if Arashi deserved more respect than Yuève and the others showed when rummaging in there for confiscated belongings, money, or the keys to the truck.

Yuè’s room was the smallest of them all and could be found right above Max’s, next to one of the bathrooms and the second set of stairs. It was usually a mess in there, with clothes thrown all over the place and music blaring. And yet, that’s where Nellie spent most of her nights when she slept over, bathed in candle light, staying up late sharing stories and wild ideas with her closest friend. 

The hall outside, from the bathroom to Arashi’s room, was adorned with family portraits and several of Raul’s paintings. Raul himself had the biggest room in the house, since it was the only one that was part of the original building, and shared it with Tei. The video games could be found there, and while most nights were spent in intense competition with one another, the two brothers would sometimes open their windows and play music together. Raul had tried to teach Tei how to play guitar, but the Tennkā child had proven a long time ago to be more attuned to the keys of a piano. 

It was there where Raul finally awoke. In his bed, with his mother singing in the living room downstairs like any other night. Except this wasn’t any other night. He’d risen from a dream full of pains and sweats. The whole time it had felt as if his body had been burning from the inside, as if his chest had caved in after being struck by…  

By the Stars, the meteor!

Raul shot up from the bed and tried to recall what had happened. He remembered the crash, and Max – Max had fallen from the truck after a meteor had struck him as well. Had the experience been any less painful for him? When the meteor struck him, Raul had felt as if his entire being had been ripped from his body. The meteors may phase through anything, but to him it had certainly felt like he’d been hit with all the momentum of a rock plummeting from outer space. 

His head was still ringing at the thought. Raul threw the sheets off himself and stumbled through the dark for the light switch. When he reached for it however, he paused, sensing the tickle of the currents running through the wires behind the wall. His face broke into a grin, no way… Lightning! I got lightning! 

Giddy with the realization, he left the room in darkness and instead focused on building pressure in his palm. He wasn’t sure what else to do, no one had been given lessons on how to be a muse in school, but that bit of apprehension wasn’t going to hold him back. He released the pressure a moment later and watched as the room shone with the dancing yellow and white fractals of electricity running down his arm. 

Raul’s smirk grew so wide that he felt the tension of his cheeks refusing to rise any further. He flicked on the light switch, expecting to at least find Tei in his bed, but no. He was alone. His thoughts immediately reached for the worst. 

Had something happened to the others? Did they need help?

He dashed out of the room and raced for the stairs, only to crash right into Max. The two brothers collided hard, but only Raul fell to the ground, his head ringing again. Ugh, this HAS to go away.

“Raul?” Max said in surprise, “Sorry, are you okay?”

Raul rubbed at his temples for a second longer, than opened his eyes and regarded his new musae sibling for the first time. Max still wore his glasses, the Instruments couldn’t fix natural afflictions like that, but behind the large frames his eyes were saucers of a deep, forest green. With the bush of nappy hair atop his head dyed the same color, his dark complexion seemed to shine, complemented by the earthy tones of his Instrument. His childlike face had aged a few years too, losing most of the baby fat, thus allowing his jaw and cheekbones to come out. 

“Yeah,” Raul replied, getting back on his feet. “I’m good. How’re you feeling, after everything…?” 

“I’m not sure yet. The whole experience hurt a lot more than I thought it would.”

“Yeah, I agree,” Raul said.

“Is Nellie up here?” Max didn’t waste any time. “I saw her bag downstairs, but Mom and Tei didn’t know where she’d gone.”

Raul raised an eyebrow at this, perhaps he had been right to worry. “No, I haven’t seen her.” But when the two of them peaked back inside the room, Raul noticed that his window was open while Tei’s remained closed. Since the windows faced the front of the house, the room opened right onto the roof of the porch. As kids, the Sorairos had discovered that once there, they could walk over to a low hanging portion of the roof, and climb on top of the house. Arashi hated it, and often threatened to have that part rebuilt to stop them from falling and breaking their necks, but the kids had all proved defiant and often risked the climb for picnics or a star-gazing sleepover when the skies were clear.

Raul gulped. The morning had been too cold for him to have left the window open before school. “I’ll check if she’s out there,” he told Max. “If not, she could be with Yuè.”

He climbed outside and onto the roof without waiting for an answer. 

She sat with her back towards him, looking out towards the sky. The light from Meteora along the eastern horizon left just the silhouette of her shape, hiding all of her features, hiding whether or not she had received an Instrument.

"Nel?" 

She didn't turn around, "Hey."

Raul hadn’t moved, but to him it looked as if her hair was more saturated than before, like the shadowy colorings of a dark musae. His worries immediately lifted. “How was the shower?

She hesitated, but when she answered she still didn’t turn, "It was… unbelievable. I’m watching what's left of it before it’s gone."

Her voice quivered in her response, sounding strained, as if it had been a long time since she had been able to speak. Raul approached then, taking a seat beside her. The realization hit him harder than any meteor ever could.

“Nellie…”  

Nellie whirled finally, and her eyes met the lightning musae's. They were puffy and red, but her irises remained the same hazel color they’d always been. Raul’s heart broke at the sight. He’d seen the pain in her eyes for years now, but this… this grief and turmoil were new, and it pained him to realize how long she’d endured the suffering of a shattered dream.

 She reached for his hand to get his attention. “Don’t look at me like that,” she said. “I’m still me. The same me I’ve always been.”

Raul bit his lip, but nodded all the same. He didn’t know what to say. It occurred to him right then that he must look so jarring to her with his musae coloring, a constant reminder that he’d received the powers she had coveted for so long. Perhaps he’d dye his hair. Black, like how it used to be. Past records highlighted how musae could dye their hair fairly easily, and would often sport varying colors to display their proficiency with the powers of nature. Even dark musae, who’s colorings were as black as the void of space itself, were able to paint their hair with the brightest hues. 

But then Nellie took his arm and wrapped it over her shoulders, bringing the two of them even closer as she turned once again towards Meteora. “You’re really warm,” was all she said.

Raul thanked her silently for trusting him, even in this state, and the two of them remained like that for some time. It wasn’t until they heard a commotion and a tremendous holler from inside the house that they realized how much time had passed. Yuève was awake. They heard her dart down the stairs and greet her family with a torrent of cheerful energy. 

“GUESS WHO’S A MUSE!”

 Nellie tensed immediately. Her jaw clamping shut as a surge of spiraling thoughts threatened to break her down again. Raul straightened and drew in a deep breath, prepared for the tears to come. But instead, Nellie drew away from him and rose to her feet.

“Where’s Raul?” Yuè’s voice rang through the house again. “And Nellie, is she awake?”

“Come on.” Nellie offered a hand down to him, her dress and hair carried by a salt-ridden wind off the coast. She led him down from the roof, through the window, and into the nearby bathroom. Raul followed in silence, ready to be there in any way he could should she finally break down. This couldn’t be easy for her.

Nellie pulled out a box of tissues from one of the cabinets, and very diligently began to clean up what remained of her make-up after their dip in the canal. She caught sight of Raul in the mirror, leaning against the door, and offered him a genial smile. “I put your hair up in spikes like that,” she admitted. “But I didn’t think they would stay up that way.”

Raul grinned in response, “And here I thought it was just the worst case of bedhead I’ve ever seen.”

“I’m not sure about the color though,” she continued, “Such a lively yellow is a pretty drastic change from black.”

“I was thinking of changing it back. My curls would look better anyway and it wouldn’t be as jarring that I’m a–”

“No, it’s fine,” Nellie insisted, offering a smirk before she took another glance at all the other, not-as-drastic differences in him. “You can’t change everything to how it used to be.” 

“Oh, like my eyes?” Raul suggested after a moment, “Yeah the yellow in them is pretty cool.”

Nellie rolled her eyes. “Yes dude, I was talking about your eyes.”

She had finished up and dragged him out of the bathroom to save him from the lost look her sudden sarcasm had produced. When they made it down the stairs, they found Yuève and Max sitting on the couch, facing Arashi as if in an interrogation.

“I want to hear you say it,” the Tennkā woman demanded.

“We won’t use our Instruments inside the house,” repeated the two Sorairos.

“Good,” huffed Arashi, crossing her arms in triumph. “That goes for you too, Raul. I’m going to bed now, please don’t keep your brother up too late.”

At that, Tei groaned from somewhere in the kitchen. But Arashi ignored him and stopped to speak with Nellie before she made her way up the stairs. Taking Nellie’s hand and clasping it with both her own, she said, “Get some rest, honey. It’s been a long day.”

“I will,” Nellie murmured, taking the chance to close her eyes, and allow herself a long breath. She could feel Max and Yuè’s attention on her, and knew this revelation would be much harder than her talk with Raul. The thought of facing the two of them and acknowledging that they had all received Instruments made her stomach turn. But the Sorairos knew that, and they would pity her for it, which made it all even worse.

“Hey guys,” she said, keeping her demeanor casual.

Yuève was the first to speak, “Nel, you didn’t–”

“No.” Nellie was quick to cut her off, quicker than she should’ve been, but the sooner they were done with this talk, the happier she’d be. So she said the words one more time and hoped this would be the last time she’d have to revisit that memory. “I tripped, and the closest meteor missed me.”

Yuè winced, as if reacting to the pain of Nellie’s fall down the hill. As a water musae, she was radiant. Her eyes shone an icy blue while her hair seemed to have loosened from tightly bunched curls into long locks of royal blue waves. Max’s colorings were a little less drastic than the others, earth tones that were just as dim and nappy as his black hair had been.

He scoured her with those green eyes of his and when he found the scrapes and bruises on her legs, his eyebrows shot up in concern over the rims of his glasses. “Are you hurt? We can find bandages and disinfectants if you’d like?”

“No, I’m okay,” Nellie promised, waving him off. She saw Tei come out of the kitchen then and pressed on. “It’s getting late though. And this has already been a pretty crazy night, how would you guys want to end it?”

To her surprise, Max was the first to answer. The earth musae rolled up his sleeves, brandishing his left arm as a murky colored vine coiled slowly around it. “We could test our powers? It’d be cool to see what our limits are and how we match up against one another.”

“Oh…” Nellie bit her lip, sensing her heart as it started to race again. “I was, uh, thinking that we could stay inside. Hang out in front of the TV maybe.”

Raul neared and placed a hand on her shoulder, as if to comfort her, but his touch made her feel even more tense. “Did you want to see what else happened over in Fort Maelstrom? Or the Pharum maybe. I know you’ve met the Eden before. It’s weird how he disappeared.”

Nellie shrunk away from him, hating that she felt so coddled all of the sudden. “Maybe…

“But I was thinking we could try something more low key, like a movie, or a game perhaps.”

“Oh!” Tei jumped in at the sound of that. “I’d be down for a game.”