Flashes of white overtake the sky.

A bolt of lightning misses the plane’s wing by a few harrowing inches. Thirty minutes after takeoff and the storm has only gotten fiercer. Rain pelts against the hood, strikes the window glass, weighs down the entire four-ton vehicle.

Two miles above ground level, destination unknown, a young man sits calmly amidst the storm. He’s situated in the back – one of the more shabby, uncleaned sections, though the transport plane is in no better shape regardless. There are litters of garbage, weeks-old rot, scorched marks on the upholstery.

The stench is foul, and especially so when mixed with cigarette smoke, booze, strong cologne that does not offset. Suffocating. The noise is worse – rowdy hoots and chortles, clinks of glass bottles, conversations that are louder than the earsplitting thundercrack.

The front of the plane is colored in amber lights, the mid is brightened in sepia, and the back – cloaked dark. There are eerie red glows mixed in the backdrop, but none of the passengers notice anything amiss.

A subtle highlight catches onto the redness of the young man’s hair, the pallor of his skin. The coldness of his eyes. With both hands in his pockets, he reclines against the seat and stares emotionlessly out the window.

The storm rages on.

Thundercrack once more. The overhead storage bins rattle from its intensity, and several plastic pouches hit the floorboard. The turbulence is no deterrence to the few dozen passengers – most of them greasy middle-aged men with no distinguishable characteristics sans the long-running tattoos down their backs.

A slovenly one heads toward the young man who is entirely deaf to conversation. The former sends over a leer. Ruffians, the bulk of them are, and this man is no different – unkempt goatee, mussed locks, a face that carries an everlasting, haughty smirk.

A half-smoked cigarette is offered.

“Care for a smoke?” the man asks, leaning in without any regard for personal space. Blind to the young man’s obvious irritation, to the murderous flash in his gray eyes, the ruffian chortles and jabs him on the shoulder. “No need to get your pretty self all worked up now. Loosen up and have some fun, eh?”

The response is blatantly hostile. Roughly twenty years of age and already, the youth has the bearings of danger – never mind his elegant appearance, his aura is that of frost. One closer look and the man before him is rooted in place. Five seconds of standstill until the latter coughs, retracts his arm and rejoins his mates nearby.

On the other side, loud whistles, hoots and cheers are ongoing. The ruckus masks the low beeps, the static, the odd vibration beneath the seats. The aircraft engine throttles at full – until an odd interference makes its way through, a foreign frequency that…

The beeps speed up, then there’s a sudden rush of heat followed by smoke – not of cigarettes – and immediately, the plane ruptures.

The explosion is deafening and blinding all in one – the overhead units crack from the pressure, the ceiling is blown into debris, the floorboard fissures, and the aircraft is entirely split into two. Hectic yelling comes from the cockpit before downfall, screams echo faintly in the distance and instantaneously, all noise is drowned out.

When the flames ripple across the walls, out the walls, engulfing the cabin in full… there isn’t much more to see amidst gray clouds and thunderous skies. The passengers are thrown offboard. Flailing limbs, pathetic gurgles, pained screams from those swallowed up in red.

And the young man, freefalling two miles toward certain death, is entirely expressionless.