In a place so beautiful it’s painful Distant thunder rumbles, felt more than heard— like bowel gas after cabbage, percussive shivers deep in the bones.
Gaia’s unrelenting energy unleashed upon arrogant primates. Abandonment the only option: families with suitcases, many leaving their homes for the first time ever, running from atmospheric warming and rising seas, the two mouths of hell.
Structures dismembered, falling like bones of an overcooked stewing chicken. Shape-shifting phenomena, silent screams of terror echoed off brown-tinted glass, shaken by nature to the foundation.
Slender and vaguely professorial, a de facto general shouting orders to noncompliant buffoons amid growing chaos, failed leader overseeing remnants of the lost battle— a battle over before it had begun.
A battle begun without sufficient warnings, or, more accurately, ignored portents. Scientists' signals heard by captains who did not listen or simply misunderstood, returned grumpily to rudely interrupted slumber. Some pious fools, sensing unknown danger, lifted hands to the gods, perhaps invoking their own demise.
Waves lap at rooftops. Wind blows unimpeded across leveled ground. Holy mountains now undone— not by gods, but by human nature.
Desert Dweller 