Stormborn

The sky roared and licked the earth, and the earth shook with the violence of it. Lazuli screamed, and her nurse tried to comfort her as they waited for the doctor to arrive. Derek opened the door for the doctor, who was quickly getting soaked in the rain. The night was dark. Giant purple clouds rumbled overhead, pouring down torrents of rain and striking out at trees and antennas with white-hot lashes that tore everything they touched. The air was wet and sharp. It was not a night to be outside.

"Hell of a storm," said the doctor, shaking off the water that had clung to his coat and closing his umbrella.

"She's upstairs," Derek said stoically, and he took the man's umbrella and his coat.

The doctor hurried up the steps to find his patient in the throes of labor, flailing and cursing at her nurse and anyone else who would approach her.

"She's lost her water. I think she's about to crown."

"We'll have to do it here," the doctor said, looking past the nurse at the widening wound between Lazuli's legs. "Get me a bowl of hot water, and have Derek call 911, just in case." The nurse left, and the doctor muttered under his breath, "Though I doubt anyone's coming in this weather." He took Lazuli's hand in his and started to lead Lazuli through a Lamaze breathing exercise. "How are you doing, Mrs. Tamsin?"

"I'm in fucking labor! How in the hell do you think I'm doing?"

"Hang in there, then. We're going to get through this." He didn't wait for a response. He knew, from her condition, and from dealing with her for the past five months, that it would be caustic and utterly incommunicative. The doctor lifted Lazuli's gown. There was a lot of blood.

When the nurse returned, he began the work of delivering Lazuli's child. The storm continued to rage outside. Thick rain needles shot against the window, each one threatening to shatter it.

Lazuli screamed again as her flesh tore. The lights overhead sizzled and dimmed, then shone brighter than before. The nurse looked at the doctor with concern.

"It's only the storm," the doctor assured her. "It's normal. Focus on the task at hand."

But he heard her say, "Nothing about this pregnancy's been normal, doctor."

A few minutes later, there was a crash of thunder, the window shattered, and glass flew throughout the room. A bolt of electricity shot out of Lazuli's womb and hurled the doctor against the far wall. He landed on the wooden floor with a hard thud.

The nurse watched the doctor's lifeless eyes stare at her across the room, and then she heard the sound of a crying baby boy.