“The first death in over twenty years has been reported at City General Hospital this week. Earlier, we spoke with the Director of Healing Services, and they had this to say.”

“This tragic event has indeed shaken a number of our younger colleagues, as they began their career well into what we grudgingly admit were indeed idyllically happy and peaceful days for our profession. The family has allowed us to speak on this case in their time of grief, as it was a young man tragically struck by a dead tree limb which fell upon him. We mourn along with his family, and are calling upon the public to exercise caution as our mortality again becomes evident.”

The news report continues as two disheveled men sip forlornly at their beer.

“Too bad they aren’t covering even the half of it,” the well mustachioed man wearing a crisp button-down shirt and slacks begins to his flanneled companion. “We have twenty years of geriatrics that have been inches from death.”

“Teh dōn even bodder with teh trooth ēthar. Didn I say tis would see-m like tee end-of-days wen dat slick bastard left dat Winter bastard in da pile of coins?”

“You did, but that was a long time ago. Many have forgotten or ignored it,” he replies. “When did you start drinking today Fred? You seem pretty far gone already.”

“Yesterday,” the barkeep chips in, to which Fred attempts to concentrate before nodding. “You know he’s always been good with numbers, and decided to believe that ‘warning’ the Mad Hammer gave, said he showed up six months to the minute to start drinking.”

“W’en tee old litch dis’peered frum prison ‘zactly at tee end of the Hammar’s grace peer’od, knew tee slick bastard wa’nt lyin’ or makin’ up numbars,” Fred continues before getting interrupted by the newscast.

“Indeed, this is a day that we will all remember. Up next, the Black Tracker. We will have an update on the sudden disappearance of Nora Black yet again, seemingly from under the noses of the League of Nations.”

“Bah,” Fred says before raising his glass as if giving a toast. “To tee end of tee world as we know it.”

“Indeed,” his companion says quietly, taking a drink.

“Hey boss, I need you to take a look at this!” yells a man dressed as a stereotypical astronomer.

A younger man wearing a button-down shirt sniffs loudly and turns away from an open window in the observatory.

“Charles, is it really that important?” he asks, melancholy evident in his voice.

“It’s a large space rock, and it’s gotten bigger in the 10 minutes I’ve been looking at it,” Charles replies.

“It’s not a crow again is it?” the melancholic man maligns.

“Don’t think so boss, it’s that one right there, off the tip of the Barmaid’s broom-handle. Has been moving a bit towards the east as well.”

A resigned sigh is the man’s reply as he walks over, staring at the abnormality in the constellation before looking through the telescope. Yet another sigh makes itself known.

“Great, first my Grandpa, now the sky is falling… Call the Navy and the Air Force numbers in the book, make sure you have the codes they gave us so it doesn’t get lost in some pile of paperwork to be discovered in three years. I’m going up top to watch it from the balcony for now.”

Charles nods. “Understood. Just make sure you strap yourself in while you’re up there, for your mother’s sake.”

“I keep telling you man, this is weird, the forrest has been silent for days,” a young man proclaims.

The ‘man’ being a Xavarkian female, notable for her birth defect of being singular.

The man stares out at the night sky from their camp along with his companion, not sent by anyone to investigate the forrest, but out of sheer desire to escape their daily lives.

“This reeks of old magic, the kind found in our tunnels the deeper we go,” the orc replies, staring out beside him. “It’s almost as if…”

The man initially takes her silence as melancholy before realizing there was an inflection of primal concern hidden within the ‘if.’

“You can’t leave me hanging like that man, what’s up?” he says, trying to draw out an answer.

“Have you ever heard about how my mountain came to be?” she asks, receiving a negative grunt in response. “The short of it is, it fell from the sky. The murals inside those hallowed tunnels also show animals fleeing the mountain.”

“Yeah, so what brings this up now?”

“That,” she says, pointing to a star in the sky, “seems to be bigger than the last time we set up camp.”

“In the dead of night, the skies above the continent were ablaze with the light of a falling star. For those whom fate allowed to bear witness to this event, it is a sight they will never forget,” a reporter states before the screen changes to a live interview.

The scene changes to a dirty, tired, and dust covered man and orc who are standing at the edge of a town and forrest similarly blanketed in grime. As the field reporter leads the questions, the orc responds.

“We had just set up camp in the evening when I noticed there was a star that was a bit different, and after a few minutes it seemed to be getting bigger, and a few minutes after that a massive ball of flames streaks high overhead.”

“Yeah man, that was so loud!” the man continues. “Rattled the trees and we decide to pack up and move out like all the animals did, when there’s this earth shattering ka-boom! Knocked over a few trees from where we were at even. The dust started settling before dawn even hit, and I like this mushroom you can find out there so when I found one I tried washing it off and [Identify]-ing it…”

Apparently going off-script, his orc companion raises an eyebrow as she is unsure of how a mushroom is important to his story, but doesn’t interrupt since they were told the interview was ‘Live.’

“… and I’ll be dang’d if I couldn’t. Haven’t been able to do that to anything covered by the dust.”

His orc companion’s eyes seem to flash, looking, almost subtly, at various things as concern mounts in her posture.

The field reporter signs off quickly, and the screen goes back to the studio.

“Thank you Jade for bringing us scenes from the forefront. Up next after this break, the disappearance of the Karakis Mountain range and the Fallout from the heavens.”

In the studio, a voice yells “Clear!” as the broadcast switches to advertisements. The flurry of the production staff, driven by a particularly anxious executive behind closed doors, quickly spreads to the floor. Those few fortunate enough to have obtained the [Identify] skill find the results lacking, more-so than when illness strikes and all magic becomes muted and difficult.

In a frozen landscape, beyond the eyes of civilization, a dark and silent object plummets from the sky. Unheard and unseen, the only evidence of its passing is a large cloud of snow and rock dust, settling back into the crater from whence it came, only to be packed down by time and the elements.