At the corner of Broadstreet and third stands an outline barely visible beyond the mist. But with every progressive drop and swell, his contours have grown clearer.

At the corner of Broadstreet and Third stands a boy in a raincoat beneath an umbrella. Inky black hair is tousled and curled, hiding the tiny nubs beneath it, and the dew clings to his chestnut skin. A small upturned nose and a dull-eyed stare and a thin line for a mouth, they call him Black Sheep Boy.

Beneath his umbrella he can hear the rain patter softly and fall in circles beyond him, forming streams along the plastic rivets and tears. He's always told them he doesn't like the rain, but truthfully he holds nothing against it. It is after all only rain, doing what rain does, blanketing this town in the old familiar mists of the mountains from a time long ago. Sometimes it gets so thick he can barely see the passerbys ten feet away. It isn't so bad though, he learned to maneuver the fog during the olden days. He's older than his smooth face shows, but not that old. He thinks the rain is just fine in itself. It's just the connotations that get to him. He never mentions it, for he fears the harkening of the days of Bleeding Black Sheep Boy.

No one knows the true origins of Black Sheep Boy, for none now remain that he is willing to call a friend. It's not that he isn't liked, but that, for too long, he has remained impassive and cold to any that might care to take an interest. He had always been a miserable little thing, the Black Sheep Boy. Not that anyone blamed him - with the untimely demise of his mother, his long-vanished neglecting father, and the mysterious circumstances surrounding his upbringing, he had every right in the world to be a little miserable now and then. Despite this, he remained cold, for he never was able to recognize just what he had all around him. To all others he wandered as an entity that seemed to only exist as another sight to see on the way through town, whos woes were at their best, tragic, and at their worst, comedic.

His thoughts are shaken and the twinge appears at the corner of his pale lips. For the slightest of moments, the rain seems to freeze in the air, still and muffled against the thickness beneath his hood and furred collar. In that brief instant he saw the veil of a woman walking, tall and forlorn. The way her dress and long dark hair drifted in a careless breeze sent a thrill coursing through his ordinarily sluggish heart. Not in ecstasy, but in anxiety. It was an unbridled fluttering fear that let itself free, without completely knowing the reasons why. It was not until she had grown close enough to be seen unhindered and uncovered that he saw her for what she really was (an ordinary doe, of course), but even so the damage was done. The image still lingered, flitting and haunted as the memory resurfaced of the Great Unraveling of so long ago. How terrible it was. How Terrible it had been! Quite suddenly and without warning, he could see it all - every tortured visage, every lined eye and cracked countenance that had ever been seen along his quest of comfort came back in a flood, along with every memory of every life he couldn't save. As if the Unraveling were to be occurring all over again, still they came one after another, the flashes and flashing until it was all he could see. Covered in a red haze the image of the Caretaker, intermittent with the shots of a seabed of swirling colour and lidless eyes, the mounting, impending, sense of something gone terribly astray when---


The woman spoke. "Hey, are you alright?"

"What?" The word escaped Black Sheep Boy's mouth as he turned to face her, mouth slightly parted in an expression of bewilderment.

"You looked like you were trying to pass a kidney stone."

For what seemed to be a long moment, he only stared before slowly blinking his wide orange eyes. "...What?" he restated in his ignorance. At was at this point that he finally noticed that the rain had ceased. The world was brighter than it had been before. Shifting his umbrella, he looked upwards into the spear of light that poked out from a swirling puff. He stated quietly, to no one in particular "The rain has stopped."

"Yes, it has. " The woman put down her red umbrella, folding it away. "The sun is out. It's a beautiful day. And I can't believe you're scared. "

"What?" He had the look of a man left falsely flabbergasted.

"Not really the day for crying, don't you think?" She paused, taking the moment to smile and hoist the umbrella over her shoulder. "Take your time. I'll wait for you. After all, it is a beautiful day. "