At 10:31 pm, I just heard the scariest and most unique thunderclap of my entire life.

A sudden mighty burst, the world lurched, with an even-descending microwhiplash that last over 40 seconds.

At the beginning, there was no cracking open, no process, no warning, an immediacy like a meteor impact, when you were asleep to begin with. Even massive fireworks have more beginning and end than this did.

It was as if suddenly the world had changed.

The tail shuddered through my feet for over ten seconds - ten whole seconds through my feet - and then discernably through the air for another 30. But freakishly even, no warble at all, like a mighty amplifier simply being shut up, and the slightest amplitude in the signal fading off logarithmically. Except that it was a slow logarithm, and stubborn to finally let go.

But nothing about the whole thing was rumbly.

Once it finally abate, I admit I filled with fear. What was that?

I found myself halfway waiting for a horrible shockwave in its wake.

I ran out my door, down to hall, and to outdoors. I stepped halfway out into meager rain, just desperate for some sign of explanation. But there was none. And it sounded like my neighbor was just carrying on with his life.

I'm back, so struck as to write you immediately.

Every gene of mammal I'm built on is still in awe, and tentatively fearful, afraid to relax.

It makes me more afraid, of someday when a bomb might fall.

It helps me understand where mythology came from.

Those single inexplicable events.

I'm hearing sirens out there, but nothing with quite the urgency of a four-alarm fire.

But clearly in reaction.

What the hell was that?

It wasn't like any thunder I ever heard before.

The world feels different now.



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