21st June, 1888 — Near the Honeyduke's Rubble

Without work doing its daily effort to distract her, Sarah was feeling more lost than ever. The fog was making visiting friends or running errands more difficult than usual, and she was already running out of errands to do. Frederick had gone out yesterday evening, too, and left her alone in the house. She might've been relieved about that - without much work for either of them to do, they had been forced to spend more time in each other's company than they had in years, and nothing about it felt the same as it had once done - but instead she had been jittery and restless, setting the laundry to dry by the stove inside (the line outside had seen the last basketful drenched in the dusty fog smell) and going to bed early.

The morning had rescued her mood enough to head out early for a walk, with plans to buy some more flour for baking - and perhaps some flowers, too, so that inside would look more like the summer it was supposed to outside - and she had found her way to the shops easily enough. Laden down with things, she eventually found herself slowing into the congregation of bystanders looking on at what had - only yesterday - been Honeyduke's sweet shop. She'd read it in the papers this morning, but hadn't quite believed the extent of the damage until she could pick out the form of the rubble a few feet away.

Until all of a sudden, she couldn't - everything was plunged into blackness, a pitch darkness against which Sarah's eyes could scarcely adjust well enough to see her own hand, let alone the scene in front of her. Most people froze, as the seconds passed but the darkness did not. And then uproar: raised voices in panic, a cacophony of sound as people broke into confused movement all at once. Sarah was late to come back to herself, and shoved roughly to the side by someone who'd charged off into the street, her stumble sideways sending her knocking - unknowingly - into the leg of a camera stand.

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It was almost a good thing that Asha was trapped in Hogsmeade. It seemed as if something new came up for work every day he was here. The bad news was he and his camera always seemed to miss it. Yesterday he'd narrowly avoided the whole troll situation as he made his way down High Street, having ducked into the Three Broomsticks for a bite when choas had broken out down the street. His hide thanked him for the refuge but his camera glared at him knowing it for a missed opportunity. So he'd made his way to the totaled candy store this morning to capture a photo of it. Others had flocked to peer through the fog at what remained, the troll and survivors having already been removed.

Gossip ran hot through the crowd, murmuring who might have been there, how had it happened. They speculated on whether or not the ministry would get involved. Asha ignored them and set up his camera to capture what he could. The words of the gentleman from the other day ringing in his head. It was hard to capture anything note worthy in the fog. Suddenly a hush grew over the crowd and Asha's camera lens went dark. He popped his head out from under the curtain thinking it a malfunction when panicked voices greeted him. It was utterly and completely dark. The pale sunlight that had reached through the fog was entirely gone. He ducked back under the curtain, knowing he wouldn't be able to see anything and pressed to capture whatever picture there was to capture with the flash in the fog.

The flash had just gone off when his camera was jostled by someone next to him. A curse flew out of Asha's mouth as it made to fall down. Desperately he reached to catch the camera on its downward descent to impending doom, his arms snagged around it and the curtain and toppled him, the fragile camera, and the person who had knocked them to the ground. A string of curses flew from Asha's mouth, caring little about who might be around them in that moment. He wrestled with the curtain of the camera, desperately trying to free himself and find out what was going on out there.

  

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Amazing Elaine set!

Her leg had gotten caught amongst what felt, in the moment, like the legs of a stool, but as whatever it was began to topple, so did she. Sarah tried to throw out her hands to stop her fall, but all that served to do was propel her baskets of shopping off her arms, flowers and flour lost to the darkness as she was lost to gravity. Whatever she'd bumped into first had toppled too, she could feel it, but its crash was so excruciatingly loud that her gasp was more at it than at the bruising of the fall.

As if that were not bad enough, she'd also somehow managed to bring down another person with her. They might help cushion the collision with the ground, but Sarah had heard the stream of curses issuing from a man's mouth as they fell, and that was warning enough that this situation was Not Good.

And besides this sudden pall of darkness, Sarah was almost certainly to blame for this disaster.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" She exclaimed, though perhaps it was more of a moan, really, her voice stricken by panic and remorse, and her hands patting around frantically to try and understand how she'd fallen, tangled amongst the - broken? surely not broken? - object, a curtain of cloth, and the other body, presumably the man's. How on earth was she to set this to rights when she couldn't even see what she'd done?

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The person beside him began a liturgy of apologize, the voice clearly feminine. Asha sighed, he couldn’t hold it against anyone in this situation, certainly not a lady. “It’s alright.” He muttered as he finally got the cloth off his head. “It’ll force me to get a new one. Been wanting one anyways.” He added, trying not to think of the fact that this one was expansive enough. He had no idea how he’d come up with the cash for another but he’d find a way.

“Are you okay?” Asha asked as he crawled a bit toward the woman. Glass bit his hand and he hissed in pain. “Careful. Broken glass. Camera broke.” Any last remaining hope that his machine remained unharmed was completely and utterly gone.

  

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Amazing Elaine set!

"It's not alright at all," Sarah insisted with a miserable shake of her head, though acknowledging her guilt would hardly help undo what had been done. Not that she'd have the skill or the confidence to fix it even with a working wand, the fog had already quashed that possibility - and she didn't have enough hope to think that this unforgiving darkness had possibly restored it.    

Gingerly, she stopped patting the area around her and instead slid a hand over her own limbs, feeling for where the worst of the pain was. "Only a little bruised," she reassured the man quickly, although felt as though some of the bruises from the fall descended right to the bone. It had been more her own fault than his, though, and he had already suffered apparent tragedy enough - and then he hissed in pain. Sarah winced aloud, reaching out towards the sound to touch lightly and discern where he was, how much he had been hurt, whether her hand would come back wet with blood - without him denying it, since she could not see.

"Here, stay still a moment," she instructed, feeling upwards to press his shoulder and getting unsteadily to her feet; for if either of them remained on their hands and knees for any longer, they'd only do more damage. Cautious, but with a brisk efficiency, Sarah began to use the tip of her shoe to tidy the scene as far as she could without seeing, brushing the pieces of glass she encountered into a makeshift pile. "There, that's a bit better, I hope," she murmured, carefully finding the cloth the man had been wresting with and attempting to shift the glass into its folds. Her brow creased, though the man would not be able to see it. "But perhaps it can still be repaired?" A camera, though, was not just a glass jug - so perhaps not.  

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It was kind of the woman to acknowledge that it really wasn’t alright, but honestly, if Asha admitted that to everything that happened in his life he’d think himself no better than a cockroach. He’d find a way to make it work out. He always did.

Only a little bruised, that was a good thing. Perhaps the skirts that women always insisted on wearing had helped the fall. Before he could comment on this, however, she was instructing him to stay still. He did as a small hand touched his arm, he could only assume it was the woman. A moment later it appeared she had managed to right herself and he could feel her skirts brushing around him as she tried to clear the glass out of the area. “Thank you.” Asha felt odd having the woman take care of him, really it should be the other way around. He took a moment to draw the piece of glass out of his hand and push it toward where he thought her pile was. With a glass free sidewalk before him he pushed himself back to an upright position.

“Perhaps.” Asha agreed nonchalantly, deciding it better not to mention the fog nor his rather inability toward most magic in case she might find herself even more at fault. These things did tend to happen. Especially to him.

  

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Amazing Elaine set!

She only gave a small smile at his thanks, her mouth forming it before she realised the stupidity of such a thing, when he would not be able to make out her expression, since she could hardly make out his merest silhouette. No, they were as good as blind, one sense down for as long as this darkness lasted. With how long the fog had already made its home here for, she was not optimistic - but she would hope.

She ought to pick the debris she'd collected up into a makeshift bag, because they could hardly leave it here for anyone unsuspecting to stumble across - and if there was a chance the camera might be salvaged - but there was a more pressing issue, so she left it on the ground for the moment, not far off from her foot.  

Having heard the man shift somewhat, she reached out again uncertainly for him, trying to keep track. "Never mind the camera, anyway," Sarah said, more firmly insistent than she suspected she would be to a stranger if she were actually looking him in the eye, and then returned the question he had put to her. "But what about you, are you alright? Are you hurt?" She had heard him hiss at something - though she didn't know what use she would be in asking, if he was. Miriam was the healer.

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Yes, the poor camera had met its end, there really was no further reason to continue lamenting it. Asha agreed with the woman’s words. He’d figure it out, he always did. But then her attention returned to him and he rather wished it back on the camera. There was no use making a fuse out of a cut. “Just a bit of glass in the hand. Nothing to worry about.” Asha assured her, although when he touched his palm he could feel the warm wet indication of blood. Perhaps it had bit deeper than he had originally thought. He reached into his pocket to find his handkerchief but it appeared to be gone. He probably hadn’t even thought to grab it to put in his vest pocket when he’d left his room this morning. “You wouldn’t happen to have a handkerchief would you miss? Seems I sound probably cover it, scratch or not.” His voice took the cheery tone of the nonchalant.

  

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Amazing Elaine set!

He was a total stranger (she assumed, at least; she wasn’t sure she knew anyone with a camera) and she probably ought not to humiliate him by making a fuss, but - the way Fred told it, Sarah supposed she made a fuss about everything.

“Sarah,” she offered lightly, because miss had not applied to her in years, and - well, in the dark - it might be useful to have some other method of differentiating between crowds on the High Street, and names would do as well as any. “I’m sure I do,” she added, feeling for a square of cotton in her skirt pockets. Finding one, she drew it out - if she’d had to guess, she would suspect it had been the one edged with yellow flowers, not that it mattered for a bandage - and edging her hand through the air until she had found his again, cupped the back of his in hers. Carefully folding the handkerchief into a strip, she laid the thickest stretch of it across his palm where the cut was (she wished she could be sure it was clean, but in this instance, that seemed impossible) and began tying up the corners underneath. Men tended to be rather hopeless at things like this, in her experience.

“There, that might do for a moment,” she said, a little shyly. Blasé as he had sounded about the cut, Sarah hoped he didn’t mind her presumptiveness at making sure it was no worse than he said. Nothing to worry about, he had said - but she would have worried about it all day, all the same. “I hope you live nearby? You really ought to look at it under a lamplight.”  

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“Asha.” He replied simply as the lady looked for her handkerchief. It might be easier to have names to each other in this situation, something the woman clearly had already reasoned out. It wasn’t like he’d abandon her in the dark at this point, no, camera, or not, he’d try to get her to a storefront at the very least and if they were to lose each other in the dark - why names were the best way to make sure he’d be able to help.

Moments later he felt the woman’s light touch graze his hand then she grasped it firmly and began to wrap his hand. “I can do -” He started, but the woman had a deft touch and before he could really finish his protest for making the woman, Sarah, go out of the way in helping him she was tying off the makeshift bandage. “Thank you.” He replied gratefully.

“I’ve got rooms at the Three Broomsticks, not too terribly far away. But it’ll be fine.” He shrugged, realizing last minute that she likely couldn’t see that. “No worry about myself. Is there somewhere I can help you get? I don’t think any of us expected the day to turn out like this.”

  

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Amazing Elaine set!

No, indeed, he was a stranger, as his name - Asha - had made clear. She did not have the means to double-check her handiwork as he thanked her, but it might at least hold until he found some light; at the Three Broomsticks, if the skies did not clear beforehand.

She hummed in brief surprise when he asked if he could help her in turn. Used as she was to being self-sufficient, used as she was to mothering everyone she knew, used as she was to keeping her head down, offers of help were rare occurrences. But not ill-received; she smiled gratefully, though he wouldn't see it.

Perhaps he would hear it, a little, in her voice, as she answered serenely: "Oh, The Three Broomsticks! I'm sure we can manage getting there - and that'll be a help to me, as it's part of the way home already." This was not, strictly speaking, entirely true, given the Three Broomsticks was on the High Street, just as they were now, and she and Fred much further out in the slums. But Sarah would not thank herself for dragging the poor man all the way out there in this darkness - after she had shattered his camera and all! - out of kindness or chivalry, so she would manage perfectly well alone.

In any case, she chuckled lightly at his last remark. "No, I don't suppose we did. I've not seen a day like this in some time," she joked mildly - or ever - because it was not much of a day any more (although she suspected Cassie had probably foreseen it along with the fog). "But perhaps the sun will be out again by the time we're at the Broomsticks," Sarah added optimistically.

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With a destination agreed on, Asha smile. Of course he had no intention of escorting her only part way home, but he could press the matter once they reached a place that actually had light. “Give me a moment to gather my camera, then, and we can be on our way.” He certainly wasn’t going to allow anyone trip over the carcass of his camera and its tripod. Gingerly he leaned down, allowing his fingers to graze the ground until he could feel one of the wood legs of the camera. “Watch out. I’m going to lift it up, not sure where exactly you are.” He warned her. Asha pulled it up with an ‘umph’, awkwardly jamming legs into his ribs and chest until the ungainly weight was manageable again. “There we go. Shall we?” He gestured forward, remembering half a moment late that she couldn’t see it.

He chuckled at her joke. “No we haven’t.” He easily agreed as they started forward. “I can certainly hope. Or at least hope our eyes adjust.” Really at least at night the darkness did tend to fade enough to see outlines, this had not yet done so. “Will talking be enough to keep you from getting lost?” Asha asked, feeling his cheeks turn pink at the suggestion he bit back. But it was dark, who would see them holding hands?

  

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Amazing Elaine set!

"Oh, yes," Sarah said hastily, backing up a bit and trying to hazard where the fallen camera had ended up. She heard him fumbling with it through the dark, a little vexed that she couldn't be of any help. Even so much as a candle would have made all the difference, but - never mind. Gingerly, Sarah gathered up the basket she'd had in hand before the blanket of black had hit them all, and transferred the shards of glass she'd collected into it, just so that they would not be leaving it behind.

"Let's," she murmured cautiously, starting off in the same direction as he. Or so she hoped; she could hear him well enough, had her attention trained on picking out his voice, though she could not make out actual footsteps against the background buzz of chaos elsewhere. It wasn't the easiest task, having never heard him before today - but everything he said had been pleasant, in a warm, assuring tone; there was something in it that felt trustworthy. Would talking be enough? He asked, and Sarah started slightly, as though he'd read her mind. "I - I dearly hope so," she admitted, with a ginger laugh, rather intent on working out which way the man was moving without tripping over him (or the camera he was carrying) all over again. "I've never seen such darkness as this," she said lightly - it was dizzying, really - as she reached out to her side to pat awkwardly about for him as she had done amidst the chaos earlier. Just for a moment; she didn't plan to cling on like a child, but... It was suddenly disorienting again, now that they were walking, standing, because he was a little taller than she had expected - if that was his arm at all! "That is you, isn't it?" Merlin, who knew, in this!

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The darkness was impenetrable, no matter how much Asha's eyes strained he could not see before him. "I haven't either." He admitted, trying to keep track of her voice among the murmurs of others' voices.

Something brushed against his outstretched hand and arm and then a hand found it and held on. "I do believe so." Unless there was a silent third party who had become involved.

"Right. I think its this way." He tried to say with some authority. Although he really had no idea. he barely knew the town in the first place, but hopefully a shop would open and allow light to spill forward soon enough, right? Perhaps from there they would be able to find their bearings.

  

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Amazing Elaine set!

"Alright," Sarah said encouragingly, as he selected their direction. She wasn't sure how he was so sure, today, but she wasn't inclined to argue. Never mind, anyway; if they had it wrong, soon there would at least be light enough from somewhere to illuminate their wrongs.

She hadn't meant to hold onto him, had meant no more than a brief touch at his arm - enough to confirm it was him (however little she knew him, the man she had pinned her walk home upon!) - but as soon as he started off moving, struck by the sensation that she might lose him in a heartbeat, Sarah curled her fingers gently onto his sleeve, face flooded with embarrassment she was at least relieved he couldn't see.

"Rooms at the Broomsticks, you said?" Sarah piped up, furtively fishing for a topic that would cool her cheeks and perhaps guide them through the darkness without her having to grasp at him too hopelessly. "You don't live in Hogsmeade, then?" She put together, cautiously - not that she meant to pry. "That must be wretched luck, to have found yourself here in time for all this," she explained hastily, a sympathetic grimace colouring her words. The poor man, to have found himself surrounded by fog and darkness!

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Moving them forward, Asha tried to move tentatively, brushing forward in an odd shuffle in case they were to run into anyone. The fog had been bad enough to see, but this darkness was next to impossible to see through. Hopefully the sound of conversation might draw attention to anyone traveling opposite them and so he found himself rather relieved that Sarah brought up a topic.

"Ah, yes. My luck does seem to be a bit like that." Asha told her with a chuckle as they continued on. "I actually live in London. Was here covering the fog's expansion, didn't quite make it back home in time." Asha shrugged. "At least it gives me something to report back on. Since photos of the dark don't really sell papers." He continued cheerfully.

"You live in Hogsmeade then?" He returned, hoping she didn't think him prying too much.

  

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Amazing Elaine set!