CHAPTER 4

The storm became serious around seven in the evening. What should have been a smooth departure at four had already slipped into delay after delay, and now the van refused to start altogether, forcing them to call the mechanic. He arrived soaked and quickly diagnosed the issue, shaking his head as he explained that it couldn't be fixed on the spot and would have to be taken to the workshop. With no other choice, the farmer, the two consultants, and the mechanic all set out together through the heavy rain, arranging a slow, careful move of the van and making their way toward the workshop as thunder rolled over the fields while Isidro and Tasyo stayed behind.

Tasyo noticed it first in the quality of light—how the sky curdled from gray to a greenish-bronze, the kind of color that meant the wind was about to turn vicious. He'd learned to read these signs growing up, the way the air itself seemed to hold its breath before breaking.

By eight, half the access roads had vanished beneath brown water that moved with a terrifying lack of urgency, as if time had slowed down just enough to swallow everything completely.

By nine, the power died with a sound like a gasp—a high-pitched whine from the generator outside, then silence so absolute it felt wrong.

The temporary field office descended into darkness broken only by the battery lantern Tasyo had salvaged from somewhere, its light sitting crooked on the plastic table between stacks of soil reports and topographical maps that suddenly felt like artifacts from a civilization that no longer existed. The rain hammered the corrugated roof with a violence that made conversation difficult, each gust forcing new leaks through cracks. The smell changed too—dry paper and dust mixing with petrichor and wet metal, the sharp mineral scent of earth washed clean of all its secrets.

The office itself was barely larger than a storage shed, divided haphazardly into what was generously called a "workspace" and what was more honestly a pile of supplies. Two plastic chairs. One folding table, currently buried under documents. Filing cabinets that hadn't been properly closed in what looked like months. Narrow windows rattled violently with every gust, as if the storm were testing their structural integrity with methodical patience.

Isidro hadn't grown up with storms like this, but he had been around long enough to know they were not the theatrical, dramatic kind that cleared the air afterward and gave you stories to tell. This was different. This was the storm equivalent of a fist clenching slowly—no drama, just relentless pressure. The land outside seemed actively hostile beneath the deluge, the recently excavated site transforming into something that looked less like an archaeological dig and more like a wound.

He had been reviewing hydrological surveys when the lights went out, cross-referencing floodplain data with the structural requirements of the development. The cityscape he'd designed—all flood-adaptive towers with angled foundations, elevated pedestrian corridors threading between buildings, and rooftop gardens meant to soften the concrete skyline—suddenly felt impossibly fragile. Six months of planning and refinement, and now the very landscape he had sought to accommodate was reminding him that stability was a concept architects invented because they couldn't handle the truth.

"Good news," Tasyo announced from the doorway, his voice carrying that particular dry tone Isidro had come to recognize as meaning the situation was genuinely bad. "We're stranded. Completely. The road's gone. The secondary access is worse. My cousin tried to ford it on his motorcycle five minutes ago, and his bike stalled halfway across."

Isidro looked up from his laptop, whose battery was now flashing a red warning he chose to ignore.

"How long are we talking?"

Tasyo stepped inside and shut the door against the wind with considerable effort, his shoulder braced against the frame. Water poured off his work shirt in rivulets, soaking the concrete floor beneath his feet.

"Depends how bad the flooding gets in the next hour," Tasyo said, peeling off his soaked overshirt with the casualness of someone who had worked through far worse conditions. Underneath, a black sleeveless shirt clung damply to his skin, revealing inked patterns that ran along his arms—faded lines, symbols, and a few bold geometric designs that disappeared under the fabric at his shoulder. "Could be a few hours. Could be all night. Could be worse—my cousin got stuck in an office building once for three days. Power out, water rising, nobody knew if the structural integrity was going to hold."

He rummaged through cabinets with the ease of someone familiar with the office's chronic disorganization, muttering small victorious noises under his breath when he found a container of emergency candles.

Isidro immediately looked away, not before noticing broad shoulders that spoke of actual manual labor, not gym sessions; the precise line where muscle met bone at his waist; and rainwater sliding down his throat toward the hollow of his collarbone.

God.

This was becoming a genuine problem. Isidro knew Tasyo found him attractive; the feeling was mutual, but Isidro was still processing it, and Tasyo felt the same pull Isidro did.

"You okay there?" Tasyo asked, amusement flickering across his face. "You've got that look."

"What look?"

He struck a match, and the smell of sulfur cut through the petrichor. The candle caught. "Like you're in a trance of deep thought."

Thunder cracked so close that the corrugated metal screamed, a sound that made the floor vibrate beneath them.

Isidro tensed.

Tasyo's whole face lit up—not just from the candlelight. There was something almost like joy in it, his head tilting back slightly as if listening to music only he could hear.

"God, that was a good one," he said, sounding almost happy.

Isidro stared at him. "You're enjoying this."

"The storm? Yeah." Tasyo grinned. "Why wouldn't I?"

"Because it's dangerous. Because the road's gone and we're stuck in a tin can, and because—" Isidro gestured uselessly at the windows. "—that."

Another boom of thunder. Tasyo's grin widened.

"It's just nature being nature," Tasyo said, leaning against the filing cabinet. The candlelight caught the edge of his jaw, the hollow of his throat where the rain had left him damp. The office felt very small, very warm from the candles, and very full of something Isidro didn't have a word for.

"You grew up in an agricultural community. Storms would've been part of life."

"They were," Tasyo said, his eyes on his cup. "Still are, technically. I've been through maybe a hundred storms. Probably more."

"And you love them."

It wasn't a question. Tasyo's body relaxed slightly at the acknowledgement, as if Isidro had removed a barrier he'd been holding in place.

"Yeah," Tasyo said quietly. "I do."

The rain softened briefly from violence to a steady, insistent rush, the rhythm almost hypnotic. Outside, the world had become all water and shadow. When he spoke again, his voice had changed—smaller somehow, more careful.

"My lola forgets storms now."

Something in those words shifted the atmosphere of the room.

Isidro leaned forward slightly, giving Tasyo space to continue.

"She used to predict them," Tasyo continued. "Not with instruments or anything. She'd just wake up and tell us rain was coming. She said the air changed texture, got heavier. You could taste copper in it." He paused, a faint, devastating smile crossing his face. "She was right every single time."

Isidro waited.

"She could read the soil like other people read books. Just by smelling it, by touching it. She knew exactly what to plant and when. Forty years of that knowledge, all stored in her hands and her senses and her memory." His voice cracked slightly. "Now she forgets recipes she's been making since my father was born. Last month she made the same dish three times in one week and didn't remember making it the first two times."

The grief in his voice moved through the room like an old ache—quiet but unmistakable.

"She has dementia," Isidro said softly.

Tasyo nodded. "Early onset. Sixty-eight years old." He set down his cup carefully, as if it might break. "My father didn't want to admit it at first. He thought it was stress, that she just needed rest. But I knew. I watched her trying to hide it. Trying to remember things, and then pretending she'd simply decided not to."

Another silence settled between them. Thunder rolled across the flooded fields outside, and Tasyo's shoulders tensed as he said, "She forgot my name once," the words barely audible beneath the storm. "Just for about sixty seconds. But I was there. I watched it happen—watched her reach for my name and find nothing, watched her panic for just a moment before it came back. And I… I couldn't— I didn't know how to—"

Isidro didn't interrupt. He simply sat in the candlelight while Tasyo gathered himself.

"That's when I started my project," Tasyo said finally. His voice had steadied, becoming more precise. "The oral history recordings. The soil mapping surveys. The seed viability databases. My dissertation eventually grew out of it, but it didn't start as research." He paused, staring at the candle flame. "I needed…"

He searched for the words carefully, as though accuracy mattered more than comfort.

"I needed proof that memory could survive somewhere. That knowledge could be kept, even if the people carrying it couldn't. I'm studying what happens when entire ways of knowing disappear."

Thunder rolled across the flooded fields outside.

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