The Stone That Sings Of Static

"You need to stop staring at it," Andy said, his voice quiet. He sat on the other side of the fire, cleaning his rifle, the oiled rag making soft, methodical sounds. "It ain't healthy, Vern."

"It's singing to me, Andy," Vern whispered, not looking away from the strange rock. "It shows me things. The inside of the earth. The space between the stars. There's more than gold in these hills. There's... everything."

"There's madness in that thing," Andy countered, his voice firm. "We came for a stake, same as always. Gold, silver maybe. Enough to get through the winter. This... this is something else. We should bury it. Leave it where we found it."

Vern finally turned to look at him, his eyes wild in the firelight. "Bury it? Bury it! You don't bury a miracle. You don't bury the voice of God."

"That ain't the voice of God, Vern," Andy said softly. "It's just a rock. A weird rock, I'll grant you. But it's twisting you up. You haven't slept in three days."

Before Vern could reply, a twig snapped in the darkness beyond the fire's light. Andy was on his feet in an instant, rifle raised. Vern scrambled for the shotgun leaning against his pack.

"Who's there?" Andy called out, his voice steady.

A figure stepped into the edge of the light. A woman, dressed in buckskins and a heavy fur-lined coat, a Spencer carbine held loosely in her hands. Her face was hard, weathered by the elements, her eyes missing nothing.

"Evening, boys," she said, her gaze flicking from Andy's rifle to Vern's shotgun, and finally settling on the meteorite. A flicker of recognition, and greed, crossed her face. "Name's Millie. I've been tracking that rock for a month. Heard it fall. Saw the smoke. Now, you can hand it over nice and easy, or we can make a whole lot of noise out here in the quiet."

"It's ours," Vern snarled, stepping in front of the crate, shielding the rock with his body. "We found it."

"You found my claim," Millie corrected, raising her carbine slightly. "This whole valley is mine. Now step aside."

"Let's be reasonable," Andy said, trying to de-escalate. He kept his rifle aimed, but his tone was placating. "There's no need for trouble. It's just a lump of iron. It's not worth dying for."

"It's worth everything!" Vern roared, his obsession boiling over. He lunged, not at Millie, but at Andy, trying to shove him out of the way. "Don't you see? She knows! She knows what it is!"

The shove took Andy by surprise. He stumbled backward, trying to keep his footing and control of his rifle. Millie saw her opening and moved in, swinging the butt of her carbine towards Vern's head.

It was a clumsy, desperate scuffle. Three people in a small circle of firelight, grappling for possession of a thing none of them understood. Vern ducked under Millie's swing, tackling her around the waist. They crashed to the ground.

Andy, recovering his balance, stepped forward to intervene, to pull them apart. "Stop it! Both of you!"

He grabbed Vern's shoulder to haul him off the woman. As he did, his other hand, flailing for balance, slapped against the cold, humming surface of the meteorite.

The Sound of a Soul Unraveling

The static hum instantly rose to a deafening shriek. A blinding blue-white light erupted from the rock, engulfing Andy. His body went rigid, his back arching impossibly. Every muscle in his body seized. He screamed, a terrible, high-pitched sound that was not human, the sound of a soul being pulled apart atom by atom.

Vern and Millie froze, scrambling away from the horrific spectacle. The light pouring out of the rock illuminated the entire camp, casting stark, dancing shadows from the pine trees. Energy, raw and untamed, arced from the stone and into Andy, his body a conduit for some cosmic power.

It lasted only a few seconds. As suddenly as it began, the light vanished. The shriek cut off. The humming from the rock returned to its low, almost subliminal thrum.

Andy collapsed to the ground like a sack of grain. He didn't twitch. He didn't move. A thin wisp of smoke curled up from the collar of his shirt, carrying the acrid smell of burnt hair and cooked meat.

Vern crawled over to him, his hands shaking. "Andy? Andy!"

He rolled his partner over. Andy's eyes were open, but they were milky and vacant. His mouth was frozen in a silent scream. A dark, branching pattern, like a Lichtenberg figure, was scorched onto the skin of his chest, radiating from where his hand had touched the rock. There was no life there. No spark. Nothing.

Vern stared at the empty shell of his friend, his mind unable to comprehend the swift, violent finality of it. One moment, Andy was there, the voice of reason, his partner. The next, he was just... gone. The valley was silent again, save for the crackling fire and the low, static song of the stone. And then he died.