Fics like Solid Skies and Slate-Blue Earth Below

It was as dark as it could get in the city, with its perpetual haze of yellow-gray light ringing the horizon. Mickey’s eyes were half open, unfocused, directed vaguely toward the one tiny pinprick of light that had managed to glow through the screen of rainclouds and smog. If he hadn’t been so out of it, Mickey might have thought it was a little weird that there was a star visible in the first place—almost seeming to hang in front of the clouds rather than behind them—but he didn’t. He peered through his lashes, eyes glazed over, as the only obvious light in the sky did nothing of interest. Until it did. * When late summer comes to Chicago, it finds Mickey Milkovich listless, directionless, and truly alone for the first time in his life. Mickey is content to leave his empty hours empty, but the universe has other plans: A mysterious force attaches itself to Mickey and urges him to leave his life behind, to go, come on, come on-- --and so he does.