Foreword: Picking up from where Kyon had been stopped by Itsuki from hitting Haruhi.

"Wh-What's your problem!" Haruhi shouted at Kyon. "You just have to do what you're told! I'm the brigade leader, and director, and . . . ! Anyway, I won't allow any insubordination!"

That did it. Knowing that even with his left arm free, she is still too far for him to punch because Itsuki still has a hold of his right arm. So Kyon instead throws his entire body forward to lash out with a strong left thrust kick. It connects solidly with Haruhi's nose, making it squish underneath his foot and her head snap back. She makes a guttural gagging sound.

Tsuruya gasps loudly while quickly covering her mouth with both hands. Her eyes wide with pupils and irises now smaller. Mikaru cries out in a long mournful manner. Yuki merely stands there with a deadpan expression.

Haruhi falls onto the floor and immediately covers her face with both hands while making a high-pitched grunt. Her eyes are shut tightly and her tears flow. The atmosphere in the room now seems darker and heavier. Kyon's enraged expression softens, showing his doubt over this course of action.

He looks around at the others, first to Mikaru, who is kneeling on her futon and gasping at Haruhi wide-eyed with pupils and irises now dots. Tsuruya still has that pose, but Yuki is still deadpan.

Itsuki firmly grips Kyon's jaw and roughly turns his face toward his own. Kyon sees the restrained fury in Itsuki's eyes.

"I hope you're satisfied." His tone low and dangerous. "No one has ever struck her. Not even her own parents."

"Dangerous energies are rising from Suzumiya Haruhi," Yuki suddenly said in her monotone.

Haruhi is now kneeling on the floor with her head down, causing her hair to obscure her face, which is still covered further by her hands. She is now shivering and a low throaty growl emanates from her.

"I don't think you should've done that, Kyon!" Tsuruya suddenly said seriously as she lowers her hands.

Haruhi makes another louder growl with a chilling hiss to it, sounding inhuman. She takes her hands away from her face and blood can now be seen in her palms, yet her face is still hidden by her hair.

That is when everyone quickly makes a startling discovery.

"Wha-What's going on!" Tsuruya cried out as she rushes to a window. "N-Night time already! Th-That's impossible!"

Kyon sneers with shock toward Tsuruya. The room suddenly shakes as a rumble fills the air. Mildly at first, only to build in momentum, forcing him to fight to keep his balance.

"Is it closed space!" Kyon shouted at Itsuki in a panic.

"No, it's something worse," he answered coldly with a somber expression. The shaking not affecting him. "Suzumiya Haruhi now wants to personally destroy everything."

"I-Isn't there any-!" Kyon began in a panic.

"No," Itsuki answered. "She is unwittingly causing our powers to be nullified. We are doomed."

"Her body will be destroyed by her rage," Yuki suddenly said from alongside Kyon in her usual monotone. She too is unaffected by the shaking, "and it in turn will fill the whole universe in 4.885 seconds."

"I always believed you to be the rational one," Itsuki said to Kyon. "But I obviously was wrong."

Kyon suddenly looks down to see Mikaru kneeling before him and clasping onto his shirt as she is looking up at him with a heart-breaking expression.

"Oh, Kyon-kun," her tone matching her expression. "What have you done!"

"The universe will be reborn," Itsuki said. "But it won't be exactly like this one."

Tsuruya screams in horror, drawing their attention. She is still looking out the window while trying to maintain her balance. Debris starts falling from the ceiling and items start falling off shelves and walls.

"A-All the mountains are erupting!" As she looks to them with a terror-stricken expression. "W-We're all gonna die!"

More pieces of ceiling rain down. With another scream, Tsuruya finally falls to the floor and shields her head with her arms.

Haruhi makes a louder screechy growl, causing them to look at her to see her now standing. Kyon now wishes that he didn't look as his courage fails him. He gapes in pure terror at a sight that makes his pupils and irises shrink to pinpricks.

Haruhi's hair is billowing upward as if by some strong wind blowing from underneath her, with blood trailing from nostrils to chin as tears mingle with them. Her face is grotesquely twisted with rage. Such a horrific expression on an attractive girl, made even more so by wide bulging red eyes with yellow shimmering pinprick pupils and irises.

"I-I'm sor-!" Kyon screamed.

"FUCK YOU!" Haruhi roared with mind raping rage and a red glow from her mouth.

A flash fills the house, fills the city, fills Japan, fills Asia, fills Earth, fills the solar system, fills the galaxy. Fills the Universe.

Asking someone how long they believed in Santa Claus is so meaningless that it couldn't even serve as worthless gossip. Regardless, if you're going to ask me how much of my childhood I spent believing in an old man in a red suit, I can confidently say that I never believed in him in the first place. I knew that the Santa at the preschool Christmas event was just a fake. And I didn't even have to see Mommy kissing Santa Claus. I suppose I was just a precocious child who questioned the existence of an old man who only worked on Christmas.

At any rate, be it aliens, time travelers, ghosts, demons, espers, or evil organizations and the heroes out of cartoons or comic books who battle them, I didn't realize that they weren't real until some time later. No, I had probably already realized the truth. I just didn't want to admit it. Deep in my heart, I wished that aliens, time travelers, ghosts, espers, or evil organizations might pop up in front of me.

However, reality is rather cruel! One must admire how well the laws of physics were written. At some point, I stopped being glued to TV UFO specials and programs on psychics. Aliens. Time travelers. Espers. None of those could possibly exist. Though, I kind of wish they did. So I suppose my ability to hold convictions while accepting reality is a sign that I've matured. As I graduated from middle school, I also graduated from those childish dreams and became accustomed to the routine of this world.

And so I entered high school with no particular vision in mind and met her.

"From West Middle School, Suzumiya Haruhi," the girl introduced herself. "I have no interest in ordinary humans. If there are any aliens, time travelers, sliders, or espers here, come join me. That is all!"

Everyone around the class stares at the girl named Haruhi with casual bewilderment, especially the person sitting at the desk in front of her own. A girl named Kyoh.