Sorry for the delay guys, I had to scrap three other snips (only one of which reached my helpful long-suffering 'you-know-who-you-are') before I gave up and wrote this instead...

Here's to the start of a new arc.

Arc 7: * A Michael Bay Morning *

Snip #30

I ran.

The uninterrupted torrent continued from the heavens. Thick clouds turned my surroundings into a wall of gray, a liquid curtain covering everything from view. It changed the formerly familiar neighborhood into an alien landscape, blurred any and all distinguishing landmarks into hints of darker shades, barely seen outlines in the gloom.

It was not helped by the water washing down my face, blinding my eyes even beneath my cupped hands. My ears were equally useless, any sound of note washed away by the steady roar of the thunderstorm and carried away by the howling of the winds. I almost could not feel anything when I tried to wipe my eyes, my hands and feet having long lost their feeling in the cold, my face similarly feeling like a mask.

I ran.

The sky lit up with a bolt of fury giving me a moment of too much light instead of the stretched monotony of too much darkness. An enormous thunderclap assaulted my ears in the same moment, the first different sound I had heard other than the rainfall, and equally unwelcome. For a brief, terrible moment my surroundings were awash in brilliant white. Shapes, outlines, buildings and objects, all lit up for a brief, sudden moment.

I saw the individual houses surrounding me, their sloped roofs showing above the perimeter walls. I saw the flooded road I was running on, the almost knee-high river more suitable for boats instead of cars. I saw the hazards I almost ran into; the abandoned car, the poles of the street lamps, the darkness of the drain missing its heavy safety covers.

And I saw my destination; a distinctive smooth curve of the dome slightly to my right, the tallest building in the neighborhood.

I ran.

I peered in the direction I barely remembered from a moment ago, looking into a world suddenly that much darker in the aftermath of that one brilliant moment of illumination. What little I could see of my surroundings was an uninterrupted mockery of a twilight fog. The waters sloshed their chill into my clothing as I bulled through the fast flowing stream, threatening to push me over and down, a fate I avoided probably only through sheer luck.

I- my steps faltered as I peered. I thought I had seen something in the darkness… there! Lights made themselves known, the first feature in my never-ending trek through the hostile world. They blinked where they were installed, beacons in the dark. The powerful lamps were dim but visible, and they drew the curve of the dome that was my destination in the darkened sky.

I ran.

I reached the dome of the Endbringer shelter moments later, on one of the sides without an entrance. Undeterred, I navigated slowly along the perimeter using faint guide-lights installed there for just this purpose, until I finally came to the facility's well-lit main entrance. My journey at an end, I relaxed as I took one hopeful step forward… before I froze.

Another bolt of heaven's fury boomed in the skies above my head, whitewashing my new surroundings just as suddenly as the first.

The sudden flash illuminated the humanoid in front of the shelter's gates, between me and safety.

It was a monster. It was THE monster.

It was tall, almost unnaturally so, and its arms were too long where its legs were too short. Its chest was top-heavy to the point of ridiculousness, and jagged rows of the monster's huge abs completed a cartoon caricature of a weightlifter. Its skin was mostly yellow, a stark contrast to its gray head, and the reflective slickness of the rainwater made the non-existent clothing look like skintight body stocking.

In the fading echo of the thunderclap, the monster turned to look behind itself.

I was on my knees, made weak by the terror I felt from the mythical being. The floodwaters felt like glue as my limbs refused to move, as I was caught in the sight of its one red eye.

It raised its right hand to its side. Webbed claws of a red limb closed slowly, deliberately, as if the monster was savoring the moment it took to form a fist. The skin where a mouth should be stretched, forming a smile without lips beneath three glowing eyes.

It turned its face towards the Endbringer shelter, the towering bulwark of metal and concrete, a human-made mountain of safety, a defiance against the most powerful monsters Earth Bet had to offer.

Somehow, I knew what would happen next. I raised my arm towards the shelter. Towards the monster, reaching out as if I could grab it, stop it, despite knowing it was a futile gesture.

I was unable to stop what was going to happen, but equally unable to stop my want to prevent what would happen.

It pulled back its fist. It took one step towards the fortress, towards the thousands of helpless sheltered within.

My mouth was open, and I screamed even as I choked on the rain.

It punched…

"GYAAAAAAAaaaaa~hah?"

I blinked. I blinked again. I was lying down, and my arms were in view above me, flung up to prevent something. A familiar crack on the ceiling greeted me in the early morning light, a relic of the days when the warehouse was in disuse and disrepair.

"6:50 AM", the bedside clock helpfully provided.

It was… a dream?

I was breathing hard, and my heart pounded loudly in my ribcage. I shivered too; despite Brockton Bay's naturally warmer climate as well as summer's approach, the too-early morning was uncomfortable without the bedding's warmth. The futon I had kicked aside as well as the cold sweat of the nightmare added to the discomfort.

Most of my nightmare had faded from memory, and the wisps of vague imagery that was left slipped through my fingers even as I tried to recall what had frightened me so much. Whatever it was I had dreamt of in my sleep, I could remember only a few scattered scenes, and it had mostly involved… a raging downpour.

Oh.

Right.

Sitting up, I willed myself to calm down, ignoring as best I could the thought of too much rain and its obvious association. Naturally, not wanting to remember Endbringers only made me remember those monsters even more, and I sighed even as I cupped my head in my hands.

That was in the past, I reminded myself, and would stay in the past. Also, Endbringers or not, I was in America now. Chances are, I would not be this unlucky, and even if those monsters came, America was simply too big to suffer Japan's fate. And I intended to make the most of the fresh new start, charging through my new life at full throttle to the utmost, for the sake of Justice, Americaness, and… what was the third thing again? Ah, never mind that, it'll come to me.

I looked around my squatter's dwelling again as I almost ceremoniously knelt off my futon.

Right.

Big words for an illegal squatter… an unnaturally rich squatter, I amended as I looked at the corner of the ceiling. Above the tiles and inside a loose brick in the wall there was where I had hidden the windfall from the Undersiders. I was still undecided if I should stay here, or take the money to rent another room somewhere out there. Stretch out my funds as long as I could, or live in legality once again.

Folding and rolling my bedding off the floor, I stood up and turned around as I continued to ponder… and bumped into the sign.

I reached out a hand on instinct as it threatened to fall over, only for the futon threaten to fall out of my hands. I grabbed at the cloth with a sweep of the same hand, only to bump into the sign, the wooden construct bouncing off the wall as it started falling again. After a mess of half-remembered acrobatics, I managed to secure the half-unwrapped futon in a rough hug, the half-fallen sign safe within the crook of my left feet, and me almost falling over as I leaned against the salvaged cupboard I used for my clothes and bedding.

With a hop and a slow kick, I righted myself while setting the sign back upright.

"DO NOT GO OUTSIDE!" declared the panel in big, bold letters, a message held up by a messily hacked-together tripod almost on the verge of falling apart. The wooden declaration swayed from side to side from my rescue as I frowned.

'Ah yes.' I pouted. 'That.'