From my room I stared down towards the car park. The scene was devastating. My Mazda was surrounded by 3 of those gremlins. The Lightning had shattered all the windows and had even dented the roof.

I stared lifelessly at the barrage of attacks. The sky was still red, lightning still flashing, ice cubes still clinking in my glass. Well… there goes my only valuable material possession in this world. My one respite, the space i’d go to scream my guts out. I took a sip of some more jack.

Getting rejected, having a breakdown, getting my car smashed up all in the same day? Not too shabby I’d say. I sat back down into my seat and pulled out my phone. All of social media was going wild, but I doubt the system is gonna last too long with all this lightning.

There was only one other I cared about, my closest friends. I messaged them all, told them to stay safe, that this wasn’t a joke, monsters were out there and to board themselves up. Swiping through my contacts I stopped at her name. Liliana. My last message to her, an apology for me hating myself. Goddammit.

World ending be fucking dammed. I messaged her, I told her to stay safe, not to go outside, that I wasn’t joking here but there are creatures coming out of the lightning.

I put the phone down looking around my room. It was a small but cozy bland white, grey and black colour scheme with an attached bathroom. The twin-xl bed that my friends made fun of, jokes on them. I went to my shelf and began to pull out my battery packs, using all the outlets in my room to charge them while I still had power.

I grabbed my glass and walked over to my best-friend and roommate's room. A four bed apartment, the two others were out doing their respective sinful activities. My friend Bruce on the other hand should be home.

Knock, knock, knock….

I waited for a moment, before opening the door. Empty. Must be at his girlfriends place then huh? It was too late for him to be working.

Then what to do now... I guess look at the news? I turned on the television flicking through a few channels. Pretty apocalyptic, images of similar little gremlins all over the planet. Even a few larger ones, more muscular and able to fully support their weight. The message was pretty clear, stay indoors, wait for a military response, police etc…

There were a few scenes of people running around wildly shooting the things with their guns, some even looked happy. There was a warning to stay away from the motes of light, until studied further by experts.

Who the fuck are the experts?

It seemed pretty generic in my mind. Classic apocalypse type scenario, kill the monsters to survive and get stronger? I feel like I’ve read this thing a million times. I went back to my room and looked back out at the now ruined skyline. The lightning had stopped. Huh? But the rumbling hadn’t.

My spine tingled in a very bad way. I like to joke about having the perfect view of the world ending, but Jesus christ, this was actually the best seat in the house. The lightning began to streak across the sky, quickly gathering in the distant clouds. So much was gathered that for a moment the entire town was illuminated as if day. Then darkness.

Without warning a massive bolt came crashing down onto the earth, a momentary beacon of light. And with it, a towering demon. The tallest buildings downtown were 6 to 7 stories, and even then I could see its chest. As wide as a school bus, skin deep red, with streaks of lightning scattering across its surface. It held a massive broken blade, that curved inwards like its goat-like horns. Thoroughly a demon. Its eyes glowed an oddly warm yellow. But with its figure it was hard to attribute any semblance of warmth to it.

It looked around itself for a moment. With eyes of intelligence, foregin to the gremlin I fought before. Then it smiled, a row of surprisingly nice white razor sharp teeth that 9 out of 10 doct—

“GHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!” it roared.

A wave of sound dispersed through the town, I could see the windows near it immediately shatter as the shockwave began to travel past trees, pushing the clouds around it apart spreading its terror outwards. The shockwave hit my apartment but my windows withstood, shaking terribly.

Cars that hadn’t been alarmed by the lightning now began to sound their alarms all over the city. The rumbling of the sky had stopped, replaced by the sounds of car sirens, distant police sirens and the sound of utter fear.

That's a little more interesting. I took the final sip of jack, the glass now empty the lime at the bottle was all alone. I looked back at the personally named, Chad-demon swinging his broken blade gleefully at the surrounding buildings, a floating fiery crown had appeared above its head. A thought came to my mind as I placed the glass down.

The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

God, I just want to see her face.

Logically, my steps in this situation should be fairly simple. Board myself up, wait for the government/military/someone who figures out the whole awakening thing to begin kicking ass. And trust me I love logical thinking.

But I can't help not be drawn to action. The thought of being distant, even in this cluster fuck, makes that chad-demon over there a whole lot less of a concern. I'm not an idiot, I wouldn't even consider this if I felt like it wasn't worth the time. Logically speaking, and keep in mind this is my logical thinking—i should be gathering those light motes.

I won't lie and say that the increase in strength wasn't part of it. Being able to see the effect of my efforts so quickly is amazing.

Alright let's do it. There's only much I can do for my friends, I trust that they're all smart enough to figure it out. I've got someone to see.

The chef's knife was still fine. I don't keep any weapons in my apartment save for my boxing gloves and gear. I'm a college student, not a doomsday prepper. I am however, incredibly resourceful.

My lamp is made of cast iron, the tubing for the cable was split into two parts that I had to screw together. You know what this means? Exactly free cast iron baseball esque bats. I took apart the lamp and cut the cord preventing the pieces from separating.

It was heavy and about the length of my arm, overkill for a lamp but what can I say? I only buy quality items. Plus now it's also a defense weapon, really getting the bang for my buck here.

I grabbed a backpack and threw in the first aid kit I kept in my room, a water bottle and some shirts. I also put on a nice sweater that'd keep me slightly warmer but not too warm, I don't wanna break a sweat fighting those gremlin fucks.

The chef knife came with a black plastic sheath, I need it to prevent it from cutting my pockets. All set, silenced my phone and grabbed a charging pack. I exited from the same stairwell but immediately went around my apartment. The chances of being heard or seen was fairly low due to the car sirens all around me.

I took a peek at the tragic scene of my mazda.

Why… Because life hates me, probably.

Sigh, live and learn I guess, I’ll make sure to park in a spot devoid of demons.

The walk to Liliana's was about 8-10 minutes, but I had to keep a low profile. Demons and everything y'know? The streets were relatively deserted, everyone probably ran inside the second the lightning storm kicked into play. I looked down main street, a nice street with a whole host of small shops, Starbucks, Qdoba etc… Liliana lived at the end of main, which was about 10 blocks away. I could see movement. Familiar creepy gremlins here and there waddling around the place.

I’d assume that there were people in the stores, probably hiding from the little bastards. I clenched my left hand, the foregin energy my heart had started producing kept getting pumped to my arms. A delightful power. If I had to guess, it wasn’t to the level of supernatural, maybe a double in my strength. Furthermore, I have to consider the lack of balance throughout my body. Technique is highly important, my instructors made sure to ingrain that in my head, if I rely too heavily on my arms I’ll pull something.

Alright, lets go. Take it slow, and think about their moves. I looked carefully, there were about four goblin-gremlin, I needed a better name… Rude-demon? There were four Rude demons dispersed down the street. Each of them a hundred yards or so from each other… Why did my car have 3 of them?

I began to approach the first one. The surrounding stores kept flashing yellow car lights. The sirens echoing throughout the night. My footsteps drifted against the wind. When I got within 20 yards I sprinted. The Rude demon didn’t see it coming. It was too busy looking at the glass of a starbucks. Maybe considering a spice latte?

Each step I took a flash of a car siren illuminated me, in baseball fashion I aimed for its head. Crrrk.

The muted sound of crunching bones and splitting flesh was felt in my hands. It immediately fell to the floor, concussed but probably still alive, no light mote. I quickly pulled my chef's knife out of its sheath and stabbed into the back of its neck. Again the blade met resistance, its skin was definitely tougher than human skin… err, not that I’d know.

Pulling my blade out and curb stomping its throat one final time the light mote came out. This time I didn’t hesitate getting that sweet sweet dopamine inducing light. My heart almost shuddered in anticipation. But to my surprise when I touched it, it didn’t just seep into me. Instead I grabbed hold of a solid crystal about the size of my whole thumb.

What the hell, where the hell is my dopamine!

Almost a little frantically I crushed the crystal, partially due to not being used to my new strength. The second I did, it exploded in a small burst of light and seeped into my skin. Compared to before the light didn’t feel as weird, heading straight to my heart.

Oh yeah, that’s the stuff. I sent it down towards my legs, like before it split in two and began boring holes reaching my knees. Also like before it fucking hurt. I clenched my jaw and focused.

* Human | Stage 0-1 | Average Potential

* Forced Pathways (incomplete )

Still incomplete huh?

Most likely i’m going need to spread this energy around my whole body… though that ‘Forced’ makes me feel like I’m fucking myself over… oh well, live and learn.

I looked up at the starbucks. Through the flashing of the sirens and my reflection in the glass I saw some people hiding behind the coffee machines and tables. A lot of eyes on me. It's important to take advantage of exposure, if you have the opportunity to increase your public image with little risk go for it I say.

I stood straight, swept my hair back and gave a sarcastic shaka-bro. Perfect. I looked down at the street, the other nearby Rude Demons hadn't noticed the quick execution of their friends. I looked back at the glass and gave a salute before walking down the street.

My heart was pumping that good green juice through the new pathways. My thighs felt so good, like I could squat the world.