"Hello?"

"Good morning Klod."

He recognized the voice on the other end of the phone as his boss's right away and could've sworn she sounded a bit excited but dismissed it.

Klod hastily replied, worried that she was angry because of his tardiness.

"Look, I know I'm late. I apologize. I was just about to leave my apart-."

"I'm not mad Klod, and after today you won't have to worry about being late anymore!" She sounded elated. As if this was one of the happiest moments of her life. Which there couldn't have been much of if that was true.

"Wha- what do you mean?" He asked, a bit nervous.

She snorted and burst into a fit of giggles, which then gradually changed into a full-blown laugh. After several seconds of Klod standing awkwardly at his front door waiting for a response, she managed to calm herself down. That was the first time Klod ever heard Clair laugh in the past two months he’d known her, but- was it specifically directed at him or his question?

Clair cleared her throat, shooing any remaining stragglers of the giggles away, and began to speak again.

"Klod, I'm not sorry to inform you. Rather, in truth, I’m quite thrilled to notify you, that you’re fired. I hope you have a great day,” she paused, “well, with your luck, I can only hope you don’t have too bad of a day. Anyway, toodles!”

In a dramatic fashion, his phone slid from his hand once she hung up, and hit the ground. That was the fourth job in the past six months. Klod had told himself two months ago he couldn’t afford to lose another job, and yet.

How was he going to pay rent?

Why was he fired for?

Should he call back?

Questions racked his brain but none seemed viable. Clair probably wouldn't even have the decency to answer anyway.

In a small burst of rage, he slammed his fist against the wall. Klod doubted the other residents of the building would appreciate the noise, however, he wasn’t exactly in the mood to care.

Klod voiced out his anger.

"Fuck!"

“Yeah fuck!” Another voice screamed out. It seemed to have come from Randy, one of Klod’s always-drunk acquaintances who lived in the room to the right of his.

This motel’s walls were so thin you could probably hold conversations through them if you talked loud enough, he thought. Not like Klod had ever tried before, but that fact of it being possible was currently annoying him. He couldn’t even have the privacy to scream in his own home without others butting in.

“Wait, why are we yelling fuck for again?” Randy asked.

“Klod probably got fired again.” Someone from upstairs said.

“Oh, isn’t that the fourth one in the past three months?”

Klod‘s theory was, unfortunately, proven correct.

“Really? I thought that was the sixth one in the past two months.” The room to his left added.

“Can everyone please stop discussing my consistency in keeping a job?”

“Sure”, Randy said, “but can you at least tell us who’s right?”

Klod sighed. It was a perfect start to the morning. “No one is, well, no, one of you is right. I did get fired. Again. But that was only my fourth job in the past six months, and I worked there for a total of two months.” Klod knew they didn’t ask for that last bit of information, but told them anyway since he was sure that was the next topic they were going to discuss after this.

“Wait a minute,” Randy said. His voice held a serious tone, which was odd coming from him.

Klod was confused. “What?”

He didn’t speak. Klod was being to get a little worried.

“Hey, are yo-”

He was cut off by the banging of a drum coming from Randy’s room, followed by what Klod could only describe as a warcry.

“Our boy Klod held a job for two whole months?! Congrats man, that’s a new record,” Randy shouted. He started to applaud, and soon everyone started to cheer for him, Klod could even hear people from multiple rooms down congratulate him as well.

Klod, in all the racket, mumbled privately to himself, “I hate it here.”

After a couple of minutes, they quieted down and wished him good luck in finding another job. Then thankfully, finally left him alone.

Klod looked to his bed to see if Nate had awoken from all the noise, which it seemed he had as Nate wasn’t sleeping by the bedpost anymore. He briefly searched for him, surmising he must have gone into the bathroom to sleep. There wasn’t much else choice for his buddy to sleep honestly. Their room was only about half the size of a standard hotel room. And while the size did annoy him at times, it wasn’t all bad. It fitted all that Klod and Nate needed inside it. Such as a bed, a nightstand, a shower, a sink, a toilet, and even a mini-fridge.

Upon first renting the room, Klod had hated the previous set-up, so he promptly rearranged the room to fit his liking. He pushed the bed into a corner against the wall closest to Randy’s room, which gave room for the nightstand to be placed next to it. His nightstand also made a great doorstopper, since it sat to the right of the front door. Across from the nightstand was the minifridge where he stored whatever food he could spare to afford. Laid on its side next to the minifridge was Nate’s dog food, and to the right of that was the bathroom entrance.

He decided to change out of his work clothes, slipped into a black tee with a bright green four-leaf clover in the middle of it, jeans, and black converses.

Following his previous train of thought, Klod knew what he described was only the bare minimum. This motel was by no means a nice place to live. The ceiling was molded, the walls were far too thin, the carpet was course and so stained he couldn’t tell what the original color was, the power and water wouldn’t work half the time, the mattress felt more like a brick than a cushion, the room always reeked no matter how many times he sprayed air freshener, and the number of crackheads that would wander by his door at night who asked for money concerned him. But, he had nowhere else to go. Klod didn’t have much money. Plus this was the only place that would let him stay, and not hate his guts.

Klod picked up his phone that had dropped earlier and decided it was worth a shot to at least call her back. He was prepared to fake cry or beg if it was needed.

He called the number. After three rings, his phone died.

"Wow, wonderful timing."

Klod walked to the outlet next to the mini-fridge and plugged his phone in. He waited a few seconds to see the charging notification before turning his phone back on. It never showed.

He unplugged it then plugged it back in, switched to a different outlet, and even tried to fiddle with the USB port. Nothing worked. Apparently, his charger was broken.

Again.

“A quick trip to Milly’s it was then.” He thought aloud.

Klod threw the charger away, afterward entering the bathroom. He scratched the back of his companion's neck, causing Nate’s fur to shed on the gray-tiled floor.

He thought Nate might as well tag along to get in a little walk.

"Nate, let’s go, you're coming with."

The german shepherd, now awake, only puffed its nose in response as if telling him to buzz off.

“If you don’t get up, then I guess I won’t be able to add those bacon bites you like so much to your food anymore.”

This garnered a response. Nate whimpered but slowly stood up on all four paws. Klod rewarded him by petting his head and scratching behind his partially torn ear.

"Good boy." He said with a smile

Nate was quite intelligent and so intelligent in fact that Klod occasionally even mistook him for a canine with human intellect. Although he never spoke himself, Nate could easily follow along in conversations between people; to the point of convincing Klod that Nate perfectly understood and could read the English language.

While his luck was beyond crummy, Klod was confident he hit the jackpot when he took Nate in, off the streets.

Before they left, Klod did a quick check in the mirror to make sure he looked presentable. He ran a hand over his cheeks, feeling the small stubs of hair indicating he needed to shave. Sadly, however, Klod was too penniless to afford a razor. After examining the rest of himself, his eyes landed on the small scar that ran across the bridge of his nose. A scary scene started to rise in the back of his mind. So before Klod could think about the mark any further, he deemed himself decent enough to be seen in public, faced away from the mirror, then left out the front door with Nate.

The sky was a cloudless brilliant blue- is what Klod would think if it wasn't overcast. When he checked his phone last night the forecast said it was a zero percent chance of rain or clouds. But this was hardly the first time it was wrong.

Once he locked his apartment door, Klod looked above him. He heard shouting, as he always did around this time of day between his two upstairs neighbors, who were a pair of older folk. They had a distant feature Klod remembered them by, which was that they both had heterochromia, and coincidentally, shared the same colored eyes. The odd thing was that the both of them were neither related nor had known each other before two years ago. But they sure argued like they did, as every day the two of them would bicker over the most trivial things, and once even brought Klod into an argument of theirs.

Alastor, the man's name, and Zilla, the woman's. Asked him if Adam West or Christian Bale was the best Batman. He told them, Christian Bale, only because Adam had been before Klod’s time. Both Zilla's green and blue eyes lit up when he answered, and she cheered with victory. Her brown hair was done in a tight bun and Zilla’s well-defined facial features gave her a sort of noble aura. But that illusion was on nearly every occasion broken with how she behaved.

She threw her hands up in triumph and rocked backward on her seat. The breeze blew against her blue floral dress, clinging it to her body. "See! What did I say you old hoot. I was right, as I often am."

Alastor spat on the concrete floor of the second story. Klod thought he gave off mafia boss vibes from his slick-backed black hair and his Italian-styled mustache. However, Alastor’s plaid shirt, blue jeans, and sneakers gave off a different impression.

He sat forward and spoke in a snide tone. "Just because this youngster doesn't know what good acting is, doesn't mean you're right!"

At this point, Klod decided it was probably time to leave. He didn't particularly feel like being caught up in any more of their banter. So he left them to quarrel with each other on their own.

Today they were debating whether heaven or hell existed. Klod thought this an odd topic for them to discuss since neither Alastor nor Zilla had a religious or spiritual bone in their body.

He walked through the parking lot, making his way toward the sidewalk. It was only a ten-minute walk to get to the strip mall heading this way. Before he went too far, Alastor and Zilla waved at him and told him good luck today. Klod appreciated the sentiment. They both knew that his luck wasn't the best, but as he waved back, Klod oddly felt a chill. However, he didn't have much time to think about it before Nate started to nudge their head against his leg. Signaling for him to speed up.

It seemed Nate wanted to get this walk over with as soon as possible. Klod didn't mind though. He thought walking faster might warm him up because strangely enough, it was pretty cold today. Despite them being in the middle of summer.

Klod brushed it off. He had bigger issues than the weather to worry about.

He took a left turn, away from the busy street of cars driving past him. Walked for about six more minutes and then arrived at his destination. Milly's Electronics was between a Subway and a Pro-Nails on the southeast side of Wasco. Klod often visited her store since he had a tenacity for electronics to either stop working or suddenly break on him.

The parking lot was empty, except for the few employee’s cars that had to open their respective stores. Klod spotted Milly’s truck parked near her shop’s entrance. This surprised him a bit, Milly usually didn’t work Thursdays.

He saw Milly in the store flipping the sign on the inside of the doorway to open. She noticed Klod on his way and shot playful finger guns at him, he returned the gesture.

Milly was a young lady in her late twenties who was best put as being quite an… oddball.

She had dirty blonde hair which was often a massive mess of curls that came to her shoulders, and always sported thick-rimmed sunglasses that hid her sage green eyes. Milly held the ridiculous notation that they made her look stylish. Klod, for one, thought they did not. Today she wore her usual blue overalls with a white t-shirt underneath. He had always thought Milly looked like a mechanic with that get-up rather than an electrician, but she digressed.

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Klod and Nate entered the store together. He usually just lied, claiming that Nate was a service animal. This usually had about a fifty/fifty percent chance of working as Nate was very well-behaved. Although, at this point, Milly both knew he was lying and stopped caring about it after a while.

Inside the shop was a tad bit larger than the size of a convenience store, but had the exact same layout as one, minus the beverage section. The only difference was rather than shelves stocked with food, they were filled with chargers, USBs, computer chips, hard drives, and any other electronic one could think of.

"Morning Mills."

"Morin Claus, what is this time?"

Klod never liked his name but it was the name his father had given him, so he tried to come to terms with it. He never did though. After he turned twelve Klod would always request people to call him Claus, thinking that it sounded more respectable.

Now though?

He didn’t really care, referring to himself as Klod to some, and to others Claus.

"TV blow up on you or something?" Milly chuckled at her joke and leaned back on her chair behind the counter.

"Mills I don’t even own a TV.”

She blew a stray curl from her face. “Really? They don’t even give you TVs anymore at motels? T’least they could do for the crappy room and all.”

“Yeah, well, at least it's cheap. Anyway, reason why I’m here is that my charger broke,” he rubbed his eyes and added with a sigh, “again.”

Wanting to waste no time, Klod turned around and started to look for a charger on one of the nearby racks while Nate dozed off on the floor.

“Also phone’s dead.”

"Bummer. Isn't that the fifteenth one this month?" She said with a bit of irritation in her voice.

Klod glanced back and noticed Milly was chewing on a toothpick. Her sunglasses were lowered on the bridge of her nose. She looked annoyed, but she should know by now that this wasn't his fault. It usually never was.

He spotted a charger that fit his phone and returned to the counter.

"Yea, I know. Can you just hurry and ring me up for this, please?" He held up the new charger with the words SUPERCHAR printed on the green box. "I still have some business I need to take care of."

She eyed him skeptically.

"Business? I didn't know I was talking to a big shot all of a sudden."

He rolled his eyes.

"Mills, I'm sorry, but I can't talk now. I just got fired and probably have to beg Clair to take me back."

Her toothpick snapped.

"Clair." She scoffed.

Milly had said her name as if trying to spit a bad taste out her mouth.

"That pompous bitch wouldn't know what manners were if it slapped her across the face. Why beg?"

"You're not wrong, but I don't really have a choice if I want to pay rent this month."

Milly sat back up in her chair. "Claus, I keep telling you I'll hire you here. I don't know why you won-"

"And, I keep telling you that it wouldn’t be a good idea. Trust me."

She threw her arms up. "Oh my Lord. Claus! Your "bad luck" isn't real. You're just in less favorable situations than others sometimes."

Klod rolled his eyes a second time while being in this store today. He was starting to get a headache.

That's literally the definition of bad luck, he thought.

"I'm not arguing with you. So again, can you please ring me up, thank you."

Milly pouted. “You know, I’m about to stop giving you discounts on everything.”

“Please don’t, both you and I know I wouldn’t be able to afford that,” he said.

While annoyed, she still begrudgingly took the charger and checked him out. Ending with him paying his dues and taking his receipt.

"Would you like that in a bag or not?"

She sounded grumpy, but he didn't have time to improve her mood. He’d make it up later to her somehow.

"No, I'm good. I'll see you around Mills."

He nudged Nate with his foot to wake him up and pocketed the charger. "Let's go boy."

As they exited the shop, Milly gave her own goodbye. And while it might have been his imagination, he could've sworn she said. "Later Klod." But he must have misheard her as Milly didn’t know his real name. So Klod simply dismissed it.

Once outside a strong stench of sulfur attacked his nostrils. Klod pinched his nose to ward off the smell and noticed something was wrong. Very, very wrong. They had only been inside the shop for a couple of minutes, so… why was it already night? No, that wasn’t right, he thought. Rather, it was just that the sky was pitch black, a blank slate now. No moon or stars were out to provide light, which made it somewhat difficult for him to see. Luckily, a dim glow of red lit the vicinity of the parking lot, which gave him enough sight to see a few steps in front of him. While he was thankful he could at least see, it bothered Klod that he didn’t know the source of the eerie illumination.

What was even stranger was the silence. It was pretty early in the morning so a lack of people didn’t surprise him. But still, there was a busy street of cars on the road straight ahead of him. Despite Klod being unable to see the road, he should at least have heard it. The roar of engines, the tires on the road, the opening and closing of car doors, and the voices of individuals in confusion from the sudden blackout.

The tranquility was unnatural.

Klod looked at Nate, who appeared ready to attack. His companion’s ears were perched and back hairs stood up.

Yeah, this was bad.

"Hey Mills! Come check this out."

There was no response.

Klod turned to face the shop and noticed the lights were off. He tried to reenter the store with no luck. It was locked.

"Why'd you lock the door?"

He peered through the glass entrance, but it was too dark to see anything inside. Klod became worried.

He started to bang on the door. "Milly! Are you alright!?"

Still no response.

Klod turned back around to address the situation. Nothing was making any sense. First, the sky turned black; which seemingly nobody cared about. And now Milly had locked herself inside and wouldn't answer back. He had talked to her only moments ago.

What happened to her?

What was happening outside?

Were they in danger?

As if on cue to answer his question. Klod heard a shriek in the distance. Followed by another, and after a couple more seconds another. Crys of pain started to stack on top of each other. That grew louder and fuller as more time passed. Soon unitizing into a choir of blood-curdling screams.

Klod’s body was seized by fear and his mind went blank. The blood drained from Klod’s face, leaving it cold and pale, and the rapid beating of his heart indicated it was ready to burst. With Klod’s limited vision, he couldn’t see if the culprits of the screams were near or far, but was horrified by how close they sounded in proximity to him. While Nate, on the other hand, barked in response to the wretched wails. Clearly disturbed himself.

A loud thud reverberated against the shop’s door, releasing Klod from the firm constrictors of terror.

"Milly!"

Panicked, he searched for an object to break the glass with. Klod found and picked up a nearby rock, then smashed it against the glass door creating a small hole. Carefully, he reached through the opening and unlocked it from the inside.

Klod withdrew his arm back and winced. Nate noticed this and whined in response. He checked his elbow and saw that it had a small nick on it now. It wasn’t too bad of a cut, probably something that would leave only a minor scar. The only unfortunate thing was that it bled. Not to mention Klod didn’t have anything to stop the bleeding with.

Great, he thought, he always wanted to look like a horror movie protagonist. Nate lightly licked at his wound which didn’t help much, but Klod appreciated the sentiment.

"It's fine, buddy. We can worry about it later. First, we need to see if Milly's alright."

Klod felt dumb for having said that since she obviously wasn't alright, but he was desperately trying to conceive himself that she was, at the very least, alive. Pushing his worries away, Klod opened the door and walked in. Nate followed behind and began to growl. It smelt metallic inside causing his gut to churn. He decided to leave the door open, so the red glow from outside could light up the shop some.

There was no evidence of a fight. Everything had been in the same places as when they left. This confused him. Had he imagined the thud from earlier? Klod started to call out for her.

“Mil-”

He immediately shut his mouth. Klod didn’t know why, but his instincts were screaming at him to stay silent.

He motioned for Nate to stay silent as well and guard the entrance.

Klod searched the store from front to back while Nate guarded the door. It was difficult with it being so dark, but he still diligently checked between every aisle of electronics her shop contained.

In the end, Klod found nothing. There was no sign of her anywhere. Maybe he somehow missed her? He doubled back, rechecking places he looked previously, this time with his eyes now adjusted to the darkness. However, after researching Klod was met with the same results. This worried him, Milly's shop wasn't big. There weren't many places she could be, so where could Milly have disappeared to?

Klod wished he could have called her, it would have made things so much more simple. Regretfully, Klod left his phone at home, and even if he hadn’t, Klod’s phone would still have been dead. Ready to give up, he called for Nate in a whisper.

He didn’t come, so Klod went to him instead. Nate stood stationary and growled at the counter where Milly worked from. Klod mentally face-palmed. For some reason, he hadn’t thought to check behind it.

Klod walked over to where Nate was and heard a faint gnawing sound coming from behind the counter. He froze. Whatever was behind there must’ve been what put Nate on edge.

Klod motioned for Nate to circle around the counter, from where one would enter at. Then whispered to not fully show himself. In case what was behind it was… dangerous. Once Nate stood alert at the opening, Klod slowly peered over the top of the checkout table and recoiled instantly. He covered his mouth to stop himself from screaming.

It was horrific.

Milly's face was unrecognizable. Most of her skin had been torn off her face, with only small patches of skin left at random. Her eyes were gone, and her right cheek looked like it'd been burrowed into.

His voice shook. "Wha-Wha-"

Klod couldn’t think. He couldn’t even form words to address his shock.

He started to hyperventilate. Klod realized why it had smelled like iron inside the shop. The culprit was… Milly’s blood. His stomach flipped and nausea overcame him.

Klod turned around to hurl. He couldn't even tell if that was her anymore. The only thing that did clarify it being Milly was her curly hair.

This was far worse than being cruel, this was inhuman.

"What the hell did this?"

Nate didn’t move and continued to guard the checkout counter’s entrance. Eyes glued on her corpse. Watching, waiting. But for what exactly?

Mustering up his courage, Klod leaned back over the counter and noticed something strange. A bulge from underneath her shirt was moving. He connected the dots of the bulge and Milly’s cheek, taking it as a clear sign to evacuate. Klod regretted leaving Milly like this but didn't have the time to mourn over her. Whatever did this to Milly was still inside the store. More specifically, still inside of her.

"Nate, let's-"

Milly’s stomach burst open. A bug-like creature launched toward him and sank its claws into his face. Klod could feel the tips of its unguis inside his mouth and poke against his teeth.

He yelled in pain; which made his face hurt even worse.

“What the fuck is this!?"

Nate started to bark in response, not knowing how to help.

“Tha’s… not,” Klod tried to pry the creature from his face, but it only sank its claws deeper inside his cheeks, “an… anser Nate!” It was awkward to talk as his tongue and teeth would continually graze against the creature’s claws as he tried to form words.

From what he could see, this thing looked to have the appearance of a moth or a butterfly. Klod couldn't exactly tell which, with it up so close to his face. What he did see clearly, however, was its huge oval-shaped mouth which held multiple razor-sharp teeth inside. And what’s scarier, is that those very same, already deadly teeth, were made deadlier by them spinning at very high speeds. He struggled against it, but the small creature was surprisingly strong and continued to edge its mouth closer to Klod’s face.

This is it, he thought.

I'm going to die by some half-budget Mothra tearing my face to shreds. He only hoped Nate would be able to get away.

A sudden thought popped into his mind.

What if Nate didn’t?

What if after it was finished with Klod, the same fate would befall his friend?

Dread for Nate filled him with renewed vigor. Klod didn’t so much care about what happened to him after he died, but he didn’t want any harm befalling Nate.

Klod looked for something he could use as a weapon but found nothing. It was too dark and most of his vision was being blocked. The creature’s mouth was only about an inch from his face now and his arms were starting to tire. He was running out of time.

A drop of blood splashed on his nose. At first, he thought it was from the monster but soon realized that it had come from his hand. This reminded him of the glass he broke earlier. Out of the corner of his eye, Klod caught a glimpse of light refracted from the glass shards.

Using his remaining strength he pushed the monster away with one hand, leaned downwards, then with the other picked up a piece of glass from the floor. Due to the blood on his hand, the shard started to slip from his grasp. Klod tightened his hold on it, cutting into his palm. He then jammed the glass into the creature’s body. It let out a screech and loosened its grip enough for Klod to throw it off his face, onto the floor. In an instant, Nate went in for the kill, crushing the monster between his jaws.

Klod collapsed. “Nice one Nate.” He took a few deep breaths to steady his breathing. That was far too close for comfort, he thought. If that went on for a minute longer, he’d been a goner. Nate came over to check on him and licked the wounds on his face and hands.

“Thanks.” He rubbed the top of Nate’s head in an appreciative gesture.

The inside of his mouth tasted like metal. Blood leaked from multiple punctures on his face, which the creature had left him with.

He stood up, and while at first hesitant, walked over to whatever the hell attacked him. With a better look at the creature in the light of the doorway, he could confirm it was more moth-like, almost identical even. The thing was a brownish-gray color, about the size of a hawk, and its wings had orange circles on them that looked like eyeballs.

Multiple tiny legs protruded from the creature’s abdomen, ending in sharp hook-shaped claws. That Klod was now very grossed out he had in his mouth. His eyes drifted over to the monster’s own mouth. He shivered at the sight. Klod was never getting that image out of his head.

Klod nudged the creature with his foot to see if it still had some life. It gave off no movement.

Yellow liquid oozed from where Klod had stabbed and Nate bit the monster. The substance smelled like rotten eggs and began to stink the store. Klod circled behind the counter where Milly's body lay disfigured and lifeless. He grabbed the white blanket on the counter's bottom shelf Milly kept for cold days and covered her body with it, face first.

He tried looking for her sunglasses but couldn't find them anywhere, so he gave up and assumed that the mini-mothra ate them.

Klod felt awful that he didn’t shed even a single tear for Milly, but Klod simply didn't have the energy in him to cry right now. Guilt struck him hard. If only he entered the store sooner. Was quicker when unlocking the door. Faster in finding a rock. Less afraid. But…they were just that, “what-ifs.” What had happened was set in history. There was no going back to change the past.

"Come on Nate." Klod was ready to leave, the smell of blood from both Milly and the creature combined wasn’t doing wonders for keeping the rest of his food stomached.

Nate whimpered which made Klod frown. "I- I know Nate, but there's nothing we can do for her anymore. We have to leave anyway, we shouldn’t stay here any longer." There was no telling what else they would find.

They left Milly's Electronics for the last time. Outside, Klod felt a stillness in the air. The previous screaming was gone, returned to the eerie quietness it first was. A large shadow, that was not there before, overcast him and Nate.

Puzzled, Klod turned his head upwards and his eyes widened from fear. He glanced at Nate, whose ears were drooped and who emitted a quiet whine.

Klod started to speak, but an explosion from nearby cut him off. The following shockwave broke all the store and car windows. His ears rang from the reverberation of the blast and a gust of wind knocked him over. A cloud of dust coated his eyes, disabling his vision. Small pieces of debris were flung at him and Nate. Some of which hit Klod in the face causing him to yelp in pain, and in return granted him a handful of dust or pebbles in his mouth. He couldn’t see or hear until the dust settled.

Klod opened his eyes and spat dust or anything else that ended up inside his mouth. After he regained his hearing, Klod could make out the sirens and car alarms that blared all around him.

Bombs, he thought.

Actually bombs.

Both he and Nate were going to die.

Klod shook his head and pushed the negative thought away. Too much was happening too fast. He got back on his feet, Nate doing so as well. They needed to get as far away from here as possible before that notion became reality. But no matter how far they ran, Klod had no idea how the two of them were going to escape that.

He looked back overhead and stared at the colossal titan traveling in the direction north of the parking lot. It was so dark that Klod could hardly see it, but the titan’s silhouette gave enough away for him to determine it as not human if its size wasn’t ample evidence already.

The titan opened its mouth, at least that’s what it appeared like to Klod, and made a noise. What came from it sounded like a click of a pen heavily amped in volume. Nate hit the floor. Klod hastily checked to see what had happened to him. He checked Nate’s pulse and then his breathing, concluding that his friend had only passed out.

Thank God, he thought. Klod couldn’t lose someone else today.

A red dot spattered on his shirt. Klod reached up and touched underneath his nose with his non-bloody hand. When he pulled it back, Klod saw the sight of fresh blood.

“Wha-” With a start, his body convulsed and he screamed in pain. And in the next second his entire world turned white.