All things considered, today probably couldn't have been worse.

Sure, it started out alright. Heather's morning started out like any other: wake up, eat some cereal, go for a morning jog, and get on with the day. It had been hard living alone after the attack, but she had made it work somehow.

Regardless, today was a special day. After a grueling four years, she'd finally made it to her graduation ceremony and could begin her adult life. Heather wasn't particularly excited about spending the next 50 years of her life in an industry she was only mildly passionate about, but it was much better than dying on the streets, alone and penniless. Anything was better than dying.

Her grades weren't the best this semester, but she was happy she managed to graduate in this day and age. Many people had given up on normalcy when the news broke about Australia's complete annihilation, but with the emergence of Beacons, she felt hopeful for the future. Speaking of, the term "Beacon" felt very appropriate for the people who, for all intents and purposes, were the only source of hope against the constant monster attacks. Roughly 1% of the world's remaining population turned out to be Beacons, and Heather was glad that she was not one of them; she barely survived her Physical Education classes from high school, so she couldn't imagine having to face death day in and day out. A nice, relaxing life of teaching physics suited her much more, at least in her opinion.

As she stepped into the commencement hall, Heather noticed the sea of relieved faces having casual conversations amongst themselves. She almost considered starting a conversation with a classmate from one of her classes, but ended up deciding against it. The best way to stay safe is to never make yourself vulnerable, and that includes things like friends. It wasn't like she was rude to the people around her; many of her classmates had actually tried to hang out with her. However, she always came up with some excuse to avoid exposing herself to potential danger. To Heather, a friend is someone you're supposed to share valuable secrets about yourself with, which was just asking to be betrayed. No thank you!

She settled into one of the secluded corners of the hall when a middle aged man stepped up to a microphone and cleared his throat to get the attention of the crowd of future professionals. Heather quickly spotted an extremely muscular body underneath his formal attire, along with some fairly subtle wrinkles on his shirt, which suggested he was in too much of a rush to properly iron his clothes. While she was entertaining herself by inspecting the speaker, the man began his speech.

"Congratulations, Class of 2021! It is my honor to be presenting this commencement speech today, especially in these uncertain times we find ourselves in. As many of you may already know, my name is Jack Hammer, CEO of H-Corp. I stand before you today as..."

Of course it was H-Corp, one of the new companies that had sprung to prominence with the emergence of monsters as some sort of talent acquisition and management firm for Beacons. There was definitely merit in organizing a combined offensive to combat the advancing incursions of monsters, but Heather felt uncomfortable with the idea of a company assembling a private army with strength that rivaled entire countries' armies. That aside, she shook herself out of her stupor and started paying attention to the speech again.

"... may differ, we all must strive to be examples to future generations that humanity will never yield! We will continue to thrive, no matter what obstacles come our way. For some of us, that might mean having a hand to hand fist fight with a bear that could tear a building in half. For others, that might mean finding the motivation to change out of their pajamas!" That got a laugh from the audience, though it felt a bit odd to Heather. To her, it wasn't really that funny of a joke, but almost the entire chamber burst out into laughter. She wagered it was probably the byproduct of (likely) being a Beacon.

The rest of the speech ended fairly uneventfully, though Heather had felt really put off by the experience. Maybe she was being overly cautious, but the idea that someone could manipulate her emotions was terrifying, to say the least. It made a modicum of sense that someone who is meant to be a source of hope would have some sort of natural ability to influence people. Of course, this all relied on the fact that she wasn't just overanalyzing a joke she found unfunny, which she probably was, all things considered.

To celebrate, she decided to treat herself to dinner later that night. Nothing that fancy, since she was a broke college student, but just a nice burger and fries. She was used to cheap ramen from convenience stores to conserve money, so an actual meal was a nice break from the monotony.

That's when someone crashed through the windows.

With a loud crash and a quick splatter of crimson, Heather's eyes widened as she saw a certain Jack Hammer fly through the air and into the diner. She blinked a few times while she waited for her senses to catch up with what had just happened. A bleeding Jack Hammer lay on the floor in front of her while the other patrons began screaming and cursing. She shook her head, maybe trying to deny that this was happening, but her heart's rapid beating brought her into flight or fight mode. And she wasn't about to fight whatever threw a man who could punch through a building.

Breaking into a sprint, Heather pushed through the stunned crowd and tried making her way to the nearest exit. She felt her heart beat faster and faster as she started running away from the diner in a random direction. Part of her felt a bit guilty for dining and (literally) dashing, but she quickly shoved such useless thoughts aside. Survival came first.

Unfortunately, she was a bit out of shape, and the gurgling screams behind her didn't help. She didn't realize it until now, but she slowly started hearing a siren echo throughout the panicked streets around her. That was a bad sign. A siren meant you needed to take cover immediately, which typically implied a C-level threat or higher was in the city. How it snuck past the defenses, she had no idea, but she wasn't keen on finding out. She had her diploma, so her only goal was to get out of here alive, even if that meant completely abandoning the city. Judging by the wounds on the Beacon, she had doubts about how well the city could defend itself.

Eventually, her legs gave out, and she collapsed to the ground, panting for breath. She absolutely hated this feeling, the feeling of being close to death, the feeling of helplessness before some overwhelming force. She hated it even more when she saw an ominous, beastly shadow begin to peak its ugly head into the alley she just darted into. It was a monstrous abomination, the size of a double decker bus, and it appeared to be almost entirely made out of... shadows? It almost looked like an enormous black panther, if that panther had an axe for a tail made out of something from Eldritch Horror. It let out an enormous roar, and she almost passed out in pure terror. Her head ached with one of the worst migraines she had ever felt, but somehow she managed to stay conscious.

It was around then that the sheer magnitude of danger set in. She didn't think her heart could beat any faster, but somehow it managed to. Her previously exhausted body felt energized by the massive surge in adrenaline and her instincts kicked in. She burst into a full on sprint with a renewed second wind, hoping the beast would lose interest.

Unfortunately, it was not to be. In fact, it only seemed to gain interest. The beast suddenly became fixated on her, as if it had just spotted a particularly appetizing snack... or maybe it was a look of intrigue? She couldn't quite tell with a quick look over her shoulder into the lightless eyes of the beast, though the idea of an intelligent beast wanting to inspect her was absolutely appalling. Hell no!

Heather cursed to herself in her head, though she could barely think with all of the physical exertion. Surprisingly, though, the beast seemed content to simply follow behind, which gave even more credence to the idea that it was merely playing with her at this point. She ran as fast as she could, and as far as she could, turning down every alley with random turns in an attempt to lose the panther-like shadowy monster, but it seemed to keep up with ease. That was to be expected, though. Anything that could punt "The Human Tank" through a diner could probably keep up with an out of shape physics teacher.

Clearly, running wasn't the answer. She'd run out of stamina eventually, and then it would be game over, so she racked her brain on how to escape the situation, and came up with an almost absurd plan. She had no idea if it would work, but it was a Hail Mary; if it didn't work, she was as good as dead, so she might as well try.

Rounding the corner, Heather frantically reached for her purse before realizing she had left it at the diner. That plan was clearly a bust, but maybe there was another option. After a moment's hesitation, she reached into her pocket instead. She thought she could hear explosions in the distance, but at this point she didn't care. Regardless, she had absolutely no faith that this new plan of hers would work, but she didn't want to die. She refused to die. Not like this, never like this. Never.

The beast peaked its head around the corner, and she turned on her phone's flashlight.

There was a sickening sizzling noise as the beast began to recoil at the bright light, and actually began backing away from her. Shaking from the thrill of the moment, Heather slowly backed away from the beast, but tripped on some trash and dropped her phone. The screen cracked, turning off the flashlight. A sudden wave of fear and exhaustion took over her as she helplessly crawled away on her back. Unfortunately, the Shadow Panther shook itself free from her distraction and started sniffing in her direction.

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

"... Fuck."

Heather's mind flashed with danger as she quickly looked around her, muscles heavy from exertion. Thinking quickly, she grabbed a dirty plastic knife that was in the trash she had tripped over. With no other choices, Heather flailed pathetically in the direction of the panther, and it seemed almost confused by the gesture before it let out another massive roar and swung towards her with its massive tail of shadows.

Heather fainted.

***

Cursing, Jack Hammer pushed himself off of the diner's floor amidst the screaming crowd. That was certainly not the worst blow he had taken, but it had knocked him almost unconscious since he was caught off guard. He gauged he was probably out of commission for about 5 minutes, but he had no idea where the beast had gone. The sounds of the siren perked his ears up, and he knew all he had to do was stall the beast for long enough for some backup to arrive. Instinctively, he reached for his signature hammer before realizing he had left it at home because of the speech earlier that day. Figures. While stretching his muscles, he began to address the crowd around him while dusting himself off. "Citizens! Please stay calm while we sort out the situation! Seek out the nearest emergency shelter, but remember, stay calm!" The sight of the man calmly picking himself up after sustaining a massive blow seemed to calm the crowd, or maybe it was the subtle persuasive aura that he exuded, but the panic slowly died down.

Once he had calmed the crowd and ushered them to seek safety, he sprinted out of the diner, noticing several patrons seemed to have left their bags behind. He grimaced at his failure to prevent that panic, but he'd have time to worry about that once he had taken care of the beast. His body slowly started to shift into some sort of steel, his black Hex swirling as his blood turned to oil, and he began to scan his surroundings. Immediately, he picked up on a trail of Hex left by the creature, and began sprinting as his body morphed into a fully steel super soldier. While he had massively enhanced endurance and strength in his steel form, he was only as fast as an average human, so he trailed behind the massive beast.

Weirdly, it seemed like it had rapidly diverged from its path, moving away from the densely populated part of the city towards some random area of town. That immediately raised his sense of danger from a 6 to an 8, but that would have to wait for his after-incident report.

Eventually, the trail he sensed started slowing down, as if his quarry was stalking a prey, rather than flat out running like it had been doing before. He needed to hurry, so he pushed himself to go even faster by changing one of his hands into its cannon mode and propelling himself using the recoil from his shots. It would cause some fairly major property damage, but that was a small price to pay in exchange for saving people.

With his other hand, he reached up to his ear and pressed down on his earpiece to send a message. "This is Hammer, I'm trailing a C-rank, maybe even a B-rank. Seems to be made out of shadows, so it caught me off guard and got away from me. Requesting backup near Sixth Street." He was hoping they could hear him through the explosions of his cannon, but maybe it just served as punctuation every now and again.

After a brief delay, his ear buzzed with a reply. "We're sending over Cinder, Mr. Hammer. They'll be on site shortly". Now that backup was on its way, he shifted his other hand into cannon mode and went at full speed, destroying the area behind him.

After another minute or so, he heard the unearthly screech of a Shadow Panther echo throughout the city, which caused his head to ache. Any ordinary person near it would definitely fall unconscious if they heard it, so he figured it was closing in on its prey. Unfortunately, he had no idea where it was, the scream echoing all around him as if it was coming from the shadows accompanying the nearby buildings.

After a brief pause, he heard another ear-piercing screech thunder throughout the streets near him. Someone, or something, seems to have annoyed the beast, though it almost seemed like it was in pain. Sweat, or rather oil, beaded down Jack's forehead as he started losing track of the Hex trail. Fortunately, he wouldn't have to look much harder for long.

A beam of light seemed to emerge from the streets below, shining onto the night sky's clouds above. It was almost like a spotlight telling him exactly where to go. "What the...?" He had no idea who had the ability to make a light show like that, but he hadn't kept up with any promising rookie Beacons, so it was probable he had just missed them. Regardless, a light domain Beacon was at a big advantage against a shadow beast, even if it was B-rank or higher, so he was hopeful there would be no casualties.

As he rounded the corner, he saw the wounded Shadow Panther angrily circling a bloodied and unconscious woman who looked to be in her 20's. A pair of glasses lay shattered on the ground next to her, but he was too distracted by the beacon of light that seemed to emanate from her unconscious body. The yellow Hex swirling around her seemed rather loose and fractured, which he guessed was the result of instinct rather than technique. Instantly, he began blasting the Shadow Panther with his Hex cannon arms, landing several blows on the distracted creature. Taking advantage of the momentary confusion from the blasts, he swooped towards the woman, transforming his left arm back to a normal hand, and threw her over his shoulders. Once the victim was secured, he began blasting the creature again, which prompted it to unleash another primal screeching noise, this time in true agony.

Shortly, his enhanced senses picked up an incoming lance of fire as he dodged just before it exploded on the creature. While the onslaught wasn't enough to kill it outright, he felt confident now that his backup had arrived on a Pegasus made out of flames.

"Glad you're here, Ash! Let's finish it!"

***

Ugh... that really hurts...

My thoughts slowly regained composure as I opened her eyes to a barrage of lights and noises, though my mind was too fractured to properly understand anything that was happening to me. Something had changed, but... I wasn't really sure what. Is that what death feels like? Bright blue and red lights, lots of pain, and a crowd of faceless people wearing surgical masks? Well, it certainly wasn't pleasant, and it quickly became exceedingly boring to watch the blurry images, so I gave up on it and tried thinking about what happened, but that was foggy too.

So I ended up just waiting, hoping this was all some sort of bad dream and I'd wake up from it soon. Unfortunately, I didn't, and the pain only got worse as time progressed. It felt like I had been hit by a truck, and to some extent, that wasn't that inaccurate of an analysis. Right... I was at the diner and then...

My heart started to race as I thought about that shadowy monster, and instantly the (presumably) doctors seemed to start to panic at some device that seemed to be attached to me. Oh right, probably a heart rate monitor or something. Whoops. Eventually, my heart rate settled down and the panic ended.

After what felt like an eternity, my senses started coming back to me, though there was this odd sensory overload that seemed to give me a headache. It was like I had just learned how to perceive an entirely new sensation, though I wasn't quite sure what it was. I tried fiddling with my muscles and senses, and soon enough I was able to turn this headache on and off, but I still didn't know what it was that I was perceiving. Something to figure out once I've regained control over what's happening to me.

Oh right. I had almost just died. Or did die? I was pretty sure I was in some sort of hospital, so I was probably alive. The thought was enough to bring up painful old memories, but I quickly shooed them away as usual, because I didn't die. There was no point in stewing over something out of my control at this point, so I tried to think about the short term. I didn't have enough money for health insurance (which only became more expensive after The Calamity, mind you), so this was going to have to come out of my backup funds for a rainy day. Worst case scenario, I could promise to pay it and then flee the country and pose as some sort of refugee, as they were quite common nowadays. I should be able to make a decent living with my experience as a teacher, though I wasn't sure whether I could actually get a job without a background check. All things considered, though, I was glad to have survived and was happy that things seemed to have turned out so far in my favor.

Just then, there was a knock on the door to my hospital room, so I turned to face the door as an injured Jack Hammer strolled through. As if I hadn't seen him enough today. I tried my best to hide my annoyance and gave him as polite a look as I could, but turning in bed hurt quite a bit because of my chest wound.

"Good evening, Ms. Daft. I'm glad you're feeling better. When I came by earlier, you seemed to be in some sort of shock from the pain."

Now that he mentioned it, I vaguely remember seeing his overly muscular torso at some point, but couldn't quite place the rest of the image. I decided to return the pleasantries in the hopes that he might go away if I was nice to him.

"Jack Hammer, right? Thanks for the wishes. To be honest, I'm kind of surprised you would take the time out of your day to visit someone like me". Now that I thought about it, it was a little odd for him to personally visit me. I didn't remember what happened after I got hit by the Panther's tail, but I assumed that he might have been one of the people to rescue me. Even still, it was strange for a C-rank Beacon to spend time visiting every single person they saved. Unfortunately, his reply left me even more confused.

"Well it's not every day that you stumble upon a new Beacon. I'm sure you've noticed some changes already, haven't you?"

"Excuse me? What do you mean, 'a new Beacon'? Are you suggesting that I'm a Beacon? I think you have the wrong person". I felt a bit embarrassed at this point, because he had obviously mistaken me for someone else. However, I was met with laughter, which only made me feel more embarrassed.

"Haven't realized it yet? Your glasses were shattered in the attack, but you seem to be looking at me just fine."

I blinked in response, before feeling my face and confirming that my glasses were indeed missing. Huh. But I could still see reasonably well, like the light was being channeled into my eyes much more efficiently than before. It wasn't quite the same as my vision with my glasses, but it was definitely functional enough for most activities.

"What is... why can I see so well?" My heart started to beat a bit faster, but I couldn't help myself. Something huge had happened to me while I was unconscious, and I didn't even know where to start. What else is different? Do I have some deadly disease that would kill me if left untreated? What was the implication of my eyesight had magically heal itself? Is this why I'm still alive? I had so many questions.

"Well, that confirms that," Hammer said, before he checked off something on a notepad. I guessed he was probably checking if I knew I was a Beacon or not. "How about we start with this... Congratulations, you're now a Beacon!"

Can I take it back? This was the worst day of my life.