Another day down, he thought to himself as he trotted down the sidewalk leading home. It was about 7:30pm on a spring day. The sun was just beginning to sink below the horizon.

Another day I missed class too, shit…, the worry began to stir through his head. Lately he had begun taking whatever shifts he could at work, hours were cut again.

How the hell am I even gonna make rent!, it was nearing the end of the month, they’d come knocking before too long, and he still was short 100 dollars. Missing classes hurt his grades but definitely helped his wallet. He really wished he could afford to just quit going to school, but that would mean this same thing for the rest of his life. He was banking hard on a Computer Science degree easing entry into the modern day job force.

I can’t even afford a damn bike!, he sighed as he peered to the sky, his hand running through his long dark hair, it was rapidly becoming dark.

Hmm, pretty dark out tonight, he thought to himself. The moon was small in the sky, and existed only in a small sliver. Funny, how something so massive, so overwhelmingly unassailable, could look so small to an ant on a rock, he thought to himself.

Just as the thought passed the sky began to light up with streaks of silver.

Wow! A meteor shower!? What the hell is even going on? I feel like I should’ve heard this mentioned somewhere, the light show left him dumbfounded and open mouthed.

The silver, white streaks in the sky continued to build and multiply, arcing everywhere.

*BOOM*

The first hit sounded from behind him, the earth was rocking shakily beneath his feet. Spinning around briskly he was confronted with a massive smoke cloud hanging in the air, approximately near the area where his university was located in town.

Holy shit… What the hell is going on!, quickly he turned around and began to run home, his instincts drove him to the only place he considered relatively safe.

*BOOOM*

Another impact sounded, much farther away this time, to his right. Looking shakily through the trees he saw another massive cloud in the distance, streaks of some sort of blue coloring swirling around through it.

Panic pressed heavily on his mind threatening to snap it. Suddenly the ground was coming at him quickly, he had tripped.

He couldn’t even feel himself hit the ground, briskly he crawled a few feet before launching back to his feet.

Cars were zooming frantically around on the roads nearby, screams were clear and loud. Luckily he was already a way into his walk home, only about half a mile left to go. He lived in a small older house a ways away from the rest of town, in the middle of a grass lot with a few roommates. He hoped that they were okay.

The thuds of impacts sounded but the shaking of the ground was much less significant at this point.

Finally he arrived in front of his home, and began rushing across the lot toward the building in its center. When he arrived at the door he found it already wide open. Good hopefully they’re in here, he thought as he rushed through the doorway.

He rushed through the house in a whirlwind, finding no one. The air was thick and dusty, the impacts were turning up so much smoke and dust.

The cellar!, he realized suddenly. A small cellar existed beneath the three bedroom home, a relic of the past that now had an actual use.

Rushing back out and around the home he found the two doors leading beneath the house, the padlock keeping it shut already unlocked and thrown roughly to the side. Opening one of the doors and rushing in, he was immediately assaulted with a cool musty smell and a dim lighting.

“HEY! Who’s that!”, a rough voice he recognized as Danny, one of his roommates and best friends.

“Danny? It’s me Jim I’m so damn glad you’re alive man!”, he called back as he finished making his way down the stairs and deeper into the cellar. He found Danny there, he was a tall six foot, had short cut black hair, and wore a black dusty shirt and blue jeans.

“Jim! Jim my god man what the hell is going on out there? Have you seen Ash?”, the words poured out of Danny’s mouth.

“No, no, I didn’t see her anywhere, I took a shift at work today and-”, he was cut off.

*DING*

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