Chapter two: Shooting the Apocalypse. Great plan.

“WEAPONS FREE!”

The order ripped through the radio chatter and the world answered with thunder.

Maya hit the dirt before her brain caught up. Fifty rifles opened fire at once. The sound wasn’t individual shots. It was one solid wall of noise that punched her in the chest and turned her thoughts to static. Brass casings hit the asphalt around her like metal rain. Muzzle flashes strobed the street, turning the afternoon into a broken flipbook.

In the crater, Derek didn’t flinch.

Maya lifted her head just enough to see. Bullets hit him. She saw them. Saw the little sparks, the puffs of dust off his bare skin, his chest, his cheek. They struck and flattened and fell. He might as well have been standing in heavy rain.

He tilted his head. Confusion first. Then irritation. Like a man trying to swat flies he couldn’t actually feel but knew were there.

“Cease fire!” someone screamed to her left. A lieutenant, maybe. His voice was already hoarse. “It’s not affecting—”

The rocket launcher answered instead.

_WHOOMP._

The recoil blew two soldiers off their feet. The rocket crossed the distance in under a second and hit Derek dead center.

The world went white.

Heat slammed Maya’s back. The shockwave picked her up and threw her three feet sideways into the side of a police truck. Her ears rang so hard she couldn’t hear her own gasp. The air tasted like burnt chemicals and melted plastic.

For five seconds, the crater was nothing but fire and smoke. A column of black and orange that ate the sky again. Car alarms that had survived the first shockwave gave up and died.

“Hold fire,” the lieutenant yelled. “Hold—”

The fire peeled back.

Derek stood up.

No burns. No blood. Not even dirt. The only change was his expression. The confusion was gone. The irritation had sharpened into something colder.

Now he was just mad.

The police line took a collective step back. You could feel it. Fifty trained soldiers all remembering they were made of meat.

“Target is unharmed,” the soldier closest to Maya yelled into his radio. His voice cracked halfway through. “I repeat, target is unharmed. No visible effect. All small arms ineffective. RPG negative effect.”

Derek looked at him.

The soldier didn’t finish his transmission. He just dropped. Like someone cut the strings holding him up. No impact. No wound. His radio clattered to the ground, still squawking. His eyes were open, staring, and completely empty.

“Man down!”

“Move! Move! Fall back to secondary!”

The line broke. Discipline shattered into panic. Soldiers scrambled back, two of them dragging their unconscious buddy by the vest. Boots scraped asphalt. Someone tripped and didn’t get back up.

Then the heavy stuff arrived.

Tanks rolled in from the side streets, treads chewing through pavement and leaving scars. Turrets swiveled, hunting for a lock. Helicopters cut across the sky above, blades chopping the air into panic. The downdraft from them threw dust and trash into Maya’s face.

Derek watched all of it. White eyes tracking every vehicle, every movement, every new gun pointed at him. He wasn’t attacking. He was cataloging. Learning what these insects considered overwhelming force.

Then he looked past the tanks. Past the helicopters. Past the hundred rifles that had just been reloaded with shaking hands.

Straight at Maya.

And started walking again.

Each step cracked the ground deeper. Fractures ran from his feet like lightning frozen in stone. The air around him went cold enough that Maya’s breath fogged on exhale. The police barriers didn’t just bend away from him. They screamed. Metal twisting, bolts shearing, the sound of physics filing a complaint.

“All units, fall back to secondary! Fall back!”

Maya didn’t run. She wanted to. Her survival instinct was throwing a tantrum and banging on the walls. But her legs had filed for resignation and weren’t taking new orders.

She just stood there, staring, while an ancient extinction event in the shape of a man walked toward her like she was the only real thing on the street.

A helicopter swung low. The minigun under its nose spun up with a high-pitched whine that made her fillings ache.

_BRRRRRT._

The street in front of Derek ceased to exist.

Concrete exploded. Asphalt turned to shrapnel. Chunks the size of cars launched into the air. The minigun walked its fire toward him, carving a trench through the world.

One of those chunks, a slab of building with rebar sticking out like broken bones, tumbled end over end straight for Maya.

She saw it coming. Had exactly enough time to think _well, this is a dumb way to die. Mom’s gonna be mad about the shoes_ and nothing else.

Then Derek was there.

He didn’t run. He didn’t blur. He was just suddenly between her and the rubble. One moment fifty feet away, the next moment close enough that she could see dust clinging to his eyelashes. If he had eyelashes. It was hard to tell with the glow.

One hand came up. Not fast. Not strained. Just up. Like he was asking a stupid question to stop.

The concrete hit his palm and stopped. Dead. No impact. No rebound. One ton of building met the concept of _no_ and lost.

Dust rolled off his shoulders in waves. The rebar bent around his fingers, metal screaming as it deformed. The rest of the slab hung there, cradled in his hand like it weighed nothing.

The minigun kept firing. Rounds sparked off his back and did nothing. He didn’t notice.

He turned his head and looked down at Maya. White eyes reflecting her wide, stunned face back at her. No pupil. No emotion she could read. Just light.

For three seconds, neither of them moved. The gunfire kept going. The helicopters kept screaming. The world kept trying to end. But in that bubble of cold air and dust, it was quiet.

Derek opened his mouth. When he spoke, his voice was like stone grinding in the deep earth. Ancient and wrong and used to being obeyed. Every word had weight.

“You,” he said. “Why did you not run?”

The language wasn’t English. It wasn’t anything human. But Maya understood it anyway. It bypassed her ears and printed itself directly into her brain.

Her brain rebooted. The adrenaline dumped. The fear got bored, packed up, and left. All that was left was her, and the sheer absurdity of the situation.

She looked at the hand still holding a ton of building over her head like an umbrella. Looked at his face, which was currently the most dangerous thing on the planet. Looked past him at the army shooting at him and achieving nothing except property damage.

Then she sighed. Loud, put-upon, and completely exhausted with today.

“Great,” Maya said, gesturing at the rubble. “You’re strong _and_ you catch. My mom’s gonna want you to help with groceries. You free Thursday?”