Al Mastro

Chapter 1 - "Bad Night"

It is said that crime doesn't pay.

Well in this city it pays and it pays abundantly. Ever since the end of the heroic age, the resistance against crime had crippled, leading must cities into terror and worst out of all, was splash city. The once dream city deteriorated into a place where criminals can sow weed and reap wine out of it.

I hadn't the brain to remember the peaceful days, before the world lost its preterhuman's, before the invasion. Being a 5 year old, things like that didn't find room in my mind. But I've heard stories after stories and I've seen video's posted on social network of those so called preterhuman's doing things every other person could only dream of, like SpectcularMike. Still one of the top most followed social media pages, receiving over half a Billion views on each of his videos, just for posting videos of him; going into a street, crouching, rising his hands up in the sky as though he was doing a praise the sun gesture and lifting up all objects within that street. Sometimes he'd swap their position and you would see vehicle owner's getting confused.

The internet was filled with that kind of data, some preterhuman's decided to use their powers to gain fame and fortune through apps, videos and other means. Even though hearing about them or watching their work provided entertainment and hope, it still never failed to leave me feeling sympathetic for they were gone, obliterated by a force that had no intention of extending mercy to them, not even to those who didn't fight against them. They didn't even get a proper burial, some of them weren't even found. Probably were burned to ashes or were drifting dead in space (hope you see the hidden reference). I guess that's what probably happened to Victorious, the only preterhuman to have been recorded dying. Making it the most viewed video ever. Now that video always managed to change the sympathetic feelings into fear.

The way he went up into the sky with his head tilted up and his chest puffed with the bottom part of his violent cape flapping as the top half remained still as it was wrapped by a single thin gold bracelet at the middle allowing glimpses of his hip to radiate its galactic glow. The scene captured the essence of a true protector, it showed a being that held the safety of the world on his shoulder while the faith and hope of the people radiated on his chest. Vanishing Into the cloudy sky, no one could have ever predicted that this magical being would be returning in a ball of fire a few hours later.

Nobody knows where victorious hit, some say he fell into the sea, others say he hit Mount McKinley. It doesn't matter, what matters is this; whoever these invaders were and whatever they were armed with, they were beyond us.

Contemplating about the invaders is beyond me, I should stoop down to something my level like a dark, scary tunnel I'll need to go through, bad idea what else do I have.

"Damn" I mumbled while looking down onto my watch strapped on my wrist. 11:24 pm, "Shit! Shit! Shit!.." I thought. My first time coming home late usually I'd resort to ending my job hunt 30 minutes before sunset. It was safer as the tunnel would be swarming with people. But these days, it was hard to get work so I allowed a little Intel seduce me to stay for a night job. Another bad idea, again I know. But it was a good pay and a necessary one.

"Welcome to the LitNick District" I snorted reading the illuminating billboard, held up by two black colossal muscular statues standing on each side of a massive tunnel. The entrance to my district, the LitNick district; the foundation of the future it was called, apartments connected together through sky bridges resembling a wire panel when viewed from the top, with a huge tower reaching all the way to the clouds standing at the center completely covered from top to bottom with reinforced glass supposedly the strongest glass ever reinforced able to withstand strikes of lightning as was the tower's purpose.

This district was supposed to be the new found light that would revolutionize the energy industry. it was a project might to absorb the lightning energy, converting it into electricity. it was also intended to be a gift to the less fortunate providing them with cheap electricity and rent. But due to the change in global leadership, things didn't go as planned and it turned into the complete opposite, a nightmare for the poor and a sanctuary for the cruel, at least the rent remained cheap.