The clouds parted and the sky lit up as a pillar of light pierced the night, blasting skyward from the shoreline and sparking frenzy and fright.
For the briefest of moments, it was an Inverse Eclipse, where the middle of the night was as bright as day.
And at the epicentre of that blast was a man. Young, early twenties by the eldest estimates, covered in sand and drenched in water. He wore a full-body wetsuit, and was equipped with a fair heft of Scuba Equipment; by all appearances, he was a diver that had washed up on shore.
The man's eyes were shut, and his chest was still - A passerby could even be tricked into thinking he had drowned, in spite of the total absence of water in his lungs.
He lay there for a while, between life and death, bathed in unnatural light. But eventually, of course, this delicate balance was broken, as his eyes fluttered open and his lungs began to inflate.
As the light dissipated, he stared skyward at the midnight moon through hazy eyes, unmoving. How odd. He could've sworn it was only reaching Noon when he went underwater, and...
And when the bomb fell. His memories were fuzzy, thanks to him having woken mere moments ago, but the last of them he could remember with shocking clarity.
He was diving off a boat with friends - they were at the reef, he was certain. The ground shook, as a shockwave swept through the sea, carrying with it the heat of a flame and the splinters of a broken vessel.
He had fled. The surface was covered in flaming oil, so he swam down. Took refuge in a cave. There was something else in there; something that shouldn't have been there, or likely anywhere. He had touched it, and his world had gone dark. He could've sworn he died.
So, if his last known position was in a cave under a reef, possibly dead, then how did he get here? In fact, where was 'here'? If the moon was any indicator, he'd been out for a while, and if that were the case, he could reasonably be just about anywhere; but a glance at his air gauge showed his tank was just as full as when he touched the... whatever it was, so he couldn't have been underwater for very long. How perplexing.
Shaking his head, he clambered to his feet, spurred to movement by a drive to figure out his location. If he couldn't deduce the answer from his present knowledge, then clearly the next step was to broaden that knowledge.
He decided to search for any defining landmarks, first. There were short, rocky walls piled up either side of the sand, but that was the only clearly artificial marking upon the landscape; before him was merely an expanse of water, to his left and right were sandy patches of grass, and behind him was...
...well, the next place to check, of course. A grassy, mostly flat area, sprinkled with trees that got more plentiful and tightly packed the further from the inlet he searched. Eventually, it was more a forest than a grassland, and yet he still couldn't find a single defining feature of the landscape. No obelisks or buildings, no farms or... vegetation. At all. Actually, the more he looked, the more he realised that the grass and trees were the only living things around him. There were no birds, no bugs, no flowers, bushes, nor fallen leaves.
Too late, he realised that something was wrong. And too late, he realised that the cause was still there.
At first, it hid in his peripherals. He perceived it, he knew there was something, but he mostly passed it off as a trick of the light. It was well-camouflaged under the cover of night, after all. It wasn't until he noticed it stumbling slightly to maintain its place in his peripherals, that he realised it was actually there at all; and when he turned to look at it fully, armed with the knowledge there was something to look at at all, it didn't bother hiding again.
Its inky form rested on the ground, nestled between the densely-packed trees. He didn't move, and neither did it, and it seemed they were at a stalemate.
It wasn't until the mass of pitch revealed its beady white eyes that he took a step back, and it wasn't until it revealed its wide, thin, grinning mouth that he started to run.
He didn't know what it was, but something about that amorphous blackness terrified him. Maybe it was how easily it hid from him, or how fast it could move. Maybe it was those pinpricks of white that pierced his soul. Maybe it was that massive, smiling mouth, filled with human teeth. Whatever it was, it shook him to the core.
He ran, and he ran, for a whole three seconds. It let him run for three seconds. In the blink of an eye, it leapt upon him, knocking him to the ground with a shout of pain as its sticky mass stuck to the back of his wetsuit, pinning him to the ground.
It didn't attack further, thankfully. If it had, it could have killed him with ease, but it seemed to be having far too much fun messing with him to do that. It was enjoying the moment, holding down its latest catch, bathing in his fear after stalking him through its hunting ground, when a burst of energy ripped it from his back and sent it rolling off into the treeline.
He, too, was rolled onto his back by the sudden movement, though went nowhere near as far as his assailant. Too shocked to move, and feeling oddly legarthic, he stared at the moon once more in an all-too familiar position, as a person stepped into view.
Wordlessly, they punched into the air, their metal-covered fists stopping dead mid-swing as if hitting bricks. The mass returned into view, leaping through the air with deadly speed, before flying back once more - as if hit by the stranger's punches from afar.
"Hm. They're getting stronger. I didn't know Nenr'a could create photon surges like that."
The stranger spoke with an odd accent, and a soft voice, but the man wasn't paying attention. If he had been, he'd certainly be asking more questions than he already was, but as it were he was too busy watching their silver hair swaying rhythmically in a breeze that wasn't there.
They looked at him, a gentle smile forming on their face. He couldn't be certain if it was a trick of the light, or if their pupils were just dilated because of the darkness, but as he gazed into their eyes, he could've sworn their retinas were black.
"Need some help?" They asked, reaching out a hand to help him up.
He nodded slowly, breaking eye contact and reaching up to grab their arm. He hadn't done anything but walk and fall, and yet he felt strangely tired.
They hoisted him to his feet, their slim arms hiding an unexpected strength, and held firmly to his arm as he almost fell back over.
They chuckled. He chuckled back, wearily.
"C'mon. I'll take you to the safe house, alright? AmeNenr'a is persistent, but even it won't follow you there." They said, calmly. He nodded, half-hearing their words, as his consciousness gave way once more to an unnatural sleep.