Episode 15 – The Night of Provisions
That same night, the city no longer pretended to sleep.
From Officer Díaz's house, the sounds were impossible to ignore. Distant gunshots echoed between buildings. Screams rose and faded like waves. Fires burned across different parts of the city, painting the low clouds red, as if the sky itself were bleeding light.
Díaz knew what that meant.
The system had collapsed faster than anyone expected.
She checked her weapon, then looked at Eric and the Priest. Neither of them questioned her decision when she said they needed to leave. Staying inside without supplies was a slow death. Water would run out first. Food next. After that, everything else would become irrelevant.
They moved cautiously through the streets. Stores had been looted already, their windows smashed, shelves overturned. People fought openly over bottles of water, over canned food, over anything that could still be carried. Some bodies lay motionless on the sidewalks, ignored by everyone who passed them. Fear had replaced empathy.
A supermarket not far from there still had its metal shutters half intact. Smoke rose from nearby buildings, and the parking lot was full of abandoned cars, doors open, alarms long dead.
At the same time, across the city, Nico had made the same decision.
He could not wait anymore.
With his cousin Tomás, he left the apartment to search for supplies. Communication was almost nonexistent. Government messages came through sporadically, vague and useless. No help was coming. Whatever they needed, they had to take now.
By coincidence, or something else, they reached the same supermarket.
Inside, the air was thick with panic. People moved quickly, grabbing whatever they could. Water disappeared first. Then dry food. Rice, beans, pasta. Anything that could last without refrigeration.
Then the doors burst open.
A gang entered.
Young men, armed, aggressive, confident in the chaos. They spread out immediately, shouting, firing into the air, claiming the store as theirs. One of them grabbed a woman by the arm and dragged her toward the registers, screaming that everything belonged to them now.
Officer Díaz stepped forward.
She did not shout.
She drew her pistol and fired.
Two of the gang members fell before anyone understood what had happened. The sound of the shots echoed through the store, sharp and final.
Eric reacted instantly.
Years in special forces had not left him. When another gang member charged toward Díaz, Eric threw himself at him, slamming him into a shelf. They crashed to the ground. Eric disarmed him with practiced efficiency and seized the weapon—a sawed-off shotgun.
He did not hesitate.
He fired.
Three, maybe four of the gang members went down before the rest panicked. They fled, screaming, abandoning weapons, abandoning control. The store erupted into chaos again, but this time people moved with purpose.
They grabbed supplies.
Water. As much as they could carry. Bottles of liquor—not for drinking, but for disinfection once medicine ran out. Dry food. Beans. Spaghetti. Rice. Anything that could survive weeks.
Tomás was not so lucky.
During the shooting, he had been hit. A bullet tore into his leg. He collapsed near the pharmacy section, bleeding heavily.
Nico screamed for help.
Eric was already there.
He spoke to Nico in Spanish, calm and direct. He had learned the language during missions in Latin America—Central America, Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador. He knew what to do.
They made a tourniquet using fabric and pressure. Stopped the bleeding as best they could. Tomás groaned but stayed conscious.
They moved fast.
Before leaving, they forced their way into the pharmacy. Antibiotics. Painkillers. Bandages. Anything they could reach. The shelves were already half empty, but every item mattered now.
Outside, the night burned.
They loaded what they could into their arms. Police vehicles arrived, sirens cutting through the noise. Díaz helped carry Tomás into one of them. He would need treatment, even if hospitals were overwhelmed.
Around them, the city continued to tear itself apart.
Fires spread unchecked. Gunshots echoed farther away now. Groups moved through the streets like predators. The sky remained red, heavy, watching.
This was no longer survival.
This was adaptation.
And those who failed to adapt would not see another sunrise.
THE SECOND TRUMPET
The trumpet sounded again.
Not once.
Not briefly.
It tore across the sky for long minutes, heavy and absolute, and the effect was immediate.
Movement stopped.
Across the world, people froze where they stood. Cars stalled in the middle of streets. Drivers released the pedals without realizing it. Pedestrians stopped mid-step, bottles of water slipping from their hands, backpacks hanging half-open.
From the poorest alley to the highest penthouse, from crowded highways to empty deserts, every human being stood still, staring upward with the same instinctive certainty.
Something was coming.
Something worse.
Maria Diaz slowed the jeep to a stop without being told to.
Eric felt it before he saw it, the silence pressing against his ears, thick and suffocating.
The Priest crossed himself once, then stopped halfway through the motion, unsure if it still meant anything.
Nico held his injured cousin steady, his hands slick with sweat.
Around them, other cars stopped as well.
Doors opened.
People stepped out.
Everyone looked at the sky.
The trumpet faded.
For one brief, unbearable moment, nothing happened.
Then the clouds changed.
Red bled into the gray, spreading slowly, staining the sky as if the atmosphere itself had been wounded.
The light shifted, no longer natural, deeper, heavier, as if something vast existed behind the clouds and was pressing forward.
Shapes appeared.
At first blurred. Indistinct.
One. Two. Then dozens. Then hundreds.
Figures descended slowly, their silhouettes sharpening with every second. Each one bore two massive wings, folded close to their bodies as they fell. They were enormous. The smallest towered over buildings. Others eclipsed entire intersections, their shadows swallowing streets and rooftops alike.
Screams erupted.
People ran in every direction. Some fired weapons upward in desperation. Bullets vanished against armor that reflected light like polished stone. Others dropped to their knees, hands raised, voices breaking in prayer, apology, bargaining.
The first Creator landed in the street.
The impact crushed parked cars beneath its weight, metal collapsing like paper. Asphalt cracked. Shockwaves rippled outward.
Its armor was sleek, contoured, elegant. Not crude. Not heavy. Segmented plates flowed together as if grown rather than forged, hugging its massive form. The surface shimmered faintly, alive with subtle internal light. A severe helm crowned its head, angular and sharp, framing a face carved with inhuman precision.
Its expression was still.
Perfect.
Cold.
For a moment, it only observed.
Then it smiled.
The transformation was immediate and wrong. The mouth opened wider than any human jaw should allow. Teeth revealed themselves slowly, deliberately. The smile was playful. Curious. Hungry.
It reached down and lifted a man from the street with one hand. The man screamed, kicking uselessly in the air, his voice shredding itself against the chaos. The Creator tilted its head, studying him like an object of interest, then released him without care, already turning toward another cluster of fleeing bodies.
All around the city, others landed.
On rooftops. On plazas. On highways.
Each impact shattered concrete and steel. Some knelt to peer into overturned vehicles. Others lifted cars entirely, shaking them, discarding them when they found nothing alive inside. They crouched, leaned close, sniffed, watched.
They moved with amusement. With curiosity.
This was not battle.
It was harvesting.
Maria shouted for everyone to get back into the jeep.
They barely had time.
As she accelerated, another Creator descended directly in front of them, wielding a massive weapon shaped like a hammer, its surface glowing faintly with contained energy. The strike came without warning.
Metal screamed.
The jeep flipped violently, rolling across the pavement before slamming onto its side.
Nico's cousin was thrown free.
His scream was short.
The Creator stepped toward him, towering, its shadow swallowing everything beneath it. It crouched, lifting him effortlessly, examining his frantic movements with fascination. That same smile returned, wider now, eager.
Nico screamed his name.
Eric grabbed him, dragging him back as Maria fired blindly through the shattered windshield. The bullets sparked uselessly against the armor.
They ran.
They crashed through the broken window of a nearby store, glass exploding inward as they tumbled inside with others already hiding there. People sobbed. Someone vomited. Another whispered prayers that no longer sounded convincing.
Outside, the ground shook with every step.
Creators bent low to peer through storefronts, their massive faces filling shattered windows, eyes scanning the darkness within. Some fogged the glass with their breath. Others simply reached in, tearing metal frames away as if peeling fruit.
Cars were lifted. Shelters were ripped open. Streets became traps.
From inside the store, Eric watched one of them pass the window. Its armor was streaked with ash and soot, glowing faintly red beneath the surface. One massive hand dragged along the pavement, carving deep grooves into the stone.
Above them, more descended.
This was only the beginning.
The Creators did not hurry.
They did not shout commands.
They did not need to.
They were not angry.
They were entertained.
And as the sky burned red and the world screamed beneath them, one truth became clear to those still alive:
The trumpet had not been a warning.
It had been permission.