Chapter 1:
February 30, 2014
5:42 AM MST
1616 8th Ave NW
Calgary, Alberta, Canada
The meteors were beautiful and terrifying at the same time. There were hundreds, thousands of flaming otherworldly objects hurtling down from the sky, from a red Moon. It resembled Ragnarok and Armageddon in the dreams of the wildest surrealist. I wanted to run, but I couldn’t. I just stood there, transfixed, as the end of the world began.
“Wake up.”
My eyes snapped open, staring straight up at a dark sky. It was drizzling lightly, and that was not a plus. I did not like rain.
Hold on. Why am I outside?
I sat bolt upright, my head turning on a swivel as I took in my surroundings. Instead of lying in bed, I was sprawled in the parking lot outside my apartment building. The modest, four-storey complex had been leveled, reduced to several piles of bricks and twisted girders.
Holy shit. What happened here? Where the hell are my parents?
I was hyperventilating, sweating despite the chilly temperatures and nearly crying-basically going into panic mode-before I pounded the asphalt and gritted my teeth, closing my eyes as well.
Get it together, man. Do not panic. Just take inventory. Who are you?
Inventory. Fine. As my breathing returned to a lower rate, I began to recite my identity to myself. My name is David Song. I am of Asian descent. I was born in New York City and I hold dual citizenship for the US and Canada. I live in Calgary, Alberta. I enjoy playing video games, reading, surfing the web, movies and following hockey. I hate math and social dance.
Okay. That all checks out. Good. At least I’m not a complete amnesiac like Jason Bourne was.
I got to one knee, and then both feet, looking down at myself. I was wearing a familiar-looking camouflage jacket and black camouflage pants. They were familiar, except they felt…larger. I was about five foot ten, and that was taller than I was supposed to be.
Oh come on. You wake up in the parking lot with your house bombed and you wanna to talk to yourself about how tall you’re ‘supposed to be?’ None of this is ‘supposed’ to be happening, now focus!
I ran my hands through my short black hair, took a breath, and thoroughly scanned both my person and my surroundings. My digital watch had been totaled-the screen was smashed and crap was leaking out, so I tossed it aside. So much for getting the date the easy way.
There was a pair of glasses on the ground next to my feet. I tried them on, and they fit reasonably well. A little bit small. However, I noticed that while my vision was perfect without the glasses, with them it became blurred.
Strange. I could have sworn I needed glasses. What the heck-this at least is an upgrade.
The grass, trees and hedges planted around my apartment building had been absolutely killed. Around the lot, a bunch of cars were strewn in various states of decay. Among them I spotted a mangled Honda CR-V. My heart stopped for half a second. That was the family car. But there was no license plate in sight, so I couldn’t be sure the twisted CR-V was my parents’ vehicle or somebody else's.
It’s not my parents’. Mom and Dad are okay. Don’t worry about them, I thought to myself, trying my best to remain calm. The light rain, the wreckage of my home and the nighttime didn’t exactly make it easy to keep a level head, but I had to. Panicking could only get me more screwed than I already was.
The rain had picked up, and I was getting gradually soaked, but I shrugged it off with ease. I mean, if someone wakes up outside when it’s raining and a number of degrees below zero, you’d think they’d be miserable and drained, but I felt like I had been plugged into a battery and fully recharged, and then some. I felt strong. Really strong.
Then I froze as I heard the rustling and shifting of leaves and rocks being disturbed. Squinting, I could make out a dark form loping towards me through the parking lot. And that form did not look human.
Subject: The Doomsday Clock-An Epic Scifi Adventure (PG-13) 
Sat Jan 01, 2011 6:41 pm
