THE ALGORITHM OF SURVIVAL: Avenger Jasper

The sky didn't crack with thunder, it tore open in silence and then the world seemed normal as usual. If I said the Morning came like any other day that was the lie. As Jasper stepped out of the armored SUV just as the early sun stretched across the skyline of New Avalon. The city glittered. His journey had taken him far into remote lands, hidden facilities, and quiet confirmations of fears he couldn't yet explain to anyone but now he was back and something felt... wrong as if the air itself was waiting. Anthony leaned against the hood of a nearby car, with his arms crossed.

"You look like hell," he said.

Jasper adjusted his jacket slightly. "You always know how to welcome people back."

Anthony smirked, but it didn't reach his eyes.

"You disappeared for days with no details or calls. Just gone."

"I needed answers."

"And did you get them?"

Jasper paused.

"...Not enough."

Anthony studied him and that was all he needed to hear. Miles away, in a high-rise apartment washed in soft morning light, Stacy moved through her routine, brewing coffe with the curtains open a the city view stretching endlessly. She placed a hand on the glass, watching people below with cars flowing like veins of motion. She exhaled slowly. Jasper had returned but something about him yesterday...It lingered. Her phone buzzed.

A message from him:

"We need to talk tonight."

She frowned slightly, not the usual tone?

It felt... final.

It started as a flicker, high above the atmosphere. Invisible to the naked eye but not to satellites or to the systems that were already watching. Something had entered the Earth's orbit too fast with no warning systems being activated because whatever this was, it didn't register as a threat not until it was too late. Jasper was mid-conversation when it happened, he felt a subtle vibration, Something deeper and he stopped speaking.

"So the land deal..." the executive began.

"Stop," Jasper said quietly.

The man blinked. "Sir?"

Jasper's eyes lifted slowly toward the massive glass windows. The sky was blue and really clear but he felt his chest tightened. Anthony noticed immediately.

"What is it?"

Jasper didn't answer.

Because in that moment the light changed. 

It happened in a single heartbeat, a streak of white tore across the sky and then it expanded brighter and hotter, quite unnatural. People began to notice as phones were lifted and voices rising.

"What is that...?"

The streak became a fireball quite massive, descending and then the world turned white. The explosion didn't sound like a bomb, it sounded like the planet itself breaking, a blinding flash swallowed the skyline and then BOOM!

The shockwave hit like a god's fist as glass shattered instantly and buildings trembled, Cars flipped and People were thrown like ragdolls. Jasper was slammed backward as the windows behind him exploded inward, shards slicing through the air.

Anthony grabbed him, dragging him down.

"GET DOWN!"

The floor cracked and ceiling lights burst, screams filled the room and outside there was fire everywhere. Stacy never saw the fireball only the light. It flooded her apartment, brighter than the sun as she turned instinctively and then the window exploded. The shockwave tore through her living room, sending furniture crashing, glass slicing through the air. She hit the ground hard, her ears ringing violently and then everything went silent. As if the world had been muted, she tried to breathe as she coughed. Smoke already filling the space.

"What... what just happened..."

Her voice trembled and then a second sound which was distant rumbled and grew louder. It wasn't just one as streaks tore across the sky with multiple fireballs at different locations and then city began to collapse. Dust choked the air as offices was barely recognizable, half of the wall was gone with fire spreading and people being injured, some were not moving. As Jasper pushed himself up, blood was running down his forehead. Anthony was already on his feet.

"We need to move. NOW."

Jasper staggered slightly, then steadied.

His mind was racing. "This wasn't random," he said.

Anthony grabbed his arm. "Jasper, this is not the time..."

"Multiple fireballs at different angles with no warning systems triggered."

Anthony stared at him.

"You're analyzing the apocalypse?"

"I'm understanding it."

Another explosion echoed in the distance quite closer. The building shook violently and that decided it, Anthony pulled him toward the exit.

"Understand it outside. MOVE!"

They burst out into chaos and the world Jasper once controlled... was gone as cars burned and buildings collapsed. People ran in every direction, some were screaming, some were bleeding and some frozen in shock. The sky was still burning with more fire streaks and destruction. A woman clutched a child, crying for help and a man stumbled past, covered in ash as sirens wailed and then cut off abruptly. Jasper helped a little boy got out from a debris as he cried for help. Systems failed and order collapsed and Jasper turned in a slow circle. This...This was it.

As Stacy fought to survive smoke filled the apartment rapidly. Stacy crawled toward the door, coughing violently. Her hands trembled, but her mind was sharpened. She reached the hallway only to find it partially collapsed with fire spreading fast and people shouting and panic everywhere.

"Help! HELP!"

A neighbor trapped under debris. Stacy hesitated as fear gripped her chest and then she moved because that's who she was. Anthony scanned everything instantly. Threats, exits and survivors.

"Car's gone," he muttered. "Road's were blocked."

Jasper looked toward the horizon and saw smoke pillars rising in multiple places.

"This is happening everywhere."

Anthony grabbed his shoulder.

"Then we survive everywhere."

Another explosion came too close and the ground trembled violently. Jasper's eyes widened slightly.

"Run."

The second major impact hit near the city's edge and the shockwave tore through everything and buildings collapsed like paper. The street beneath them cracked open. Anthony shoved Jasper forward just as debris rained down. They sprinted barely outrunning destruction itself and behind them new Avalon died. Jasper reached for his phone and there was no signal, nothing, it was dead. He looked toward the burning skyline and somewhere out there he thought of Stacy. His jaw tightened for the first time, fear broke through not for himself but for her. The sky continued to burn. The world continued to fall and in the space between fire and ash, three lives were pulled apart...

...just as survival became the only thing that mattered