Harrison shuffles through the radio stations looking for something to listen to, but every broadcast is talking about the riots. It's the summer of 2020 all over again.

"Fucking Social Justice Warriors and their agen-" His comment is interrupted by a fit of violent coughing. His chest tightens up and for a moment he can't breathe. "We don't need these mandates, man," he shouts at the radio. He looks at the surgical mask in his passenger seat and scoffs. "Fuck you."

He hears the screeching of tires and looks up in time to jam on his own breaks.

Sliding. Screeching. Impact. His seatbelt constricts then the steering wheel explodes. The airbag punches him in the face and everything goes dark.

Who's leaning on that horn? Is that smoke? I smell smoke.

"Something's burning?" Harrison moans as he opens his eyes.

Everything is blurry. He tries to take a deep breath and breaks into a fit of violent coughing, his body fighting against the restraints of his seat belt.

"I can't... can't fucking breathe."

Snatching the seatbelt off, he pulls the door handle and spills out of his Toyota. Gravel and glass pepper his face as he lay on the cold asphalt. His chest heaves as he sucks in sweet sweet air. A bout of dizziness rolls over him, making the world a twirling collage of car lights and broken glass.

What. The. Fuck.

Pushing off the ground, his arms shake and blood drips from his forehead. The dizziness returns as he gets to his knees. Closing his eyes against the tilting images, he recognizes the screams for the first time.

Opening his eyes, he tries to get his bearings.

Still on the bridge... My car is totaled. Fuck. I'm gonna kill this guy... wait. What the fuck is this shit?

The car ahead of him is smashed against a wall of red stone, it's driver a smear of blood and guts. Should have been wearing a seatbelt, asshole.

"Sir, are you okay?" a young Asian kid asks.

Harrison studies the kid. Jeans, striped polo, baseball cap, converse sneakers. He lets the kid help him to his feet then pulls his hand away.

"Is he okay?" shouts a woman about twenty feet away. She leans heavily on another little Asian brat. She says something in their language, Harrison doesn't understand and he shakes his head.

"Sir, you're bleeding."

"I'll be fine," Harrison grumbles. He's no fan of kids or... well he's no fan of anyone really.

"My mother says we need to get off the bridge before it collapses like the other one."

Harrison looks in the direction the kid is pointing and nearly shits his pants. The Brooklyn Bridge is in shambles. The towers still stand, but the deck or what's left of it dangles in the water in shambles. The river churns with cars and debris. Emergency lights flash on either side of what's left of the bridge. In the water is a huge claw-shaped red structure, pulsating, slowly.

"This can't be happening."

"Sir, come. We have to go."

The young man takes off and Harrison just stands there, stupefied.

After a moment, he walks over to his smoking car and reaches over the driver's seat for his backpack. His ears start ringing and he goes deaf to everything else. He gets out of the smoky car and sticks his finger in his ear, jingling it as he gets as deep as he can. He pulls the finger out with a pop and it seems to have done the trick.

Harrison looks around, trying to get his bearing. There is smoke everywhere. People are running and screaming. The sound is muffled and he can still hear the ringing.

The bridge shakes and fissures crawl along the asphalt. Harrison backs away as his car dips. A section of the road glows, like a pool of molten metal. A hand emerges followed by another hand gripping a huge axe. He continues to back away as horns rise up attached to a slightly sloped forehead.

What is this, some Harry Potter and The Fellowship of Narnia bullshit?

Not willing to find out, Harrison takes off. Running through the smoke, he sees shapes and shadows pass him by, but he can barely hear anything. He pulls in air and it sears like fire. Coughing violently, Harrison stumbles blindly into a chain link fence. He grips it to keep from falling until his coughing fit subsides. The ringing returns while he clings desperately.

His hearing comes back as a train rushes past, filling his ears with a symphony of screeching metal and terrified straphangers. Harrison watches in stunned horror as fire fills the train cars. Inside people struggle in vain to pry the doors open and get away from the hungry flames. The heat is enough to burn his hand. Snatching it away, he moves away from the red glow pulsing through the smoke.

"Sir! Sir, this way!" shouts a familiar voice as the smoke thins.

The kid waves him over. The two Asian boys stand beside a Buick. Their mother sits in the driver seat, holding her head. Harrison staggers toward them, his chest burning for need of a deep breath. The kid hurries over to him.

"Something hit my mother in the head... I think she's too dizzy to drive." He pulls Harrison by the arm. The kid says something to the little woman in their language.

His mother nods slowly.

"Hawk!" the smaller boy shouts.

Harrison and the kid look in the direction of the boy's shaking finger. Out of the smoke emerges a massive form. Barrel-chested, with red skin and two massive bull's horns, the man had to be seven feet tall. At his side he drags a huge sledge hammer. As Harrison backs away, a second then a third appears. Between them skitters a wide cage walking on pointed metallic insect legs.

A glimpse of the unconscious bodies within triggers something inside of Harrison, something primal. He runs to the car and grabs the Asian woman by the shoulders. She points at the steering wheel, squawking in her language. With a shake of his head, he tosses her aside and jumps in. Putting the car in drive, he slams the door closed.

The look of shock in her eyes as she falls to the ground makes him sneer.

Better you than me.

He takes off, scraping an abandoned car as he squeezes past. Through the rearview mirror, he sees one of the red minotaur men grab a guy by the hair and split him in half with a savage swing of an axe. He puts his weight on the gas pedal, giving the engine all that he's got. Smoking cars, bewildered people. A pickup swings out in front of him and Harrison swerves. Dizziness hits a moment before he loses control of the car. His head hits the wheel as the car hits a side beam.

...

Harrison jolts awake to the sound of people running. It all comes back to him in a flash. The bridge, the crash, the monsters. Horned red monsters are everywhere.

A female with huge muscular arms and a single horn in the middle of her head drags a group of women behind her, two in each massive hand.

One of the horned men backhands a woman, sending her flying, then snatches her companion from their car. When the man struggles the minotaur headbutts him, knocking him senseless.

The air echoes with gunfire as a cop shoots one of the monsters in the chest at point blank range. The beast stumbles back then charges forward, goring the cop on its huge bull horns.

Terrified, Harrison tries to get free, but his seat has him pinned to the dashboard. Strangely, it doesn't hurt that much, but the more he pushes against the car the more he realizes he needs help. Thankfully help limps by. The Asian kid, Hawk, and his family.

"Help!" Harrison works his hand free and honks the horn. His ears ring before he goes deaf again. "Help me, please," he pleads.

The kid looks at him like he's a piece of shit and, honestly, he is one. The mother moves to help, but her sons are smarter than she is. They pull her away as the bridge continues to turn into something straight out of a horror movie. He honks his horn again, but Harrison gets it. Deep down he knows he would have left him too.

His hearing returns as a huge head leans in and grins at him. The red man growls something in a gravely foreign language and tears the door off the car. Harrison squirms, but he's pinned and can't move. The red man grabs his shoulder and tugs, sending ripples of pain through Harrison's body.

"I'm stuck, you sonofabitch," he cries.

The minotaur glares, then tries again. Excruciating pain lances through his knees just before something pops and he comes free. Harrison flops to the floor, his legs screaming. Rolling onto his back he looks up at the sky, the stars obscured by pillars of smoke. Two of the horned men step into view.

"What is he," one grumbles, a red monster with a crown of spikes around his head. "Food-"

"I'm a human, you piece of shit." The pain is so bad, Harrison pisses himself. "Fuck."

"Food or meat."

The second minotaur smirks. "I say we use him as meat, then food."

The two monsters chuckle as Harrison tries to crawl away. Every inch is agony as he wriggles along the asphalt. He only gets a few feet before a coughing fit hits again.

A rough hand grabs the back of his neck and lifts Harrison into the air. Legs dangling, he struggles, each toss and turn causing more agonizing pain to his knees. Exhausted, he stops fighting and just hangs. He looks out as more walking cages and horned men chase people to the Brooklyn side of the Manhattan Bridge. Downtown has gone dark, the buildings dark silhouettes in the night. The city has gone dark.

Harrison coughs and he feels his chest tearing on the inside. Each breath is like sucking in shards of glass.

I'm fucking dying.

He sobs, hot tears streaming down his cheeks.

The creature brings Harrison close to its chest and takes a deep breath. "He's scared." It licks his cheek, lapping up the spilt tears. "I like it when they're scared and squirming."