The ground cracked. Glass rained down. The roar that followed wasn't just loud, it was primal, like the planet itself had decided to scream a big f*ck-you at Harlem specifically.
'No…'
Ethan froze mid-step, eyes darting to the plume of dust and debris curling into the air just a few blocks over.
''Nope, not happening.' He shook his head in denial, at least in his mind, his body was too busy freaking out to cooperate.
He didn't even need to see them to know.
Hulk. Abomination.
His breath caught in his throat.
His first thought was nope.
Whatever cosmic die-roll had landed him in this cursed crossover of a universe, he wasn't about to test his luck against kaiju-sized meatheads with a pension for property damage.
Even if he had gear in his bag. Even if his reserves were full.
This wasn't his fight.
It never had been.
Gwen's hand was still in his, tight, grounding and warm, but for once, he wasn't enjoying it. Her face had gone pale, blue eyes wide, the kind of scared that didn't scream but trembled.
She looked like she wanted to help, or scream, or maybe both. Her instinct was compassion. His was survival.
Ethan scanned the wreckage. Buildings down. Cars overturned. Civilians already injured. Fire and chaos bleeding into the street like ink on paper. He tightened his grip on her wrist.
"We need to go. Now."
He didn't wait for an answer.
They ran.
He didn't think. Just dodged. Pulled. Braced. Got out of the blast zone. There was screaming, close and raw, and it clung to his ears like humidity.
Men, women and those two monsters reminding him of his place in the food chain.
They almost made it out. Almost.
A shriek snapped his focus. A kid, no older than five, standing frozen beneath a swaying utility pole. The base had cracked. It was going to fall.
Ethan didn't think. Couldn't think.
He moved.
No powers. No finesse. Just raw speed. He vaulted the cracked sidewalk, nearly lost a shoe, slammed into the kid with just enough force to lift him off the ground. Scooped him up like luggage.
A hand shot out and grabbed Gwen too, yanking her clear just as the pole slammed down behind them with an explosion of concrete.
The kid screamed in his arms. Not because he was hurt, but because he was crying for something else.
"—my dad! My dad's still there! You have to go back!"
'Hell no I don't, I ain't superman! Your daddy is your problem!' He wanted to shout back, but knew it was probably not a good idea.
"Your daddy's fine, I'll get him later!" He lied through his teeth, but it seemed to work, somewhat, the kid was still crying his eyes out but no longer trying to punch himself free.
Ethan blinked, chest heaving.
The street was chaotic, even for Harlem. Gwen was stunned. Fire licked the edge of a ruined awning. Sirens were somewhere far off, but not here yet.
He looked down at the kid, then to Gwen.
His heart pounded.
He had gear in his bag. Enough to mask his identity. He had power. Enough to save some. Not all.
This wasn't like the hangar job. These weren't coke dealers. This was real, mess up and you die, no reward waiting at the end of the tunnel.
He could run. No one would blame him.
But the kid was still crying.
And Ethan hated that sound.
Maybe he should knock him out? It works in the anime he watched, then the kid would swear bloody vengeance on the titans and destroy the world…
The closer they got to the red blur of sirens, the less sure Ethan was of anything. His lungs burned. His heartbeat jackhammered. Gwen's fingers were like iron around his wrist, and the kid—a small boy with an awful bowl cut and one shoe—was a deadweight in his arm, still bawling like the world had ended.
Which, to be fair, it kind of had.
By the time they reached the first overwhelmed firefighter waving panicked civilians away from the smoke-choked street, Ethan's legs were aching. His boots skidded on broken glass, and the smell of smoke, oil, and dust was getting thicker.
"This is as far as we go," he told Gwen, setting the boy down.
The child immediately latched onto his leg.
"Where's my daddy?" the kid hiccupped through tears. "You said—You said—!"
Ethan crouched and tried not to wince at the way Gwen's wide, glassy eyes flicked from the kid to him. "I'll find him," Ethan said, low and steady. "Promise."
'What the heck am I saying?!' His inner self was ripping its hairs out.
The kid sniffled, hesitated, then nodded. Just barely.
"Or what's left of him," a corner of Ethan's mind muttered. He shut that voice up real fast, there was no need to tell a child his dad was most likely a krabby patty.
He turned to Gwen, brushing dust from her cheek with a thumb.
"Stay here, I'll be back soon." He grunted, hating himself for the bullshit he was pulling.
"You're not seriously going back out there," she said, but she already knew the answer.
'Of course not, I'm going home with you and we'll have hot chocolate with marshmallows in it while watching Friends.' Was what he wanted to say.
"I got to," He cursed himself for saying it, knowing he was going to regret it dearly.
But there was only so much screaming, begging and sheer despair someone could tolerate before doing something to help.
Gwen looked like she wanted to argue. Maybe punch him. Maybe hug him. She did neither.
Instead, she nodded. Just barely.
He ran, like a white cop named Mike was behind him and feeling threatened.
The mess was worse the second time. Now that he wasn't focused on Gwen or the kid, he had the luxury of seeing.
A man pinned under a car, screaming and struggling to crawl out from under its crumpled chassis. A woman clutching her leg, caught under a bent traffic light. A teenager with blood on her face pulling a younger sibling from a shop with caved-in walls.
So he acted, telekinesis applied all over his body to secure his own life, like a cushion of force repulsing most things or at least slowing them down.
A psionic barrier of sorts.
He gripped the car, the most urgent issue, and lifted it with all his strength–of course cheating like only a mutant could, it creaked and groaned for only five second it took for the man to crawl out of there.
"Thank you! Thank you so much–" He didn't stay to hear the man's words, rushing to help the teenager get her sibling out of the shop and picking up the woman which he promptly handed to the stranger, sending all four where he guessed help would come.
As far away from the roars as possible.
The world blurred around him, burning rubber, panicked shouting, far-off sirens, too many people and not enough time.
He helped as much as he could, but the screams just kept going, the amount of corpses increasing.
He kept telling himself to leave. That Gwen was safe now. That he'd done enough. That no one would blame him if he just... stopped, did the reasonable thing like always preached.
But he didn't.
Because somewhere between lifting the fifth person from a heap of concrete and shielding a mother from flying glass, Ethan Cain had come to a reluctant, almost irritating conclusion:
He wasn't complete trash.
Just partial trash.
. . .
Ten minutes in and he was already sweating through his clothes. His fingers shook, not from fear, but from strain, constant use of his power, tiny calibrations.
At least he was getting better at this, the psionic enhancement of his physical capabilities, done without putting a target on his back.
Holding a beam steady here. Shoving a car off someone there. Slowing a crumbling wall just enough for people to escape.
But Ethan Cain was running on fumes.
He ducked into an alley strewn with trash and fire escape ladders. Behind a rusting dumpster, he pulled the drawstring of the sports bag he'd lugged from the Harlem storage unit earlier that day.
He cleared the area of witnesses, except for a couple dead men, but they wouldn't snitch.
It was time.
The gear wasn't a costume. It was a toolset. Armored weave, minimalistic design, padding in the right spots, and hidden plates in the jacket lining.
He pulled the compression undersuit on, clicked the bracers into place, and rolled the heavy mask down over his face.
Now he was just the guy with gloves and telekinesis, dressed like he was ready to survive a killer zombie outbreak.
And that guy?
That guy went back in.
This time, he was a ghost.
He stopped a support beam from pancaking a dozen people by anchoring it mid-fall with brute-force telekinesis, felt the weight drag at his chest like an anchor through molasses.
He shielded two behind a mail truck by yanking a fallen billboard into place, forming a makeshift barricade.
Someone screamed. Someone thanked him. He didn't stop.
A man was bleeding out, pinned between two vehicles. He couldn't reach the wound, but Ethan could split the car apart with two firm pulses, exposing the crushed metal. EMTs pulled the man out and shouted something he didn't hear. He was already gone.
He caught a falling fire escape before it crushed a group of teens, snapping its bolts loose and guiding it to the ground with shaking hands.
Half his reserves, gone.
The ache was deep now. The type that wasn't just fatigue, it was strain. Micro-tears in muscle. Overextension. Burnout.
He was becoming hyper aware of the empty space that didn't quite exist, the one that should be brimming with energy that would make every scientist cream himself like a weeb at Comic-Con.
His head pounded. He was starting to lose precision.
"Time to go," the logical part of him whispered, and for once the illogical part agreed too.
We did more than enough!
But the world didn't care about his fatigue.
A deafening crash, like the city was splitting in two, echoed down the street.
And then came the roar.
So loud it rattled cracked windows. So deep it made his bones hum.
He turned.
Down the street, a bus flew through the air and obliterated a parked SUV.
And then…
They emerged.
Massive. Towering. Green and beige mountains of raw muscle and hatred. The Hulk, and his equal—or worse—the Abomination, each one bigger than he'd ever seen in comics or movies.
Each punch they traded sent shockwaves through the concrete, collapsing balconies and shattering windows with sheer force.
They didn't see him.
They didn't care.
But they were coming his way.
And Ethan stood in the middle of the street, aching, panting, telekinesis flickering at his fingertips.
"I should've gone home," He said through his mask, and once more added 'voice modifier' to the last of upgrades he needed.
If he made it out alive, that is.
. . .
Alternative Title: Yes, it was that bad!
Author's Note:
If you're enjoying the story and want to read ahead or support my work, you can check out my P@treon at [email protected]/LordCampione. But don't worry—all chapters will eventually be public. Just being here and reading means the world to me. Thank you for your time and support.