The next morning, I woke up feeling really tired. My muscles were sore and my feet ached. Still, I had to get up and go to work otherwise I wouldn’t earn sufficient amount of money to see me through whatever university I would be attending. High education is expensive after all and taking loans kind of makes my heart tremble with fear.

So, I slowly pushed myself off the mattress to my feet with my hands and walked over groggily to the kitchen mirror. One could say I had one funny hairstyle each morning, almost comical with the way it appeared as though it was straight out of a cartoon show, mainly Japanese cartoons. I’ve seen them give their characters hairstyles that seem to defy the laws of physics.

I let out a sigh and then turned the tap to gather the water with the palms of my hands. Then I splashed the water over my face and repeated this a second time. With each time water splashed on my face, I felt a strange calmness come over me. After the fifth time, I rubbed my eyes and fully opened them to look into the mirror.

Opening my eyes, I smiled into the mirror as I said, “Right!”

I checked my watch for the time, which showed 7:30AM.

“Oh shoot! I’m going to be late!” I exclaimed in alarm because I woke up half-an-hour later than I wanted to.

I hurried to brush my teeth and went into the bathroom to have my bath as quick as I can. Coming out and changing into my new clothes as fast as I could, I chucked the previous day clothes in the corner of the room where other pairs of clothes were gathered at.

It was the spot for my clothes that needed to go to the laundry. Since I work quite busily during the weekdays, I have just about enough time to do the washing, hanging, and ironing over the weekend. You’d be surprised how quickly one could get through a week of clothes in just two days when you plan things out.

Once ready, I grabbed my backpack and checked that I got my apartment key and the key to my bike’s lock. Confirming it, I bolted out of the door, closed it and locked it before rushing down the stairs to reach the parking spot. I could’ve taken the elevator since that would’ve saved my energy, but I didn’t want to waste time waiting for it to arrive and then waiting for it to take me down just as slowly as it came up.

“Got to hurry. Got to hurry,” I mumbled frantically as I reached the ground floor and jogged to the parking space.

It took me only a few seconds to unlock the bike lock and chuck both the key and the lock into my backpack before I was on top of my bicycle and on my way out of the apartment compound. From there, I pedalled as hard as I could to make my bicycle charge down the road.

“Coming through!” I shouted as I passed a pair of pedestrians that gave me strange looks. Noticing their looks when I glanced back, I simply sighed and faced the front again while muttering, “What can you do when you’re running late?”

At that moment, my stomach let out a growl, and I placed one hand on it while keeping the other firmly over the bicycle handle. This was the reason I was hurrying, because I was starving due to not eating since last night.

Thus, I raced down the road and within fifteen minutes, I was arriving at a large hall where people were entering and exiting.

“Make way!” I yelled, and the people quickly got out of my way and stared at me as if I was rude.

“It’s your fault for blocking the road, stupids!” I wanted to respond to their stares, but I had more pressing matters to attend.

After packing the bike and locking it, I hurried to the entrance to the hall and upon entering, the aroma of food smell wafted into my nostrils. This caused my already hungry stomach to growl with excitement. This drew looks from those nearby who heard my stomach growling at me.

“Stupid stomach! Don’t embarrass me in public!” I complained as I smiled wryly at them.

This is the dining centre hall, a local hub for breakfast hosted by a charity service that I don’t know the name of. But the price for breakfast was cheap compared to buying outside, so that was the main reason I had to race to get here.

The operating timings for this breakfast hall was from 7:30AM to 10:00AM. One would think that was plenty of time to sit down and eat, but when you’re on a tight work schedule, time flies before you know it.

It was 7:49AM when I started from the apartment and it was 8:13AM when I got here and I’ve got to be at my workplace by 8:50AM and it would take me another 15 minutes to reach there from here. This only leaves me with 15 minutes to eat and get started to make it over there on time.

So, I lined up behind a queue entering into the hall and when I paid for the entry ticket, the lady behind the counter smiled and said, “Thank you for your patronage.”

I merely smiled at her and hurried into the hall and went straight to the plate section. It was a self-service thing, meaning that you’ve got to get your own plate and food. Makes sense considering this isn’t a 5-star hotel.

“What do you want, love?” The granny from across the bench asked me when I was glancing at the food placed on the trays.

She was an elderly person, and her name was Mrs. Parkhart. I got to know her from when I began coming here to have my breakfast from four months back. As such, she remembered my face since I was a regular and often greets me cheerfully and tends to help me with getting my food in case I got confused if the menu changed.

“The usual, Mrs. Parkhart,” I told her quickly.

Noticing the look of urgency on my face, she understood and wasted no time. I gave her my plate and she moved gracefully along the bench, placing food on it as she went. Just as she remembered me, she also remembered the food that I usually have. It helps considering I eat the same food repeatedly every single day.

On one occasion, she did ask me while indicating the food on my plate, “Don’t you get tired of eating the same thing so many times on a regular basis?”

I merely smiled and told her, “If I had the time, I will try the rest.”

Obviously, such a thing never came to pass since I’m always pressed for time due to my tight work schedule. Today was just an unlucky start of the day, but I’m thankful that she is around to help me out.

“There,” she said after coming back and placing the table over the counter for me to take. “Eat carefully,” she added when I took the plate and thanked her.

“I wish,” I replied, half smiling and rushed to the nearest table to sit down.

As expected, it took me nearly fifteen minutes to munch and swallow down all the food on my plate. I knew this much because I kept constantly checking my watch to ensure that I’m not wasting a single second since time was of the essence here.

When I was done, I rose to my feet, wore my backpack onto my shoulders again and went to set the plate down in the already used section. Then I walked out of the hall, where the ran into the lady behind the counter that gave me a ticket.

She smiled and wished me, “Have a good day.”

Once again, I smiled and said, “I’ll try.”

That’s all I can do, really. To do my best to have a good day despite whatever problems, headaches, and difficulties I may have to encounter along the way. Just like how I am now rushing to make it there.

I checked my watch and seeing that it was 8:29AM, I breathed a sigh in relief.

“Maybe I can still make it,” I mumbled under my breath.

Most of the time, when I am alone, I tend to speak out my thoughts as if there was someone else besides me there. If someone else found me doing this, they’d think that I was crazy or something. It can’t be helped when there’s just too much stress to cope it up inside my head. Sometimes, it just feels more calming to speak out your thoughts when no one else is there but you.

I briskly walked over to the bicycle stand and unlocked the lock before getting on it and riding out through the exit. It would normally take me 15 minutes from here on and this was the time when I added the amount of time I would have to wait at the crossing lights. So, with 21 minutes in my hand, I was calm as I rode down the street.

Several minutes later, I was arriving at the traffic lights when I suddenly remembered about the last nights’ events.

“Oh! I wonder if they had finished making their movie shoot after I disrupted them,” I muttered to myself.

Then I thought about the beautiful lady that seemingly descended from the sky and breathed a sigh.

“Well, I doubt I will ever meet her again since she’s a movie star, and I’m… just a commoner,” I muttered and felt depressed. Then I instantly became frustrated and muttered, “Damn! I had to lose probably one of my best chances I had to turn my life around!”

I was referring to the fact that I had met up, by accident, with a movie star. Even if she and I were in a different league, she was still an actress that would probably know others that she might have got me in touch with. Well, it may seem underhanded to use her help, but I was honestly prepared to do my best to put on a good performance to prove to them that I have what it takes to be an actor.

“Man, life is so tough and harsh but… I guess this is reality,” I muttered in resignation.

While I was in the midst of my thoughts, I arrived at the traffic lights and stopped when the crossing lights for my side were showing red. I took this opportunity to glance around at my surroundings and was amazed that nothing seemed out of the ordinary. No meteor crater and no sign of the disturbance caused by the explosion.

“Yup. Exactly like I imagined,” I muttered as if I knew I would expect to see this.

This proved my theory that last night’s events were indeed a set being conducted for a new movie. That bright light could’ve been a bright lantern dropping down with the support of wiring while sparkles were streaming behind it. Then the exact landing spot was triggered by some kind of remote to make the explosion that would release a lot of wind and cause the smoke to spread everywhere. After that, it was just a matter of quickly letting the heroine enter into the smoke and make a dramatic entrance as the smoke slowly cleared.

It just made me feel even more depressed at the thought of losing a brilliant opportunity. Still, something about the last night’s encounter was still baffling me. It was about the heroine, when she suddenly walked over to me from out of the smoke and asked me to save the world.

While it did seem like brilliant acting skills on her pact, she acted strangely when I asked her about the director, producer and the movie crew. She reacted as if she did not know what those words even meant, almost as if she was someone not of this world; someone from another world.

“Well, it kind of is difficult to argue since her beauty coupled with her magnificent dress and brilliant white wings would certainly make anyone think that she was someone from another world,” I muttered to myself as if that was an argument to be made.

Then I chuckled and wondered aloud, “Oh well. No point thinking about the past. I should probably remember what we’re supposed to be doing in today’s work since I don’t recall from the top of my head,” and I began to think back to what my boss told his staff, including me, what the work was going to be about on that day.

As I was in the midst of my recollection, I suddenly felt a strange chill run down the back of my spine. It happened so suddenly that I got distracted and was a little startled. I looked around to see why that happened, but everything appeared to be normal.

“Probably just the chilly wind,” I muttered and shrugged my shoulders.

At that moment, as if to prove me wrong, there was a sudden boom of an explosion from somewhere nearby. The ground shook and the wind suddenly blew wildly while I lost balance and almost fell off my bicycle.

As I managed to regain my posture by getting off the bicycle, I heard the boom come again and this time, I thought I saw something odd. The view in front of me seemed to be cracking. It was something like when a crack would appear in your car’s windshield, except this was happening in the middle of the day from the middle of the street.

“What… What’s… happening?!” I exclaimed in shock as I continued staring at the cracking spot in disbelief.

The booming sound came twice more before something, call it my instinct, screamed at me to get away from there. It was as if something bad was going to happen.

Following it, I quickly got onto my bicycle and was about to wheel out of there when another boom occurred and this time, the crack in the middle of the road shattered and exploded. This resulted in a large gaping hole to appear in the middle of the street as if a glass covering something had been broken,

A moment later, the broken glass was seemingly brushed aside as a pair of large hands appeared out of the hole to expand the hole. A second later, a large body of an unknown entity walked out of the broken glass home and out into the sunlight.

“Huh?! What is that?!” I exclaimed as I stared at this unknown creature in shock.

The creature of unknown origins stood there as if it was in a daze before it turned its body to face in my direction. It was then that I heard a deep mechanical voice emanating from this unknown creature that seemingly walked out of what looked like another dimension.

“Identification: Recognised. Target: Acquired. Method of response: Termination.”