Shadows

        Rain tumbles from the sky in heavy droplets that pelt the big man’s leather coat with violent *pock*ing noises. His head is bare and he stares up at the sky as he stands in the middle of the midnight St. Paul street. Streetlights cast a hazy halo of light and reflect off of slowly draining puddles on all sides, illuminating the world like a Van Gogh painting. The few vehicles that are about simply avoid him, they do not honk or make a big fuss about it because who wants to fuck with a giant crazy man standing in the middle of the street in the middle of the night in the middle of a thunderstorm?

        As distant church bells begin to toll the midnight hour, Grizzly Z reaches into the inner pocket of his trench coat and removes a road flare and a pack of cigarettes. He pulls out a smoke and puts the pack away, slams the road flare against his palm, causing it to ignite. He puts the cigarette in his mouth and holds the flare close enough to light it up. Taking a deep drag and ignoring the smoldering strands of hair on his head, he drops the flare onto the street and walks over to one side of the road to a huge transformer. He hops over the fence that cautions him strongly to stay out and with a mighty heave, breaks the chain that bars the door.

        He reaches in and grabs a huge handful of wires and simply pulls with all his considerable strength. There is several sparks, a popping noise, and all the lights in a twenty block grid simply wink out. The only source of light in a mile for at least sixty seconds is a single burning road flare in the middle of a street.

        Without light, there can be no shadow.

        He watches it burn until the flashing lights and screaming sirens disrupt his moment of thoughtful almost-prayer.

        He is gone before they get there. All they find is the road flare, a single mote of light in the infinite black abyss.