I took a deep breath, straightening my posture and swaying gently back and forth. Moving slowly, I pulled a sheet of paper off of the stack on the table before me. As I slid it towards me I closed my eyes, listening to my fingertips, to the whisper of the paper as it slid across the table, to the paper's fibers slipping apart as I folded. Colors twisted and shimmered across my vision for a moment, but I stayed focused on the craft.

With a slow and final breath out, I opened my eyes.

Perfect. Six hundred and thirty-four.

I inspected the origami crane in my hands, admiring the sharp edges and clean lines I'd managed to produce. The on-site therapist was always encouraging me to have a calming activity, and had signed off on getting me an absurd amount of origami paper after I'd taken to the art.

Relaxing my shoulders, I stood slowly and paced towards the back of my little living room. Just as I was about to add it to the rows and rows lining the wall, the lights dimmed and began to pulse blue.

"Should I put some pants on?" I asked aloud to the camera in the corner of the room.

"Yes." I winced as the voice crackled through the intercom by the door. They'd done their best to avoid spiky disruptions to my environment - changing the blaring klaxon to those blue lights, building day/night cycles into my living space, turning down the speakers - but it was still a bit jarring.

When I was done getting dressed, I grabbed the earpiece off of my nightstand and put it in.

"We've had another activity spike," Alex's voice came through as I bent to put on my socks. "Doc's projecting a nasty breach in about twenty minutes."

I put on my boots, waiting for him to continue.

"She thinks probably on the outskirts, so it'll be drop procedure if that's alright."

"Yeah, I guess," I twiddled with my dampener cuff absentmindedly, sitting on the couch ten feet from the door as per protocol. "The sound fittings are done, right?"

"Yeah, should be a quieter ride than last time," Alex replied, and I could hear the concern in his voice.

-----

Real air. Outside air. Night air.

I didn't mind the facility, honestly. It was for everyone's benefit, I understood, and the people at the facility were very accommodating.

But god was it a rush to be out sometimes. Especially on a night like this.

My combat watch's readout ticked as I walked down the empty street, but it wasn't really for me. They just wanted the data.

"Ready?" Alex asked, more nervous than I'd ever been. I felt a little bad that they were all so scared of me, but I couldn't help it much.

"Yeah, go for it."

"Cool. Uh, be safe." I let out a small laugh, but his genuine concern was always touching. "Hot in five, four..."

My dampener cuff vibrated slightly, and I watched the little lights tick down.

It always hit like a ton of bricks. My mind flickered for a moment as the power crackled through me. Reality wobbled, warped, growing sharp, impossibly fractalline. I could feel the hum in my teeth.

The facts began to filter in, whispers at first.

I was about ten feet from the hotspot and I could taste it. Strong this time. Wicked. Hungry. Different.

The breach opened and a humanoid stepped out.

Humanoid? I wasn't supposed to hurt human-shaped things. No. I always felt bad.

But humans always smelled so soft. This wasn't soft.

The figure stepped forward, under a streetlight. Acrid, it smelled.

"Well, hello there." Its voice was all wrong, like gravel and velvet. "You're quite a thing, aren't you?"

"Yes." I dragged the words to the swirling surface of my mind. They echoed in my skull like a thousand voices speaking in almost-unison. "What.. are you?"

"Well that's a good question now, isn't it?" Cold and hot at the same time, the voice burned.

They'd all been animals, before. Destructive but. Blind. Heedless hunger. This was not an animal.

The thing stalked closer. Wrong, wrong, all wrong. Poison and fire.

"What the fuck is that?" Was it Doc's voice, in my ear? I couldn't tell.

"Ooh, it has friends," the thing said, tilting its head. "Friends that don't know what we are, do they?"

"Okay, listen to me," it was Doc, wasn't it? Her voice was full of triangles. "Do you think you can take that thing in?"

"No." The word was all I could summon before the thing lunged.

My vision fractured, the creature unfolding out along four dimensions, past and future spiraling out around it. I sidestepped, smearing myself out along the same impossible directions it had. The me that hadn't moved caught the thing by the throat. I split again, driving a fist at it's head from the side while dashing towards the breach where the thing's past stretched out behind it. Then again, the me that had it by the neck squeezing tighter while dropping my grip and stepping to the other side.

As the fist made contact, I plunged a hand into the breach, grabbing the creature by its past, feeling the impact of the punch ripple through its timeline. It thrashed, twisting from my grip, but the me on the opposite side of it was ready. I drove my hand into its future-chest and it screamed.

I drank in the noise, and the me standing over the breach pulled.

To an outside observer, it probably looked like nothing had happened. The monster was there, and then it wasn't. But I saw it, felt it rip back into the hole in reality it had made a mere minute ago, sliding through my hands and back out of time.

Then everything went black.

-----

[I ran out of steam after trying to write that 4-dimensional fight scene lol. Let me know if that made any sense and/or if anyone would like to see me continue this a bit further.]