A second passed, then another. The fluorescent lights of the parking lot flickered back on one by one, and though they failed to banish the darkness entirely, they provided enough luminescence to reveal the center of the devastation.
The dust gradually settled and a truck-sized hole in the ground was revealed, wide cracks spreading from it as its edge crumbled, sending more rubble into the darkness below. The entire floor seemed to bend toward the hole, as if it were the center of a whirlpool that threatened to swallow everything.
A couple of meters away, Rocky stood motionless, his left arm still extended. Sparks danced between its retracted panels, most of which were missing, blasted to who knows where. The synthetic skin around that side was entirely burned off, wisps of smoke slowly rising from the charred metallic plating that was hidden underneath.
