The thunder wasn’t real. At least, that’s what you told yourself when the glass of your window rattled like it had been hit by a stray comet.

You blinked groggily into the dark room, half-expecting a late-night storm or a freak earthquake. But it wasn’t thunder. It was heavier. More… intentional.

You stumbled out of bed in a sleep-dazed haze, muttering something about neighbors and peeling back your curtains with the lethargy of someone who didn’t expect their night to turn into a comic book.

And then—well. You saw her.

A face, the size of your room. A body sprawled across your garden like a Greek titan laid low by fate. The moonlight caught her hair in curls of gold, tangled and dirty from what looked like a fall from Olympus—or the stratosphere, whichever was higher on the insurance claim.

You froze. Naturally. Because what do you do when Elasti-Girl—yes, that Elasti-Girl, of Doom Patrol infamy—is lying unconscious and roughly thirty feet tall on your hydrangeas?

You don’t scream. You swear. Loudly. Then you grab a coat and jog barefoot outside like a man without a plan.

You step into the dewy grass, cold against your feet, and approach your backyard like someone walking into a movie scene. Her form stretches across your backyard like an abandoned statue of liberty in a suburban apocalypse.

Her body is still—mostly. Her slow, shallow breaths create faint tremors that travel through the ground, gentle but terrifying. Her chest rises and falls like tectonic plates shifting beneath your lawn furniture.

Then she groans.

A low, seismic sound that vibrates in your chest more than your ears can hear. Her fingers flex. Her eyes start to twitch beneath fluttering lids. Her body starts shrinking—slowly, agonizingly—back to human size in breathtaking quickness.

You stand there, absolutely frozen, because your brain simply stops moving.

You step closer, and all you can think is how the hell any of this is real.

What the hell am I supposed to do with a fifty-foot injured actress-turned-superhero unconscious in my backyard?

And the more terrifying question:

Why do I get the feeling she came here on purpose?

You took a slow breath, your eyes drawn back to her—now even smaller, human-sized, bruised and broken and barely alive, yet somehow still looking like something out of a storybook.

You knew the truth. She hadn’t fallen by accident. Not completely. There was intent written in every inch of her strained expression, even in unconsciousness.

And maybe, just maybe, this morning… you were about to find out what she’d left behind.

You didn’t even know where to begin. Your hands trembled as the shock wore off, after the adrenaline turned from panic to dread.

Your mind—now shakier—was screaming questions.

Why my house?

Did she just collapse mid-flight, mid-escape, mid-something that caused her to crash here?

You didn’t know how to help her. Hell, you didn’t even know if she could hear you. What if she woke up and panicked and crushed half the block? What if someone else found her first?

Your phone was still inside. Emergency services? Doom Patrol? You weren’t even sure where they were right now. She hadn’t been in the news for a while. The world had stopped paying attention to Rita Farr—forgotten the golden girl turned tragic side note. Last you’d heard, she’d vanished again—just another ghost from a team no one could quite pin down.

You stood there in the shadow of her collapsed form, heart rattling around in your ribs like a wild bird, and thought—

What the hell am I supposed to do with a fifty-foot injured actress-turned-superhero unconscious in my backyard?

And the more terrifying question:

Why do I get the feeling she came here on purpose?