Edmond Hamilton 
City at World’s End [EPUB ebook] 

One moment Kenniston was strolling down the quiet street, lost in pleasant reverie. The next moment the sky split open!It split wide open, and above them was a burn and a blaze of light — so swift, so violent, that the air itself seemed to have burst into flame. Then there was silence — awful, suffocating silence. Kenniston felt the chill of premonition — a shapeless terror that grew into a thing too evil to be borne alone.