:''A buddy and I were getting our asses kicked by a couple cops after they caught us tagging a wall. I remember hearing this crack like thunder right overhead. Next thing I knew, we were all standing there, looking up like baby birds. One of the cops was crying. We were all shaking. It was like realizing I’ve spent my whole life underwater and finally looking up and seeing *real* life on the other side of the surface. The cops just left us, just forgot about us. But we didn’t notice because we’d forgotten about them.''
The number of fingers on the hand in the vision is unclear; photographs of the phenomenon suggest that it has four, but other media, such as the drawing in [[nooneimportant]]'s mailbox or the [[:Image:MVH_lin.gif|spectrographic image]] contained in [[My Violent Heart]], clearly show five. The hand could possibly be curled slightly in the four fingered versions, as this would cause the pinky finger to be covered by the palm.
The Presence concept seems to reference one stanza of "[[The Wretched]]" from ''[[The Fragile (halo)|The Fragile]]'':