The world was full of magic, fantastic things that defied explanation. Around every corner, a new miracle or devastation, an undreamed of way to live, an unfathomable way to die. It was a world of magic, and the fact was, exactly why it worked was unknown. It had to do with Aer, that much was certain, but why any given Collar obtained the ability that they did when paired with an Indicia, that was a mystery.

It was a mystery that Isaac Edgar Walker-Cross had never stopped once to think about. In a world replete with magic, magic itself became mundane. Conjuring fire, controlling the fiercest natural element. Manipulating water, bending the fluid to the user’s will. Rending earth, tearing stone apart. Sharpening wind, turning the air into blades. Those were just the traditional elements. Arcane barriers, time shifting, body transformation, weapon summoning, shadow construction, force reversal. Magic was so broad, it was stretched thin, and most couldn’t see its majesty any longer.

Magic was science, it was well enough explained that the average person needed not speculate on its existence. It wasn’t impossible, science said so, but it was so much more improbable than most would imagine. When something is so fully in front of a person, it’s hard for them to imagine it any other way.

The thing in the vault, what Isaac laid his eyes on as they entered, it changed him. It showed him the majesty of the magic, the beauty that was present in the world, was still there even through pain and loss and darkness. There was something important he did not yet know, but he knew he needed to learn it.

The room inside the vault was shaped like a diamond, and there were doors at each of the points. Several rows of computer screens squared off the center of the room, each row a step up above the previous, leading to a central platform, which each of the computer screens was facing. The walls and floors were a dark metal, and through them ran circuits glowing similarly to the energy in Aer armor, bright and vibrant colors, giving the room a soft white glow, even though it should have been darker.

The circuits ran along the floors and walls in a pattern, and the glow indicated a direction of movement, the energy was flowing from somewhere else, into the central stage. The diamond shaped floor of the central platform was glowing radiantly, bright white.

Floating above the platform, bobbing slightly up and down, burning with the intensity of a star, was the thing.

Isaac approached apprehensively, Alyssa stayed back, similarly in awe but less aware of why she was in awe. Footsteps soft and slow, Isaac climbed the steps towards the sphere. It was large enough that Isaac wouldn’t have been able to fit his arms around it, but only just so. So bright that it was hard to look at, but impossible not to stare, Isaac stood in front of the sphere and held his hand in the air just in front of it.

It was resplendent, magnificent in its colors and vibrancy. Isaac had seen one once before, his own ‘soul’ that Tyloki had shown him. His own soul had been so weak compared to this one, so dull and lifeless, monotone. This sphere swirled, an aurora borealis, colors bled through seemingly at random. A bloom of gold overtook crimson, and was washed away by emerald like a rushing tide. Not just gold and crimson and emerald. Many hues, many shades. Every color, coexisting. The surface looked like silk, and Isaac longed to touch it.

This was the first time Isaac ever wondered why magic was, why it did what it did. He knew as well not to touch the sphere, as he did that the answer to why was one that would not be a discovery he would make. It was too big of a question for someone like him. Someone so small, standing next to a star.

[Dominic, stop.]

Shut up.

Dominic walked with a steady pace towards his goal. Having been unable to gain access to the InCorp building from ground level, he fell back on a plan that he came up with while he was setting up to kidnap Sera. It was dark in the Underway, but he’d spent plenty of time down there, so he didn’t have trouble finding his way around. He conjured a torch in the palm of his right hand in order to illuminate the corridor, but he found the element revolting, so he snuffed the flame quickly.

He would have to settle for the flash of crackling electricity if he needed to see something. Electricity wasn’t fire, it didn’t light the darkness as well, but Dominic couldn’t abide fire. Not anymore.

As he went, he made it a point to avoid looking at any reflective materials, he didn’t need to see the monster that he knew was waiting for him in the mirror. After he was done, he would find a mask that he could wear daily, and hopefully, he would never have to look at the twisted mess of his face.

The only other problem that he had now was the grating insistence from Basil that he stop, as if that were even a conceivable possibility. It was not. There was no going back for Dominic, who had lost as much in Tyloki’s pyre as he had over the years since his family’s death. He was not a person anymore, but a vessel for the elements he commanded. There were no more thoughts about the long term future in Dominic’s head, only practicalities. He knew he would need to find a mask and that he could never look at his reflection. He didn’t know what he intended to do, big picture, in the long run.

Maybe kill people. People that deserved it. False heroes like Isaac Cross. This thought brought a twinge to Dom’s lips, and he felt like he was smiling. He couldn’t see it, but his face was the nightmare that looms in the shadows, waiting to frighten children from under the bed.

[Stop.]

I said, shut up.

Dominic punctuated his command with a blast of lightning directed at the nearby wall. His hand shuddered with rage, and Basil obeyed, going silent.

In his mind, Dominic was not a monster or a villain. He was justice, doing the work of an unknown higher spirit, a conduit for the will of the universe.

Much of the Underway was constructed of stone, tunnels carved out of the earth, and though in its prime most of the walls had been covered in sheets of metal, that had been a long time ago. Now much of the metal had been shorn away by time, leaving vast stretches of raw stone.

Dominic was a master of the elements.

It was simple work to will the stone out of his way, carving his own tunnel, parting the cave wall as if it were water and he were leading his people to a promised land. The stone gave way around him with deference, reaffirming his belief that what he was doing was just. He did not close the tunnel behind him, though he could have if he wished to. Eventually, the stone ended, and his tunnel led out into a room more recently used than the Underway.

Directly in front of him was a massive vault door which was of no concern to him. Whatever was inside may have been interesting to him before, but now, with no future, Dominic possessed no reason to be interested in such a mystery. Perhaps he would satisfy his curiosity after he took care of his task, perhaps he would not. He would live in the moment, and not worry about what he would do next.

A body was on the floor in front of the vault, Dominic didn’t recognize the man, but he could tell even from a distance that the man was alive. He considered ending the man’s life, just to see how it truly felt to kill someone, something he had never done before, but he would save that for his target. He imagined he would develop a taste for it in time, if it didn’t immediately strike him as enjoyable.

He had to be careful not to give in to his urges, to be only a vessel for the will of reality, to bring justice down upon those that were unworthy to live. That would be more difficult if he enjoyed killing too much.

Ignoring the man and the vault, Dom climbed the ladder at the back of the elevator shaft, moving slowly and methodically. Surprised to find that he was as strong and able as he was, having expected the damage from the fire and the atrophy of inactivity to have weakened him, an excitement twitched inside him as he went. Would he use magic to do the job? As reprehensible and disgusting as he found it, there would be an irony in resorting to fire. Maybe instead he would wrap his hands around the neck and force them to watch, to look at his broken visage, knowing that his elated grin would be the last they would see.

The climb was long, and he spent the entirety of it thinking of different ways to kill. Each element under his command provided many different ways, and he knew upon considering it that he would need to kill more people than just his target, simply to try out his creativity to its fullest. He had been limited as a Collar.

He would be unrestrained as an agent of reality.

Upon this thought, another truth became evident to him. As an agent of the universe’s will, Dominic would be free to act how he chose to, or how reality commanded him to, without fear of retribution. The problems that had arisen in his life came about as a result of him rebelling against reality. Now that he submitted, gave himself up to, for lack of a better word, fate, things would go his way.

That wasn’t to say there wouldn’t be challenges. The universe would want to test its agent, to ensure he was the right man for the job. Deep in his heart, Dominic knew he was the man for the job, and thus those tests would be but simple hurdles.

Emerging at ground level, Dominic had successfully gained access to the inside of the lockdown. Fear of death, from the army of Collars or Vassals, the squads of InCorp security, or the buildings overzealous AI system, was unknown to him. Reality wouldn’t allow those things to happen to him.

Finding himself in the lobby of InCorp, Dom needed to determine a method with which to find his quarry. Isaac had once used the security room in the lobby to protect every person in the building, and besides that, InCorp wasn’t the type of company to let an inch of their building go unmonitored. Dominic danced across the lobby to the security room, and what he found there warmed his heart, and he smiled with appreciation for the universe. One of the camera feeds had been paused on a frame and left there. The frame showed Dominic’s target where she may have been minutes ago. Even if she was no longer there, it would be a good place to start looking.

Dominic was only a few floors away from his mark. Isaac was going to lose his sister, it was what the universe wanted. Still dancing, Dominic left the security room and started for the stairs. The music was in his head, no one else could hear it.

No one else besides Basil. Basil had never stopped listening, even when he had been told to shut up. He watched Dom’s imagination, his desire to kill people he deemed corrupt, and he knew that Dominic was too far gone. There was no coming back for him, for either of them.

Riley struggled into his armor, and Rain had to materialize to give him a hand getting it on properly. Luckily, Riley’s Aer Circuit armor was designed to increase his agility, and upon activating it, gold wires woven into the fabric lighting up, it began to help him stand up on his own. Usually, it elevated him above human levels of agility, now it only brought him on par with an average man.

He huffed for breath as he stood tall with the armor’s help. “I can’t do this.”

“There’s no one else that can.” Rain said.

“What difference does it make if I go and die? Freeman is still going to use the Lance.” Riley said, next taking his daggers out of his locker.

“You won’t die. Riley, listen to me.” Rain said, and he leaned in close, waited until Riley turned his head to look at him. “You will not die.”

“It would be easier to buy into this if I knew what was going on. But since Canaan won’t tell me, and neither will you…” Riley said.

“There is something in Canaan’s office. Explaining it wouldn’t help, but you have to believe that it can’t be left to Freeman.” Rain said.

Riley nodded his head and pretended to understand. He knew that Rain could tell that it was fake faith, but it was all he had. The idea of dying at Freeman’s hands, or of having to face the Lance again, filled him with fear. Riley would have been unafraid, typically, but his experience with the Lance, and the weak state he was in now, stripped him of his usual confidence. Suddenly, and he almost never thought like this, his mind was full of all of the things he wanted to do but never had.

So many movies he wanted to watch, foods he wanted to try, Indicia he wanted to lure into bed. Feelings that he hadn’t admitted to that he may never get the chance to own up to. Riley wasn’t a bucket list kind of guy, but maybe he was turning into one.

Riley looked across the contents of his locker, making sure he brought everything that might be of use in the fight against Freeman. Just about the only thing left inside was the butane lighter, Isaac’s lighter, the small fire he kept in his pocket all the times that he was berated by Tyloki. Isaac didn’t need fire, he had insisted time and time again, but he carried Tyloki’s lost flame in his pocket like a torch leading him through the darkness.

That torch had almost gotten him killed. And he had left that flame, as well as Tyloki’s, behind when he left the Registry. Riley pocketed the lighter, bringing Isaac’s light with him. It restored a small bit of his fractured confidence.

“We don’t have much time, right?” Riley asked.

Rain answered with a quick kiss on his lips before disappearing.

[I’m afraid we don’t. Not even enough time for a quickie.]

“It must be serious.” Riley sighed as he shut the locker and exited the room. “Rain doesn’t want to have sex.”

Back in the atrium, Freeman’s shadow stairs were still present. Once again, Riley was worried that the stairs would cease to be at an inopportune time and send him hurtling to ground level, but with time so short, he would have to take his chances. He vaulted over the railing onto the stairs and started to climb.

It took a while to walk to the top of the Registry, giving Riley’s brain ample time to obsess over the many ways that things could go south. Freeman had bested Canaan in combat, which meant the fight would be suicide under normal conditions. The only thing Riley had going for him was that his target wasn’t Freeman himself, but the Lance. Freeman had the Lance to protect as well as himself. This was, as far as Riley could come up with, the only advantage he had.

That and the element of surprise.

At the top of the atrium, Riley climbed over the railing to the top floor balcony. Unfortunately for Freeman’s shadow stairs, the atrium didn’t go all the way to the top of the tower, only most of the way. Many of the upper floors required the entire available space of the building’s square footage, and the balconies only went up as high as some administrative offices, above the medical floors.

Between Riley and Canaan’s top floor office, and presumably Freeman, were R&D, the Registry’s portal to the Indicia realm, and a few more secret floors that even Riley didn’t know what was on them. Freeman would have been forced to climb the building’s stairwell to reach the top floor.

Riley wasted no time moving forward, pushing his hesitation deep into his belly, taking deep, considered breaths to fight off his worry. Riley was struck by something as he approached the stairwell. It was a scent, an odor, but more than that, it had a presence. He could nearly feel the tragedy that he was about to come upon.

It was an odor that he was familiar with, but never in such quantities, never so devastating. It was the stench of blood and evisceration, fresh death. Riley was confused, certainly there hadn’t been so many Collars standing in the way of Freeman, and there was no way he carved his way through them with such ease.

His confusion was cleared up as he opened the door to the horror in the stairwell. The smell hit him physically, driving him back a step, and his eyes couldn’t focus on a single aspect of the nightmare in front of him. The bodies were garbed in the Registry prison uniforms, which explained where they all came from. Fresh blood dripped down the walls, oozed down the stairs like lava from a volcano. Not every body was intact, many were missing parts, entire limbs, which were scattered about the stairwell chaotically.

Riley heard a wheezing gurgle come from one of the bodies who must not have died yet. Before he could locate its source, it stopped, presumably as the source drowned in their own blood or died from blood loss.

It was unimaginable, a warzone in miniature, like nothing Riley had ever experienced. If Freeman had done this, what chance did he have of stopping him? Glad now that he had been holding his worry at the bottom of his stomach, he was able to hold down his gorge as it attempted to empty itself.

All this was in several seconds, at the end of which Riley knew he had to keep pressing forward. If Freeman had done this, he couldn’t be allowed to keep going, no matter his aims. Riley closed his eyes and held his breath as he stepped into the stairwell. He opened his eyes with he realized he needed to be able to see where the body parts were. Before he made it up enough flights of stairs to escape the gore, he was forced to let his breath out and take in fresh air. The air he took in wasn’t fresh, it was stale with death and blood.

Riley climbed with determination. They had been criminals, but that didn’t mean they deserved to be massacred. He was going to stop Freeman or die in the process. If all else failed, the Lance had no allegiance, it would work for whoever possessed it. If he was willing to use it, it would guarantee victory.

Coming to the top floor, Riley found the door open. He could hear footsteps echoing around Canaan’s office. Freeman had arrived, and Riley was right on his trail. This was all going to end soon.

At this point, between his fear and determination, Riley wasn’t sure which ending he preferred.

Isaac took a step back from the soul sphere, but he had to force his hand back to his side, his desire to touch it was great.

“What is it?” Alyssa asked, finger on the trigger guard of her gun, held ready but lowered to the ground.

“It’s a...soul. Tyloki showed me mine when I after I made a pact with him. Mine isn’t this...magnificent. But I can tell it’s the same thing. This is a soul.” Isaac said in hushed tones.

“A soul? You’ve lost me. If it is a soul, whose is it? How is it here? Because, and I’m not saying I believe in souls, but they’re metaphysical, right?” Alyssa said.

“I have no idea. Too bad you clocked Parker out. He could have told us, I’d bet.” Isaac said, turning around.

“Heat of the moment.” Alyssa shrugged. “This must be Nova. A soul, but here in our world.”

“That would mean…” Isaac started, but he didn’t finish.

They both stared in awed silence.

“Alright, we’ll have time to be lost in wonderment later. First, we need to find the source of the AI and shut it down.” Alyssa snapped them back to the task at hand.

“Another thing Parker could have helped with.” Isaac said.

“Could’ve. But he wouldn’t have. Looks like we’ve got three doors. It’s like a game show.” Alyssa smirked.

“Split up or stay together?” Isaac asked.

“Depends. Is this a scary movie?” Alyssa said.

“I’m not scared. But there is only one gun between the two of us, and all I’ve got is a stick.” Isaac said.

“Let’s stay together, then. Stay behind me.” Alyssa ordered.

Leading the way to the leftmost door, Alyssa moved like a soldier. Isaac hadn’t been trained as a soldier, but it wasn’t the first time he had been following Alyssa’s lead, so he was able to stick with her competently enough. It was fruitless, as the leftmost door was locked and there was no panel or handle with which to try to open it.

Aware that time was not on their side, they moved swiftly to the door on the right hand side. It opened, thankfully, but led to a wing of what appeared to be laboratories behind walls of glass. A quick scan of the rooms from the doorway revealed little of interest, so Alyssa and Isaac agreed to move on to the third door, at the back of the vault.

As the door slid open, Alyssa kept her gun ready, and she spun into the hallway with the gun drawn up, prepared for any possible threats. The door led into a nondescript hallway, which reminded Isaac of the long hallway that led to the prison at the Registry, except here it was gunmetal instead of bright white. Alyssa started to move down the hallway cautiously, Isaac couldn’t help but imagine some sort of laser grid security system that would trap them in and chop them into little pieces.

No such security system existed, and they reached the far end of the hallway safely. Here was another door, and Isaac was truthfully becoming tired of closed doors. Maybe he would get a studio apartment with only one door so he wouldn’t have to deal with them anymore. No more surprises behind thresholds.

This door opened as well, and on the other side, a row of doors. At least ten of them. Isaac groaned inwardly as they stepped into the hallway of doorways. Checking the first door, which slid open with a gasp, they found the doors led to a sort of dormitory. A living area. The room had a corner with beds in it, a computer in the opposite corner, and little else. A fake plant graced the nearest corner, which somehow made the room feel artificial, like someplace no one had ever or would ever live.

“Chances are all these rooms are bedrooms or the bathroom or showers. I don’t know why they need a bunker down here, but I doubt the AI is kept in the living space.” Alyssa said.

“You’re right, I doubt that, too. But if there is anyone actually living here…” Isaac said.

Alyssa nodded. “They might be able to lead us to the AI, wherever it is.”

Three more doors on the right side of the hallway came up empty, immaculately clean with no signs of life.

“This place is eerily empty. The soul sphere is just floating out there by itself, no technicians or engineers or scientists. Isn’t that strange?” Isaac asked.

“You said it. It’s eerie.” Alyssa agreed.

The fifth door on the right bore fruit.

The door slid open with ease, as the others had, but the room on the far side was different. Instead of being a minimalist underground bunker, the room was quite differently designed. A faux fireplace on the far wall cast a flickering glow across the room, illuminating the full sized bed and ornately carved desk. An entire wall was a bookshelf, covered from top to bottom in thick texts that had titles Isaac was unable to comprehend.

In the chair at the desk, a man sat.

He was facing away, and he didn’t turn to look at them as they stood in the doorway. Finishing what he was writing down, he jabbed a period at the end of his sentence, and then set his pen on the desk. He stood up from the chair and pulled his coat straight from the lapels.

And he said, “It’s about time.”

His hair was neatly combed, if not a bit too long, and Isaac could see the sides of a short beard on the man’s silhouette. The hair was the color of fire, and seemed almost to be actual flames in the flickering light of the fireplace. He was wearing a neatly pressed, gray three-quarter length coat.

Isaac and Alyssa had expected to come across a scientist, they had hoped to find someone, but this encounter had an unexpected, surreal quality to it. The man turned around to face them. Indeed he had a short beard, also the color of flames. Disappearing under the lapels of his coat was an impossibly vibrant tie, striped with multiple hues and standing out as a shock of color, resting atop his shirt which was the color of stone.

Just underneath the collar of the man’s shirt, Isaac could make out a familiar colored band, the tattoo of a pact, the mark of a Collar.

“I take it you’re here to rescue me.”

Archer was beginning to feel exhaustion creeping in on him. It wasn’t a feeling he was used to. He trained daily, and fought real battles with Thralls on a regular basis. The feeling of exhaustion was frankly a bit worrisome. He had been fighting to the best of his abilities for the better part of the day, and he was only human. Though if he was getting tired, that meant his enemies must have been more so.

As he fought, he didn’t need to worry about what drove him. He simply fought because it was the thing he did. He was good at it, and he did good with it. He wouldn’t go so far as to call himself a hero. Simply, he had never had trouble discerning right from wrong, and he applied those to any problems that arose in front of him.

Archer functioned simply, and he didn’t need Alkaid inside his head, as many Collars did, to help him with strategy or planning. The man was good, in many senses of the word. He was carving his way, as necessary, up the InCorp building, stopping on floors where the Registry was losing ground to the Vassals. Few of the relatively untrained Vassals could stand against him for long, and he was becoming exhausted simply by the sheer number of people he had fought with so far.

Floor by floor he went, keeping Rufus safe by the stairwell, securing the Vassals and forcing any of the InCorp security to stand down, if they were feeling a bit itchy in the trigger finger. It was a display of art in the form of weapon play, as if this was the day that Archer had been training for all along. However, Archer wouldn’t agree that this day was a foregone conclusion, that it was inevitable. Events led to this, but that didn’t mean they had to lead here.

Sera was, as far as Archer was aware, still tucked safely away in the closet floors below. It wouldn’t be long before Archer had the entire building secure, though the credit didn’t belong entirely to him, he was simply joining with the Collars on each floor to help them take the lead. Once the building was under control, then there would be the task of figuring out how to get the innocents, and for that matter, the perpetrators, out of the lockdown.

Slim had yet to show his face again, but in the grand scheme, it didn’t matter. Slim was just a Vassal, and if another Collar didn’t take him down, he would be an easy mark when most of the other Vassals were dealt with.

It wasn’t until nearly the top floor that Slim appeared again. Archer felt an unusual compulsion to make sure that Slim was taken care of, as if they were rivals. It was more likely that Archer didn’t like the feeling of someone one-upping him in combat. It wasn’t something that happened often.

Having exited the stairwell, the floor they were on was much like every other they’d passed. Rooms full of cubicles and computers, the occasional fake plant or water cooler. Rufus stayed in the stairwell, still human despite his insistence that he’d be able to transform again soon. Archer had his katana ready as he glanced around the floor. Slim was with a small group of Vassals on the far side of the cubicles. They hadn’t seen Archer yet, so he ducked behind a cubicle wall to survey them.

Keeping a low crouch, he moved across the room toward them silently, listening in to their conversation. Slim was aware that they were losing ground, being forced up until there was nowhere left to run. Whoever he was, the other Vassals deferred to him, taking his advice and letting him make the decisions about what to do.

It was a shame for them that their plans were about to be ruined by Archer. There were four of them, including Slim, and four on one was a bit of a challenge. Not impossible, but the odds weren’t worth taking as they were. Archer glanced back to see if Rufus could join in, and saw him hunched against the wall, still breathing heavily and drenched in sweat. Rufus would be unlikely to join him in a fight for the rest of the day.

He would have to make a plan. Still crouched, Archer was just around the corner from Slim and his cronies. He leaned out ever so slightly, to get a view of them. A quick glance showed them to be standing relatively close together. That could facilitate taking out more than one at once. None were very large, though they were not quite as thin as Slim.

Archer took a deep breath and was shocked to find weariness in his chest. He wouldn’t be fighting at peak condition anymore, and he wouldn’t be fighting at all much longer. If he was going to take down Slim, he needed a good plan. He glanced out at them again, but this time, one of the Vassals was looking his direction.

Having been spotted, he wasted no time stepping out into the open. Slim raised his guns at Archer, and the others readied unknown abilities. Archer raised his hands in the air and dropped his sword on the ground.

“Hold on, wait. You got me.” Archer gambled, hoping they wouldn’t just kill him on the spot.

One of the Vassals started walking towards him, most likely to apprehend him.

“Wait! He’s got weapons hidden on him. Tons of them. Don’t get near him.” Slim warned, and the Vassal stopped.

Archer cursed inwardly and took a millisecond to go over how he would drop down, grab his sword, move into range, and take down four combatants in a single motion, while also being prepared for Slim’s guns and at least three other magic abilities he knew nothing about.

It didn’t seem particularly doable.

An answer to his problem presented itself when he least expected it. It seemed, at a glance, to be quite a coincidence, but it wasn’t at all.

Archer was linked to Alkaid as any Collar was linked to his Indicia, and that afforded them a connection that could be used to gain the upper hand in such situations. Perhaps inspired by Tyloki’s performance in the Underway, Alkaid stepped around the corner from behind the cubicle wall behind Slim and his companions.

Trying not to smirk, Archer was glad that Slim hadn’t just killed him on sight. Now he didn’t need to take out four of them at once. Only two of them. Those odds were good.

The calico walked towards Slim from behind, his footsteps absolutely silent, wearing only his yellow hoodie and a sword sheath at his side. There was a gleeful smile on Alkaid’s lips, and his eyes glinted darkly. His tail whipped behind him. If they weren’t friends, Archer would have been afraid of Alkaid, as anyone who crossed the cat should have been.

Slim must have seen something in Archer’s eyes, because he turned and ducked as Alkaid pulled the sword, a wooden sword, from the sheath and swung it at him. It was an impossible dodge, but Slim had pulled it off just the same. Not missing a beat, Alkaid redirected his attention to Slim’s nearest ally, taking him out with a swift blow to the head.

Slim’s other two allies turned now, pincered between Alkaid and Archer. As Slim recovered from his duck and pulled his guns up at Alkaid, Archer skipped forward and grabbed his sword, engaging the other two Vassals. Alkaid leaned aside, dodging a colorful blast from the gun trained on him. The other gun was thrust backwards, and a familiar mint colored light increased the speed of one of Archer’s enemies.

“Don’t let him buff them up!” Archer shouted.

“Oh certainly, that was intentional on my part.” Alkaid said, still smiling as he tried to take Slim out.

For his part, Slim spent most of the time dodging Alkaid’s blows, attempting to shoot the cat with colorful light that Archer assumed would make something explode. Alkaid had little trouble dodging these blasts. The greater challenge was, indeed, keeping Slim from using his second gun to improve the capabilities of his companions.

Anticipating that the newly enhanced Vassal would use his augmented speed to try and flank him, Archer thrust the hilt of his sword backwards, and it smashed into the man’s gut, knocking him back. The katana was long, and it was poised now to thrust directly towards the second Vassal, which Archer didn’t want to do, but he didn’t have much choice. Instead of going for a killing blow, he drove the sword through the Vassal’s shoulder, hoping to incapacitate him.

The man screamed and, when the sword was yanked out, fell against the wall with his hand on his shoulder, clutching the wound tightly. That took care of that, for now. Archer spun and found that he had lost the speed enhanced Vassal.

Alkaid and Slim were making no progress when it came to fighting each other.

The Vassal was hiding somewhere in the cubicles, and his increased speed would make it a dangerous maze. Archer clutched his sword tightly and scanned the nearby area. He walked slowly along the rows, ready for an attack from any direction. He didn’t notice he’d been snuck up on until the arm was already wrapped around his neck.

The Vassal squeezed, choking the life out of the Collar. Archer struggled against the man’s arm lock, but he was tired. It would have been no problem, normally, to flip the man over and take control of the fight, but he was proving to be too weak to pull that off now. Airway cut off, Archer struggled for a breath that wasn’t coming.

Only one thing left to do. Archer didn’t fancy driving the katana through himself to kill his attacker, he wasn’t a character in an action movie. That was why he prepared a weapon for this eventuality. Dropping the katana, he tried to remember the exact hand motion that would summon the weapon he needed. He raised his right arm high in the air above him, and in his palm a silver light started to shine. There it was.

He swung the light down, and emerging from thin air, from the light, was a short sword that he had placed in the air above him, pointing backwards so that the blade ran along his forearm. In this case, that meant that it was a weapon, ready to summon, pointing directly behind Archer. It was a single short thrust away from his attacker’s gut, which is where he drove it in.

With a chunk of metal in his stomach, the man let go of Archer, who fell forward onto his hands, gasping for breath. Archer coughed a few times and patted his hand against his chest. It was time to check on Alkaid.

The cat and Slim were still dodging each other more than fighting each other. Archer stood and walked towards them, behind Slim. He reached forward and grabbed Slim’s hands, wrenched the guns out of them, and tossed them as far as he could behind him.

Slim turned towards him with an expression on his face that showed he knew he had lost. Archer, perhaps venting a bit of anger, punched Slim in the nose. When the Vassal reeled back, Alkaid knocked his feet out from under him using his wooden sword, and fell with his knee on Slim’s chest for good measure.

With the Vassals taken care of, Archer felt reinvigorated. He could fight Vassals for hours yet.

“A wooden sword?” Archer asked.

“Felt like playing challenge mode today.” Alkaid said.

“Are you purring?” Archer asked, upon hearing the engine rumble coming from the cat’s chest.

“Goodness no.” Alkaid replied with a smile as he continued to purr loudly.

“This is the Automated Emergency Response Intelligence. Notification: essential personnel have been successfully evacuated. Premises will be purged of external threat.”

The purring stopped.

“Challenge mode, you said?” Archer asked.

Freeman placed the Lance on the floor of Canaan’s office. Its barrel was pointed at the wall. The device would take only a moment to set up, but it would take a few minutes to charge, especially given the modifications that Freeman had made to it. Overall, it was the same Lance, but it had a few tweaks to functionality.

Moments to set up, and it would bring about a new order to the world. Freeman knew that what drove him was described best as petulance, but being aware of the fact did little to deter him. He would be in charge of the new world, and his power would be that of a King, instead of the leader of the worthless lot that was the Vassals. It didn’t even occur to him to think of them as pawns, as that would imply that their sacrifices had been worthwhile. The Vassals had been a tool, and the organization was now through.

Freeman would have to round them all up once he was King. Those who served under him would retain a false sense of belonging, so the only choices he had for them were imprisonment or death. The mere idea of the power that was soon to be his made him feel giddy and young, not the skeleton he had become in his time of waiting.

The fact that there was a price for this power was a part of Freeman’s rational. The Lance was the most powerful weapon ever created, this Freeman was aware of because he had commissioned its construction from the beginning. His learning of the boy Renton had been but a coincidence, but that coincidence brought an end to the waiting and a start to the planning. The Lance’s price was life, the life of an Indicia. It was a Burnout machine, with a singular purpose, absolute annihilation.

Aware that the Lance would cost Anje, Freeman hadn't expected the Indicia to go along with the plan. Indicia weren’t suicidal, as a matter of course. Though they could be vague on their purpose, goals, or motivations, those ends were not served by bringing about one’s own death. But to Freeman’s surprise, Anje had been most willing.

The reason for this, Freeman was unaware of. The Indicia was always a mysterious one, cloaked in shadows and never revealing his true form. The one thing that Freeman did not consider is that using the Lance did serve Anje’s needs, and that he had a plan of his own. The old man was arrogant above all else.

With the lance prepared, set on the floor of Canaan’s grand office, the time had finally come. Gone were the handles of the Lance, they had been replaced by a small sphere. Freeman pressed his thumb against the sphere, and slowly, it began to spin in its socket. The barrel was pointed directly at the side wall of the room with no apparent, specific target.

The Lance was beginning to activate, and there was nothing that could stop its firing.

Click.

Freeman whipped his head towards the door to the office, which now stood open. The door had automatically closed itself after he entered, so for it to be open, someone new must have been foolish enough to come confront him. Little did they know that their presence did naught but serve Freeman’s own needs.

Standing in the doorway was a small man, a pathetic man, who appeared weak and battered. A man who would be unable to put up a fight, much last survive the next few seconds. Without even asking who the man thought he was, Freeman readied a barrage of darkness in the form of talons, they would tear the man to pieces, but not so many that the life was extinguished. Then he would help serve as fuel for the Lance.

Click.

The man was holding a small object, and he had made it click twice in quick succession. Freeman could not tell what it was at a distance, only that it made a small spark of light along with the click. The man wobbled slightly, Freeman could easily see that he wasn’t in the best of shape. He hesitated only a moment, dumbfounded by what the clicking object could be.

It was a lighter, Isaac’s lighter. A small butane box which had, in days long past, been a quick way to make fire. It was technology, it was natural, but it was not magic. The magic users of modern day had become so accustomed to magic and modern technology that using something like a lighter to make a fire wouldn’t have crossed their minds.

And what good would a fire do, in an office made entirely of marble. A lighter could light other flammable materials to create a larger fire, but marble was decidedly not flammable. Even if a fire were started, the Registry and most other buildings of the day were equipped with top of the line, quick response fire suppression systems.

Riley held the lighter aloft, straining his arm to hold it high enough. He brought it to the top of the door’s threshold, where there would be a sensor for the sprinklers. Through the windows outside, Riley could see that, though a storm still loomed, it had not yet started to rain. In that case, he would bring his own rain to the fight.

Click.

And the lighter flashed up, bringing a flame to life, no larger than a candle’s burning wick. That small fire would have to be what saved Riley. There was no other way. As the fire burned, the sensors for the suppression system picked up on it, and they reacted.

Clink.

In an instant, in what seemed to be the same moment that Freeman first noticed Riley, the sprinklers turned on. Of course the mixture they sprayed was not entirely water, but a solution of chemicals designed to best extinguish a fire. There was water in it, and that was close enough. Riley smirked, his usual expression.

The room exploded into a maelstrom, a deluge of wet and dark, indiscernible from the undertow of the deepest ocean. Riley stood in the doorway, Freeman by the Lance, and without moving, they began to do battle. Water poured down on the office, began to whip around the room in a violent tornado of ice. Likewise, Freeman was contorting as much darkness as he could into sharp objects.

Standing their ground, Freeman and Riley were locked in a battle of will, of the strength of their souls. Riley knew that he was weak from his injuries, but Rain was cheering him on. It gave him hope that winning was a possibility.

[You’ve got this.]

Riley could hardly see Freeman through the storm, and he had to fight to keep his concentration as small shards of darkness sliced his skin. They were superficial cuts, nothing deep, and only where his flesh was exposed. If he let down his control of the ice, the cuts would get deeper and deeper until he became more shadow than flesh.

Though he couldn’t see it, his shards of ice were doing the same to Freeman, cutting and jabbing at him superficially. Each was using their control of their elements to defend themselves and attack at the same time. Riley knew this was the only hope he had of winning; that a traditional fight would be over before it began. He couldn’t move acrobatically, he couldn’t hit with the force he normally would.

Unconcerned with the fight the two humans were having, the Lance spun on. As the sphere reached a certain level, the charging mechanism activated. Freeman had replaced the manual charge with an automatic charge. A modification based on another design of Renton’s, it would allow the Lance to collect Aer even when not in direct contact with a Collar. Amongst the maelstrom, a white sphere of light expanded from the Lance, engulfed the whole room, bringing about a haze that washed colors out. As soon as it reached Riley, he knew what it was.

He could hear his heartbeat as the white field encompassed him.

No…

It was the same design as the bomb that Renton had designed to drain their Aer in Cliffridge. It would be able to absorb his energy for the Lance, even at a distance. It was time to go.

[You can’t go, Riley. You can’t let the Lance fire.]

Why not? Tell me why, Rain! If I’m going to die for this, tell me why! What here is worth dying for?

[There is something on the other side of that wall. If it gets taken or destroyed, it’ll all be over.]

It?

[Everything.]

Riley knew that Rain was telling the truth, and with those words, it was enough to keep him from running away that instant. His heart was pounding rapidly, but he could feel each and every beat as if they were slow and measured. He could feel the blood rushing through his head, to every part of his body.

The Lance wasn’t unstoppable, it just meant that Riley couldn’t stand his ground any longer. He needed to move forward. He wasn’t just walking forward into Canaan’s office, he was stepping through his fear and uncertainty. It was a walk through a shadowed valley, and it was only that Rain was with him that enabled him to move forward.

As Riley pressed his leg forward, the white wisps that gathered Aer for the Lance began to swim about, unfazed by the storm of ice and darkness. They came for him, and he moved towards them, unafraid. Wisps shot through Freeman as well, coming out the other side of his body in muddy, faded colors. Riley ignored the wisps as he took the first few steps into the office.

But he could feel them taking his Aer away, taking Rain away. The Lance was threatening to take Rain again. It had been a terror that had filled him since his first encounter with the Lance, but it would have been ludicrous to expect it could actually come true. It was unfair, ridiculous, and impossible.

Shadows tore at his armor, ripped at his flesh, as he walked deeper into the heart of the storm. In his head, threatening to break his concentration completely, nightmares emerged. Memories of Rain, huddled together and warm, even in the snow. Those memories were changing, asking Riley a question. Asking him who he would be without the otter.

What would he be on his own?

They weren’t real, they were a product of his fear. The closer he got to the Lance, the more of his energy that it drained, the more forceful they became. Without Rain, Riley would have been nothing. He would never have left Acadia, he would never have met Jin or Archer or Isaac. He would never have saved a life. Everything that made Riley who he was came from Rain. In the world of his imagination, Riley saw it was true.

The begrudging footsteps stopped. Feet remained still. Wind whipped at his hair and armor, and Riley had one last chance to turn and run away. He could escape the office, escape the building, and continue to live with Rain. But that was impossible. To run away would be to throw away that which Rain made him, to give up being a hero. To stay may mean to die or to lose Rain, but leaving would eventually lead to one or the other, anyway.

The outcomes were inevitable. Rain wouldn’t forgive him if he fled.

And Rain had turned Riley into a hero. Riley didn’t pretend to be a hero to make Rain like him. Riley had become one thanks to Rain. Riley didn’t have it in him to turn tail and run, as much as his fear told him it was the correct course of action. Even as the wisps took his energy, as his connection to Rain grew dimmer, Riley stepped forward.

Slight as it may have been, the connection to Rain was still there. Deep inside, Riley felt for the light that the otter brought him, the warmth. Gone were the terrors of finding himself alone in the snow. No matter what happened now, Riley hadn’t been alone. He’d been with Rain, he’d been warm, he’d been happy, and he’d been safe. Not a single night had passed since they met where Riley was alone, where he wasn’t nestled in the otter’s arms.

The wisps were filling the air with bright and muddy hues, flitting about with no concern for the people they were taking away from. Their job was nearly done. The Lance’s barrel was spinning, and it was glowing with a cold, heartless light.

It was Freeman who faltered first. Riley didn’t know if it was because he had experienced the Lance before that he was able to hold his concentration longer, but he took advantage of it the instant it happened. Directing the entirety of the ice storm at Freeman and the Lance, he hoped to bring an end to the encounter in a single swoop. The ice gathered in the air above Freeman and crashed down on him in a frozen waterfall.

As the air cleared, Riley’s heart sank. It hadn’t worked. Though Freeman looked scuffed up and more worn than before, he was still standing. Evidently, he had reconfigured his shadow into a shield to protect him from Riley’s ice.

Rain attempted to say something, but it was distant and muffled. Riley couldn’t hear it.

Freeman breathed slowly, arms held in the air in front of him, covered by a shadow wall that reminded Riley of a tinted window. Freeman could have ended the fight there, he could have killed Riley and been done with it. It would be only seconds until the Lance fired.

Freeman was arrogant above all else.

Instead of killing Riley, who stood halfway between the door and the Lance, Freeman acted spitefully. Using the shadow of Canaan’s desk, he lifted the large object into the air and hurtled it at Riley. Unable to react quickly enough, the desk hit home, knocking Riley to the ground, crushing him, trapping him.

Unconcerned with appraising his own damage, Riley didn’t struggle against the desk. He didn’t try to pull himself free. It would make no difference. Instead, he desperately searched for Rain. The connection was still there, albeit weaker than it had ever been. He closed his eyes, shut out distractions, reached for Rain.

“Rain, this didn’t exactly go so well.” Riley said.

“It’s not over yet.” Rain said.

The otter was standing in front of him, inside his head.

“What more can I do? I’m stuck under a desk and I’ve got about nothing left in the tank.” Riley said.

“You’re still alive.” Rain said.

“Not for long.” Riley said.

“The Riley I know has never been that pessimistic.” Rain said. “Is Isaac rubbing off on you?”

“Phrasing.” Riley said, with an involuntary smirk.

“I meant it both ways.” The otter said with a wink.

“Am I an optimist, Rain? Or is that just you?” Riley asked.

“I can see who you are, but I can’t tell you who you are.” Rain said.

“What is this all for?” Riley asked.

“I couldn’t explain it in the few seconds we’ve got left. I already told you, it’s for everything.” Rain said.

“No, not the Lance and Freeman. I mean...life. You. Me. Indicia. Collars. What is it all for?” Riley asked.

Rain smiled broadly. “Isn’t that the question?”

“You know something, don’t you?” Riley said.

“We’d better do something, time is almost up.” Rain said.

Riley opened his eyes, and Rain moved far away again. He was pinned firmly underneath the upturned desk. Freeman stood triumphant near the Lance, the Lance was ready to fire. Riley had never been a pessimist. Thinking quickly had saved his life before, he wasn’t about to let everything end like this. Outside, rain was falling from the clouds, indifferent and cold. He was too weak to do anything with it. Magic was no longer an option.

If magic wasn’t an option, he would have to do it the old fashioned way. Unfortunately, his legs were under the desk, and he couldn’t reach any of his daggers. Something picked at him from his subconscious. There was another option, something he was having trouble thinking of. It would have been…

“Is that a gun?” Riley asked, ignoring Canaan, referring instead to what he saw in the desk.

Canaan tilted his head to the side, waited a moment before answering. “It is. Why?”

“We’re Collars, we have magic. Why have a gun?”

Riley prayed silently and pulled the desk drawer open, and tumbling out came many things, and Riley’s salvation. The gun clattered on the floor noisily, but not out of Riley’s reach. Freeman turned to see the source of the noise, and Riley gave him no time to react. He scooped the gun up and turned it on the old man. He hadn’t fired a gun in years, and wasn’t skilled at it. His arms were tired, and he was probably broken in a few places from the desk. He fired once, twice. Bullets cracked the glass behind Freeman, the windows came close to shattering, but they held.

The third shot tore into Freeman, jerking him back violently. Riley kept firing, as many bullets as the gun held. He lost count of how many bullets he fired, of how many hit Freeman. The old man fell to the ground in a splatter of blood, and Riley could hear the man’s wheezed as the firing stopped. All that was left was the noise of the trigger clicking, a ringing in Riley’s ears, an old man’s dying wheezes, and the whirr of the Lance that was about to go off.

Perhaps the thrill of victory rejuvenated him, or maybe it was just a rush of adrenaline, but Riley pushed desperately and was able to lift the desk enough to struggle and pull his legs out. He dropped the gun on the floor and crawled over to the Lance. There had to be an off-switch. The ball of energy that had accumulated at the barrel of the Lance was shuddering, the want of potential destruction, an agent of entropy.

Drawing out his last reserve of strength, Riley used the Lance to pull himself up. Time was up. There was nothing left to do. The Lance would fire, Rain would be gone, and whatever was on the other side of Canaan’s wall would go with him.

But time wasn’t completely up. There was a second left. Riley concentrated and placed his hand on the Lance. It was an old trick, he didn’t use it often, not since his days as a con artist. His ability to turn back time. It was small. Only for a single object, and only for thirteen seconds. Blood dripped from his nose as a sphere of light appeared around the Lance’s barrel. The Lance would be kept from firing for thirteen seconds.

Riley had thirteen seconds to figure out how to stop it.

“Doctor Noether. Pleased to make your acquaintance.” The man in the coat said.

The surreal quality of the encounter persisted. Alyssa and Isaac stood, struck dumb for reasons they’d didn’t quite understand.

The man spoke with a poised quality, properly enunciating each sound. Isaac would have expected to meet a man like him at a cocktail party, not in a secret bunker.

There were many things Isaac could have said in that moment. Myriad relevant, pressing issues that he could have asked about, information he could have gained. Instead, he commented on the man’s outfit.

“I hate that tie.” Isaac said.

“Isaac, don’t insult the appearance of strange underground men that you’ve just met.” Alyssa scolded.

“What? So it’s okay to insult him after we get back to ground level?” Isaac asked.

“The underground part was not the point of what I said.” Alyssa replied.

Dr. Noether watched the two with curiosity. “So you’re not here to rescue me, then?”

“Every time we’re together, someone wants to be rescued!” Alyssa threw her arms into the air.

“You’re the one who works for the evil mega corporation.” Isaac muttered with a sideways glance.

“What? Don’t make me remind you that I’m a crazy woman with a gun. Also, point, I don’t work for InCorp anymore. And I never would have, if I knew they imprisoned handsome doctors in the basement!” Alyssa waved her gun around in the air to emphasize her point.

Though her point was taken, Isaac couldn’t help but bite back. “Don’t flirt with strange underground men we’ve only just met.”

“I’m not strange.” Dr. Noether insisted, “You two are.”

“I am not strange. I’m crazy. There’s a difference.” Alyssa turned her glimmering eyes towards Dr. Noether, and they twinkled in the firelight.

“Noted.” Dr. Noether said with a hesitant nod. “So if you aren’t here to rescue me, why are you here?”

“What do you need to be rescued from?” Isaac asked.

The room was poshly decorated, more of a formal office than a prison cell. Though it was inside the vault, there wasn’t anything evident that the doctor could need rescuing from. Isaac did not consider the existential concept of rescue, of being imprisoned in one’s own life, if not physically but emotionally. People tend to have a blind spot where their own problems are concerned.

Regardless, that wasn’t the type of rescue that Dr. Noether had in mind. “I’m a prisoner. Despite the look of my office, it is a prison cell, indeed.” The doctor waved a hand around at the room. “They gave me whatever they wanted, so long as I did what they asked.”

“Did what they asked?” Alyssa said.

“I’m not a medical doctor. I’m a doctor of Aer. Of magic.” Dr. Noether said. “They wanted me to make something for them. I’ve been trapped here, working on it for InCorp. I thought, when you arrived, that the Registry sent you to liberate me.”

“Why are you the only one here?” Isaac said.

“You two are full of questions. Listen, if you get me out of here, I’ll answer anything you like. Later. As for why I’m the only one here, it’s because I’m the only scientist they still need. Everyone else left when we finished.” Dr. Noether walked past the pair and into the hallway.

They glanced at each other and started following him down the hallway, as if he had come to lead them to safety. He walked with a confident step, upright posture, a haughty air. The door slid closed to the office, and none of them looked back.

“Finished what?” Isaac asked, and he kicked himself for being only able to ask questions.

Dr. Noether didn’t speak until they came to the central room. As they entered, he pointed to the glowing sphere in the center. “It was a whole team of us, working day and night for years. We hardly ate or slept, we were committed. At first, it was voluntary. We had a common purpose, we were probing the depths of possibility.  We were trying to do the impossible.” He sighed loudly.

“You made something impossible.” Isaac whispered, once again entranced by the soul sphere.

“We did.” Dr. Noether nodded. “We created Nova. That is what you see here before you.”

“An artificial soul sphere.” Isaac said.

“Synthetic. A synthetic soul sphere. Minute distinction, but important.” Dr. Noether corrected.

“Why?” Isaac asked.

“Magic, unchained from the collar of an Indicia.” Dr. Noether whispered.

“I’m glad you two are having a moment, but now that that mystery is solved, it occurs to me we had something else we were doing. Isaac, something else…?” Alyssa said.

Isaac took a moment to wrench himself from the wonder of the soul sphere. “You’re right. We don’t have much time. Doctor, do you know anything about the Artificial Intelligence that InCorp developed? They turned it into a security system in the building, and it’s going to be used to murder hundreds of people.”

“Ah, Stella. She was the first thing we developed, before Nova. Though I was unaware she would be used for a nefarious purpose. She was intended to be the control system for Nova.” Dr. Noether said, though there was no hint of concern in his voice.

With the thoughts of Sera and his friends upstairs, in danger, returning to the forefront of Isaac’s mind, concern was inevitable. The soul sphere wasn’t majestic enough to make him forget about his worries any longer. He wanted to ask why Nova needed a control system, and an artificial intelligence, at that. That question could wait. The AI had to be shut down. If it was meant to be a control system for Nova, and the synthetic sphere was Nova, then it followed that the AI core should be nearby.

“You were right when you said you should educate us later. Is the computer that Stella is on nearby? We need to stop it.” Isaac said.

Dr. Noether walked calmly to one of the computer terminals and turned it on, typed at it with one hand. Isaac and Alyssa waited, twitching with impatience. Dr. Noether cleared his throat, and tilted his head to the side as he looked at the screen. “Uh oh.” He said, though there was no urgency to it.

“Uh oh?” Alyssa asked.

“Take a look.” Dr. Noether said, stepping aside from the screen.

Isaac and Alyssa stood side by side to get a good view of the display.

“Stella has already activated a purge protocol. As I said, I had no idea she would be used for such a purpose, but I suppose I knew it was possible. The entire building, you say?” Dr. Noether said.

“Except for this bunker.” Alyssa nodded. “We can’t let that happen.”

“Can’t say we have much of a choice. I’m a prisoner here, remember? I don’t have any control.” Dr. Noether said. “Safest bet is to stay here and wait it out.”

“Not an option.” Isaac said. He began to glance around frantically. “Stella, she’s saved on one of these computers?”

Without looking, Dr. Noether pointed at the locked door to the left of the room. “A server bank in there, to be exact. No way through that door. No way to stop her.”

In this same situation, previously, Isaac had relied on Tyloki to save everyone. Without Tyloki, there was nothing he could do. There was no way to combat such a large threat with just his bare hands. It wasn’t his fault, everything that was happening, but his brain had no trouble twisting it to seem that way. Everyone that would die because he ran away from Tyloki, it screamed inside his head, filled his stomach with lead.

Alyssa started typing at the computer, and Isaac couldn’t keep up with the speed with which words were flitting across the screen. “I used to work here. Maybe I can redefine essential personnel, or something. Anything to stop it or slow it down.”

“I doubt you’ll have much luck, but feel free to try. If we are safe here, it’s not like we’ve got anywhere else to be.” Dr. Noether said.

Isaac ran his hands through his hair. He felt useless, but that was nothing new. He always felt useless. This was different, he felt useless because there was something he could have been doing. It just hadn’t occurred to him yet. It was an idea that was crazy, certified Isaac. An idea that would have caused Tyloki to call him an idiot. Those were the kinds of ideas that worked for Isaac. There had to be one here, something to do.

Something impossible.

“Alyssa, is it working?” Isaac asked.

“No. No it isn’t.” She said.

“Alright.” Isaac skipped across the room, down the center alley, towards the soul sphere. “Alyssa.” He turned to look at her, waited until he had her attention. “Go start bringing as many people down the ladder into the basement as you can manage. We can’t fit everyone down here, but we can fit some.”

“Sure. What are you going to do?” Alyssa asked.

“Something idiotic.” Isaac said.

You are a runt. What could you possibly do on your own?

Isaac smiled as he climbed the stairs to the central platform. “Haven’t you heard? I always stay when I should run away. That makes me sort of a hero.”

Isaac waited until Alyssa left the vault, and then he took a deep breath and held his hands before the soul sphere. There was really no reason this would possibly work. But if trying to kill himself by trying dumb ideas was who he was, Isaac couldn’t help it. He had to give it a shot.

Magic without the chain of an Indicia.

“Don’t!” Dr. Noether shouted urgently as Isaac reached forward.

It caused a flash of panic in Isaac’s stomach. Why would the doctor, who had been so calm before, be emotional now when he realized Isaac intended to touch Nova? Isaac’s palms pressed against the sphere, and he was surprised to find it didn’t feel like silk. It felt like the sun, or however he imagined the sun would feel.

Isaac wasn’t in the vault anymore. He was elsewhere, everywhere. Images flashed through his head, his consciousness was lost in a vast expanse, being tossed about by the tides of a chaotic universe. He saw things that he had experienced, people and places from his past. He stood before Edgar Cross, confident and unafraid. He stood in front of Tyloki the Flame. In an instant, he saw and heard and felt everything he had ever done before.

He was falling, gazing up at Tyloki. Falling towards a firestorm, looking at the grinning fangs of a monster. His hands were covered in blood, blood dripped from the walls, puddled on the floor. Dreams and nightmares, dredged up from the furthest reaches of his mind, places only an Indicia could have tread. The need to keep Sera safe, the belief that she could be so much more than he could, if only he could keep her from being broken. All this time, they had huddled together in the darkness, and she wasn’t better, but she wasn’t broken.

Nightmares about her being taken from him. Taken by Edgar or by Dominic or by Tyloki.

He was in Miria’s apartment, and it was empty. There was no furniture, only empty rooms and sterile walls. The mark she had made on the world was gone, as well as she was. A black mist swirled around the kitchen.

He was at the Registry, he was at home, and he was in the city. He was healthy, he was battered and bruised, he was bleeding and he was drawing blood. All things, more than he could comprehend at once. Pain and loss, hope and happiness.

Images. Places. People. Faces.

A crack.

A shining white crack in a black wall, a crack that filled him with terror. He didn’t know how he knew, but he knew what he was looking at. Something was broken in the universe, and he was looking at the damage.

Pulled back by Dr. Noether, who had to wrap his arms around Isaac’s midsection to yank him back off of Nova. Blood dripped, dripped, dripped onto the floor from Isaac’s nose. He wiped the blood off of his lip and turned to look at the doctor. The room was filled with a new light, a blue glow that hadn’t been there before.

Dr. Noether stepped back, backwards down the steps. “Are you okay?”

Where was the blue glow coming from? “I…” The light was coming from Isaac.

It was strong and bright, brilliantly blue, like an azure gemstone.

“You’re...glowing a little bit.” Dr. Noether said.

It was true. The light was coming from Isaac’s collar brand, the blue circle around his neck was luminescent. Inside, Isaac felt a wealth of energy, something he never felt before, even when he was bound to Tyloki.

Tyloki was not there. The totem was in a lockbox.

But even still, Isaac had magic.

The bloodlust was reaching a fever pitch. Dominic had expected not to feel quite so emotional over the prospect of getting his revenge. After all, if he was acting in the interest of reality, of justice, then it shouldn’t be personal. As he climbed the stairs, he started to feel a pang of some analogue to guilt, but he quickly squashed it down. Certain that he was justified, the euphoria that he knew would envelop him was just a bonus. A reward for bringing balance to the world.

Sniffing the air as he stepped out of the stairwell, Dominic thought he’d still be able to pursue Sera, even without knowing where she was. He would have been able to follow her scent, like a search dog. That wasn’t necessary, he knew precisely where she was.

A computerized voice announced something over the building intercom, Dominic ignored it. There was no way it was important to him, nothing bad would happen to him so long as he was carrying out justice. The hallway was quiet and barren, remnants of a battle hinted at events that had recently transpired here, but these likewise mattered little to Dominic.

His eyes seized onto the door where he knew Sera to be hiding, and he halted his movement. Caution wasn’t the reason he stopped, caution was unnecessary to him. Caution was the hopelessness of the common man, who had to genuinely worry about the possibility of failure. The reason Dom stopped was to savor the moment.

The moment of anticipation before opening a wrapped gift. Here was every gift he had ever been denied, lost to the tragedy that had befallen him.

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, committing the feeling from his stomach to memory, in case he ever forgot his mission. It would be simple to recall such a fantastic feeling, the reaffirm his dedication. To remind himself just how much he wanted to kill someone. Random muscles twitched in anticipation, Dominic felt as if he was vibrating. A cocktail of emotions rushed through him, and he was letting them sink in before moving forward.

There was no reason to wait any longer. Time to get the job done.

The door was only a few feet away now, but Dominic’s anticipation caused each footfall to feel like a mile. Would he end it quickly or toy with his prey? Would he use Tyloki’s damned fire or a more elegant element? Knowing that he would be able to make all the decisions he needed in the blink of an eye, he reached out to grab the door handle.

Sweat made the metal handle difficult to grasp, it felt slimy as he twisted it open. The reaction he got as the door swung open wasn’t a scream, as he expected. It was the face of a frightened woman, but she didn’t give him the pleasure of a blood curdling scream. Dominic knew he had the face of a monster, so why she didn’t scream was confusing to him. The blonde woman was huddled at the back of the storage closet, and she was staring at him in disbelief.

As it dawned on her who he was, her facial expression changed, and it felt like a punch in Dominic’s gut. Mixed in with her confusion was pity, she felt sorry for him in some way. That wasn’t fair, why would she feel sorry for him? He had suffered, yes, but he suffered as a result of what he had done to her. Hadn’t he? No, his suffering had been because of Tyloki, because of the actions of the wolf.

The demon wolf. And that wolf belonged to Isaac, which was why Sera was a target. That was always why Sera had been a target. She had done nothing herself except be alive. She should have been angry that she was a part of this at all. If she was angry, it would have been easier to carry out his mission of justice.

Dominic was beginning to confuse himself. There was no more time to think about why. It was time to act.

There was a gun in her hands, an implicit symbol of hostility. Despite the pity on her face, she held a gun in her hands, and that signaled that she wanted to fight. If she wanted to fight, Dominic felt no guilt for bringing her into this. Choosing to fight made her responsible for the outcome.

The air became charged around Dominic as he began to prepare a spell. He didn’t know which element yet, but it would make itself known to him as it began to form. Molecules cracked and screamed as Dominic wrought his change on the universe, turning air into another of the primal elements.

Sera noticed the beginning of the spell, and she raised the gun. She wanted to fight, and yet she did not pull the trigger. Tears formed in her eyes, her own form of magic was crying, it seemed. The dark storage room flashed with a strobe light as charges in the air equalized themselves, flashes of a lightning storm caught in a bottle.

Tongues of lightning licked around Dominic, between his hands, between his flesh and the floors, the walls. The lights flickered. The girl was pleading now.

“Please, please…” She was shaking her head, tears were running down her face like rainfall.

It wasn’t Dominic’s decision to make, he was carrying out the will of the universe. Perhaps he would have stopped, if he hadn’t received his mission.

[That isn’t true. You wouldn’t have stopped.]

Shut up.

[This isn’t about the will of the universe. This isn’t about what Tyloki did to you.]

Stop.

[Walk away.]

I can’t!

[Dominic, I love you. I would’ve given my life for you, to make you happy. When we met, I could see that you were injured. I wanted to be the one who would save you, because I loved you. I went along with the things you wanted, stuck with you, in the hopes that I could steer you in the right direction. Over time, I lost sight of my hopes more and more. Eventually, I was just your servant, I couldn’t even see how little I mattered to you anymore. Any capacity you had for love was being overwritten by a need for revenge. And revenge for what? Tyloki spared you from a life of hardship. There was nothing the wolf could have done to save your mother, to save Doreen.]

Shut up!

[Tyloki could see you were too young, too fragile, to be with him. And I could never hate him for turning you down, as much as that hurt you, because if he hadn’t, I wouldn't have been able to be with you. We’ve seen a lot of beautiful things since we met. We’ve had a lot of good friends. But you’ve missed all of them, somehow. I wonder if the person I saw in you was ever there, or if it was just my own dream. I can’t do this anymore.]

It’s not that you don’t matter to me, Basel.

[If I matter to you, even the tiniest bit, then walk away.]

I can’t.

[If you can’t, then I can.]

Dominic couldn’t let Basel leave, he needed the ferret’s magic. The lightning was already conjured, he just needed to direct it. Then he could try to convince Basel of the truth of the universe. The truth of justice.

[You’re not righteous, you’re just crazy.]

Throwing his arms forward, Dominic blasted all of the pent up energy towards Sera. She closed her eyes, but she still didn’t pull the trigger. None of the lightning hit the woman, it all went off course, striking the walls and floors. The reason for this was that Dominic’s arms weren’t held forward, the direction he intended. They were being held out to his sides, furred arms wrapped under his elbows.

In essence, Basel was hugging him. It was warm, and comforting, and he hadn’t been hugged that way in as long as he could remember. Any time Basel would have tried, he would have shooed him off, that sort of sentimentality showing his weakness. But the ferret was also holding his arms still, preventing him from casting any more spells. He struggled against the ferret, trying to pull his arms free.

“Sera, I can’t…” Basel said. “I can hold him. But I can’t…You have to do it. I can’t hold him forever.”

“Basel, what are you doing? You said you were going to walk away. This isn’t walking away.” Dominic complained.

“I walked away from Dominic. Whatever you’ve become, it’s not Dominic anymore. I don’t love you. I loved him.” Basel said.

Sera’s hand trembled, and she wrapped her free hand around the gun to steady it. Her finger touched the trigger.

“You’re going to get me killed, Basel!” Dominic said.

“Still blaming others, all the way to the end.” Basel said. “Sera! You have to save both of us.”

            Dominic was beginning to say something else when the gun fired, and his last word was muffled under the report. Basel held Dominic up as the bullet hole bled into his prison uniform. Thinking she was done, Dominic considered ways to take them with him. He could Burnout, punish Basel and Sera together. She was foolish to only shoot him once.

She wasn’t finished.

As she stared at his face, and watched the blood soak into Dominic’s clothes, Sera let go. She watched Basel as she did, and she knew it was what he wanted her to do as well. She fired again, one shot after another, not quickly but with an even pace. The world wouldn’t be safe, Dominic would always be hiding around a corner, but at least if she killed him now, she could remind herself of that every time she thought he might be lurking in the shadows.

The gun kicked back when it fired, the only cost of the gun was the kinetic energy. It wasn’t powered by magic or Aer. No Indicia needed, and though guns were ineffective against Thralls, they worked as well as ever against humans. Sera had practiced shooting guns since Dominic had taken her, but shooting at targets was different than shooting at people.

The bullets disappeared into Dominic, causing invisible destruction inside his body. The only hint to this damage was the bullet hole, the crack in the facade, which was misleading in its fanfare. The bullet hole was what commanded the eyes, when the more severe damage was hidden safely inside. Sera didn’t know on which shot Dominic finally died, but when he did, Basel vanished, and the body slumped to the floor.

Now her body allowed her to scream, and she did, but it wasn’t a scream of fear. It was of pity, of anguish, guilt, and despair. Sera threw the gun away, she couldn’t touch it anymore. Tears stung her eyes, and she stood up, shaking. She covered her mouth with her trembling hand, held back her gorge. Trapped in the closet by Dominic’s lifeless body, she knew she had to get out. This wasn’t a place she could stand to be anymore.

Not the closet, but the city.

Sera stepped gently over Dominic’s body, but her back foot caught on him, and she stumbled towards the wall on the far side of the hallway. Someone approached from the stairwell, they must have heard her scream. Wishing she still had the gun, Sera knew there was nothing else she could do but turn and face them head on.

Practically falling down when she saw that it was Alyssa, Sera leaned on the wall again. It didn’t take Alyssa long to appraise the situation, and she wrapped her arm around Sera.

“Come on, come on.” Alyssa said. “Isaac found a safe place for you.”

The former InCorp security officer must have thought that bringing Isaac up would have comforted Sera[1] .

Sera followed along obediently, but she had no comfort. “There’s no safe place.”

“There is, I’ll show you.” Alyssa said, but she misunderstood Sera’s words.

Thirteen seconds. The length of time that Riley could bend. It had never seemed to be a particularly useful power, he had only ever used it to con people out of money. It wasn’t enough time, on a large enough scale, to be of use for anything important. The size of the field he could effect was just too small. Now it finally came in handy, and he needed to think fast on how exactly to use it.

There was no time for words. Thirteen seconds would be consumed by words far too quickly. Instead, Riley and Rain had to communicate using thoughts, things that they knew. The Lance couldn’t be allowed to fire. If it fired while Riley was in the room, it would kill him, along with destroying whatever Canaan was protecting. If Riley tried to run, he might survive from the other room, but Rain would die when the Lance fired. If Riley threw the Lance out the window, hundreds of people might die, along with Rain, but at least the thing in the office would be safe.

It was hard to make that decision, since Riley didn’t know what the thing in the office was or why it was so important. All he knew was that he trusted Rain that it couldn’t be allowed to be destroyed. They couldn’t kill innocent Bastion citizens, either. It appeared impossible.

Riley didn’t know how to break the Lance. Maybe Renton would have, but he wasn’t there. There was a chance he could freeze the Lance solid in ice, but there was no guarantee that it wouldn’t still fire. Besides, Riley wasn’t sure he could otherwise effect something that was currently being held in time.

Time was ticking down.

Twelve seconds.

That was a long second, maybe they could figure something out if they kept working at it.

The Lance worked by building up and firing a massive amount of concentrated Aer. It had already built up most of the Aer it needed, and seemed to be working at the concentration part. The last of the Aer it needed would be Rain’s life, the thought sent Riley through a lurch. Break the part that was gathering Aer. The sphere on the back of the Lance. It might still fire, killing Riley and destroying the office. That couldn’t happen.

Eleven seconds.

Destroy the concentrator. Riley didn’t even know how to begin doing that. It appeared to be the barrel, but the mechanics of it could’ve been hidden anywhere inside the Lance. With more time, he would bash the thing until it didn’t work anymore. There wasn’t enough time to be sure about that. There wasn’t much time left at all, he had to choose something and try it. Stick with it. Even if it might not work.

Ten seconds.

The Lance gathered and fired Aer. The bond between a Collar and an Indicia worked on a similar principle, thought it was more of a balance and Riley didn’t honestly understand most of it. Indicia were Aer, they were energy, coalesced into a specific form. Where did the life come from? Was it from the Aer? No time to worry about that now. It must have been from the Aer. Take the Aer away, take the Indicia away. Riley could take the Lance into the Indicia’s world. Would it be able to fire there? Maybe there would be enough Aer there that it wouldn’t take Rain’s life. Wait, that was no good.

Nine seconds.

Technology and machines couldn’t go to the Indicia’s world. Only simple things, and humans. Riley didn’t know where the cutoff was, if he could take a weapon created by a machine to the other world, but not the machine that made the weapon. It didn’t matter, the Lance was undeniably a machine, and so it wouldn’t make the trip to the other world. They had to pick something.

Eight seconds.

Aer. Indicia were Aer, and they could transfer Aer from the other world to the Collar. That was where the Collar got most of their power from. The human world had ambient Aer, yes, but to have enough to cast magic, the human needed a bigger energy source, an Indicia. If Indicia could send Aer to the human world, could they take it back with them to the spirit world? That wasn’t a good plan, either. Riley and Rain both knew what it meant. They knew at the same moment, and one said no, the other said yes.

Seven seconds.

Riley tried to unthink the thought, to take it away from Rain, but the damage had already been done. They determined that the Lance fired Aer, and Aer was naturally drawn between the human and spirit worlds. If they couldn’t take the Lance itself to the spirit world, they could take its Aer. That would require letting it fire. It would go off, and in that instant, Rain could take the energy from the weapon to the spirit world, and it would disperse. It wouldn’t kill any innocents, and it wouldn’t kill Riley.

But the Lance would still fire, and that would kill Rain.

Six seconds.

Riley couldn’t let Rain do it, but he also couldn’t stop him. The seconds went faster as time ran short. It wasn’t enough to communicate in thoughts anymore.

No.

[The Index can’t be destroyed, Riley.]

I don’t care what the Index is, all I care about is you.

[If the Index is destroyed, there won’t be a ‘me’ to care about.]

Then we’ll die together.

[Not dead, Riley. Gone. And you know we don’t have any other options.]

Rain was correct, as usual. There was no other option. Riley felt paralyzed, not just in body but in mind. He couldn’t think, he couldn’t move, he couldn’t talk. A life without Rain was an abyss he didn’t want to find himself in. There was nothing he could do to stop the otter.

Five seconds.

No more talking inside his head. Rain was standing beside him now. Riley couldn’t even look over at him. This damn machine, it was going to kill him, no matter what. Even if it didn’t take his life, if it took Rain, he was as good as dead. What could be so important to be worth throwing away the thing you love most? Rain wasn’t throwing Riley away, he was saving him.

Rain was always the hero. Riley didn’t want to think about the person he was in the absence of the otter. The person he soon would be.

The otter placed his paw on Riley’s shoulder, and Riley’s face contorted, and he gave in to the sob. Riley would never have wasted time sobbing, such indulgent crying, at such a critical moment. But he couldn’t help it, it was all he could do, and he knew that the only thing that could comfort him was Rain. If he ever wanted to feel comfort, he needed to take it now, before it was gone forever.

Burying his face in Rain’s chest, he inhaled as deeply as he could between the hitching of his sobs. The otter always smelled of such an unnatural beauty, the impossible ideal of a perfect world, a place with no pain or fear, only bright, sunny days on the river, cool water rushing through pristine forests. Riley had never known a place like that, besides the river where he first met Rain in the other world.

Four seconds.

Now he knew that it was because such a place didn’t exist, it couldn’t exist. Indicia were separate from humans, above them. Indicia existed to lift humans up, and humans insisted on digging themselves back down. They fought and scrambled for meaningless things. Rain’s arms wrapped around Riley’s back, held him tight, like he used to do when Riley was a frightened boy lost in the Brink. In truth, Riley had never been lost, he’d been free, and it was Rain that brought him that freedom.

Three seconds.

Riley wanted to talk to Rain, to tell him and ask him so many things. His mouth wouldn’t move, all he could do was press his head against the otter. Rain’s fur was the softest thing in existence, no disputes, but it was also slick and oily. It was warm. Without that warmth, Riley would have been lost, dead and frozen in the frigid winters of the Brink. Now he would be just as frozen, though the snow had all melted long ago.

“I didn’t give you freedom, Riley. Freedom is being alive. What you do with it, that’s up to you.” Rain whispered into his hair.

What was the point of freedom, without Rain?

“I can’t tell you what the point of being alive is, Riley. I don’t know. I don’t. I’ve had plenty of chances to figure out, but maybe we just can’t. Maybe the question is unanswerable. All I can do is what I think is best. If there was any way to stay with you, I would.” Rain said.

Two seconds.

Riley steadied himself, pulled his head off of Rain’s chest. He looked up at the otter’s face. There wasn’t enough time left to say or do anything of consequence. He blinked away tears and just looked at Rain’s face. Humans didn’t deserve Indicia, Riley didn’t deserve Rain. The universe finally realized it, and was correcting the mistake. Pressing his lips against Rain’s muzzle, feeling the whiskers against his face, Riley tried to remember it all. It was something he could never forget.

One second.

Rain was gone. Anticlimactically, gone just as suddenly as the Indicia could vanish was the energy that the Lance had built up.

[I love…]

Riley stood in disbelief. He was angry, but he couldn’t feel it. He was numb, maybe he was broken forever. As a man who had gone blind knew what he might have seen, Riley knew what he should have felt, but it was not there. Inside his head, inside his soul, there was a silence. It was steady and still, and it scratched at him. The room was quiet, his soul was silent, and he was alone.

Not entirely alone.

And not entirely quiet.

He heard Freeman’s wheezing from the floor nearby. The old man wasn’t dead yet.

“You may want to get out of here.” Isaac said to Dr. Noether.

The man walked backwards, but kept his eyes on Isaac. “I don’t know what you’re doing, but…”

“My totem is in a Lockbox, I figured if this thing is a soul sphere, maybe it could give me magic the way my Indicia used to. Looks like I was right.” Isaac explained.

“A Lockbox.” Dr. Noether nodded. “Alright, looks like it worked, as bad an idea as that may have been. That sphere was designed to be interacted with through an interface system. You’re lucky it didn’t deteriorate your brain tissue.”

“Who’s to say it didn’t?” Isaac smiled and wasted no time heading to the locked door.

“What, exactly, is your ability?” Dr. Noether asked.

Isaac held his hands in front of him and effortlessly produced a shield. All the energy coursing through him meant he didn’t even need to concentrate much. The shield was vibrant and rich in color, looking less like glass and more like a wall than it had before. But a shield wouldn’t do what he needed. A shield wouldn’t get him into the server room.

“I’m sure you’ve figured this out by now, but that ability isn’t going to open the door.” Dr. Noether said.

“I know. This is just what I’m used to doing. You might want to leave before I try this next part.” Isaac tilted his head to the side.

Dr. Noether watched Isaac for a moment, appraising him, and then turned to exit the vault. When Isaac was sure he was clear, he set to work. Tyloki thought that he was weak, and maybe, compared to the synthetic soul sphere, Isaac was weak. Tyloki put energy into him, gave him the strength and power to make fire and shields. Destruction and protection. Isaac had never taken well to the use of Tyloki’s fire, and the fire itself had been unattainable since the burnout. Even when Isaac used Tyloki’s fire, it had always been to protect.

In this case, it would be necessary to let go of the notion that he had to protect someone. Here he just needed to be destructive, he needed the power that had frightened him since he had met Tyloki. Tyloki thought that he was weak, now he would be powerful. He wasn’t afraid of what he could do, he wasn’t confused about his purpose in life. There was an obstacle in front of him, and he was going to get through it.

That was the point. Edgar, Tyloki, obstacles that could be overcome, instead of run away from. Those obstacles had made Isaac stronger, and this one would as well. He wasn’t the weak boy who had met Tyloki a year ago. He wasn’t the boy who tried to die saving Sera from Dominic, and he wasn’t the boy who walked away from it all when he was given a chance.

He was Isaac, overflowing with power, pissed off, and ready to go.

A shield appeared in front of him, between him and the door. Not what he needed.

Get rid of the shield. The shield wasn’t going to help anyone, right now. He needed fire.

Another shield.

Growling audibly, Isaac twisted his head sideway to crack his neck. He closed his eyes and imagined fire. The essence of the element, what it meant, and what it stood for. It was passion, strength, energy, heat, salvation. It came big and small. A butane lighter. A firestorm that engulfed an entire building. The destructive force that had nearly killed Dominic. The flames in Tyloki’s eyes. Tyloki wasn’t fire, Tyloki just controlled it. Fire itself was an element, primal, one of the building blocks of life. Isaac had just as much right to utilize it as Tyloki.

With no idea how much time was left until the AI purged the building, Isaac needed to make this work. Another shield. He wasn’t angry enough, and that was what gave Tyloki his power. Or, not anger, but passion.

In the years when he had been running away from life, it was impossible for Isaac to be passionate about anything. Fire was opposed to his very being. Tyloki had shown him passion, what it meant to care about what you wanted to do. What you needed to do.

Isaac’s balled fists opened, and in them, fire. It burned dazzlingly bright, so hot that Isaac could nearly feel it. Not orange, or even blue, but the fire was a shining white. From the fireballs, miniature suns in the palms of his hands, pale fire came forth. Isaac didn’t know how hot it was, but it must have been thousands of degrees. The fire spilled forward in front of Isaac, and in the heat, the metal began to change colors, to sag under its own weight, to melt.

Shouting loudly, with a growling voice, Isaac willed the fire into existence, exhausting the pool of power that he had absorbed from the synthetic soul sphere. White fire in torrents, splashing against the melting walls, bending them to his will. As soon as there was a crack in the metal door, the fire flooded through, into the server room. The computers wouldn’t last long in that kind of heat.

Still, Isaac kept destroying. In order to protect, he forgot about protecting, and instead, he burned. Wave after wave of white flame, having already made the AI unable to function, continued to melt the component parts into unrecognizable piles of carbon. Isaac kept going, because he didn’t want the power he had taken from the soul sphere. He would exhaust it all.

When it was empty, and he had no magic again, he would be done.

The band around Isaac’s neck stopped glowing, and the fire in his palms dissipated, and the energy was spent. Isaac took a deep breath and fell forward onto a knee. Then he smiled, and he laughed. His throat was hoarse from screaming, and he felt like he’d just finished a triathlon, but he’d done it. He’d saved the day without trying to kill himself.

It was an important step.

In a moment, he would have to get up and go help the others upstairs. He would make sure that he had stopped the purge in time, he would aid the other Collars in the building as much as he could. Helping to evacuate the innocent would still be quite a task. The day wasn’t entirely over, not until the building was cleared and the Vassals were taken into custody. First, he needed to make sure that Sera was safe, and Roy.

There was no doubt in his mind that Riley had managed to stop Freeman and save the Registry. No doubt at all.

Forcing himself to stand, he looked around at the destruction he had caused. A shiver went down his spine, and he left the vault, and the synthetic soul sphere, behind.

Riley approached Freeman with all of the urgency of a man on a stroll in the park. He bent down to one knee and checked Freeman’s pulse again. The old man was not nearly as dead as he could have been. Without bothering to check the man’s injuries, the extent of them or their locations, Riley bent his head over Freeman’s and spoke.

“Indicia, that machine is powered by Indicia. That makes the Lance the closest thing to Hell that exists on this planet.” Riley said, and when he thought he was losing Freeman’s focus, he tapped the man’s face a few times with the flat of his hand. “You sacrificed your Indicia, and my Indicia, and for what? What could possibly have been so important on the other side of that wall that it was worth all of this?”

Riley leaned his face a little closer, smelling the blood and sweetness that accompanied death. “Indicia are, what, I don’t want to say angels. But they exist to make us better. They improve us.”

Grasping the man’s collar in his hand, Riley stood and forced Freeman to stand with him. The old man slumped, on the edge of death, in Riley’s grasp. Drawing him in closer, Riley continued. “I can’t say why we deserve the Indicia, why they would waste their time on us, but that’s the way it is. I don’t know what your Indicia meant to you, but obviously you were blind to it. Otherwise, you never would have thrown him away.”

Walking with Freeman, Riley dragged the old man’s feet along the ground, causing a screeching sound as his shoes dragged wetly across the tile. “I wouldn’t have thrown Rain away, I would have died for him without hesitation.”

When Riley didn’t speak, there was a blinding silence in his head, so he kept speaking to fill it up.

“Because Rain made me so much better. Indicia do that.” Riley slammed Freeman into the window overlooking the city. The sky outside no longer appeared to be the pallid visage of a rain soon to come, but instead, it was the pale stagnation of a sun that would never emerge from behind the clouds again. “Some make us stronger. Some make us faster. Some make us smarter. They can heal wounds and cure diseases.”

Riley pulled Freeman off of the window and slammed his against it again. The glass was cracked after having received so many of the bullets that were meant from Freeman. “And that’s just what they do to our bodies. They make us more attuned to this all, everything. They bring us closer to our potential, to what we were meant to be, but can never be on our own.”

Another slam, and blood was dripping down the window behind Freeman.

“I was broken before I met him, and he gave me something that I didn’t have. Do you want to know what Rain did for me?” Riley asked, and he paused to give Freeman time to answer.

The old man was not coherent, most likely couldn’t understand or hear what Riley was saying, but he gave him the chance to answer, regardless. He pulled Freeman off of the window and close, so he could whisper in his ear.

Rain was gone. All of the hope that the otter stood for, the freedom they shared, their lust and passion, their happiness, in an instant, it was gone. Riley hadn’t lost a piece of himself. He lost an entire half, gone forever. Whispering softly, so that he could feel the silence that he had allowed to come to pass, Riley answered his own question.

“He made me feel.”

With the next slam, the window shattered, and thousands of shards of glass scattered outward into the wind, taking Riley’s dreams with them. With his arm fully extended, Riley let go of Freeman’s collar, throwing the old man out into the air, doomed to fall to the city streets below. Riley watched him fall with a stoic expression, wind whipping against him. He thought for a second about jumping, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it.

Watching Freeman fall didn’t bring him any joy or closure. He felt nothing as he watched the man hit the ground and become nothing. He wouldn’t feel anything, not anymore. Just as he was before he met Rain, Riley was broken. Something inside kept him from feeling his emotions, though he knew what they should be.

All that remained was a numb silence, and the silence was so loud, it echoed in the halls of his mind, as unrelenting as the wind and rain, unforgiving, and never ending.