Choreees fell silent. Wind scraped against bent metal and toppled stop signs, sirens wailed across the ruins, glasses fell from broken windows and shattered on the streets below. What lingered was the weight of heavy breathing and the scattered shuffle of those still alive. While the breath of life escaped from those who were no longer alive.
RUINS – LOWER RIGHT OF THE LAND OF PARADISE
The blast flung Micheal like a ragdoll. His body tore across the concrete, skin scraping raw, until he smashed through the glass front of a corner store. He lay twisted among the shards, blood pouring from a gash at his head and soaking into his collar. His shirt hung in ribbons, every strip of fabric clinging to cuts that ran deep across his chest and arms. His lip split wide, leaking crimson that mixed with the glass dust on the floor. His vision swam double, then black, then double again.
"Wha… hel…" he croaked, words slurring as his body switched in between consciousness. He had taken the force of the attack head-on, and it clearly showed.
VAN #4 – NEAR THE DESTROYED UNDERPASS
The van tumbled violently, metal screeching as it rolled end over end before slamming into the shattered remains of the underpass. Not near the crater, but not nearly far enough. Flames erupted at the wreckage, creeping across the twisted steel.
The mangled side door burst open, and Madison crawled out, coughing up blood. One arm dangled uselessly at her side, but she still screamed through grit teeth, "Doug! Are you alive?! Get the damn radio, we need to reach Sage!"
Doug dragged himself out after her, face bloodied, body marked with purple bruises and jagged cuts. His chest heaved as he met her eyes.
"Fu… what the hell was that? I thought we were gonna die…"
Madison pressed a trembling hand to his chest, light spilling from her palm. His wounds began to knit together, his breathing easing.
"Thanks," he panted. "But don't forget yourself—"
She spat blood into the dirt and snapped back, "Idiot. Hope Presence doesn't heal its user. And last I checked, I'm the only one here who has it."
Doug froze, words caught in his throat. "Wait… then how are you even standing? The van flipped a dozen times—are you—"
"I've had worse," she cut him off, tearing her sleeve into a strip and knotting it tight around her ankle. "I was trained for this. These are just scratches."
Doug exhaled in disbelief, until his face suddenly drained of color. "…Madison." His tone sharpened.
She shot him a glance. "What."
"Your ability. Is it still active? Shirley… Shirley was at the center of that blast!"
Her laugh cracked, short, kinda frantic, until the weight of his words slammed into her. "O—no. No, no, no, no! Shirley was right there! But, he has to be okay. The link… it must've just dropped now!"
Doug grabbed her shoulders, shaking her, desperation bleeding through his voice. "Madison, you were just tossed around in a burning van! Of course you lost focus! Shirley—goddamn it—Shirley took that head on!"
Madison's teeth clenched, blood dripping down her chin. "It can't be…"
Madison's hands shook violently, but she pressed them together anyway. "Come on… come on… work, dammit!" Blood ran down her arm, soaking the dirt beneath her knees. Her body screamed for her to stop, but she forced Hope Presence back into existence, desperately clawing at the faint thread that might still connect her to Shirley.
NUMEROUS RESISTANCE VANS – AFTERMATH
The earth was still trembling when the noise faded. What followed was worse than silence, screams, scattered cries, groans of the injured.
A Resistance fighter staggered out from a burning van, his face half-covered in blood, clutching his side where metal had torn through him. Another lay in the dirt, arm bent in the wrong direction, staring wide-eyed at the crater as if it might still swallow him whole.
ZE210 dragged himself up from a pile of debris, blood was exposed from a couple exposed spots on his chest. He looked at his trembling hands, then at the chaos around him. "…Mascots don't bleed," he muttered, as if saying it could undo the truth dripping down his arm.
Sage emerged from the wreckage limping, his clothes torn, face scorched from the shockwave. He pressed a hand against his ribs where bone threatened to snap with each breath, yet his eyes didn't waver. "Focus, you bastards!" He barked, voice raw. "Get up! Count survivors! MOVE!" The words were steel, but beneath them, his clenched jaw betrayed the same fear coiling in everyone else: what had Cael unleashed?
LAND OF PARADISE – CIVILIANS
Far from the battlefield, citizens had felt it too. Windows shattered across blocks, alarms wailed, and people stumbled into the streets, clutching their children. Rumors spread faster than the smoke: the ground had split, CORE's enemies had been obliterated, the world was ending again.
LAND OF FLAMES
Tucker froze as the rumble reached even there, a low growl through the earth. His hands trembled, fists tightening against the fear crawling under his skin.
"What was that…" he whispered. His voice cracked as he scanned the endless wasteland around him.
The woman who had helped him earlier glanced skyward. Her brow furrowed, searching for signs in the emptiness above, nothing. She exhaled, forcing a smile she didn't believe. "Just the land shifting," she muttered. But her voice faltered, and her eyes lingered far too long on that trembling horizon.
SHIRLEY'S POV? AT THE UNDERPASS
Cael hovered high above the underpass at he stared at the crater. His creation. A faint, frantic smile appeared on his face. The angel was no longer a saint.
Flames raged at the edges of the crater, so hot they curled metal and melted asphalt. Anyone who dared step inside would be reduced to ash.
But from the heart of that inferno… something moved.
A shadow clawed its way free of the fire. Step by step, it staggered upward, what was left of a man, or a boy. Shirley's body was unrecognizable: skin shredded and blackened, muscle fibers twitching where flesh had burned away. His left arm was gone, torn clean off at the shoulder. His torso was half missing, ribs jutting out, lungs exposed. The side of his head was split open to raw bone, an eye socket hollow and smoking. He looked less like a human and more like some nightmare dragged from the pit of hell.
And yet, he held one cleaver in hand. Its edge burned dimly, reflecting the firelight.
Madison collapsed forward on her knees, hands pressed outwards, blood leaking down her chin. "Not yet," she whispered, voice trembling. "You don't get to take him yet." She forced Hope Presence into the broken husk before her, light spilling from her palms like threads weaving themselves into his wounds.
The process was grotesque and divine all at once. Burned skin began to stitch itself back together, pale and raw as if freshly grown. Muscle reknit, fibers pulling taut as veins began crawling their way back into place. Where fire had eaten him alive, glowing tissue layered itself over bone hardening into form. His chest expanded with a ragged gasp as new breath filled scorched lungs. Even the exposed half of his skull began to crawl with fresh skin, stretching and shaping across the wound until he resembled something human again.
Shirley twitched violently, every nerve screaming as life dragged him back from the brink. His grip on the cleaver tightened, knuckles whitening as sensation returned. He staggered forward, his vision still blurry.
Through the haze, he lifted his head—one eye blazing with fury, the other covered by his hair.
LAND OF SNOW – CORE'S POV
Deep within his cylinder of viscous liquid, CORE's lips curled into a smile. "Ahh. Has he been forgiven…? I wonder." His voice echoed softly in the chamber, cruel and curious. "I do dream to see this 'Genius.' Some dreams stay dreams… and some, it seems, claw their way into reality."
UNDERPASS – SHIRLEY'S POV
The world rang in Shirley's ears. His vision flickered between light and shadow, every movement sending pain screaming through his restored body. But in his hand, the cleaver remained steady. He forced one step forward, dragging fire and blood with him, and the crater seemed to shrink behind his silhouette.
He was still here. Still standing. The self proclaimed Genius did not fall neither yield.