Chapter 137
The Abnormal sang its liturgy with solemnity, with devotion, with faces that suddenly turned calm, peaceful, like monks chanting psalms within an ancient cathedral, like qari reciting sacred verses with a flowing tartil, like believers across the world whispering their deepest prayers with unwavering faith.
Yet behind that perfect solemnity, Nirma felt something wrong, something that made the hairs on her neck stand—not out of fear, but because of a gaping emptiness hidden between the notes being sung.
The liturgy contained not a single element that existed in any holy scripture—no verse from the Bible, no line from the Qur'an she had once heard in the markets of Constantinople, no sloka from the Vedas she had read in historical archives, not a single revelation from the thousands of religions and billions of beliefs in this world reflected in that chant.
What existed instead were insults, what existed instead were curses, what existed instead was hatred woven into a language so beautiful, so grand, so sacred, that words which should have been repulsive sounded like the most sincere of prayers.
She heard how the liturgy tore apart every verse ever written, how it burned every revelation ever received, how it trampled every belief that had ever allowed humanity to endure suffering, and Nirma felt her chest tighten.
Not because she was devout, not because she believed in any particular scripture, but because she knew that behind this liturgy was something older than any religion, something that hated all that was sacred, something that sought to prove that everything humanity believed as truth was nothing more than dust scattered by the wind.
And then, the burning happened.
Nirma did not see fire, did not see flames—what she saw was how Ashita's attack, fifty bullets accelerated with momentum a hundred times the speed of light, vanished in an instant, how Tegar's missile with its six escorting blades was incinerated without leaving even smoke, how Arya's five-colored laser descending from the sky with deadly beauty was extinguished like a candle blown out by a child.
Everything was gone, everything was burned, everything turned to dust drifting within the liturgy that still continued to echo, and before Nirma could process what had just happened, she felt something even more terrifying.
The M4A1 in her hands—a weapon she had used in hundreds of battles, a weapon that had never failed her—suddenly trembled, then heated up, then emitted a hissing sound she had never heard before.
She saw the small screen on the side of the weapon flash red, error codes appearing too fast to read, and within seconds she knew the M4A1 was no longer usable, that its technology had died, that what remained in her hands was nothing but a piece of heated metal that would eventually explode if she did not let go immediately.
Nirma threw the weapon as far as she could, and at the same time she saw Arya doing the same with his modified XM8, saw Ashita releasing the M20 Browning from the year 2233 AD, saw Tegar discarding his 4444 AD bazooka and the glasses now sparking with small bursts of electricity.
The four agents who just seconds ago had been fully armed with the most advanced technologies of their respective futures now stood bare, with nothing but the clothes covering their bodies and supplies they had not yet activated—items still neatly stored in pockets, bags, and hidden compartments, items that were not burned because they had not been used, because they had not known that this third liturgy would attack all active equipment regardless of its origin year or level of advancement.
Nirma felt a coldness in her palms, a strange coldness because she had long been accustomed to the weight of a weapon in her grip, and now she had only empty fists, only her own body, only the instincts she had honed for years, and she wondered whether that would be enough to face a being capable of burning future technology with nothing but a song.
Amid the silence that suddenly descended after the third liturgy ended, Nirma shifted her gaze.
She did not move, did not turn her body, only her eyelids, directing her sight toward Ashita's position floating across from her, and without agreement, without signal, she saw that Ashita was doing the same—that the orange-haired woman was also looking at her with eyes she could not read.
They stared at each other like that for a moment—two women separated by several meters yet connected by more than twenty years of memories, two women who had both lost their weapons, both laid bare on the battlefield, both realizing that they now had only themselves and each other.
Ashita did not nod, did not smile, did not show anything that could be interpreted as agreement, yet she spoke, her voice soft but clear amid the wind that had begun to settle, sounding as if she were speaking to herself even though Nirma knew the words were meant for her.
"Throughout all the exams, trials, and dangers in the Linear Time Police agent selection tests, this is the first time I've encountered a deadly threat that chose to come to me on its own."
Nirma heard the metaphor, heard the meaning hidden behind those seemingly simple words, and felt something pierce her chest—something she could not call guilt, because she had long since forgotten that feeling, yet something like an old wound reopening, reminding her of that night, of the little girl in rabbit pajamas crying between two corpses, of a sob that had never truly ceased even after decades had passed.
Ashita's laughter broke into the air still lingering with traces of liturgy, a laugh that strangely did not feel bitter or resentful, but one so sincere that Nirma briefly wondered whether this woman was truly the same child she had left twenty years ago between two corpses, wearing tear-soaked rabbit pajamas.
"You know, Nirma," Ashita said between her laughter, her voice light as if speaking about the weather, "my happiness right now is perfectly aligned with my tears at the age of six, right after you decided to leave after taking the first prototype of the teleportation device in the history of the Linear Time Police."
Nirma fell silent, not expecting Ashita to mention that, not expecting that the woman she had always thought hated her with burning resentment actually held a different perspective—a perspective that made her chest tighten in an uncomfortable way.
Ashita kept smiling, a smile that no longer hid anything, a smile that showed she truly had been sad at the age of six, that she truly had cried over her parents who were shot dead before her eyes.
But that sadness did not last long—not as long as Nirma had imagined—because behind it was something greater, something that made that little girl wake up every morning with relief that she no longer had to hear arguments, that she no longer had to be an accessory in a silent mansion, that she was finally free from the chains of a family that had never truly wanted her.
To be continued…