Friday, 29th November 2024, 9:12 pm
"What the fuck is happening? Those two monsters just disabled every archaner in the vicinity. Mitchells isn't responding! We need support. Get Split Nova here now!" The Director screams as he watches scenes of the training facility play out on his office monitors.
Jesse Martinez bursts out of the main administration building, sprinting toward the training grounds as fast as his old body would allow him, loading his trusty 9mm handgun as he runs.
Every other combat capable archaner or personnel still active in the compound is ordered to gather at a perimeter 200 meters from the training facility and wait for further instructions. A litany of support and medical staff already sit prepared in various locations around the HQ, eagerly awaiting to heal those injured in the sudden attack.
The Director reaches the training facility entrance, slipping inside and watching the unfolding scene while hidden behind a low wall on its outskirts, he holds his radio close, ready to order a command as soon an opportunity presents itself.
But, as he watches Ghazal's dead body hit the ground, Reyn's wailing erupts into an unnatural screech that seems to attack every eardrum within kilometers.
Reyn's ARCH-unit bursts with power, and Rick Justice flinches as he feels the power-cores at his waist suddenly disappear.
A moment later, they fizzle into existence, twirling in the air around Reyn. The sparks of his ARCH-unit flick out around him, grabbing at each power-core and pulling them painfully into the flesh all over his limbs and back.
Powered by 15 additional cores, Reyn's ARCH-unit flashes a blinding incandescent light, and a moment later, he is back in his mind.
He splashes down into the ocean, overwhelmed by grief and anger, seeking only vengeance. He blasts down into the deep with powerful pulses of aether at his feet, swerving wildly through the transition zone looking for a choice worthy of his revenge.
After hours of feeding on his growing anger and frustration, he breaks down, unable to find a choice that would satisfy his overwhelming urge to inflict pain.
He lies in the transition zone, wailing as his mind bounces between the many memories he shared with Ghazal.
The memories feed further into his anger and he finds himself screaming in fury and frustration at the choices made by him and others that would lead to his friend's death.
Anger fades to depression as the thought Ghazal's existence no longer being able to touch him, brings with it a deep darkness in his mind that sucks him toward the void below.
His depression sinks him into the abyss, and as black appendages fold around him, Ghazal's last words hooks themselves into his mind, pulling him wildly out of his mental downfall.
Like a firm slap on the back, he feels Ghazal's pride and confidence build up within, as the thought of his friend dying in vain consumes him.
He erupts from the aetheric ocean, and with no bubbles in sight, concentrates all of his mind on a single thought.
In an instant, the entire ocean lifts into the sky, whooshing past Reyn as he floats effortlessly on his whims.
He stares above him, to a sky filled with a shimmering, undulating ocean surface.
And below him, he finds the true source of his power.
Hidden at the end of the endless ocean in his mind, he finds the core of himself. A glowing ball of pure ethereal light that houses his sentience and soul.
As he moves closer, the light wraps around him, enveloping him in deep, comforting warmth.
He opens his eyes to a familiar scene.
He sits on a park bench, his elementary school is visible through the tree line, just across the road. A sandpit filled with playground equipment stands before him and wide open fields of green grass stretch in every direction.
A gentle midday sun lays its warmth across the park while Reyn sits still, looking around, trying to make sense of his own mind's manifestations.
"Move your arse, you plughead!" A voice suddenly yells out and Reyn looks around him wildly. "Come along, princess! We're gonna be late! Get out of that bloody head of yours!"
"Ghazal!" Reyn wails out, leaping from the bench and running randomly in all directions looking for a source of the voice.
"Once a plughead, always a plughead! I'm not here you idiot. Well, I'm not anywhere. I'm dead." The voice speaks, seeming to come from every leaf and blade of grass surrounding Reyn.
"You're in your head again, plug. Thinking too much instead of doing! Come on, Reyn! We prepared for this." The voice cries out.
"Ghazal! I don't understand…"
"You never do. So much thinking and so little understanding. I'm you, you idiot. This is you speaking to yourself. Your brain telling your mind that the Great Ghazal is still alive and well, just stuck inside your head now. Well, more like grafted to your soul, actually. Guess I did have a pretty big influence on you after all."
"I… Ghazal, I can't do this without…"
"You fucking not, you idiot! You are literally talking to me now, in your head. I'm here, mate. Trust!"
"Gaz!"
"Reyn! Come on, this is embarrassing! Nut up, soldier! Besides… your bloody mum is watching!"
"What…"
"Yeah, mate, shouldn't be a surprise, you couldn't stop talking about her. Makes sense she would be a part of your soul too, you know."
"Mom… mom, are…"
"Hey kiddo. Still here, alive and kicking… in a manner of speaking."
"Mom! Gaz! What the hell…"
"You poor thing. I know, this is all really strange and hard to understand. It doesn't need to make sense right now, Reyn. This is just you telling yourself that it's not over, ok. What you lost out there, it's still in here. And as long as you have faith in yourself, we'll be here to believe in you too, baby. So listen to your friend. Get out of your dang head, and go do what you're supposed to. Fulfill your purpose!"
"But… how, they're too strong…I can't…"
"Remember what I told you, honey. Sometimes, the good guy just can't lose. No matter how strong the enemy is, you have to win. Else you lose the ones you love."
"Ghazal! He's already dead…"
"Jocelyn, you fucking plughead! You wanna see her brain get mushed too? And everybody else…"
"Remember, Reyn. You just have to win! Reject the Impossible!"
"Victory or Death! Now go revenge my arse!"
"I… Thank you! Thank you for everything! I love you guys so fucking much!" Reyn cries out, tears freely flowing as he falls to his knees.
A warm, white light reaches out to him from all directions, and as his mind is pulled from within itself he feels the familiar touch of Ghazal and his mother, each caressing his heart.
He opens his eyes to his friend's lifeless body lying at his knees, while the Architect stands lurching over him, smiling eagerly as he awaits Reyn's reaction.
The Architect notices the unrelenting rage has faded from Reyn's eyes, leaving only a cold, calculating intensity as the human stares directly into his soul.
He shudders.
Reyn rises to his feet and lifts a finger gun towards the Architect's face as his ARCH-unit begins to spark.
"Your paenetic power has no effect over me, you're wasting your time, human. Give into your emotions, let the paenessence consume you…"
"Bang!"
Reyn's ARCH-unit flashes, and in an instant later, the Architect's head whips back violently with a loud smack, twisting his body completely onto itself and his entire existence folds into a crack in spacetime, closing behind him with an audible plip.
The Harbinger looks at Reyn, confused. As the rage begins to build up in his eyes, Reyn's ARCH flashes again, teleporting him next to the entity. Reyn touches his belly, causing his entire body to fold into the point when Reyn's finger had touched him. A moment later, he too has vanished from existence.
Reyn closes his eyes and strains, causing the power-cores lodged to his body to start cracking and erupting from his skin one-by-one.
As the final core at his neck erupts, he unleashes his power, sending out a wave of pure, concentrated aether in all directions and in the blink of an eye the humans all around him begin to wake from unconsciousness, their wounds mostly healed, but their bodies still bruised and sore and their minds forever changed by the tormenting experience they had endured. Reyn runs over to Jocelyn and slowly helps her to her feet.
"Reyn… is Gaz…" Jocelyn whimpers.
Reyn lowers his gaze, fighting away tears as he holds Jocelyn up. She peeks around Reyn's shoulder, glimpsing the headless body of Ghazal still lying undisturbed in the center of the battle stage. She grabs Reyn tightly as she bursts into tears.
"Mitchells!" Ravinok shouts as he quickly runs over to the couple, followed shortly by the Director. "What happened? Are they dead? Did you…"
"Nope, pocket dimension. Only thing I could think of at the time" Reyn says. "But I doubt it'll keep them for long. You need to prepare incase I don't make it back."
"No! Mitchells, there must be another way!" Ravinok says, his voice breaking.
"Fuck!" The Director interrupts. "What can you tell us about them?"
Reyn goes on to explain as much as he can remember about his time with the entities and what he had discussed with one who calls himself the Architect.
The rest of the recruits and veterans quickly evacuate the area while Reyn helped the Director and Ravinok plan an impromptu defense.
"I have to go. I can feel them breaking through." Reyn says, though his confidence sounds waning. "Oh, I need a…"
"Here." The Director says, tossing a small object to Reyn. He catches it against his chest. "New spec, supposed to carry twice the output. Don't let it go to waste."
Reyn stares at the power-core in his hands, its unmistakable shimmer sparkles across his eyes. He slips it onto his neck with a nod.
"Remember, Reyn! Reject the Impossible!" Ravinok shouts with teary eyes.
"Victory of Death!" A litany of cheers ring out.
The chorus comes from behind Reyn, as an army of recruits and archaners stand to their feet and salute Reyn with raised fists. Each prepared to fight and defend the compound with their lives as they crudely prepare a defensive perimeter.
Reyn is seen off by the Director and Ravinok, but as he is about to activate his ARCH-unit, Jocelyn yells out for him.
"You asshole! You seriously gonna go on a suicide mission without saying anything?"
"Yeah! What do you want me to say? Sorry, Joze, gotta go die now, see ya later? You know I gotta do this, Joze. For Gaz… for everyone still here."
"I know, you asshole. I know. I just wanted to make sure you know I love you. And I'd really like it if you could come back. One piece would be nice, but I'd live with a couple missing pieces." She says with a smirk while her eyes are red with sorrow.
"I love you too, Joze." Reyn says solemnly, kissing Jocelyn gently on her forehead. "See ya, later."
His ARCH-unit flashes and he vanishes in a blink, leaving Jocelyn to burst into tears once again.
"Oh! Look brother! He has come to us, instead!" The Architect yells out happily as Reyn materializes inside his pocket dimension.
He stares at the beings intently as they float about in a tiny bubble of gravity contained within the core of a collapsing star while dense fusing gasses burn all around them.
"This power of yours, truly remarkable, human. For eons our Father toiled to mold for his purposes a dimension of his own making. And yet, you do it with a mere thought. You have no idea the power you possess. The potential! This is why we must find its apex, the peak of your species' potential. Perhaps there, we will find the answers we seek! The keys to eternal paradise!"
"You speak too much." Reyn groans.
The Harbinger snickers.
"Forgive me. It is my nature, collecting and disseminating information is part of why I was created." The Architect says with a grin.
"You know, I almost don't hate you. You're honest. You have a purpose you were born into and your work hard to fulfill it, you even seem to enjoy doing it. That's not evil, might not even be wrong. Survival of the fittest, you know. You guys fuck with us because you can fuck with this. Like a kid poking a beehive. I get that. You're much stronger than us, you could crush at any moment. So you're here for a reason, right?"
"Bravo, human! I do apologize for my earlier surmization regarding your mental acuity. I dare say I have widely miscalculated your ability to reason. Forgive me, Reyn Mitchells."
Reyn chuckles.
"Look, what I'm getting at, is that you fucked up. You seem reasonable. Maybe we could have discussed this, figured something out. Sounds like we have something you want and you have us under your thumb. Pretty good negotiating position, you know."
"Ah, Wait, I've heard of this concept. Something involving discussions of business if I remember correctly…"
"Fuck…" Reyn sighs, slapping his forehead. "You don't know what negotiating is?"
"Well, I may not be familiar with the finer details of the institution, but I'm aware of the general outline. It's a novel concept, I've not experienced anything like it in eons. Surely you can't expect me to understand all there is to know about your ancient species in less than a blink of my lifetime."
"Ugh, You know what grieving is, right?" Reyn asks, his face fading of emotion as he bites on his tongue.
"Oh, yes! You have no idea, human. You could say it is the very thing that drives our Father's mission. Grief is the first thing we taste when we are reborn. It's the emotion that drowns so many into endless cycles of rebirth, trying in vain to find the ones they've lost. Grief is in the very essence of our being. You have no idea what true grief is."
"Damn, that did not go the way I expected." Reyn sneers. "Look, Architect, or whatever. You killed my best friend. I need to grieve that, but I don't think I can until I've crushed your head. So, can we stop talking and just get this over with?"
The Architect sighs.
"Very well, human. Harbinger, if you…"
The Architect's words are interrupted by the explosive removal of the top half of his skull while Reyn draws back his finger gun with a sly smirk.
"Sorry, I didn't get your name… was it… hamburger?" Reyn scoffs as he turns his attention to the Harbinger and lifts his finger gun toward him.
"It's The Harbinger, actually."
The being whispers smoothly into Reyn's ear from behind his back, startling Reyn as he still clearly faces the Harbinger who was floating and sneering at him from a ways off.
Reyn feels a building of energy behind him and is blasted by a sudden outburst of aetheric power that appears from empty space, ripping apart every bone in his body instantly and sending him tumbling across his own pocket dimension, beaming past the Harbinger, who waves at him with a smile.
A moment later, he hits the wall of the mini-dimension and bursts through into base reality, crashing through the battle-stage as he comes to a screeching, bloody halt inside a crater.
Harbinger steps out of the pocket dimension, his long, slender legs oozing from the void as it brings forth its body into base reality. He tugs at the belts and buckles around his body, flicking the curly hair from his face as he struts toward Reyn. He leans over Reyn's body and scoffs.
A click of his fingers would see Reyn's health and body structure returned to him, but a swift kick from the Harbinger into his ribs, would shatter every bone on the left side of his chest.
The strike rockets him into the air where he promptly slips into a window through reality and the Harbinger flies in after him.
Reyn gasps for air as he floats through interplanetary space, the Harbinger catches up to him and grabs him by his neck. Reyn's body is instantly healed again, and the Harbinger wraps his body in a layer of compressed air.
Reyn takes a deep breath and immediately activates his ARCH-unit, but just as the aether bursts into his body, the Harbinger gently puts his finger upon Reyn's forehead. The strike erupts with overwhelming physical power sending Reyn hurtling through space at hundreds of meters a second, until his body slips through another window and he suddenly finds himself drifting near the surface of a star.
The intense heat immediately ignites his clothes and his skin starts to seer and bubble, but a powerful strike against Reyn's chest warps space near the star's surface, causing a gargantuan eruption of star matter.
Reyn is punched through another crack in reality, and he sees him beaming down toward the surface of Europa.
He blasts throw layers upon layers of methane ice in a monumental explosion that sends gigantic cracks and crevices through hundreds of kilometres of the planeth-wide ice sheet.
He breaks through the cap, tumbling into the bioluminescent ocean hidden below. He tries to activate his ARCH as he starts to succumb to the unrelenting cold, but a hand once again pulls him through a portal.
He slips into reality again, falling at terminal velocity towards the Martian surface. He activates his ARCH-unit as he falls, but the Harbinger again waits for him inside his mind and tosses him out of himself.
Reyn rolls across the training facility main stage, broken and bloody, charred and half frozen as the Harbinger walks through a portal after him.
"I honestly thought they would have more capacity for reason, Brother." The Architect laments as he appears out of a tear in reality, shaking his head with discontent. "Disappointing, but not unexpected. Overall, they have proven the reliability of my hypothesis, we shall proceed as planned for now. Harbinger, finish up here, and let us prepare for the next invasion. I think I've found a way to improve their output!" The Architect signals to the Harbinger, who snorts in response.
The Harbinger strolls over to Reyn, his eyes shifting around to the hundreds of humans all lining the training facility around him. He picks Reyn up by the head, dusts off his clothes and sets him down.
As Reyn's feet touch the floor, he finds his body, again, healed and restored.
"You are interesting, human." The Harbinger huffs. "You kind show signs of Father's power… even his wisdom, yet you are as frail as an insect, not fully touched by the paenessence. But I see now what my Brother saw in your species. I apologize for the death of your friend. Grief is not something I wish to spread, ending its existence among my people is the very reason I exist. I lament that your people must be sacrificed in our mission to save our own. But, as you say, survival of the fittest. Ready yourself for war, human. I suspect we will see much of each other in the days to come." The Harbinger says as he sees Reyn off with an approving nod and vanishes in a blink.
"Consider that a good omen, humans. It's been eons since I've seen the Harbinger praise an opponent. You must have proven yourself worthy adversaries. Farewell! See you at the next invasion." The Architect says with a deep bow and knowing smirk, vanishing with a blink soon after.
Reyn immediately sprints off the stage and toward the training facility entrance, searching out frantically for Jocelyn.
"Reyn!" Paola's voice screams out.
"Where is she?" Reyn shouts back across the legions of personnel that have prepared and maintained a defensive perimeter around the training facility.
Paolo points to the edge of the crowd and Reyn quickly pushes through the horde of people in the direction provided.
He eventually finds Jocelyn, sitting on the back step of an ambulance, weeping into her hands.
"Joze… are ok?"
She looks up, her eyes deep red. She leaps up to grab him as soon as they meet, digging her body deeply into his. They don't say a word, choosing instead to savor each other's presence for as long as they could. Eventually, Reyn breaks the silence with a question.
"Gaz?"
Jocelyn sniffs and rubs her tears across Reyn's chest as she gestures her head behind them. Reyn twists his neck to peek into the ambulance.
Inside, the corpse of his friend lay covered in a dark, blue sheet.
"I'm sorry, Joze. Can I…"
"Oh, yeah, of course. I-I'll be right here." Jocelyn whimpers as she fights back tears.
Reyn enter's the ambulance and closes its doors.
His cries of mourning filled the air around the vehicle as Jocelyn and the rest of the recruits watched and listened solemnly, each grieving for the life of their fellow recruit in their own way.
In the end, Reyn would not leave for almost two hours until forced by the medical crew and Ravinok.