The silence didn't last. Not long, anyway. The screen flickered again, showing a new city engulfed in fire somewhere in the Southern Bloc.
Couldn't even tell which one anymore. Didn't matter. It was gone now. Like all the others. Behind me, I heard a ragged exhale. Then boots scuffing against the CIC deck plating.
"...F*ck…"
That was Paul.
"F*CK!"
That one came from Robert. He slammed his fist into the console nearest to him. It didnt dent the nanocomposite alloy, but the crackle of static that followed made a junior technician jump out of his seat.
"You were right…"
Julian's voice was low, barely more than a whisper. He stared at the screen like it personally betrayed him.
"F*ck, Drac. You were right all along."
Darius shook his head slowly, eyes shadowed beneath his buzzcut.
"Humanity's just a cycle. A g*dsdamn ouroboros chewing its own f*cking tail. We build up, we burn it all down, and we call it progress."
Airid didn't say anything at first. He stood there, fists clenched, breathing heavy. The light from the screens turned his face into a mask of shadows and rage. Then he spat on the floor.
"S*it I wanna rip the f*cking spines out from those who pressed the button"
He looked at me then. All of them did.
"Drac…"
Robert muttered, jaw tight, yellow-golden pupils glowing.
"You said it before. You said the world needed a reset. I thought you were being dramatic. I thought maybe… just maybe, people would wake the f*ck up before it was too late."
I didnt meet his eyes. I didn't speak.
"But they didn't,"
He growled.
"They nuked the f*cking planet instead. They killed everything. Everyone. Kids. Civilians. All of it, because some old bastards wanted to save face and die with their pride intact."
Paul leaned forward, knuckles white against the metal.
"We could've been the last line. We could've done something."
Julian scoffed bitterly.
"Like what? Stand in front of the nukes and scream 'stop'? We're ex army grunts, not g*ds."
"No."
Darius looked at me.
"Theres a g*dess standing right next to him Isnt there?"
That hung in the air like a noose. Behind us, a screen went black signal lost. Another followed. And another.
One by one, cities stopped broadcasting. Either vaporized, disconnected, or simply lost in the chaos. The world was going dark. And we were still here.
Five battlebrothers. One self aware AI. And me or whatever I was becoming.
"F*ck the ones who did this,"
Airid snarled.
"F*ck every last one of them."
The world burned on the screens. Firestorms swept across continents. Ash clouds turned day into a dusk that bled red. Sirens, alerts, screams—they were all background noise now. Meaningless.
"Sow what now, Drac?"
Julian's voice cut through the chaos like a dull knife, not demanding, not hopeful... just... hollow. I turned around slowly. And they flinched.
All five of my battlebrothers, all grown augmented men with forty years of life experrience flinched. Even Invicta. Even she, a million years old self aware AI, took a half step back without meaning to.
"Drac... what the f*ck is wrong with your eyes?"
Airid was the first to speak, voice half choked. I followed his finger to the reflective surface of a dark monitor. My eyes. Not even remotely human.
Pitch black sclera like void soaked glass. Blood red irises glowing with fury. Golden-yellow pupils like sunfire caught in a storm.
Black veins webbed out from under my eye bags like cracks in glass, spreading with each heartbeat. I didn't say anything.
I just turned and walked out. Through the CIC. Through the silence. Through the doors that hissed like a coffin sealing and entered the elevator.
The lights above me flickered as I descended. The walls of the elevator warped in my vision. My hands twitched at my sides, fingers curling, uncurling, curling again like they didn't know what they wanted to crush more: the controls, the walls, my own skull.
I felt it. Something deep. Something primal. Something ancient. Not rage. Rage would've been a relief. This was colder. Hungrier. A silent scream building in the void behind my ribcage.
The elevator dinged. I stepped out. And boarded another one, the one leading to Invictas room. The moment the doors parted once again, I beelined straight to the minibar like a predator drawn to ritual.
Bottles lined the shelves, fancy, rare, stupid expensive. Didn't matter. Not tonight. I grabbed the first one. 90%. Glug. I downed it like water. No burn. No cough. Nothing. My body didn't even process it as poison anymore.
Second bottle. Gone in three seconds. Third. Fourth. Fifth. My HUD blinked furiously with warnings but I just Ignored them.
Sixth bottle. I drank It dry and then slammed it.
"F*CK!"
The glass shattered under my grip. Splinters dug deep into my palm. Blood welled up thick, red like my rage. Even my augmented skin couldnt withstand the force I was exerting on the glass shards.
Seventh empty bottle flew across the room. Hit the wall. Explosion of glass. Eighth. I downed it. Slammed it to the counter causing the bottle to shatter.
"F*CK!"
I slammed my fist Into the shard covered nanocomposite bar counter again and again.
"F*CKING... FCK... FCK!!!"
Crack. My knuckles split. Blood ran down my wrist, pooled across the minibar. Mixed with whiskey. Glass embedded in flesh like jewels on a corpse.
My breathing was ragged. I didn't care. I wanted it. I wanted the pain which I could no longer feel. I wanted something to cut through the numbness blooming inside my skull.
The numbness of watching the world burn. The numbness of knowing I let it. Not by action, but by inaction. Not my problem. That was the lie I'd told myself.
I was the monster who'd stood at the edge of the abyss and said.
"Let it fall."
And now I couldn't look away. Not from the fires. Not from the screens. Not from my own reflection. Where a man used to be. And something else stared back.
As these thoughts swirled In my mind the voices Inside my head laughed, rejoiced, celebrated and they wanted more, more death, more tradegy, more chaos, more suffering and pain.
Ohhhh, you feel that, don't you? The rot blooming under your skin. The silence that screams. The fire that won't go out.
This is what you were made for. Not peace. Not redemption. You're a harbinger. A Reaper in leather and scars.
Let them die, Drac. Let them all die. They're weak. They chose this. You didn't push the button… they did.
But you could've stopped it. And you didn't. And now it sings to you. Doesn't it? The screams. The flames. The end.
You are not human. Not anymore. You're what comes after. The final chapter. The cleansing fire. The reckoning.
Burn their monuments. Crush their legacies. Salt the E*rth with their bones and watch it grow beautiful again.
They would have never listened anyways. So scream, Drac. Scream with every of your soul. Let your rage become law. Let your wrath become prophecy.
You were never meant to save the world. You were born to end it. And from its ashes… Make. It. Yours.
Embrace the darkness, embrace the pain, embrace the rage, embrace the chaos, embrace the power Im offering, become my apostle and make all that exists yours, break It, bend It, crush It make It yourse son of gaia.
...
The CIC lights flickered faintly, still colored red from the global alert, but none of the five overgrown schmucks noticed. Not anymore.
They stood in stunned silence, still facing the direction Dracula had just walked out of. The echo of his heavy footsteps down the corridor faded slowly… but the feeling he left behind? That stayed.
Airid ran a hand through his hair.
"...What the f*ck was that?"
Robert's arms were crossed tight across his chest, his shoulders tense like he was resisting the urge to punch a bulkhead.
"That was creepy as f*ck. His eyes, those weren't human. Not anymore."
Julian forced a dry laugh. It didn't land.
"Yeah, what's next? He sprouts horns and a tail? Sh*t's biblical."
Paul didn't say anything. He just leaned on a railing, knuckles white as he gripped the metal.
"Drac saw extinction that he allowed to happen and Inderectly hastened… and I think it broke him."
Darius was the last to speak. He didn't turn to face the others, just stared at the closed CIC doors.
"No one comes back from that kind of rage. Not the same. Whatever he is now, it ain't our Drac."
The mood shifted. Tension gave way to grim acceptance. Robert grunted.
"F*ck this. I need a drink. A whole barrel of it. He'll snap out of it tomorrow, right?"
Julian raised an eyebrow.
"Tomorrow? Bro, he just growled like a devil out of a demoncore. Tomorrow he might be one."