The entire mood in the arena had changed, attitudes whiplashing beyond a simple bout for initiation. Erdwut was turned immediately out of bat, all the agreement and principle dashed by just the results of this surprise attack. What he had been told, what he had expected burned to ash to fuel the glare that had come about. And now they all knew that Seth would do anything and everything he could to beat Para to death if he stayed on the field for even another moment. So he had to go! Now!!
Aegis knew this as certainty, matching and then overmatching that glare despite her protective stance. And Para didn’t question it, couldn’t. And yet still he hesitated. Whatever need he had for this kid to lose too damning, but the pressure to leave too great. He back peddled to the wall, keeping ready and refusing to turn his back on what he had done. To know certain that even this wasn’t over. And falling further with every step. His last look from the door behind one of such deep fear it almost made Aegis sorry for him. But so very much way too late.
The rest of the heroes regrouped as that door slammed shut, the latter half feeling the strain of getting smacked around over and over again. But more so on their willingness to hold back against this supposedly weak trainee. Maglev stumbled into the left side of a growing line. Closer to the podium and the healing field so he could snap his arm back into place. And raise it to pull Samurai’s sword out of the wall.
He caught it and immediately locked into a defensive stance, jovial demeanor a distant memory at this point. All the time and trust earned coming up ash. The rest of the heroes filling in that line up center stage. Hothead in the middle still trying to work his face back together, flanked by swords and shaking out the added concussion. Erd holding his place beside. Ziyou limping to the right end as she added her own glare to the mix. Aegis staying put on the edge, but knew she couldn’t stay there forever. Techno had fallen back completely, that living black hole had killed all his tech, so now he was recording everything he could by hand. Meeting Para as he stepped back onto the stands, fear and spite meeting technological judgment, but both joined the audience in their rising dread.
The atmosphere reduced, thin and weak, pulling taut as everyone waited to see if Seth really was down for the count. The recruits had long since begun barricading their protected bench. Tossed, tattered, and scared of who they had been training alongside this whole time. Though one clearly less than surprised. And many just as condemning as their seniors. The stands were hushed with a familiar fear, and confused at the sudden matching of what was supposed to be this city’s greatest. How one trainee could match them like this.
All careless, all pointless. Questions ceasing as new terror ruled down, as metal clawed its way back up. Titanic movements hollowed away, so something new could rise to take its place.
A loose hunch over, arms swaying and heavy as Seth righted and rose. And pulled up his head to bear what he was now. The burn true heat, eye slits half charred around their edges, but wild stance and empty glare did nothing to ease the fears wringing the air tight.
The pull upon him had inverted and changed, the outward edges deadened and full weight falling square. The hum of his threads, the song of his existence, denied what had happened and floated him up. Rose him back from what brink he had been thrown over. But denied any other outcome but then what now burned within.
He could feel himself, feel the world, feel all those careless eyes and unwittingly poured out emotions. But he could also feel nothing, that nothing. That emptiness, that stringent need. No will but what had been ripped into him, no want but what was immediate and ahead. All instinct, narrow animal, seeing naught but revenge and what was deeper than this ilk. What he wanted out of this. If it meant losing more than so be it! He was not going to lose this fight.
So a shiver, a tensing, raked through him. Talons digging into metal and sand alike, claws rounding back and splaying, tail swished to life, and a low metallic growl escaped that freshly made maw. As it came down from its on high reckoning to take in those arrayed. The heroes wincing as what they had wanted reignited those eyes, blue plasma right bright as ever, red burning left dimmed back down to match. And nothing left to draw this balefire ire away.
But the Elite staunchly defiant before him.
Tensions redoubled, both atmospheric and physical. Servos winding themselves up, legs locking like springs made of dynamite and det cord. The heroes gripping tighter on their weapons, hardening their stances to limits withheld, building up heat and ripping up metal to fight off whatever the hell it was that Seth was accepting about himself. But preparedness could only get you so far. And a flinch all it took for that potential…
To shatter apart!!
A column of sand and spalling shot, a thousand plus pounds of metal and monstrosity launching forward with aberrant speed. Clearing the edge of the ring as heroes launched their own attacks, screening themselves to intercept despite all proceeding. A full panel rent and bent violently up. A blast of flame adding velocity and variable, near to melting viscosity. Occluding paired swords pushing forward to strike when all that momentum came crashing down in molten speed trap. And rend what could be rent in the blistering confluence.
But that plate bulged in shoulder shape, snapped apart like pitiful roadblock to a fully loaded freight train. A hail of friction and overheated screech, a high held right coming down on its counters. Molten earth and folded steel slammed down upon before any could impact. Vaulted over, because they weren’t targets yet. Blades followed through haphazardly, eating sand and floor for all they were good for. Their target flipping over beyond them, landing in relock. Because this Seth only had eyes for Hothead.
A full column sand buffet for the swordsmen at point blank, as those locks released and the missile knew where was. Hot trying to counter, arms ahead building up for another blast of flame. But a claw skimmed the ground, came up between chest and hands. Shooting, skewering upward just short of his chin, ripping apart his so very underutilized suit. To snag him by the collar. Pulling him face to face with that starset eye, to make him feel his part in its burn.
And to throw him over to eat the fucking sand again!
To dig a trench with his bloodied nose. To toss him down to where he deserved. And so Seth could leap back over to bury him in it! Crack his flippant jaw between metal and metal grip! And face back down what barreled to this cretin’s defense.
They all charged as one and closed distance in nothing. A tiger made of tattoo ink on the right proving their surety. A new brace of metal bars flying from the left a proof of their folly. Erdwut and Samurai dashing in from ahead to show their resolve. And Hothead snorting out a bloody nose full of sand to try and rise to the occasion. Only to be flattened as that mountainous mass of metal fell down upon him.
The right leg pressing out the wind and sand of his chest, latching down around his neck. The left slamming subsequent and leaned on hard. A furious back hand scattering those metal bars seeking purchase, before shooting forward and snatching Maglev by the neck as well. Samurai pulling ahead, an overhead slash aimed at the right shoulder. Another flash, a right catch, and a locking around that too fast of a blade at last. Ziyou flanking around, moving in half behind to strike the now undefended side. But animalistic roar cut short in metal whiplash. Once ancillary tail yanking her just short and locking her alongside.
As finally Erdwut made his own way, a heavy hammer down to smash in the head of this beast once again. Dull edge on yet without any mercy. Only for that metallic maw to burst open and crunch down on that molten surface, jagged metal digging in and stopping it dead. The heroes all attacking as one, but now instead were caught as one. That impenetrably stiff helmet showing little outward emotion, but blaring clear as day a wicked smile beneath it all. For Erdwut to know firsthand what was coming.
A shift on that loadbearing left, talons twisting and digging deeper, a monumental turn against far more weight than his, because all the heroes became part of the merry-go-round to hell. Erdwut and Samurai relinquished their grips as it picked up speed, learned restraint finding footing the rest were without. The remaining left to the whims of violent acceleration, reaching launch speeds before even half way round. The foot bearing Hothead rising and whipping him to missile into another oh so awaiting wall. Then slamming down to whip that tail about, send Ziyou whirling at that same wall in a low tumble. For the final go round to clear the left arm for its own unload, tossing Maglev in kind. Leaving all three to impact in sequence.
Hothead crashed through the stone reinforcement and into the periphery hall. Maglev impacting the other side wall with just a bone curdling crack. And Ziyou tumbling into the closed shutter door and getting it wrapped over top. All three out for what good he could ensure. Those talons scathed to a stop, fighting momentum with a whipping back right, slamming Samurai’s sword out of the hand and sticking it into the floor before the protected bench. Eschenwald still in its faux real maw, burning in it like Seth really took a bite. But still whipped about to be rid of it. The sword tossed back toward Erdwut, molten material searing the sand as it slid to a glassy stop. The maw whipped clear of scraped bits of blade so those burning eyes could stare down their adversaries. All out daring them to keep going. Because this was getting too good.
Both unarmed swordsmen looked to each other and wasted no time, dashing toward and kicked up respective. Erdwut whipping off the fresh layer of glass on his and intending to make Seth regret wanting this fight kept fair. He charged in, Eschenwald trailed behind to add run up distance. A hard right counter charge, a balled up armored fist slamming in as a horizontal edge swung around, a notable indent and ripple across its surface as both implements recoiled. But that challenging glare wasn’t done. A sidestep right and forward, a low left under the blade, plate mail meeting as a full metal fist bashing for gut. Lungs strained and retaliation obliterated, his heels dug ruts all the way to the rings edge. But those burning eyes didn’t have time to watch his travel.
A quick right guard against a slash, metal ringing true from an impact at true full speed. A dash strike from distance cutting nothing but edge, but laying down what the pace would be. A sudden turn over, a strike from his left, faster now. A hand extended out to catch again, but the blade sparked across the palm, metal singing like a vehement chorus. Samurai was refusing him a chance to keep up. Another strike, and another, faster than could be caught but not fast enough to go unblocked. Each strike adding more spalling and sparks to this wayward dance. Carving out the world with one solid tone, whiting out all else and demanded his attention. The suit echoing with it, with that sacrificial cacophony as that blade wore away its own sharpness with each scattering strike. But they all amounted to nothing, not even enough to bother blocking as the guarding relented and Seth just pushed in to silence this chorus.
A slash across the chest was the last that could be wrung out, a show of sparks and counter fury to carry one last resounding tone. One full to its brim with heat and light, in concentrated wrath put forth and pouring forth. And receiving what it wanted in balled up a left swing away. That dulled sword reversed of position and blocking. Silencing it final, to ring away with no malice brought to bear, but still enough force to bend wrong and send him away. Send him crashing down out of the ring with his job done written plain.
As those sparks died away and the echo deadened to nothing. And yet both were swallowed up by what they shadowed. A flare reflecting a rival to Seth’s own shine. And a glare at his back the one blaring truer wrath. This Seth turning to face his final real opponent, but that red glare found itself blinded completely for daring to!
Whited out pure as a gleaming expanse filled the arena. Risen high and coming down as righteous fury. Where Eschenwald once rippled and seared the air, now it was naught but holy brilliance dropping down from on high!
Left shoulder cleaved before any sense could be made, like the Sword of Damocles let loose without it ever even being hung. Tearing through everything that thought to stand in its way. Metal, ceramic, gel, and fiber. And flesh. And bone. Right down to his soul.
It… was truly gleaming. The entire blade made solid from that molten form, forged into a true bastard befitting. Mirror sheen, radiant aura, heat like it was just born from the fire it…
Seth could feel again! Oh fuck he could feel again!!
The weight of his suit, the weight of the sword cleaved into his shoulder, and the burn seeping through and baking all of it. It dropped him to his knees like a felled giant, strength sapped away as his blood steamed and boiled. His arm dropped limp, collar bone split by this near pure white sword Erdwut just brought down on him. But the heat from it wasn’t where this burn came from, that was just the excess pouring through the gap without care for this sudden reawakening. This light… it was more like a ray of sunshine soaking through everything in its path. Or like the light of a god saying “You fucked up!”.
Seth could feel it through every layer, feel it pour into his helmet through its burned out eyes. The darkness of that faux maw driven away, its jaw hanging slack and revealing the flesh wincing underneath. Because there was no way it could escape the fury blazing through. Yet despite this, despite this raw make, this true condemnation Erdwut had brought to bear. He… he was hesitating. Like he was realizing what he’d done, regretting this sudden all out, regretted displaying this higher level of his power.
Against a trainee. In an official bout. This level of lethality. This destructive a means. How could he have let himself slip? How could he have had to put so much power into just a fight against this kid? How did it get this far? His regret, his shame, his grinding admonishment, his worry, and his…
‘Wait…?’
This wasn’t right, it was too deep, too personal. Seth wasn’t feeling his avoiding glare… This was his actual emotions! Some fine line connection, not close enough to see and scry into his deeper thoughts but enough to hear his plight. It was like with his mother, contact breeding connection. But instead he was connected through this true Eschenwald, a frayed thread reaching out and affixing in the wound. This wasn’t dumb moldable metal, it was a pure expression of will and thought brought to bear and made physical. And all that was Erdwut right now was coming off of it. Like it awoke from his need and now bore his shame. Seth felt him say something before he could speak it, the mind faster than the mouth. A low whisper under the hum of all this fire. And a regretful necessity coming over almost hollow.
“I’m sorry.”
But Seth felt his sincerity, his loss of that stoic mask. Yet he knew this wasn’t over like he would hope. Seth felt himself getting dragged back by the need, and by the pain of his bones searing and veins boiling in the heat. As it waxed against this overriding resolve, yet paled in the resurgence of that hunger. But a little more control was etched out from the void trying to take him. He wasn’t going to fall far, only enough to push himself on. He fought to stay afloat, to speak for himself in this dire cauterization. His maw still limp and hanging open but rearticulating as he eked out all the words he needed.
“No… I’m sorry.”
Erdwut flinched as that wincing in the half buzzing utterance, the flesh beneath that metal monstrosity denying his regret. He wasn’t expecting Seth to still be conscious. Less so still able to move. But expectations were always challenged, weren’t they.
A shift, Seth shaking off the weight and pain that yoked him. Another flinch of his grip like a sudden shock hit it, a surge of power reigniting what was though snuffed out. But what truly startled Erd was the sudden claw against the underside of his manifest expression, the one that had dropped limp under undo cleave. And the pressure of it pushing back against all that tried to keep it down.
That claw digging into the gleaming hot metal, finding give despite its new perfect surface, and pushing it upward out of Seth’s shoulder in defiance of all brought forth. Erdwut fought despite his regret, as if removing it would only exacerbate the wound and bleed this defiance dry. But his might wasn’t enough to keep what Seth was down. He could only watch as his true blade was forced out. And replaced.
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Sparks and arcs of electricity radiating from the gash in its rising wake, the wound beneath disappeared under the display of true power. The suit repairing yet again, but also the flesh, and the bone, and the vain, and the muscle. A healing in violent splendor, a refutation of his shame…
A sizzling denial in the face of one who no doubt knew that sound.
But wisdom and guile were long passed over. This mending suit rising off its knees, a titan shuffling off from its presumed grave. An anger flared in its defiance of prostration, as the connection between finally pulled free. Something deeper driving but kept below the veneer, boiling to the surface of that erstwhile expression of will. Not wrath alone, but a hatred.
And a fear that fed it well.
With a final massive push out and release, that blade was flung back, the suit reformed as if it had never been cut, and those eyes brought back down and burning once again. Renewed in color correction. Plasma twined in blue flares to say more than enough. That this fight will never be over so long Seth’s soul still roared.
And yet Erdwut fell back, a fucking trainee just took a hit from the true Eschenwald and he was still getting back up. And the look on his face was like he’d just seen the ghost that murdered his entire family. Something Aegis knew was bad. Really bad! This wasn’t some official bout anymore, this was nearing catastrophic, and...
And he needed someone to stop it now!
“AEGIS!!!”
On pure reflex too ingrained to refute, her stance dropped and disregarded the ceiling sequestering the arena from everything beyond it. Like it was the only thing she knew in this world, she dashing from her guilty prison to her leader's defense. Sliding in, round shield unfurling in slashing sequence and slamming off away the momentum. Cold eyes staring down those blue flares. But her expression said everything for her. She was needed in this fight, needed to keep this from getting worse than it already was. Needed despite everything she felt.
She shook the reflexive loyalty away, but knew her part to play in this too far gone act. It wasn’t enough of a test if all the fighters didn’t fight, and she’d hadn’t stopped it because she needed to know for herself. Know just what the hell Seth really was. A soft orange glow rising to match that plasma flare, to meet his as this new brighter burn stared back to accept her need. A greater tension in his movements, a mutual realization, he was taking her challenge and going beyond his all out. And she knew what that looked like. She knew what that meant, and…
She just dropped the only defense the audience had between them and this power. She winced, stuck her shield in the sand and reared up at the stands.
“EVERYBODY BRACE!!! THIS IS GONNA GET LOUD!!!”
She slammed her shield back up, hardening her stance to near bulging maximum. The warbling burn searing her back ignored completely. Erdwut rearing back from his failing composure at the sudden full frontal warning. His consternation pulling him back in and swinging that true Eschenwald up to match alongside her shield. A two person sword and board to take all comers.
The stands mumbling in the confusion and the circumstance, but quickly tensing in kind. Beginning to cover their ears and hunker down sheepish. All as the full power oncoming made itself known.
As a new round of electric discharge raked and glassed, but didn’t come from without. Rather within. That roaring soul forcing it all into play, that peaked resonance roiling it to over boil. Bolts centering, becoming focused on the back and legs. Like Ohm’s abilities but turned up to a scale too extreme to compare. Sand and metal melted to slag as the discharges increased in frequency, an ionic jet of all the power sucked in readied to be forced back out.
Suddenly though this armored behemoth dropped forward, dug those claws to match those talons, to boost this charge to ludicrous wash. The stands behind buffeted by the lucky grains that escaped. The unlucky turning slurry between glistering melt and molten shrapnel. The whole arena beginning to understand what this already knew, dreading what deep in that down he knew was needed. Because he’d seen how fast she could be.
Heroes in the stands yelled for the audience to brace for real, blocking in front of them with whatever they could conjure. Whether it be stone metal or bravery in the face of it. The protected bench received a sudden sandstone wall as Maya refused to leave her friends to just brace for dear life.
Glassing sand flowed like a storm surge before a hurricane of energy being thrown, pushed out before it could feed this hungering void. All as a simple thought pried itself through to its surface, one that not even that scorched in scar could keep down. One that only Seth could have brought to bear. Refusing to be buried. So he could see! So he could know! And so-
‘You’ll remember me now!!!’
As the world failed to keep up. All the audience allowed a back blast plasma wreathed all the way to the roof. As everything came to an overridden standstill, and as the mother of all haymakers came screaming, overwhelming. But even from within it, impact came in the blink of an eye. Perception not fast enough to even match its dared speed. Metal striking metal, hardened layers and fiber reinforcement meeting the inscrutable…
And indestructible.
But ringing it high for all the world to know!
That there was power to overwhelm their gods!
Shockwaves tore away, like a hundred pounds of dynamite were just set off without a damn given to danger close. Overpressure rippled and broke and carried this tone to all in its path. Sand and glass and metal shards fled. As flesh and bone and all in between defeated and bore it as just another burden to take on. Aegis had matched this excessive force, perception and brace in holy parity. But she could do nothing for the audience, as action broke to devastating reaction.
People, heroes, recruits, the walls, the shutters, the very foundations of it all. All were assaulted, shockwave propagating upward. The closed up roof rattled like a drum about to burst, the stone and metal of the Hill shaken to nearly its overburdened pillars. All to the baffled out screams of careless terror, coming from those left to bear the brunt. Wind force tearing away at what got in its way, throwing everything back against the stone and structure behind. Concessions and possessions and bodily restraints, as bodies narrowly added to the crashing wave.
That haymaker recoiling off, opposing metal abnormal in its own refusing right. A shield fitting a paragon of defense in depth, and that shockwave hitting back just as much as was given. But despite the lack of damage and wear, Aegis and Erdwut were recoiled in kind. A rut dug into the sand at their heels, a single step won under monumental force.
‘And so many more to go!’
Talons sliced barely covered floor as they took that recoil and kicked back on, turning and burning another streak of glass into a curved right turn on Aegis’ flank, left dragged high for another all-out or nothing. All in the time it took for the shockwave to reach the stands. So no respite would be had again!
Another air splintering strike matched at speed, Aegis able to equal this overdrive at every turn, and follow as this dance picked up the pace. Impact came again, shockwave and all. Another buffeting, another violent quake to make the breadth of Seth’s power true and clear. Every step won at all or any cost.
He followed through hard, fought recoil with momentum to carry him over. Fist glancing its force into the shield, but throwing him aloft with its overwrought inertia. To land him back down on the opposite flank, other arm primed for more and more, but legs locked tight to add more wrinkles. To leap him up, adding weight to force and angle to attack. Aegis swinging her shield around like this fight wasn’t already fast enough, pulling it over her head and bracing it too fast for normal anatomy to keep up.
Another impact to add to the thunderous reverb. Sparks and friction splaying off in shining splendor, a near ton of metal slipping a knuckle and tossing itself over behind the pair. Priming to deck Erdwut out of the picture. Eschenwald falling vertical in track, braced hard as the attack found him too. Both blade and wielder recoiled, but stayed firm. Reverb deadened by that manifest will, but still ringing in echo across this now knowing lot.
Seth spun back with his recoil, momentum turned to spring tension and loosed to round his target again but a foot stayed up as its opposite scathed and transferred all this momentum to kick that shield. Another equal reaction, a following line drug in the sand, a brace before impact keeping up even to this. A reemphasized reverberation, but another glancing blow, complete with screeching scathe of that stainless bronze surface.
‘The fuck are you made of!?!’
So again and again he pounded at its surface, each time sending more shockwaves barreling through the arena. Every hero left in the stands fearing for the audience’s safety, fighting through the barrage to desperately and vainly plead for Para to end the fight before the roof collapsed. But all he could do was watch, all he could do was stare, his horror nothing but background noise to drive this fire higher. He was finally seeing what he wanted, and dreading to the level he dared throw Seth down. As the prospect of success drew closer one lost step at a time.
Another glancing off throwing Seth around, sending this armored catastrophe slamming down in front of the duo. A new attack locking in, taking time for the expected reaction to slam in place. As he blasted forward with his mind set to only one target. Right dragged along, charged for yet another almighty haymaker, giving every intention he was going to ring that gong. Win another step toward victory. But intentions can always be misleading.
Those talons scraped all that inertia to a stop at Aegis’ side, catapulted that huge right in her direction, but sailed it over her shield as her brace against found folly. The fist skimming the rim, spalling the barest fleck of armor surface to spark, to sizzle its own remaking in the barest faction of this instant. And reveal its real target, Seth only real target! An unsuspecting Erdwut caught in the lurch. Amid those of truer high percentiles.
Plated fist met face as he looked up from his own brace, Eschenwald kept too low to block or retaliate or to give a damn about. The only outcome left to finally get ringed out like the rest of the lousy pieces of shit he called a team!!
Toughened bone from innumerable hours of training, skin hardened by power and burden he bore, all that stood between a dashing of flesh, as junction crunched and Erdwut flew like a human baseball pitched with extreme prejudice! Face contorted, jaw relocated, massed concussions all retained, as he spiraled through the air. A last attempt to slow his flight digging shiny blade into piled up sand. But only led to cementing his impact into the wall back first. Bouncing him off, cracking stone and doubtlessly bone. Leaving just one opponent to ring out left, and just a few more steps to push it down.
Seth rounded back, got distance and continued his assault. Aegis keeping the pace like nothing had changed, her footing held like she never had Erdwut at her back in the first place, because she may as well hadn’t. Yet still was losing ground, and it was almost making her smile. He struck, another resounding hit, but no recoil fueled rebound. He kept his position, locked hard and close, and poured the onslaught that was waiting for its chance. Giving Aegis no chance to counter, no chance to change tactics, only more ringing in her ears and more ruts dug toward the edge. Each hit kept pairing into that resonance, battering the audience and shaking this mountain of justice to its very core. A tone irrefutable, his own manifest expression to show his power to all who had dared to doubt it.
But still Aegis held her stance, and there was only so much of her ignoring Seth could take in what was supposed to be a battle. He pulled his foot up and blasted himself off her chosen shield, kicking her stance up and voicing a rising frustration. Quickly he slammed her shield back down, ready for whatever he threw at her next, head rising over the lip to blare her own message in a less destructive fashion. To show that he was heard loud and clear but this was not just his fight alone. This was truly too good, too much to just leave him to break free. He had to … fight… to…
She froze, lost the cold, lost the heat, and failed to keep. As the recipient of her demand came into her guardless view. Matching speed and yet still too fast for what she knew he was.
Seth landing down, glassed sand rippling like kicked up incendiaries, broken open maw agape and voicing one final yell against the impediment to its dream, claws extended out before re-balling into over tight fists, and eyes burning the brightest they ever had. And yet… bringing forth what was long held back.
An image, a memory, a deja-vu driven motion forcing itself to life. As those talons shattered the metal floor for one final attack. That darkened doorway, that hollowing thunk, that desperate lock and bounding assault. The very definition of a laceroid bearing down on her with malicious intent, and her mind allow no other reality. All that training, all that arrogance, all that time trying to forget and go beyond. Instinct overriding empathetic handicaps, the speed of that day forcing its way back. Her shield furling back as her hands reared halt, eyes closed tight in fear and too late realize, as the shame and the shape and the form blasted out into existence. A barrier of the faintest orange transparency forcing its way into the world.
True indestructibility, an impregnable barrier that nothing could defeat beyond the stamina of its wielder. A vaunted wall that had kept this city and its people safe through the worst of this and other worlds. The purpose in professional that demanded all be tossed to the wayside. That stole all else and shoved her into shape. That cared little for its bearer’s pride as anything but defense.
But Seth knew its weakness.
Knew it by heart, held it back as was proper. Kept that final admittance of who he really was at bay so she could find out better. But understood its make, its fault, that he could strike right through it like it wasn’t even there at all.
That nothing could stop him from ringing that…
Hesitation. Invading his perception. A flash of guilt, of shared out shame, of pressed to extent and…
He can feel again!
A snap realization, he was out of his personal abyss and screaming toward Aegis about to break her vaunted invulnerability for way too many people to see! Way too soon, and definitely at the wrong goddamn time!
A swift pull back, both feet pulled up in front and weight brought about to desperately tearing through the titanic force that they had so blindly imparted. A screaming balance, a strenuous fight against momentum, he could do nothing but hold himself tight to stop from falling right through her barrier and turning this fight to an incident beyond all reckoning. If not a pure and simple unmasking than an utter obliteration of both of their lives. A catch in the metallic scream, friction winning out at the very last moment. A titan stopping on a dime, but betrayed by its momentum.
His upper body carrying over against his restraint. Head falling forward, narrowly putting the snout of his helmet through like an unstoppable oaf. But forgetting the horns still crowning atop it. A single top glancing in, imparted the faintest ripple onto the barrier despite the colossal force put forth to stop it. As all his perception and reflex, all his overdriven senses and weighed down existence, all of it coming crashing back to normal. As he shot his head back, desperately raised like nothing unexpected had happened. But he knew it had.
But despite this, despite the near infinite ramifications he just narrowly avoided, he didn’t have time to deal with this shit! The maw snapped open, slack and masking nothing, trying to call Aegis out of her literally impossible blockade. To snap her out of her instinct, to demand she come back to the fight at hand and-
*EEEEERRRRRRRRRRRRR*
And instead he was cut off…
As a blaring horn came from the arena's speakers.
Everything froze of its own volition, that maw left open as Aegis rose up to face the result of her instant of weakness. Seth’s hesitation dimmed eyes meeting hers over that translucent orange. A horrified expression half hidden in metal slowly turning toward the podium, toward the clock behind it. A painful slowness that Aegis mirrored in horror all her own make. The audience caught between titans now frozen in their own agonizing turns, some still covering their ears and bracing worse to come. The heroes scattered about all looking to it, exacerbated expressions mixed with genuine relief.
And Para, turned from his battered stage, an evil desperate grin rising on what could be seen of his face. As he stared back at the clock.
As it flashed zeros across its length.
Seth inched back over to that pure wall of you shall not pass. To Aegis turning down toward her feet as she followed his heartache. Her heel backed all the way to the line, touching the border between a win and a loss. And signifying that the outcome of all this struggle was all for nothing.
Seth had lost.
That false maw slammed shut of its own accord. The spark and burn of fusing metal and layers followed, but the clear jagged outline of where it had broken remained. What little light left in the eyes waned away, as the armor shook like a marionette set free. As Seth lost the strength forced upon him and backed away from his pyrrhicly victorious opponent. Aegis shot up from her feet, from that undeniable signifier, and pleadingly looked back up with almighty guilt. Ripping down her true shield, none the wiser of what had narrowly passed through it, but fully aware of what it had caused. She rushed toward him, desperate to stop the oncoming fall. But his knees gave out before she could take another step.
The weight of the world had just fallen on his shoulders and buckled the battered metal floor. The weight of all the power taken and used up in full. The weight of the suit now squarely dropping over. The weight of all the things given up and taken away. And the weight of all of it made worthless by the barest of inches. Too much to take, took much to bear, too much...
His suit retained its caustic mode, but this fall was too far gone. A colossal crash, one last echo of that reverberating resonance desperate to blare its existence. But there was nothing left of the monster displayed to keep. To see. To feel anything but hollow.
Anyone else would see it as just power withdrawal, using so much and exerting yourself too great had adverse effects. But only Seth knew what truly this was.
His cover, his past, both eaten away and made fuel. He’d opened himself up to a scrutiny feared and hidden away from for so long. He’d lost his chance at a brighter future of his own, and now had nothing to show for it all. He could hear the Garkah in the back of his mind trying to reassure him, trying to keep what cover they could manage and stop him from falling deeper. But his hopelessness drowned them down to incomprehensible static with good intentions.
He couldn’t move, could barely feel the overheated suit searing the skin fallen onto it. There was nothing but the suffocating blankness it created around him. As a darkness snuffed out any light left in the arena.
Aegis worked up the courage to advance again, but that same heat forced her back before she could attempt to comfort. To reassure. To do anything but nothing as she watched despair take hold.
But it was already too late.
Para was reasserting his role in an echo dying out, as the world around Seth blackened to nothing. His head slumping in his helmet without even the strength to stay. To hear what was already too much to know. Instead falling into that darkness he had seen too much of already. The darkness that swallowed up his feelings and senses, but left his subconscious to hold its vigil. As his mind lost itself. Like the world ceased to be allowed to him, as his mind could no longer stand the weight forced upon it. And yet would know full well what was occurring in his absence. As it added more weight on top to bury him deeper still.
Till there was nothing but the blackout.
And Para… saying too clear… who had won this day…
HERE
THE MIXTAPE IN QUESTION.