Archive of Our Own

He heard screams, going up in pitch as more and more rose up, mixing and blending together in a weird alien way, then slowly dying around him.

Then an impact.

After a while, he opened his eyes, seeing dark clouds above him and asphalt surrounding him. Sensations slowly came back into his limbs, and he couldn't feel any damage that needed to be taken care of. Carefully, he moved his fingers, getting used to move them, then his entire arm.

He got up once he was sure he was fine, and climbed out of the hole where he laid, feeling something soft under his fingers as he gripped the hard material.

Getting up, he walked in what appeared to be the ruins of a city, bodies lying everywhere around him, bloodied, bruised, disfigured, gutted, blown heads, limbs missing. All were dead, frightened or sad expressions painting the few faces that he could see in the dark.

Smoke was coming from everywhere around him, hiding the sun, and he realized that what he thought were dark clouds were actually ashes fluttering down like snow in December, dark and white, unblemished until they touched the ground and soaked in the blood that was everywhere.

Far away, he saw the shape of a building collapse, more smoke and dust lifting around it. He looked around him, then up, seeing a tall tower disappearing into the dark cloud, stirring something in him.

But what, he couldn't tell.

I can't remember
What happened in September

He thought there was something missing, perhaps on tower itself. There was something before, wasn't there? But he couldn't remember nor see the top, so he walked toward the tower, still looking up. Ashes were falling on his face and his clothes and he had to blink every so often to get it away.

It didn't come up to his mind to look behind and see how deep the crater from where he had gotten up was, nor to think about how he found himself here or how he survived.

When everything is gone
When it's dark and I'm alone

He arrived in front of stairs leading up to a pair glass doors, looking surprisingly intact. Guards were on floor, gripping something -their head, a gun, a phone-. He nudged one in the arm, but the person didn't move. He couldn't see their faces properly, but they didn't seem to arbor anything that could be called a peaceful expression. He didn't dwell on it too much as he walked on, climbing the stairs, and opened the doors to the inside of the tower.

It's been forever
Since I could have remembered

There was no one alive in the lobby either, but the power was still on in some sections he could see when he lifted his gaze upwards, so he went to an elevator, knowing that it wouldn't stop in the middle of nothing. He passed the body of a secretary, her face full of dried tears and blood, gripping a picture in front of her face. Not much ash had gotten in before, but he had left the doors open, so it was now getting in behind him, following his trail and falling on her body like a white sheet.

He turned his head away, clicking on the button and noticing the blood on his hand while doing so.

He stared at it curiously, wondering where it came from, turning the appendage around to see where it had soaked from or if it came from an unnoticed wound.

Seeing nothing too grave, he stopped doing looking for now as the elevator arrived, and gazed down at the destroyed city through the darkened reinforced glass as it climbed to the last floor, where he felt he needed to go.

Where the hell is everybody
I just want to know the story

Why is everyone dead, he thought. Why am I alive while everyone is not? What happened to the city? Why can't I remember much of what happened?

He wanted to know.

The elevator dinged and opened to a familiar living room with large windows giving him a view of the city above the ash and destruction. He recognized the couch, the bar, the tv screen, the holo study.

He looked at his left. He also recognized that crater, not dissimilar to the one he'd woken in, and that hole in the wall, and the one in the window.

But these were not supposed to be here, he thought. They were not, usually. Just like the bodies outside, or the fire marks on the ceiling, these were recent, he just knew it. But he didn't know what happened for everything to go to hell like that.

Of what happened right before

He went to sit on the white couch, not caring whether he dirtied it or not, avoiding the broken glass table. Glass seemed to be prominent in the design, he had noticed. And metal.

Glass and metal. That suddenly brought up memories.

He was sitting in a comfortable chair, with the same clothes, but cleaner. His fingers were tapping on the glass table before him, a taller and larger one than the one in his living room. He could see his own feet underneath.

Someone was talking while pacing around, but he wasn’t really paying attention, lost in his dark thoughts and emotions.

Something unnerved him in the lecture he was given, and he got up, walking angrily toward the metal corridor, feeling like he was getting swallowed by a metal creature.

He opened his eyes, looking around him once more.

Suddenly, he knew there were supposed to be people with him.

I became so alone

Where were they? Were they dead too? No, he felt that they wouldn't die so easily. Even if he didn't remember them well, in his mind, they were tough people.

It was left to him to discover what happened.

He got up, and started searching around for clues, but quickly saw that there wasn't much in this room. He had to explore more.

He went into a corridor, and started looking into other rooms, a large kitchen, bare bedrooms, bathrooms and so on. Looking at products, clothes, no memory came up. Perhaps it was because there wasn't much yet, some parts of the building still seemed in construction.

Still can't remember
What happened in September

Then he saw stairs, leading up and to somewhere down, and another elevator. He took the stairs to go up this time, but the lights were flickering, going on and off, and there were blood trails on the walls and the stairs.

Some of these looked fingers-shaped.

Back when everybody died
Trails of blood during my stride

He arrived on the roof of the tower and saw two bodies. He rushed to them, feeling something stir in his chest, though he didn't know what it was or what it meant.

One of them looked like an old white man, slumped against something metallic, perhaps the exit of a ventilation system. He had his hands on his chest, near his throat, fingers barely spread apart, as though he had been gripping his neck strongly before he died. His eyes were wide and bloodshot, just like a lot of bodies' so far. Blood had dried under his eyes, nose and ears.

The other was a red-headed woman, lying on the ground, mid-long hair spilled around her like an aureola. She was much more… damaged than the man, her limbs torn off and twisted in painful ways, blood and bones and muscles out in the open. Her face was struck in both a sad and terrified expression, tear trails visible -something he felt he shouldn't see here- on her face. Blood had dried under her nose and on her cheeks from where it had dripped from her mouth, her arms were spread as though she had been pinned down, or just unable to move them with the damage done to them.

There was no doubt that these two had been killed in painful ways, perhaps more so than the people in the streets. Yet he felt that they, especially the woman, should have been able to survive whatever happened to them.

And so he concluded that something terrible must've happened.

I just discovered that
The humans were defeated
By something really strong

He got up, the strange feeling still inside of him.

He was sure that he knew these people, perhaps what he felt was sadness, at the thought of their death? He couldn't tell. His mind felt fuzzy, he could remember some details of his life, but not everything. And it wasn't getting better, unless when he had one of these weird flashes.

He looked around, seeing a strange machine with something glowing in his center. He got closer to it, curious, sensing that it was also something familiar, more so than the bodies he had just seen. The weird feeling in his chest intensified as he saw that the glow came from a blue cube inside of the machine.

He reached toward it with his hand, noticing in the corner of his eye a scepter on the ground, and saw a barrier stop his hand, then slowly letting it enter and grab the cube. He felt a tingle in his spine and his head as he retrieved the strange object from where it had been put.

He got it closer to his face to inspect it, the feeling growing bigger and and somehow brighter too, to the point where it blinded his vision.

It seemed very weird and wrong
It just doesn't belong

He was in the living room, walking with a glass in hand toward a strange man dressed in black, green and gold. The strange man had a smirk on his face, and was talking to him. He couldn't hear what he was saying, but he felt amusement, fear and irritation as the dialogue went on.

Then the strange man approached him slowly, and put the tip of a scepter on his chest -the one he had seen near the machine-, a 'ting' resonated, he heard a whisper that sounded like a question, and he felt the same feeling again, growing more and more until he felt like bursting, like everything was too much and he— and he— he just looked at the man like everything was normal, said something and was thrown out of the window.

Later, he flied into a wormhole, something dangerous and deadly on his back, looking up to the infinite and otherworldly enemies, and he just felt that weird feeling again.

Like it came out of this world

He gasped, coming back go his senses. The overwhelming feeling had subdued, and the glowing had gone away. In his hand, the cube had broken into pieces, leaving a startlingly blue stone in his palm. Not knowing what to do else than keep it, feeling that he shouldn't separate from it, he threw the rest of the cube away, watching the shards dissolve before they touched the ground, then tucked the stone into his pocket, hoping that he didn't get any blood on it.

And now, he was back at square one.

He looked back to the dead woman again, and noticed a trail of small holes in the gravel next to her leading to the edge of the building. He followed it until he saw it going from a single but sparse trail to a large person-shape in the ground, as if something had fallen here.

Falling…

His memories stirred again.

He fell, he fell down and down and down, and no one would be able to catch him—

Not that he’d let them try once more.

And why should anyone be able to catch him? Why should anyone need to catch him?

He was right where he needed to be. Up, up, up, up.

Up above them.

A warm wave gushed out from his heart and went through his entire body.

"Finally.
Finally It's done!
It's finally done!"

He felt heat, melting something around him. He could feel the stars surrounding him now, and their light caressing him in every way. He could hear more whispers, so many of them, yet none of them were overwhelming, as if his mind had become as vast as space and could contain all the whispers of the world. He never felt so at peace, listening to them swirl around like butterflies in a garden.

Down, he heard someone cry in dismay, and the feeling of well-being disappeared, leaving him in skin and bones and a smaller head again.

He became aware of the explosion, and the danger it still represented for him. He twisted, focusing on the blue light he could see from here, and plunged for it, arm raised toward it.

He passed the portal in a blur, whispers becoming shouts in him, and the top of the tower got closer.

"Stop It! He's trying to kill us all! Stop Him!"
"No! I'm going to save you. I'm going to save you all! Don't you try to stop Me!"

But he never touched it, as it felt as if time slowed down for him just as he was about to hit the top of the tower, and he angled himself just the right way to touch the cube and dislodge it with his fingers, closing the portal.

It snapped him out of his daze, and his body bounced on the gravel, pain exploding in his mind (and he heard more screams as his own resonated in the air) and body, blood spilling everywhere and sinister cracks from his bones echoing. The momentum made him topple fast and hard, twisting and spinning until he barrelled off the tower, heading straight toward the ground with no way to stop.

But this time there was no feeling of euphoria or freedom, just fear and pain and the screams—

I've regained a small memory
Came to my head just like that suddenly

He came back to his senses, finding himself with his feet dangling over the edge and lying on his back.

What had happened? What were those visions? How was he alive? He had seen the woman, and the old man, when he fell down. He had heard other voices too, ones he knew but couldn’t identify.

It seemed to him that things would come back to him if he thought strongly about something linked to a recent memory, and he wanted to know more.

What could he think about that would get him to know more, he wondered. He sat up, staring down at the city again. He could not see much beside the ashes and the top of skyscrapers.

What was up with that ash anyway? He had stopped the nuke, nothing had exploded—

—The heat was back again, lighting up his veins with fire, swirling inside of his body like bad cigarette smoke and filling him up to the brim, even starting to hurt. He let it go, feeling the wave of fire expand around him and burn everything too close to him, people, animals, buildings… then further away trees, bushes, paper, anything that could easily burn was on fire instantly, everything else heated and almost melted. He felt hands brush his shoulders, but they became bones before they could do anything more, then they became ashes, then they were crisped to nothing, and there was nothing but unconsciousness

—or perhaps nothing did explode, but someone did.

I think I've gotten a clue
Something tells me this is worse than what I knew

What had happened to him? He looked down at his hands, full of blood. They looked normal to him, but the shape of the liquid around them was too precise to let him believe he had just stumble upon something and fallen into a pool of blood, no, it was all around them, under his fingernails, up his wrists, under his sleeves, almost to his elbows.

He had put both of these deep into something full of pumping blood, probably something alive.

He couldn’t remember it, and it only stirred the feeling more. He looked behind him, but shook his head when he saw that the woman and the old man had no stomach wound to explain this. That’s when he noticed another body on the balcony below, one he hadn’t noticed before.

He got up and went to the stairs, determined the get to the bottom of it. Going down, he traced the bloody finger trails, noticing they looked like his.

”I wonder if you can taste your own blood like this?” He heard himself ask.

There was the strange man again, but this time, the stranger was kneeling in front of him, choking on his arm that was elbow-deep down his throat, and he was watching him squirm and gag helplessly around it. He had torn his way through his oesophagus and anything else that might have gotten in his way. Blood had been welling in the poor man’s stomach, making the strange man want to vomit even more, but not being able to.

“Stop fighting," he whispered, going down deeper and hearing a yowl of pain in his mind, "think of it as a redemption for interrupting me earlier and talking when it wasn't your due."

"This is your redemption day everybody!

He had arrived on the balcony, and approached the body. He recognized it as that of the strange man, thanks to the clothes, but his front had been disfigured beyond measure. He had a sudden vision of himself doing that by ripping his arm out of the man’s body… by the front, tearing muscles, bones and organs apart.

He turned his head away, breathing deeply through his nose. He felt something heavy when he had looked at the body, precisely over his torso, right where his heart was located.

A large object impacted him, making him rip out his arm of the strange man… by the front, tearing him in almost in half by the chin, neck and so on. He stared at his arm, drenched in blood, organ bits and gut, a childish 'oops' almost escaping him -he had underestimated his strength-, if not for the pain he felt in his torso. That's when he understood that his heart had stopped from the impact (that would also explain the cracking noise he heard).

Unfazed, he ripped the strange metallic device that was embedded in his sternum and blocking his way, and with his cleaner hand he grabbed the organ then squeezing gently, making blood flow again. He did it several times, ignoring the pain in favor of listening to the screams and cries in his mind, a very loud one coming toward him.

He felt more than saw the object flying back at top speed toward him, and he got out of its way, his hand still squeezing periodically his vital organ. It wouldn't do to find a body survive such a fall only to die again, he thought, and cleaned the blood oozing from his nose and mouth with a dusty black sleeve.

A man landed in front of him. He couldn't clearly see his face (not that he could see anything clearly), but the sun seem to reflect on him and he was tall and muscular. He could hear a booming voice, if not proper words, because of his damaged ears. They sounded anguished, wary, angry.

The man stomped toward him, and a foreign feeling woke in chest, the desire to keep him safe from danger. Safe from him.

He opened his mouth to talk—

Go away from me!
Stay away from me!
Go away!

—but not words came out, as he got punched with a strength way superior than what he expected.

He fell, getting his hand out of his chest just to be safe, and feeling his heart beat again on his own with relief. Then a sharp pain erupted, bigger than before, and he felt as though his chest was tearing itself apart more than he already had.

Fate forbid he could find someone without a condition.

The man was screaming, both in and out, but he couldn't understand because of the pain. His hands scrambled inside the hole again, twitching nervously and sending more pain messages to his mind. The man loomed over him, but he paid him no attention, searching for what was causing the pain. There were some small things inside of him, foreign, tearing through him. He knew those, he didn't like them.

They got out in a stream of red, hurling past the man's face and cutting it lightly. He only got angrier, and tried to grab him by his neck, but the red and the fire came back, holding him away.

You can't touch me now

And that's when he heard the other, while watching the man fight the fire and the red with lightning. Louder whispers, coming up from outside like a bird flying down to its nest. He turned around and climbed the stairs, leaving bloody trails in his way. He would wait there.

He was curled up into a ball on the floor of the living room, head clutched between his fingers and tightening in the hair here. The visions came by, faster and clearer, though his vision and audition were still fuzzy in them, so he understood that he must've been concussed and hurt when those events happened. Perhaps from the fall, yes, definitely from the fall he shouldn't have survived from.

He saw what he did to the old man and the woman. How much glee he seemed to feel from it. And how he taunted the other one with it. And his new state of being.

He remembers—

—How easy it had been to take his whispers and say them out loud, turn them into screams and shouts and cries. And how easy it had been to do the same to the woman, and the old man, and then, why stop? To everyone.

And then, to show them. What he could do.

You see this button here? I'm going to press it!"

He whimpered, assaulted by visions after visions. He didn't want to remember anymore. Didn't want to remember more of the pain—

—Screams filled the air as everyone in the world clutched their head and fell down in pain, and blood dribbled down their orifices as terrifying and hurtful visions plagued their minds—

—he didn't want to remember, but he did. And oh God, he did.

I just remembered

And the fire was starting up again, he could remember the feeling of it under his skin, and he remembers the red, playful yet wicked, mischievous but dangerous. He remembers feeling it—

—finally tearing the tall man apart piece by piece down there as he was crying in pain because of the visions, and wreaking that stupid star-hammer into oblivion—

—and he remembers losing himself, hearing someone plead, call his name and beg for mercy.

What happened in September

But all he had done was stare blankly then laugh, and laugh, and laugh—

—because that wasn't him anymore. That wasn't who he was. He was—

I'm the one who killed them all

And he couldn't take it anymore. He got up, running blindly, away from the pain, away from the suffering he caused and felt, away from the strange silence of the tower, where another body also laid, one made of metal and electricity, one mind made of everything, one mind he tore into nothing.

And he tripped onto something, perhaps a part of the tower, perhaps even the strange man's body, as if karma had catched up to him, and he fell, down, down, down, down.

Right where he needed to be.

I survived after the fall

He heard screams, going up in pitch as more and more rose up, mixing and blending together in a weird alien way, then slowly dying around him.

Then an impact.

After a while, he opened his eyes, seeing dark clouds above him and asphalt surrounding him. Sensations slowly came back into his limbs, and he couldn't feel any damage that needed to be taken care of. Carefully, he moved his fingers, getting used to move them, then his entire arm.

He got up once he was sure he was fine, and climbed out of the hole where he laid, feeling something soft under his fingers as he gripped the hard material.

Getting up, he walked in what appeared to be the ruins of a city, bodies lying everywhere around him, bloodied, bruised, disfigured, gutted, blown heads, limbs missing. All were dead, frightened or sad expressions painting the few faces that he could see in the dark—

"No, you've had enough time."

He opened his eyes, seeing dark clouds above him and asphalt surrounding him. But nothing really stopped him from seeing further, and his eyes of gold found equally golden eyes -though pinched in confusion- framed by an equally golden armor, standing on an even more golden palace, staring down on him from a faraway place.

He grinned and got up, his aches long ago healed, this body long ago transformed. Skin pelt off him, broken and useless. The fire burned the rest away, inside and outside. His body shone in a sweet yellow glow, tempting like honey, dangerous like the true power of the Mind.

His Mind, which would shine so beautifully once there was none left to try and outshine him.

Red lifted him, and the fire licked at his legs like a kitten. They were diminished, but only for shortly as he felt smaller versions of them come back, baring him presents from scattered minds around this desolated planet; and a particular one shining a pretty green and familiar color. His vastness absorbed them all, glazing brighter until he knew none could look away, mesmerized by his warm golden glow.

None could strike him down now. He had two of his siblings with him, making him a vast vault with no end, eternal space and time always at disposition.

And if he fell, he would always rise and shine more brightly.

"No…"

"Fret not Firefly, I will put your mind at rest."

A small light flickered out, unseen next to a golden sun. Little by little they melded together, soon becoming one bright supernova outshining every stars.