FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

The subway was not the one he quite remembered from Union Square, but rather standard form as a collective of several stations he had struggled to piece together. Literally, by the Frankensteinian tapestry of white spackle, black formica and simple grey linoleum mixing all over the floor and ceiling that stretched on in front of him. It was odd certainly which only further added to the rather uncoordinated look of the subway passages, the entire place slanting violently left or right as if the entire place had been structured with parallelograms. Halfway along hallways everything would veer insanely towards another direction, creating a rapidly crooked path that didn't even manage to try and stay on the same level as him to cause gentle tweaking inclines that caused him to walk upwards or downwards subconsciously. The walls however were covered in advertisements for one single fictional movie poster, known as "The Knight of Daventry" to which Roy saw himself in at least ten heroically devastating adventure covers. Strange pastiches of his own different parts of his journey ranging from dynamic action shots of punching fierceness, to sombre lighting of two-toned silhouetting shot strangely well for his memory to represent. One showing him as a much younger boy staring up towards a handsome lizardman, the second carrying a wounded man from a cave almost hoisting him on his shoulder. The third presented him an image of striding out into the wilderness upon a mighty painted steed of white and amber, whilst in full resplendent armour glistening underneath his hoodie as he struck out towards fearsome beasts. The fourth had him meeting a strange winged reptilian of silver hair and darkest skin, alongside a shorter female lizard of cool green skin who wore simple grey farm clothes who stood along with her child who wore a blindfold smiling up at Roy. The fifth was surprisingly fantastical, showing both him and Professor Layton blasting off into the sky with what seemed to be some sort of steam-based mechanical jetpack, binding them together as they blasted white and black bullets of shrieking fire down upon a most dreadful airship. The sixth poster had him bodytackling a cyborg creature out of a news office window in some futuristic blue city, whilst the seventh had its own tremendous explosion with a giant colony in space detonating behind him, the raptor desperately clinging onto a giant toad-like beast with dark emerald-crested head. The eighth picture he well knew as the great battle against the Scissoraptor, monstrous long teeth and a wicked set of blades upon Kruz's airship, seeing the kremling along with Fayne and Baldwin in frightful tension watching in the background as the demon screeched with spindly fingers weaving wicked spells of terror upon Roy and his Great Knife. The ninth picture brought a tender shock to flicker in his heart, an iron steel train rumbling towards a devastated bridge whilst he stood upon the carriage in a firefight against humans wearing grey soldier outfits, blood exploding out of one's head from his pistol shooting off in his left hand. The last portrait of all however gave a rather gentle sadness upon his heart, seeing himself and his steed pressing their heads together as they both shed tears within the midst of a morning glade. He clenched his fists with a bitterness dwelling in the pit of his stomach before realising he had reached the ticket booth of the odd uneven subway station. There were some benches, trashbins, a magazine counter, information office, bathrooms and beside the ticket booth itself, was a row of gates that completely blocked his way forwards from floor to ceiling with ticket counters inbetween. " Identify yourself." A robotic voice came piercing with a buzzing tone from behind the ticket booth, a firm rectangular room with a window where one could see a complex computer panel more akin to a 1950s laboratory than a ticket booth station. Roy carefully walked forwards asking cautiously: "Who wants to know?" " I am the guardian of this place. Identify yourself." "Ah don't remember subways havin' robot guardians." " Incorrect. This is not a memory. Your inability to comprehend this repeatedly is either a case of stubbornness, or ineptitude." "Well ahm certainly not inept." " Agreed. Were you inept, you would have had to replace more than just a hand." "Hhhhmhmhmhmhm...good point." He walked over to the booth itself, staring into the window to see a rather bizarre steel creature with sharp edges on every part. Its face was shaped like that of a V with fierce slitted eyes of red, a long tail with little hooked wires at its tip, the entire body resembling something of a canine down to its claws ruthlessly digging into the concrete. The raptor stared at him cocking his head, seeing it sit proudly on its hindquarters waiting with a door on the back wall behind it. "Okay soooo uh...mah question is not HOW you are here, ah get that now...but rather as to WHY you are here in this place?" " I am unable to answer this. Apologies, Roy MacGregor." "Because you don't know?" " I only do not know this because you yourself do not know this. You are expecting a fabrication of your mental scape, to know things that you have no data on, not unlike your previous encounter with Professor Herschel Layton." "HOW'D YOU-...okay, okay no, ah understand, it's mah head, god this is so fuckin' weird." " It is an experience more common than you think." "That don't make it any better Bladewolf, you ever been insahd your head?!" " My optical neuro-AI is fundamentally similar to an actual human brain. My mind was built around the concept of problem-solving, independent solutions and lateral thinking. I have no database, I learn only what I have experienced." "Alrigh', ah gotcha, so...you can think for yourself but you not sum kinda supercomputer." " Correct. If I were to surmise my reason for existing in this ticket station, it is perhaps that subconsciously you associate me to underground passages. It is a common tactical route for me during missions to traverse through access points such as subways, sewers, and subterranean caverns." "Heheh, righ', ah guess that makes sense. Sorta, so uh you gonna gimme a ticket to get through?" " I am highly trained in counterterrorist measures and urban combat. I am not trained for the role of...ticket distribution." "Come on man you just gotta push a button on that machine." " I am not authorised...to touch the machine." "DOH come on dude, you really gonna let that stop you?!" " Do you wish for me to...touch...the machine?" "Well yeah or else ahm stuck here, ah need to get to Fulton Street!" "Woah woahhhh chill out blackie-brah." A new voice came through the door inside the ticket booth before placing two plastic grande cups of piping hot liquid as Roy looked startled with honest joy at the newcomer who spoke again. "You know well as I do that just like any fleshbag we gotta adhere to rules too right bladeboy?" "JACK! AWHAW MAAAN HOW YA DOIN'!?" "Hahaha I'm great thanks! Wow, you look like shit!" "Says thuh one who got screws wired in his mouth, you pay your dentist for that shit?!" "Pffft hah! Not likely." The new resident of the booth was a solid green crocodilian creature around 6'4'' with every part of him the same colour, his hands rather thick but smooth with firm black claws and wearing nothing on his body. But a closer indication of all the steel rivets and perfect sheen showed that he had no reason to be as his eyes remained bright with black pupils on solid white, sipping one of the cups to gulp thick black synthetic fluids down into his throat. "Soooo this I never seen from you before, sittin' out here in the tunnels like a robo-hobo." "Man shut up, ah wuz forced to go this route!" "You plannin' on takin' the train?" "Hell no, not if ah can help it. Ahm real glad to see you though, ah mean damn we had a lotta fun, you were a real cool dude." "For all the couple weeks we had together, yeah sure it was pretty great! You still enjoyin' that Maverick Power Recirculator on you?" "Mmhmm, righ' here!" Roy tapped the back of his head just along the height of his spinal column. "Really helped me out in other places...ah only wish FG had been in your world, woulda made things a lot easier." " That is not certain," said Bladewolf coldly, " the fact that he still exists proves that you are hesitant about what is the truth. It is that what has caused you to be in this place, inside a mental construct representing a rather ill-conceived subway system representing of the New York transit-" "Yeah yeah we got it," said Jack rudely, "seriously, you ever considered being a Mechaniloid? We oughta fix that whole 'lodged a USB stick up your backport' issue." " I do not have a backport. I am however USB-compatible, yet I believe my body frame is more than adequate to adapt to my capabilities, as opposed to Reploid designations." "Well, yeah but...maybe not sound like a freakin' audio guide at the museum." " Informality is not necessary in my duty. I am an AI-designated weapon primarily specialising in scouting maneuvers with conversational and decision-making capacities. You are a basic security model with built-in CCTV compatibility, designed to appear unassuming to not intimidate a civilian population." "Sheesh, the way you say that makes me sound like a freakin' wuss." "You are a wuss," said Roy, "ah seen you freak out seein' butterflies pass your face." "HEY-EY that thing looked BIGGER than it actually did, do you know how big the zoom function is on my scope?!" "No?" The reptile gently opened his mouth with an automatic creak, despite having only just previously been talking without little trouble as something peered out the back of his throat. His uvulal wall carefully rescinded to reveal with cautious whirring clicks the sight of a sharp smooth camera's lens as it took a picture briefly before disappearing back inside its throat "muscle". Bladewolf casually slipped his tail round towards the other cup of fluid and grabbed it like a prehensile tentacle to carefully tip it into his rigid mouth. "This baby's got a twenty-times zoom on it remember, anything that pops up is gonna be BIG, I can practically see the individual scales on your face." " A conspicuous oversight. Perhaps to simulate the social phenomenon in mammals known as 'yawning'?" "Naaaah that's just when I'm undercover, I got smaller cameras in my eyes to process stuff, they just don't got as good a zoom on them." " Interesting. How is your new hand, Roy?" "Ah don't have it righ' now," said the raptor, "damn thing's gone and we're back to mah original hand." " It is possible you have adapted so completely that you do not recognise your new limb as being a separate creation from yourself." "Nnnnbbooooo cuz mah hand here is still warm an' fleshy. You do know thuh difference between flesh an' steel righ' Wolf?" " I have never known the feeling of having parts of my body replaced with different structural materials. Parts that were steel have been replaced by other parts, but I understand that creatures such as humans and yourself would have a much more different experience considering amputation." "Did you cry like a bitch?" asked Jack. "Ahhhh don' wanna talk about it," murmured Roy. " I do not understand. You adapted perfectly. In fact you were glad that you had been given a superior replacement to your original hand, as well as replacing the tribal-made assemblage that you possessed when first meeting our organisation." "Rememberin' sum things about mah hand is not always positive. There are other things ah can associate with it ah would rather not remember." " Understood. My apologies Roy." "S'alrigh' man. So uhhhh good drinks?" " This synthetic fluid is very nourishing. Unusual, when I have no need to digest food or liquid in order to recharge my body." "But it's nice!" replied Jack. "I mean sure this stuff does nothing to some Reploids but it makes ya feel like yer one of the fleshies huh?!" " Of course. The human act of social gatherings around intoxicating fluids, instilling a bond of familiarity and brotherhood amongst those in similar predicaments. A place to go where everybody knows your name." "Right exactly! Anyways uhhh Roy, I know you're cool and all and you need to get going soooo here ya go." The Reploid reptilian punched a ticket out for the raptor to obtain, tickering out on his side of the window before Roy tugged it free and gently slipped it into the barricade's reader. The gate swung open with a beep and a clunk showing the way forwards to the lonesome dark platform down beneath with Jack adding helpfully: "Don't step over the line now!" "Ah won't...ah hope." " New York subway trains can reach fifty-five miles per hour, but rarely do they go over thirty. Recent legislations concerning health and safety have cut speeds and acceleration, to prevent accidents as well as for approval with ecological sanctions." "That REALLY does not fuckin' help." " You are afraid of being involved in a subway accident. I am simply informing you that there is less likely a cause for it to happen." "A train goin' fast enough i-i-is gonna cut me up an' nuthin' you say is gonna fuckin'-J-J-JEE-EESUS!" He suddenly spasmed with a horrifying thought implanted into his head, stumbling through the gate as he forced himself through his panic attack, quivering in fear. The Reploid rolled his eyes and backslapped Bladewolf in the back of his head. "Now look what you done, you got him all riled up!" "I was trying to reassure him with factual data concerning the safety measures of the subway system." "Well MAYBE that's not the problem, do you not understand phobias pal?!" "AHM NOT AFRAID!" Roy stomped fiercely with a bitter stinging look in his eyes. "I...am NOT afraid anymore, ahm beyond that, ahm not gonna let it get to me, ah have come too fuckin' far to let that stop me. Ah wuz able to handle a goddamn tank, ah KNOW whut ah can do!" " Incorrect. Your pupils are dilating, I am sensing an increased level of cortisol and epinephrine in your body, along with your heart rate increasing rapidly." "AH DON'T CARE YOU FUCKIN' MACHINE! AHM NOT GONNA LET FEAR STOP ME NOW AFTER COMIN' THIS FAR!" " Then why did it stop you before?" "H-HUH!?" " You were willing to allow your fear to consume you so completely, that you seeked death at the hands of a friend because you were afraid of loneliness. You were also afraid of dishonouring your father as according to the Christian law that suicide is a sin, so you believed by a loophole that if another person killed you, it would not be considered as such. What is different from this?"

The colder logic of the steel hound hit him much worse than the previous intellectual he had met. Roy was starting to wonder at this point who was truly representing his intelligence, or rather how many parts of him were going to speak out against his motives as an inner turmoil began to twist and contort his stomach harshly. He felt sick suddenly, a great weight coming upon his shoulders as a deep regret came through from his throat, sighing with a longful melancholy as Jack could not help but ask him: "You weren't really planning all this, weren't you?" "I...a-a-ah don' know." "You started out suicidal, you end up here having no idea what to expect, you don't really wanna find out the truth at this point and yet somehow you made it here. You coulda ended up back at the city square just sitting forever with all yer friends an' memories just hiding away from the world. Nobody would blame you, and I'm pretty sure at some point FG would realise you were not gonna wake up. I mean think about it. It'd be like a perfect little coma and all you had to do was just stay back in that city square and never leave. You'd never have to worry about things ever again. So why didn't you stay?" "F-fuckin' Carlos for one thing." "Whosat?" "Carlos...he...he reminded me why mah whole journey even started. Ah have to know, ah have to seek justice. Ah HAVE to find out thuh truth, ah know ahm exhausted, ah know ah been searchin' for years without any answer. But...a-ah've come to realise over these past few weeks up at Mz. Ruby's place that if FG ain't gonna give up on me, an' neither his husband who's not even got any obligation towards me...then ah have to at least take a shot at this. If ah find out thuh truth in thuh one place that even Scissoraptor got his ass beat, then cool, alrigh', we can finally move on with things. If ah don't...well...ahm already dead, ain't ah?" "Damn brah, that's pretty fatalistic. But I get what you mean, if that's the case then uh...go forth and do greatness for me pal." "Thanks Jack. You were a great partner for all thuh crime bustin' we did." "Hey it was fun! Small fry admittedly but it was great to have a pal that knew what he was doing for all the little stuff happenin' down on the city." "Ah wouldn't call a terrorist faction tryin' to blow up a news office 'small fry'." "Compared to what Dr. Light's people have to fight it sure is." "Righ', okay fair point. Later dudes." "See ya round Roy!" " Do not fear the unknown, Roy MacGregor. It is said that Fear is the mind killer." He walked down into the depths of the subway station, keeping the warmth of friends in his heart to keep the fear from penetrating his heart. The cold tiles underneath his claws did not help as they echoed across the lone platform, small empty benches of wrought iron along with sturdy black pillars keeping the foundation of the roof supported above his head. There was not a sound from either end of the train tunnel as Roy saw the long yellow line stretch across the platform's edge. It was covered in blood. "Awww jeez...g-god dammit brain whut thuh hell?" His fears were creeping up into his spine, trembling as he shook with every step that he made towards the long end of the station's platform. He noticed there was a sign hung upon each pillar facing towards the benches.

THE TRAIN TO FULTON STREET IS CURRENTLY OUT OF ORDER ALL PASSENGERS HEADING TO FULTON STREET, YOU MAY WALK THROUGH THE TUNNEL SAFELY AS IT IS CURRENTLY NOT IN USE

"...are you serious? Are you FUCKIN' SERIOUS?!" Roy stomped his feet letting anger replace his fear as he ran back straight towards the ticket station to demand: "HEY, YOU TWO KNOW ANYTHIN' ABOUT A FUCKIN' TRAIN NOT EVEN WORKIN', HOW THUH FUCK AHM AH GONNA-...g-guys? Bladewolf? Jack?!?! ...Snappy Jack?" But there was no one else in the station beside him, the ticket booth now empty and ruined beyond repair becoming a complete mess of mortar and steel crushing inwards of itself. The gates were now crumbling and devastated by some sort of cave-in with the roof, yet he had never heard a sound from upstairs as he walked forwards carefully. Gently peering over the blockage he thought he saw a shadow moving past his vision, the door to the bathroom swinging gently. "HEY! HEY-EY-EY WHOSAT!? S-SOMEONE THERE!?!" He had no means of breaching past the barricade by this point, peering desperately through the cracks to try and see anything possible. Nothing came despite his suspicions as he turned to walk away back down towards the platform. He knew he had no choice, wringing his fingers desperately as he peered carefully along the darkness. Nothing more could be seen or heard, not even a gasping wind. He clicked his claws upon the bloodied step, breathing in deeply to steady his nerves. He felt it coming back to him, the trickling warm sweat, the deepening tremble in his legs with his voice catching tightly in his throat. "F-f-fuck...f-fuck this...a-ain' no turnin' back now, ah said ah wuz gonna see this through. L-l-last tahm ah went through these places, ah know it wuzn't used but whut if this one is...a-a-ah just...ah just don' wanna......wait. Wait whut's your problem?" His eyes turned a deep cold stare towards the opposite wall. "Whut's thuh point of being scared if you wanna die anyway? You take one step an' it's all over, lahk in a flash. No more nuthin', just a smear on thuh pavement. ......maybe that's why he killed himself when ah wuz little...that man...ah always wondered for years why he smiled when he wuz gonna kill himself." His mouth opened agape in sudden contemplation, fully understanding the darkness beneath that everconstant smile which haunted him for years as he gently stepped off the platform. His feet clacked onto the deactivated rails, cold iron bars lengthening towards the infinite abyss to the south of Manhattan. He knew this route well, it would just have to take longer than usual. He wasn't dead yet, and there was a bit of him that became slightly disappointed at no brazen beast of steel coming for him like he almost imagined to. But he walked regardless. In the tunnel his footsteps echoed onwards, the stone gravel rubbing against his hardened scaly soles as he did everything he could to control his breathing. He knew the darkness was where monsters hid, he knew it was a great and dreadful place to find yourself in. But he knew also that there was something worse he would find in the train tunnels should he ever see one. A light in the distance followed by the sound of screaming steel that he hoped he would not see or hear. With that thought in mind, he found the darkness to be a soothing emptiness. No light meant no death. His rings glinted softly in the bleakest rays from the fluorescent lighting of the train station behind him before he found that the dark had swallowed his vision completely. He felt his feet becoming treacherous, with slightly uneven ground making him suspicious of every moment that could lurk within the great long subway tunnels of his home city reimagined. There was a sense of something creeping along the walls, sounds unknown as something slithered and cracked along the walls on either side of him, trespassing along the ceiling above his head to drop something past his cheek. Water dripped, echoing across the railway darkness resoundingly sharp almost like a pin clattering against his ear endlessly. First came one drop then came two, then three more and then half a dozen pattered next, with some drops trickling upon his head. He almost feared it was some strange monster but all he could see was a large root of some sort, twisting gnarled tentacled lengths that somehow grew past him at an absurdly fast rate, constantly wet and thickening with every step that he took. They never seemed to come closer to him, nor would they attack him and the water was not acidic to his skin so he had no reason to fear them. But for some reason they filled him with a sense of dread that deepened into the well of his heart. please A voice came from the darkness, bleak and whispering. please help "H-...h-hello?" i can't see, please...h-help me "Um...are you lost?" i need...eyes to see, h-help me...my brothers...m-my sisters cannot hear me "You need sum light? Ah can make sum for ya if you want." please...p-please please help me, th-this pain inside- "Alrigh' just...j-just hold on, lemme bring this up." He was about to bring up his omni-tool before realising where he was and that he could imagine bigger than just that. The flashlight function he knew would be suitable, but he wanted to reveal much more of the area having no idea where this person would be as he began summoning a great thickening force from inside of his body. Like resonance from his chakra, if he ever knew where it was, he felt a pulse of energy from within before bursting a solid light above his head with the brilliance of a small sun, floating like an orb of of incandescence to send the entire darkness back to whence it came. It was a mistake. The entire floor started to move with hundreds of tiny screaming bodies that resonated throughout the long tunnel amidst bleak amber walls of cold stone. Everywhere he looked, he saw the corpses of animals, dogs twisting their necks with mangled shrieks, horses gutted open to still breathe with silent screams, birds walking upon their own shattered wingbones like crutches with spastic motions of constant agony. But they were nothing compared to the horde of seething rats, all of them screeching. Screaming. Never stopped screaming from the sickness within that they never understood. i can't see, i can't see she's eating herself, i can taste her misery my son is screaming from his ears, why won't he stop i was thirsty, i didn't know, i didn't know, i was thirsty the water was poisoned, it had man's taste i tasted his blood, it was not man's blood, but some beast itchy please do not eat me, please, this sickness tasty you will die too, this sickness is killing me my children are a disease now all of us...are a disease the city died because of us the plague we have doomed this world why didn't you help us you HEARD us screaming i bEgGeD yOu tO sAvE uS aNd wE KNOW yOu hEaRd uS "STOP IT! S-STOP IIIIIIIIIT! AH KNOW AH HEARD YOU SCREAMIN' AH KNOW AH DID! WHUT DO YOU WANT FROM ME?!" wHat KinD oF hErO aBaNdOnS uS bEcaUsE wE aRe nOt hUmAn bEcAuSe wE aRe SiMpLE sUbHuMaN BEASTS "THAT'S NOT TRUE! AH CARE ABOUT EVERYONE!" _ tHen wHy dO wE sUfFeR aRoUnD yOU _ A horse began choking, screeching with breaths caught in its throat as something forced itself through its mouth in the form of a black tentacle glistening like the ones from the roof above him. Then another horse, then a dog, all of them slowly broken into pieces by the violent aberration of thick tendrils pouring from their throats, their eyes, their raw stomachs flickering to twitch and spasm as they began to stagger onto their feet, but not by their own will. yOu aBaNdOn uS yOu HEAR oUr sCrEaMs aNd yEt tHeRe iS nOtHiNg yOu cAn dO yOu cAnNoT eVeN sAvE HER yEs hEr wHeN yOu aRe nOt eVeN hUmAn yOuRsELf "SH-SHUT UP! SHUT UP ALL OF YOU! AH CAN'T SAVE EVERYONE OF YOU, AH DID MAH BEST, AH DID ALL AH COULD!" a CoLoNy oF aLiEnS yOu cAn saVe aNd nOt uS yOu aRe a DisGusTiNg hYpoCriTe "_SHUT UP! SHUT UUUUP! AHM SORRY, AHM SORRY AH DID EVERYTHIN' AH COULD, AH CAN'T SOLVE EVERYTHING! AH DID MAH BEST TO FIX ALL YOUR FUCKIN' PROBLEMS I CAN'T DO EVERYTHIIIIIING! _" "That's good." Gently from the darkness there came a light glistening with cyan colours from beyond the range of Roy's own beaming orange glow. Before he even realised what would happen, an orb of purest blue honed in towards his sphere of light and swallowed it completely, consuming it, possessing the entire aura around him to suddenly drive every single tortured creature in his vicinity to fall silent. Or rather, detonate all of their heads into a rippling explosion of blood and festering sinew. Panicking from the bursting flesh and popping organs of both beasts and their tentacled possessors, the raptor staggered out of the way to desperately force himself against one of the walls to try and avoid the disgusting carnage across the subway tracks. Once he heard the noise of bursting stomachs and shattering skulls cease whimper a bletcherous whimper, he turned to see the orb of sky-blue hover swiftly back towards its original incarnate. A lone creature wearing only a loincloth with purplish-green skin and darkened arms resembling a bald bird without its beak. "......A-abe? Issat you?" "It should be," said the creature, "not like anyone else it could be."

Moving back away from the wall, Roy approached the odd two-legged beast, his thin emaciated body looking as if it struggled to breathe showing three fat fingers on each hand along with a tinier claw-like stub to accompany them. His eyes were wide with yellow piercing stare, a strange amber-and-purple tendril from his head like some sort of fleshy ponytail, as well as lastly having leathery stitches piercing both sides of his mouth. Roy could not help but look at the odd pendant hanging from Abe's neck, a W-shape in front of a smooth circular amethyst, which in turn hung above a deep reddened scar going vertically down the creature's ribs. He had a soothing voice, humble yet melancholy with a monotone dullness as if he had become enlightened beyond the point of fear and sufferance. That, or he was dead inside which might have explained his odd giggling and the blankest voice of effervescent whimsy. "Hee hee hee." "Did...d-d-did you just...okay, firstly, ah wuzn't expecting you." "Who else DID you expect inside your head?" "Secondly, fuckin' blow up every animal's head, whut thuh fuck?!" "There was no cure for them. Sometimes there is mercy in death." "Wuz it really necessary?" "They were screaming for you. Begging for an answer you did not have. Would you rather they kept screaming, suffering?" "N-no...but ah-" "Then the problem is?" He shrugged plaintively, which did nothing to ease Roy's mood of being partly shocked, disoriented and in shivering remorse as he clasped his face with a hand over his eyes. "G-god...f-f-fuckin' dammit ah wish ah'd never heard them." "Who?" asked Abe. "Those fuckin' rats. Ah remember Raccoon City...ah hate this ring. Ah hate havin' to hear all this, all thuh animals that beg me. Knowin' ah can't do nuthin' to save any of 'em, ahm not a fuckin' doctor." "Sometimes..." The newcomer put an arm around Roy's hefty shoulders, showing black tattoos on the back of each hand. "All you ever need, is someone to listen to you. Even if they can't do nothing, it's nice for somebody to tell you that you're not alone. Right?" "Ah guess. Doesn't mean nuthin'." "At least you told the truth. Sometimes there is nothing you can do. But all you had to do...was listen. Come on, we're almost out." Abe slowly walked with Roy alongside him, the odd creature somewhat shorter than him by almost an entire foot at a height of 5'8''. The darkness returned to them yet Roy could still see the much paler outline of his temporary companion, along with his wide beaming eyes that pierced the dark. "Why did you come here?" asked Abe. "Whussat?" "Why did you come here? Do you even know where you're going?" "Ahm goin' to Fulton Street." "Why?" "Because...that's where mah parents told me to." "Why go there?" "Because it wuz...i-i-it's our favourite place, it wuz sumplace we always went to, whether it wuz thuh church or um...just...just even thuh mall or thuh memorial, sumplace!" "You feel safe there." "Yes, righ'." "What if it's not safe?" "Whut you mean, why wouldn't it be?!" "Safety is not always freedom, Roy. Sometimes...it's but a prison. I should know." "Ah don' know where else to go Abe. Ah swear, ah just wanna find...find out thuh truth. An' ah just got no place else to go, ahm not lookin' for safety. Ahm lookin' to find a way through out of this." "Good. Because safety was back that way, and you passed the first test to not stay in it." "Wuzn't exactly much of a test. If you call that a test, then you mudokons must have sum low-ass standards." "Not every test has to be mean. Some are just very simple." He felt the mudokon's smile brimming next to him. At this time he felt an odd tingling in his right arm subconsciously as Abe continued asking: "Do you remember, what I told you?" "That sumbody always worse off than you?" "Mmmhmm. Maybe you don't know it, but you always have friends someplace that care about you." "Ah know...ah just don't...want to really intrude on them." "Why?" "Cuz they don't got no reason to help me, they not entitled. Ah don't want them to see...to see me beggin' when ah wanna leave them with a happy memory of how ah would be." "You don't want to look weak?" "N-no...not lahk that." "Weakness is not everything it's cracked up to be. I mean...heh, hey, look at me, I'm only ninety-five pounds." "Yeah ah know whut you did...an' that's incredible, ah mean all thuh stuff you did, you lahk a fuckin' messiah. It's just...i-i-it's just that-" "What?" "All mah life ah been this big-ass strong dude, ah been called smart, brutish, powerful, ah felt everyone looked up to me. Back in high school ah wuz this good blue boy, when ah went out on mah journey even then ah wuz seen as a good guy. A strong guy. But...whut happens when...ah need someone strong beside me?" "Then you find someone. Did you not find someone before?" "Yes...a-ah did." "And where are they now?" "...not here." "Sorry." Abe's response was almost too quick, which made Roy turn suspicious as they saw the light finally. At first he started panicking thinking it was a train but soon seeing that it was natural sky splitting itself into three colours he started to relax briefly as he saw the mudokon's face more clearly. He smiled from beneath his loosened stitches as they soon found themselves upon an elevated bridge for railway tracks to continue out of the tunnel. It was early dawn or perhaps a cold evening, he was not certain at this point. For however long he had been within the darkness of the subway, time skipped on to the point he now felt aged with a body turning more muscular, a gentle huskiness developing on his belly as he absentmindedly rubbed his chest. Something wasn't right as he looked down upon his hand feeling an odd creaking stiffness in his fingers. "......aww. Not this again, dammit Abe, you hafta remind me of this?!" "I thought it was pretty good, considering." The flesh and bone he once had had now been replaced by a strangely gnarled wooden hand that was surprisingly intricate. Three mahogany fingers carved like lean claws with impossibly-tough vines spindling attached to mimic veins and nerves with disturbing accuracy that went deep inside the wrist to bind with his own original nerves inside his arm. He managed to pull and twitch each separate finger, not in perfect sense. He appreciated the gesture but also hated it deeply from how unnatural it always felt. He never understood how Abe's people had managed to bind his own nerves with the vines on his fingers, but a part of him didn't want to know. He smelt fire on the horizon as he glanced across the city. There was darkness and flames silhouetting his body black along with every other building on both sides of him, in the midst of a deepening red dawn that began blending with the cleansing fire. "Do ah just keep walkin'?" asked Roy. "Why not?" said Abe. "If you find yourself in hell, just keep walking. Eventually you find some place where the fires stop burning." "That's whut ah've ALWAYS been doin'! Fuck man, ah been walkin' for fuckin' years an' ah ain't never found any answers!" "Because you keep trying to walk ahead of everybody. Sometimes maybe other people might know about things that you don't know, so maybe let them lead. Even when you stood with James' friends, you always tried to lead your own way." "No ah didn't, ah wuz strictly an outsider!" "I don't mean leading them...I mean not letting anyone lead YOU. You never let anybody talk to you about your problems, you always talked about them." "Ah wuz just bein' polite, ah know they had their problems...they don' wanna hear about me." "Why not? You're all friends." "Just...look, ah appreciate thuh help, an' all you did for me Abe, especially managing to give me a replacement for mah hand but-" "You weren't happy." Roy said nothing, standing tall and primly polite to say: "I appreciated it. Thank you." "Hee hee hee. You look funny when you're trying to look strong, when you're not." "Wh-whut's that mean?" "You don't have to keep being the hero. Nobody asked you to be." "Ah know just-...ah know, a-a-ah just don't...ah don't know how to stop." "You already did. You asked James to help you." "Not for thuh right reasons." "And look what he did. He helped you in his own way, and now you've come this far. Look." He pointed out with thick fingers towards the horizon on their left. He stared out towards the south end of Manhattan, almost certain it was the same place he knew from his past. Except for one thing. "...whut's that? Ah don't...ah don't recognise those buildings." "Maybe you should follow it. Shining stars always have good luck for those who travel." "Ah guess...worked for three guys in a desert, might as well work for me." "Heeee. Okay. I have to go now." "Huh?" "There's someone else you need to talk to. You'll want to be alone for her." "...h-her?" The mudokon smiled with a gentle wave as he closed his eyes before clasping his hands in gentle prayer before he said his last thoughts. "Remember, you are not alone." Mumbling a strange song that turned synthetic in his throat, his body became overwhelmed with soft sea-blue lights dappling across his withered skin until he burst into a dozen birds of glistening white wings. The raptor stood looking shocked and almost blinded by the light with his right arm to his face, seeing the small flock that simply fluttered off into the sky without a word. He walked on along the bridge, carefully gauging his steps whilst gently clutching his raw wooden fingers. The touch of fire flickering across the breeze made him feel nervous as his feet clacked upon wood and steel, sensing he was heading in a circle to someplace, but as to what he did not know. The long bridge seemed to stretch on forever as he watched the city pass by from underneath, slowly but surely crumbling to a state of ashen debris that turned into dust upon the wind." Across the skyline in the flickering dawn, above the flames that seemed to crackle and burn throughout the city streets like rivers of molten fire, he saw two shining stars almost perpendicular of themselves. Sparkling with the light of radiance, they seemed to be the only things worth noticing in the midst of all the much smaller creeping black length of the land as he tried to focus. "What are you doing?" A gentle firm voice came from in front of him. "What are you doing in this place?" "......who-...n-n-no. No it can't......don't do this."

Through the fog of the flames burning deep, he saw her like a vision to come torment him. A banshee of a shadow, pale with long golden mane and body white as snow dappled in caramel patterning. Her eyes gazed with fierce amber upon him, judging with silence until he spoke her name. "...Lizbeth?" She walked forwards as the sound of hooves clacked underneath, stopping only once she reached twelve feet away from him. There was the look of shame in her eyes as she asked: "Why did you become this?" "Wh-wh-whut...whut you mean?" "Do you even remember why you came here? Or are you going to let your stubbornness be the dagger that finally plunged through your feeble heart?" "I-...a-ah came here to...t-to find out thuh truth!" "Really? Did you just remember that?" "Whut do you mean?! God...g-god you look...just thuh way ah remember you." "Don't." The raptor tried to walk forwards but her voice bade him still. "Don't even try. You did not come here of your own will, you had to be dragged through this place. You promised me. You...y-y-you promised me you would cease this." He had only ever seen her cry three times since they met each other. He had never known beasts like her to cry with such primal form compared to the species of his world. He had no escape as he watched the tears trickling down her softened snout. "Ahm sorry. Ahm sorry Lizbeth...but ah couldn't keep that promise, ah thought-" "You thought what? That I wouldn't know you were being insincere, in my last moments with you?!" "N-NO! That's not it!" "THEN WHY!? WHY DID YOU SEEK DEATH AFTER I PASSED AWAY!? I BEGGED YOU, I BEGGED YOU WITH MY LAST BREATH NOT TO LEAVE OUR HOME, THAT YOU BUILT FOR US!" "WHUT ELSE DID AH HAVE LEFT?! ALL AH HAD WUZ YOU, ALL AH HAD WUZ YOUR HEART BESIDE ME EVERY NIGHT, AH STAYED WITH YOU 'TIL THUH END!" "AND THAT MAKES IT ALRIGHT?! You abandoned me the moment I became cold, you did not even TRY to have the strength to stand beside me in spirit, and instead you left our home empty and bereft of our memories together! Were you ashamed of me?! WAS I NOTHING BUT AN EXCUSE?!" "N-NO, OF COURSE AHM NOT ASHAMED! AH WUZ HAPPY WITH YOU!" "NO! You were complacent with me, you came back to me years after with a hand made of steel and eyes haunted but you never let me into your heart! All the things that you have wrought since we parted ways, you never even tried to open up to me!" "Ah didn't want you to know, a-a-ah didn't want you to know thuh shit ah'd been through that ah suffered." "Then why even bother sharing your heart with me?" He couldn't even look at her. It said everything to Lizbeth. "You keep trying to look pure and strong in front of me...even after all those years you kept trying to be my pillar of strength when I told you before I did not NEED you to be one!" "Ah...a-a-ah just wanted to support you, to be with you." "And I was not allowed to support you?! You clearly need it more than I do, you weren't trying to support me. You were afraid. You denied yourself any chance to grieve because you're terrified of the very truth you seek!" "Ahm not...ah don't...ah don't need-" "STOP IT!" Her hoof stomped viciously upon the road as tears flecked down her cheeks bitterer by the moment. "STOP. Lying to me. You lied to me before I died and you lie to me again when I am but a memory, you might have a body thick as meat but I know your soul is much weaker than that! You could have said no to me." "H-h-huh?" "I offered my love to you, and you were so hurt and alone that you said yes, I did not love you out of pity. I loved you out of respect!" "I KNOW YOU DID! AH WANTED TO BE WITH YOU, YOU UNDERSTOOD ME LIZBETH! AH DON'T CARE IF THUH ONLY REASON AH EVEN UNDERSTOOD YOU WUZ BECAUSE OF THIS FUCKING RING BUT GOD DAMMIT I LOVED YOU! ...ah know this makes no sense...none of this does to me, not when it first happened between you an' me. I...a-ah never planned on us bein'...together lahk that but you were smart, you were fun, you were wild an' never took no for an answer, you were strong, you understood me! You spoke to me...you understood thuh need to look all strong in front of people." "Then why? Why...did you dishonour me and chose to die so easily?" "......ah wuzn't prepared for this. Whut happened, to you, a-a-ah didn't know, ah thought-" "You knew perfectly. I told you, my species does not live as long as yours. I loved you and you loved me knowing that, knowing that you would far outlive me and you CHOSE to. All you wanted me to be was a crutch to hide away from the world, just to let ourselves be an absurd romance and wrap yourself within the magic of Daventry and just pretend, WAS THAT IT?! Was I but an escape for you?!" The mare walked two steps forwards, her legs starting to shake with quivering weakness that Roy struggled not to look through the fear stifling his heart. This was not the Lizbeth he knew when she was in the prime of her life. She was aging with every second that they spoke as he forced himself to walk to her. "Please...p-p-please don't leave me, ahm sorry. Ah...a-ahm sorry. Ah couldn't do it...a-a-ah couldn't live without you." "I know. I know you couldn't. But you promised. Why would you give me a promise that you would never keep?" "A-ah just wanted to keep you h-happy." "I WAS happy. Living with you. I know that our love was different and I know that we had to hide it. I know that in another world and another place this would not have been. But I don't care. I never cared because what you felt for me was genuine and I was not some simple beast of burden. I understood you. I yearned for you...my brave sweet Roy." "L-lizbeth...ah know when...w-when this all began it wuz weird a-a-and mah head wuz all mixed up, a-ah never thought this could ever happen, ah never had any feelings lahk that ever an' ah never would but...I loved you." "I know you did. But now you love a broken heart. You wish to honour my memory? Reclaim your worth?" "Always." "Then find your truth. Find your damn truth, LIVE for me and don't ever throw yourself to the gates of death again like you just did. We went through too much just for you to do this." "N-NO, NO LIZBETH DON'T, DON'T LEAVE ME!" "Promise me this. After all that is said, after everything is done, you live a good life. I don't care who you end up with, I don't care where you run to, but please...don't..." She weeped silently, her face barely changing with a staunch sneer of shameful hopelessness. "Don't ever think your life is worthless because I'm not in it. That was not what I wanted...that was never what I wanted. I was strong for you...now you must be strong for me." "I can't...a-a-ah can't do it...please." "Then let me ask you something. What price is too steep to learn that of Truth?" "Wh-wh-whut? Whut are you...wh-whut is this, wh-whut'sat even mean?" "You will understand eventually. I hope...it is not too late then." Her legs began to shimmer, sweeping dust trailing from her hooves as her body began to fade in the gust of wind rising through the streets. Brushed softly out of existence, she gave a last smile as Roy ran straight to her. But the road became cruel against him, stretching out beyond his reach as Lizbeth never came closer to him. Yet her body swept away off into the trailing sky as all around him Roy could see the black tentacles trembling around him once again. They latched onto the bridge and started to twist it, slowly tearing it apart to the point of snapping steel that scraped into vicious screaming abscess of its new wounds. The bridge had torn itself into three pieces as it began to sink into the abyss, the raptor struggling to stand firm and rush forwards with stumbling gait with shrieking tears upon his face. The thickening tendrils were merciless in wrapping themselves onto the sides as wood and steel shattered with falling rocks to the darkness down beneath of the city streets, along with a constant tearful rain from the tentacles' porous skin. "N-NO! NOOO LIZBETH! LIZBETH COME BACK! COME B-BACK LIZBEEEETH!" "I already did. My memory will only come back to you...when you deserve it." "D-D-DON'T, DON'T LEAVE ME AGAIN! AHM SORRY! A-AHM SORRY LIZBETH COME BACK! C-COME BAAAAAAAAACK!" But it was too late. He fell into the darkness but never felt his body hit the ground wherever it may be. Whenever it may be. The taste of ash filled his throat, coughing, staggering to clear his reddened eyes almost completely dried out to the point of cracks bloodied out on the surface of his pupils. His body felt weak and crippled despite having none of his limbs to be broken as he felt dust swiftly scatter across his head, before something clanged upon the cold steel floor. It was a horseshoe. A simple wrought steel piece that he knelt upon to clutch softly in his hands. His eyes became wet finally, bleakly across his cheeks as he grasped the steel against his forehead. It was warm still. It hurt like burning irons into his skull. "Wh-why...why did you leave me? A-ah didn't...ah don't care whut you are, th-this isn't righ'...it's not fair, it's not...n-n-not...all ah wanted wuz s-somebody to open mah heart to. Ah gave you mah heart...and then...and then you left me without ever giving it back. L-lizbeth...h-hoh Lizbeth..." He bent forwards in kneeling as he sobbed wretchedly into the cold thick tarmac of the broken street, clutching the beloved horseshoe close to his chest. He did not move from his grieving stance for the next six minutes until he was able to swallow his tears once more, struggling desperate. He did not want to grieve, he knew he had no time. He knew he had to push onwards. It hurt him. But he had gotten used to the hurt as he gently put his horseshoe back inside his satchel, the large bookbag he had carried for all these years. There weren't many items left inside of it, but he felt better for them being there. Slightly, only just. Roy began looking around himself, at the darkness of the crumbling pit that he had landed in wondering if there was an exit still. Eventually, amidst the pile of rubble that laid all around him, he saw a light shining through a set of doors far beyond which he cautiously walked to. The doors were of thick steel and quite heavy like one would find in a hospital for sealed rooms as he naturally found a corridor of clinical servitude upon the other side. Normally the smell of disinfectant would be what would greet him. Instead he smelt only death. He wiped his tears struggling to keep focus of the situation, as he tried to walk forwards into the pristine corridor of which there was only one exit for him to see. Straight on, though the many doors on both sides of him had been well-barricaded. Hands were smeared upon the round porthole windows, some of which were red. Some of them were black and dusty like coal as he kept moving forwards. Struggling, his head felt thicker than lead along with his chest which began to burn a raw deep hurt as he pressed his claws against both sides of the corridor. Eventually he reached the other end and pushed it open, the doors swinging with a creaking sound almost resembling a child's scream before he saw a large wooden table. It was either a very traditional operating table or a butcher's chopping block. He wasn't even sure what original colour it had been from all the red and brown smears that had aged with coagulation, turning harder than pus. But what he noticed most was the giant steel blade that laid on the very centre of the table. It was the same blade he had found in a lonesome town far away, a place of restless dreams that he never understood to this day what had happened in such a small twisted settlement. But he had found that blade, in the basement of a hospital on the northeast side of town and with it he had found a small poem written in neatest black. His father's handwriting.

_By the rivers of Babylon we sat and wept when we remembered Zion. There on the poplars we hung our harps, for there our captors asked us for songs our tormentors demanded songs of joy; they said, "Sing us one of the songs of Zion!"

How can we sing the songs of the Lord while in a foreign land? If I forget you, Jerusalem, may my right hand forget its skill. May my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth if I do not remember you, if I do not consider Jerusalem my highest joy.

Remember, Lord, what the Edomites did on the day Jerusalem fell. "Tear it down," they cried, "tear it down to its foundations!" Daughter Babylon, doomed to destruction, happy is the one who repays you according to what you have done to us. Happy is the one who seizes your infants and dashes them against the rocks._

He remembered this psalm. He remembered the verse and he remembered especially his family name knowing that if he were ever a stranger in a strange land, he would learn not to forget. It was here that he made his statement, to find justice without end until the truth had been set free. He saw beside him on the table a set of tools, one for carving in wood, the other for carving in steel. He had no need for them when his blade had already been christened with the names of his father and mother. Joseph upon the wood, Lashawndra upon the steel. His claws gently scraped against the thick handle, slowly taking it in both his hands to feel the weight suddenly drop clanging to the steel floor. It was heavier than he remembered it to be, too heavy for him to place on his back or carry properly. He felt uneasy without a weapon so he decided instead to drag it along behind him. Shrieking sounds of steel followed him wherever he would walk as he turned back towards the single set of doors in the room. But he would not find the hallway that he had come from. Instead he found a much worse place. "......no." Slowly opening the two doors, he walked down a ramp with the Great Knife still razing the ground behind him as it clunked thickly onto the short steel incline before breaching the solid dirt. A giant wrought steel set of gates grand and looming above the raptor, between imposing stone parapets as they began to scream viciously open. He knew exactly what sort of screams they were when he saw the long silted field containing nothing but raw concrete prisons evenly structured into rows of inhumanity. Skulte-Marupe, it said above the gates. A name that turned his blood cold. "No. Wh-why...why ahm ah back here?" He saw beyond the gate and structures the two twinkling stars, a shining light of hope come dualistic upon him. But he saw worse things than expected from the place in the form of beastly-looking shadows that crossed the deadened field, hulking armoured monstrous things with red eyes of piercing strength and cruel guttural voices. Voices that Roy could only imagine from his worst nightmares as he cautiously entered the grounds with steel blade scraping behind him, down into the dirt. All he knew in that moment was that he had to avoid the demons that prowled through the place, his sense of fear and survival instincts returning to him despite his urge to keep holding onto the Great Knife. It slowed him down, but he knew he had to keep it, he knew he needed this weapon beside him for what would come next as he hurried over towards the first building. Huge rectangular structures without any sense of warmth or dignity, becoming nothing more than oblong tombs as he hid himself into its doorway. The shadows prowled with thick feet, heavy thuds and sickening voices that slathered and hissed with rasping horror that easily sent a shivering of fear down Roy's spirit, primordial nerves flickering into a panicked state. He struggled to control his breathing but he would have no time when he saw that inside the building was a filthy-looking hospital room with rows of beds in filth and depravity. An unwelcome memory played upon the wall by a film reel from some unseen source, completely in black and white. "Mister MacGregor?" From a hospital bed's view he saw a familiar face. A stern-looking man of military outfit, buzzcut blonde hair from his lumpen square head, piggy eyes and stubby nose as his younger voice came from behind his perspective. "Who...wh-who are you?" "My name is Guston. General Guston. You have been in an unfortunate...incident, have you not?" "I...a-a-ah don't...ah don't know whut you-" "Your parents. My condolences. I am here to explain some things to you regarding the...incident that happened last week." "Ah don't know anythin'...a-ah told thuh police all ah know, ahm-" "I know you have. But what if I told you...that I know who killed your parents?" "Wh-wh-...wh-whut?!" "There is something you must know, regarding how this all came to be. You want to find the person who killed them, do you not?" "Ah...a-a-a-ah don't...ah don't know...wh-why are you tellin' me, wh-why not tell thuh police, th-they should know tha-" "The killer is a very...sensitive matter. The police will not be able to bring him to justice for he is a very powerful individual. Very dangerous. I know this because I know who he is precisely." "Wh-whut, i-i-is he sum kinda ex-military guy?!" "Not exactly. But the New York police will not be able to face him so I want to give you something better. I can bring you justice." "Jus...tice?" "I need someone to stop this killer. Someone who has more heart, determination, and a strong moral code such as you. I've seen reports about you Roy, I've read up on your immaculate standing at your school whilst I was hunting down our mutual enemy." "Wh-who is this...who thuh fuck is this guy th-th-that...h-hhhh..." His memory started to blur, tears in his eyes as his past self cupped his hands into his face. General Guston moved closer, a smile solemn upon his lips. "I want justice as much as you do, MacGregor. It said in your school reports that you had plans to join the police, didn't you?" "U-u-um...ah dunno, a-ahm jus-a-ahm all shook up, a-a-ah can't think straight." "I understand. Let me explain...the killer is someone from my organisation...someone who became an irresponsible reckless thief and ruthless murderer, someone who should never have been involved but it was too late. A traitor from my group, and I want to see him brought to justice but we cannot go to the police as this has all become a very legally-structured mess. But I want to give you retribution. Here is my deal." The human leaned over until almost completely filling Roy's tearful vision, his eyes shining with the wondrous glee of a snake oil salesman. "I will give you a life, any life you want. Whatever university, college or foundation you want to go to pursue your new career, I cannot bring you your family back. But I can give you a new life, a new home...so long as you work with me." "Wh-why...wh-why would you do that? Y-y-y-you can't just offer sumbody that." "I am a very powerful man Roy MacGregor. But I can only do so much from behind a desk of an institution. I need someone strong, someone truly capable...a heroic person like you to dish out justice...to find the one who has ruthlessly killed and have him brought to what he deserves. I promise you, I can make you something truly incredible, I may not be able to quell the pain in your heart...but I can preserve you a future...alongside me." "......I...a-a-ah don't...ah need a moment to think about this. S-sorry, it's all-" "No no, that's perfectly fine. I will return just before the hospital entitles you to leave after they have performed all their tests. You have time to consider...but you know that you have only six months left of school before you are out in the real world, don't you?" He walked away from Roy slowly as he carefully checked his pace, as if allowing him the most opportunity to reconsider his deal as he stepped out from the private hospital room. "Before I go...I will leave you with the killer's name. James...Campbell." "...really?" "A brown-scaled velociraptor, purple marks on his face...five-foot-ten...he was from London, had an English accent. That sound familiar?" Even back then Roy felt the shock and surprise trickling across his face. Flashes of memories came vivid and rambling across his broken mind, struggling to keep all the details fitting into place like a jigsaw piece in the wrong spot. Yet something clicked in him. Was it the right "......it...i-i-it does...he kinda had that...look a-a-and that accent wuz sort of-" "Just to allow you some sense in realising your thoughts. I only want to help you attain justice as it should be. I'll be waiting to hear what you think of my offer, Roy MacGregor." The reel stopped showing, the wall faded with its memory as Roy stood alone in the abandoned room before making his way out. The shadows had moved far enough to allow him to slip to the next building. His blade dragged behind him like a broken plough, forcing him to pull it free from the dirt as scarred lines made their way across the muddy soil, black and grey as he almost didn't make it. He managed to push himself in with blade in tow just before a shadow burst its head from another building opposite of him. He couldn't even see what weapons they had from the convoluted darkness that composed their bodies, haunting eyes that slithered across the walls outside of the concrete structures as Roy looked upon the second building's interior. A cave full of broken tools and a campfire left recently touched with an ashen pile upon its wood. As he approached, the fire started to burn suddenly bursting alight causing Roy to almost stumble and fall back before another memory came to him. A lizardman, sitting beside a young Roy both of whom had been sculpted from the smoke to become almost holographic monochrome visions as he spoke. _"Master...can ah ask you sumthin'?" "Of course my boy...what is it?" "...whut wuz it lahk thuh first tahm you killed someone?" "Why do you ask?" "......um...a-a-ah don't, never mind." "No no, it is healthy to try to understand. Are you afraid of something?" "I...a-ah don't know." "Are you thinking about your prey, young Roy?" "Kinda...not lahk ah have anythin' else to think about." "You were charged with a mission were you not?" "Ah wuz." "Then why did your original peers not train you, strengthen you?" "Th-they did, but...they tried to teach me about guns, a-a-ah didn' wanna learn. Ah don't lahk guns." "I despise them too. Far too easy for a common fool to commit his great mistake." "They just told me to follow mah instincts, they said they would track me when ah left, see where ah would go, hunt for this Campbell guy. They said that ah would be able to...sorta track him by his energy signature. But...ah don't think it's working." "Or he is not in this world." "Then why did ah come here?! Ah don't remember how ah got here." "Regardless...what do you plan to do once you find this killer that you seek?" "Ah...ah don't...ah don't know." "Really?" Nikolaides gently shuffled closer towards the younger Roy, seeing the raptor start to panic and break out with spasming fingers as he struggled to get his words out. "A-a-a-a-ah wanna take him back, bring him back home so ah can sentence him." "And if he will not go without a fight?" "......ah have to kill him." "But you are afraid?" "Because ah never killed anyone! Ah never killed anybody before a-a-ah don' wanna do it! A-ahm scared!" "Why?" "B-b-because...because if ah kill, wh-whut makes me different from him?! Nobody should kill, murder's a goddamn crime n-no matter WHUT your excuse is, there is NOTHING, absolutely nothing that justifies it, EVER!" "Hhhhmhmhmhmhmhm...hhhhahahahahaha-" "WH-WHUT?! WHUT'S SO FUNNY!?" "You...hhhha ha ha ha, by the gods...I have never seen a boy so precious as you." "H-huh?!" "You are so insistent, so stubborn you are that you never managed to learn the killing blow in all of our practices together. In all the three years that you studied under me, you can never seem to bring yourself to kill." "...ah don't wanna kill. Ah just wanna protect. Ah just wanna stop this killer from hurtin' anybody else." "And that is good. That is a wonderful motivation, I want to say I am proud of you but...I know that it was not me who taught you that." "Ah learnt that from mah family. Thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not steal, honour thy mother and father-" "Ahhhh yes, the Ten Commandments." "Well, not all of them. Mah dad wuzn't too strict, he said ah didn't have to follow thuh ones about God an' not bein' with other gods, that stuff he said wuz all outdated lahk 'do not worry about what God thinks. What matters the most is you are a good person, because in the end God is only but the one who watches us. He is not as important as your own moral fibre' he told me. That so long as you do not hurt other people, or steal, or commit crimes that worsen others...you have lived a good life." "If that is the case, why are you so hesitant to kill the one who dishonoured your family?" "...b-because..." His younger self slumped his shoulders as his eyes went upon the verge of tears. "Ahm scared of turnin' into someone lahk him. If ah don't brin' him to justice, ah dishonour mah family's name...but if ah do...ahm just a killer. J-just another stupid killer." "My boy...do not fret." His master slowly wrapped an arm around him with a tender kiss upon his cheek. "You are a good child...the fact you are hesitant even now shows that you will not falter from this path. You will know the right thing to do." "AuSLiEfeRN!" _ The raptor turned with sudden panic, grasping his blade tightly as the voice of a shadow screeched down at him from the entrance to the cave. He rushed without warning as the monster dove in with claws of wicked steel shining from its dark tendrils as Roy swung his vicious Great Knife, carving ruthlessly through the spectral beast as it shrieked with violent agony. Tearing apart with a cloud of smoke, he shuddered with hot gasps as he struggled not to breathe in the acrid fog before bursting his way out from the concete structure before heading into the next.

He heard the place now on alert, voices resonating across the buildings as he headed into another to hide. The room of the third building was like the interior set of a medieval house with a long rectangular table lined up with seats all along both sides of it complete with a throne resplendently granite and firm at the very end of it. Swords and shields stood prominent on the walls along with a beautifully ornate tapestry woven in fine black, green, white and red behind the throne seat. He was able to make his way around the table to see the tapestry move, bringing back a memory to him as the human on his throne sat patiently in full regalia of a furred cloak with two guards on either side of him. Roy himself was on the fabric too, a finely-patterned black beast whose voice became clear as day. "Dontcha see that your own ways of subjugation an' violence to thuh assemblage are exactly like his to his own kind? How can you see thuh huge stick in HIS eye, but you can't even see that tiny little splinter in your own?!" "And just what do you mean by that, marsh-dweller?" "Whut ah mean is that both of you are blinded by your own biases. A governor should never use their own bias against thuh people, anyone out there who can walk an' talk an' think deserves a right to live." "And yet they do walk and talk and think, what is your complaint?!" "Mah complaint is that your treatin' them like slaves! Forcin' them to live in cramped quarters, gettin' paid way less than a nord or a breton or redguard, even though they're just as good at workin' than any of you! Give them a hammer, we'll put in your nails! Give them thuh bar, we'll serve you drinks! Give them a sword, we'll fight to protect thuh city! All these people want is fair pay an' for people to look at them like PEOPLE, not subhumans that get treated worse than livestock!" "...I do not understand." "Whut?" The lord stood in brief respite as he stepped down from his throne towards Roy. "You claim that your people wish to be the same as us. To be paid the same tithe, to be in the same places, to walk amongst us freely and take part in our debates, correct?" "Exactly." "You truly wish to be so unkind to your race as to burden them with this?" "...wait, whut?" "Do you not understand why I do this, marsh-dweller? The nords, the people of this land, who were born and raised here since the very birth of this place. We know our own rules, our laws, our practices far better than any of your kind ever could. Why, were we to induct you all into our forums, it would be naught but chaos!" "W-whut?! Why you say that?!" "I am talking about our burden, as people of this land. The burden of making this land work, all these laws that our ancestors have placed down upon scroll and stone for centuries...why, that would be far too much a burden for an argonian. Laws they do not understand, an entire history they will become lost in, they would be revealed as fools to the entire court of their betters! Would it not be better for all of us, and them, to do what your people know best? To labour and toil and earn your pay fairly, rather than become overwhelmed by what we have to deal with every single day?" Roy felt his outrage echoing from his past seeing his threadwoven reflection step back in fury containing itself. "...ah don't fuckin' believe you." "What?!" He stepped forwards as the guards braced themselves. "Who...thuh FUCK do you think you are, callin' your basic rights a BURDEN?!?! Sumthin' that EVERYBODY has thuh right to?! Whut kind of asshole are you, draggin' around that ego like you know about us any better, you're a goddamn DISGRACE!" "HOLD your tongue lizard!" "NO, AH WILL NOT HOLD MAH TONGUE! You insult me, you insult every argonian an' you insult every single sentient being in Skyrim with whut you JUST SAID! This court is a damn mockery, YOU'RE a mockery an' so is your fuckin' excuse of thuh law, you think we're all stupid?! You think we can't understand your backwards-ass nordic bullshit about guys with dragon heads spittin' out their backs, DO YOU KNOW WHUT AH WUZ BROUGHT UP WITH?!" "ENOUGH, LIZARD YOU WILL LEAVE THIS COURT NOW OR SUFFER THE CONSEQUENCES!" "AH WUZ RAISED ON FABLES ABOUT GOD MAKIN' THUH WORLD IN SIX DAYS BEFORE HE FUCKIN' FLOODED IT! AH WUZ TOLD ALL ABOUT THUH SON OF THUH SAME GOD GETTIN' NAILED TO A DAMN STICK, BEFORE HE COMES BACK AN' RIDES ON SCORPIONS ACROSS A SEA OF FIRE, YOU THINK AH CAN'T UNDERSTAND YOUR BULLSHIT?! TRY ME, FUCKIN' TRY ME JARL, I WILL MAKE YOU SEE WHUT A FUCKING 'MARSH-DWELLER' IS CAPABLE OF!" "sTeRbEn TIER!" Another shadow came through whilst he was distracted by the tapestry's rage, rancorous in its voice behind him with a sword in its possession. A long withering blade that dripped thick like blood, yet poured like smoke along the blade's thinning tip. "SiE WeRdEn uNs NicHT eNtZiEheN!" Roy was outmatched in terms of speed, frantically blocking the wispy blade with his own Great Knife, almost ducking down behind it before shoving the hilt forwards to slampunch the beast in its chest. Staggering backwards slightly, it kept guard with sword raised aloft to block Roy's striking sweep as he desperately carved his blade upwards almost leaving himself wide open for a lunging strike. The raptor forcefully leapt to one side amidst the momentum of his swing and backfisted hard across the demon's face with his left hand stunning it briefly. The dark shadow seethed with fury until Roy brought down his blade in a swinging cleave that tore through the monstrous head, brutally carving it into a bloodless smog that faded with its scream. It suddenly lunged into his throat as he felt a burning coughing from his lungs, gasping as his right arm began to burn with a horrifying deep sensation that almost tore through to his very bone. "H-HHHHH! NNNNNGUUUUUH! G-g-god...f-f-ffffffuck...n-no...d-d-don't make this...h-happen again-" "Roy?" He turned to see the row of seats around the table slightly move one of its chairs to reveal a trap door, slowly opening in the corner beneath as a young human face popped out. A woman in her 40s of dusted olive skin and worn brown eyes that he gasped upon recognising, her short brown hair matted with filth and practically falling in strands from deprivation. "Whu-...is...issat you A-alma? Wh-whut is happening?" "Quickly, we have no time, get inside here with me." Roy never questioned her before and so he would not question her now, swiftly coming down into a dark-looking tunnel beneath the building. The sounds of the world became briefly silent, seeing only the middle-aged woman's ragged skirt and bruised legs in front of him who spoke with a thick Latvian accent as she crawled forwards through the thickening soot and dirt. "This way...Heinrich is waiting for you." "He...h-h-he is?! He also here too?!" "He has always been here...you could not have forgotten us surely." "Part of me wishes that ah could. But that would only dishonour you." "I know...I already thought the same thing too, now stick close to me. We shall escape this place." "Ah already escaped it before." "You are in a different world now Roy. You have to put all things behind you and push onwards, remember the drive you had when you came through this place before." "This isn't thuh same Alma. Ah wanted to survive so ah could see Lizbeth again...that wuz mah only reason, ah just wanted to give up thuh whole journey an' find sumplace to be, somewhere ah could live. But now she's...gone." "And what's changed truly? Do you think that I gave up, considering everything that I lost? I could never bring myself to." "Why? You...nnnngh...you lost more than ah did, ah never woulda judged you." "Because I could not...dishonour my family, or my friends. If I let my own grief and sorrow take me, I would only disgrace their memory. All of them...they made certain that I would live to see the end in some way, how could you even think to bring yourself to that?" "A-a-ah don't...ah don't know...ahm sorry." "Don't apologise to me," said the woman, "I am not the one who should hear it." "Everybody ah should have apologised to is already dead. Who do ah have left?" "Friends. And a future that you can welcome to your heart." "Whut...wh-wh-whut f-future is there left for me?" "The same future you gave me...all of us. Do you think any of us gave up after you freed us from Skulte-Marupe?" "Ah dunno...that's your decision, ah won't judge you for it." "Then it is my decision to live. It will not be my decision to die or anyone else's decision. I remember what you told them, those...I would never call them people but, no matter how hard they tried to break you...I remember what you said to them." "I...a-a-ah know. I just couldn't bring mahself to that...level, th-tha-tha-that's not...who I am." "We're almost out, be careful." Slowly Alma crawled her way out of the tunnel exit, far away from the row of buildings that amassed to a small village back behind them as Roy stood up onto solid ground once again. The woman in ragged shirt which appeared half-torn as if on purpose smiled up at him, next towards another creature that soon approached. One that even to this day stultified the raptor with a look of shame and disgust. "...Heinrich?" "We meet again, my friend and dear traitor." He said this with a warm heart bowing his head before him. A tall brown stately thoroughbred horse with a body wrapped in cruel iron parts that were welded to his skin. Dark burns could be seen around the points where steel and flesh would meet, his four legs reinforced to glistening metallic struts with a head composed of reinforced steel showing nothing but his cold eyes of hazel. "Are you ready for your final moment of this journey?" "Wh-huh? Where are we going?" "Forwards my friend. We have a train to catch." Even beneath the cold iron mask Roy sensed a sadistic grin. The raptor struggled to blink in the midst of ashen skies. "A-are you...serious? We're off to do that again?" "You were searching for a star, were you not?" "Yeah...yeah ah wuz." "You mean that one? Or rather those two?" The horse turned his body towards the horizon where he saw indeed a giant pair of two twinkling stars much closer than they were before. There was a great fog coveting the great expansive world of the open barren plains beyond what appeared to be a broken bridge. "Oh god," murmured Roy, "is...i-i-is that the...Daugava river?" "What else would it be?" replied the horse. "We are ready to depart, you know I was not one to wait when the time is right." "Is it really that close? Are we almost done?" "It appears to be. You have one last step to take, and I shall be the one to do it for you, as a friend and companion...as well as fellow terrorist." "Hhhah...hhhahah, a-ah dunno if that's really flattering." "I would take it." The woman said this with a gentle smile of severe patience, tightly knit as if struggling to contain her emotions which Roy could see clearly. "You must continue on and follow your instincts." "Whut's that ever gotten me?" said Roy deflated in a humble stance. "At this point ah dunno if mah instincts want me to kill or not kill. Ah just want all this to be over, ah don't even know how long ah been sleepin'." "The sooner you finish this, the sooner you will wake up and find out the truth you needed." "How will ah know that?!" "You don't. But that never stopped you before to seek out the truth. Believe in yourself, just as you did when we first met. You never gave in, despite everything they did to try and turn you into a monster. You could have done it so easily. The ones who set you on this path originally tried to make you a weapon of destruction. The ones who imprisoned both me and you tried also to do the same. And yet neither of them could...because you refused." "Ah could never...a-a-ah couldn't...that's not...who I am." "I know." She reached for his right hand which still remained a wooden relic of itself, but she reached further up past his wrist as he clasped onto her arm in turn. They both felt a deep burn coursing through their fingers as they gasped tears from their cheeks, simultaneously as their grip became tighter. Roy was stifling in sweet agony silently screaming, as if she were crushing his hand in a vice of superheated steel that he almost felt his bones start to char. "NNNNGH...g-g-g-god..." "Is this pain worse, or better than what you felt when Lizbeth passed away?" "I-...a-a-a-ah dunno...A-AAAAGH...A-alma p-please!" "After everything that has happened...do you truly think that there was only one way out, after we had escaped?" "S-STOP...s-stop it...s-s-stop please, i-i-it hurts!" "I know it does. But you never gave in. Remember that. Don't give up. Please." The woman released his arm as he grabbed it tightly to his body, whimpering hotly as he felt a sizzling scald on his black-scaled skin before he walked over towards Heinrich who simply grinned. "When you are ready, just simply mount." "Whut about Alma?!" "She will be fine, do not worry. You know she has survived with everybody else you have freed." "...you're...you're right. Um...l-listen, thanks for everything miss Dzenis. Ah know ah already said this to you but ah just wanted you to-" "I know. I am forever in your debt." She bowed before coming close towards Roy with a gentle hug, struggling to reach his height by standing on the tips of her bare feet. "My hero."

His heart felt more at pain than it did before, but it was a good pain. Warm and sweltering not like the cold and quivering stiflement of his depression, his sorrow and grief from before which still remained somehow within. He held her with great arms of thick scale in return before they parted, miss Alma Dzenis smiling happily at him from beneath her haunted sunken look. "I know you will find the truth. I believe in you. I believe. If you cannot believe in yourself...then let me or someone else believe in you." "Th-thank you...thank...th-th-thank you." He struggled to say this in an almost mumbling state, as he cautiously hopped onto the horse's back, seeing the label of Eisen-Hengst upon the side of his flank as the beast braced himself. He took off without any warning as he rode on towards the lonesome bridge, a crumbling state of twisted lumpen steel as Roy noticed also next to it the crushed and spiralling remains of a huge train. Iron and thick, imposingly black and desperately hanging over the edge of the bridge's gap with the sounds of creaking desperation to not fall completely into the abyss. Hooves pounded the soil beneath him, pummelling the ancient earth to dust that sweeped behind them as the iron horse galloped forth to the crumbling bridge. The sound of the train's struggle to hold brought back memories shuddering through Roy's body as he gripped on fiercely to the steel bar welded to the back of Heinrich's neck. It took them no time to reach the bridge, but it had been almost entirely blocked by the lengthly steel carriages as the horse switched tracks to jump into the train itself. Cargo rooms lived-in, piles of lumpen ore to scatter and dash between the powerful hooves as they burst through door after door, barrelling with strenuous force as the train shuddered and slid deeper into the ravine causing the entire carriage to uptilt. Roy stifled the panic in his heart at a sudden lump in his throat, but the Eisen-Hengst simply barged through the rooms without a care until managing to reach halfway through the carriages. The other half was now weakly hanging off the bridge straight above the dark abyss, like the sword of Damocles. The raptor could now see the other end of the bridge straight across from the back-end of the carriages that still sat on the tracks, the open door in front of them almost inviting them to run and leap. Which was precisely what Heinrich was about to do. "HOLD ON!" "WH-WHY ARE WE EVEN-" "JUST TRUST ME! LIKE I TRUSTED YOU, REMEMBER ROY?!" "UM...O-OKAY! AH TRUST YOU!" "ONWARDS TO VICTORY!" Time briefly stopped. The sound of all four hooves cracking down upon the very edge of the carriage exit as the train suddenly lunged deeper towards about two seconds after they had leaped. Roy did everything he could to not look down as the wide open rift swallowed the wreckage of the train, grinding steel screaming off into the infinite darkness as he felt a sudden urge from memory of instinct. " WUUUULD!" A sonic boom that near rent the very seams of the sky apart as both Roy and his iron steed bursted forth with a shrieking comet force before they landed finally. His stomach thrust up into his throat at the sound of steel crunching upon the dirt, splintering the thick stone gravel into dust as Heinrich stood fiercely upon the other side of the bridge. The train was now gone forever down into the abyss of what was once the Daugava River as the horse cackled with a bristling pride beneath his mask. "Hhahahahahahaa, a shame what we did in real life was nowhere near as grandiose!" "Hhhah...yeah...y-yeah it...damn shame." "I would have enjoyed the train ride." "Ah wuzn't exactly enjoyin' ridin' on top of an escapin' cargo train, you know how hard it is to use a gun when one of your hands is made out of wood?" "I do not have hands, I would not know you simpleton." "Simpleton, YOU'RE thuh one who can't count up past fifty!" "Well I was never taught economics by my commandant so you cannot blame me!" "Hhhhmmmmm...alrigh', ah guess ahll let you off on that one. So...uhhh, where we at?" "You are almost there now Roy. Look." Heinrich indicated his head towards the shining stars hanging right above Roy's head. The fog that surrounded the opposite side of the long river's chasm began clearing finally. What soon revealed itself however was not at all what the raptor expected. Two towering skyscrapers, borne of steel and glass almost perfectly oblong reaching straight up towards the heavens at a height of 1370 feet. Standing almost perpendicular of each other at a slight diagonal, they trotted forth towards the very base of the towers which stood upon an empty wasteland. Beyond this was nothing else, no city, no death. No memories and no existence of Roy's mind went on from this point except an ancient vast plain of forgotten rock and dried earth. Between the skyscrapers stood a golden beautiful statue of a blind reptilian creature with curled horns who was only the height of a child despite standing greatly above Roy upon a pedestal even when he was on horseback. The statue held a sword in one gentle clawed hand whilst the other held a balancing scale high aloft. He understood what this statue was despite the creature looking familiar. Both of the skyscrapers had two grand doors each awaiting their last newcomer to be approached as the raptor softly leapt off from the Eisen-Hengst's back. "Whut is this?" "I am not certain." "These...ah don't recognise whut these buildings are." "Are you supposed to?" A child's voice came from the statue between the buildings as it turned its head. "Not everything relates to you exactly." "Whu-...w-w-wait...Sha? I-issat you?" "Mmhmm. You are now at the end of your long journey mister Roy." She smiled kindly beneath her blindfold. "I am very honoured you hold me with such high regard, even though I'm but a dirty killer according to you." "It's...hard not to think on your advice sumtahms." "You call it advice, not opinion anymore?" "Ah learned a lotta things. An' ah've...come to realise that...you had a point about law not bein'...synonymous with thuh right of way an' justice." "Better than when we last spoke, hmhmhm! What a strange and long journey you must have taken." "You don' know thuh half of it...Sha-Zer-Ah." He looked back towards the river, finding it had now simply disappeared from existence along with Skulte-Marupe to become once again the endless wastes. It was a pale sky of morning due with the colours of powdered blue mixing with the bleakest maroon that slowly merged with the horizon, forming a sickly deadened brown. "Was there ever a world better than Skyrim?" asked Sha-Zer-Ah. "Definitely." "But you saw places that had the same problems as us." "...somewhut." "And some places even worse," said Heinrich. "Consider this. You know the laws that exist in my world, would you consider them right?" "Never," said Roy unflinching. "Absolutely not." "But they are the law, are they not? That means what you saw and became part of were legal, and by all means right." "Nothing would ever make that right, don't you fucking call it right." "And that makes this law unjust," said Sha-Zer-Ah. "Stop it. L-look, both of you, ah know whut yer sayin'. Ah always believed that thuh law wuz made with good intentions, an' ah still believe that. Ah still believe that in sum places, laws were made originally to protect thuh people, not to serve their enforcers." "And you yourself have become so fallen from grace. You struggled to stand as a hero, a knight of valour and a just police officer. You always desired to be a protector." "Ah still am. Ah never wanted to give up that dream, to protect an' serve." "But now you are many things. In my world you are a traitor, a cruel blasphemer." "Whereas in mine," said Heinrich, "you are a terrorist." "In so many different places you have become a small hero in some scale to many different groups of people. You are a noble transient in my world." "You are a hero to the impoverished in mine." "And in Ivalice whilst you are a fraud, you saved an innocent man's life and punished thusly those who are guilty. What do you think law is now to you?" The raptor thought about this, taking a few moments of silence to consider this as there stood not a single breath of wind in the air. He found this to be an uneasy feeling, as if the world was waiting with bated breath for his response struggling to form his words into something concise. He did his best to swallow the grief like he had done many times before that it was starting to be second nature. Not such a good thing as he was hoping it would be. "I realise that...Law is a guideline for one's society that you measure yourself to, but there are sum times when thuh law can't help you. And it's only then that you must rely on yourself an' those who are around you to do whut is right. People don't choose not to commit murder or thievery because thuh law tells them to, but because their own personal beliefs tell them not to. Law is a reflection of society, good laws that are just an' supportive of all people equally, show a good society. Laws that are biased towards certain people, or not measured out equally, show a broken society "In the end, when that society breaks, people must stand on their own two feet an' find ways to show the deeper issues, break free of those chains that their broken society made an' hopefully start rebuilding a new society, one better that treats people rightly." "Do you believe that such a thing can happen?" asked Sha-Zer-Ah. "Of course it can. Ah've seen it happen, ah've seen places where it worked, ah've seen places where thuh law worked. But only because people struggled to break free from a tyranny that broke through, maybe that's not thuh law that wuz originally set but people change, societies change, worlds change because...in the end...I always believed that good would defeat evil." "Then why did you look down upon those such as me?" "...because...I wuz foolish. I wuz naive, I just never really...understood thuh need for such strife because I always saw thuh world as good versus evil. I grew up seein' officers bein' heroes, fightin' to protect people, in mah world at least thuh little world of mah city, I saw people representin' thuh law who did their best to protect an' serve thuh people." "And did never you hear of corruption or abuse?" "Course I did. But those are tiny specks, I never saw an entire system break down an' subjugate people, abusin' us as sum kinda subcaste, I heard about bits an' pieces in London or Chicago or thuh Ukraine but I never knew thuh whole story. I never saw an entire world turn on an entire group of people...until I met you. It never...hit me whut could happen when Law breaks down an' serves only a higher elite." "And now you understand...why I do what I do. The Truth is always darker than you'd want...that is why I see best when in the dark." "...n-nuthin' should justify murder." "Yet you have killed many times." "I hated it. I hated this." He pressed his head into his hands struggling to keep his breath as his voice started to burn shivers in his throat. "I never wanted to be this...they t-turn me into a soldier, to hunt down thuh one they told me killed mah parents...but in truth...I wuz always afraid of thuh day I would finally meet him. Because I knew...I'm not a killer. I'm not him. Whut if I froze? Whut if...whut if I stare into those cold evil eyes and just freeze...because I'm not a killer?" "You are beyond that point now, Roy." "I know. And I hate that I am. I miss me. I miss the young me when I wuz scared before I took mah first life. Even when it wuz self-defence, even after all that Master Nik told me, I-i-i still feel...I have so much blood on mah hands, I don't feel like...a good person. I just wanted to be a hero." "Aren't you?" The steel horse turned towards him with strange eyes devoid of emotion, reflecting Roy's own which began to crease with thick tears fattening down his cheeks. "You have succeeded plenty times as a hero in other places." "I know...but not to thuh ones that matter most to me. I'd never become a hero...to my family. I-i-i wanted to make them proud." "They were always proud of you, your memories said so." "I-i-i just...want to honour their memory...an' find this fuckin' killer...I need to find out." "Then I offer you two choices," said Sha-Zer-Ah, "there are two towers here, one of which you shall find your destiny within. But you must answer a simple question." "Whut is it?" "What, in the end, do you now desire the most? Do you desire Justice...or do you desire the Truth?" "...whut?" "Do you understand?" "Not really." "Then allow me to summon some delegates to help you think somewhat more clearly." The little argonian upon the pedestal whistled sweetly as a small breeze formed across the wastes, sending a rippling sensation upon the dirt which swept upwards into a thickening cloud of ashen dust. Roy turned his head struggling to not choke with a thick coughing noise from his throat suppressed as he heard the two doors opening from the towers that revealed two huge shadowy monsters. One of them was a mountain of 8 feet and heavily built, whilst the other was slightly shorter at 7'3'' with grand mighty wings spanning a foot each behind its back. "Wait...w-w-wait wait...whut are you two-wh-wh-ah don't understand thuh question, an'...why are THESE two here?!" "To represent," said the winged beast of deep unfiltered eloquence, "two facets that are important to you, one of which you must sacrifice in order to favour the other." "Two facets," said the mountain of cragged rough voice, "that you have been struggling to keep, only to find that you cannot obtain both of them. Do you understand yet Roy?" "...Dh-Dhar Khern? Garr?!"

Appearing from the left tower's entrance was a krogan with dark emerald-crested forehead and a deep scar on the left of his chin with caustic burns wrapping across his limbs and exposed flesh. The other was being guarded by a stately-looking gargoyle with crusty amber skin and a griffon's beak, wearing blue prayer beads and a red vest with his arms and thighs wrapped finely in thick bandages. Huge demonic red horns sprouted behind his head the same colour as his clawed feet and nails, with eyes of ruby with blue falcon-like streaks beneath his pupils. Roy had a sudden urge to bow before them but the presence of the argonian child somewhat made him uneasy to know what to even do. Dhar Khern stepped forth, the krogan whose tired eyes blinked with exhaustion towards Roy as he spoke. "Do you remember what I told you? That obsessions can control you?" "A-ah know...but ah...whut's an obsession when you got nuthin' left?" "A death wish. You have a good heart, you know deepest of all that truth is the one thing you have always desired. Even at its most inconvenient." "Ah wish ah knew that for real." "You do. If you did not care about truth, you would have ended James' life when he was resting on my ship. My race does not show that sort of mercy, and in olden days I would not have cared about truths so long as my personal justice was fulfilled. But I do not need to fulfil that life anymore, and neither should you." "It wouldn't have been justice if ah killed him then. Even if it turns out he wuz, ah couldn't take an unarmed person's life. That's not me." "I know." Garr spoke next, approaching from the second tower's door with strapping wings and thick heaving muscles that went rippling up his arms. "You understood things such as I in our short time together." "It wuz an odd tahm for both of us," replied Roy. "You know...ah always did wonder if you ever found that kid." "I spoke to you regarding what my life purpose had been. To become a guardian in the name of God herself, to slay all of dragonkin from my world because she demanded such." "Which...kinda sounds lahk you no different from a terrorist." "I had many years to think over my actions. I was born into existence by God, therefore I am devoted to her by every need absolutely. She told me that the Brood were rancorous, monstrous and had the power to end existence were they allowed to live unchallenged." "But you had no proof!" "Neither did you concerning James." The black raptor felt a twinge of guilt in his heart as the guardian continued speaking. "We spoke concerning our objectives, to clear each other's heads and despite my own having already at least formed some answers and a singular course to take in life, I sensed you had not come to the same conclusion." "That thuh one ah wuz told wuz mah enemy, may not actually be thuh one?" "That is correct. Whether it was my God or your pseudo-military superior, we cannot take a singular authority to be absolute truth, especially when we had found examples to the contrary. I was told that the Brood were selfish and cared for nothing except to be the most powerful...yet I had found a single boy that defied everything my God had taught me. You were told that this James was a murderous fiend and yet...what evidence did you find of that?" "Nuthin'...least not that ah learned anyways. Mah only theory, thuh one that makes sense, is kinda fractured cuz ah know he ain't lahk that. But on thuh other hand, everything else fits." "A child stands over his friend's body with a bloodied knife. The first thing you assume is that he killed his friend. But what if he had just found him, what if he had just picked up the knife in curious shock? What if that is not even the same knife, but a completely different one from a separate incident? Circumstance is irrelevant, it is simply the judgement that mattered once to us." "Whut are you saying?" "You have two choices. Either you pursue the truth, or seek justice." "That...th-th-that's just thuh same thing." "Is it? Is it justice that I eradicate every single one of the Brood when I have not seen a shred of evidence for the crimes against them?" "N-no!" "Yes. It is, because my God has deemed it just. But it is not the truth, now is it?" "Not like what you know," said the krogan calmly, "you need to believe in what YOU have seen, from your own eyes and your own experiences, everything you have collected from since you have come to this. If you want your answers, you want your truth...go through into Tower 1." "If you desire justice," said Garr firmly, "to quell the need for retribution, to sate your masters and to restore a sense of peace and order towards your wasted life...you may enter Tower 2." Roy looked between the two choices as both Garr and Khern stood waiting beside their doors. The argonian stood waiting upon the pedestal with sword and scales smiling upon him, her blindfold keeping still yet Roy could feel her eyes underneath tracking his movements. Heinrich stood waiting, his part said and done as Sha-Zer-Ah stated thus. "Would you like some help?" "Please," asked Roy beseeching. "Why did you come here?" "...because ah wanted to die." "And when you found that you had been tricked, why did you stay?" "Because...b-because James put all this effort into helping me...ah felt it would dishonour him, after all that he's done, plus he...said that if this all never worked he...he would do to me whut ah wanted." "And so you come here to seek truth?" "Yes...frankly." "Then what of justice?" "James said thuh killer is dead." "According to him." "He would have no reason to lie, if he knew anythin' then-" "He could have every reason. But it is up to you. What do you need more than anything at this point in your life, Roy? What do you need to help you live a life better for yourself? What do you need...to find and become free from suffering? Justice...or the Truth?" A pensive several minutes stretched into eternity for him as he struggled between two choices. The raptor closed his eyes as he forced his emotions aside relying on pure simple logic. His heart however spoke, pleaded with him in its conflict, weighing upon the two as he sighed deeply in a sweltering frustration that almost hurt. He weighed out his options, thinking back over every single point of his life that mattered before this. Every word that he kept close, every thought and memory that he regarded with highest importance knowing that in the end, all he had to do was be himself. He struggled to keep this, but he wanted to at least stay true to himself. To honour his family. "I seek the Truth." The four all stared at him as Sha-Zer-Ah nodded. "Lift up your blade before me." He had almost forgotten that he was still carrying it, gently lifting it despite its leaden weight but once he had it aloft it slowly began to leave his grip. The child whispered with a flickering song across her lips, crying out to a rising howl that steeped the twin towers in a sudden fog that encroached upon them, buffeting Roy in a blasting burst of hot thick acrid smoke. Something shined throughout the dust storm, sweet and pure as he saw his Great Knife had now been replaced by something incredible. Something he had not seen in many years. "Is...i-i-is that...mah first?" "It is indeed." Hovering down towards the utahraptor was a solid nondescript zweihander blade of almost 6 feet, a thick steel weapon that went thinning towards the very tip before ending on a fine point. A longsword with traditional crosshilt, he grabbed it to find that it was much lighter than the Great Knife had been, almost to the point that he could simply carry it upon his shoulder with one hand like a normal bastard sword would be, despite its great length. "It...ah thought ah lost this back when ah first met Zhang Wu." "You did. Because you were not experienced as you were now, until that town of restless dreams offered you a substitute. A rusted yoke to bear your own curse with, but no longer shall you wield it. That blade does not suit you any longer." "Why?" "Because you chose truth. Is that correct, Roy?" "Yes. I want...I have to know thuh truth, I don' care whut it is. I need to know." "Then you care not for punishment or vindication. You care not for vengeance." "No. It's been much too long to regard that and...frankly ahm kinda scared about such things after talking with Garr cuz...after whut he told me ah realised...ah don't wanna be that sorta person like he wuz once." "That is good. Then you...may enter." She swept her sword towards Dhar Khern and the first tower as Roy carefully took a step forwards. He had no idea what to expect, he felt as if he were coming to the end truly by the sudden tension in the atmosphere. As if everything would just suddenly fade like the last moment before waking from a dream. Weightless. Tense from anxiety. His feet felt as if they would break just by moving too fast as the krogan nodded and swiftly opened the door before him. "Trust in yourself." The raptor looked pitifully towards him as if begging him to come with. "Nothing is always what it seems to be the first time you look. Remember how you found the truth in Ivalice...use that." The door closed shut behind him. Darkness almost took him as he found nothing but a lone singular staircase wrapping around the inside of the building. He was certain that the skyscraper was much more than this, but he found no other means to exit plus the door behind him was now replaced with a thick smooth concrete wall as he stood at the bottom of the staircase. He gently gripped the stair's bannister and took his first steps towards the roof of the building. Nothing but stairs in a constant spiral unending towards the grey foggy ceiling beyond his vision. Only the sound of his footsteps could be heard echoing towards the very top, a sense of coming dread thickening down into his stomach from his head. He wrapped his claws tightly upon the grip of his steel blade, the first weapon he ever wielded back long ago in his infancy. He saw that not a single speck of dust would even be able to touch upon it, a pure soulful blade that he knew had never taken a single life upon its sheen. He had no idea how far he had walked up as he allowed his feet to become automatic, stomping his way further onwards. Somewhere along the way, he saw another person stand before him. A smaller creature, one he knew to be female at the height of a child. A leather-armoured lapine creature with large rabbit ears, darkened pale fur and shining sword of mythril. The gentle bauble red upon her head by a string did nothing to diffuse her severe aura as Roy blinked at her. "...Navarro?" "This is your final test." She said this with her blade propped upon the staircase pointing down between her feet. "You have five questions you must answer truthfully, kupo." "F-five? I-i-i wuzn't expectin' anybody else here right at thuh end-" "If you are searching for Truth, you must answer these questions with absolute truth, no matter how selfish or demeaning it may sound to me. Then you must explain your answer concisely. Do you understand, kupo?" "...alrigh'. I've come this far, let's do this." "First question. Do you truly believe Sha-Zer-Ah was right, when you said you understood her?" "...no. Ah don't." Navarro crossed her arms waiting for his explanation as she emphatically stated: "More callous than I expected." "I-i-it wuzn't...I knew that her point, her argument wuz right. But I cannot agree with her as she is, as an assassin. I know I said to her that I understood her...and in truth a part of me does but I just...don't...understand her, or even agree fully with her. I cannot accept that." "Very well." The moogle stepped to one side as Roy climbed another seven flights. He soon met with a rather plaintive-looking creature around four-and-a-half feet with gentle bifocals on her snout. Solid white fur and long drooping ears, the pale robe of red edges masked the deeply burned tail behind her as she asked: "Here is question two. I hope you studied." "Whut can I even study by this point Dahlia?" "Hmhmhm...alright. Why were you much more angry about the Jarl of Windhelm than anyone else, more than the most foul of killers you ever faced?" "...because he made me realise that Law means nuthin' when a society's already gone bad." "But surely your world has demonstrated unfairness and inequality." "Not to thuh extent of him. He wuz a two-faced liar who contradicted himself in thuh same breath an' didn't even change thuh look on his face. He didn't care, all he wanted wuz to keep HIS people safe, not anyone else's. His selfishness sickened me." "I understand." The nu-mou stepped to one side, Roy climbed further onwards. He wasn't so surprised to see the kremling with brown scales and a solid green cloak, his left hand replaced by a hook with firm wires running across the length of his arm. "Question three. Yer already halfway there." "Is all of thuh clan here, whut is this?!" "You'll see. Did you ever honestly believe that Guston would honour his deal?" "No, never." "Khheh...quick to answer that one, and yet you still took the deal." "I knew he never planned to Kruz, or at least I never trusted him. I just wanted to escape, an' he gave me thuh right means to escape out of thuh fact that I lost my future. I wuz willin' to make a bargain with him, cuz I knew neither of us would uphold the end of that." "Understood. Head on up buddy." With the crocodilian bowing to one side, the utahraptor headed further up. Each set of stairs between clan members felt strangely shorter by the next encounter as he felt truly that he had only halfway up to go, seeing the fourth person appear before him. A copper-skinned reptile of long pointed snout wearing the soft blue regalia of a monastic order, his right foot clunking gently like solid wood onto the stairway as he asked: "You are performing a great undertaking, good sszhir." "Heh...ahm only sorry we never got to rap about sum theology, father Fayne." "You can alwaysszh return to me and we sszhall debate gladly. Now your fourth quesszhtion. What upsszhet you more? Your beloved dying...or the fact that you never found the true criminal?" "......never finding thuh criminal." "I sszhee." "...I sound horrible don't I?" "It mattersszh not anymore. What mattersszh now isszh for you to sszheek the Truth." "It's just that she...she wuz mah only shield to protect me from thuh fact I had nuthin' left. When she wuz gone...well, I knew there wuz nuthin' else." "And sszho you return to her, knowing sszhe had a sszhorter life sszhpan than you, sszhimply to protect you from the inevitable future." "Exactly. She didn't deserve me." "I will not make judgement. That isszh your own belief." Fayne simply nodded and stepped away, leaving Roy to climb up towards the final set of stairs. Standing upon the very top step next to the roof's exit door, was a bangaa just like Fayne except of a darker brown with less glossy skin. His body was armoured across his arms with pantaloons loosely fitting on his legs. "Lasszht quesszhtion pal." "Wow...you, really?" "Ssszhomeone'sszh got to asszhk the hardesszht quesszhtion." "Really? Those weren't as bad?" "Well...here it isszh. Can you sszhow me your number?" "Huh?" "Your number. You know what number I mean." "Whut...wh-whut...whut thuh hell are you talkin-......no. H-h-how...you can't be serious Baldwin. You cannot jus-" "Sszhow me." Roy struggled to even speak, panicking slightly as he crossed his arms fiercely. The bangaa stared with a look of utmost severity. "C-c-can't ah just...tell you?" "I have to sszhee. I'm sszhorry. The door won't open unlesszh I know the number for real." "...god. Dammit fine." The raptor slowly extended his right arm towards Baldwin. It was difficult to see due to the dark scaled skin but he saw it clear enough once his eyes focused upon six grey numbers tattooed with permanent ink into the flesh. 643890. "Thank you," said Baldwin calmly. "For whut?" "For managing to get thisszh far. You had chansszhesszh to sszhtop doing thisszh. And you almosszht took it yoursszhelf before coming here, but the fact that we've come to thisszh...that provesszh you are determined enough to finisszh thisszh. Beyond thisszh door liesszh the Truth...I will only tell you one thing to prepare yoursszhelf for it." "Whussat?" "...remember what you told me. Everything you remember, even the tiniesszht detail...will mean everything to you." "Whut I...told you?" The bangaa monk stepped to one side cautiously opening the door with his welted fist, thick calluses covering the flesh over his knuckles as Roy saw the outside world once again. The long pale sky of the wasteland welcomed him as he stepped out onto the roof. It was sunset, the sky a deep blood orange in every direction yet he never saw the sun in this place. A wide empty roof with blacktop concrete floor, the only things that appeared to be significant were the door behind him, the great antenna tower of red and white that stood peerless above him, and the second tower across the way which had no antenna tower of its own.

The door closed shut behind him with no handle on his side to bring him back in, as he stood watching for where his truth would be. It was cold, the air turning much more harsh out on the skyscraper's roof as he felt a sudden sense of vertigo coming over him. Nothing beyond the horizon from every single direction as he flexed his fingers carefully. His right hand felt stiff, and strangely cold before looking down upon it and seeing an old familiar friend that he wished he could simply smile at. The lone steel fist of cyborg engineering. He was only happy that he would never have to see his tattoo again, buried underneath. "Congratulations." He heard a voice that was far too familiar to him from the antenna tower. "Took you this fucking long, shitscale." "......who...i-i-is that-" "What's the matter? Don't you recognise me?" A brown-cloaked creature with a hood over its head leaned up against the base of the antenna, but the moment it started walking towards Roy he heard the thick clumping sound of big brown boots. "You really should after all the times you reminisced about us...all the small detail you keep thinking over constantly...never managing to get away from me. And yet never...could you catch me." "...that...th-th-that's not...that's not you is it?" "You tell me." The killer stood close enough to reveal part of his face. A brown snout with purple markings smiling with a fiendish grin as Roy backed off gently from the shock that was building in him. It was definitely the same voice as the only other raptor that he knew. "No...n-n-n-no, it...this can't-" "It can't what?" said the killer. "Be possible? You're the one that made up the best theory, who else COULD it be?!" "Th-that doesn't...that's not...please...please let me be wrong FG." "Hhhhmhmhmhmhahahahahaha...ohhhhh...I knew it. I knew you were a fucking bitch." The heavy boots stomped forwards as the smiling snout beneath the hooded brown cloak simply cackled, the cold breeze whispering across the hem of his raincoat. "You didn't even have the balls to kill me right when I was at my weakest. You had me so many times and yet every single time you let me run. I almost feel sorry for you." "Stop it. S-s-stop, this isn't, this is NOT-" "Real?! Of course it's not, but it's still what you remember. See this?" The brown raptor pointed at his marks. "You remember these don't you? THAT'S how you know it was all me. Who else did you think it was going to be Roy? Why did you ever pretend, in some fake point of justice and honour that it was anyone else BUT me? You weren't trying to be just...you just couldn't bring yourself to kill me because you're a fucking coward." "SHUT UP! THIS ISN'T HAPPENIN', THIS IS NOT YOU FG! IT'S NOT YOU!" "WHAT THE HELL DO YOU KNOW ABOUT ME HUH!? I've already killed plenty others after your parents, much worse victims, do you THINK I give a fuck about honour at this point?!" "OF COURSE YOU DO! YOU WENT BACK TO YOUR HOME, YOU STOPPED THUH A.R.M.E, YOU WENT BACK TO KOOPIN AN' MARRIED HIM! IF YOU DIDN'T GIVE A DAMN ABOUT HONOUR WHY WOULD YOU EVER KEEP YOUR PROMISE TO HIM!?" "Because I got bored! What's better than a nice job, a nice house and a sexy little turtle I can fuck anytime I want?! It's everything that YOU don't have." "IF YOU'RE REALLY LIKE THIS, WHY DID YOU TAKE ME TO MIZZ RUBY HUH?! WHY!?" "Hm...yeaaaaah that's something interesting, why DID I do that Roy?" "H-huh?!" The killer grinned as he flashed a spark of black light from his hands suddenly twirling the ruthless-looking scissors in his fiendish claws. A weapon Roy had not seen in years but still glinting with foetid blood. "Why would I take you to a dark lonely place, isolated far away from everyone? I can't just kill you in the Mushroom Kingdom, there'd be questions. Koopin would question me, and I want to make sure he doesn't know. How much do you think he knows about me really? One more death isn't anything to me anymore." "THAT'S NOT TRUE!" "You think at this moment right now, I'm just hovering above your corpse, waiting for the right moment to just stab you right in the throat? You're completely conked out, lying on a stone cold slab in the middle of a swamp and I'm holding a dagger. How long do you think you've been dreaming Roy? Three hours? Four? Five minutes? I might wait another minute until you never wake up and then no one will ever know the truth. I'll be getting away with it forevermore." "BULLSHIT! YOU'RE NOT SMART ENOUGH FOR THAT!" "HAH! If I'm not so smart, how come it took you twenty FUCKING YEARS to figure it out HUH?! WHAT YOU SAY TO THAT?!" "BECAUSE IT'S NOT YOU! YOU AIN'T GONNA TRICK ME, AHM NOT GONNA DO THIS SHIT!" "Do what, FINALLY KILL ME?! ...you really are a fucking coward, aren't you? I know why you can't bring yourself to stop me. Because the moment I'm gone you have no reason to exist." "Whussat s'posed to mean!?" The creature in the brown cloak walked forwards smoothly without fear of retribution, the constant smile like shark's teeth underneath his dark snout. "I'm the only reason you're part of this. You have no adventures without me, you have no sense of purpose except to hunt me down, I GAVE you a reason." "F-FUCK YOU! NO, this is NOT IT, I had a life before this, I wuz ready to go to college, I wuz gonna-" "Shut the fuck up, shitscale. I don't care. Here I am, ready for you to kill finally, here I am to beat the fucking truth down inside your head and yet you STILL question it?! You had the right answer for years, it all makes sense doesn't it?! Two years I can't remember, right around the time your life went down the shitter, weird markings, brown cloak, and I'm pretty fond of stomping your fucking shit face pretty much everytime we fought, it's kind of my favourite thing!" "WHUT WUZ YOUR MOTIVE THEN HUH!? Cuz everytime I met you, you were so sure, you had no reason to fight me, you always backed away, you always tried to keep away an' never try to kill me!" "Maybe I never knew. Maybe I was all possessed by Scissoraptor but it's still my body. It was still my hand holding the knife that drove into your mom's fucking face and scooped her eye out like a meatball." Fury and shock burned deep within the black raptor as he stepped forwards with his longsword in firm grip, desperately trying to control everything that trembled inside of him. There was a fear certainly, but not of the actual killer. It was a fear of making a mistake, for he felt something wrong about all this. He tried to form his argument back. "You never knew how to get back. Scissoraptor never knew how to leave worlds either, cuz if he did, why would he hang around in sum places?" "I dunno, he's a fucking demon." "Well if Scisso wuz thuh one that did it, you told me he got exterminated...so if that's thuh case, I got no reason to hate you." Roy smiled, feeling his logic intact as the killer looked strangely offended by this. A sneer crept up as he felt the shifting tide in the atmosphere until slowly there came a grin of realisation as the murderer slowly began to walk a circle around MacGregor. "Did I SOUND like a demon to you? Remember what I told you?" "...yeah...I do." "So...that's kinda shot your little theory hasn't it?" "Naw it ain't. Scissoraptor can mimic voices...I remember him doin' that." "Why would I mimic a voice when I'm already being caught, exposed and outright murdering your family in front of you? Be fucking sensible for once in your life." "I AM bein' sensible. Sumthin's not right, an' whutever bullshit this is, you're not gonna trick me. I've come too far to let mahself be played lahk a bitch ever again." "And you still are. You always were Roy, everytime we met, I knew you would be so easy to play with. I could have killed you when we first met." "Why didn't you then?" "Because you were fun." "You saved mah life from bein' killed. Twice you shoved me outta thuh way from bein' run over, once in Silent Hill an' once again on thuh Citadel. Ah wuz ready to kill you righ' there, yet you shoved me away. If you really wanted to cover up all this, an' fuck knows why cuz you told me abou' sum shit you did, you done FAR worse-" "But I told you. No one else. So what's gonna happen...when I kill you?" There was a logic he saw in this. A cruel sadistic logic but one nevertheless in making him a taunted figure as he tried to rationalise this. "You musta told Kruz about sum of this." "He ever tell you anything?" "...no." "Then why do you think I told him? Maybe I only told you, because I was gonna deal with you." "An' whut if ah told people?" "You already accused me of killing your parents, which you got no proof of. Anything else you say would just like a smear campaign. Face it Roy." The simpering snout leaned forwards never showing his eyes beneath the hooded coat. "I'm the only suspect you ever had because it's me. And now...you're gonna meet your family, after so many years of walking." With sweeping scissors brandished as they shone in the sunset, the murderer bent his shoulders as if preparing to lunge at him. But the raptor in black remained hesitant, stern in his authority. "No. It's not you, you were never lahk this. This can't be thuh truth, ahm not gonna let you tell me whut to do, whut to think after all these years." "Then you'll be dead forever, after I've killed you here, you will never wake up." "I will defend mahself. I won't lay down an' die, but if you are hidin' thuh truth from me...I will drag it out of you." "You mean this?" The killer pulled out a small key attached to a chain, pure and golden that Roy instantly recognised as his original house key, right before the creature suddenly lifted it above his head and dropped it into his hood with a hefty gulp. A brief shot of the hood slipped back to show green eyes, yet Roy almost swore that he saw tears glistening upon James' scaled cheeks before the hood was pulled back over his head. "There's only one way you're gonna get this key...heheheh...so you're right, I am hiding the truth from you. All you have to do...is kill me finally. If you can kill me...you can dig that key right out of my stomach and see the truth inside your precious little home. But if I kill you...well...it's not like you wanted to live after this, right Roy?" "Who are you?" demanded Roy. "Who thuh fuck are you an' why are you pretendin' to be FG?" "Who says I was pretending? I'm the FinalGamer..." The scissors sweeped viciously across the sky which began to bleed thickening red above him. " Motherfucker." The killer charged grinning with madness as Roy dodged fast as he could, the whirling scythe-like blades of the scissors cutting past his cheek as he guarded himself. The cloaked fiend turned and thrust with stabbing force, opening his blades fast to violently cut a dozen times in front of Roy who blocked and pushed himself back as his zweihander caught itself in the scissors. But the brown raptor clamped hard upon the steel and suddenly pulled Roy harshly to the left forcing him to almost stumble, but he steadied his balance and tore free his sword out of the twin blades.

The murderer thrust forwards with violent plunge at arm's length, causing Roy to dodge with sweeping crouch as he swung his longsword like a baseball bat, cracking the thick rusted steel straight up into the air and forcing his enemy to be defenceless. But the killer simply cackled and rushed forwards with horrifying speed whilst his cloak whistled out behind him like a shrieking banshee of the night. With raw gusts of wind aiding his feet, he slammed with one fist straight out across MacGregor's jaw before his second came furiously underneath, striking with uppercut almost burning his flesh. He staggered falling back with a slight blurring of his vision, just enough to see his enemy grasp the scissors back into his hand after falling from the heavens, the sky turning a deep red as blood poured beneath the horizon. Endless crimson fear snaking like rivers across the valley of forgotten truths straight towards the twin towers, whilst the killer suddenly spunkick into the air swinging his scissors fiercely down into a diagonal strike upon Roy's head. He dodged to his right underneath, seeing the sweep of the blades aim to his left before he punched his left fist deep into the killer's solar plexus. Thrice he crunched his knuckles straight into the flesh, but he did not even make a sound, no pain, no gasp from his throat. Not even by a flinch before he countered back in turn with a walloping elbowstrike that shattered brutally into Roy's skull like a sledgehammer. He stifled the pain in his jaw harshly, doubling over before pushing himself away with a blasting gust that prevented the killer reaching him, taking his time to recover as he guarded waiting. The fiend slid his claws along the blades trickling with blood still, before hurling them like a giant knife as the black raptor guarded viciously against it. The clanging shriek echoed throughout his entire body shuddering from the forceful impact as he watched the scissors hurtling across his body and straight over towards the other end of the tower's roof. But that did not stop the killer from fighting back unarmed when he hammered his entire body straight into Roy's by a crushing shoulder charge attack. The raptor was forced straight down onto his back, just in time to see the killer's favourite tactic as a heavy boot stomped upon his face, crushing him powerfully as he screamed out from the weight of steel-capped feet. "REMEMBER THIS, FUCKBOY!? _" "_A-AAAAAAARGH!" Thrusting his longsword upwards hard towards the killer's thigh, he ripped through some of the coat and managed to expose the leg briefly as he forced the blunt edge of his steel against it, blocking the next boot to stomp awkwardly upon the gravel next to Roy's head. Clumsily trying to pull his foot back, the cloaked murderer tried to move away but the raptor dodgerolled hard to his right, taking his own sword with him and slicing powerfully across the cloaked leg. It sharply tore open some of the coat, but the wound to the killer's skin was simply superficial despite his gasping pain. "AAAAAGH! NNNNNGH! HHHAH! FINALLY, YOUR DADDY WOULD BE SO PROUD OF YOU ROY!" "SHUT UP! SH-SHUT, UP YOU FUCKIN' SNAKE! _" He managed to stagger up onto his feet, keeping his blade guarded but he did not take one step back. Instead Roy simply waited for the next move as he noticed the tear in the cloak showing a brown-scaled slightly scratched leg as the killer rushed forwards to grab his scissors. The raptor knew he had to stop him as he stood fiercely defiant, pounding his feet towards him with longsword fully out as if ready to decapitate the killer. But instead he had a different idea in mind as he twisted the handle of his blade so that the blunt edge was facing his enemy. The cracking slam clotheslining into the murderer's shoulders forced him to stagger, yet still he did not feel any pain from such a solid blow even after Roy grabbed him by the throat and lifted him single-handedly up into the air. The black raptor slammed him hard down upon the gravelled roof, but the brown-cloaked fiend retaliated by a sudden sparking blast of firey wind that gusted hot ash into his face. Roaring as his eyes watered with burning heat, he stumbled back wincing to cover himself with his hands as the murderer ran across the roof to swiftly re-equip his most lethal weapon. Wiping away the flickering sparks from his eyes, MacGregor stood waiting with guarded sword as his raptor opponent came charging with burning streaks across his blades. Fire scorched thickly from his hands grasping the steel rusted handles as he swung with violent passion, seventeen hits upon Roy who blocked at least fourteen of them amidst screeching sparks of glistening amber and horrid flaxen white. Every clashing set of blades from above or to his left, Roy guarded against twisting the direction of his sword that remained unyielding against the killer's frenzy. The other three hits that he didn't succeed in defending from went straight across his face, swiping fast with scarring shriek or even tearing across his arm to send a cauterised streak of darkened burns along his scaly flesh. The moment his opponent stopped briefly to recover his strength, the raptor retaliated with a powerful slamming thrust of his left fist straight into the dark-hooded face. The hood itself became free snapping back with his head violently from the punch that broke into his eyes, cracking sharp as he flinched to reveal James himself. But there was something wrong about him as he heard the voice of a female deep with resonating strength from long ago. _"Do you know how I met this stranger you are hunting?" "No...how?" "I found him...within the depths of Oblivion, within the very hells of this realm. A dark landscape brimming with fire and chaos wielded like water and peace in this world." "Wait...there's a hell in this place?" "Yes." "Whut were you...doin' there?" "Rebellion, turning against my masters, or so they would call themselves. Perhaps you have realised already that my existence is not purely mortal." "So...you're a...d-demon?" "Daedric in origin but if you wish to call me that, yes. He was searching for someone." "Who wuz he searchin' for?" "A maiden...a pure-hearted argonian who had been taken to be a sacrifice. Your prey confessed that he had barely ever met her, and that she was nothing more than an acquaintance who gave him a warm bed out of the cold dark night...yet he told me that if he had decided to run, and abandon her as was the first thing on his mind...he would never have forgiven himself. As terrible as the fate of your parents is, the fact remains unchanged that he saved a maiden from certain death. Not for money, not even for love. But to make amends." "But...but why?" "There was pain in his eyes. A pain untold yet I could see clearly. Grief was within, even if he himself did not acknowledge it. Guilt burned deep inside his heart." His eyes were full of fear itself. Green and bristling they showed no fury, no arrogance upon them despite the snarling bristling rage that came fully by its own volition. His eyes and teeth spoke different stories and emotions to him, as Roy felt a trembling memory come unto him. The last time that he ever saw James' eyes like this, was when he begged him to listen, pleaded to not kill him. It was the very same look he had given him back on the Citadel that forced him to cautiously reconsider everything he had thought. "YOU _FUCKING SHIT! _" James' scream forced itself from his throat before a violent headbutt came courtesy of the raptor, pounding his forehead against MacGregor with a solid crack as his eyes remained pulsing with horror. The black raptor stumbled back watching James flip over the hood back onto his head showing only the snout once more, his smile cold and thickening with a cruel gleam from his teeth. "What? There something on my face?!" "More than that." "Well why don't I fix YOUR face instead?! _HRAAAAAAA AAAAAARGH! _" The scream of pure fury echoed across the top of the two towers as without warning the cloaked killer brought his right arm up towards him, now converted to a shimmering green cannon that blasted with such a force that Roy was pummelled straight across the building roof. Slamming hard into the antenna tower, he felt the foundations of the red and white steel struts bend with tearing creaks underneath him as FG came thundering towards him. Roy swiftly clambered up onto the antenna, grasping with his steel hand whilst his other gripped tightly onto the longsword. James fired once again with brilliant plasma energy beaming out of his cannon and just missing Roy harshly, despite the tearing shriek of oscillating waves almost searing through his skin. But the raptor down below was much more reckless than expected, and simply pointed downwards at the tower struts snarling viciously before he blasted them all completely. Tearing hot molten beams in sudden shots charged up, the black utahraptor grasped on tightly waiting for the last moment before he could jump in order to surprise his opponent.

But the FinalGamer, or so the killer called himself, had another plan entirely as he leapt up and forced his entire weight upon Roy, trapping him harshly as the great antenna of the first tower began screeching off from its roots, unplugged and now tearing free to fall over. Down towards the abyss between the twin towers as the sudden weight of gravity reasserting itself forced them to stand opposite of each other. From both sides behind them individually, they saw glass and steel zipping past them, faster and faster they reached as the wind started shrieking past their skulls. They braced themselves into a duel, falling freely upon a bridge without any escape as the red sunset bled deep into the ground below farther reaching. MacGregor knew he could not hold back any longer as he rushed forwards to surprise his enemy, bursting through his reluctance as he tore deep into FG's coated presence, watching the scissors desperately guard against. The striking clash was of such fury and strength that a sonic boom pierced the windows on each side of them, shattering with falling rain upon them that sparkled twinkling like diamonds. Roy swung his greatsword with fiendish strength, tearing from his left then right before spindriving a small circle of steel death from around him before blasting out a shrieking spear of ice from his fist. The raptor enrobed charged up his screaming flames of raw synergy as he carved deeply through the solid ice, searing blue from either side of him that shot deeply through the windows behind him until Roy followed up with a charging slam of his shoulder deep. He cracked against the jaw of the velociraptor forcing him into a stumbling gait before ripping the other sleeve of the cloak off, tearing some but not all causing a shriek of rage from James' body. Pulsing deep green inside his arm, the brown raptor fired off another shocking sphere of pure brazen energy that sent Roy straight into the second tower. He felt as if a truck had crushed into his ribs, crying out as he fell into another world entirely within the skyscraper. Crumpling upon the dust of a circular pit, some form of arena with iron bars and stone seats above him that he knew precisely where he was from the banners fluttering of a bear's head. The killer had followed him from above, plunging down hard upon him with scissorblades out that sunk straight into the soil. The gladiator's pit brought him the stench of musk and testosterone as he dodged swiftly in a rolling sweep with his sword cutting towards James' ankles to try and knock him down. But the brown raptor leapt and suddenly slamkicked his boot deep into MacGregor's face, crunching hard upon his snout before he staggered back onto his feet with stars bursting in his eyes from the pain. Once he managed to refocus upon FG however, he watched him strike forth with burning blades fast and diagonal at least three times before backing off and whirling with somersaulting spin upon Roy's head. Clashing perfectly opposite of every attack, he watched FG readily come tearing down from above with full swing in retaliation as he charged up his own nanostrength. Pulsing deep crystalline blue along his great blade, the coldest of ice sparked thickening to a frozen gait as it screeched against the flames of fury. Parting the red sea that blazed briefly before him, he struck hard with a clanging shiver throughout the killer's body and forcing him to fall back onto the solid roof with his momentum unsheathed, stumbling to gain his footing until Roy grabbed his arm viciously and tore off the sleeve of the cloak. For some reason this caused a piercing shriek of agony from the raptor despite never causing any wounds upon his skin. He understood clearly as he felt a burst of confidence bracing himself for the next attack. "WAIT!" A memory screamed out at him as he saw ghosts from within the arena. "S-sumthin's wrong! He ain't breathing!" "What's happening?!" "A-AH DUNNO! He just collapsed!" "This...this is...poison! This man has been POISONED!" "YOU FILTHY LIZARD, THIS WEAPON HAS BEEN TAINTED!" "WHUT?!" "You DISGUSTING-" "He can't even fight fair!" "Wretched FILTH!" "NO, NO WAIT, LISTEN! LISTEN TO ME AH NEVER DID NUTHIN', AH WOULD NEVER DO SUCH A THING, AH SWEAR ON MAH HONOUR!" "Striking down a noble and pure Nord with such vile tactics, is this what he demonstrates with HIS sense of honour?!" "THAT'S BULLSHIT! YOU FUCKIN' PLANTED THAT SHIT ON ME! YOU GAVE ME THIS BATTLE GEAR, YOU FUCKIN' CHECKED!" "Clearly we did not check well enough! But now the crime has been committed already, YOU must pay for your disgrace!" "YOU'RE THE DISGRACE, YOU FUCKIN' MURDERED ONE OF YOUR OWN JUST TO TURN ME INTO A SCAPEGOAT!" "That is untrue. Scapegoats would never become guilty to begin with, unlike your species." "_NOW YOU'RE DEAD! _" Breaking through his reverie came the raptor with pounding boots thick and crunching underneath as he swung his scissors across the lone dusted field of death and purtenance to try and decapitate Roy violently. But MacGregor clashed back in his countering strike as both blades crossed into an X, more than once as no matter how fast the killer struck against, he was blocked fiercely before Roy blasted a shocking gust to force his enemy away from him. In turn James' hands burst freely with fireballs multiplying in crackling fantasia, a maddening cacophony of fiery explosions. The black raptor guarded himself as he shivered water deep from his veins trembling in a circle around him before blasting a sheet of white from his claws forming a shielded spiral of ice everywhere around him. Burning spheres of raw flames shattered like glass upon his defence, struggling to melt through as fattening drops of pure water started to form a pool from around him. He now realised he could fight back with another weapon in his inventory seeing what strengths that his enemy now possessed inside his mental scape as his left hand charged with a thick sheen of cobalt that went shuddering into the form of a pure blue arm cannon. Hidden in his shield of pure ice crystal, he had all the time he needed to gather his strength and brace himself for a ruthlessly powerful shot. Exploding white before him signified the intensely devastating strength of his own retaliating force. His blast that pierced through the ice shield was shockingly strong, almost comparable to James' own plasma beam and just as draining of his energy were this the reality of their battle. But having felt not a single glint of the usual exhaustion from using his nanos like usual, he felt a much greater confidence when a solid white piercing flame of energy tore deep inside of FG, along with crushing him against the iron gate at the side of the arena. His cloak was starting to burn and tear off in thin strips of blackening ash as James roared with trembling furious pain as he fell through the gate straight back out of the arena. Roy made haste quickly after him, jumping through the hole to see they were falling once again. The city of New York was wide and flowing out beyond them, early morning with a soft grey as James' hood was now only half-gone showing his constant look of fear and desperation. But his snarl still remained wicked upon his lips as the coat kept itself wrapped firmly around his body. Falling forevermore down towards the city streets. "_STOP FUCKING AROUND ROY! KILL ME! _" "YOU'LL HAFTA DO BETTER THAN THAT FAKER!" "_I'M NOT THE FAKE, YOU ARE! _" Whirling scissors came whistling across the city air as Roy swung back with his pure unstained zweihander blade, reflecting the deadly weapon back towards the raptor in brown who burst furiously with a sheer tornado around him. He spun towards him like a shrieking missile as Roy swiftly covered himself into a bubble-like shield green and voluminous with a transparent thin layer that bounced FG off from him with only a dull painful force through his own body before he shot out his shielding sphere towards the cloaked fiend with an almost electrical blast. The bubble turned into a cracking shot, piercing through the killer who spasmed with a sudden scream as Roy came down upon him hard in that moment. He grabbed at his throat and used his sheer weight to have them falling even faster, roaring together in a screaming crescendo as the scaled comet went crashing down into the road beneath, whistling that ripped through their ears almost deafening by a scream piercing almost out of their hearing pitch before the crunch of a sickening thud. The road became cracked underneath them, and Roy did not yet realise that they had landed straight back outside his original home down on E 18th Street, Gramercy Park. His body pressed thickly against James who had been rendered half-naked, still wearing his jeans but as always with nothing on his chest. He gasped with hot fear in his eyes and frustration thickening in his sneer of outrage, despite the fact that he had been greatly weakened. "Well? Hhhhh...hhhhhh...a-are you done yet, f-fucker?" "Yeah...ahm done. Ahm done wit' you. Ah almost expected sumthin' more outta you." "You...hhhheheheheh...you're a stupid fuck, you were the one that...was controlling the battle here, you only ended it because you wanted it to be." "Shut up." Roy grabbed James fiercely by the throat, almost suffocating him with claws tightly strangling him. His eyes were whimpering silently in pleading tears that turned even more desperate than usual. He was begging for mercy. Yet his mouth spoke differently despite the coat heftily weighing down on his body, as MacGregor held his longsword with his other hand bracing it tightly. "Y-y-y-you...gonna kill me now? Finally?" "Yeah. Finally." "G-g-g-go...ahead. Fuckface. Hhheheheh...y-you could never...t-take a joke." "Really? Here's one for you then. Knock knock." "Wh-who...who's the-" "Your knight in shining armour."

He thrust his sword deep. James stopped breathing for at least a moment. Something screamed with a rippling agony that sent the entire street to a trembling quake of discord that near-deafened them. He let go of James who fell slumping onto the street. The raptor suddenly gasped with new life as his eyes sparkled green with glistening shudders of deep relief as he watched Roy stand towering above him. His sword had the old brown coat ruthlessly impaled upon it, the ragged cloak shrieking with animalistic sounds of rage unholy. With a slashing motion of his long blade, Roy tore the cloak swiftly into three pieces that all screeched individually as they slowly began to fall, fluttering upon the nonexistent breeze around James Kennidon's shuddering body. A key softly clinked from the deep folds of the raincoat, both of them looking towards the shining piece of gold amidst the tattered rags of fabric as James spoke: "HHHHHH! HHhhhhh...hhhh-hhhhh...hhhhff-f-f-fuck...f-f-f-fuck, fucking shit-" "You alrigh'?" "...y-yeah. Yeah I'm okay...hoh jesus...I almost thought you-" "Woulda killed you?" "......yeah." "Ah know you a lot better than that." Roy casually picked up the gold key with a smile returning on his face, feeling victory almost in his grasp. "You ain't never gonna fool me lahk that, ah seen a lotta tricks bein' pulled on me an' ah ain't gonna let that happen again." "Good...g-g-good...jesus you fucking strangled me." "Sorry, ah had to make sure ah gotta good grip. "Y-y-you really thought...I was the killer, like seriously?" "A little. But just thuh theory, cuz thuh more ah learned about you an' whut you did all throughout your journey...thuh more ah started to rethink that theory cuz...well, you remember that ol' Brunhart case? A guy got put in jail cuz sumbody else wore his clothes, not that hard to frame people. But, speaking of which how'd that coat even get on you back on that tower, ah ain' never seen you wear a coat." "I was waiting for you at the top, I just wanted to help and explain everything, I even had the key for you right in my pocket." "Why do YOU have thuh key to mah family house?" "Because I'm the one that searched for it. I did spend almost five years nearly killing myself to get back and fight the A.R.M.E and you know...try to expose the truth for ya but then...somebody else or something just came sweeping up over and forced itself on me." "Maaaaan, you have GOT to stop lettin' dumb shit possess you, lahk first Scissoraptor an' now this fuckin' cloak." "Hahaha, yeaaaah I know, I should really stop that you think." "It's gettin' to be a pretty bad habit. Buddy." He offered his hand gladly towards FG, who swiftly grabbed him without even thinking and allowed himself to be pulled up. He patpatted James on the head patronisingly as the raptor smiled bashfully, both starting to feel at ease in the middle of the empty street. "Once ah saw that you wuzn't reactin' to being attacked, except when ah tore your stupid-ass coat...ah thought there must be sumthin' goin' on. Plus...ah could see thuh fear in your eyes." The two hugged sweetly with a weak tenderness. Both of them were bruised as they tried not to hurt or squeeze too tightly, especially Roy with his greater strength and bulk who simply smiled. "Thanks FG." "Hey...save it for when you wake up, alright dude?" "Heheh, alrigh' then. Now...ahm pretty sure that this is mah own actual key. Ah think we're at thuh end." "I'm not so sure about that." "Whut?" "Well...you've got to know what the truth is for starters, and that door into your family house is the only place you have left. I'm here for you." "Alrigh'. Let's do this." His bravery took him thus towards the small stoop of his own quaint little home, the old apartment door with a buzzer door panel and a list of numbers beside it as he fitted the key into the lock. It turned perfectly as he felt a sense of younger days come sweeping over him, such a familiar place of neutral safety to him once. Red solid floor, white stairs to his left leading upwards with two doors on the ground floor. One on his left at the base of the stairs saying "J. McCluskey", and one at the very end of the hall directly in front of them. James walked behind him carefully as they reached the door before them saying "J. MacGregor" on its nameplate. He felt Roy start to tremble in front of him, shuddering with gasps as everything just suddenly start to hit him. "You alright?" asked FG. "Y-yeah...kinda...a-a-ah just...ah've not been back in this house for uh...lotta years." "I guess after all the shit you've been through this has got to be a piece of cake." "Ah sure hope...ahm not tryin' to think on it. Um...listen." He turned slowly towards his nemesis. "You uh gonna be mah advocate, sorta neutral party righ'?" "Yes." "You ARE FG himself, righ'?" "Mmhmm, James Campbell-...well, Kennidon actually, remember I'm married now." "Heh, yeah I um...ah still kinda have to remember that." "Hhhehehehe...listen, I just wanna say, I know you're scared about all this. I am too, as part of your memories and the one that's sort of trying to get all these pieces connected. I'm just here as a guide and somebody to help make comparisons to, now as your first and frankly only suspect concerning about this, I have to be here. I want to exonerate myself, prove my innocence. That's something that I've always said to you." "Ah didn't know you knew thuh word 'exonerate'." "I don't," responded James, "this is your head, seriously I'm not good with long words." "Damn straight...mister Rappernasty." "Oh fuck you." "Hhhheheheheh...righ', okay, how you wanna play this?" "Well, let's do it like a police thing. Let's pretend that I'm the detective, and you are the one that witnessed it, now you tell me EVERYTHING. Leave nothing out, because we're about to go inside that memory and trust me, you are going to see everything that happened. As far as YOU know." "Um...o-okay...ah got this. Hhhhhh...let...l-let's get on an' do this." "I'm here for you. Just do what you think is best, I'll be here. I won't leave you, not after coming this far." "Ah know. Thank you." He went to turn the key into the lock, but the moment he pushed his fist into the door it simply swung open without any need. He thought it somewhat odd before slowly watching the door creak in towards a small hallway around eight feet, with shoes and linen cupboards before ending at his living room. Sofa on the right wall, a table in the middle, two chairs on his left with a television in the far left corner. Two doorways, the one straight ahead towards the kitchen whilst the one left of it went towards the bedrooms and bathroom as James asked: "Is...this door supposed to be open?" "N-naw...no it isn't, ah always keep it locked, everyone in mah family does." "Who lived in this place?" "Mom, dad an' me. That's it." "Okay...so what about that front door, the one we did unlock?" "......waaaaaaaait...ah remember sumthin'." "Huh?" He turned to see the entrance hall of the apartment block, a black shadow drifting from his chest like smoke debris towards the front door as they heard the clinking of keys. Roy opened the door to the apartment block. The keys jangle slightly, having two always on him in a small keychain as he walked to his home. The door of the building clunked behind him, a stocky young utahraptor wearing a grey V-neck sweater, slacks of dark coal and thicker black shoes with the emblem of Park West High on his sweater. "I remember...thuh front door of the apartment always locks automatically, you have to get a key to use it. Then it locks behind you." "Wait, what?" asked FG. "It never...crossed mah mind at thuh tahm but...when ah first came back that day...thuh door wuz already open." "That's...odd, okay that's our first detail. What happens next? You can tell me if you want or just let this happen." "Ah can do both...ah saw thuh door wuz unlocked, an' ah thought-" "Huh, that's weird. Mom? Dad?" He walked into the house, the small hallway but he doesn't take his shoes off just yet. He felt a tenseness in the atmosphere, the faintest sound of somebody fidgeting from the kitchen. He cautiously took a few gentle steps into the living room seeing the green velvet armchair squinted out of place. His father was on the floor in front of it, blood glistening from his neck slashed open to a red glistening pool around his head fallen forwards. The clock on the wall said Monday November 7th, 3515 A.D. 4:15pm. The sounds of struggle came louder from the kitchen as someone shouted, two shadows pass in front of the doorframe. He froze to the spot, the shock paralysing him as his mind tried to process everything. His mother is grabbing at a brown coat, the hood forced forwards as a knife shines above him. He's shorter than her, but he slams his elbow into her throat to force her to lean against the sink. She grabs for a bottle of something, white liquid sprays across his face. He roared with frenzy in sudden pain as the knife comes down on her. She screams before her son does. " MOMMAAA!" The killer doesn't stop twisting the blade into her eye as it plunged into her brain. She falls as he throws her, cracking her head to the kitchen floor as she spasmed in a crumpled heap before Roy desperately charges at the cloaked fiend. The killer covers his face with the hood tighter, something liquid dripped across it as he lunged forwards with a slamming boot straight to his stomach. MacGregor gasps wincing as he sees the bloodied knife ready to stab him in the face, he grabs for the arm with both hands and slams it down onto the table next to them. The knife flies across it but the killer has his other arm free enough to slampunch Roy across the face, tearing with black claws to almost gouge his eye. He doesn't let go, seeing the brown snout with dark purple markings turning runny, sizzling to settle in like a chemical burn, the thickening stench of alkaline lye in his nostrils. He smelled paint with it before another fist slammed Roy into the table and knocked him hard onto the floor. He stared up towards the hooded criminal, screaming something furious in a strange mocking accent before the boot comes down upon his face. The raptor blacked out after the third stomp. "I'm sorry." James looked towards Roy who was struggling with tears trickling down his face, feeling his cheeks turn warm with an empty feeling down towards the pit of his stomach. It felt just as deep and terrible as the burning from his heart with a thickening agony. Almost like it was about to break completely apart. "Ahm...a-ahm sorry, ah just...a-a-ah just can't stop hearin' mah mom screamin lahk that. A-ah should have rushed in, ah shoulda stopped him b-but ah wuz...ah wuz frozen. Ah couldn't think, i-i-it all happened too fast-" "It's alright. Look I saw it just now, it did happen way too fast. You can't regret things like this, but we can at least solve the truth. Just take your time, we will unravel all of this and we've got all the time in the world to do this so there's really no rush, Roy. Just think. Just go over every single detail that you can think of, I'll be the detective. And you be the witness." "U-um...okay. Okay ah will...ahll just...wh-where would ah start?" "Let's think about things from the very beginning."

The utahraptor nodded, pressing his left fingers to between his eyes as he concentrated, feeling the bridge of his snout as if trying to dig up the answers from inside his head. He shuddered to contain the droplets, bitter in swallowing as best he could before he was able to reimagine the scene after three minutes of personal silence before he spoke clearly. "Ahm ready." "Firstly...what was going through your head when your saw your dad?" "Ah didn't...register it at first. Ah mean a part of me saw that there wuz blood...an' that he got stabbed but ah wuz...it wuzn't until ah heard mom that everythin' kinda clicked." "What happened to your dad's foot?" "He...lemme think, ah think, yeah...yeah he broke it a few days back, before thuh weekend an' he...had to take painkillers. That made things sorta difficult for me that week." "Why?" "Cuz ah had to take thuh bus, instead of him drivin' me in his mail van." Rewinding, Roy walked backwards out of the house with sudden rapidity, the murder undoing itself rapidly before everything spun back towards that very morning, his father alive and well sitting in his armchair, occasionally moving back and forth between bedroom and living room. Another black raptor hovered around the kitchen, his mother either talking with him in rapid incomprehensible speak along with Roy who moved randomly around his house, bedroom, kitchen, living room, bathroom, busying himself on various things. Time soon returned back to normal on that same Monday, except now it was 7:02am. Roy had reappeared in the living room walking back to sit down and eat his breakfast, his father having disappeared with serious crippling gait backwards into his bedroom where he would remain for a good few hours. His mother swished out of the kitchen still in her pyjamas of a fine soft pink robe as she made Roy a good simple meal of bacon and eggs. "Is dad okay?" asked the young Roy. "Ah thought ah heard him still in bed." "You better take thuh bus today," said Lashawndra, "daddy hurt his foot an' ah ain't driving that thing!" "Awww dammit, he alrigh'?!" "Oh he fine, broke it real bad, he ain' gonna be movin' outta this house fer any good reason." "Ah thought he wuz just tired." "Well he is, knocked out on sum painkillers, pretty strong things too! Ah thought you knew." "Ah thought dad wuz away on that outin' with thuh church." "That's next week sweetie." "Oh. Damn ah feel bad now, ah didn't get a chance to say g'night to him, or even anythin' this mornin'." "Heheh, you'll git to say hi to him once you git back, now cummon eat up! Here." She pulled out several coins and a five-dollar bill to plant on the table despite Roy's protest. "Whu-awwww mom, no it's cool ah got money-" "Take iiiit, it's fine." "N-naw naw ah can't ahm-seriously ah got money-" "Just at least fer today, alrigh'? You can pay fer thuh bus tomorrah, besides...can always weasel sum outta yer daddy once he wake up, ah mean his fault his foot got broke!" "Pffffft, awwww come on mom that's mean!" "Hhhuhuhuhu, ah know ahm jus' joshin'...alrigh' now eat up, bus'll leave roun' seven-twenny, now ah see ya when you's here." Bending over to plant a kiss with a smoosh of her chubby cheek on Roy's face, he blushed with a smile as he ate most of his breakfast before pocketing the bus fare and leaving swiftly. "It's okay," said FG. "If you need a moment, I can wait." "A-alrigh'." Roy felt his tears coming back through him again, his mother's voice digging wounds into his chest which became much heavier than usual. His past self shadowed through his body forming a somewhat-blissful haze of his yesteryears. "Okay...o-okay, ah got this." "What happens usually, when your dad's okay?" "He normally would drive me to school, he would always drive in early mornin' startin' at six, then he would come round at seven-thirty, drop me off an' we'd wave off before seein' each other again when mah school day wuz over. Saved us a bit on bus fare." "When did school start?" "Eight AM. It ended aroun' three PM." "Alright. So...is there something wrong here?" "...ahm tryin' to think." The day passed on by in a vivid flash until Roy returned back home upon the scene of his family's murder. His father had suddenly appeared on the floor once again dead in his own pool of red. "WAIT!" James cried out. "Look at the clock." November 7th, 4:15pm. "That's...huh?" Roy scratched his head as his logic started to take the reins of his mind. "How...ah never get back that late." "How long does it take to get home from school?" asked FG. "Twenty minutes." "So...why did you take so long to get back home that day?" "A-a-ah dunno! Th-that just...that's not...wuz that really thuh time ah came back?" "It was, remember the police report you showed me? The one that was real and the one the A.R.M.E had made up?" "...yeaaaaaah." The scene changed with vivid blurring of colours as the summer yellow and green furniture of his home became a rosewood tapestry of a bar in another world. Warm brown oaken colours amidst a tavern floor, the raptors sitting up amongst Ivalician decor and pint glasses to where they faced each other on the seats of the tavern's counter. The black raptor leaned back with open arms incredulous before he spoke from his memory. "Do you REALLY think they gonna believe ah went through a whole galaxy, a town fulla monsters outta mah head, a city fulla zombies AND a mushroom kingdom lookin' for you?! When thuh truth sounds even more stupid than thuh lie, ah know ah wanna play this more diplomatically." "Right," said James, "gotcha, to be honest I wouldn't believe any of this stuff anyway if I heard about it someplace else." "So lahk ah wuz sayin', ah went back, told them ah needed to get sum more profile info on any of your movements, thought you came back home, maybe tryin' sumplace to lay down low so ah said ah wanted to build up a profile on you. They gave me one report about you, thuh one that points you at mah house." "Okay." He pulled up his omni-tool flickering open a photographic picture of a police report in high resolution, to which James froze with shock after briefly reading over it. "That wuz thuh fake report," said Roy observing, "but thuh real report ah showed you just after." "And the time on it said...4:15pm you came back." "Righ'...that wuz whut it said so...let's...d-damn, all ah remember about that day wuz thuh murder but-" "There has to be something more. You left the house, you went to school, you took a bus...tell me everything, even if it's something stupid and not related to anything." "Alrigh'...lemme think." Roy left his house as he exited the apartment block, the door locking behind him automatically. The bus came, he did not remember the time, watching the thirty-seat vehicle hover lightly over the tarmac with a waft of steam pushing underneath it, dust and hot air exhaust beneath the anti-gravity thrusters. Not powerful, but enough to float and move along the road with very little fuel consumption. The scene changed to bits and pieces, snapshots of his high school, sitting in classes studying over lessons. Only half the day did he actually study in advanced courses, papers fluttering past his vision as he pored over notes, broke fractions down, developed paragraphs in the deconstruction of a poem. He remembered hating the poem, it bored him, something about cars as a metaphor for entropy, he made a note to look up what entropy actually meant. Midday was his P.E session, he sits on a locker room bench putting on sport shoes, thick and well-designed to open outwards like a cardboard box to push his feet into, keeping his claws snug inside before sealing them with velcro straps. Running on the field, pounding feet, someone tries to grab the oval football spinning through the air. Red team tries to grab it, a young rhino with swollen arms and smooth skin he crushes his body into. He throws him to one side but not down on the floor, snarling to block his hands as his teammate in blue grabs the ball. Runs to the endgoal. The rhino sneers at him but eventually chuckles and backpats him. "I need to gutcheck you better," said the buff rhino. "Gotta keep above the belt man, not lahk you ever do." "Hah! Unless you my boyfriend I ain't ever getting down that low." He turns away from the field, his mind reveals a long school corridor as Roy leans against a wall reading a book. Looking down on himself, grey V-neck sweater with prefect emblem, he hears the sound of pounding feet clack down the corridor as he looks up and puts a finger out towards two young wolves, brown and grey. "SHHHH!" Finger to his lips, he points at a sign in the classroom next to him. "Exam In Progress, Please Be Quiet". The wolves look awkward and cautiously jog past without ever making sound despite the tiniest of tittering. He returns back to his book, he can't remember the words. School is soon over as he walks towards the simple bus stop at the end of the road. Sheltered roof above two chairs as the raptor waited with several other people beside him. Faces he did not remember, bodies vaguely reminiscent as cars drifted back and forth before suddenly there came the sound of a cracking thud piercingly sharp to his right. "J-JESUS!" He turned to see a spiderweb pattern radiate from the window next to him, seeing something red dripping down on the other side as he got up to look. A child's shoe covered in what looked like blood as his eyes widened. "...shit. Um...h-hey, does anyone gotta cellphone?!" "Yes?" asked a faceless shadow. "A-ah found sumbody's shoe, a li'l kid's...d-don't touch it! UM, i-it migh' be evidence!" "What the hell is this?!" "A-a-ah dunno!" "Who the fuck threw this, oh god...oh jesus wh-where's the kid?!" "Lissen, can sumbody call an ambulance, ahm gonna head down thuh street where it came from, maybe find someone hopefully." Without even thinking he ran down the street, looking everywhere he could for someone in danger or harmed in some way. The world started to blur until the sound of someone crying next to an alleyway. A fox cub leaning against the wall covering his face whimpering with blood down his hands and face, with only one shoe on him. "OH, j-jesus kid you alrigh'?!" "N-noooo...a-aaaaaah!" "Um...sh-shit, um, c-can you-um...is...is anythin' broken?!" "A-ah dunno...m-mah head, s-s-somebody hit meeee!" "Whut? Kid you're bleedin' all over, are you-" "Whut?!" The boy took his hands from his face, seeing the blood stickily smear across his fur which turned matted. He started to panic, screaming with frantic energy as Roy tried to calm him as he knelt. "Kid, c-c-calm down, okay just calm down focus!" "AH, A-AHM BLEEDIN', MOMMY!" "Stop!" He put his hands on the child's arms and pinned them firmly to his body to try and calm him with a serious look. "If you get all panicked you might make sum injuries worse, now sumbody's phoned an ambulance cuz ah found your shoe down thuh road." "M-...m-mah...shoe?" "Yeah, sumbody threw it." "He...h-h-he took mah shoe." "Who, thuh guy that attacked you?" "Ah didn' see him, he...he hit me, punched me righ' in thuh face a-a-an' then he...he dumped stuff all over me, an' then he took one'a mah shoes an' told me ah wuz a dirty stupid-...k-kid." "Aw jeez. Can you walk?" "Um...ah think so." "Come on, let's git you up." He picked up the boy carefully, seeing that nothing was broken despite the blood but he saw nothing that would cause so terrible an injury. He had no skull fracture nor was he bleeding from any orifice as he watched the boy limping towards the bus stop. It was 3:34pm, there was now only one person left at the stop as he asked an Asian female human in a pink hoodie: "Did anyone call an ambulance?" "I did...oh my god is, is he okay?!" "Ah think so...doesn't seem to be bleedin'." "Ah wan' mah moooom!" whimpered the child. "It's okay, we're gonna get you an ambulance, whut's yer name?" "T-tyler." "Alrigh', Tyler? Just sit up here. Did ah miss thuh bus?" "Yeah," said the lady, "left about five minutes back." "Damn, alrigh' then...heh, you missed it too?" "I was kinda worried...I didn't wanna leave just in case." "You're a good person...thanks miss." Roy gently hoists the cub onto a seat in the bus stop. An ambulance came ten minutes later, a small van in green and blue where two stocky-looking black bulls stepped out with one looking much hairier than the other in shaggy fur beneath their green uniforms. "What happened?" "This kid," said Roy, "he said sumbody beat him up, ah found his shoe got thrown at thuh bus stop covered in blood." "Woah jeez, alright can he walk?" "He can, come on kid." The child gently hobbled towards the paramedics who gently sat him up into the back of the van as they began to clean the blood off to check for wounds. He was certainly bruised but it seemed not to be bleeding at all. "What's your name son?" "Tyler." "What's your surname?" "Skinner." "What happened?" "S-sumbody...h-hit me, punched meee...righ' in thuh face, a-an' in mah leg." "Was this another kid?" "No...b-bigger than me." "I see......huh. Carl, smell this." The hairy bull smelt the bloodied cloth firmly before he gently licked some of it from his finger. His eyes rolled unseen beneath the shag hair. "For god's sake." "It is isn't it?" "Jesus...kid, you're not bleeding." "H-huh?!" Tyler looked up a little shocked whilst Roy looked on. "This stuff is corn syrup. Fake blood." "Whut?!" The kid tasted some for himself. It was sweet and thick whilst the raptor looked stunned and somewhat frustrated. "You tellin' me this wuz a prank!?" "N-NO IT WUZN'T, SOMEONE HIT ME!" "He's right," said the medic, "someone did hit him, definitely. Quite hard as well, but nothing's broken. We'll just put some ointment on it and it'll be good as new." "Tyler," asked Roy, "you said sumbody dunked sumthin' on you righ'? Could that have been thuh fake blood?" "Um...a-a-ah think so." "Whut kinda jerk does that ah mean seriously!" "Halloween," said the medic, "post-season is always the worst, just because the festiveness is over some people wanna make 'accidents' look like something bad and waste everybody's time." "Damn...so, he's okay?" "Yeah he'll be fine. Just a victim of a stupid prank, we'll take it from here. You know your home address Tyler?" "Um...y-y-yeah, it's...sixteen, west sixty-fifth street." "Alright then, how about we take you home since that's not too far from here." "Okay...th-thank youuu." Roy simply smiled and waved as the ambulance veered into the road and it was not more than three minutes after that the bus finally came. Sighing with some relief, Roy managed to hop on as the rest of the journey became a blur right up until he reached his home address once again.

"Well that was...odd," said FG observing. "It wuz," replied Roy beside him. "How come you never said anything about this?!" "It wuzn't important! Whut thuh hell does this have to do with mah family gettin' murdered, sum shit beats up a kid an' dunks fake blood on 'im!? Ah mean it's only been lahk a week since halloween so ah knew SUM people were still tryin' to prank others but-" "It was because of that kid you missed your bus and didn't get home early enough." "Well...yeah but...but wait...whut are you sayin'?!" "Never mind, let's not jump to conclusions, like you say it was after Halloween and some dipshit tries to waste people's time. But beating up a kid is pretty awful." "Tell me about it. Ah can't believe ah forgot about that, it wuz in mah head when ah wuz comin' in an' ah wuz gonna tell mom about it but...then things happened." "Alright, so...you came back late because some kid fell victim to a prank, a rather bad one honestly in both ways." "Ah huh." "So...let's get back to the actual event." "Oh god...ah know ah seen it in mah head lahk a million times but it hurts...f-fuckin' hurts." "The sooner we get this done and out of the way the better. I'm here for you. Now just think back, break things down, you have to find something that tells you who it is." "Ah don't even know if it's NOT you!" "Then let's find out, play it out for me." "Alrigh'...g-god...just fuckin' tired of all this." The struggle came from the kitchen, two shadows pass the doorframe as Roy stood with fear and shock rooting him to the spoit. Brown coat, glistening knife, covered face with a hood, something splashes from the sink. Screams of fury, the knife comes down, she screams before she's thrown to the floor. Roy shrieks as he's bolted into action but the killer rushes forth booting him hard in the stomach. He almost falls, the knife comes up, he grabs the killer's arm and slams it down to the table. Blue markings on his face, he releases the knife, two punches to the head brings Roy onto the floor until the giant brown boot came up upon his face. Screaming something unintelligible. "Wait, wait a minute!" cried FG. "Whut?" "He's shouting something here...is that...some kind of accent?" "A-a-ah dunno," stammered Roy, "lemme just...it sounds familiar to me ah don't...ah mean ah just know that he said sumthin' to me...sumthin' weird, ah don' really understand whut it wuz cuz it kinda don't make any sense." "You have to. You know what he said, because you told someone already. I don't know it, but you did tell someone." "Lahk who?!" "Think about everyone that you told this story to. Who would you have told this to, maybe you found an extra detail that might have told someone when you were remembering." "O-okay, well there wuz...Nik, Lizbeth, Gillian, Tah-Zer-Ah, her daughter Sha...Jack, ah never told Jack about this, ah think...Dhar Khern, definitely...Garr......Kruz...Baldwin-wait." Roy's eyes widened as he watched the scene frozen in time, the killer about to curbstomp him. "There...there WUZ sumthin' ah said to him...ah only just remembered that recently because ah told Baldwin sumthin'. An' before ah met you up on that tower, he told ME sumthin' about...wait, yes thassit." "What's it? When did you tell him?" "It wuz back while you were away, we wuz all out in Lea Monde whilst it wuz in winter...me an' Baldwin were at thuh sauna that they open up cuz it gets all lahk freezin' out there. Him an' me got pretty close cuz we both lahk to work out, so we kinda bonded for a bit." A scene surrounded by steam, the constant sweltering of heat as both Roy and Baldwin slip deep into the hot roasting waters of the constant-cleaning sauna pool with rushing waters of a river skimming through it. The dull brown-skinned bangaa sighed with some relief alongside the thickly-muscular black utahraptor who asked: "You tired?" "No jusszht...it'sszh weird, but...you ever felt...like...I don't know how to exszhplain it." "Just try me." The bangaa turned towards Roy with hands spasming slightly, trying to describe his words in visual. "You ever had thisszh...kind of dream that you never really sszhtop dreaming about? Like it alwaysszh comesszh back to you and you don't know what it meansszh, but it'sszh not ACTUALLY like a dream and more like you......remember sszhomething?" "...ah do." "Wait...r-really?" The raptor hunched over slightly with heavy shoulders. "Ah have this memory...of sumthin' bad happenin', an' everytahm ah try to remember it...ah can't...ah can't get every detail but ah know it happened. It almost feels lahk it never did but you KNOW it happened, you got that...sorta thing that tells you, you ever lahk...you ever seen your own reflection in a mirror, but you also see lahk sumthin' out thuh corner of your eye?" "Ah huh?" "Now you know that it's YOU in thuh mirror, but sumthin' off thuh side you know that's just your eye goin' weird on you, that ain't anythin' cuz it's all lahk, readjustin' itself. But even though you have that sorta thing at thuh back of your mind sayin' 'did ah see sumthin' or wuz it mah imagination', you got your OWN reflection there an' it's lahk, you KNOW that you saw yourself, that's real. Know whut ahm sayin'?" "I think I do...kind of, you mean like sszhome thingsszh you remember about are not real, but you know at leasszht one part that wasszh DEFINITELY sszhomething real, right?" "Yeah, righ' exactly!" He clapped his hands in excitement as he got all fired up to make a connection. Then he realised with sombre tone before he leaned forwards. "So...um...ah don' wanna put a downer on today or anythin' but...thuh memory ah wuz talkin' about, wuz mah parents bein' killed." Baldwin's face drooped feeling rather off-kilter, but regardless he put a hand on Roy's shoulder with sympathy. "......s-sszhit, um, wow Roy that...I didn't know I mean...I'm sszho sszhorry." "S'alrigh', ah never told any of you. FG knew about it but uh, none of you did, anyways, ahm tryin' to remember that night...an' there's parts of it that ah don't quite get, an' then there's other parts ah DO remember, lahk very clearly. Ah remember seein' a guy, ah remember sumthin' about his face lahk a mark on him...ah remember him stompin' me on mah face with a goddamn boot lahk THICK as hell, lahk clown feet big, ah remember hearin' him stompin' his way over when we fought, ah even remember whut he said to me when ah tried to stop 'im." "What did he sszhay?" "He said 'what's the matter, can't you take a JOKE?' Lahk that's really fucked up!" "Wasszh he a big guy?" "Wait, what?" asked FG. "That wuz it. That's whut thuh killer said to me." The scene switches back upon the giant boot simply hanging above Roy in pausing moment before the voice made itself clear. "Wots thuh mattah?! Cawn't you take a JOKE?!" Crunched on his face. Crushed on his cheek. Stomped on his dreams as darkness swallowed him.[/i] "That's when ah black out," explained Roy. "But...ahm jus' tryin' to figure it out. It sounds kinda British, that accent." "It does," said FG. "Really weird but it does sound like it's from London, kinda bad cockney." "So, you see why ah thought it wuz you...ah mean it all kinda fits, you stompin' me, that accent...those weird markings." "There's something off here though...so let's think. You come home late from school because some kid got beat up and you stayed with him. You found your house open and unlocked despite the fact that the entrance has no way of letting people in without a key." "Righ'...so whoever managed to come in-" "Had to be let in first...now there's a buzzer outside isn't there?" "Yeah...righ', that means if sumbody buzzed in to lahk mah house an' asked 'hey this is me, can ah come in' an' then they let you in." "Okay, so...who would your parents let in?" "They wouldn't let anyone in, they'd go meet them at thuh door, nobody comes into our apartment." "So how did someone get in?" "...it would have to be a friend. Sumbody we know." Roy contemplated this as he looked down towards his feet. The boot remained in media res crushing on his younger face, hanging above him constantly whilst he noticed his own bare claws tapping the floor. Something clicked. He looked towards FG. "Where are your boots?" "Huh?" James looked down at his feet. "Dude, when we were fightin', back outside when that big coat had you...you were wearin' boots on you, lahk big brown things." "Really? I was?" "YES, you were, where'd they go?!" "...when have I ever worn anything on my feet?" A strange look came between them as Roy struggled to think. He was certain, he was absolutely certain he had seen James wearing boots. "...wait...w-wait, wait. You...JUST wore sumthin' when we fought!" "That's not a memory. That was here, in this world inside your head." "WH-BULLSHIT, AH REMEMBER YOU WEARIN'...l-l-look, THIS, righ' here! This dude stompin' on mah face, YOU ALWAYS DID THIS!" "Really?" "YES REALLY! Everytahm we fought, you ALWAYS fuckin' stomp on mah face, EVERYTAHM!" "Seriously?! Do I do it that often?!" "YES YOU DO! Look ahll prove it, let's remember, when did we first figh'?! Fourside, wuzn't it?!" "Yeah, back at the department store. You lured me there with a message from one of the kids." "Righ', so!" Roy allowed his memory to flood back to him once more, flickering towards an empty department store. Bookcases lined up from the wall into small aisles of themselves, the black raptor's eyes staring across towards FG. The hood that he had worn back then only further allowed him to compare the two memories together. His vision rushed forwards, suddenly slamming into FG's past self, grabbing him with both hands outstretched and throwing him towards the bookcases all while Roy watched on from beyond his own past visions. James' past self snarled at Roy charging, who barely saw the puddle between them. Water thickened from James' hands on the floor, as Roy watched his former self's sight stumble and slip upwards, a shuddering slam as he hit the bookcase. Then came James' foot, kicking hard suddenly across the face before stomping lower on his chest. The thick brown scaled foot came straight down upon his head, trapping the cloth of the hood against Roy's cheek. "NNNGH!" "You know...in Britain, you can get arrested for attempted murder if you stomp on somebody's face. Wanna know why?" "...wait."

Roy's eyes widened as he looked towards FG, both in the past and the present. Something kicked deep inside his head, a shudder of realisation. "...n-no, hold up, there must be sum kinda mistake, there must be-...a-a-ah don't-, wait wait, maybe you just lost them." "Really? What about the other times then? Like when we fought in the Mushroom Kingdom." "H-huh?" "Remember when I won against you? Koopin cried out before you dealt the final blow, trying to stop you." "NO!" "HUH?!" The world had changed once more, a fiery pit suspended by a stone platform. Roy felt his memories now guide themselves, the simple association of their brief encounters already rebuilding the memory itself. A scream came from above them, while Roy watched on. Himself standing over FG, who laid on the ground ready to be dealt with once and for all. His eyes had turned upwards, seeing a koopa stare down at him from the pit opening above. His eyes, clear blue and plaintive with tears struck deep into his own. Then came a shuddering groan, as his eyes turned back towards James. His leg was firmly planted into his crotch, the sound of his great blade clanging from behind him. "...Y-...you..." James responded with another brutal kick, making Roy scream and fall to his knees before him, his eyes staring up towards his foe. His vision went closer to the ground, his legs buckling as he laid helpless before FG, staring down at him before a sudden kick to the face. "Never...fight clean with me." With these words he slammed his bare foot straight into MacGregor's face, sending him backwards across the platform as his eyes rolled to the point of seeing only grey and red, of stone and lava. "B-b-but that...th-that can't be! That wuz whut ah built half of mah theory on, YOU ALWAYS STOMPED ON ME!" "Fine, let's go to Raccoon City, when we got stuck together, how about the first big fight we did there?" "Remember THIS?!" Black tarmac sweeped across the land, a darkened city of death and destruction far from prying eyes as Roy found himself in a small parking lot, laying down on his back once again. James was sneering down upon him, the brown sole of his scaly foot crushing down on Roy's cheek hard. "Remember THIS?! HUH!? Remember when I stomped your ass back in Fourside, FUCKFACE!?" Roy's eyes shook with fear as the realisation had come full circle. His hands were flickering with sudden spasms as the claws of his fingers started creeping up his head. "...no...n-no no, this isn't, th-that's meaningless, it don't count! It don't-WAIT! W-WAIT, WE FOUGHT AGAIN, IN THAT GALAXY, REMEMBER! AH TRICKED YOU, YOU HAD ARMOUR ON YOU, YOU HAD TO HAVE BEEN WEARIN' BOOTS!" "Are you sure?" asked FG. "YES AHM SURE, AH REMEMBER WHEN WE FOUGHT, WE WENT DOWN THAT SLOPE AN' ALMOST FELL OFF A CLIFF!" Sand and rock crumbling below as everything flipped itself onto a strange angle before them, the long slopes of a distant planet bare before all as both James and Roy began tumbling down towards a long ravine. Roy burst himself onto a large rock with his gust of nanostrength, before being followed by FG separately onto another rock sliding down together. Roy stood with shining steel grey against the velociraptor in full red with purple accents upon him. The utahraptor boosted forwards to slam into FG, but he shot straight up into the sky to dodge him before crashing down hard upon his shoulders, crunching his knees fast into Roy's chest. He quickly stood up, his shining red foot in a perfect clawed steel semblance of his own foot as he viciously stomped harder. "HOW YOU LIKE ME NOW HUH!? YOU LIKE THIS?! YOU FUCKING PIECE OF SHIT!" "That sure doesn't look like a boot," said FG of the present tense. "N-NO! NO IT HAS TO BE!" "Have you noticed that everytime I fought you..." "Wanna know why?" "I never..." "Fight clean with me." "Wore..." "Remember THIS?!" "Any shoes?" "PIECE OF SHIT!" "NO!" shrieked Roy. "THAT CAN'T BE! SUMTHIN'S NOT RIGHT! THIS AIN'T RIGHT!" "Something isn't right here. It's not me though. Everytime we fought, I never had shoes. So that's one part of your original theory flawed." "But...b-b-but...but whut is-...who thuh fuck IS this guy then?!" "That's why we're here isn't it?" "WH-WHUT ABOUT-...whut about thuh facepaint, thuh markings?! An' thuh accent, that's GOT to be British!" "It's a weird accent. The markings you're not even certain on." "Huh?!" "First time we went through this memory they were purple. Second time you went through, they've become a dark blue so what is it?" "...I...a-a-ah don't know. Ah don't know, it wuz...it...wuz really dark, an' mom had kinda splashed him with sum bleach or sumthin' so it wuz all runnin' out, might have even been a chemical burn an' THAT kinda turns purpley!" The face of the killer blurred in rewinding. He struggled to remember the colour. It was constantly shifting, always dark colours between blue, indigo, violet, always the coldest colours. "So who is it? Think. Someone knew your family to get into your house. Someone who wore boots. Someone who wears paint." "Cuz ah couldn't...take...a joke." In that moment came the worst feeling of Roy's entire life. Betrayal. "Biiiiiingooooo." A voice came from inside his living room. Dark tendrils began forming, the shadows of his family rippling together as they started to twist and fluctuate towards a single body motion. A torso formed from within, slithering black tentacles dripping with hot tears upon the floor as they sculpted legs that suddenly grew with thick brown leather like mould from its insides. A thick brown coat, the hood unveiled as standing before them now was the beaming grin of a coyote, his face grotesquely twisting like rotten branches binding together to grow brown fur with painted cheeks, his snout coloured in darkness. "I told you you couldn't take a joke. And look what happens." "......oh god." "Yyyyyep. Just...everything coming back to you now isn't it?" The killer walked forwards with thick clumping boots. "The boots. The paint. The fact I know where you live...and your bus route...and your family cuz I used to be friends with you and...well...all I had to do was come in and ask 'is Roy there? I wanna make up to him and still be friends with him'. Heh...not that you really told them about me cuz you were all ashamed of me." The coyote switched his voice to a horrifying whimsy. "Oi can even pull out me ol' cockney accent that always made ye lawff, so's that nobody got who oi woz when oi left! Heheh...best sorta prank is the wun you's never expect from me, my ol' chummy. All oi needed to do roigh', wuz to appeal to your inner samaritan, an' you gave me plenny of toim when oi smash sum kid's face in an' dunk a good quart o' corn syrup on 'im. Oi knew you'd never leave 'im, oi know you too well after all these years cuz unlike SUM people...oi actually know wot makes my friend tick. All goody two-shoes loik a wannabe police officah, so you miss yer bus...an' miss the chance to say g'bye to yer daddy. Epic, roigh'?" "N-n-no...no, no no no no!" "Oi mean, oi'm the only guy you knew who had everythin' fucking PREPARED for any prank you ever saw in yer loif!" "You...y-y-you can't be f-fucking serious. YOU CAN'T BE, THIS IS A FUCKIN' JOKE, THIS HAS TO BE-" "A FUCKING JOKE?!" he screamed back in his normal voice. "YOU MEAN LIKE THE ONE YOU EXPELLED ME OVER?! Yeah it is, I mean who else did you expect, the fuckin' president? Do you not remember the last time we met, I mean BEFORE that...I used to be your best friend, and you fucking rat me out." He sneered with a cruel glimmer in his snout as he poked Roy in the chest hard enough to throb deep in his sternum. "You...fucking expelled me because you wouldn't let it go. All I did was pull a sweet-ass prank on a girl, she wasn't DEAD or anything...and we could have just brushed it off as a terrible coincidence. But you had to go and snoop in to what I did, YOU had to go the fucking MILE because you're a little prefect FUCKER!" "N-no...n-n-n-no...C-carlos. This can't be righ'...this can't be." "YOU RUINED MY LIFE! DO YOU KNOW WHAT HAPPENED TO ME AFTER I GOT EXPELLED, FUCKFACE?!" The front doors of the high school revealed itself, opening out from the kitchen as he saw his entire world start to break, falling, crackling with shredded tears as he saw his alma mater crumbling as his memory struggled to hold on. The sky was turning pale behind them, like rotting skin upon the bleached bones of the desert. Carlos stood with thick brown boots before Roy who dominated him on the steps, wearing his V-neck sweater whilst crossing his arms towards his former friend who screamed violently. "YOU FUCKING SHIT, WHY DID YOU DO THAT?!" "You almost killed sumbody...you KNEW she wuz allergic. You can't resist, you got a problem." "YOU'RE the problem here Roy, YOU RUINED MY LIFE! MY FAMILY ARE FUCKING PISSED, THEY DON'T EVEN WANNA KNOW I EXIST ANYMORE! I HAD PLANS TO BECOME SOMETHING GREAT, I WAS GONNA BE SOMEBODY UNTIL YOU RUINED IT!" "You ruined it yourself, because you couldn't learn to stop fucking around with other people's lives for shits an' giggles." "I THOUGHT WE WERE FRIENDS!" "We were. Once. Now you gone too far, whut ahm ah supposed to do?! Let you stay on an' call it a prank?" "YES, because that's what it was you fucking LOSER!" "An' when you actually kill sumbody?! Because ah didn't get you expelled, ah know you Carlos! Ah know thuh shit you did, ah know whut kinda pranks you always pull and you've gotten worse!" "FUCK YOU ROY! FUCK YOU!" He lunged towards the utahraptor but Roy was too high above the steps, slamming his shoe fiercely into Carlos' head and sending him back down before crushing his cheek. He didn't stomp, but he pressed his foot upon him heavily to make the coyote scream in furious seething pain. "G-GET OFF! YOU FUCKING BITCH I'LL SHOW YOU!" "Whut's thuh matter? Can't you take a joke?" "YOU MOTHERFUCKING SHIT!" Roy stepped off of him very briefly to grab him by the neck with one hand whilst grappling his arms fiercely tight, shutting down his wrists in an almost police-like maneuver whilst holding him down on the ground. He bent down towards him and snarled thickly into the coyote's ear: "You ever come back to this school...ahm gonna make sure you end up in prison. Ah don't make friends with fuckin' psychopaths." "You...y-y-you scumbitch fuckface...you're gonna pay for this Roy. I swear it... I'll fucking kill you." "And I almost did." Carlos grinned with utmost pride as Roy felt his heart crush inside itself. "I almost did, if it wasn't for that bitch neighbour of yours calling people, so I grab the knife and leave. I mean, not that anyone found it at the scene...so I ran. I ran away...and you never... ever...found me again because you got all caught up in some other business. Someone else just whisked you away...because-" "All the details fit," said FG. "You were just a big strong orphan with a bright future completely lost...and a raptor. You had no strings attached on you. You were perfect for the A.R.M.E to just simply take away, and all they had to do...was simply lie to you." "No...n-n-n-no, n-no no no..." He crumpled to his knees feeling everything inside of him start to break. He couldn't stop his tears, his face contorting up into a vicious inflection of horror and agony. Darkness took him as everywhere around him he saw black tentacles. The same ones he had always seen in his journey inside himself, flickering with spasms of frenzy with a life of their own, tears dripping from every single root and stem that flowered free into ugly welts of gloom and despair. Carlos spread his arms and began laughing as the black filth spread around him, pulsating out of his brown cloak as the water coursed freely from the tendrils across the entire floor, twitching towards Roy. They searched for him, blindly, grasping at everything as he heard sounds from off in the distance. Buildings were falling, glass and concrete, stone and mortar, crumbling between streets as he felt the quaking of sorrow. His agony burnt into him, and through all of this turmoil that shrieked with shattering sounds of explosive fury, he heard Carlos never stop laughing. "Hhhhahahahahahahaha, HAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHHAHAA! OHHHHH GUESS WHAT ROY?! YOU REALLY DID SEE MY GREATEST PRANK! Maybe it wasn't April Fool's but it made YOU the biggest FUCKING FOOL that ever walked this earth!" "N-no...n-no this, THIS ISN'T IT! THIS CAN'T BE-.... NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" Destruction deafened his ears as the city started to fall from around him. He blacked out, just the same as he did at the end of his most bitter memory. His scream echoed throughout his mind scape with grief consuming his vision.

He woke up what felt like ages later, his eyes blinking through the debris that laid all around him. His residence no longer existed, his house and sanctum completely destroyed and covered in mortar chunks. Grey dust covered his body as he began to shiver from the deep cold in his heart. He struggled to remember the face of Carlos cackling upon his misfortune. It all connected. Everything finally. It was the worst truth he could ever unveil. "Roy?" He heard James from behind him. "Roy...get up." He laid in the crumpled ruins of his home, feeling the bodies of his parents beneath him. "Roy...what are you doing?" He closed his eyes. "Please...p-please say something. I-i'm here for you Roy, I jus-" "Leave." The dust poured into his mouth in a single breath. "It's...over." "What do you mean?!" "You did it. You found thuh truth. Now ah have nuthin' to live for." "Th-that's not true. I wanted you to find the truth because I-" "Whut?" He blinked open to stare towards the grey thickening sky, of constant clouds where sunlight never would reach him again. "There's nuthin' left, James. Mah best friend, thuh one ah turned mah back on because he almost killed someone with a prank...a sadistic creep that got slowly worse over thuh years...ah know he wuzn't lahk that...he just got worse on his own an' ah wuz too stupid to see it. Until a girl almost died. All his jokes, all his shit...they started out as dumb kid shit but when we got to high school...he just got worse. Ah shoulda learned. Ah shoulda found a way to...to stop him, why did mah parents let him in?" "You can't do anything about it." "Which is why ahm not leavin'." "What?" "Leave me here. Ahm home finally. Where ah wuz supposed to be, dead with mah parents...mah family...so ah could never feel this pain ever again." "Roy don't, p-please no, d-don't go back to this." "It's mah fault. Ah should have seen thuh signs, ah should have told mah family not to let him in. Ah thought I did...but I wuz too ashamed to even acknowledge him as mah friend. He always came over sumtahms, he knew mah mom an' dad, he loved mah mom's cooking. Mah dad wuzn't too keen on him but...he knew I wuz good friends with him. Why didn't I tell them? I'm sorry." Gentle trickling slivers from his deep brown eyes over the dusted rock. "I'm s-s-sorry momma...I-i'm sorry daddy...I didn' wanna bring this unpleasantness into mah house...I just wanted to forget him, you both never asked questions about...you trusted me. You trusted me with mah life an' I've murdered you...h-hhhhhh..." He buried himself into the debris as he sobbed gently, muffling the dust that seeped down into his lungs as he wished he could stop breathing. He wanted to suffocate, he needed a new pain to feel suffering from, something to ignore the anguish inside his heart which became a deadened weight of roasted horror. Agony. Burning to a charred husk in his weeping heart as he felt a shadow come upon him. "I'm not leaving you." Roy said nothing. The sounds of the earth rumbled throughout his inner psyche. His mind began decaying from every inch around him as the world became lifeless. "I'm not leaving you Roy. You have a life, you're still alive...do you really think your parents want you to join them?" "S'not about whut they want...I j-just want...thuh pain to stop." "I can make the pain stop." "You...gonna...h-how? Whut can you possibly do to me?" "I'm going to help you. I'm going to be by your side, no matter what happens. I'll be here to fight off every bit of grief that you have until you're happy again." "I will never be...I've got no reason to live, James." "You do." James bent down and placed his hand upon Roy's shoulder. "I'm here. If you can't find a reason to live...then let me be your reason." "Whut?" "I will be...your reason to live. Please. I want you to live. I don't want you to be gone...I was so happy to see you...remember? When you came to me, at my home...I hugged you. I was so happy to see you." He remembered. James embraced him on the front doorstep, his arms wrapped round him tightly as his voice shook. "You...y-you're okay...h-holy shit you're okay, you're alright I jus-...wh-what happened? What...wh-where've you gone, wh-where'd you go?!" He pulled back with eyes glistening in gasping tears. "Where did you go Roy?" "Why do you care about me?" "Because you're a victim. Just like me." "Wh-whut?" "You lost your family. Just like me. You were turned into a weapon...just like me. I managed to live a life afterwards. I just want you to have the same thing." He turned his head slowly towards James Kennidon. His eyes glinted green, purest of intent. Something inside Roy flickered with a refusal to give in. Was it his stubbornness? Or was it the fact he knew he still had one true friend as he reached to grab his hand? "Please." His fingers twitched from the rubble. "P-p-please help me. J-james." He felt a hand grasp him. Pulled him up slowly as he staggered onto his feet, a sound of thunder off in the distance. Was it thunder? No. Roy knew it to be something deeper, something monstrous rumbling through his very being. "I'll help you," said James. "But first we have to get through something." "Huh?" "...we have...to get through this." Both turned their heads towards the source of the trembling sound across the scape. His city was now gone as simply ruins upon the scorched earth stretching towards the Hudson Bay with not a single beam of sunlight ever breaking through beneath the stormclouds. Nothing for miles, except for one thing. A great evil. A monstrous being of loathsome proportions. Two towers that remained with something black and shrieking between them, resonating throughout the gone city. The sound of its scream broke him down to tears as Roy asked pleading: "Whut...wh-wh-whut is that? Wh-why is it screaming?" "That...is your Grief." He turned towards James. "You have to overcome your Grief. Just like you always needed to for the past twentty years." "H-h-how...do I even start?" "It's your mind Roy. How would you fight it?" He struggled to think, the sorrow dwelling deep enough to stifle his thoughts from becoming clear as he forced logic to push through. His hands clenched, he pushed them into his eyes as he shuddered with aching fear. "A-a-ah dunno how. After all these years, h-how thuh fuck do you expect me to do this?" "Then ask me. I can help you Roy." "H-h-help me. James, p-please...help me." "Alright. Come on." James grasped his hands together within his. "Let's finish our story, together." A light shone within them, brightening until Roy felt himself to be blinded as the word suddenly shifted from his feet. His body became weightless. Warmth filled him as he felt James' presence against him. Embraced with him. The light soon faded as he found himself floating before the twin skyscrapers. The black horror known as Grief appeared between them at a height of 1400 feet, a mountain of madness that screamed from inside its necrotic clutches. Its body was but a root of infinite sorrow, twisting out of the concrete city block with many thousand writhing naked shrieking creatures. Formless backs and limbs crawled underneath the effluence, dripping tentacles of formless tenebrism huge and swollen as they wrapped round the twin towers crushing them against its body. The sound of glass and steel creaked with shrieking agony that only further added to the Grief's eternal sufferance. Its eyes resembled that of an insect, multilensed with two-dozen broken mirrors that bled down upon its gaping mouth. Not even darkness escaped from within its maw. Roy could not speak. He felt James behind him as every touch the raptor made brought strength to him. "I won't leave you. Please...fight it. Fight it for me." Slowly hovering in a gentle circle around the great Grief, Roy tried his best to think of some means to fight against it. His mind was sinking into despair, his eyes bursting from the pain. The only thing he could think of was a blast from his hand, forcing a cracking shot as his steel fist sculpted itself into a pure blue steel cannon, trying to be tactical as he aimed for the creature's head. It did nothing, so he fired again. Nothing happened, as if repelling his shots before he tried using ice instead. Piercing with a spear of brilliant white and blue, it shattered forth towards the monstrosity but still it did nothing. Crackling harsh upon its foetid goo, the Grief did not even dare attack as Roy tried to summon his flames shrieking hot. Firing a rain of death upon the most grievous beast, he amplified the force of his flame with pulsing strength, imagination run wild as he tried to remember the walls of Jericho. He brought forth almost biblical destruction, the greatest fires upon the earth pummelling through the city, crashing, exploding. But still it did not wound Grief itself, a shield forming across both it and the twin towers almost protecting them as a voice came from it. Deep and austere with a forced evasive.

**_I AM NOT WEAK

I HAVE NEVER BEEN WEAK

IF I EVER SHOWED MY WEAKNESS...THEN EVIL SHALL WIN

I CANNOT LET THEM WIN

I CANNOT_**

"...weakness...weakness, thassit." His mind tried to think, pushing logic through its greatest hurdle. "If I ever showed my weakness...that means it has to have one! James!" The raptor's arms wrapped themselves from behind him to signify his presence. "This monster's got a weakness, some part of it that it's denying! If I can just find it, then attack it I can-" "How are you gonna do that, you can't even hurt one piece of it!" "Doesn't matter, it's not about hurtin' thuh weakest part, it's KNOWING thuh weakest part!" "Alright...antagonise the huge monster the size of a skyscraper sure. We're annoying enough, let's do this! You have an idea how to fight it?" "Yeah...I do. Turn round, put your back against me." "Why?" "Trust me!" Wings sprouted from between their backs at Roy's behest from deep inside his imagination, twitching writhing mechanical wings that cracked and snapped open of shining purest blue. Attached between both of their backs, strapping them together within tight harnesses was a large cranked machine somewhat reminiscent of a turbine, pumping raw steam into a thick flapping gust as the dual wings kept them flying above the Grief-consumed structures. A large steam pipe squealed above their heads, goggles swiftly wrapping themselves onto their heads. "Wh-what the hell is THIS?!" "Me an' thuh professor got up to sum crazy tricks. Well this wuz one of 'em...we had to take down an airship over New York once, I never had thuh chance to tell you about this story did I?" "N-NO?!" "Well..." Guns swiftly appeared in their hands, James' pair red and Roy's pair blue with all four guns attached by a thin tube towards the machine between their backs, harnessing a strange residual energy. "Maybe I oughta show you." Roy fired across the sky with several dozen flames of reddish darkness that tore like bullets deep through the infernal form of Grief, despite nothing affecting it. He covered an entire section that he focused on towards the right tower trying to find and expose a potential point of weakness. "SWITCH OUT!" He spun himself round with James suddenly taking forward charge, firing his own spray bullets of an equal numbered dozen coloured bluish-white. Nothing seemed to work, but the raptor's striking volley down towards the left tower seemed to create a small shudder from within Grief as he spotted something. "THERE! D-DOWN LOWER LEFT!" "WHUT?!" cried Roy behind him. "I SAW SOMETHING MOVE, IT REACTED WHEN I FIRED DOWN ON IT!" "FOCUS ALL YOU GOT, CUZ HERE WE GO!" They flapped down closer towards it by an instinct of his memory as Roy controlled the flying machine with a strangely perfect expert precision despite its odd incredulous nature. He swooped upon the sensitive part, a large quivering mass almost reminiscent of a giant pus-filled embryo that twitched and shuddered far more than the rest of its inconceiveable body. He fired both guns emptying his entire ammunition, a shrieking revelry of black fire sculpted like ink, whistling volleys of bullets spreading back and forth until he switched with FG to recharge his weaponry. The raptor of brown scale poured everything he had upon it, seeing almost crack as the invisible shield that formed through Grief began to carve into itself, a bending light shattering through completely as it exposed one of its weak points. The pustule bled itself free and showed within its craterous skin a poor mimic of James himself, brown and lumpen with the barest resemblance and purple scars across its body like a malformed foetus without eyes or mouth, feeding off of Grief itself with umbilical cord pumped into its head. "I am not weak...he was the one that did it...he destroyed everything...it could not have been anyone else but him." "Sayonara." James blasted his cloned mimic free of existence with a double spray of whitened fire, devastating to a pulp of black ichor as suddenly Grief began to scream with a new sound from its throat. Shockwaves pulsated from the colossal state as both raptors went flying powerfully across the city block, struggling to regain their composure as they heard its scream. Then it started to change shape. The tentacles suddenly pulled back, twisting and crackling with the sound of a million snapping bones in succession fracturing across itself, dislocating effluvial limbs before hiding them behind the towers, slipping them back from their view. The skyscrapers were impaled violently with a screech of structural agony, tormenting twisting turns of raw steel and brittle glass falling like rain upon the ruined city, a skull-shattering implosion that almost deafened them by a sheer piercing sound as its tentacles combined into two thick sheer lengths, blood pulsating from every orifice down its arms showing them to be a luscious red with a voice burning of vitriolic confrontation.

**_I DESPISE YOU

HOW DARE YOU DESECRATE ME

I SHALL DESTROY YOU

I SHALL EXTERMINATE YOUR ANCESTRY

YOUR FAMILIES SHALL BURN BENEATH ME_**

The monster began its attack, swinging with vile lengths that soared above their heads with the force of sonic booms, like screaming engines as Roy dodged with FG behind him. "YOU DID IT!" cried FG. "YOU GOT HIM MAD!" "Y-YEAH! Alrigh'...he's dropped his shield, now whut?!" "What's different about him now-WOAH!" Their wings struggled to swoop beneath and above the massive tentacles, whirling like the baseball bat to a tiny moth where even the very sweep of its reckoning was enough to power into them. The fierce gust from the aftershock of its swing tore across their skin, rippling like a cold shearing wind upon a mountaintop as Roy gritted his teeth. "AIM FOR THUH HEAD!" When nothing else came to mind, it was always good to attack the face itself, knowing that it now had no defence against them as they spun and spiralled as one between the huge blood-born lengths. Dripping red flowed across the city like acid rain, scarring deep inside of the concrete as Roy did everything he could to avoid the hail of crimson death. He covered himself within a shield of almost translucent green, like a bubble to guard them but it was only brief. Just enough to stop the few first drops of rain but not the entire storm. They weathered through towards the head as they fired upon it, the FinalGamer starting first as he desecrated the left eye, his white fire-steeped bullets shattering upon the multiparalleled glass like a giant fly's compounded pupils. With a sound like crackling thin ice he saw that part of its head began to crumble as if losing its load-bearing weight, before switching himself out to let the Knight of Daventry take the second shot. Scorching darkness with seething vermilion lines traced around all of his bullet flames tore apart the windows to its soul. Its head caved in on itself but it was not done yet, the vile retina strands of its eyes bleeding out before hardening to solid lengths, red thickening blood becoming two bristling arms of human skin, wielding a sword and shield with a bear's roaring face. "I despise you...you are responsible for everything that exists in my world...disgusting halfbreed, subhuman WRETCH!" "Not this tahm Jarl." The black raptor tore apart both eyes' protectors with a pitiful resistance from them, the sword crumpling like cardboard as its arm was shot completely through into giant vicious wounds ripping apart the raw flesh. Its shield did no better, punching holes through it as its entire head began to collapse completely. Screams started forming once again from its morbid throat, a turgid belch that would gust an evil wind forcing the two flying raptors to be repelled once again miles from the beast. From inside its throat, vomiting forth a new black gore across its corpulent monstrosity sleek of darkest sheen to catch the light nonexistent, was a strange structure that resembled a shining golden pyramid. Floating out from within its grieving corpse, it settled its giant base upon the crushed remains of its former head before opening a gargantuan singular eye as its tentacles contorted, shortening back into the twisted steel and glass of the twin towers. The grand red limbs became a purest green of copper rust, pushing themselves out from the top of the building's roofs as they formed into giant hands, turning the skyscrapers into almost like a throne.

**_I WILL BE YOUR SOLDIER

I WILL BECOME WHATEVER YOU WISH

I WILL OBEY EVERY NEED

I WILL SACRIFICE MYSELF

SO LONG AS YOU REWARD ME WITH MY PEACE_**

"Thuh fuck is it doing now?!" asked Roy. "I don't know," replied FG, "but if attacking the eyes worked before I think we need to hit that pyramid hard!" "Ahm on it, wait wh-wh-whut, WHUT'S HAPPENIN'?!" The world suddenly twisted, bending half of itself into a ruthless violent spiral as half the city curved around them, the horizon now beneath them and the ground to their left with the sky above directly on their right. Grief remained on its "seat", grand fingers of copper green rattling upon the roofs of the skyscraper before one of its hands lifted up towards them. Reality twisted as they found themselves within the swamp of Mz. Ruby's home, hovering above Roy's body still unconscious upon the stone slab. James stood watching motionless next to the gator, whilst both raptors still at arms saw the singular pyramid eye now a shadow above them. Its hand reached out towards Roy's body, grasping at his hand and twisting it to a violent snap. "A-AAAAAAAAAARGH!" "ROOOOY!" "NNNNNGH! M-MAH HAND, N-NOOOO!" "SH-SHIT, FUCK LEMME- AAAAGH MY EYES! _" The other hand swung out to plunge its fingers deep into the real world James', blinding his eyes powerfully and even in reality the raptor stumbled falling back screaming as blood poured from his face. "_I CAN'T SEE! I CAN'T SEEEEE! _" "_J-JUST...NO! FOCUS, WE HAVE TO BEAT THIS, THIS IS NOT HAPPENING!" "BUT I CAN FEEL HIM IN MY SKULL, FUCKING CHRIST IT HUUUURTS! _" "_LISTEN TO ME! WE ALREADY BEAT HIM TWICE, WE CAN DO IT, YOU SAID YOU'D NEVER LEAVE ME, NOW YOU PROMISE?!" "AH...a-a-alright...a-alright jesus f-fuck...you tell me what to do." "Alrigh', let's find him fir-SHIT!" A giant coin suddenly dropped into the scene causing their entire world to ripple like a pool of water. They pulled back even further showing they were now within a giant wishing well reflecting in the moonlight, or perhaps they had shrunk to fit within it as the world began to rain from above. Fluttering April showers that soon became torrential floods as the well filled up. Water consumed them despite desperately trying to cling onto the rocks yet their steam-infused machine of flight never seemed to lose its power from Roy's determination. They burst from beneath an ocean of purest yellow stars, sparkling everywhere from around them as they watched the moon brilliant in white. It softly turned rotating upon its axis before it blinked, flattening itself to a giant craterous oval before Roy suddenly grabbed one of the stars themselves with his single-useable hand. "WISH UPON THIS, MUTHAFUCKER!" Shimmering with a mighty throw worthy of a field goal, the star shot across the great endless night like a purest tailing comet striking the very eye of the pyramid beast, crying out in violent anguish as the illusion shattered suddenly. Roy felt his hand's control regained whilst FG could see the world once again, back inside the great city of ruin. They wasted no opportunity to fly straight inside the pyramid itself, smashing through the wounded eye like a sheet window and seeing the true creature that hid within. It was a perfect recreation of General Guston himself, seated upon a throne of steel and paper documents forming legal gibberish on the seatrest behind him. "I will be your soldier...I will destroy every enemy that you seek, as long as you give me what I most desire from this world...my peace from this pain." "Deal's off," said FG. "You never woulda given me peace anyway," replied Roy. Spinning together throughout the solid pyramid-shaped room, they scattered their bullets, black and white ricocheting off the walls which destroyed the thinning paint. Gold was not within this place, but instead a poor imitation showing rusted copper and filth wedged inbetween the bricks, before the fire burned straight upon the steel throne which in turn revealed its truth. Nothing but wood within paper as it melted completely, along with Guston who he himself was also made of cheap bark. The entire room became ignited in flames before the floor suddenly swallowed them into a deep evanescent abyss. Falling forevermore, they soon realised that it was not gravity that brought them down since they felt a stronger force. Something much more fierce and constant in its field of influence almost physically pulling them by their flesh and bone with sudden density as if falling towards the surface of Jupiter. At the very bottom, within the pit of nothingness, they found its ominous source in the form of a giant twisted gasping abomination in the crippled form of Roy himself. It was twenty feet long and seven feet wide, emaciated to a skeletal revenant whilst being bound in tendrils thickening that slowly would strangle him.

**_THERE IS NOTHING LEFT FOR ME

ALL I WANT IS PEACE AND SILENCE

LET ME DIE...PLEASE

LET ME STOP THIS PAIN INSIDE OF ME

LET ME SLEEP...FOREVER_**

They landed upon the bare concrete floor, realising it was the city still at the very foundation of Grief's root within the monster's internal shell as Roy saw that his other form would not attack them. They felt no malice, no fiendish hatred from it. Only sadness as they felt the water pooling around his eternal weeping husk cradled within the sorrowful glinting tentacles. The raptors looked at each other and began to throw away their steam-crafted weapons, knowing what to do. James brought out his scissors, whilst Roy brought out his longsword as they carefully began to cut through the tendrils of flesh. It never seemed to attack them, or even try to prevent their severing of its host as they hacked away, being precise as they could whilst the thin cadaverous self simply stared up at them blankly. His eyes were burning red with white pupils as he weeped a constant stream without making a sound from his throat. Yet every cut they made, Roy himself felt a deeper pain tearing at his heart which soon became unbearable. "S-s-stop." He knelt onto the floor. "S-stop...p-please, ah need to think." "No." His friend stood with a hand before him. "I know it hurts. But you have to keep pushing." "I-i-i-i...don't...g-god it hurts." "I know. But you have to keep going." In his mind he knew that he was right, and so Roy did everything he could to resist the increasing pain with every tearing slash they could make. Ripping apart what felt to him as the very life essence of his body, feeling as if he were cutting out his own heart with every severing of its tendrils like they were blood vessels, he pushed ahead with stifling pealing sounds of thin screaming sorrow. His anguish started to reach an unquenchable level of torment that sent him dizzying with a vomiting sensation, a sickening heat of illness that twisted deeper into his body. "P-p-p-please...please...s-s-stop." "You're almost there...I know you've got this." "I-i-i...just...w-want it to end." "I'm here. Just keep going." Roy MacGregor gasped with silent howls of a thick shivering agony as his hands simply spasmed, dropping his sword at the very altar of his Grief. James saw there was a few last restraints left as he opened his blades fully to snag them fully within its grasp. He gave one of its handles over towards his friend. "Come on. We'll do this together." "N-n-no...no, please...everytime you cut one of these i-i-it hurts." "I know it does. I want to free you, but you have to keep going." "G-g-god...please m-make it sto-op." "One more. I promise you. That's it." His hand shook with increasing trepidation, spasms of raw internal screaming that poured deep down his throat as his whole body shuddered with an ache that never ceased. He grabbed faintly upon the handle of the scissors as the two slowly pushed towards each other. The scraping tear of the sharp scissorblades cutting apart the very last tendrils of Grief. It was the only thing that kept his greater self from staying together as the moment the restraints fell, so too did the husk itself crumbling like the dead skeletal residents of an ancient tomb as his withered form scattered upon the floor, showing something had been inside of it. A large wooden coffin. There was only silence inside the great abyss, no place else to go but a shining light that came glinting from above illuminating the sarcophagus. He gathered his strength, gently forcing himself to stand up as he grasped his claws upon the side of the oaken casket. He pushed the lid carefully sliding off to clunk thickly upon the floor in a clatter. "Oh...o-o-ohhh...g-god in heaven..." It was his family. Mother and father, their eyes closed in a still neutral state neither happy nor in misery. They looked so strangely at peace, their hands clasping each other wearing their simplest clothes, not a single drop of blood laid upon them. But there were tears soon staining upon their shirts. "N-n-n-no...m-momma...daddy..." He knelt against the coffin's side, shock resonating through him as his eyes started to run once again. His voice shook, trembling lost and quiet at first as it shuddered with his breath. He finally wept his truest grief. He pressed his head forwards, his eyes burying into his arms crossed together underneath his head as he started sobbing with heaving shoulders that shadowed across his family's resting place. His father's shirt became wet, dripping onto his mother's in turn as he raised his head up only once. To scream. His eyes shined in the light above him, screeching with his voice that howled throughout the dark abyss. Screaming. Sobbing, only ever stopping to take in his breath with stuttering. Whimpering. Crying out for their names as he always knew them, his claws tightly gripped upon the casket as he felt his neck trembling. Wettening. Glistening in the soft eternal light. He threw his hands forwards, desperate to hug his parents, pulling them close together as he shrieked deeper into the coffin. His hands felt warm. His cheeks were hot. Their bodies remained cold forever after. Whatever time passed did not exist to him as he grieved for them. He grieved all he could until his eyes turned scratchy. Dry. Blistering with a crackling red trace, a bloodshot lament that never ceased. He pulled his family closer, squeezing them tightly. He wished they would open their eyes. He hoped they would touch him once more. He begged them to speak. But all he ever heard was his own painful desolation. There was no strength left in him, but to weep as he slumped upon the casket. Even when he stopped screaming, his tears would never stop until much, much later. Soon as he began to pull back from his family's coffin, falling down upon his knees as he stared before them, he felt a set of hands upon his shoulders as someone hugged him. He bowed his head forwards as a silent gasping scream panted out from him. Painful. Stifling. Bursting out of the misery from his burning heart as the light slowly began to overwhelm him, blinding his vision through the tears. "I'm sorry...i-i-i'm sorry...I'm sorry I'm s-sorry I'm-" "Shhhh." He heard James' voice. "It's alright. It's going to be okay." He woke up.

I FORGIVE YOU

Roy found himself within James' arms, the raptor hugging tightly against his nemesis as he felt his cheeks almost burn like acid against James' glistening wet shoulder. He shuddered gently, whimpering against the brown scaled body who clutched him tighter rocking gently back and forth. Mz. Ruby said nothing, but she knew exactly what had happened from the shift in Roy's aura that day as they simply waited for Roy to cease his shedding tears, the raptors not saying anything between them until he was done mourning. He knew that it would take time, he knew that it would be hard, but they had achieved the greatest hurdle of them all as Roy felt his mind turn piercing sharp with clarity despite his eyes remaining full of grief, emptying out of him by even the smallest of tricklets. "Th-thank you...hoh...th-th-thank you James...thank you...th-thank you for findin' out thuh truth for me." "It wasn't all about me. It was you. Me and Mz. Ruby just...had to give you the key but you had to go through. I knew you would do it." "A-a-ah don't...ah don't know h-how to thank you both...h-hoh jesus..." "I don't need anything. I just want you to be okay...okay Roy?" "Y-yeah...ah know...ahm just, I...I need to be sumplace...where ah can think about things." "I know a place. Why don't you and me and Mz. Ruby just relax for a couple days...and then I'll go find you a perfect place to be?" "A-a-alrigh'...you won't...you won't leave me?" "I promise you. I promise I won't leave you." "Th-...th-th-thank you...you saved me...I will never forget you...for whut you did for me." He smiled gladly. James stayed with him as promised for the next few days in Mz. Ruby's house, talking away about pointless things as Roy recuperated from his recumberance. His emotional state was fragile, but his mind had become clear as day with a brighter sense of the future ahead of him. He had no idea where he could go, but he knew at least one thing. He had found his truth. He had no reason to tie himself to the past ever again. And soon James would find a perfect place for him around three days later, when he returned back to Koopin. His husband opened the door with a smile on his beak, with tender blue eyes widening upon seeing James himself smile in return before gently stepping to one side. Roy stood behind him showing weak but gentle eyes of simple brown from his blue-ringed pupils as he bent down slightly to shake Koopin's hand. He gladly grasped it in return before inviting him in, with James following lastly to close the door behind him. From inside that house, there would be sounds laughter, there would be cries of joy. There would be the sound of a chain chomp barking around with sudden frightful excitement before soon there came a crashing inside the place. There would be the shouting of great frustration from both James and Koopin panicking whilst Roy would simply laugh in startlement at such a beast, who jumped up upon him to slather his face in hot drool welcoming him into their home. He laughed until he cried sweetly in merriment, despite having landed head over heels onto the floor from the couch to almost hit his head against the front door, with a steel ball almost crushing his weight against him. And yet he laughed still from a warmth that came freshly anew in his heart from something he had never felt in years, something that he knew was simply happiness. Surrounded by those who cared about him. Roy would find his own life eventually in the Mushroom Kingdom, his own house, his own place to stay with his own job and station in life wholly anew but he never forgot his friends. He would visit them every day, at least once to say hello, banter with James, play with Charlie with no fear for the chain chomp and his brutish ways or simply become close with Koopin as they shared topics on food, cooking and cartoons that they both enjoyed so soon they would end up bonding very quickly. He never left the Mushroom Kingdom again after that day, with no need or want to ever do so again. There were no places left to visit, no heroes in need, no loose ends left unrequited. He would find happiness in the company of two friends, one of whom had become his closest and dearest friend of all that he ever had. The one friend he had who had never given up on him, his nemesis truly. The A.R.M.E's legacy had ended that day, when James Kennidon nee Campbell and Roy MacGregor had finally formed the deepest of friendships. The truth had finally set him free.

THE END