I vaulted deeper into the store as the car behind me was sent flying through its front window. Maximal and Egregore caught up to me immediately, but smashing through walls was only so effective as a means of chase. It was better as a means of escape.

And so, I ran into the back while they were coughing up rubble trying to get a clear lock on my position. I could just keep moving in the meantime.

They weren't stupid, I knew. When the white-suited Hero came straight through the next wall ready to hurl a piece of rebar at me, I was expecting it. That didn't mean I could simply dodge it, though.

I held out one of my last two remaining spider-legs and attempted to block the projectile, but I was unprepared for just how fast it was going. Luckily, it failed to travel in a straight line, otherwise it would have absolutely gored me. Instead, it simply bounced off with a loud crack, and I could feel as the exoskeleton shattered. The limb was completely wasted.

"Hold still you fuck!" Egregore shouted, raising her hands again, this time with a Power seemingly already in mind.

I was by no means about to hold still.

I shot off the mangled leg to skew her aim. And, with my narrow dodge, I barely survived.

The space I had been standing in before was completely blown away. The back of the building was shredded, right along with the building behind that. I shuddered to think what the original, undampened form of this Power looked like. There were constant explosions going on outside, and I was sure it was just part of the cacophony, somewhere.

Egregore seemed drained from her attack, allowing me to escape in the split second of Maximal's distraction with her. I sprinted then, going straight into the passage they had conveniently made for me.

In there I saw bits of gore. Not clear, Martian blood, but bright red blood and bone.

Friendly fire, I thought. She should have held back.

Suddenly, Egregore appeared in front of me out of nowhere. She manifested from thin air via a teleportation Power, her hands wrapping quickly around my outstretched arms, grabbing me at the wrist with a vice-grip. Those same hands of hers glowed with white-hot light, and they immediately started to burn through my chitinous shields.

She had gotten ahead of herself, though, leaving Maximal behind. The further she was from the source of her Power, the weaker it was. And now with at least three in her roster, I knew that her protections would be dampened. I didn't go for the kill because I wasn't sure I had it. I couldn't take any chances, here.

Instead, the razor edges of my final spare limb went quickly out, raking over her pretty face. And that would be enough. She recoiled in pain, immediately going to cover her now bloodied face. For the moment, she was blinded by the salty sting of blood.

I moved to duck out and around her after that and make my final getaway, but there was one last piece of bad luck in store for me.

I cried out as my final leg was ripped from its socket at my back, pulled off by the Hero who'd caught up. He would have gone straight for my neck after that, but I wasn't so fazed that I couldn't complete my escape, though stumbling in pain. Once he caught sight of Egregore, Maximal stopped to help her, and that was all the space I needed.

I'd put up a good fight, but without my spider-legs now, I couldn't keep it up. One more direct confrontation with the two of them and I was as good as dead.

If Paradise couldn't find my backup, I would just have to make do with the Martians again, even though they were seriously struggling with the higher-class Heroes. It was dangerous, but another gang-up might work.

Doubtful. They'll be expecting it. And these ones can fly.

That meant I had to get out on the street again. Yet, everywhere I turned, I only found another hallway inside the building I was in.

At some point, my panicked sprint began to slow, and I looked around at where I was.

"Where are all the windows?" I said, turning frantically.

This can't be right.

It was like I had stumbled into an endless back room. Even as I turned around to retrace my steps, the passageways looked different. Where I should have reversed my steps and taken a left turn, there was only a right.

Immediately, I knew this had to be a Power; just like the one I'd run into back in Central America. Only this time I didn't have my own damn abilities to escape it.

This would be a hell of a poor way to die, I realized.

"Wait a minute." I turned around in circles. "There's no way there's two of such a powerful Type. This has got to be an illusion. Some kind of mental projection that just mimics a similar result."

"Not quite," I heard a voice say.

Oh shit.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

I turned, ready for a fight, but I didn't see anyone. The sound had been coming from right behind me.

This is bad, I thought. My hands were mangled. I wouldn't be much of an opponent.

"Take a seat, Walter. We need to talk."

I swirled around again, and this time I did see something. A man was there, and he had pulled up a steel chair, turning it around backward so he could prop up his arms as he stared at me. He merely gestured to the second chair, which had also appeared at my side.

We were no longer in a hallway now, but an open, carpeted room. Dull fluorescent lights buzzed overhead.

"What is this?" I demanded.

The man had a shaved head, though he was young in face. He had a mustache, and there was something off about him that spoke of a different time. Like the style of his grey suit, he was dated. But maybe it was just the tiredness in his eyes.

"I said take a seat," he repeated.

Not seeing any way out but through, I obliged, then repeated my question. "What's going on here?"

At this, the man smiled. "You already know who I am and you already know how all of this is going to end. I could put it in my own words, but then we might be here for hours. So, why don't you tell me? Who am I?"

I sighed, slumping down into my chair and taking a deep breath. Adrenaline was still pumping in my veins from moments before, and even though this was a bad situation, it was a respite. One more crazy god-man like before on the moon.

Still, my body rebelled. I was amped up and ready to keep fighting. I didn't have time to slow down and chat with this asshole.

"What?" I asked, my burnt face grinning, "Now you want to negotiate?"

He slowly clapped. "See, you're a sharp one."

"Well, you can forget about it," I spat. "You're right that I know how this is going to end. And I don't need to meet you or know anything about you to know that I'm going to destroy everything you've created. So you can just fuck off, Seraph. I'm not changing my mind."

"I figured you might say that. And fair enough. If you're determined to see it through, then let it be so. I'm content to remain what I've been. That great and powerful Oz behind the curtain. I just felt you might want to meet me before this is all over."

"I figured that I would meet you when I killed you, sometime after I set up base on your precious North Circle. If I met you before then, you'd probably never shut up."

He shook his head. "Here. Let me show you something."

As we both looked, he pointed me over to the wall where a door had appeared. Through its threshold, he opened up a portal back to the battlefield. Not exactly where I had left it, but across the street with a perfect view of Maximal, angrily shouting at the corner. He was calling for me to come out, but his voice was distant and hollow.

"I can cut to the chase, Walter," Seraph said. "There is no greater plot here. The reason I want to find the Logician is that he needs to be killed. You can hear me out as to why, or you can step through that door."

"Why, then?" I asked.

"Why do you do what you do? Why does anyone do what they do? Because they think it's the right choice. And despite what some men have said, we try to make the choices that we think are innate in us. We try to act as we think the world ought to be. Not as a matter of freedom, but as a matter of nature. We are all of us attempting to be good machines. And you are the best machine, dear Walter. And the worst machine."

"Why do you say that?"

"Because the man on the moon spoke truly. As my old friend said, you are the Logician's greatest disciple. You, more than anyone, carry out his will to stop history in its track and keep the wheel of suffering turning. You fetishize it as a return to nature, ironically against nature's course."

"So what? You just want me to step aside while you bring about the end of the only thing that makes life worth living? Because that's all you achieve by taking away struggle with technology. The moment it makes reality an option is the moment everything we loved dies. No more truth. No more meaning. Just endless, suffocating control." My cynicism was thick.

But he vehemently disagreed. "I don't expect suffering and hierarchy to just disappear. But they will become voluntary. Once the physical limitations of our existence are removed and we become entirely digital, we will be in the perfect care of perfect machines. Our lives will be a flourishing piece of art without end. Like the artist, our struggle will be an object of pure self-expression."

"That's not going to happen, though. Goddammit." I stood up to pace. If I ran out the door now, I'd be faced to face with Maximal. I wouldn't survive.

"All you see is the transitioning phase," he said. "The Logician is carrying out a ritual over the Earth. He is flooding it with Powers. It's not me who creates them as you might have been told, but him. He has continued to spread chaos exactly in the hopes of creating one as powerful as you, Walter. He is no God, but a kind of dark sorcerer. The price for this ritual, though, was the creation of myself and the Iron Tyrant. Equals who might oppose him."

"Look," I said. "Even if I could call off this battle now, I don't see any reason why I should just leave Earth to your vision. Its where I was born, and I have a right to care about its destiny."

"For someone who believes so strongly in affirming life, you have so little respect for the path its chosen. You and the Logician both. You're afraid of life's most defining feature. Rising complexity."

"Nothing comes next!" I shouted. "I would think being told that by a literal God in a cave all those years ago would have fucking got through to you." At this point, I just wanted him to shut up and let me get back to fighting. There was no point to this conversation. I would just have to take my chances.

"I understand that you can't stop this fight," he said. "But I can protect you until it is done. I can keep you safe in these halls until I have prepared a ship for you to take back. Then, you merely need to say the word, and Creep will obey you. Tell him to leave this solar system and go to make your own story. Let Earth have hers."

"I won't, because I know you're wrong. You're just trying to demoralize me because you know you can't win, and you're desperate. All you'll achieve by letting technology run its course is a lifeless universe. Some soulless, automated horror will delete you all and spend the rest of its existence strip mining in the void. Silent, forever. Nothing happens after Artificial Intelligence, because there's nothing for an omniscient being to become. I don't need to see this to know its a fact. It's why God killed himself in the beginning... chose to be us."

He simply gestured to the door. "Then you've made up your mind. I wish you luck with Eugene. That's his name by the way. Hopefully, you find some closure by killing him. I'll see to that."

I turned away without another word and stepped through the door.

He would never understand the truth, which is why I had to defeat him.

Maximal was shocked to see me appearing from thin air, but he didn't look a gift horse in the mouth. He started forward immediately to kill me. "There you are!" he called.

Just then, I saw two figures lower down from the sky. It was Foci and Paradise together, and in their arms, they were carrying a person each. Never in my life had I been so happy to see that Racist Southern Bastard or that Fascist Mexican Lunatic. My very own friends.

Egregore stepped out to join Maximal, and there wasn't a scratch on her, as she had been healed. There was only bloodthirst in her eyes, now.

I shouted with joy. "Bring it on!"