Just as the world began moving for the first time after so long, Albert made it so that it suddenly stopped yet again. But this time it was only the world that had stopped, not him. He was free to move. His eyes moved first, scanning the room even though he knew it down to the last molecule.

Then he gently slid off the weapons piercing his flesh. He felt the tip of the spear dislodge itself from his back, the sword slide out of his shoulder, and the claws tear out of his muscles. The pain was almost laughable. He hadn’t realized that after millennia of withstanding the pain, however muted, this amount was no longer a concern. Besides, he had transcended the normal limits of a flesh and blood body.

Before the weapons were even fully out of his body his flesh had mended, his clothes were repaired, and no blood had been spilled. Albert stood up and stretched, moving out of the way, stifling a yawn.

It truly was no fun, he thought as he shook his head. There was no more tension, nothing. Overwhelming power was convenient, but it robbed life of all risk, and with no risk this was nothing more than a walk in the park. At least the idea of saving his friends made it all worth it.

Lazily he walked towards Scrappy. He righted her frozen body, applying enough Power to undo all the damage done to it and restoring her to how she was before she was attacked. Then he approached Lina, touching her with his index finger. All the wounds disappeared from her body, her clothes were restored, and the blood that coated her and clung to her bare skin turned to dust blown away by an unseen wind. Then he touched her mind, and she was freed.

Lastly, he turned to the monster. He did not even give it the honour of a thought, instead snapping his fingers and making it vanish. As if it had never been in the first place. Albert did not care how such a monster had come to be, how it had learned to imitate human speech, how it managed to manipulate their minds. It was all just too far beneath him, like he did not care about how the specific concrete making the walls of the underground complex was made to resist the ages, or like he did not care about why a grain of sand was a certain shape and not another.

Healing his friends and restoring the room to his liking took the better part of an hour even with his powers. He moved slowly, methodically, thinking things through more than he used to in the past because he was not used to experiencing time like a living person anymore. After so long trapped alone, it would take a while to return to normal.

How much Power did I use? He checked with Jeff.

Less than a percent of a percent.

Good.

Time resumed its flow once again.

***

Lina found herself inexplicably, suddenly and painfully thrust back at the forefront of her own mind. After witnessing what the monster had done to her, and after having been a puppet in her own body, the last thing she expected was for things to change so suddenly.

She had been fighting, trying to wrestle back control of her own mind with all she had. So when she was put back where she belonged, the metaphorical momentum of her struggle almost made her black out. After that were the tears of happiness.

Through clouded and teary eyes she saw that around her, other inexplicable things happened. The room was restored to how it was before the commotion. The monster was nowhere to be seen. Scrappy… she panicked, searching for the small girl. Her eyes found her standing close to Albert, perfectly fine although looking just as confused as she felt.

Albert, on the other hand…

How could she even begin to explain how he looked like to her? He didn’t seem any different at a glance, and yet…

Scrappy was the first to speak, apparently voicing the same concerns.

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“You feel different.” She told him. “You are… heavier, somehow. More… here. More… you than before.”

Albert flexed, and the world bent around him. “I am.”

His voice was croaky, low and strained. As if he hadn’t used it for a long time. In fact, he looked surprised at the sound of his own voice.

Silence fell upon the three of them. Scrappy was looking expectantly at him but was saying nothing. Lina too felt weird, especially after the recent experience. But what was strangest was that they both knew that after something like this happened it was Albert who usually spoke up to defuse the tension, or asked them how they felt, or did literally anything to break the silence.

This time he just stood there, watching them without uttering a word. It was creepy.

“Albert?” She asked tentatively.

He turned to stare at her, and she felt naked. As if he could see through her, as if he was able to know more about her than she herself knew. It was like being under the weight of a mountain, so heavy that even though it was not hostile nor malicious it was still suffocating.

“Sir Albert?”

Scrappy looked up at him too, tugging at his sleeves. A frown appeared on his face, and he slowly turned his head down to watch her tug at the fabric of his shirt. As if he was struggling to understand.

“Ah,” he said after a minute. “How are you?” He spoke slowly, measuring every word. It felt like he was fishing for them out of a sea of random letters.

“I’m well now.” The girl said, voice shaky. “Thank you, you saved me. That you did.”

Albert nodded. Clearly Scrappy was expecting more, and her face fell.

“Are you okay, Sir?”

Lina’s face melted. The girl was being so cute, worrying about him! But why was he not responding like he always did? What happened to him?

She tried to think back to what was going on before he suddenly changed things. She could only recall flashes, but she remembered very clearly that something had hurt Scrappy. That Albert rushed into the room to save her. That the monster had controlled her body and turned her against her friends. That she was about to kill him… she shook her head, realizing that she was shaking. She forced herself to keep going, to not become stuck reliving the same moment of agony over and over.

After the pressure lifted from her mind, that’s when everything suddenly changed. He teleported to the other side of the room, right as her mind was expunged of the monster’s presence, and Scrappy was healed. But how? Even if his power was strange and seemingly random, just how did he do it? And why did he change so much?

“Albert?” She found herself asking, after seeing that he was once again not replying.

“I am fine, yeah.” A smile fought to appear on his face, but it was so slow as to appear creepy and mechanical. Like a golem being made to smile. “I… Time is fast. I’ll need, a minute, I think.”

Scrappy was concerned. Lina too, but she hid it better than the girl did.

“You must be hungry.” Albert said after another long silence. Straining against something, looking in the distance and squinting he said: “Let’s make camp. I think I could enjoy cooking for you.”

With a snap of his fingers, everything changed.

“Where are we?” Scrappy asked, wide eyed.

Albert looked around. “We are… here. Why?”

Lina looked around. They were on a mountain peak, surrounded by the usual hedges that had come to define their nights out in the wild. There was a gentle wind blowing their leaves, and in the distance she could see that they were very far up. It was not cold, and the sight of the many other snowy peaks gave her an overwhelming sense of peace.

“We are not in the material plane anymore, that we aren’t.” Scrappy continued. “It feels like when I go to the place of shadows, Sir.”

Albert hummed. “Yes. This is my soul.”

Things were cooking on a fireplace. The smell of meat and spices filled the air, and stimulated Lina’s appetite. She found herself looking forward to eating, as she was hungrier than she remembered. Perhaps a side effect after having been healed from her extensive wounds.

She shivered at the memory of how mangled her body had been while she was under the monster’s control. She hadn’t been able to control her movements, but she could feel the pain just as well. Pain but she could not scream.

“Ah, thank you for reminding me, Jeff. I was spacing out again, wasn’t I? No good eating a burnt steak.”

The sound of plates being passed brought Lina back to the present, and her mind reluctantly let go of her disturbing memories. When she looked up, however, she found Albert staring at her.

“W-what?”

“You have trauma.” He was speaking a bit faster now, his movement less wooden and more natural. “It was your first time being puppeteer against your will, wasn’t it?”

Lina gulped. She nodded.

“This might help.”

He snapped his fingers again, and suddenly her mind cleared. The memories were still there, but they didn’t hurt as much anymore. She hadn’t realized just how heavy they weighted on her mind until tears began to well in her eyes.

“Thank you,” she said in a small voice. “I… I just couldn’t…”

“Shh.” A voice said from beside her. She found Scrappy holding her hand, and Lina felt just how small the girl’s hand was. “It’s okay now.”

She sniffled, but nodded nonetheless. A few weeks ago she would have never allowed herself to act this vulnerable in front of a man. Now, now this was just another among many impossible things that happened to her.

Fortunately there was good food to take her mind away from them.