V-00000.7 - Good-Bye

Unarmed Combat, 3:

I harness my instincts and raw strength, becoming both blade and shield. My dance of war will be the last beauty you perceive.

Your strikes are true, and your technique allows you to bring your full power to bear.

You can mix martial techniques to form a unique style.

You are more aware of your body in relation to other things.

[Thick Skin – Common]

[Enhanced Night-vision – Common]

[Dense Musculature – Common]

[Dense Skeleton – Common]

[Gigantism – Common]

[Fast Metabolism – Common]

[Slow Metabolism – Common]

The list expanded onwards massively into insane and mundane shit, everything from rare eye color mutations to giving me RH-null Golden Blood. My teenage mind went a little crazy seeing the possible below-the-belt options before my black thoughts drew my mind to Alice’s body, which I was still avoiding.

I need power and something to offset my vitality and dexterity penalties.

[Dense Skeleton: This mutation significantly increases the density of your skeleton, granting you increased strength and resistance to physical injury from impact trauma.]

Cost: 180 pounds of bone biomass absorbed (2/180)

27 pounds of musculature biomass absorbed (54/27)

[Dense Musculature: This mutation increases the density of your muscles, granting you significantly increased strength and increased resistance to physical injury with a minimal weight and size increase.]

Cost: 200 pounds of musculature biomass absorbed (54/200)

30 pounds of bone biomass absorbed (2/30)

"Well, that is a serious fucking problem. I can’t eat or bite through these jackasses bones, and if I can’t do that, it will take me months of eating fucking fingers and similar shit just to get one mutation... Although this does answer where the fuck everything I ate went, it got absorbed somehow.”

“It’s really amazing how quickly you’ve adapted to cannibalism; your first thought after all this was people's fingers, not any other creature’s bones... then again, suppose it's not your first rodeo.”

"Oh, eat a dick, you giganti... Shut the fuck up, I’m a genius.”

[Crushing Maw – Common]

[Crushing Maw: This mutation will increase your bite force and strengthen your teeth, as well as making your gums more resistant to trauma.]

Cost: 40 pounds of muscle biomass absorbed (54/40)

10 pounds of bone biomass absorbed (2/10)

I looked upon the skeletal mess I’d made of Adam and considered my options. With long strides, I walked off to the edge of the room, rifling through the seats, until finally I grasped the hunting knife I’d knocked away during the fight.

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"God, that feels amazing. I can’t believe I forgot what it was like to take a step without it hurting.”

Walking back to the desecrated corpse, I kneeled and used the hilt to start smashing away and chipping the skeleton, shaving it into bite-sized pieces as much as I could.

“I would say sorry, but... fuck you, Adam, my only regret is you aren’t alive to feel this.”

The bones had a strange flavor to them; they were dry and porous to the point they dried my entire mouth out going down, set still somewhat flavorful; the omnipresent taste of fermented grape was in their bloody coating, and the marrow tasted like ambrosia, like a gelatin made of this strange fermented purple taste.

[Crushing Maw – Common Acquired, please stand by; stocks are being drained.]

[Musculature: 14]

[Bone: 0]

[Blood: 2]

[Organ: 30]

Jets of fire seared into my jawbone and the surrounding muscle, making my mouth hang open as I felt the muscle liquefy under my skin. Hours passed as I endured the strange numb pain. I felt as though invisible hands were weaving the liquid muscle into strands and needling them back into fibrous muscle.

When the process finally ended, my jaw ached and felt cramped; however, this was short-lived. Opening and closing my mouth a few times seemed to set everything right, and my bite felt powerful, like an alligator. When I snapped my teeth together, they didn’t click; they snapped like the jaws of a predator.

As far as I could tell, the only thing that changed about my teeth was how fresh they felt, as if years of neglect were undone and they had been coated with fresh enamel. Although there was a serious bonus, on the floor before me were chunks of silver metal and white material, all my fillings and the fake buildup my front tooth had after being shattered; my entire mouth was brand new.

Let’s take this mutation for a test drive, shall we?

Leaning down, I tentatively pressed my teeth against Adams forearm, flexing my jaw. I felt my teeth grind in a way that worried me, and when I heard the crack, I was horrified that I had just stupidly broken my brand new teeth. I licked the inside of my mouth frantically, trying to feel for the damage before realizing there wasn’t any—no chips or cracks, nothing lost—only fragments of Adams delicious bone and marrow sticking to my lips and gums.

I rose from my meal and looked towards Alice, no longer able to justify putting this off. Seeing her like this, it hurt me and brought my beating heart to a standstill as ice crept up my spine, making me shiver. I slowly walked towards her, my feet suddenly heavy again, all the vigor parasite had gifted me with seemingly leeching away. Kneeling down, I placed my palm to her face, stroking her cold skin with and closing her eyes.

I whispered to her, my voice hollow and weak like a man in his death bed.

“I’m so sorry, Alice, I’ve failed you... and I’m going to fail you again. You always told me I was better that I could be so much more, but the truth is I can't. You made me more; you gave me the gift of light and pulled me above the waters I was content to drown in. Without you, the man you saw doesn’t exist; I cannot live for your sake without dishonoring your memory with how I would live.”

“I’m sorry I am not better. All I can do is inflict horror and suffering, which I will not do in your name. The only thing I can promise you is that I will endure in your name.”

I reached into my pocket as I ran from my eyes, mixing with the grime and blood on my face, and fell red upon her cheeks. I lifted a small velvet box from my jacket and pulled from it a ring made of gold with a set of black angular gemstones set into its center. I slipped the ring onto her finger and lifted her, my hands supporting her legs and head as I walked away from the dilapidated building.

“Good bye, my beloved.”

Hours passed with my mind numb as I let her loss truly sink in; she was so cold and light in my arms having been exsanguinated, and the scenery passed me by as I continued on autopilot until I was upon a hill covered in wilting flowers that overlooked an old stone structure, a long ruined and abandoned church that sat on the very edge of anchorage just before the city gave way to forests.

I had some point in my travels grabbed a shovel from a neglected hardware store in preparation for my grim work. A part of me was thankful that even in my absent-minded state, some part of me was still thinking, I would have hated to leave her here like this.

I dug her grave deep, and it took many more hours than the empty-headed walk. For each and every stab I took at the frozen earth, I seethed fully in the moment, processing the anger I held towards the world for taking her from me.

I could feel my strength being stolen from me, or perhaps more accurately, I felt my stolen strength leaving me. All the life and health Parasite had gifted me was clearly temporary; without a source of constant healing, my body would decay again, and my overused muscles would fail to hold my joints together.

I laid her to rest in the ground and pounded a large stick into the ground to mark the spot before refilling the hole, then I turned to look over the city that I had called home for most of my life, this place that had taken so much from me, that had watched idly as my health failed me and I realized I saw no home; all I saw was filth, decay, a rotten place filled with animals.

“You’ve made me bury the last thing that made humanity worth a damn... There’s no hope for this pathetic excuse of a species anymore; you’ve had your chance, every opportunity for redemption to do anything right... And what did you do with it? Nuclear holocaust, an actual genocide. You poisoned the planet, eviscerated the atmosphere, and set the climate on fire... and as the cherry on top, you’ve made me mark a grave for the last bit of good left in you.”

I looked out to the east, flowing the sun's arc to find the horizon, and my thoughts turned to family, more specifically my father. Memories of his deep voice screaming at me, phantom aches and pangs of pain wracked my body as I remembered how he would beat me; he always felt so big and powerful like a titan, but I suppose that’s par for the course when you’re a seven being hit with a fist the size of your head.

You’re a terrible man. Morgan, but you were right about one thing: our family turns out killers, and if there’s anything we excel at, it’s paying back a blood debt.