Chapter 86: The Cold of Outer Space, the Warm Embrace of Death, Part 8

Although he had the strength to hold the sword, he couldn't move his arm, no matter what he did. That's why Sylvester was furious; if there was anything he hated more than anything else, it was losing control.

For most of his life, he hadn't had control over his decisions, not really, but at least he had been able to depend on what most people had and took for granted: control over their own body. Once again, a strange creature had taken even that away from him.

Zed didn't waste time with nonsense, didn't ask "what are you doing?" and things like that. He immediately realized what was happening and, flapping his wings, flew towards him like a cannonball, even faster than the impostor, the final enemy who wore precisely his face.

Away from the enemy's attack, but this one also had wings, of course, so he could simply change trajectory and that's what he did. But of course, Heather simply intercepted him brandishing the sword; their weapons crossed violently, throwing sparks.

Sylvester wondered if her pulse wasn't trembling a little as she glared at an enemy who was exactly like him in appearance. He wouldn't hesitate to slice up the enemy no matter how much it looked like him, no matter how identical they were, but he didn't have much appreciation for himself in the first place.

Sylvester landed on the asteroid that kept spinning through the vacuum of space. The enemy should have been busy with Heather, but as soon as he heard him land, he felt its eyes on him and things changed immediately.

The enemy came for him; Sylvester was able to dodge at the last moment, but simply by passing by, that damn thing took out another good chunk of the asteroid.

Well, it's not like they needed it as a platform, as a combat arena; all three could fly perfectly. He felt a bit anxious seeing how it was being destroyed even more, it was because it was the only tangible thing in this dark void apart from them, and no, the stars certainly didn't count - he had said tangible.

Sylvester and Heather attacked that abomination simultaneously. The final enemy... just a little more and he could feel peace, relax and enjoy being human for the first time in so, so long.

Even Sylvester himself would learn along the way alongside Samada. It wasn't him who had things to teach Heather, they could teach each other of course, but what mattered was the bastard in front of him.

There was no point in dreaming until he killed it, until he erased it from this universe and any other, putting an end to this madness, to that cursed mess of cosmic gardening, without caring about anyone's life, a tournament without a winner, not really.

The enemy defended valiantly against both their attacks at the same time. Sylvester and Heather coordinated with the same naturalness as if they had been fighting together for countless decades, covering each other's gaps, without thinking twice, without hesitation and without failing.

It was an overwhelming and unbreakable wave of attacks, but the enemy, whom he couldn't even give a proper name to, rejected them all, without breaking a sweat.

Sylvester would have felt like he'd been kicked in the balls, if it weren't for the fact that they finally managed to disarm that thing. Its sword flew far away, getting lost in the vacuum of space; soon it disappeared completely.

At just the right moment, Sylvester and Heather attacked simultaneously, stabbing that bastard in the chest, gutting him. Or at least that's what should have happened, but the false Sylvester suddenly had the sword, the perfect replica of his sword, back in his hand again.

He plunged the weapon into Heather's chest, running her through from end to end, making blood flow copiously. Then he yanked it from her body without consideration - well, how could he have any consideration - and hit him with the sword's hilt right between the eyes, between his eyebrows.

That blow, although relatively mild, disoriented him long enough to run the sword across his chest, from left to right. The bastard drew a scarlet cross on his chest, two perfectly executed cuts.

Then he was going to finish it all, and him, with a blow to the center of his chest, but then Heather thrust her hand into his back; she immediately pulled it out through the other side dripping with blood, entrails, and who knows what else.

He had copied even the inside of his body, more or less, but there were other things that had nothing to do with human biology, things for which there was no name or explanation whatsoever, writhing, damaging his sight just by entering his field of vision, in the corner of his eye.

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The blow didn't seem to do much to the false Sylvester, except make him angry. Without turning around, he reached back to grab her head and pulled it forcefully, hitting it with the sword's pommel, once, twice, three times and more.

By the seventh or eighth time, the hilt pierced her eye, making it explode like a ripe melon. They couldn't communicate with this being, they had no name for it and the creature cared very little about the fight that was happening, it wasn't even worried, much less afraid.

At least not yet. Sylvester would surely succeed, he yearned to see fear in its eyes, yearned for it to have a taste of the pain and havoc it had caused throughout the universe, throughout all the countless damn universes.

Selfish as it might be, Sylvester wasn't fighting only for himself and his happy ending; his was a sword of vengeance that contained the rage, the regrets, and the weight of the universes he had killed with his own hands, even if it had only been because he had wanted to have, to have no other choice at that moment because it had been a matter of survival.

All that weight was contained in the sword, in his hands, in his heart, and he would make it know, he would drive it deep. Sylvester planted the sword, plunging it forcefully into that son of a bitch's neck, while Heather struggled to pull the sword's pommel from the destroyed socket of her left eye.

The monster seemed to be pushing it harder inward as if intending it to reach her brain, as if believing it could kill her instantly, just like that.

He didn't know Heather very well and, anyway, she managed to slip away. Instead, that being focused on him, on the sword stuck in its neck. It grabbed the blade with one hand and drove the other into his chest.

Sylvester couldn't defend himself, but a good defense wasn't always the best; rather the opposite, in his experience, these sons of bitches needed uncontrolled aggression, without worrying about one's own safety.

There it was, there was his chance for victory. Sylvester wielded the sword against the enemy like a butcher's knife, resisting the blows he received, gritting his teeth, biting his tongue.

Taking advantage of the fact that he wasn’t even bothering to defend himself, his cheap imitation went after him with the same violence and brutality. It was strange to see his own face reflected, to see what he looked like, sculpted in rage and bloodlust. To see himself as his enemies did: terrifying, inhuman, dark, without a hint of light, life, or warmth; a mere killing machine, a mere tool, though one with just enough autonomy to enjoy its purpose. If he wondered which of the two would last longer, it was obvious. Sylvester had stopped being human, but that thing was beyond even that. It was a being that devoured planets, that swallowed universes. There was simply no comparison.

He understood that perfectly. But that didn’t mean all was lost. Just because it was difficult didn’t mean he’d throw in the towel and accept his fate—or, for that matter, believe there was such a thing in the first place. Destiny was forged step by step, decision by decision, nothing more, nothing less.

This creature believed it could decide the future of countless billions. Sylvester would prove it was completely wrong.

At last, the savage onslaught stopped. Not of its own accord, but because Sylvester formed structures of black crystal, building them right on his enemy’s body, sometimes above or below, hitting it hard, tossing it around like a ping-pong ball far into the darkness.

Of course, that thing came rushing back at full speed, without slowing down, without flinching, without lessening the ferocity and power of its strikes. If he wasn’t careful, they’d be evenly matched soon. Sylvester realized he couldn’t tear it to pieces this way. Whatever that being was, its form was still a sham, a disguise.

So the question was: where was the real one? How far would he have to go to find the true body, to kill it, to make sure this bloodstained madness would never happen again anywhere in the multiverse?

He didn’t have a damn clue, but he didn’t think it would be as simple as just defeating the enemy right in front of him. Not like this, not here, in the final battle, where there was nowhere else to look except for the three of them and what remained of the meteorite, that spinning wreck. He had even less of an idea about that, but there had to be something. He couldn’t be deceived by appearances.

Space was as fake as everything else, like the copy of his own body. The answer was there, somewhere, trading blows with that being.

Alongside him, their gazes briefly met, and then he knew Heather was thinking the same thing, as if they were synchronized.

Suddenly, Heather left him. No, she couldn’t leave him; they were mutually dependent. Rather, she flew off, leaving him to resist that being on his own.

And for what? Well, she hurled herself at the asteroid, smashing it into a thousand pieces, as if trying to reveal what might be inside. But there weren’t many places to search in the end. All that attack exposed was more broken rock, more fragments vanishing without a trace.

Soon, all they’d have left was the faint, dying light of distant stars and the cold of space.

Fine, it wasn’t in the meteorite. So where could the real being be, if Sylvester wasn’t entirely wrong? Maybe it was right in front of him and nothing else, maybe it was exactly what it seemed. It didn’t seem very likely to him, but he’d definitely like that. A lot.

Claws of darkness emerged from a particularly large meteorite fragment that floated toward him. But that bastard could use his powers too. Well, yes, he knew that already, since it was flying on those damned black wings, but the fact it could use other powers caught him by surprise.

Either way, he didn’t have a good excuse. It was simply stupid not to have considered it. He admitted that himself, but he didn’t pay dearly for that stupidity. His increasingly inhuman reflexes and speed saved him. He backed away from the fragment before those hands could scratch him and saw them disappear along with the meteorite fragment seconds later, leaving no trace.

Good, everything was going well—or as well as he could hope. They were roughly evenly matched and had a decent chance of defeating the enemy, whether or not it was the main body. That was a good sign, progress.

The Cold of Outer Space, the Warm Embrace of Death, Part 7: END