There was a moment of silence as drones quickly converged upon the carnage seeking to unbury the one who ordered them there. Obscured by smoke, they probed the rubble. Captain Steel emerged with the explosive force of 2 tons of TNT that crushed a phalanx of drones like aluminum cans. One drone had remained, one that saw fit to fight and instantly regretted its hubris as it got melted by super-hot plasma vision.
Captain Steel huffed and trudged through the rubble like one did through feet of snowfall and stopped. He dug his hands into the ground with force and pulled out moments later with Roxanne in hand.
Pale white due to being covered in dust from head to toe, a cloud of smoke erupted when he tossed her back onto the uneven ground upon which he stood. Her eyes shut and unmoving, Roxanne's aura fired and covered her automatically to keep the body safe. He saw this and laughed.
“Scared?”
Her eyes opened weakly; she felt like she got hit by a rogue planet. She looked into Captain Steel’s eyes and saw nothing but fire.
“The-the people…” she weakly spat out, finally aware that she was covered in the debris of a fallen skyscraper.
“Oh, is that your concern?” He smirked, the same smirk anyone with eyes saw on a historical vid, the same smirk that made the original lie so easy to say. “No normies in that one, Roxanne. You got us away from them like the good little soldier you are.”
There was a not-so-insignificant part of her that felt satisfied by that. She watched as Cap raised a hand, fist tight and shivering, set and ready to finish the job. He wasn’t looking at her anymore. He looked beyond her to the future and what was next—a smile formed on Captain Steel’s lips.
The next attosecond, he was gone.
Roxanne felt the force of what had swooped over them but could not register what had happened. She sat up and looked to the sky; streaking figures smashed through other buildings that had not yet fallen and continued upward. The figures flew past the skyline, beyond the cloud cover, and even further. Roxanne scanned through her memory, one of the few things she felt she could do reliably and competently with how she currently felt.
It had been Lady Steel. Slowed down, she saw Corina Kyle collide with her brother’s doppelganger, forcing him off her and high into the sky.
The two grappled as they ascended. They broke through the atmosphere and continued their trajectory, crossing more kilometers until they broke the thin atmosphere of Mikoto, one of the twin moons of Izanami. The two collided with the dusty surface with enough force to cause the ground to crack and splinter. In real-time, Roxanne saw the cracks spiderweb out from the impact point. She debated joining but again felt slow; recovery was going slower than she liked.
It was too late, however, as she saw their tiny figures push off from the surface and toward the planet itself. Corina’s clothes, nondescript hospital scrubs, mostly burned up thanks to atmospheric tension, while Captain Steel had parts of his jacket, shirt, and pants. The two were relatively locked together, at first oriented with Corina on the bottom, before they quickly changed places. Both had their hands on each other and were shouting.
“You…survived it! I didn’t think you would!” He had a hand on one of her wrists and jockeyed to remove it from his collar.
“Stop…! Stop fighting…!” She shouted. “Stand down, damn it; what have you done?!”
“What have I done??” He replied, eyes filled with a mixture of fury and madness. He was enjoying the confrontation. “Boy! You’re really behind!”
The two continued their rapid descent. Roxanne was up and tracked their trajectory while she slid further into the pit on her heels. The earth shook, followed by a loud rumbling. Roxanne calculated they had landed no more than 500 feet away. Seconds later, a thunderclap chased the sound of something flying over her head.
It had to be a hell of a punch.
Roxanne threw her hands out in front of her to sense for Central One under all the rubble. Contact. Hard light snacked forward and dug into the ground; they pulled and unearthed the massive mechanical cube.
Release me, Roxanne, it said.
The cube, Central One, started to transform. Flaps opened, pieces extricated themselves and shifted elsewhere; screws unscrewed themselves, moved, and re-screwed at different positions. Arms unfolded from within, hands missing until they emerged from the stumps. Within seconds, it was a twenty-story tall box mech with broad shoulders, square legs, and gunmetal gray head to toe. Synthetic mechanical fingers, pale as snow, flexed like they only just now knew what existence had felt like.
Roxanne backed off a tiny bit. Not because of the enormous monstrosity towering above her, that was certainly something alright and deserved a comment, but she just didn’t have the time. She could feel the electromagnetic spectrum shudder uncontrollably. She could feel him. Mouth wide open and full of foam; face contorted at the engagement of every single muscle primed and cocked; fist thrown back behind him as he entered her peripheral vision.
Captain Steel had arrived.
Roxanne screamed; reality warped outward in the aftershock of another light boom that pushed her backward. She snaked out hard light strands from her rings and watched them warp and rip through space-time after being carried by the sheer force momentum of Captain Steel’s fist. A cacophonic pop followed, having enough force to knock back both robot and man. Left in this wake, a gashing of reality itself and a flood of Bleed energy. All matter cracked and broke apart upon contact; left unchecked, it would only mean implosion.
“Oh god…” Roxanne uttered while an immediate flood of information filled her HUD: the temperature of the heat generated, the composition of the energy spilling in, and possible explanations regarding the tear itself, but she didn’t want to know any of that. She only desired to know one thing:
“What do I do?!” Bleed energy continued pouring out of the tear, parts of the body that housed Central One got caught in it and was immediately broken down atom by atom.
I...I do not know, said Azonne.
Roxanne expected panic to follow that statement. Typically, such a response meant that she was indeed the first to experience something, which—when you consider how far the lineage stretches back—was supposed to be such a rare occurrence to be considered wholly impossible.
Yet this was the 3rd time this week she’s had this feeling.
And yet, despite that…she felt calm.
Roxanne’s left fist jutted out in front of her, followed by her clasping her inner bicep with the other hand; it was instinct, muscle memory. Fluidly, both arms broke apart and then swept above and below her, respectively, as if she were making a massive circle. The kata came so easily. She could feel the energy pouring out of the hole intimately, which was hers entirely to command.
And so she did.
Her hands and arms danced in the air, focused movements that—in her mind's eye—corralled the runaway reality destroying energy that flooded in. She felt the tear pulsating between her cupped hands, and she pressed against it. The current fought her, and she started to sweat. She repeated the arm movements once more, now with more grit in her actions, feelings, and senses.
The tear shuddered but got atoms smaller. Roxanne repeated the kata, and the tear got smaller still. Her muscles felt on fire, and her brain pounded heavily like a high-powered engine. In her mind's eye, the rip lay between her hands and thrashed against her might.
Yet it closed still.
In the real, the tear struggled. But again, it closed still; micro-atoms smaller.
Roxanne gritted her teeth to the point of breaking. The hardest thing she had ever done, yet she still felt comfortable and right in her movements. The tear closed some more, followed by a kinetic energy pulse that moved dust, rocks, and stone. Roxanne screamed one last time, and the incision fully closed. Reality pulsed again and shuddered upon the tear’s closing.
Roxanne dropped to one knee, exhausted.
Captain Steel emerged from rubble enraged, spit flying as unintelligible sounds emerged from his throat, only to be blitzed by Corina Kyle. She pulled him away from ground zero and grappled with him. The two wrestled on their way into another collision with the ground. Still grasping one another, the pair rose to their feet simultaneously. Corina shifted her weight and used the leverage gained to toss Cap over her shoulder and back into the ground.
He rolled away and narrowly missed a stomp from her bare feet, resulting in a foot-deep crater the length of her soles. Captain Steel was on her instantly, grabbing both arms by the wrists; Corina pulled back but, met with equal force, the ground trembled.
“This…this is what you do, isn’t it?” He grunted at her. “Just blind charge into a fight, not knowing the what's or why’s? No wonder this world is how it is!”
“Roxanne is a damn saint…anyone trying to fight her…isn’t up to anything good!” Corina broke the hold with such force the air surrounding them had gone silent. Corina then stepped forward with a front kick that forced Cap to double over in a heap. He threw his head back and looked at her, tears flowing down his face, mouth contorted into a pained grin.
“If you have beef with her, then you have beef with me,” Corina said. “I don’t care what you look like.”
“Even your brother?” He let the words slither from his lips.
“You’re not my brother!” She shouted, dropping her guard. It was all he needed.
“You sure had no problem pretending I was!!” Cap flew at her with blinding speed. He collided with her abdomen and sent all the air out of her body. He continued his trajectory forward and banked toward the sky, taking her with him.
“You fell into the narrative!” He shouted as he snapped a right hook to her temple that made her ears ring. “We both did!
“And right now….” His hand snapped forward, grabbed her by the shoulder, and pulled her toward him. “…for all intents and purposes,” He snapped off a headbutt following this. “…I am your brother!” Corina’s nose shattered; blood exploded outward and covered the top of his forehead. She lost consciousness and dropped from the sky.
“I’m doing exactly what you should have done.” Captain Steel watched her drop like a sack of bricks, then turned his gaze toward ground zero. Toward Roxanne. He sneered. “Force change.”
Roxanne had caught this—she had been watching the whole fight in between breaths—and did her best to stand. The tiny figure in the sky shifted. He was coming toward her. She sucked in a mouthful of air before tightening her muscles. She thrust her right arm out in front of her just as she brought her left hand, palm out, toward her chest. Slowly, she let the air out of her nose.
Fifty billion tons of plasma ripped out of her hands and screamed toward the oncoming Captain Steel. Around her, the air swirled outward and kicked out plumes of dust and smoke. The plasma split the air molecules as it traveled, a bright yellow current of protons, neutrons, and radiation. Cap saw it coming but didn’t move.
He took it head-on.
The energy collided with him like water, split into two streams that went everywhere. With his palms out in front of him, he cut through it like magma through a snowy hill. Roxanne swore she could hear him laughing but continued forcing out energy. She moved her arms again, followed by another fresh volley.
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He crept closer despite it, his skin burning and clothes vaporized; he pushed. Before Roxanne realized it, he was in front of her. Hands clasped over her knuckles and snuffing out the stream, he squeezed. The bones in her hand gave way first, and eventually, so did the integrity of the rings.
Her vision got white. So white that she had to close her eyes. Her eyes flew open a second later, and she was in the white room. Azonne was in front of her, but this time, the construct transformed. The First had become his pure energy form for the first time in just her presence. Roxanne felt a sense of calm wash over her, and they smiled at each other.
“What…?” She let out the words just as the walls cracked—red light from the Bleed beyond flooded in through the rapidly expanding spiderweb.
“Roxanne…” The First said and touched her hand. “Do you understand what’s happening?” She shook her head, almost defiantly—she didn’t want to understand. “He’s destroying the rings.”
“So what?” The words felt useless in the face of widening cracks and blinding red light. “You’re eternal.”
“The light is eternal, yes.” Their eyes closed, and they smiled. “You must go before your mind is trapped here forever.”
“No! I’m not losing anyone else!”
“It is yours now.”
“No!” She screamed. “Stop!” She blinked again, back in the real world. The rings burst on her hands and sent out a blinding hot light that exploded silently, violently. Both Captain Steel and Roxanne were overwhelmed and sent flying in opposite directions.
Cap landed on an empty transport bus that was supposedly there to aid in evacuations that never actually came. He was screaming. Captain Steel’s face and skin, so burned he looked unrecognizable, made him shout so loud it reverberated across reality and was heard for light years beyond. The pain eventually subsided, and, molecule by molecule, his body rebuilt itself.
Captain Steel stared at his hands and laughed.
Corina appeared behind him, finally conscious, and wrapped her arms around his head and neck. Weak from the explosion, his struggles were for naught. He was a small animal in the jaws of a lion.
“Stand down, damn it!” She shouted, muscles tight and sinews pulsating. Pathetically he pawed at her arms, making sounds that were a cross between a long guttural snarl and a wheezing pathetic laugh. Corina wanted to end it, felt on the cusp of finishing it, but lacked something to make it so. She was unable to know whether it was the literal strength or the nerve.
Feet away, not too far at all, light pulsated. An unassuming pile of rubble throbbed and leaked light beams before it was gone seconds later. In its place stood Roxanne with her entire body engulfed in yellow light. Her eyes were white, hot, and full of energy; her hands were fixed and tense at her sides.
Her hair had come undone and flailed about wildly. The right half of her face was dark and burned from the explosion. Another second, a light second, and she was in front of them both. She moved her arms deliberately again.
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“You know something?” Her voice was ethereal and sent echoes rippling faintly. Her right hand, fingers forward and palm up, cut a half circle in the air before resting at her hip. “I can manipulate energy all across the spectrum,” Roxanne held out her left hand before making an emphatic fist.
“That includes Quantum Fields,” She asked. “I wonder what happens…if I removed yours?” She closed her eyes and could see and feel every atom that made up the ground and sky around her; every molecule that built every living and synthetic thing that had ever existed; the last proton, neutron, and electron that formed the world she lived in.
Whatever surrounded Captain Steel slowly got stripped away. Roxanne felt momentarily overcharged as his aura peeled away atomically and became a part of her. She spun her arms again and finished with a flurry and clenched fists. Suddenly Corina felt powerful.
She added torque. She pulled; she twisted.
His neck snapped in half.
The silence that followed was deafening. Corina released her grip, and the counterpart's body fell to the ground with a thud. The melee finally ended with less force than what started it. Corina dropped next to her knees, exhausted, spent, and shocked. She stared at her hands, barely believing what she had just done.
“Corina…?” Roxanne was standing over her, looking exhausted; her skin was back to normal, and her loose hair succumbed to gravity's pull. Corina glanced upward, the pain in her eyes evident, and wrapped her arms around Roxanne tightly. Roxanne accepted this happily and pushed Corina’s head into her abdomen.
“I’m so glad you’re okay,” Roxanne said. Corina disengaged at this. She stood up and looked around. Buildings were collapsed all around them and dead bodies scattered and littered the streets across the city. She stood, looked at Roanne, and then back down to her brother's doppelganger.
“Am I?” She said softly. “Is anything?”
Roxanne didn’t answer; she didn’t have one. Instead, she hugged her friend tightly. Maybe nothing was okay, but, at least for the moment, it was over, and they were alive.
…Roxanne…
She broke the embrace at the sound. A part of her thought—hoped perhaps—that it was The First, but she knew it wasn’t. Roxanne slid down the crater to the bottom and started searching for the source. Corina followed her down and watched her scan the ground. Roxanne eventually found it, half buried in debris. The robot form of Central One had half of its body missing, imploded by the crushing weight of Bleed energy, and burned at the edges like melted plastic. The machine head darted in various directions, the shock of what had happened still affecting and evident.
“—zzt—Roxanne, you live…” She didn’t respond, instead staring at it dispassionately.
“I—we—zzt—cut off from other subminds. Cut off from Bleednet. Please, allow me/us to piggyback off you and reconnect. Without check-in, systems across the bubble will collapse.”
“Hm,” she sniffed. “That doesn’t seem very smart. No backup in case of an extended outage—or are you just lying to get what you want? Is this part of the models?”
“Please, Roxanne, this shell was meant to house me until I could reconnect and upload my core programming…subminds are only so much of it. Without constant uploads, they can develop their own values and go rogue, or worse.”
“Worse?” She almost laughed. “After everything you’ve set in motion…give me one good reason.”
“Wes Gibson.” Hearing that name got her dander up; she squinted at the machine under her.
“Excuse me?” She eventually said.
“The Black Zero was removed from Madrono City at the behest of Shaw and his father, John Gibson. He was being held here in the city for observation.”
“To observe what?”
“To aid the ICG by any means, including a possible connection to what had infected him in the past. Some thought such a thing would be beneficial to humanity.”
Roxanne was furious on the inside. That couldn’t be a thing…could it? The Nameless was gone, and that being a fact was the entire driving force behind her constant sense of dread.
“Is-is it? Is it still there?”
“Allow me to reconnect to The Bleednet, Roxanne. I can tell you everything you want to know. I/We can help you find him.”
“He’s missing??”
“The facility holding him was destroyed during the melee. That’s all I/We know at this moment; that can change once I/We reconnect.”
Roxanne fumed. She felt energy swell up inside her, more powerful than she had ever felt in this job, let alone in her entire life. Frustration, anger, and helplessness blossomed all at once, and she channeled that into a beam of plasma that erupted from her eyes and instantly atomized the rest of the robot’s body. The only thing left of it was the ash that stained the rubble.
“I choose an uncertain future over whatever the hell you’re promising,” Roxanne said when the energy had subsided. “Bastard.”
“Rox?” Corina was behind her with a comforting hand on her shoulder. Startled, Roxanne spun around. She braced for some admonishment. After all, Corina had always represented the establishment. She worked closely with Central One and had spent much of the last few days and hours in a coma; would she have to fight her friend?
The hug was quick and easy; Roxanne immediately felt guilty. She should have had more faith in their friendship. They pulled apart and smiled while tears welled up in both their eyes. Corina whispered in her ear:
“Tell me everything,” she said.
So Roxanne did.
Warts and all.
----------------------------------------
The white room made Roxanne feel calm.
Usually, her mind palace, cluttered like her real life, was filled with faux versions of consumerist pablum. Today she opted for something cleaner. To her, the white room represented peace and, of course, a new beginning. After all, this place was where her new life as Solar Flare started. It would have to do, even if this weren’t the real thing from her past.
A large screen in front of her was floating in the air as she narrated her personal logs. Roxanne sat in front of it cross-legged; words filled the screen as she spoke, not unlike real-world dictation software. Periodically, as she talked, she would reflexively touch the bandage wrapped around her right eye, an artifact drawn in by the one she wore in real life.
“I found Chris unconscious buried in rubble; I was pretty mad but glad they were alive. Somehow they protected the rioters and others from being crushed to death by falling buildings. I love that idiot. Can you believe it?
“…as for the plague, well, Corina’s blood fashioned both a vaccine and a cure. And yeah, I know that was in the so-called ‘models,’ which low-key makes me sick, but…yeah.” Roxanne cleared her throat to gather more of her thoughts. “Both Sam and Spyda received some of the first doses and will apparently pull through; don’t get me started on how that got distributed. Sometimes I’m not sure I want to know.
“Ugh, I’m the worst. Scratch that bit,” she said and adjusted slightly; previously spoken words vanished from the screen. “I’m happy that Sam is okay, but a part of me can’t shake the idea that he got it first due to the privilege of being close to someone important—never mind that he and I have been deemed necessary because of luck essentially. Still, 90 % of people who caught it are dead, both OHs and Norms combined, untold billions dead; my concerns and misgivings feel pathetically small. Regardless, people, for the most part, are helping one another out, but I see cracks appearing as word of what has become of Central One Spreads.
“Right now, humanity is leaderless, rudderless, and I need to come to terms with the fact that it’s because of me. I’ve no regrets over what I did, at least not yet, but perhaps they’ll come in time. They always do.” Roxanne stopped, aware that someone had appeared next to her.
It was Azonne, so to speak.
“Corina is outside,” it said. Roxanne stood and looked it over, hands on hips, somewhat nonplussed.
“This is still weird,” she said.
“Tell me about it,” it replied. “I’m a collection of memories placed into an avatar of someone that existed independently. Does that make me them? Or am I someone new? The last thing I really remember was when we first met.”
Roxanne considered these words. The confusion made sense to her. It brought to the forefront the idea of whether such a thing as a soul existed.
“I’m just confused,” she finally said. “Are all my predecessors available to me as avatars like you, or is this it? Did C’hiad do this because they knew I’d want someone there, at least while it’s gone? I’m apparently the light now, yet so much still feels locked away to me; why?”
“I don’t have an answer for you, Roxanne. Everything was always opaque when I served.”
“I know you don’t, just thinking out loud.” She walked around the white room, her heart half set on expecting The First to show back up like they always had. But of course, they never came.
“They can’t be gone for good,” she said. “I’ll find them, and Wes too.”
“Very well,” Azonne responded. “Corina is still outside the room. She’s anxious.”
“Right,” Roxanne shut her eyes, and the white room melted into the real world around her. Roxanne was at the hospital again in Chris’ room, who was recovering from, well, everything. She stood over their bed and watched them breathe, thankful they were still alive. Eventually, she turned to the door and allowed it to open. Corina walked in dressed like a civilian, and they hugged.
“How is Chris doing?” Corina asked. Roxanne sighed and said:
“Better, their rings are doing a lot of the heavy lifting, but they should be cool in a day or so.”
“Good, I’m glad.”
Corina let the words hang in the air and said nothing more. She was different than what Roxanne was used to. It was understandable, but the way she glanced at the floor meant she had so much more to say.
“What's up, sis?” Roxanne said with a soft smile. Corina found her warmth welcome and returned the smile with one of her own. Still, she found it hard to say the words. Roxanne leaned forward and touched her hand.
“I’m leaving,” Corina said eventually.
“Like…the planet?” Roxanne asked when she let those words hang there. Corina nodded as if she were thankful she didn’t actually have to say the word yes. Eventually, she said:
“Breaking my brother's neck is messing with me more than I thought it would.” A broken smile curled on her face for a flash.
“That wasn’t your brother, babe.”
“Does that actually matter?” Corina replied with a hint of exasperation in her voice. “I’m not sure anymore. He looked, acted, and talked like him to a point. Before I got sick, I thought this was a second chance to be close to him. I thought…I thought…” Roxanne cut the distance between them and placed a hand on her shoulder.
“We’re all guilty of that.”
Corina nodded. The nod conveyed an understanding of the words but hinted at not accepting what they actually meant.
“Regardless, knowing that isn’t helping,” she said. “And I keep watching the footage, the stuff he said...all these people dead, most of them were people like me; I’m complicit.” She braced herself for a rebuttal. She had rehearsed this alone for hours and played every part of the conversation in her head with the certainty that it was exactly how it would go. Instead, Roxanne squeezed her shoulder harder.
“I think about that too….” Roxanne whispered. This admission completely took Corina by surprise, though it shouldn’t have. After all these years, Roxanne was the only person who truly got her and honestly knew the person behind the façade.
“Do you…think he was right?” Roxanne asked her.
“I don’t know. The violence? The madness? Obviously not, but…I need to get away from here. I know Izanami needs me—or a part of me is telling myself it does—but maybe this should be the end of Lady Steel and the start of me finding out who Corina Kyle really is.”
“Have you told your family?”
“No, MJ would jump at the chance to leave with me after what’s happened, and I don’t think he needs that. Athena is gung-ho about helping out and keeping things peaceful; I think that’s where they should be. Izanami’s going to need their voices to recover, not mine. I don’t think Danielle wants to see anyone right now.”
“So you’re not telling them at all, but you’re telling me?”
“I wasn’t,” Corina let out a sad chuckle. “But it didn’t feel right…I guess that says a lot about me, huh?”
“Shut up, come here.” Roxanne opened her arms wide, and the two embraced. Corina softly sobbed, thankful for a friend like this when she felt she didn’t deserve one. Roxanne, too was grateful, bittersweetly. With grams gone, the woman in her embrace was essentially her only family now.
“Where will you go? Do you know? I’m going to miss you.” She stated when they broke apart.
“No idea,” Corina replied. “Maybe the outer rim, a whole lot of nothing out there to get lost and think in.”
“I love that for you,” Roxanne smiled. “Well, guess this is goodbye….”
“Nah,” Corina smirked. “It’s a ‘see you later.’”
They clasped hands and held them firm for a moment or two. Corina then left; Roxanne watched as her soundless sneakers glided across the floor. Roxanne felt a part of her ache. The neglected part, the feelings, and emotions she bottled and bottled away as everything worsened. And that bottle rattled; boy, it shook. She looked at her hands and saw they trembled. Roxanne took a deep breath; she shut her eyes.
Not today.