Chapter 10: Eight Seconds

My name is Thomas Clark, and I was deeply hurt, the kind of hurt that would only leave invisible scars.

I was covered in blood, brain matter, and fragments of her skull. Her eyeball dangled grotesquely from a thin string of flesh, while the other one had bounced away into the sand. None of it made sense. In front of me was a headless body, slumped and lifeless. Huh? Who was this? Lois? Wait. What?

“Lois? Where are you?” I called out, my voice trembling, confusion clouding my thoughts.

Never had denial hit me so hard right at that moment.

Her headless form leaned against my shoulder, her body still warm, the blood from her neck spurting out like a macabre fountain, drenching me in its warmth. The crimson liquid clung to my skin, to my clothes. Why? What?

Suddenly, laughter filled the air—mocking, gratified, and ecstatic.

I looked up, my vision blurred with shock and disbelief, and saw the descending figure of Ivory. Her expression was cold and indifferent as if what she’d just done meant nothing.

“What have you done?” I demanded, my voice barely audible over the pounding in my ears.

Ivory glanced at me, dismissive. “Huh? Oh, a civilian…” She waved her hand as if brushing me aside. “Come on, now… Run… You might still live…”

Ivory stood before me, just as I remembered her from the day she saved me from that thug. Her silver hair shimmered under the moonlight, her red eyes piercing and cold. The white costume clung to her form, accentuating her every movement, while her white cape, with its golden inner layer, billowed gently in the wind. But unlike the heroic figure who had once rescued me, this Ivory bore none of the nobility or compassion that had made her the superhero everyone revered.

The Ivory standing before me was more like the version of her from the fighting game Versus, the very game upon which this world was disturbingly based. For a long time, I had resented my inexplicable transmigration into this world, feeling out of place and lost. But with effort, I had fought to belong. I had found hope, and the future had finally seemed bright.

My voice trembled as I choked out the words, "Why do you have to ruin it? I… I was so… happy…”

Ivory looked at me with disdain, her lips curling into a sneer. “I don’t have to answer to you, plebeian,” she spat, her voice dripping with contempt.

Without a second thought, Ivory used her telekinesis to pry the bench from beneath us. I scrambled to my feet, clutching the headless body of Lois tighter in my arms. The world felt like it was crumbling around me as I struggled to comprehend the horror unfolding before me. Ivory, the hero everyone admired, had just torn apart the life I had painstakingly built.

Ivory's voice oozed with malice as she spoke, "Well, I might as well take my time to gloat… can’t gloat without an audience, can I?"

I stayed silent, my heart pounding in my chest. Fear and anger wrestled within me, but I knew that speaking wouldn’t change anything. Ivory was in control now.

She continued, almost playfully, "Once upon a time, there was a Dome—a place where the strong are nurtured. Among their most successful products were Ebony and Ivory."

As she spoke, I felt a strange pressure around my body, and suddenly I couldn’t move. Ivory was using her telekinesis, locking my joints in place. I couldn’t even open my mouth to speak. I was completely at her mercy. She began to walk toward me with a cruel smile playing on her lips.

I knew about the Dome. Everyone who had any knowledge of the World Order’s dark secrets knew about it. It was one of the most inhumane projects they had ever allowed to exist. From over a hundred selectable characters in the game Versus, more than twenty originated from the Dome. That alone spoke volumes about how influential and twisted the project was. Most factions in the game had maybe a dozen named characters, but the Dome? It was a factory for creating powerful, broken souls.

Ivory circled around me, her eyes examining me as if I were some specimen. "You see, Ivory had a grudge against Ebony," she said with an almost mocking tone.

I glared at her.

"I never took Ebony’s taste for men to be so… boring. Well, you aren’t so bad-looking yourself." She smirked, the insult hanging in the air. "Anyways, I couldn’t believe I’d be able to kill Ebony like this. Long-range telekinesis isn’t as fun as close quarters."

Her words cut deep, but all I could do was listen as she gloated and savored every moment of her imagined victory. The weight of Lois’s lifeless body in my arms felt heavier with each passing second.

Ivory's voice dripped with mock pity as she floated in front of me. "It is a pity, truly..." she said, her eyes narrowing as she began to levitate slowly. "I could have been sisters with this gal, but she just had to betray the Order. Thus, the death of the Ebony Knight." With a casual flick of her fingers, she used her telekinesis to pry Lois from my embrace, the lifeless body slipping from my grasp as if I were powerless.

"Ebony? You mean Lois?" I asked, my voice trembling with a mixture of confusion and anger.

Ebony Knight. The name sent a chill down my spine. I knew Ebony from the game, Versus, as a masked character who had never revealed their face to anyone. Most players assumed Ebony was a male or some kind of automaton, but never in my wildest dreams did I think Ebony was, in fact, a woman. And even more baffling was how I, of all people, had become entangled with a character like her—despite my best efforts to avoid getting involved in the superhuman scene or the game’s plotline.

Ivory seemed momentarily thrown by my response. "Huh? How can you talk?" she asked, her eyes widening in surprise.

"Because you forgot how to use your telekinesis," I replied, a smirk forming on my lips despite the terror that gripped my heart.

Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.

As if on cue, Ivory’s telekinetic hold on the world faltered. The sudden loss of power caused her to fall to the ground with an ungraceful fumble. At that moment, Lois's body plummeted toward the ground, and without thinking, I darted forward, catching her in my arms just in time. The momentum sent me rolling, but I held on to her, cradling her as we came to a stop.

The rage that boiled within me was unlike anything I had ever felt before. I couldn't believe the words that were forming in my mouth, but they felt right. "I’ve never been so offended in my life," I said, my voice low and seething with anger. Then, without hesitation, I uttered the promise that felt more like a curse, "I will murder you."

Ivory's face twisted with confusion as she flexed her arm, trying in vain to summon her telekinesis. "Weird," she muttered with a note of frustration creeping into her voice. Her eyes narrowed at me, filled with anger. "What did you do to me?"

I carefully set Lois aside by the lamppost, her lifeless body leaning gently against the cold metal. As I straightened up, I cracked my neck, feeling the tension in my muscles release. My mind began to slip into a darker place, where the concepts of 'humanity' and 'limits' no longer held meaning. It was an unfamiliar state, one I had entertained after countless hours of practice in the park, a place where I had learned to gauge a person’s mental power with an almost supernatural sixth sense.

I scrutinized Ivory carefully, estimating how long it would take for her to recover her abilities. Sixty seconds, I calculated. She’d regain her powers in roughly sixty seconds. That was more than enough time for me.

"Round One," I stated flatly, my voice devoid of emotion.

Ivory blinked, bewildered. "What?"

"Fight," I said, and without another word, I rushed toward her, my right fist aimed for a jab.

Ivory’s reaction was delayed by surprise, but her instincts kicked in just in time. She managed to raise her left arm in defense. Anticipating her move, I shifted my weight, canceling the jab mid-motion, and unleashed a powerful front kick straight into her abdomen. The impact sent her flying backward, her body skidding across the pavement for several meters before she came to a stop.

The clock in my mind continued to tick down, and I knew I had to make every second count.

"You forgot to dodge," I remarked coldly, the words slipping from my lips as I moved with precision. I had used a combination of remote casting and mental suggestion, forcing Ivory to forget to dodge. I aimed a kick right at her noggin again. As she struggled to regain her footing, trying to rise from a mid-squat position, my boot connected with her face a second time, the force of the impact sending her crashing back down.

"I will destroy you—" she spat, but her words were cut short as she hit the ground again, sand and blood mingling on her once pristine face.

I moved like a machine, all thoughts of humanity erased as I focused solely on inflicting pain with brutal efficiency. I followed up with a right jab to her cheek, her attempt to roll away foiled as I transitioned the jab into a firm grab on her cape.

"Fucker, not my cape—" she snarled, but her own long, flowing cape had become her downfall.

With a merciless yank, I dragged her toward the sea, her face scraping against the rough sand as we neared the water. The waves lapped at the shore, indifferent to the violence unfolding beside them. I stepped on her leg, pinning it down, then bent both her arms in unnatural directions, the bones creaking under the pressure. With my remaining foot, I kicked her hard in the posterior, forcing her head under the water.

The bay was shrouded in darkness now, with few visitors frequenting this desolate stretch of the shoreline at night. The lax security was a consequence of its proximity to the slums. There were no interruptions as I held Ivory down under. The waves crashed around us, a quiet witness to the savage beating I delivered.

Ivory's struggles grew weaker, her once formidable powers rendered useless against my relentless assault. It took me no less than eight seconds to subdue her—

I mentally counted down the seconds. Fifty-two left, and I was almost done with her. In fighting games, combos were everything, and I had strung together a perfect sequence. With plenty of time to spare, I began to deliberate on my situation. Emotion had left me, allowing me to think with cold, calculated clarity.

Would killing Ivory benefit me?

For one, it would certainly soothe my anger once I allowed my power to relinquish control over my autonomy. But what else would it bring? A pawn of the Union would be dead, which was a victory in itself. Yet that victory came with a hefty price.

Ivory was a named character in Versus, deeply intertwined with multiple storylines. Killing her wouldn’t just erase a thorn in my side—it would draw the Union’s full attention. They’d send more resources, more operatives, into Kane City. Even though Ivory operated as an independent hero here, it was undeniable that she was still a Union asset.

"Do I want to kill her?" I murmured to myself.

The answer was yes.

Forty seconds had passed by this point, leaving me with twelve. Ivory was tougher than I imagined and she proved it via her continuous struggle, her movements growing more frantic as the seconds ticked away. But by the tenth second, she stopped struggling altogether.

In those final moments, I felt the weight of my decision, but I didn't waver. Emotion had no place in this moment; it was all about the cold, hard facts. I had already crossed the line, and there was no turning back.

So I came to a decision—

I dragged Ivory to the bay’s sands, thinking what to do next. A part of me screamed to end her right there, to finish what I had started. But the rational part of me, the side that always won out, held back.

In the end, I decided not to kill her.

I didn’t fully understand why, but something in the back of my mind urged restraint. Perhaps it was a lingering shred of humanity, or maybe it was a deeper, more calculated desire for a different kind of revenge. It was surely of the latter kind.

“Still,” I muttered to myself, “that doesn’t mean my revenge shall be unattended forever.”

The human brain could die roughly six minutes after the heart stops. That was plenty of time for me to do what I had in mind: erase parts of her memories. This would be my revenge—a slow-burning one, seeded deep in her mind. I knew Ivory’s background story all too well.

Contrary to what I initially thought, my abilities weren’t omnipotent. I couldn’t erase memories I didn’t know myself. I wasn’t a mind reader. I couldn’t make people forget their entire childhood if I didn’t know the details of that childhood. But Ivory was different—I knew so much about her as a game character.

I placed my palm over Ivory’s forehead, feeling the subtle shift as my power began to work. It wasn’t flashy, but it was effective. I started deleting parts of her that made her so violent, so dangerous. The memories of the Dome, her brutality, her love for blood—all of it.

I understood the existence of latent psychosis brought on by superpowers, and in Ivory’s case, it was particularly strong. I knew her violent streak would eventually return, but not until she’d caused enough damage to the Union. I doubted though whether I could effectively subdue her bloodlust.

The idea was simple: by removing all that was ‘bad’ in her, I could turn her into the ideal hero, one who would strive for moral good. Even if this state only lasted for a month, it would be enough. By the time her psychosis resurfaced, she would have seen the corruption of the Order and done enough damage. Ivory would be fighting against the Union, not for it.

Moreover, following her heroic rise… would be her tragic fall as a psychotic monster. Ah~ how poetic. I could almost see the propaganda that would follow her demise. Ivory would become the perfect distraction, allowing me to continue my mundane life. At the same time, I’d have punished her in a way that would inflict a lifetime of pain and self-hate.

“It was the perfect plan,” I whispered, feeling a grim satisfaction.

I meticulously erased any memories of my appearance and Lois’s from her mind, taking care to do it as thoroughly as possible. Five minutes had passed by the time I finished, and without wasting another second, I began performing CPR on her.

“You are going to live,” I spat the words like a curse, “and you are going to suffer for it.”

When the time is ripe, that's when I will kill you.