"Reese, your antics must come to an end immediately. There is no time to spend on insignificant characters like Miko," warned a mysterious voice. The man's face couldn't be seen because of the blindingly bright screen behind him.
"There is a man you must defeat at all costs, but due to certain circumstances, he cannot be discussed."
"What sorts of circumstances?" Reese asked, puzzled.
"The sort of circumstances that make it dangerous for me to even be standing here," the man trembled slightly as he said those words. "Anyways, I'll be off, here is a briefing that was painstakingly crafted to be as informative as possible."
The man dropped a Manila folder on the table and exited the room in a hurried fashion. After the door slammed shut, the room fell completely silent, except the faint buzzing of the television screen.
Calmly, Reese opened up the folder. As he slowly opened the folder, he was shocked by the first page, which simply contained the single word "DEATH," written in small letters and leaving the rest of the page blank. Confused, Reese turned to the next page, hoping the real information would begin there. But yet again, there was a single word, "ALWAYS". Slightly annoyed, Reese turned again to the next page, which seemed to be the final page. It too had a single word, "EVERYWHERE". However, in addition to the lettering, there was a faint red stain in the bottom corner, which sent shivers down his spine.
"Death, always, everywhere" he repeated in his head, "what an ominous thing to have written, and completely uninformative." The next thought in his mind is one he would come to regret the most.
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Miko felt strange today, and not in a physical sense. His body felt fine despite the trauma of the previous nights. He had made a full recovery, however something was off.
He realized that the strange feeling seemed to be coming from the world around him rather than any specific ailment he’d been afflicted with. Sidewalks and roads seemed to twist in impossible ways, and buildings seemed to alter shape at random. The cars passing by seemed to change color, model, style, and age every time he looked away. The people walking by sometimes seemed to slide forwards or backwards in between steps.
The world was morphing, moving, liquidizing, blurring. In all this, his body felt fine, but his mind was unable to fully process what was occurring, if anything was occurring at all.
In the corner of his eye appeared what seemed to be a misalignment in the fabric of reality. He desperately tried to approach it, but as soon as his perspective changed, the tear seemed to be, in reality, fully coherent.
This would continue to occur, and would be as frustrating everytime, as frustrating as would be following a rainbow to its hypothetical end. As soon as you reach what seemed to be the end, you realize that the end is not where it had been, and maybe, if your skill in self-reflection and critical thinking was high enough, realize that there was never any end. It was all simply a matter of perspective.
At some point, Miko had had enough, and the next time he witnessed one of the tears, he pulled the space itself towards him. And as the space stretched, and the world bent, the tear seemed to disappear before his power could even reach it.
Miko would continue to lash out at these tears, sometimes neglecting to place space back into its proper position, forever warping the fabric of the universe in that spot.
Miko's head began to throb, and his vision was blurring. He finally decided to quit what he was doing and get some rest, so he begrudgingly turned around and headed home.
Reese would be angry, but it couldn't be helped, his mind must still be messed up from the day before. When he finally reached his apartment, he crashed onto his bed and fell asleep instantly.
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She checked her watch once again, 1:36, it read.
"Hmmm, maybe he won't be coming," she thought to herself, twirling the spaghetti on her plate. A passing waiter stopped by her table.
"Would you like some more water ma'am? Or how about some more wine?" he asked politely.
"No, I am fine, I think I'll take the check as well."
"Sure thing ma'am."
She looked out the window longingly. What had kept him from being here with her? What sorts of things was he dealing with? What evils was he fighting? What good was he doing? Surely, they were of immense importance for him to skip such an amazing opportunity. However, she knew that this would not be the last chance for them to meet, for she was ready to try again another time. That is how much he meant to her.
"Today's not my day," she whispered to herself, a dejected look on her face.
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Reese walked down a bustling street with a somber look on his face. He eyed the three pieces of paper handed to him by that hurried agent. He carefully examined each and every corner of the page, hoping he could eke a bit more information out of them.
The only other things echoing in his head were the words of the agent he had met with. What had he said? It seemed like it was written... I mean said... weeks ago when it should have only been minutes.
"He cannot be discussed" is a line that he finally recalled. What did that mean? What were the consequences of discussing this man?
What constituted discussing him in the first place, after all, wasn't that exactly what that meeting was?
Were there operations underway now that we had spoken about him? That would be the most obvious train of logic. That there existed a man, no, a criminal who possessed the ability to peer into discussions about themselves.
But then what were these papers about? They didn't fit into his current theory at all. After all, if discussions were dangerous, then wouldn't the safest course of action be to write down the meticulous details of the ability they were up against?
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In light of this new thought, Reese made an amendment to the enemy's abilities. Not “discussed”, but “mentioned”, or “implicated”. A definition that would include any form of communication, or possibly an even wider range of actions. In any case, he was already a target, no doubt about it.
"If I was already destined to become a target, why not give me as much information as possible?" he complained to himself.
It was a pervasive thought, one that plagued him deeply. In this case, the ability must be even more general, or split amongst many separate abilities. The possibilities were almost endless, in every step he took, countless ideas flowed in and out of Reese’s mind, but none seemed definitive. He lacked information, that was the only thing he was sure of. Maybe it would be best to put off the hunting and focus on other matters, Miko's matters.
It seemed he had skipped out on the meeting he had planned meticulously. It was evident that Miko, over the last few weeks, had begun to restrain his sense of obedience towards him. This cumulated into the unfavourable results he had seen recently.
First, Miko’s rejection to “do something,” and finally, the nail in the coffin, refusing a solution to his crippling loneliness.
When had he become so comfortable with himself? It seemed more discipline was needed, but most of all, he needed to install a feeling of normalcy. Otherwise, simple concepts like loneliness or responsibility would be meaningless.
Only a person who lacks things can feel these, so in a way, being incomplete is what makes someone truly human. Although for that to be true, Miko’s current state must be considered “complete,” however that was something he could never accept. Was the state of completeness not what Reese was, or at least strived to be? It wasn’t something so dark and empty, but bright and full of passion.
In the end, things like loneliness and responsibility were only means to an end, ways to achieve the state of completeness. In the end, Reese acknowledged that the only way forward would be to take things a step at a time. Destroy and rebuild, over and over until you get it right, and once more for good measure, that was his motto.
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Miko woke up feeling a lot better than earlier in the day. It seemed whatever was going on with his mind had stopped.
He turned to look out his window and noticed that it was now nighttime. It seemed like he had slept for quite a while, and now he probably couldn’t sleep anymore.
Bored, he began to walk in circles in his bedroom. After a couple of circles, he spotted an object out of the corner of his eye. When he went to examine it further, he realized that whatever it was, wasn’t his.
Not only that, the item didn’t even seem like it belonged to this world. It was a small rectangular prism with rounded edges and was iridescent yet also a dull green, almost like it was made out of brighter soapstone. But it was light, unlike stone, and it had a slight squish to it, it seemed it was a material not used in this world, and definitely not known by Miko.
He picked it up. it seemed like it was made up of ordinary matter, but there was still something off about it. When he took a closer look, it seemed to bulge and shrink at its faces, almost as if it was breathing.
He then held out his empty hand and tried to replicate the object. At first, it seemed to work, but then in the next moment, it seemed to turn into dust. In the pile of dust, there seemed to be a number of strange components, which seemed to be made out of glass. However again, on physical inspection, they too seemed to squish. These components were in the shapes of rods, disks, and spheres, some connected, and others separate. They seemed to break when touched, even through psycho-kinetic means, so there was no good way to thoroughly examine them. Indeed, it seemed like even the slightest things could cause them to shatter.
As the mattress connoisseur he was, he instantly recognized the fine craftsmanship in this object. Once again, he was unable to recreate an object.
Miko sat on his bed, staring at the pile of dust and strange components that used to be the mysterious object. He couldn't shake the feeling that there was more to this object than met the eye. He had never seen anything like it before, and he couldn't even recreate it using his psycho-kinetic abilities.
He decided to try and figure out where the object had come from. He closed his eyes and focused his mind, trying to sense any clues that might lead him to the object's origin.
After a few moments, he opened his eyes and stood up, a determined look on his face. He had a feeling that the object was connected to a place called "The Green Zone," a place that was rumored to be home to all sorts of strange and mysterious objects and phenomena.
Miko grabbed his backpack and filled it with supplies, including a few spare clothes, some food, and a map of the area. He knew that the journey to the Green Zone would be treacherous and full of danger, but he was determined to find out the truth about the object.
As he set off on his journey, Miko couldn't shake the feeling that he was being watched. He glanced over his shoulder a few times, but he saw nothing out of the ordinary. He shrugged it off and continued on his way, determined to uncover the secrets of the strange object and the mysterious Green Zone.
Or maybe, the Green Zone was a construct created by an artificial intelligence in order to control his actions. Or more sinisterly, to prevent him from discovering the true nature of this object. That was the real identity of the Green Zone. A trap of the highest order, formulated by the amalgamation of a higher consciousness that controlled fate itself. A being etched in the very fabric of space and time itself, influencing the simultaneity of events and bending the perception of reality. The being would have no beginning or end.
Gravity.
He dropped the green object.
As it fell, it warped reality around it, swapping colors and features of the furniture around it, causing Miko great psychological pain.
Suddenly it was falling upwards, or maybe was it that reality was simply upside down? It continued to flip the world until it reached a certain speed, which then allowed it to rip a hole into space itself and passed through that tear.
Hyper-aware of the situation, Miko stopped the self-regenerating function of this tear and peered inside the gaping hole. He saw nothing, or simply he was not able to see anything. But was it green? His brain certainly wanted to think so. But Miko could not let it be true.
The Green Zone was not real, he had to continue to remind himself. With this, he made up his mind and plunged his body into the green void.
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The Butterfly saw it, his demise. And it was gruesome. But totally avoidable.
A hole had opened up in the air, time and space were warping in its presence. At an incredible speed, some sort of black liquid shot out of the hole, spiraling and curving according to the bent space around it. It seemed to circle backward yet plowed forwards. Its pitch-black color seemed to emit unfathomable amounts of light. Its presence ripped apart all that was in its vicinity.
How could it possibly be avoided? He admitted it was the perfect trap to kill him. After all, if it was completely unpredictable where and when this hole would appear, each tiny action could vary the result widely.
He could predict it for a moment, but one slightly wrong step could throw things way off, and if perhaps he was unlucky enough, kill him right then and there.
However, clearly, there was a starting point, as he had never been killed by it yet, and he had never known it had even existed. That means either it occurs incredibly infrequently or there was a trigger, someone or something has to cause it to occur. And that action has yet to occur. In that case, all he would have to do is search for the universes in which it never occurs and use their commonality as a basis for what causes it. And there would be his culprit.
This would take some time, and he would be vulnerable during it. However, using the countless versions of him scattered among infinite dimensions, it would at least take a finite amount of time.
A smile began to grow on his face.
“Done,” he giggled.