The Unraveling

The first thing you learn about eternity is that it gets boring. Fast.

I sit in the desert, watching my skin burn and heal, burn and heal. An endless cycle of regeneration that would drive a normal person insane. Good thing I crossed that bridge centuries ago.

My strings dance in the moonlight, cutting shadows into pieces just because they can. Each one a reminder of the power I've stolen, the lives I've ruined, the reality I've bent until it screamed.

Chronos. That fight changed everything.

***

Finding an immortal is like trying to catch smoke with chopsticks. You don't track the smoke - you follow the fire. Aahan's memories painted the picture. Chronos was a collector of catastrophes, drawn to moments where reality buckled under the weight of change. Always present, always watching, cataloging humanity's greatest hits like a cosmic tourist. I hunted Chronos through time itself. Each lead a breadcrumb through history's bloodiest moments. Guy had a thing for chaos, for watching empires fall. Always there, always watching, never aging.

But immortals have patterns. Habits carved so deep even eternity can't wash them away.

I found his in Rome. Not the tourist trap version - the real Rome. Underground. Catacombs older than Christianity. A perfect circle of stopped time, where decay fears to tread. The door looked like it predated dirt. Symbols carved into metal that shouldn't exist, telling stories that would make archaeologists shit themselves.

"Come in," his voice echoed from everywhere and nowhere. "I've been expecting you."

The catacombs opened like a mouth swallowing light. Air thick with the weight of centuries, heavy with secrets older than language itself. My strings twitched, hungry for immortal blood. He sat on a throne carved from moments - frozen fragments of time compressed into something solid. Reality hiccuped around him, centuries condensing into seconds.

"The puppet master himself," Chronos smiled, perfect teeth gleaming in the darkness. "Come to steal what can't be stolen."

I stepped forward, letting Maelstrom's power crackle along my strings. "Already done that three times. Want to make it four?"

He laughed. The sound echoed through time itself, rippling reality like a stone in still water. "You think draining those children makes you ready for this? I was ancient when the first fish crawled onto land. I watched mountains rise and fall like waves."

"Nice resume," I spat. "But I didn't come for a history lesson."

The fight started with a sound that shouldn't exist - the scream of time itself being torn apart. Chronos moved like mercury, flowing through moments like they were suggestions rather than laws. One second he was on his throne, the next his fist was halfway through my ribcage.

I coughed blood, feeling organs rearrange themselves in ways anatomy textbooks would reject. "That all you got, old man?"

My strings lashed out, black lightning dancing along their length. He dodged most - key word being most. One caught his shoulder, drawing blood that shimmered like starlight.

"First blood," I grinned. "How's that feel?"

He touched the wound, looking more amused than hurt. "Like a mosquito bite. Four billion years ago."

Then he got serious. The air around us crystallized. Time became solid, sharp enough to cut. I felt my skin split open as seconds turned to razors, minutes to guillotines. I countered with Torque's power, trying to bend space where time had gone rigid. Reality groaned under the strain.

"You're playing with forces you don't understand," Chronos lectured, casually stopping a chunk of debris in mid-air. "Time isn't just another power to steal. It's the fabric of existence itself."

"Thanks for the physics lesson," I snarled, launching a barrage of strings wrapped in Veil's illusions. "Here's my response."

The strings hit like a symphony of razor wire. Each one carrying a different power - Maelstrom's lightning, Torque's force, Veil's mind-bending reality warps. Chronos didn't dodge this time. He aged them. My strings turned to dust before they could touch him.

"Impressive collection," he admitted, brushing ancient string-dust from his suit. "But ultimately futile."

The battle escalated. Because with guys like us, it always does. My fist connected with his jaw, backed by Torque's power. Bone cracked. Reality rippled. For a moment, the perfect bastard actually looked surprised.

Then he hit back. His punch carried the weight of centuries. I felt ribs shatter, organs rupture, blood vessels burst. The impact sent me through three walls of solid stone, each one older than written history.

"Do you feel it yet?" Chronos called out, stepping through the destruction like he was taking a Sunday stroll. "The futility? The inevitable march of time?"

I spat out a tooth, watching it age to dust before it hit the ground. "Feel this."

Maelstrom's power answered my call. Lightning that could split mountains danced along my strings. The air itself ignited, turning the catacombs into an electric hellscape. Chronos waved his hand. The lightning aged, turned to cosmic radiation, then to nothing. But it was just a distraction.

My real attack came from below. Strings erupted from the ground like hungry serpents, each one carrying a different flavor of stolen power. Some burned with elemental fury, others bent reality, a few just went straight for the throat. He couldn't dodge them all. Blood sprayed as strings pierced flesh. Perfect suit, not so perfect anymore. The wounds healed instantly, but I saw it - a flicker of pain in those ancient eyes.

"You're starting to annoy me," he growled. The temperature dropped. Air turned solid. Time itself began to crystallize.

I felt my body begin to age. Skin wrinkled, muscles atrophied, bones turned brittle. A century of decay in seconds. Then he reversed it. Youth flooded back, bringing with it the raw agony of cells rebuilding themselves too fast. Back and forth, old to young, young to old. A temporal yo-yo of pure suffering.

Between one breath and the next, Chronos appeared behind me. His elbow found my spine, sending shockwaves through bone and time. Pain exploded like a supernova in my nervous system. I turned the fall into an attack, strings whipping out in every direction. Each one vibrating with stolen power. A few found flesh. His blood hissed where it hit the ground, eating through stone like acid.

"Getting sloppy," he taunted, healing instantly. "Those strings of yours are just cheap imitations of real power."

I laughed through a mouthful of blood. "Says the man who's bleeding."

He reached out. The air between us shattered. Time fragmented into a thousand razor-sharp shards. I felt my body being pulled apart, each moment of my existence trying to occupy the same space. Past, present, future - all colliding like drunk drivers at a cosmic intersection.

But pain? Pain's just weakness leaving the body. And I had centuries of weakness to purge.

My strings wrapped around the fragments of time itself. Used Torque's power to bend them, Veil's illusions to reshape them, Maelstrom's fury to charge them.

"Impossible," Chronos whispered, watching his own power turn against him.

"Nothing's impossible," I grinned. "You just lack imagination."

The battle turned into a dance of destruction. Each step cracking reality, each movement tearing holes in the fabric of existence. Chronos aged the very air in my lungs to poison. I responded by filling his lungs with strings that conducted Maelstrom's lightning.

He tried to trap me in a moment, freeze me in time. I used Veil's power to make the moment believe it was something else.

Reality trembled as we clashed. The catacombs groaned, centuries of history crumbling under our war. Time stopped having meaning. Could've been minutes. Could've been millennia. When you're punching holes in existence, clocks become suggestions. I let loose another barrage of strings, each one vibrating with stolen power. Chronos danced through them like they were party streamers, not weapons that could slice atoms.

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"Getting tired?" he taunted, aging a chunk of ceiling into diamond-hard crystal, then hurling it at me like the world's deadliest fastball.

I caught it with Torque's power, crushed it to dust, then sent the particles back at him as a storm of microscopic razors. "Just warming up, old man."

He froze the dust in time, creating a beautiful, lethal sculpture in mid-air. "Stolen power is no match for mastery."

"Let's test that theory."

I unleashed hell. Maelstrom's lightning turned the air to plasma. Torque's force crushed space itself. Veil's illusions made reality forget what was real.

Chronos responded by aging the lightning to heat death, warping space back on itself, and simply closing his eyes to ignore the illusions.

His fist connected with my jaw, carrying the weight of eons. Teeth shattered. Blood sprayed. I felt my skull crack like an egg dropped from orbit. I retaliated with a string-wrapped uppercut that caught him under the chin. His perfect head snapped back. For a moment, those ancient eyes went glassy.

But immortals don't stay down.

Between one breath and the next, Chronos appeared behind me. His elbow found my spine, sending shockwaves through bone and time. Pain exploded like a supernova in my nervous system.

I turned the fall into an attack, strings whipping out in every direction. Each one vibrating with stolen power. A few found flesh. His blood hissed where it hit the ground, eating through stone like acid.

"Getting sloppy," he taunted, healing instantly. "Those strings of yours are just cheap imitations of real power."

I laughed through a mouthful of blood. "Says the man who's bleeding."

Reality convulsed as Chronos gathered his strength. The air between us shattered as he reached out with tendrils of pure temporal force. I felt my body being pulled apart, each moment of my existence trying to occupy the same space. Past, present, future - all colliding like drunk drivers at a cosmic intersection.

Then he surprised me. His attacks stopped.

"You fool," he said quietly, temporal energy still crackling around him. "You think this is about power? About control? The Fellowship wasn't created for dominion - it was created to hold something back. Something that would make our petty wars seem like children squabbling in a sandbox."

I kept my strings ready, but curiosity got the better of me. "What are you talking about?"

"There are forces," he continued, eyes distant with memory, "that existed before time itself. Before reality learned proper rules. We thought we could contain them, use their power. But they're waking up. Your actions, your collecting of abilities - you're weakening the barriers we spent centuries building."

"More Fellowship lies," I spat, though doubt crept in like unwanted shadows.

"Look around you," Chronos gestured at reality fracturing under our battle. "Feel how thin existence has become. They're already beginning to seep through. The Event was just the beginning. And if you continue this path..." He shook his head. "You'll give them exactly what they need to return."

But pain had made me cruel, bitter. "Pretty words from someone who helped enslave reality itself."

"So be it." His form flickered with grim resignation. "Remember this moment, puppet master. When everything starts to unravel, when reality forgets how to be real - remember I tried to warn you."

The battle resumed with renewed fury. Time itself screamed as we clashed, each blow carrying centuries of power. But his words lingered, planting seeds of doubt that would grow into dark forests of regret.

Reality trembled as we clashed. The catacombs groaned, centuries of history crumbling under our war.

Time stopped having meaning. Could've been minutes. Could've been millennia. When you're punching holes in existence, clocks become suggestions. Our fight reached its crescendo. A symphony of violence that would make gods cover their ears.

I hit him with everything. Maelstrom's storms. Torque's force. Veil's mind-fucks. My strings sang with stolen power, each one hungry for immortal blood.

But Chronos was eternal for a reason.

He aged my attacks to dust. Reversed my momentum. Turned my own power against me.

Then I saw it. A pattern in his movements. He kept glancing at a specific wall. Between punches that could level mountains, his eyes would dart there. Just for a microsecond.

Protecting something.

I threw everything I had at him. A hurricane of strings and stolen power. Pure chaos theory given physical form. He blocked most of it. Key word: most.

One string slipped through. Not aimed at him - at that wall.

Reality cracked. Stone shattered. And there, in a pocket of frozen time, I saw them.

Two small figures, huddled together. Twin boys, maybe four or five years old. Perfect miniature versions of their father, right down to the pristine clothes. Terror etched on their small faces.

"No," Chronos whispered. First time I'd ever heard fear in his voice.

Time froze. Not Chronos's doing - pure instinct. Like reality itself was holding its breath.

The boys stared at me with wide eyes. Mirror images of terror, clutching each other in their perfect bubble of stopped time.

"No," Chronos whispered. First time I'd ever heard fear in his voice. "Please...they're just children."

I studied the twins, then looked back at their father. "The great Chronos, begging. Never thought I'd see the day."

"You don't understand what's at stake," he said, blood trickling from perfect lips. "If you kill me, if you take my power - reality itself will-"

"Spare me the cosmic consequences speech," I cut him off. "I've heard it from all the others too."

Chronos screamed as he lunged at me. He unleashed centuries of compressed time. Reality screamed as past and future collided. Mountains of force hit me like cosmic freight trains.

I answered with everything. Maelstrom's storms turned savage, hurricanes of lightning and fury. Torque's power bent space itself. Veil's illusions made reality forget what was real.

My strings, hungry as ever, danced with stolen power.

The collision leveled the catacombs. Ancient stone turned to dust, then to nothing, then to everything.

Time to end this.

My strings wrapped around Chronos like a lover's embrace, each one pulsing with stolen power. Lightning from Maelstrom arced between them, reality bent and warped under Torque's influence, and Veil's illusions made the very air forget how to exist.

"Last words?" I asked, tightening the noose.

Those perfect twins watched from their bubble of frozen time. Pristine little dolls in miniature suits, not a hair out of place even as reality convulsed around them. No power radiated from them - just pure, mortal fear.

Chronos's eyes met mine. "They won't survive what's coming. What you'll unleash."

"Maybe," I admitted. "But neither will you."

I pulled.

The universe screamed.

Chronos's power - his essence, his immortality - flooded into me like a tidal wave of broken glass. Each moment of his eternal existence crashed through my strings, turning my blood to fire and my bones to ice.

Then I saw it. Not just his memories - something deeper. Something older.

In the spaces between seconds, in the void where time fears to tread, THEY waited. Shapes that shouldn't exist, geometries that made reality itself scream. Ancient things that were old when time was young. The kind of darkness that makes darkness afraid.

I saw what they did to existence before the Fellowship sealed them away. Worlds where physics went mad. Dimensions shattered like broken mirrors. Entire realities digested and remade into impossibilities.

And they were stirring. Each power I stole, each barrier I broke - I was unlocking their cage, one cosmic tumbler at a time.

For a moment, real fear gripped me. Not the kind that makes you run. The kind that makes you realize just how fucking small you are.

Chronos's body began to crumble, perfect suit turning to ash, perfect hair going white, perfect skin becoming ancient parchment. But those eyes - those eyes stayed the same. Watching his sons until the very end.

I understood now. The Fellowship wasn't just hoarding power - they were using it. Keeping reality sane. Keeping THEM locked away.

And I'd just broken another lock.

When it was over, Chronos lay at my feet like a broken statue. Not dead - death wouldn't take him. But something worse. Empty. Eternal, but powerless.

The twins hadn't moved. Still clutching each other, mirror images of fear in their perfect suits. No power radiated from them. Just two kids watching their world end.

I looked at them. Really looked. Saw myself at that age - another scared kid in an alley, blood on my knuckles, someone else's tooth embedded in my fist.

"You know what happens now?" I asked them. Their identical faces showed matching fear. "Your father's gone. Not dead, but...might as well be."

"Are you going to kill us?" the one on the left whispered.

I laughed. The sound echoed strangely in the ruins of our battle. "No. I'm giving you a choice. The kind I never got."

They looked at each other, having one of those silent conversations only twins can have.

"You can run. Try to survive in a world that's about to go mad. Or..." I held out my hand, strings dancing between my fingers like deadly puppet strings. "You can come with me."

The one on the left - Nyx - took a step forward. His brother - Lark - grabbed his arm.

"Don't," Lark whispered. "He's a monster."

"He's strong," Nyx replied, eyes fixed on my dancing strings. "And we need strength now."

"We need each other," Lark pleaded. "Like always."

Nyx looked back at his twin. For a moment, I saw their whole lives in that look - every shared secret, every mirrored laugh, every identical tear.

"I won't be weak," Nyx said softly. "Not anymore."

He pulled away from his brother and took my hand. My strings wrapped around him - not to hurt, not to drain, but to claim. To mark.

Lark backed away, shaking his head. "Nyx, please..."

"Last chance, kid," I offered. "Family shouldn't split up."

"We're not family," Lark spat, glancing at his father's broken form. "Not anymore."

He turned and ran into time's shadows, leaving nothing but footprints in ancient dust.

Nyx watched him go, face unreadable. Perfect little mask, already learning to hide pain.

"Will I see him again?" he asked.

I smiled, feeling the weight of prophecy in my words. "Oh yes. But next time, you'll be on opposite sides of the board."

Time to rewrite reality's rules. But now with an apprentice to teach. A puppet learning to pull his own strings. After all, every monster needs an heir. And every hero needs a villain to fight.

Even if that villain wears his own face.