Chương 49: Chapter 48: PAIN – The Regret of the Speedster

Jin stood still. That alone felt wrong. The corridor was too narrow. Too damp. Too still. The air carried the metallic taste of old concrete that had been sweating for years. The walls pressed close enough that if he spread both arms, his fingertips would scrape both sides. Their surfaces were pocked with tiny cracks and long ugly stains, places where water had seeped through, dried halfway, then given up. Above him, rusted pipes ran along the ceiling like dead veins. Somewhere between them, something dripped.

One drop. Then another. Plink. Plink. Each sound struck the floor too cleanly for a place this filthy. Like a clock. Like a countdown. Like time did not care whether he was ready for the next second. The lights did not flicker. That was the worst part. They hummed. A deep, steady vibration pressed into the bones behind Jin's eyes. It made his skull feel slightly too tight, as if the world had placed both hands around his head and squeezed just enough to remind him it could. Standing still made his skin crawl.

His calves twitched. His ankle flexed without permission. A pulse ran through his thigh like an engine revving in neutral. He was not anxious. He was wired. His body did not understand waiting. His heartbeat refused to match his breathing. It ran ahead, impatient, as if his chest had decided the safest place in existence was five meters into the future. Speedsters were never just fast. People liked saying that because it was simple. And simple things made monsters easier to laugh at. But speed was not only muscle.

It was Prime Flux threaded through nerves too thin to see, turning panic into acceleration, instinct into distance, and reaction into survival. Every burst demanded conversion, stabilization, friction compensation, impact tolerance, and a thousand tiny corrections the body handled before thought could catch up. Jin's channels were always restless. Even now, standing still, he could feel them twitching under his skin. Waiting for command. Waiting for fear. Waiting for an excuse. Jin swallowed.

The sound was loud in the tunnel. Too loud.

"If I stop," he whispered, "I'll hear it." The thought surfaced like a reflex. Like a trapdoor opening beneath his feet. One second passed. Then another. His heel slid back. And he shot forward. The first few steps were controlled. He kept his speed low, testing the floor, listening for loose rubble, counting the distance between lights. He forced his breathing to remain calm. Forced his shoulders to loosen. Forced his body to pretend this was only movement. His footsteps still echoed. Too loud. Too slow.

The tunnel threw them back at him in layers. The echoes multiplied, ricocheted between the walls, and became a thin hiss chasing him from behind. Jin sped up automatically. Water on the floor splashed beneath his feet. Droplets lifted and hung in the air for a fraction of a second, suspended by the violence of his passage, then fell again as if nothing had happened. The walls seemed to curve inward. Not physically.

But in the way spaces did when you moved fast enough that the world had to work harder to look normal. The hum of the lights pressed deeper into his skull. The air felt thinner. The tunnel felt longer. And somewhere inside his chest, something cold shifted. An old sealed thing that hated being touched. This place was too familiar. Jin knew exactly where this was. He absolutely did not want to remember. Because his body remembered. His muscles. His nerves. His Prime Flux channels. His bones.

All of it carried the shape of this tunnel like a scar that had never healed properly. Jin's jaw tightened. He did what he always did. He tried to outrun it. He pushed harder. The lights stretched into pale lines. The tunnel became a smear of gray, damp concrete. His mind anchored itself to one thought and refused to let go. Don't stop. Then— A voice. Soft. Almost uncertain.

"Hyung…?" Jin's breath hitched so hard it hurt. His chest tightened as if someone had closed a fist around his lungs. The voice did not come from behind. It came from ahead. Thin. Young. Shaking. Too familiar. Jin's entire body reacted like he had been stabbed with an electric needle. His Prime Flux channels flared before he chose anything. Acceleration surged through his legs. Reaction pathways sharpened. The world stretched. His speed spiked without permission.

"No," he whispered. Not denial. Refusal. The voice came again. Closer and farther at the same time.

"Hyung…?" Jin's throat went dry. He surged forward.

"I'm here!" he shouted, voice ripped apart by the wind he created.

"I'm coming!" The distance did not change. No matter how fast he ran, the voice remained ahead. Never closer. Never farther. Always just beyond reach. Like mercy held one step past his fingertips. Jin's teeth ground together. His muscles screamed as he forced more speed out of a body already running on old pain. Every step sent sharp vibration up through his ankles and knees. The floor began to crack beneath him, hairline fractures spidering outward in his wake. Blood warmed his nose.

He wiped it away without slowing, smearing it across his cheek like war paint.

"Hyung…" The voice trembled. And memory— No. Worse than memory. Certainty slammed into him. Fire roaring through twisted metal. Smoke so thick it felt like chewing cloth. The sound of something collapsing that he could not stop no matter how fast he was. A small shape flickered at the edge of his vision. Not fully formed. Just the idea of a child.

"Hyung… save me…" Jin's heart punched his ribs. He forced his legs to go even faster, to the point where his body stopped being a body and became a weapon. Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author's preferred platform and support their work! The tunnel screamed around him. The lights exploded one by one as he passed, glass raining down behind him. His channels burned hot. Too hot. Prime Flux was not infinite. Conversion always had a cost.

Too much acceleration without enough coherence tore the body from inside. Nerves misfired. Blood pressure spiked. Joints absorbed impacts they were never meant to survive. Jin knew that. He did not care. He reached out. His fingers stretched forward toward something that finally appeared clearly. A boy trapped in rubble. Small. Skinny. Face streaked with soot. Eyes wide and wet, trying so hard not to be afraid. Jin's little brother. The distance shrank. For one miraculous moment, Jin was close enough to feel heat.

Breath. Life. His fingertips brushed the boy's hand. Then— BOOM. The ceiling tore open like rotten fabric. The tunnel collapsed in a single brutal gulp of concrete and rebar. The boy disappeared beneath the falling mass. Jin's hand snapped shut on air. His feet skidded. The world lurched. Jin screamed. Raw. Ugly. Unfiltered. Like something inside him had finally found the correct sound for grief. He had been an arm's length away. But he was still late. He was the Speedster. The Fastest. And it still did not matter.

Silence. Then— The tunnel was normal again. The lights hummed. The pipes dripped. Jin stood at the beginning. His lungs dragged air like he had been drowning. His nose bled again. His hands shook. The voice returned. Soft. Patient. Cruel.

"Hyung…?" Jin stared down the corridor, pupils tight.

"Again," he muttered, voice cracked.

"This time, I'll make it." He ran. He ran like the word again could overwrite the word never. He ran until the tunnel became streaks. Until thought lagged behind his body. Until the world began to skip frames like a broken film. The voice stayed ahead. Always ahead. Always exactly the same distance. Jin's chest burned. His muscles trembled. His heartbeat chased his steps like a dog chasing a car. His Prime Flux channels screamed with overuse, each pathway converting more fear into speed and more speed into damage.

He pushed harder anyway. He did not know how to stop. He never had. The third time, the tunnel changed. Not visibly at first. The air thickened. The darkness between lights stopped being empty and became present. Like tar waiting at the edge of lamp glow. Jin's speed pulled wind through the corridor, but the darkness did not move with it. It clung. Heavy. Patient. The voice came again. But now it sounded wrong. Layered. Like two recordings playing on top of each other.

"Hyung…" Then, underneath:"Why are you still running?" Jin's stride faltered. Half a beat. That was enough. The tunnel stretched sideways, as if hesitation had warped reality. The walls flexed inward. The lights dimmed. The hum deepened until it felt like pressure against his teeth.

"I'll save you," Jin panted, forcing his legs to move. The voice laughed. Quiet. Tired. Not mocking. That made it worse.

"You always say that." Jin's foot slipped. His heel hit a patch of water. He slid sideways and slammed shoulder-first into the wall hard enough to numb his arm. Pain shot down his elbow. His knee buckled. He caught himself against damp concrete, chest heaving. He was not running anymore. The tunnel remained endless. Still humming. Still dripping. But now the voice— Was behind him. Right behind his back. Jin did not turn. His fingers dug into the wet wall.

"I…" His throat tightened.

"I came too late." The words tasted thin. Hollow. Like saying them changed nothing. Which was the point. A footstep sounded. Not his. Slow. Wet. Deliberate. Something touched his back. Cold. Then the voice became many voices. His brother's voice. His own voice. The voice he hated most. The one that spoke inside his skull when no one else remained to blame.

"You're the fastest…"

"You said you'd come back…"

"I waited…"

"I was so scared…"

"Where were you?" Jin opened his mouth. No sound came out. Darkness wrapped around his ankles like cold tar. It did not drag him away. It pressed him down. Forced him to kneel.

"You're so fast," the voice continued, heavier now, accusation turning into weight.

"So why did I still die?" The lights above shattered. Not flickered. Shattered. Glass rained down in slow motion, catching fragments of Jin's face. Distorted. Fractured. Broken into a hundred pieces. Something tightened around his ankle. A black band. Thick. Sticky. Alive in the worst possible way. His instincts screamed one word. Run. Just one step. One burst. One conversion. One violent command through the channels that had saved him so many times before. But his legs would not move.

The Prime Flux inside him answered fear. Guilt answered louder. Speed meant nothing when guilt had your bones in its mouth. A small figure appeared ahead. Again. A child. Skinny. But wrong. His brother's face stretched slightly too long. Mouth open a little too wide. Eyes hollow, glowing faintly, as if someone had poured darkness into them and lit it from within. The child whispered:"Run."

"Run like you always do." Jin closed his eyes. His voice trembled.

"I don't want to be fast anymore." The darkness did not soften. It surged upward. The accusations rose with it. Multiplied. Like a crowd surrounding him. Like a stadium chanting his sin.

"You left me behind."

"You left me behind."

"You left me behind." Each sentence became a nail hammered into his chest. Jin doubled over, clutching his head. Guilt became physical. Not emotion. An object. A thick, choking substance poured into his mouth, his nose, his lungs. He could not breathe. He gagged. Tried to inhale. Swallowed darkness instead. Then his body began to shrink. Not metaphorically. Literally. His shoulders narrowed. His arms thinned. His legs shortened. His clothes sagged loose around him.

His hands, those hands that had been so fast, so proud, so certain, became small. The Prime Flux channels that had once screamed beneath his skin fell silent. No acceleration. No reaction compression. No escape. Only a child's body. A child's fear. And the unbearable knowledge that being special had not been enough. When Jin opened his eyes again, he was no longer an adult. He was twelve. Face smeared with dirt. Eyes red. Lip trembling as he tried not to sob and failed. The darkness leaned closer.

It preferred him like this. Smaller. Weaker. Easier to blame. His brother's voice softened. Gentle in the most painful way.

"I'm not mad at you."

"I just… don't understand."

"You're fast."

"So why did I still die alone?" Jin made a sound that was not a word. A broken, strangled gasp. Tears fell without permission, hot against dirty cheeks. He wanted to say sorry. But sorry did not rebuild rubble. Sorry did not reverse collapse. Sorry did not stop time from being a cruel machine. The darkness folded over him. Pressed him down. And speed, his only identity, was useless here. So this was it. His punishment. Not death. Reliving. Always arriving late. But then— The darkness ignited. Not with light.

With violence. A thin violet bolt speared through the void like a blade thrown by a god. The sound was not thunder. It was a roar. Deep. Furious. Alive. As if reality itself had been insulted. The tar-like darkness around Jin scorched and peeled away in charred chunks, blown back as though a storm had punched it in the face. A pale arm tore through the black curtain. Veins raised beneath ash-gray skin. Electricity wrapped around it like living chains. The void split. A figure stepped out. Not the Z-69 Jin knew.

Not the undead, sharp-eyed, hungry version who walked beside him now. This one was older. Older in the way war made men old. Silver hair in violent disarray. A scorched cloak hanging from his shoulders like a flag that refused to surrender. His posture was straight, but bent slightly forward, as if he had carried too many deaths on his back for too many years. One eye glowed with aged lightning. The other looked burned. Not blind. Exhausted.

The air around him crackled with violet arcs that snapped against the darkness like whips. This was not ordinary awakened lightning. Not Prime Flux converted into electricity through a clean combat channel. This was refusal given color. Thunderlight. A storm that did not empower darkness. Did not negotiate with corruption. Did not soothe the wound so it could keep feeding. It burned what should not remain. The accusations went silent. As if they had suddenly remembered fear. Old Z-69 did not shout.

Did not announce himself. He raised one hand. Thunder swept across the void. Not a blast. A cleansing. A wave of violet pressure tore tar from the walls, burned voices out of the air, and left the space behind clean and empty. Like someone had scraped mold off reality with a giant knife. The blackness around Jin vanished. So did the chanting voices. So did the phantom footsteps behind him. Only silence remained. The kind of silence that hurt because it left you alone with yourself.

Jin, still a child, knelt in the emptiness. Shaking. Sobbing so hard his ribs hurt. Old Z-69 approached slowly. Each step left faint sparks in the air, like the world could not decide whether to bow or burn. He stopped in front of Jin. Looked down. For a long moment, he said nothing. Then he knelt. A huge old hand, rough, warm, steady, rested on Jin's head. The touch was heavy. Real. Not comforting like a lullaby. Comforting like a shield.

"Kid," old Z-69 said, voice hoarse as gravel.

"You've run fast enough." No philosophy. No grand speech. Just one sentence that sounded like it had been earned the hard way. Jin's sobs hitched.

"But…" He tried to speak and failed. He swallowed and forced the words out.

"I didn't come back." Old Z-69 watched him like he was watching a wound. Then he exhaled.

"You did come back." A beat.

"Just too late." Jin's face crumpled. The child version of him looked up, small and raw, eyes unable to hide the question anymore.

"Then what do I do?" Old Z-69 stood. Lightning crawled up his arm and vanished into his shoulder like it belonged there. He held out one hand.

"Get up," he said. Behind him, something appeared. Faint at first. Then clearer. A path. Not bright. Not holy. Only lit enough to take one step without falling. Old Z-69 looked back at Jin.

"Keep going." Jin hesitated. Because taking that hand meant admitting he could not do it alone. Because taking that hand meant letting go of the punishment he had been using as proof he loved his brother. Because if he stopped hurting, it felt like betrayal. Old Z-69's gaze did not soften. It did not need to.

"Speed won't save you in here," he said.

"So walk." Jin's shaking hand rose. He grabbed old Z-69's hand. It felt like grabbing steel wrapped in warmth. Old Z-69 pulled him up effortlessly, like lifting a feather. When Jin took his first step onto the lit path, the world trembled. The void resisted. Darkness hissed. Old Z-69's lightning cracked once. The resistance broke. Jin stepped again. And again. Every step felt like tearing glue off his bones. But he kept stepping. When he crossed the boundary of light, the world exploded into white. Jin gasped.

His body jerked upright inside the pod like he had been yanked from deep water. His lungs dragged in air violently, as if he had been drowning for hours. Cold sweat soaked his back. His arms trembled. His eyes burned. An alarm shrieked once. Then cut off abruptly. The room's white lights stabbed into his pupils. Machines hummed around him. Steady. Clinical. Indifferent. Jin blinked hard. The pod glass was fogged from his own breath and heat. Outside the pod stood Z-69. Too close.

A connection helmet sat crooked on his head. But the cables did not run into Z-69's pod. They ran into Jin's. Jin stared. His throat tightened.

"You…" He tried to speak. His voice came out raw.

"You were in there." Z-69 yanked the helmet off. The cable snapped free with a crackle. He swayed. Only slightly. Like someone who had stood too fast after a long sleep. Then black fluid ran from his nose. Thick. Not blood-red. Ink-black. It dripped onto his lip. A darker line slid from his ear. Jin froze.

"You're bleeding." Z-69 wiped his face with the back of his hand and examined the black smear like it was an annoying stain.

"Yeah." His voice stayed flat.

"Brain's a bit fried." Jin stared at him.

"Are you insane?" Z-69 shrugged.

"Probably." Jin swallowed. His chest tightened in a way the illusion had not prepared him for.

"How did you even get into my PAIN?" Z-69 pointed at the side of Jin's pod. An auxiliary access port sat half-hidden behind a panel seam. The kind of thing a person would miss unless they lived by breaking systems open. A scratched warning label was stamped beside it. AUX LINK — DO NOT CONNECT NEURAL DAMAGE RISK FOREIGN RESONANCE CONTAMINATION POSSIBLE Z-69 tapped it once with a knuckle.

"There," he said.

"Side door." Jin stared at the label as if it had personally offended him.

"You saw a warning that says neural damage risk and you—""And I did it anyway."

"That's not an explanation."

"I saw you weren't doing well," Z-69 said.

"So I helped." He said it like that was the most normal sentence in the world. Jin exhaled a laugh that sounded halfway between relief and disbelief. Then he looked down. His hands still trembled. The memory of small fingers reaching for him had not vanished. Neither had the sensation of being twelve again. But something had changed. The darkness had stopped holding his ankles.

"…Thanks," Jin said quietly. Z-69 did not answer right away. For one second, he simply looked at Jin. Really looked. Not like a commander. Not like a monster. Like someone checking whether another person had returned intact. Jin swallowed. Then asked the question before fear could stop him.

"In the PAIN," he said, voice lower, "why were you old?" Z-69's mouth twitched.

"If I told you I'm over three hundred years old, would you believe me?" Jin snorted.

"You're messing with me." Z-69 said nothing. Only gave a small, unreadable smile. Jin's laugh died.

"…Wait." His eyes narrowed.

"You're serious?" Before he could process that, a sound came from the third pod. A low groan. Ten. Jin's spine went cold. He turned. Ten's pod was still lit. Ten lay rigid inside, fingers twitching, jaw clenched, lips moving soundlessly as if trying to scream without air. The glass was fogged. Condensation streaked down it like claw marks. The monitor above the pod flickered with unstable images. Not tunnel. Not darkness. Fluorescent light. Cold. White. Merciless. Stainless-steel tables. Restraint straps.

Metal beds. Figures in lab coats moved in and out of frame, faces distorted by interference as if the system itself refused to grant them human features. And children. Too many children. Thin arms. Wide eyes. Numbers where names should have been. Jin's mouth went dry.

"What is that?" Z-69's expression changed. Not dramatically. Worse. His face simply emptied of humor. Something dark formed behind his eyes. Like storm clouds gathering behind glass. On the screen, the image stuttered. A child appeared in the center of the frame. Skinny. Seven or eight years old. A number marked on his clothing 10. Bound. Eyes open. Staring straight at whatever leaned over him. Jin felt his skin go cold. A chill ran from his neck to his lower back.

The kind you felt when you realized horror was not imaginary. It was personal. Z-69 did not move. But his hand clenched. Rage. Pure rage. So intense it surprised even him. He did not understand why the image woke such emotion inside him. But he knew what needed to be done. Jin swallowed.

"Silverhead," he said carefully, voice tight.

"Don't. You already—" Z-69 reached for the helmet again. Jin snapped forward and grabbed his wrist.

"Are you out of your mind?" Jin hissed.

"You want your brain to turn into cooked tofu?" Z-69 looked at Jin's hand on his wrist. Then looked at the screen again. The child labeled 10 blinked once. Slow. Exhausted. Z-69's voice was flat.

"I'm fine." Jin tightened his grip.

"Bullshit." Z-69's gaze flicked to him. The next words came out like the most casual thing on earth.

"Worst case, it'll just be a headache." Jin stared at him, disbelief turning into anger.

"That is not just a headache. That's—" Z-69 pulled his wrist free. Not with force. With certainty.

"Let go," he said. Jin hesitated. Then let go. Because something in Z-69's eyes made one thing painfully clear. This was not negotiable. Z-69 fitted the helmet back onto his head. The cables trembled slightly, as if alive. He reached toward the side of Ten's pod. Found the same auxiliary port. The same warning. DO NOT CONNECT. His finger hovered for half a second. Then he plugged it in. The machine's hum rose. The monitor flickered violently. Ten's body twitched hard inside the pod. Jin's breath caught.

"Silverhead…" Z-69 did not answer. His eyes half-lidded. His posture straightened. Like someone stepping into a storm by choice. The PAIN system tried to map him again. Neural pattern. Bio-electric output. Resonance compatibility. Then the monitor spat out broken text. FOREIGN SUBJECT DETECTED. PRIME FLUX PROFILE: INCOMPATIBLE. THUNDERLIGHT SIGNATURE: UNCLASSIFIED. WARNING: INTERFERENCE MAY DAMAGE TRIAL INTEGRITY. Z-69's lips barely moved.

"Good." Then his consciousness vanished. The helmet lights dimmed. The pod's systems whined. The screen steadied. And Ten's nightmare opened like a door.