Chương 119: CHAPTER 116 - Onkruid Vergaat Niet

Icarus was a military conglomerate, distorted and consumed, but it still housed all the remaining equipment. The gigantic first- and second-generation airships peeked out from the holes of the snow-covered hangars, trapped like canaries in a cage while the wind shook the rotten flags above their masts. The old models still used partial maritime navigation, along with the intricate and deafening liquid Taumite engine.

The second generation had abandoned such ambivalence, opting for sturdier hulls and wings more resistant to winds and more effective. Despite the history that once accompanied these colossi, they were destined to decay under the looming malevolence. A black miasma, dense and unnatural, absorbed the snowy land. The snow melted. The iron began to fuse or rust until it collapsed. The bare trees either rotted or were devoured by flames. The rocks eroded or crumbled into mud.

Everything met its end before being slashed by thousands of black cuts, manifesting in the cold, silent air. A portion of Icarus as large as an island was torn to pieces, rent by that hollow mass. Among the corrupted debris, shell casings slid, immediately followed by other cuts." Hakmes …" A distorted voice murmured from one globule of black and red slime floating among the rocks. It aimed straight at the rock where a coated soldier was seeking a foothold.

The slash and the man's coat collided, releasing a sea of sparks while a veil of white energy enveloped him entirely.

"I'm glad you're here." From the cocoon of darkness emerged a figure cloaked in a black, almost liquid veil of debris and military wreckage. Everything that belonged to him was black, from his eyes to his hair, in contrast with the disgustingly deathly appearance he displayed. Despite this, his gait was vigorous, incessant, and unchanged, like the faint smile on his shadowed face.

The bursts of violet energy dispersed into the air, while the soldier wrapped in white caught his breath, slowly feeding the rifle a new bullet with reddish reflections.

"So am I, you know?" Malcolm smiled, landing on a floating rock opposite Maverick's.

"I see you've managed to carry on that technology. Do your pupils know?" The smile remained the same as he ran his thumb over the open wound on his cheek, which desperately tried to close.

"You know I have no pupils, only colleagues." The rock where he stood detonated, enveloped in that same fibrous, grim slime. Malcolm followed him with his gaze, without moving.

"It wasn't always like that, seeing how much you appreciated our company." He moved his head to the side, avoiding the bullet aimed at his forehead.

"Do you still think I can harbor even a drop of respect for you, demon?" Maverick spat on the ground, reloading the rifle. In the distance, from their shelter suspended in the void, part of the region was being devoured by what Malcolm called the "calamity" at the base of his ability.

"Destiny is something terrifying, Haia. An endless skein without beginning or end. People are nothing but immersed in the amniotic fluid of existence, cradled until they cease and then repeat. The war should have made you understand well for whom and for what we fought. What do you think humanity will gain from it if not a pale imitation of an ending? As long as we can keep going, the End will never come to free us." He vanished into the black liquid, while the bullet shattered the ground.

Maverick turned sharply, unsheathing a blade hidden in his elbow. Violet sparks and black drops spread through the snowflakes as the blades clashed.

"An external Frequency amplifier? And I was wondering how you were surviving!" Maverick's sword sliced off the slim weapon, closing in to sever Malcolm's throat. He vanished again, replaced by a horrible sensation." Zwerm." Thin black filaments slashed the entire area, cutting every grain of dust in the air. Maverick found himself hurled from his shield onto solid ground, crashing against wreckage and debris.

As he slid across the terrain, he grabbed a new bullet from his pocket and deftly loaded it into the rifle's chamber. He aimed, but the black-clad figure, so far away, now held the rifle's barrel.

"Did you modify this too with Lambdite and the blood of those two?" From Maverick's pocket, at insane speed, a blade with a blood-crusted edge burst. Malcolm's palm was pierced, forcing him to release his grip. Maverick was about to strike, finger on the trigger, scope centered on the forehead, but he noticed only the black light concentrated in the bloodied hand that rippled and contracted." Granaatscherven …"

An eruption of black, oily darts perforated the entire island, transmitting the vile calamity to every crevice of the area. Thus the hangar began to crumble, and its remains plunged into the void for the little time left before vanishing into the air. Maverick felt his armor, still intact despite the blow." It sucks feeling it move inside my spine... But it's keeping me alive." The thin tubes hidden beneath his skin pulsed, sucking in the Frequency that flowed along with electrical stimuli.

"Without my mark, I won't last long… But the machinery will stop working." He shouldered the weapon again, observing his surroundings: this time he had ended up in the remains of what looked like a shipyard, with the remnants of a gigantic Assailant under construction. He could clearly see the barely welded blocks and the detached front section, still to be impaled by the colossal beams and secured by the gargantuan bolts. With a leap, he hid inside that space, drawing a blade from his pocket, this time pristine.

The snow began to settle on the damp wooden skeleton, now rotten. The entrance portal was slashed open, letting in the light needed to silhouette Malcolm's figure. The man was cleaning the hole in his hand, still pulsing as it tried to heal, heedless of the dry ground and the sparks his cloak's plates caused. He looked around, sketching a vague smile.

"How many of these did we shoot down against Termìe? How much did the crew beg while they burned alive in their own fuel? I remember you refused to give them even a single merciful bullet." His steps echoed in the silence, crushing the occasional snow remnants gifted by the hole in the roof.

"I still can't understand you, Haia. Your change of direction. Where did the idea come from that you and I were so different? The Offrandes 8G, our unit of rejects… United by the same hatred for the system that rejected us and forced us through unspeakable violence, would that be the womb of our schism?" Without warning, a gash detonated toward the side, splitting the ship's bow in two. The rotten metal fell to the ground with a crash, spreading a white mist with various orange contrasts.

"Perhaps you never forgave yourself for that woman? Poor little Alice." Malcolm smiled, spinning as a metal container plummeted at insane speed toward him. The acceleration was so great that the metal began to glow as if molten. Malcolm's barrier erased the impact, hurling him outward as he watched the atypical projectile destroy an islet suspended in the void with a deafening boom.

"You truly haven't learned anything…" Malcolm turned toward the hangar, with black light expanding between his fingers. A single black thread cut the air, clashing against the colossal wreck hurled at him. With a gesture of his hand, the black strip split into many small filaments, slicing through iron and frozen wood. He emerged unscathed, motionless as he watched the remains fly past his shoulders and turn into a bombardment for the barren plain below.

"Don't tell me you intend to keep hiding." As he spoke, a faint ticking reached his ears. His eye shifted as needed so that a small reddish cylinder appeared in his peripheral field. He smiled before being enveloped in an explosion the color of blood. Intense red smoke enveloped the site while Malcolm lay on the ground, coughing. With every breath, he could feel his lungs dying and his throat tearing, yet he smiled.

"Don't tell me…" He chuckled, staring at what remained of his hand. The hand he had tried to defend himself with was now reduced to a liquefied stump of epithelium, bones, tendons, and muscles. As much as he felt the core's shards spreading through his body to minimize damage, the pain only grew unbearably. Despite everything, Malcolm laughed weakly. Maverick burst from the rubble, brandishing a new blade: it was straight, just over an arm's length, and gleamed with an unsettling scarlet reflection.

Both soldiers locked eyes: one twisted with joy, the other furrowed and bloodshot. Malcolm placed his wrist on the damp rock, injecting his own Frequency into the landscape. Just before the blade could sever his neck, the ground exploded in dozens of different points, raising numerous spikes wrapped in black slime. All the earth near the crater began to distort, split, or erode until Maverick completely lost his footing.

"Shit!" Malcolm vanished in that brief instant, appearing beside him. He managed to turn, trying to mitigate the elbow's impact on his face. Maverick staggered in the mud, avoiding a new blow. The weapon's hilt and Malcolm's knuckles clashed, pushing the two apart.

"A grenade with a personalized pathogen? You've surely matured." Maverick did not answer. He simply brought the blade forward and the arm back with a clenched fist. Malcolm nodded, vanishing again. Maverick swung a slash at his back, missing as he crouched. Malcolm drove his knuckles into Maverick's abdomen, hurling him away. He tumbled through the now-deposited brown slush before getting back up. He couldn't steady his stance before being kicked straight in the face.

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"Had it been any other Meta, they'd probably already be on the ground writhing as their organs turned to mush…" A gush of blood erupted from Malcolm's smile.

"However, I think you've forgotten my constitution." With his free hand, he drew an old, rusty knife, soaked in the same disgusting presence that characterized every gesture of his. Maverick panted, spitting blood at his feet. His grip on the hilt tightened until his forearm trembled. No answer. He simply took a step forward.

"I didn't forget anything about you or what you did..." The two blades clashed again, scattering black sparks. The exchange of slashes tore the earth and cut the air while neither could tear their gaze from the other. Suddenly, a new hand sprouted from Malcolm's wrist. The spectral fingers stretched toward Maverick's face like tentacles, forcing him to pull away.

"How? Regeneration should…" In the whirl of thoughts, the fear of failure drew near. Malcolm grabbed him by the face, ignoring the barrier's burns, and slammed him to the ground. Maverick's body, soft and weakened, lost the sword as his skull sank into the mud, hitting the hard soil beneath.

"Come now, this is nothing compared to what the victims you writhe for have endured." He kicked him, shattering the rock and hurling him against one of the crater's walls. Maverick's body struck with a dry thud, while snow and debris fell over him. Malcolm watched him, amused, while flexing his new artificial fingers, composed of the same slime born from his ability. He picked up the blade from the ground, snapping it with the edge of his hand.

"You've truly reached an abyss that even your past self would have refused to taste even before death itself." Malcolm advanced slowly, ignoring the dripping wounds on his abdomen. Maverick coughed, trying to keep his gaze steady as his peripheral vision faded into black. He felt the dirty snow melting on his shoulders, while a scratched, crackling breath rose from his chest.

"So this silence is your answer?" Malcolm was now in front of him, still with that faint smile sketched. Facing that silence, he simply raised his black hand.

"You underestimate me again… If you think all this hatred burns out into nothing." He made a single gesture with his index finger, and immediately a terrifying boom spread through the crater. Maverick's ears bled as he lunged at Malcolm, his arm pierced by the remains of the blade. In that moment, he noticed the symbol engraved on the guard.

"Did he add it while he forged it?" Malcolm turned, extending his black hand, making it erupt in an explosion of black slime tentacles. Maverick's barrier pushed them back one last time before detaching, leaving the mechanical access exposed. The mark engraved in his flesh lit up blue. His fingers clenched into a fist as sparks and flashes began to swarm around him like fireflies. Malcolm smiled, feeling the impact spread through his body.

With a shout, Maverick channeled all the force his body could exert, that the electricity of his neurons could produce, and that his heart could pump into his right arm.

"That's a vector too, right? Your arrow… for my heart." A white halo enveloped them before releasing a terrible boom. Maverick's arm vaporized while Malcolm's mutilated body shot through the floating islands like a bullet, destroying everything in its path until it lodged itself on the slope of the great mountain, once a populated center of Icarus. The impact made the entire region tremble, as if from an artillery siege.

"It doesn't end here…" From the wounds, violet fluid began to pour out, and suddenly all the flesh began to aggregate, closing wounds and repairing his bones. Maverick could feel it clearly: the weight of every cell of his body, of every small pulsation of his tissues. His arm regenerated quickly, while a violent series of impulses shot through his meninges. He took flight, accelerating vertiginously toward the mountain, weaving through debris.

"Already regenerated?" Maverick dodged to the side at insane speed, weaving through the nets of slime hurled from various points on the mountain. He bent his legs, launching himself toward the source of the attack. The air grew ever colder and thinner, dirty frost accumulating on his face as he pierced the clouds. He emerged wrapped in a mantle of electricity, sizing up Malcolm. The man had completely regenerated, torn from his uniform to reveal the countless pulsating scars on his chest and abdomen.

Without warning, a new flash of darkness split the sky, spreading across the entire region.

"I know that you are just showing off. I know your core isn't that efficient at regeneration. On this, we are similar." Maverick threw himself at him, at the same instant his hand descended toward his face." Scheuren!" A wall of black light crossed the entire region, extending until it touched the sea. Every piece of information crossed by that gash of black light was made to cease. Across Icarus, every fighter paused as the black wall expanded until it separated the island.

That was one of the simplest applications of Verstoring. No manipulation of slime or complex collapse of surrounding information, simply a single slash." That's Malcolm's Frequency?" Lance thought, losing sight of Laure. He was thrown away just before her claws could tear off his head. Noel held him by the neck, opposing the beast with his blade.

"Focus, Lance! Whoever it is will be fine!" Lance nodded, breaking free to drive his knuckles into her flank. In the snowy province, the gash had also separated the mountain, causing the entire territory to sink. The wreckage, the hangars, and the remnants of civilization in the area were already disappearing toward the abyss, disintegrating in the fall amid flames and rust. Malcolm smiled, floating in the storm as he felt the violent rumble of landslides and avalanches.

"Maverick Haia, aren't you nostalgic? This is exactly the desperate attempt to rebuild that old battlefield. Unfortunately, memory… Isn't that effective." He smiled, swinging a second slash through the blanket of snow and dust. The roar of destruction completely nullified Maverick's hearing, so much so that even his own thoughts seemed smoky to him. Suddenly, everything stopped, leaving him enveloped only by the sound of the blizzard. He turned, grinning with his dark face, as was his custom.

"So we've reached the epilogue?" Malcolm spread his hands as half of the mountain buried him. The rock crashed down at insane speed onto the rubble, making all of Icarus tremble with a boom comparable to the horrors of the Great War. The entire region was enveloped in a white fog that showed no sign of stopping its expansion toward the dark sky of the anomaly. The floating island lost altitude, colliding with some small formations below, collapsing and almost creating a cup of debris.

The smoke subsided, revealing the desolation beneath. The same desolation that had originally birthed that singularity. The snow had tinged black and red, still subject to small landslides while the rest continued to crumble. A hand pierced the rock, sinking into the mud. A chuckle rose, muffled by the ground, as a shirtless man with torn breeches rose, lifting the rock from his black-stained shoulders. From his eyes flowed tar-like tears, while he stared at the shadow that stood just before him.

"So we're left with the aces up our sleeves?" Malcolm advanced through the sludge, while the surrounding air seemed to distort. The white snow mixed with the filthy sludge, while continuous landslides accompanied his steps. Maverick detonated a shot, grazing his ear.

"Just like that time… You can't keep yourself standing anymore. If only your brain would stop imposing that man's morals on you… By now you would rival the destroyer at the head of your agency." For the first time, Malcolm smiled openly, stroking the missing portion of his earlobe. Light filtered through the clouds, illuminating Maverick, more dead than alive: the calamity infested his dangling arm. Boiling blood dripped from his eyes, and numerous lines had been carved into his skin.

He held a small pistol, partially damaged by the clash. Despite everything, Maverick's gaze was steady on the companion he so despised.

"I know your hatred doesn't end here, but what benefit is there in being on the right side?" Malcolm, too, however, had been severely wounded. The poison had not yet been eliminated, and the wounds struggled to close, forcing him to stitch tissues with black slime.

"Why…" Malcolm stopped halfway up the slope, awaiting Maverick's words with trepidation.

"Why did you kill them? They were… children…" Malcolm tilted his head onto his shoulder, staring at Maverick with an expression so dazed it seemed unnatural for him. After a moment, he smiled, extending the black, slimy finger directly at his old comrade. One last snowflake landed on Maverick's nose, and he began to chuckle while that finger was pointed at his chest.

"Our squad was nearing stagnation, and I had brought it to completion." The laughter ceased. As silence ran between them, a thread of light briefly illuminated Maverick's face, and Malcolm smiled.

"Finally, I see it again... The same smile you had when you died as a human." A swarm of black lightning exploded around them, hurling Malcolm back as crackling energy accumulated in the palm of his healthy hand. A black sphere began to condense, humming a constant lament in the air.

"Did you deceive me? I thought you had already used it before fighting… Good! Shine and burn yourself out!" Malcolm smiled as dark filaments cut through the air in an attempt to stitch themselves to his arm. The first memory Malcolm had of their clash was the black beam slashing the air, aimed at his head, but now he understood. The shot wasn't born from Astrea itself, but only from a fragment.

From the beginning, Maverick had never manifested Astrea directly, only for very brief moments, created using various disposable weapons as a base. This time, however, the relic had been fully activated and seemed to fuse with his arm, engulfing his shoulder with that strange, glossy geometry. Maverick burst out laughing, perhaps because the wounds were healing as intended or because of the earlier words.

"You're right! You've always been right, Mr. Harmenszo or Van Jir. You and I are rags torn from the same cloth!" Astrea finally stopped manifesting, leaving in the air the acrid taste of burned blood. With every breath Maverick took, a matching lament rose from the barrel of the armed prosthetic. Red fluid flowed in the opaque tubes, occasionally charged with some black sparks. The hand had vanished, fused with the gigantic mouth of fire. A weapon longer than he was tall and thicker than twice his wrist.

He slammed it violently to the ground, continuing to laugh under the pale light. His mind filled with faded memories of the war, and in each of them he heard that raucous, frantic laughter.

"Precisely because we are the same, I want to make amends… By eradicating my worst half from the world." A black light began to manifest from Astrea's barrel, while Malcolm watched him, that faint smile still on his face. Maverick's face was frozen in euphoria, with a dazzling glimmer spreading silently in his iris. Laughter accompanied the condensation of his breath, faintly followed by the otherworldly laments of what remained of that relic.

The black tattoo, the mark of the Omen, had already begun to spread across Malcolm's skin while an icy rain crowned the ruins of Icarus's peak.