The world still lives on, despite the witches laid slain, and sins are rampant, spreading to every corner of the world, twice over. He has her, all to himself. He is without his own loss. Miriam Mead is dead once again. Michael Langdon cannot find it in himself to care about spoilt milk, torn wires and fired circuits. No. Miriam's an acceptable casualty.
Cordelia Goode, the Supreme. His prize. His prisoner. His companion. She is worth more than the technology-carved face and iron frame of his staunch believer. Michael is not alone. She has him.
He cloisters her in a castle made of crystalline-clear glass; a prime view to observe the barrenness the world has fallen into. Far away from Outpost 3, a graveyard of failed rebellion and the extinguished salvation in a weak prodigy. Chaos is king outside the castle's walls. A reminder of her new dismal reality—and to crush any residual hope lingering in her heart.
She flinches, as his fingers tilts her chin up. His glacial blue eyes linger on those cherry-coloured lips, a contemplative second passes—Michael nominates a retreat. He is a patient man. He will not touch her, unwarranted. There is nothing but them two and ample time to let her heart thaw.
She elects to ignore him, peering on her fingernails as if they are mightily exciting than his appearance in her chambers. On rare occasions, the mascara lined her cognac-coloured eyes, marks her cheeks in a warrior's tribute to her fallen sisters as if it's a talisman worn to ward off Michael. His track is halting, his cape swirls and he abandons his desire for a visit. He will return.
Their conversation is a series of his voice bouncing against the walls and her seething gaze. Dinner is a ghastly silent affair; only a rage-fuelled and frustration-composed symphony of silverware and cutlery echoes in the dining room.
Perhaps, his judgement in her is an overestimation of his chameleon-like charm and endless time fortifying her lioness tenacity. She is unyielding to his efforts, despite he has stooped lower than a suppliant for a scrap of godly affections.
Once he imposes his will on her, finds her forced compliance a disappointing bore. Michael craves a fight from the Supreme. Wants her fingernails, whetted to sharp keratin blades, scrap against his skin, spine, face. Needs her magic crushing every bone he has into dust. Smites her wrath on his bare collarbone. Tugs his golden hair until his scalp bleeds from the force.
He stops her from undressing any further. He stomps, thundering in thick-heeled boots, out from her room, acutely aware he resembles no different than a petulant child.
In an abysmal fit of depressing nostalgia and mawkish remorse, he swallows down bottles of Crown Royal. Ceases to care for his appearance, regardless the fact ever watchful Cordelia is a chair away and still burning with a harpy's fury and a mother's grief.
"I truly apologise for this fucked version of the world we're living in," he remarks, as if he's commenting on the weather, "Wasn't my idea. I had my sight set on being the President of the United States. Apparently, it doesn't fit the biblical requirement of fire and reign."
Alcohol does wonders to his wits and tongue, for it is loose with words he had held deep within his throat and heart. "It doesn't leave me, even after all these years," he says, his voice deepens, "that day you offered me your help," and pauses. His fingers swipe fallen teardrops away with swift practiced movement. He pinches the bridge of his nose, discreetly thumbs another stray tear. Forces himself to laugh and he sighs.
It is a while before he speaks again. Her fingers brush against his own, she pulls her hand back unceremoniously as if her hand grazes lava. He thinks, in his hazy vision, Cordelia's gaze is comically sympathetic—Michael chalks it up to his imagination, she is never one to show him anything but contempt.
"Let bygones be bygones, isn't that the saying? I guess we will never know if the world would be a better place had I wasn't too wrapped up with my emotions," he chuckles, all hollow and forced, with a smile straining to stay on his lips. "However cliché it was."
"The blame is not entirely yours," Cordelia mumbles, cryptic and there's a faraway look in her eyes. The ends of her lips quirk upwards—partially genuine, and every bit remorseful as the one etched on his.
He knows his end is nigh. He senses ever more so, with the first squeal of a new-born. That child so fragile in his arm, eyes piercingly innocent sapphire blue and without a doubt, flesh and bones fashioned from his blood and the last remaining witch's. Three years is more than enough—for weary and fatigue has accelerated Michael into a man drained of his motivation to see the world in ruins.
Cordelia Goode will not allow any harm befallen on the child. Her hope for a better future is reignited upon the child's birth. The Supreme and her coven of two. The child is mostly a warlock; Michael detects not an ounce of malice tainting the boy's soul. How ironic that the long-awaited Alpha is born out from the unholy union between the Supreme and the Anti-Christ—and the warlocks all have perished by Michael's hands.
Quite frankly, Michael Langdon has no desire to lay a cruel finger on the boy. His grave is dug and made to fit Michael's form. Only that is left for the boy to plunge a blade fashioned by Michael's bare hands of his own blood and the ashes of witches and warlocks.
The boy, the Alpha, his son and his army of a thousand fallen witches will repair the destruction Michael wreaked upon earth. The boy's mother, the Supreme, will guide him and mould him into a man Michael could only aspire to be, before the realisation that he is a monster is blackened into his psyche.
Michael thinks, that is not a terrible way to end his life.