Guardians make their own fate
{SteamCloud}|{System_information_962}|{System information_963}
{antigenesis}|{rewrite}|{enigma}
{abort}!{halt}!{extinct*FAILED*
The ground where Freehold would have been built now became a battlefield for a war that was always on… Jing couldn't quite understand why the Vex were aiding them, but he wouldn't complain… perhaps he would get a chance to decipher the reason later… He leapt over the mix of killer robots driven by bacteria and ghastly white Remvenants who somehow glowed black… going into a glide… he could hear the jetting sound of Karina following him with Lift… it was always reassuring to have her with him in battle like this… he began to fight his way through the warring mobs to Chara once it was clear he couldn't make it there with flight alone.
Harley dodged Froggit's altered jump projectile, which was apparently somehow it shooting a leaping copy of itself at her… she slid under a Vex Minotaur's legs slicing clean through the Remvenant Aaron it was grappling with mid slide with her Sol Edge. She pulled out Eyasluna and fired at the Remvenant-Froggit behind her… and stabbed Remvenant Whimsun in front of her through the ring of blight it fired…
[Harley]: I still feel bad…
[H Ghost]: When they are taken, they're worse off than dead… this time it is legitimate mercy to kill them…
[Harley]: I don't think that applies here, the kid just keeps calling more and more in.
[H Ghost]: Then we stop the kid… and maybe the Traveler will hear our story and help us?
[Harley]: I don't deserve to be…
[H Ghost]: Take responsibility and make it better, that's what you're doing isn't it?
Harley didn't reply, she blasted through a sprinting human corpse with the Dreg's Promise as a Hobgoblin shot zinged past her head and struck one of the Dog royal guard's shambling forms… she followed up on it with three swings of Sol Edge… a headless goblin ran forwards towards the Remvenant of Greater Dog chewing on what had been its head…
[Harley]: Raze lighter, switch in my Queen's Choice.
[H Ghost]: I'll pop a Heavy synth just to be sure.
The Greater Dog Remvenant noticed her and roared like an ogre then charged… the bellow of a bark shattering a Vex Harpy that had been firing upon it. She set it aflame with a throwing knife… followed up with an incendiary grenade… the massive armored canine didn't seem to care it was on fire… she did a solar uppercut with the Raze lighter, cleaving it into two vertical halves which dissolved into goo and then nothingness.
[Harley]: Bones of Eao, Triple Jump.
[H Ghost]: Switching…
She sprinted and leapt up, Remvenant Tsundereplane turned and charged at her… she powered up her Golden Gun once more, extending her airtime and fired… she took one more jump and noticed a sniper glint… she fired her golden gun at its source in the crowd, melting a Remvenant sniper back to nothingness… she leapt a 3rd time, keeping one final jump… she spotted Jing and Karina battling Chara… she took the final extra jump the exotic boots granted and carefully aimed her final solar bullet… Chara teleported away and it struck red earth as Jing's Stormcaller lightning turned the same patch of sand to glass, but never getting to connect with her… until Karina's suppressor connected… and Chara was forced to block with her knife somehow... an imitation of the sword's forged guards… which failed as the last of Jing's stormtrance came out from his fingers and he stopped levitating with Arc…
Chara: I already have what I need from you, you're beneath me… these two however…
Harley gasped as a haunting form of Toriel emerged from the blight puddle she was standing on… hollowed eyes… dripping blight… aglow with alien black light in various spots of her dress and fur… blocking her way from reaching Chara who teleported and blinked a good distance away and assisting her friends… she hesitated… and the Remvenant before her seemed to hesitate… before it spoke and waved it's hands sending blue flames that froze the ground they passed over at her… she hurled an incendiary grenade and leapt over the exploding mix of hot and cold that resulted.
Remvenant Toriel:… I do not have the strength of will do restrain this horrible form of my being and speak at the same time, I am sorry…
Harley: Don't be… that should be me…
Remvenant Toriel: Save… that poor human… make this right…
Harley slid through the familiar spiral the chilling flames formed… she saw frost form on the FWC visor of her Infinite Lines mask.
Harley: Forgive me…
Remvenant Toriel: When you… end this abomination…
A large chunk of unnaturally cold fires blazed past her, freezing Vex that had been encroaching on this fight…
Remvenant Toriel: Do… it…
Harley approached the towering form before her… she was shorter by a good measure… it spread open its' arms and closed it's eyes… blight flowing from between the eyelids… mouth and nostrils as if crying… Harley leapt into the hug and stabbed Toriel in the back with her hunting knife…
Remvenant Toriel: T…th…thank…you… p…p…protect…
Harley:I… will…
Normal colors seemed to return as the Remvenant held her in that fatal hug… Toriel held her closer just a bit tighter as a real tear came out from the goat woman's eye instead of blight…
Toriel:…be good… my… child.
Harley: Aaaaarrrrrrggghhh!
Harley's golden gun ignited brighter than ever… the Vex fighting the copies of Snowdrake and Chilldrake looked at her once and immediately teleported away as she leveled the sunfire weapon… each shot leaving a burning pool of light… she sent that final round rocketing its slipstream at Chara… who seemed to flinch for a moment at the sight before teleporting away again as Jing's storm grenade landed on that spot and turned the sand below to glass with lightning…
She rounded a rock in her way and a Remvenant Papyrus stood in her way… somehow still wearing that smile… Harley paused as a Minotaur came up behind her to smack away a machete wielding human Remvenant… Orange bones came out from the ground and impaled the chasis of the massive metal machine and swept towards her, she jumped over them as they came from her back…
Remvenant Papyrus: It's good to see you again human… you didn't stop doing violence, but at least it seems you are doing it for a good reason now!
Harley: I…
The blight dripping skeleton stopped moving and talking, Harley hesitated… she knew Papyrus dying was a point of no return for her in the underground earlier…
Remvenant Papyrus: Do it… my body will fight when I try to talk… nyeh-heh… ha… being like this really feels awful…
Harley jumped over a sequence of black and orange bones that came out from the ground and swept at her…
H Ghost: What are you waiting for?! He wants you to do it! Jing and Karina need our support…
Harley shot Remvenant Papyrus in her head with Eyasluna… not even daring to look… he started coming over despite the fatal wound… that had been scored without even being looked at.
H Ghost: He's coming over here, he's coming over here! I really don't like that he's…
She felt boney arms and a crudely made set of chest armor press up against her and unwillingly returned the skeleton's hug… she didn't deserve this… if only he had stopped believing in her and cursed or swore at her for killing him the first time… only, that time could have been an accident… this time there was no going around that… or the fact that Chara and the darkness were no longer messing with her. Papyrus regained his more normal colors and stopped leaking blight and spoke his final words.
Papyrus: Even if nobody else will, I… The Great Papyrus, forgive you for everything! You are super strong human! Make sure you win this… it was hard to talk… but it's… becoming harder now, good luck with your life… human!
Harley ran towards Chara again, the last of Papyrus dribbling off her armor and cape… her golden gun over penetrating the armor of both Remvenant royal guards, Remvenant dogamy, Remvenant dogaressa… she reached a Vex Hydra blocking her path, but it's back was to her… it was firing at something…
Harley: Move, or you will be moved.
As she finished her sentence a blood red spear cleaved clean through the Hydra's protective rotary shielding… she jumped over as the chasis glowed bright orange and detonated… landing afore Remvenant Undyne…
Remvenant Undyne: Well, this will be worth it! At least I get to try for my revenge now!
Harley dodged the blood red spear as Undyne swept with it following the inirial thrust, she jumped once… over the sweep…
Remvenant Undyne: Besides, if you aren't strong enough to beat me again… you don't stand a chance against the real monster…
Harley timed her extra jumps to avoid the magical blighted spears which appeared in the air around her, which instead of acting like they were hurled, whirled and spun like a combination of deadly airborne buzz saws…
Remvenant Undyne: …That you created! Or is that also something you didn't know like how Papyrus would die to your powers?!
Harley landed on Undyne's spear rod… forcing the fish woman to cancel the weapon and summon a new one as she drew out Raze Lighter…
Harley: You're right… I didn't know what I had been doing… but I know I did it… and now I want to fix it…
H Ghost: Aren't you gonna let us through like the others before?
Remvenant Undyne: This is my last fight ever… against my greatest opponent… you will give it to me and show me all the skills you hide!
Harley deflected the spear with Raze Lighter and slid under the length of the spear's rod… Undyne jumped away and began to twirl it around until he air pressure built up from the spinning began to kick up a small dust storm… Harley stopped and channeled her light, unholstering the golden gun again… she started with an incendiary grenade… which Undyne's defense deflected… and then pointed the sunfire weapon at Undyne's head… she fired… it was blocked… the second shot went for Undyne's feet… it was blocked again… the third shot impacted Undyne's weapon directly without deflecting… the blighted mermaid staggered from the hit… Harley charged in and slashed with a Solar uppercut from Raze lighter… no time to waste now…
Undyne: That's it, that's the power! Go! Go now! No need to watch my pathetic death again!
She began the chase again… spotting Jing close in with a glide as Karina's suppressor grenade exploded on Chara once more… he emptied Invective's clip into the child of darkness… A bright green laser beam blazed out incinerating a Hopgoblin that had been firing in that direction…
Remvenant Mettaton: Quite the plot twist darling, a war sequence after an apocalypse from a horror film! Ooo-la-la…
Harley: Ugh… how many of you guys are there?!
She chucked an incendiary grenade which a blighted minimett suddenly appeared from nowhere to catch and take it up into the air where it exploded harmlessly.
Remvenant Mettaton: It takes too much effort to talk and make my now puppet body not fight, so pay attention to what I have to say… ah ha ha ha…
Harley: Yeah, you gonna lecture me about glamour?!
She performed a Solar Uppercut again on a shadowy copy of Mettaton's rectangular robotic body which silently had appeared and tried to sneak up on her… motion trackers were such a boon to have back.
Remvenant Mettaton: So unappreciative and ungrateful darling… I'm trying to help you win here, so that at least you can write a good ending to this box office bomb of yours…
Harley: Don't keep me waiting…
She took cover behind a rock as the bright green laser blared again… she could feel the rock beginning to crumble and melt from the sustained beam assault.
Remvenant Mettaton: Plot twists darling! Plot twists! Hit the audience in a way they will never see you coming! You did do it to me… when Alphys and I thought we won! Ha ha…
Harley: What audience?!
Remvenant Mettaton: The one who has been watching your very horrible little show from the beginning way before I tried Neo:Death by Glamour…
Mettaon sent a trail of minimetts to swarm her and instead of weighing her down… they dragged her so that she was looking at Jing and Karina battle Chara… as he was now throwing a vortex grenade which Chara teleported out of after taking some hits from it… the minimetts began to beep and blow up… her shields failed and she felt herself bleeding and with broken bones within… but this close to the traveler… her regeneration began a lot faster… she got back up…
Remvenant Mettaton: Oh… that magic couple attacks with a fab color, shame I am all teal now… sorry darling!
Harley jumped out of the way as a functional blighted imitation of Mettaton's jet boots impaled the area where she had been and exploded.
"Harley of all the God damned things you taught the kid, the one you got right was being a good blade dancer and gun slinger…"
She remembered herself operating as a bladedancer during most of her time in the Underground… then Mettaton's words clicked in and made sense… she had only showcased her Gunslinger abilities at him… which they had never seen before and couldn't account for… so Chara did learn those or understood the light that empowered those abilities… could even imitate them when she was cut down earlier via Hive magic mumbo jumbo… and she remembered how throughout this whole battle, only Karina seemed to be able to get a decent hit on the kid and hold her own properly while she and Jing had been ineffective… Karina was working as a Defender Titan… and Defenders drew power from Void light… from the corner of her eye, Jing's Vortex grenade scored a short few seconds of damage before Chara teleported… and Karina threw her Ward of Dawn back up against Chara's imitated blade dance… While Jing seemed to be succeeding now as a Voidwalker…
[Harley]: Nightstalker me.
[H ghost]: Nightstalker… change done… you must have realized something serious…
Remvenant Mettaton stood before her and prepared his double lasers… she shadestepped out of the way of the beam. And drew forth a bow of Void light…
Remvenant Mettaton: Oh… that is new, and fabulous… darling…
The arrow struck Remvenant Mettaton… his body began to defy gravity as he turned into blighted goo and purple void charged particles… floating away while flaking…
Mettaton: Marvelous darling! 100/100! Best ratings for sure…
She ran forwards, and found an ideal spot to shoot Chara with her void arrow or tether her with it, at least… but it was occupied by two Hobgoblin's who were sniping at Remvenants of Final Froggit and Knight Knight… a familiar sound reached her ears and she ducked… a black laser vaporized the Vex machines… Remvenant Sans stood behind her… blight leaking from his nose hole and teeth… his eye now flashing red and purple, still clad in slippers and a hoodie… which were now orange… Sans grimaced and pulled the hood over his head… he wasn't smiling… and just looked tired.
Harley: I know… you told me so… warned me…
Remvenant Sans:… But… there might just yet be… a chance.
The Gaster Blaster shook next to him and backfired as Sans managed to will enough to keep its jaw shut… he was clearly strained to the limits from the efforts needed… there was quite a cynical scowl on the skeleton's face as a blighted sweatdrop went down his temple.
Harley: I… my friends… can make this right Sans…
Remvenant Sans: I see… it's out of my hands now anyway… heh.
A shaking Gaster Blaster came down again, pointed at Harley but it trembled and shook…
Harley: I'm sorry for everything…
The Gaster Blaster began to rotate… no longer aimed at Harley…
Remvenant Sans: Don't tell the other Sanses…
H Ghost: He… it's gonna…
Harley: Sans… forgive me…
Remvenant Sans: If we truly were friends… you won't come back.
The Gaster Blaster fired, there was nothing left of Sans and the blaster dissolved into the ether… Harley took up the position… another pair of Hobgoblins had been perched at the spot again… they looked at her and each other then promptly backed away and sought other vantage points to fight from… She let the Void arrow fly and it struck Chara who screamed in an inhuman wail and struggled to move from the binding energy tether…
Harley sprinted to her comrades' side… doing her best to ignore the wellspring of pain she felt building in her chest…
Harley: I… I got it! She doesn't know anything about how to deal with the way we channel Void energy… during my time down there…
Jing: Yeah, I kinda already figured… you never use Nightstalker until we demand it… ever.
The sound of a Ward of Dawn going up filled their ears…
Karina: Changed to weapons…
Harley went in and felt the power strengthen her guns… Jing blasted away with Invective… Karina slashed with Dark Drinker's supermassive Vortex… Harley fired with her Queen's Choice… but the Tether lasped and Chara teleported away before she could connect with another… the battleground grew shadowed… Jing hurled a Lance type Nova bomb as Harley connected with another tether arrow…
Chara: Ha, this little fight has drawn its attention… and from the brightest light casts the darkest shadow… I can eat of all this because it still knows that soul is flailing in me!
Jing looked closer… Chara was wounded, but the human body wrapping her blight was still recovering… The Traveler's looming form had stopped causing rain on Mars in the distance and was indeed approaching their battle…
Jing: She's too rich with killing and devoured light… we could fight her forever unless the Traveler intervenes directly…
Karina: Beloved… why not show the brat a game of rift?
Harley: Is this really the time for that?! Ghostie!
H Ghost: You never wondered why guardians die when you score and they are nearby? It's the strongest Nova bomb ever made that a warlock can't detonate it themselves under normal conditions…
Harley: What if we kill the kid? The real… kid in there…
Jing: We're near the Traveler, that stupid taken tot bringing us here with her was a big mistake… I'll make the preparations with Karina… you have to occupy her and keep her off us and the Traveler… trust it, and us!
Harley: But I…
Karina: There is something evil in there… if you made it, you can beat it… but don't stop to gloat or feel power over it… we kill because they will… they kill because they can… to feel good and powerful… laugh at dying prey… there lies the difference… between a protector and a murderer…
Harley turned and made ready to face Chara again… Vex teleported to her and marched at the same stride behind her as Chara called forth more blight Remvenant monsters and humans… Karina pulled dark drinker out and twirled it… preparing to make the rift for Jing to ignite the spark in… Minotaurs and Hydras floated and marched in step with her…
H Ghost: And what is a protector… but… a guardian?
Harley: Thanks Ghostie…
Chara: You really think those stupid robots with germ brains are your friends? Beating me is just a way for them to get what they want, as is yours, that pathetic moral construct called redemption… Or do you actually think you can save the world I already destroyed…
Harley: Well, me and the robots think each other are bad, that's true… but we both looked at you and decided… you're worse…
In a strange way to never be seen again… the Vex waited for Harley to fire before joining in… was this respect, power or a possible new alliance and understanding? Guardians have spent many a long hard year trying to communicate with the Vex… but it just kept proving impossible… was this payment for a favor in the vault of glass or had something gone so wrong in their calculations that here they would marshal to the side of the Guardians in a show of desperation? As Jing generated and condensed the Void energy into a spark he contemplated… and wondered what secret answers he could get from the Theosyion Vibrissae on his left arm and shoulder… did those whipping tendrils contain some part or the whole of the mind or processing intelligent part of the Restorative Mind, Theosyion? The answer would need to wait… Chara was the immediate concern first… He continued to charge the spark…
Karina began channeling Void energy into the Dark drinker, forming a supermassive Vortex in the same spot repeatedly intending to open a rift without the sophisticated technology of the tower… Harley fenced with Chara, intending to make sure Chara couldn't see what Karina or Jing were attempting…
Chara: Time and history are changing… soon these dumb robots won't be here… and you and your friends will be all alone…
Harley ducked underneath a black blade extending from the red little knife… she was mainly on the defense as Chara used San's style of teleporting to fight in her weakened state…
Harley: What the hell are you talking about?!
Chara: Time is an ocean… stick a finger in it and the ripples grow…
Harley prepared a tether as Chara prepared a blighted variant of blade dance…
Chara: These robots… they aren't like us…of the deep and sky… when the timeline shifts or resets, they just have to suck up any chance that they won't exist... could happen, that's why they rail and rage so hard against it like unfed babies… and then when they realize nobody is coming… they'll stop crying…
Harley: I don't care about what you're thinking as you turn to me… cause what I have in my two hands is enough to set me free!
She shadestepped away and jumped once, again in the air… Chara missed several slashes… a second time… and a third…
Harley's Raze Lighter failed as Chara's corrupted copy of blade dance clashed with it…she shade stepped and jumped up twice… Chara teleported behind her… Harley turned and caught her exiting out of teleport with a tether… out of the corner of her eye she heard the familiar hissing noise of a spark and rift… Chara was floored…
Harley: Blah blah blah, I know your type! You think it's too much for someone to take you sneak up from behind!
The rift was formed… and Jing was sprinting over with the spark… Karina grabbed the still tethered Chara and heaved her at the rift easily… since Chara was hit by the tether it didn't break and she was still suppressed, barely mustering the strength to get off the ground again…
Jing: You've been talking a lot, real big about the sword logic… but ever since I got my own hands on it, I've been thinking… how come something that became so powerful… still lost to me… I studied the swords and tested them in battle again and again…
He knew the timing of the tether and paced his walk to match, the spark in his light hissed as he pushed it out into his hands…
Jing: There's apparently another hidden level I will find a way to put into words that's more meaningful than "answer me truthfully if I can rip your world apart or somebody else will ask me that…" But I'll call it "strength through trial" for now and you… I look upon you and I can tell, you may have the sword logic and great power, but nothing you gained from it was truly a trial was it?
He ignited the rift with a somersault dunk, the blast did it… the original kid in a double blue and purple stripped shirt was blown clean… though Chara still remained before them… Karina picked the kid up and carried the child on her back… having gotten there first by a creatively speedy use of lift…
[Karina]: Make a containment field for the kid on me… I need both my hands…
[K Ghost]: Got it…
Chara got back up to her feet… she opened her palm to reveal a red heart on it… even as her face distorted in a horrific smile as blight trickled down suddenly vacant eye sockets and her mouth…
Chara: Looking for this? I finished taking it already, it's mine now…
Harley: No…
Karina: Harley! The kid on my back still breathes! There may yet be a chance or way…
The vex fighting Chara's Remvenants suddenly seized up… and shook… as they began to flicker away into nonexistence in a mix of mechanical shrieks, wails and screams… history had been altered in a way such that the Vex never existed… somehow… Jing checked for his left arm… somehow the remnants of the Restorative Mind remained there… though it's tendrils twitched and flexed in random uncontrollable panicked directions…
Chara: Ha… look at your feeble hope… the only reason you are still here is because you channel the sky… like I channel the deep… I wonder… what would happen to you if the Traveler were no more… would you lose your ontological traits and vanish? Or will you be here for me to kill off?
Jing: We won't be finding out. Same plan!
Chara seemed to grow taller… until Harley realized they were looking upon each other at eye level… like starring in a mirror at a blighted taken version of herself… except for the blight that bled from an eyeless version of her face through the sockets and mouth… Harley was stunned by this… and stepped backwards… Jing and Karina began to prepare the spark and rift while defending each other back to back…
Chara: Fitting, isn't it… that it ends like this… because everything here, you wrought… I was going to incubate longer but taking over that meat sack was but a preference, I no longer want it… and now here I stand… I am a monument to all your sins…
Chara said all this while waving Thorn glowing its brightest greens ever… along with that red knife that exuded a black sword blade at her.
Karina: Harley it'll take a bit longer since the Vex are no longer here to…
Harley stepped back… choking back tears… Karina noticed… and as she punched away a Remvenant of Loox, she shouted encouragement… glowing purple as she drew a force barrier from the blighted eye monster.
Karina: We can make it right! Somehow… I know we will!
[Harley]: Heavy synth.
[H Ghost]: Go get her.
Harley prepared and charged a tether… but Chara teleported in front of her face just as she drew the bow string and ran her through with the black blade from her blood red glowing knife…
Harley: Ugnh… G-*hack*…
Chara:And… there goes the only advantage you all have had over me… so this is the legacy of the void… hungry… not bad… it suits me… I like it…
Harley: Ah-….
She landed on her knees as her ghost shell emerged… spinning… but the uninjured Traveler was here… this was no darkness zone… she rose back up having recovered from that death quickly… pulling out Raze Lighter once again…
Chara: You're still coming? Can't you see it's hopeless? With so much light here I can corrupt it to just replicate everything you all do, never mind how you fed me fat with so much killing of all those monsters… You're supposed to despair and give up! Why do you still let your hope poison you!?
Harley swept with a Solar Uppercut… which Chara teleported away from… Harley saw the trip mine at her feet and blocked with the sword's guard… she swung the blade at Chara… who teleported away again… Harley shadestepped backwards and as she came out of the roll, hurled a smoke pellet and Voidwall grenade together… catching Chara and blinding her as she emerged from the teleport…
Harley: I finally fully get what Jing meant and said about you…
She stepped into the smoke pellet and flames of voidwall and slapped Chara's perverse mockery of herself in the face…
Harley: You're a bully and that's that!
Chara struggled to level herself and power up a blade dance but was suppressed by another tether arrow from Harley…
Harley: OOOooo look at me! I got the big bad Hive mumbo Jumbo that lets me steal people's powers by killing them, yay! I am so strong… Ha ha… ha ha ha ha ha…
It was a childish jab, but Harley could tell she was getting under the skin of the demoniacal kid.
Chara: You… mock me?
Chara strained against the tether… but it held and kept her quite immobile. She screamed in frustration.
Harley threw a solar uppercut again with the blade, drawing forth blight… she hoped the red heart or… the kid's soul wasn't harmed… as the blighted imitation of her FWC mask fell off dissipating into goo and nothingness… Chara struggled with Thorn to get it pointed at Harley…
Harley: Yeah, I do… you know something… all those monsters whose powers you took… I did the real fighting with them… me! Harley! You worthless free-loading thief! You didn't even steal their powers by killing them properly! You just dipped in with that Hive Abra Kadabra when I was about done with them…
Her tether spit more purple tendrils out as Chara's Remvenant minions encroached and were bound similarly… Harley fired one more tether before the first expired on Chara and renewed the smoke pellet and grenade as well… as Chara missed with a shot from Thorn due to Harley shade stepping.
Harley: You take the easy way and kill steal… or kill them when I didn't want to just by riding along! Big whoop! Now you think being able to do what I can do in a fight makes you stronger than me? Don't make me laugh! I got this good by practice, bullet holes all over my body and close scrapes, not being a cowardly fair weather opportunist like you!
She drew raze lighter and threw three vicious slashes, a downward cut as if she had just unsheathed the blade… a side slash that nearly bisected the blighted lifeform before her, and an overhead slash that almost cut the thing using her physical shape in half… she renewed the tether again as Chara rolled near the rift from the blows… Jing finished the spark and was about to ignite the rift but Karina stopped him by putting her hand on his shoulder and shaking her head at him, then cocking it in Harley's direction…
Chara whimpered… she had come so far… gained so much power… yet here and now… like when facing Sans… was something that truly gave her pause and could stand against her… and she was afraid… for whatever the Deep and Darkness had blessed her with… now here she was again… made into a victim… of the very laws of the universe she had pledged herself to… worse… the horrible years that have passed were now flooding back into her mind that ended with her fleeing her village… a powerless victim… good, at least that meant she could see Asriel again… only… she had ruined that too, hadn't she? She feebly tried to fire Thorn… it thudded into Harley's shoulder… the hunter clearly felt it, but renewed the tether again in the boundless light… and gripped the stake and pulled it out… and jabbed it into her gut…
Harley: I work together with my friends to make things bigger and better and for everyone we care about to be happier… and for the record… I'm the only one who should look like me…
Jing handed her the spark and backed away with Karina as Harley took the glowing cluster for a moment and with purpose, stepped forwards… igniting the rift.
When the flash of light faded… Chara was back there in her normal appearance… rosy cheeks… smiling… but her glowing red eyes shattered and the smile began to melt away as well… the brown hair sliding off corrupted flesh like hay in defrosting winter mud… she laughed as the blight within began to flow away into nothingness uncontrollably… a red heart hung there for a moment trembling… and split down then middle… then shattered… Chara's laughter seemed to echo in an unholy manner…
Harley: No…
Jing cradled the child of Karina's back… the kid's breath weakening…
Jing: She… didn't just steal the soul… she had devoured it… and when she went… the kid…
Karina knelt and took off her helmet, closing her eyes in mourning and grief… the Traveler had apparently already made the air of Mars breathable…
Harley: No… no… no… no… why why why why why why why?!
Harley beat her hands on the ground in frustration and grief… she had won the battle, but her failure was now well and truly complete… Jing got up and paced toward the Traveler… and used his helmet to zoom in on Earth… the blue planet was now brown and still bleeding orange magma and molten iron… it's polar ice caps nowhere to be seen… with thick clouds and ash cover now obscuring nearly everything he could see…
[J Ghost]: You got a plan boss?
[Jing]: Yeah? What would I do? Go up to the Traveler and say, "Hey ma'am I'm from a future timeline where you're in a coma and somehow got dumped in an altered timeline past by killer robots who no longer exist… oh and by the way, the species you are fixing this planet for just got made extinct in this timeline as well… please help us… especially this dead kid first?"
[J Ghost]: That sounds just like one actually… let me try…
Jing opened his palm and let his ghost fly out and off towards the huge white sphere in the distance… wondering if his sarcastic rant could actually yield any productivity in this current bleak situation… he strolled back over to where he had summoned the Vex gate… before the battle… only now there was never a Vex gate at all… never had been one, never would be… he looked at the gloves on his left arm again… the Aegis from the vault of glass… and took out Atheon's eye which he had been keeping in his robes… part of him just wanted to hurl said eye into a rock and smash it to bits for putting him into this dumb time abyss he couldn't figure a way to navigate out of… never mind landing Harley here first… she wasn't bad, but tended to need more focused, calm… less blood thirsty minds around her. But because of a guardian's nature as beings wielding the Traveler's light, and since he held all these things, they were somehow still here… hopefully there would be a purpose or use…
He returned and found the women speaking excitedly to his ghost… Karina kept the little souvenir she kept from the Crota's End raid she had been showing Harley…
J Ghost: There is a way! And now that you're back, we have everything we need!
Jing: How?
J Ghost: I told the traveler what happened to us and anything relevant to do with it… weird telling what's basically my mum that she'll go into a coma giving birth to me so to speak… but well… she'll need Atheon's eye… the relic… and your gloves… oh and we better bring everything that was with us all along… including… that.
They looked at where the ghost bobbed itself in direction wise… The hand cannon which was less a weapon than a curse sat there… it's jagged black metal edge looking like some perverse spike… Karina got up… picked it out from the ground and handed it back to Harley… who shuddered as she received what had once been a prized possession of hers… now mocking her irresponsibility and frivolousness in becoming its master once again… taunting her of decisions that were made, even if time was put back on the course it should be… her bubbly jolly demeanour vanished now that this gun was here, a monument to all her sins….
They stood under the Traveler… Karina holding onto the kid's body and Harley looking at the ground as Thorn was limply, loosely held in her left… there should be a great shadow but now there was abundant light beneath the Traveler… which got brighter and brighter and yet somehow was warm, loving and gentle… never blinding.. the Theosyion Vibrissae on Jing's hand even seemed to waft in joy despite currently being the last of the at the moment extinct Vex… The relic fired a blaze of intense light into Atheon's eye, which flashed again… and then this timeline… happened only in memory.