Chapter 18: Night Raid

Day 12 - Night

"Took me a while but I've figured out the solution," Hachiman declared as they gathered later that night, leaving his pink-haired partner to stand guard outside, "We'll have her hibernate in the refrigerator."

"H-Huh?" his audience chorused in unison, "W-Why?"

"The thick, solid metal should help to attenuate some of the incoming and outgoing signals," he explained, knocking on the walls for emphasis, "Don't worry, we won't need to turn on the power, so she won't catch a cold. It'll probably be dark and claustrophobic though, but she doesn't need to breathe, does she?"

"Hikigaya Hachiman, in case you didn't know, Alice isn't some goddamned sashimi!"

"Do you have a better idea, Kirigaya Kazuto? Like putting a tin-foil hat on her head to cover the tracker? Or dragging her with the anchor underwater?"

"It's okay, Kirito," the blonde knight interjected, turning a little red, "I vaguely remember packing myself into a crate to be transported to your doorstep. The storage area here should be more spacious than a box. I-I can preserve my strength too, I think I'm running a little low after…that."

"See? Your android girlfriend agrees," Hachiman commented gleefully as he opened the door, bowing to usher her into the compartment which stank of rotting fish, "Though I highly recommend that she temporarily disable her nasal receptors, if she can."

"Smells like your eyes here, Hikigaya," she managed to throw him a snide remark before he shut the door on her.

Kirito beamed. She was a quick learner indeed. With time, she should be able to adapt well to the customs and expressions of the Real World, though they had not necessarily led humanity on the right path in hindsight.

"I've left a small gap for emergencies, Alice," Hachiman scowled as he turned to walk away, "Don't make me change my mind."

Just then, a blood-curdling scream rang through the air, stopping him dead in his tracks as the others stood petrified in shock.

No, it can't be, please don't tell me–

"Yui!" he shrieked, nearly tripping over himself as he sprinted out to the deck.

"Alice," Kirito hissed, charging his SMG and tossing her a handgun, "I'll protect you, so just stay safe where you are. But whatever happens, promise me you'll take care of Suguha."

"No, wait!" she shouted, banging desperately on the metal, only for her cries to be drowned out by the resounding chatter of gunfire.

Please don't leave me, Kirito, I can't lose you when I already have nothing left.

In the cold quiet, the pink-haired airhead found herself alone, sitting on a bench, staring at the infinite darkness surrounding the trawler. Her boyfriend had gone in to discuss some important matters with the others, and in the strange, eerie emptiness, she could not help but shudder.

Minutes passed like years as she waited, squinting in the dim lighting that had been kept low to save fuel and avoid unnecessary attention. Somehow, the serene tranquillity was desolate in his absence, and she wished that he would quickly return, if only to snuggle again in the warmth of his scarf–

Stop being so clingy, she chastised herself, slapping the thoughts away. To be fair, he had invited her to follow him inside, worried about leaving her in the dark, but it was she who had insisted on staying put. She truly needed to be more independent after all, for herself and for him, and as the girl who had been entrusted to take care of the loner, she simply had no choice but to be stronger.

How else would she be able to face herself? How else would she be able to love him?

So many things have changed, she mused ruefully, humming the tune that she had performed on stage with Yukinon and Hiratsuka-sensei as she clasped her handgun, even though all I ever wanted was for things to remain the same.

And to think that it had only been two weeks - even if it had felt like a century since she had been able to enjoy herself, to let herself go, to walk her dog Sable, to chat with her friends, to hang out in the Service Clubroom without having to look over her back every ten seconds and probably kill someone every few hours.

Yukinon, Iroha-chan, Komachi-chan, I miss you so much.

Miura, Ebina, Hayama, how's it like back at home? Zaimokuza, Totsuka, Kawasaki and the rest too.

Her vision blurred as shadows swam. She rubbed her eyes, tears streaming down her cheeks. What had happened? Where, when, how and why had it all gone wrong? She was supposed to be in a teenage romantic comedy, not a post-apocalyptic survival tragedy.

She heard a splash and quick footsteps, and felt herself choke as thin wires dug deep into her neck. She could barely let out a whimper as she suffocated, her breath forced out of her throat to form mocking wisps of condensation swirling before her face. The gun clattered noisily on the floor as she clawed desperately for her dear life, breaking her nails and bloodying her skin yet unable to tear off the arms holding the garotte.

Time slowed as her heart raced, deprived of oxygen. Gathering her fading consciousness and faltering strength, she tried to escape the vice-like grip, elbowing her assailant in the guts, only to see another figure leap in front of her, the cruel blade of a combat knife gleaming in the pale moonlight.

No, please don't do this, I don't want to die, I don't want to–

Yet, in the icy silence, the masked man pressed on, unmoved by her asphyxiated cries as she trashed around in futile terror. Her eye went wide as she felt the cold metal piercing her stomach, the sharp tip sliding through raw flesh, and she managed to let out a tortured scream before the tension mercifully loosened around her neck.

Deafening shots erupted around her as her mind swam, and loud thuds echoed beside her as the men fell in pools of warm crimson. Yet more phantoms climbed on board from under the water, and she found herself trampled under pairs of heavy boots, sending shockwaves of excruciation across every living inch of her body until she finally blacked out in pain.

"Yui!" he yelled for the tenth time; his voice hoarse from shouting over endless bursts of gunfire. He had witnessed the fateful stab, and had been but a second late in pulling the trigger. Overwhelmed with rage, he had pumped the men full of lead, only to be beaten back by a dozen more shadows springing from the water as he hurriedly dived for cover.

"Hachiman!" the young man in black called out as he opened up on the reinforcements clad in night-vision and full body armour. Unscathed by the storm, they promptly shot back with suppressed pistols, the symphony of deadly staccatos contrasting against the discordant chatter of blind automatic fire.

"Watch where you're aiming, dummy!" the dead-fish eyed loner roared as he blasted away, "I'm so gonna kill you if you accidentally shoot her, I swear."

Kirito did not reply, gritting his teeth as he emptied his final magazine, managing to score two hits before running dry. Yet, more than half a dozen highly trained operators remained, and with his teammate low on ammunition and the pink-haired airhead bleeding out before their eyes, he could not help but feel a sense of inevitable dread descending from all sides.

"Get back!" he yelled, cold sweat trickling down his spine as he heard the unmistakable sound of more speedboats approaching in the darkness, "We must retreat, or–"

"I'm never leaving her behind," came the firm reply as he expended his rounds, "This is the end, Kirito, I hope you enjoyed your quest while it lasted."

The blonde knight had snuck out of the refrigerator as soon as they had left, watching the fight unfold from around the corner, cursing her uselessness as the enemies swarmed the boys with superior firepower. She knew that she had to do something, anything that was better than nothing, and for once, unlike the previous engagements where guns and bullets prevailed, the battle on the boat, though undoubtedly intense, was confined to the crammed deck.

This was her only opportunity, no, her duty to step in and step up as Alice Synthesis Thirty. She was done being his hostage, and this time, she would be his heroine - to fulfil her oath, repay her debts and protect the one she loved.

Arming herself with a metal pole, she shouted a war cry and charged out into the open. As she had hoped, the men immediately let go of the boys to focus their full attention on her - their target and their prey. Ignoring his pleas for her to stay back, she allowed them to encircle her like sharks, smiling quietly as they holstered their pistols for batons and combat knives.

In the calm before the tempest, she breathed a sigh of relief. Her daring bet had paid off, and the odds were in her favour. Tightening her grip on the pole, she struck before her enemies could react, taking the initiative and the element of surprise to draw first blood. Three blades slashed back at her chest, which she dodged and parried, and three batons flew at her head, which she deftly evaded and counterattacked.

A skull seemed to shatter under the impact, the bones in her arms trembling with the force. Flinching instinctively and tensing in guilt, she bit her lip to steel herself, swinging the iron rod as if it was her Gold Olive Sword. With a powerful stab, she impaled another, the sharp end plunging through muscle and flesh as she grimaced at the sensations coursing through her fingers, warm blood staining her hands as she pulled the weapon out from between the ribs.

She would not and could not allow herself to fail, not when she had sacrificed years of her childhood, innocence and adolescence for the Sacred Art of the Sword.

But this was no duel or level playing field, and she certainly did not expect the sharp pain when a baton inadvertently touched her skin. Staggered and paralysed, she nearly dropped her weapon, only for a blade to cut into her arm, sending shockwaves of agony across her nerves. Red liquid spurted from the wound, reminding her of raw blood, and she cried in alarm before another baton came for her neck, triggering paroxysms of torment down her spine.

Growling as she crawled to her feet, she reached into her pocket to pull out her gun. He had taught her the basics of the life-ending tool, and she would honour that by putting the knowledge to practice at that very instant. Compared to her affinity with the sword, her Object Control Authority over firearms was low, but at point-blank range, even she knew enough to spray her opponents with heated lead.

Perhaps in a world of honour and chivalry, she would have been embarrassed. But in a universe where only the next breath truly mattered, where death and destruction were as meaningless as they were absurd, she would fight to save her friends by all means necessary.

With that, she pulled the trigger, snarling at herself and the enemy. Much to her surprise, three men fell, only for ten more to pounce on her from the speedboats that had arrived, pinning her helplessly to the floor. Red liquid continued to spill from her arm as she grappled wildly to break free, only to find herself on the receiving end of more bolts of electrifying pain which were just strong enough to disable without causing lasting harm.

Writhing in untold agony, she clenched her fists to brace herself for a nightmare of suffering.

I'll be strong, Kirito, but please don't miss me if I'm gone.

"Yui!" he screeched, rushing towards her limp, motionless body as the android distracted the enemy. Pressing down on her wound and reaching for her pulse, he was relieved to find that she was weak but alive.

"Hachiman, get back here, we need to help Alice!" the young man in black yelled from behind as he picked up as many pistols as he could from the corpses on the floor, not that the dead-fish eyed loner seemed to care.

Yui was the only thing that mattered after all. Not Kirito, not the blonde knight, not anyone else in this cursed hell, not even himself.

Gritting his teeth, he scooped her up and ran inside, setting her down on the bed as he threw open the drawers and pulled out the medical box, fumbling blindly for disinfectant and gauze. He felt like punching himself as the bottle shook in his quivering hands, spilling messily over the wound and jolting her awake in pained screams as she threw up a mouthful of blood on the sheets.

"I'm sorry, Yui!" he sobbed, completely hapless and at a loss. With no one else to turn to, he went back for the young man in black that he had stubbornly ignored, only to see him preoccupied with readying himself, lining a trench-coat with weapons as he watched the battle for a suitable opening to retaliate.

We all have our own to care for, don't we, the loner muttered as he continued to work on her injury, forcing himself to endure her cries of agony. They were truly alone in this world after all, just the two of them and no one else - that was why Yukino had asked him to take care of her, and for them to take care of each other.

To each his own - Kirito the solo beater and Hachiman the loner, that was perhaps the truth of this reality.

"Alice!" a familiar voice called out, and her torment abruptly lessened as her captors turned to stare at the dual-wielding force of rage and vengeance. Mustering her strength, she rolled out of the way as two bodies hit the floor, dripping blood all over her cheeks from ten bullet-holes to each head, as the gunslinger tossed his pistols aside to pull a fresh pair from his coat, charging and blasting away to reach her without the slightest signs of fear.

Firing so quickly that the suppressed echoes resonated like thunder, two more men collapsed in messy heaps of flesh, their visors shattered by repeated shots from close range, only for the young man to produce yet another pair from his trench-coat to destroy two more unfortunate souls who happened to cross his line of fury. Time slowed as the remaining four switched to their handguns, but he did not allow them to land a single shot as he proceeded to slash their arms and necks, his gleaming blades flowing like bursts of lightning and streams of stars, eclipsing the sun and drawing nightmares of crimson all over their stunned faces.

When he was done, he exhaled deeply, letting out a sigh as if a huge weight had been relieved from his chest and lifted from his shoulders. Soaked in vermillion, the cleavers clanged noisily on the floor as he released them from his hands, shuddering in the post-adrenaline rush as he panted to catch his breath. He cast her a quick glance to make sure that she was safe, but instinctively looked away in the next moment, averting his eyes from the ten lifeless and disfigured men that he had so brutally murdered, unable to face them or her in the burning guilt and shame.

"Alice, d-don't come near me," he spluttered, traumatised, disgusted, sickened by his own actions as she approached in the quiet, "Leave me alone, I-I'm a monster."

"And I'm a robot, Kirito," was all she said as she pulled him into a tight embrace, the wet blood dripping from his shirt and his hands onto her own.

I can't be human if you aren't, Kirito. We both bear the sins of living on in hell.

"This is why I told you to stay with Seven, Mio and Amadeus back at the ship, Maho," a masculine voice declared in accented Japanese, shattering the silence, "Field work can be messy, as those idiots Miller and PoH have learnt the hard way."

"Either way, seems like we're almost done here after sending in the fodder," he continued as the sound of more boots echoed in the background, "Aren't we, Kagari?"

A flash of red hair flew before the blonde knight's eyes as a syringe plunged deep into young man's spine, and he cried in surprised anguish before growing limp and motionless on her shoulder. Horrified, she tried to shake him awake, only to see that he was fully conscious, his eyes wide open, an expression of unspeakable torment frozen on his bloodied face.

Screaming in shock, she nearly released her grasp, catching him before he could collapse on the cold, hard floor.

"I see that RATH has replicated human emotions pretty well on your synthetic body," the lanky middle-aged professor commented, adjusting his lab coat, "We never really got to see you cry in your public appearances, so this itself is an interesting observation. How do you replenish your tears anyway? We may need to make you cry some more to find out. Don't worry, Alice, the Black Swordsman of VRMMO fame isn't dead, at least not yet. Unlike those Laughing Coffin jokers, I prefer to use my own concoctions to prolong the suffering."

"Maho Hiyajo, are you watching this at all?" he turned to glare at the short girl with long, messy hair who looked as if she was still in middle school, "Or are you just going to stand there and throw up all day?"

"Sorry, P-Professor L-Leskinen, I-I can't help it," the girl groaned miserably, clearly not used to such gruesomeness and brutality, "I-I don't like this at all."

"You don't have to, Maho," he replied coldly, motioning at the men that he had brought on board, "I'm sure that fat-ass Daru didn't like it either when we made him hack into RATH's systems for us."

Wrapping her fingers around the cleaver that Kirito had dropped, the blonde knight prepared herself to strike. But before she could plunge the blade into his neck, a pair of wires darted forward and struck her in the chest, staggering her with shockwaves of pain. Groaning in agony and roaring with rage, she tore away the cables and sprung to her feet, only to be stopped by yet another shot, paralysing her in a world of excruciation.

Unwilling to give up, she tried again, and again, and again, and again - and then some more. With each failed attempt, her body seemed to grow heavier, but she picked herself back up every time, if only to buy herself a few more seconds.

She was, after all, a proud Integrity Knight, and she could keep throwing herself at the enemy until they run out of rounds. Knowing that they only sought to break her will, she would remain standing long after their guns were empty, and with her blades, she would–

Alas, on her sixth attempt, the men switched to batons, achieving the same effect as they rained mercilessly down on her arms, chest and neck, pushing her back to where she began.

"Alice, w-why?" the catatonic young man managed to utter after her tenth try.

"T-They'd g-give up eventually. I-I just need to try h-harder. I-I'm a r-robot, Kirito, t-this p-pain is j-just a t-temporary–"

"Let's just stop this," he cut her short before she could finish, heaving in exertion, "You've done enough. You've done more than you ever need to."

"I-I can't, the moment I surrender, I-I'll be captured, Kirito."

"I-I'll just have to save you then, Alice."

She shook her head as tears of frustration streamed down her face. Why did he not understand?

"I-I don't want to leave you, Kirito!" she cried with all her breath.

Silence ensued as the world froze, as if stunned by her exclamation. She took the chance to recompose herself and muster her fading strength, only for the Professor to clap mockingly as he spoke.

"You've far exceeded my expectations as a bottom-up ghost in an android shell, Alice. Who would've thought that the soul of an infant incubated in a virtual world would grow up to develop such strong emotions and feelings for a man? You're the future of humanity, the next step in the evolution of homo sapiens towards the inevitable Omega point. You're the missing link, the final piece of the puzzle, the counterpart to Amadeus - the AI born of the human mind."

"I-I d-don't give a flying shit about that," Kirito hissed, interrupting the Professor's monologue before he could ramble on, "I-If you w-want Alice, y-you'll have to f-fight me first."

"I'm amazed you can still speak, but don't think too highly of yourself, Kirito," the Professor smirked, a cruel smile on his lips, "Kayaba and Sugou may have humoured you to a duel but I'm no Neanderthal."

"Stop!" she screeched, pressing the cleaver to her throat before he could think of any devious plans, "L-Let him go or I'll–"

"This is why we came for you, Alice," he gasped, more excited than taken aback by her actions, "Selfless sacrifice in the name of pure love, you're more human than human, transcending even the Laws of Robotics. Do you think Amadeus would ever achieve this state of being, Maho?"

"Maho?" he asked again as his question seemed to have fallen on deaf ears. Yet the girl was nowhere to be seen, perhaps hiding in a corner to piss herself dry.

"Let him go," she reminded, gritting her teeth as she tightened her grip, pushing the blade deeper into her skin.

"You won't die from a few severed wires, silly," he laughed, signalling to his men, "Your brain is what's important, and it's protected by that metallic skull. We can even cut your head off and reconnect it later if we want to, though that body is certainly worth dissecting."

"We prefer you in one piece, and we wouldn't want you to harm yourself," he continued as they took up positions around the helpless young man, "But if we can't break you physically, we'll just have to break you in other ways. Let's see how deep those feelings are and how far those emotions go. Take it like a preliminary load test before we do the real thing back at the lab. We've got to check the goods for any defects that we may have to fix."

"Keep us entertained, Alice. Show us the colour of your soul."

Before she could scream, three batons violently smashed onto the young man's head, chest and back, arcing with electricity with each blow. Unable to raise his hands, he could only cry in strangled agony as waves of excruciation surged across his body, amplified by the nerve agent injected into his spine.

"Kirito!" she could only sob in horror as his cries quickly softened to a whimper.

"Hikki," she urged when he was done with her wound, "Just leave me and go help the others."

He did not reply as he continued to hold her hand, afraid that the moment he let go, she would disappear into the night, slipping through his fingers like melted snow. He had lost Yukino, and he would never forgive himself if he were to lose her too.

"This isn't our fight," he explained as she stared tearfully at him, "We didn't ask for any of this. We shouldn't even be here in the first place. Sorry for dragging you along, Yui. If I knew this would happen, we should've just left them at the damned farmhouse."

In the speechless quiet, he watched in surprise as she struggled to her feet. "Yui!" he called out, concerned, only for her to turn around and give him a weak slap.

"You didn't drag me along!" she cried, "I followed you because I wanted to. And I'm sure you weren't strung along either, you stayed on because they're your friends!"

"T-They're just fellow survivors from the plane crash," he muttered, a little unsure of himself for once.

"Maybe they are," she replied with a hand over her heart, "But I-I don't know if I can live with myself if we just leave them be, knowing that we could've helped."

"I-Isn't that just guilt and sympathy?"

"I don't know, Hikki, don't you think it could be friendship too?"

Silence ensued as he searched his mind. Why had he stuck around for so long? Could it be that a part of him had wanted to matter, to be at the centre of the world with its fate hanging in the balance? Could it be that he had wanted to be - as much as he hated it - on a Grand Quest with his fellow party members, to have a reason to live and fight on for something greater than his own pathetic existence in an otherwise absurd and meaningless universe?

"I don't know, Yui," he finally said, unable to find the answers amidst his confused thoughts and conflicting emotions, "We don't have to do this. But God I feel so bad about leaving them. Why do I even feel this way? I've always been a loner anyway."

"Because you care, Hikki," she pulled him into a hug, "Just like how you care about Komachi-chan and Yukinon, just like how you care about me."

He nodded, prying himself away from her embrace, squeezing her hands reassuringly for the last time before letting go. She held on for a moment longer, leaning in to plant a farewell kiss on his lips.

"Stay safe, Hikki, and please come back to me."

He was at a loss for words when he saw the young man lying on the floor, bruises and burn marks blistering his skin.

"The choice is yours, Alice," the tall foreigner in a lab coat declared as the beating continued, "The AI gets to decide whether the human lives or dies - such is the ethical conundrum before us."

"Stop, just stop," she pleaded, letting go of the cleaver which clattered noisily on the floor. Satisfied, the men released the battered heap as she stared on, broken, having reached the limits of her grief.

Hachiman gritted his teeth at the sight, tightening his grip on the combat knife that he had picked up along the way. The odds were seven to one - two, if the android could still fight alongside the loner who had never held a blade longer than a knife in all eighteen years of his life.

In the unnerving quiet, he hesitated, wondering if this was truly the right thing to do, but before he could decide, his feet had already moved. He was about to charge out with a war cry when he spotted a little girl huddled around the corner, and he skidded to a halt, surprised, only to see that she was sobbing, stricken in genuine shock and fear, entirely defenceless and unaware of his approach.

Who the hell is this person and what on earth is she doing here? He found himself asking, careful not to underestimate her despite her rather small stature.

Oh, she's one of them alright, he realized when he saw the oversized lab coat. Holding in his lingering doubt, he rushed forward, nearly knocking over her small frame as she tensed like a deer in the headlights. Before she could scream, he had pressed the knife to her throat, dragging her by the collar as she hyperventilated in panic, raw blood trickling from the cut that he had made in his haste.

Don't be fooled by her antics, or she'll turn the tables on you, he warned himself, ignoring the voices in his head and the weight in his heart. Drawing a deep breath, he steeled himself and pulled her roughly into the open, to stop the enemy before they could lay another finger on his friends.

"Drop your weapons or the girl dies!" he shouted as loudly as he could, pushing the blade closer to her quivering throat.

A deafening silence ensued as everyone froze, and for a moment, he felt vindicated and thankful to whatever god that existed in this cursed reality that his plan had worked, and that the terrified hostage in his trembling arms was indeed one of his enemies.

"Sorry, P-Professor," she whimpered, struggling for air in his vice-like grip, "I-I was just–"

"Maho, you miserable little thing," the Professor pulled a handgun from his lab coat, not wanting to hear the rest, "You amuse me, young man with dead-fish eyes, but all you've really done is to remind me that I don't actually need her anymore."

"No," she begged, a warm stain forming between her shuddering legs as she stared mortified at the cold, hard barrel, "P-Please don't do this, please!"

"Now that I've got Alice, Amadeus and your brain data, Maho," he snickered, ignoring her growing shrieks of terror, "I can always create a new Salieri."

The loner had barely let go of his useless hostage when a resounding gunshot rang out from close range. Stunned, he found himself falling on his back, the combat knife clanging noisily on the floor as a sharp pain emanated from the hole on the side of his abdomen. She collapsed in the very next second with muted disbelief on her face, sending him into a world of torment and agony as she crashed squarely onto his chest.

In the cold silence, their blood seemed to flow into the same puddle of crimson.

Stirred by clashing steel and gunfire, Suguha opened her eyes, haunted by the ethereal fragments of her delirious dreams. Yet, as more reports echoed through the air, undampened by the thin wooden walls, she could only scramble to her feet to prepare herself for the fight.

Slapping herself to action, she hurriedly pulled on her shirt and grabbed a metal rod that would make do as her shinai. Inhaling deeply to calm her nerves, she slowly opened the door, careful not to make any noise, only to be hit by a brief but debilitating headache as she stepped out into the night.

Quit being such a useless coward, she scolded herself, slumping to her knees but refusing to ever turn back, you haven't even apologised for the bad things you've done to him and Alice.

Clenching her fists to muster her resolve, she forced herself back up again as the sounds of battle seemed to intensify. Kicking her instincts into high gear, she inched forward, one step at a time - not out of consternation, apprehension or trepidation but caution born from years of training.

She was ready. She had to be. She was among the best in the nation, and she had sworn on her honour that she would give her all.

That was when she heard him scream.

She froze in panic before dashing forward, throwing aside everything else to focus on the only thing that mattered - him. Yet, barely a few seconds later, she found herself petrified once more, unable to think, move or breathe as he fell to the floor, limp and motionless, surrounded by five armed men, a red-haired girl and a tall foreigner who appeared to be their leader.

Time slowed as her heart raced. She saw the loner pulling his stunt, only to be blasted to a heap, and with the android broken in despair and the airhead nowhere to be found - she was the last one standing.

She clutched her head as her pulse quickened, heated adrenaline coursing through her veins. She felt faint, not from the fever, but the inferno of rage and courage, determination and frustration all rolled into one massive conflagration burning across every nerve, cell and fibre of her being.

In that moment, she was the Flame Spirit Efreet, her fires fuelled by the Wind Element of the Sylph, strengthened by the force of the little cat girl that could punch like a ton of bricks.

Before she knew it, she had closed the gap, smashing the weight of her wrath on the first skull with such power that the rod was instantly bent in half. Ignoring his tortured shriek, she swung again, striking another man in the chest with such speed that the metal snapped, revealing a sharp end that she stabbed through yet another screaming creature, impaling the wretched soul to a bloody demise.

Two combat knives slashed at her, and she raised her arm to block, the blades digging deep into her flesh. Yet she neither flinched nor grimaced, even as tides of red spurted like water, for such pain was little compared to what he had suffered at their hands.

Turning her torment into energy, she punched one in the gut with such fury that the joints in her knuckles shattered and cracked, sending him sliding across the cold, hard floor. The other blade somehow found its way through her stomach, only for her to pull it back out to return the favour, plunging the knife through his abdomen before he mercifully died.

Two more remained - the tall foreigner in a lab coat and his red-haired female bodyguard, and the kendoka did not hesitate. Retrieving the weapon from her cursed assailant, she sprang forward to engage the girl in black leather, blood streaming from her wounds with every strike.

Heated sparks flew as metal clashed on steel, her unstoppable force seemingly crashing into an immovable object. She had finally met her equal. But even as part of her relished the duel of a lifetime, time was ticking, and she had precious seconds to spare.

Alas, the collision of momentum on inertia could not last forever. With the imaginary powers of healing and regeneration keeping her from fainting and dying on the spot, she blocked her opponent's final blow with her injured hand, the sheer force rippling through her bone and ripping apart her wounds. Biting her lip to take in the agony, she rushed for the final boss, hurtling like a meteor without a care for herself or the world as she slashed the arm that was holding the handgun before he could pull the trigger.

Time seemed to stop as the blade slid between his ribs, staining his lab coat in a growing halo of crimson. In the deafening silence, he staggered and fell, myriad expressions of fear, pain and surprise washing over his face for the first time that night.

And for once, even as she truly hated what she had done and what she had become, she smiled.

She had never told him - her one and only brother, her dear cousin, her beloved Kazuto - but just as he would climb the tallest mountains and cross the deepest valleys, she would descend to the lowest depths of hell for him to live on as a human.

And that was why she had lost everything, but she had won.

She did not even seem to notice as the red-haired girl plunged stab after stab into the fading warmth of her motionless body. Somehow, in the numbing quiet, she could not feel anything, not even the sensation of saltwater on her wounds as she was flung overboard in a fit of savage fury.

The only regret that she had, as she inevitably drowned, no longer gasping for air with her blood-filled lungs and the gaping wound in her throat, was that she had not managed to apologise to him for being such a burden till the end.

But then again, she had spoken through the swings of her blade.

A/N: Chapter title inspired by Akame ga Kill. Additional character references from:

1. Steins;Gate 0 - Professor Alexis Leskinen, Shiina Kagari, Hiyajo Maho, Hashida Itaru / Daru, Amadeus (digital form of Makise Kurisu)

2. Chaos;Child (same Science Adventure VN universe as Steins;Gate 0) - Kunosato Mio

3. SAO: Lost Song (game-verse) - Nanairo Arshavin / Seven

4. Date A Live - Itsuka Kotori / Efreet (same VA as Suguha)

5. High School DxD - Toujou Koneko (same VA as Suguha)

With this, we move on to the aftermath (Chapter 19) and the finale of part I / teaser for part II (Chapter 20). As always - favs, follows and reviews highly appreciated!