TW: discussion of suicide. The views expressed by characters in the chapter are not the views of the author.

Warning: this chapter is freaking huge. Start reading at your own risk.

Tyrant 2.9

The vault swung shut in total silence. It really felt like it should have made a loud, apocalyptic, life-ending noise. Fucking tinker tech.

So, I was outside the vault. I'd made my choice, as much as there was a choice to make. More like I had taken the only path available if I wanted to be at peace with the decision. That peace was small comfort in the face of a growing ... not regret per se, but close. Maybe restlessness? I guess the hero thing wasn't quite working out, heroes made their self-sacrificing decisions and never looked back.

Although I did have first hand evidence that real life heroes weren't everything the stories made them out to be. Maybe making the decision at all was all that counted, and selfish second thoughts were par for the course?

I pulled hard on the outer handle as someone tried to open the vault from the inside. Probably Gallant, trying to live up to his name. Again. It was going to get him killed one day.

Aegis would have to restrain him soon, always reliable to make the tough decision, and then Clockblocker...

The handle froze and I sighed in relief. Not much point to all of this if I got caught while I was still in the basement, holding the vault closed to stop the misguided heroism of people who were almost my friends. Would have been nice, they seemed like good people, even the weird ones.

I shook my head to clear out the unnecessary thoughts. Lead the enemy away, that was the aim of the game. Nothing else mattered.

"What the fuck are you doing?" growled a familiar voice next to me. I spun around to see Shadow Stalker practically vibrating with anger. Damn it, I hadn't expected her to work it out faster than Clockblocker. The Ward stepped closer. "Is she right? Are you trying to get yourself killed?"

Ah. So that's how she pieced it together so quick. Tattletale fucked me again.

I pushed past her, striding towards the stairs. "I'm leading them away, buying time for everyone. They'll chase me."

She grabbed my shoulder roughly. "They'll fucking kill you. Is that how you want to go down, suicide by monster? I honestly didn't peg you as a coward."

A coward? I was going to make the ultimate sacrifice, and she calls me a coward?

I rounded on her, my own anger rising. "What the fuck do you want from me?" I yelled back. "Should I just let them die? Let Vista die?"

She shoved me, hard. "Fuck you. Don't you dare blame her for your shit." She chased me as I stumbled, staying right up in my face. "I bet it was the same when you were going after Lung, wasn't it. You just expected to get killed? How the hell did you get this fucked up, to want to go down without a fight?"

I snorted, probably a bad move considering how pissed she was, but I couldn't help it. "Seriously, that's your problem here? You want me to fight? This isn't some movie where the weird girl locks her friends behind a door and kills all the monsters. This is reality, and in reality I control bugs. "Suicide by monster" is the best I can do."

She staggered to a stop in front of me, eyes wide. "Are you fucking nuts? You killed three of those things already!"

I blinked in surprise. I did what?

The world tilted as the memories flooded into me. The sound as I crushed a cultist's head between my mask and the street. The feeling as I swung my claws through the skull of another. Soft pulpy flesh dripping down a wall.

I dry heaved, hunching over as my diaphragm spasmed wildly. How the hell did I forget all of that?

"I ... I guess I did," I gasped, reaching for the edge of my mask. I needed air. "It's not the same ... I wasn't thinking. I got lucky."

Shadow Stalker grabbed my hair from behind and lifted my head.

"You call that luck?"

She was pointing at the dark corner under the stairs. Human blood stained what was left of the wall, but what really captured my attention was the sheer destruction around it. I tasted bile rising up the back of my throat, and I remembered. Being consumed with rage. My gloves splitting, my hands changing. Destroying that creature so utterly that what was left was unrecognisable.

Driving my arms shoulder deep into solid rock.

"I'm a monster," I whispered.

She yanked my hair, arching my neck backwards and twisting my head around to face her. Our eyes locked, our masks almost touching. "Join the fucking club."

I stared blankly as she evaporated into smoke, my mind in turmoil. More images assailed me; Shadow Stalker wide-eyed on the street. The Wards casting sidelong glances in the bank. Vista refusing to look at me.

They hadn't been concerned or even suspicious. They had been terrified.

I had killed these things, brutally, and then walked away like nothing had happened. No wonder they were scared. I could count the number of capes who acted like that on one hand, and they certainly weren't heroes.

Something inside me noted that the first cultist had escaped the tunnels. That something responded, pulsing with malevolence. It cried out to take these things that were not mine and devour them.

And in that moment of contradictory feelings, self-loathing and terrible hunger, I realised that the other something wasn't me. It wasn't separate either, not truly. It contained part of me, and I held part of it.

The first enemy cleared the tunnel mouth and launched itself forward.

I could feel that other part inside me reaching out, and I could see where it touched me. Where I touched it.

The monster leapt, soaring across the basement.

I cordoned it off, building a barrier around the alien element. It shuddered and strained against the bonds but to my surprise I was stronger. Much stronger.

I could see it clearly, now that I knew how to look. It was something else, something related to my powers, and it had insinuated itself into me. It had changed me, made me into something my dad wouldn't recognise. Something I didn't want to be.

The claws reached for me.

My world exploded into noise as the cultist screamed. Not a cry of victory, but pain, terror. My eyes snapped open.

Shadow Stalker stood over the thing, holding the legs of a hard-backed chair. The body of the chair was inside the creature, I could see the transition where the wood jutting through its forehead seamlessly melded into flesh. It thrashed weakly and then stilled. "You still having a fucking crisis?" she asked with a grin in her voice.

She sounded excited.

I instinctively backed away from the wrongness of the scene. From her.

But other images crashed against me. Browbeat and Aegis crushing their enemies together, methodical and disciplined. Kid Win vapourising one and whooping with joy. Glory Girl tearing another apart and smirking.

I hadn't thought they were wrong then, when I had been caught up in it and altered by this thing inside me. But now? I still wouldn't criticise them. Their motivations seemed inconsequential compared to the stakes involved. They did what was needed to survive, and felt what they needed to so they could be ok with it.

And I had killed …

to save them. I saw Kid Win falling from the sky, claws striking against him. I saw the shock in Glory Girl's eyes as she tumbled into the dark, and the terror in her thoughts when I picked her up.

I saw Vista smiling weakly, blood staining her teeth.

And the something inside me pulsed in anger. Not so alien, that feeling.

"You finished freaking out? I could use some help here."

I looked up in surprise. Shadow Stalker was reaching for me, holding out her hand. Behind her the real monsters were pouring from the tunnels.

OK. I nodded. As I took her hand, I reached inside myself and made my own offer.

I grinned and pushed, swinging my arm up as hard as I could without hurting her. She had a brief moment to widen her eyes in surprise before she dissolved into smoke and disappeared through the ceiling.

I burst out into the sunlight, the metal vents and ducts glaring. My feet crunched across the gravely surface of the rooftop.

Shadow Stalker stood at the far edge, hand on hip. "That was not fucking funny…" she started, trailing off as the top of the stairway behind me exploded. The monsters poured through the wreckage, harried by a gigantic swarm of bugs that reached upwards and spread out like a giant hand, blackening the city skyline. They crashed down across our enemies like a tidal wave, and I felt several of them stumble or fall.

The majority of the bugs sunk back into the stairwell, blocking off that route of entry into the building.

My foot struck the edge of the roof as I passed Shadow Stalker, who was turning to follow me.

"I don't know," I said. "I thought it was hilarious."

I pushed, reaching past my defensive wall and my passenger responded. The ground flashed by beneath me, four stories below, and then I was onto the next building and running again.

The rhythm of running had always soothed me, left my head free to think and plan. The feeling of freedom I had now only heightened that experience; I could runanywhere. It was exhilarating.

The train of death that was following at our heels barely dampened the rush.

Despite my current level of augmentation Shadow Stalker easily kept pace beside me. I idly wondered if she ran competitively, her stride looked practiced. Her use of her power certainly was, as she flickered into reality as her feet struck the roof and then dephased to bound forward, decoupling from the forces that kept normal people stuck on the ground.

She even managed to twist in the air and loose bolts from her crossbow at the apex of each arc, which was pretty damn awesome to watch. Like a deadly shadowy ballerina or something. Our pursuers had wisened up quickly though, and were managing to evade most of the projectiles. None had fallen yet, but she had slowed a couple of them down.

I didn't doubt that Shadow Stalker could get away, and I could probably outrun them for a while by myself, even with my current self-imposed limitations, but that didn't change the fact we were charging through the business district, which meant civilians.

The blackout had caused chaos, the streets littered with cars that lost control and crashed into buildings or each other, shopfronts smashed open by opportunistic thieves. It seemed like the majority of people were off the streets, probably a result of our melee and firefight in front of the bank as much as the civilian damage, but some brave or foolhardy folks were still loitering nearby.

Even looters didn't deserve what would happen if they got caught up in the carnage following us. We needed a plan other than "run until the heroes arrive". Whatever we did had to keep them occupied and away from the public.

I ran through the short mental checklist. Resources we had available: myself, Shadow Stalker and a literal metric fuck-ton of bugs. Something about being trapped underground in a small metal box had boosted my power to new heights, and it seemed like I had been doing that "subconsciously attracting bugs" thing for most of the time we were down there.

Every street for several blocks was nearly blanketed in the things, and the air was thick with flying insects. It was all I could do to keep them away from the people still out on the street, and I could only imagine what they thought of the orderly rivers of cockroaches and spiders marching in formation.

Unfortunately the small insects couldn't keep up with us and were quickly left behind. I would need to be smart if I wanted to bring them back into active play. Thankfully the massive volume of creepy crawlies passively granted me an amazingly high-res awareness of the surrounding area, which revealed several possibilities.

"Keep running," I yelled out, hoping Shadow Stalker would hear me over the sound of the wind whipping past, and then I veered to the side and dove off the building. Not the best time to test my durability from four floors up, but I didn't really have time to take the stairs. I was pretty sure I would be fine.

As I had hoped the majority of the pursuers followed me over the edge, a few stragglers chasing Shadow Stalker. She could handle them, her powerset was pretty much hax against Brutes.

It was time to test a theory.

My pursuers were literally snapping at my heels as I raced through the streets, the closest threats being the two big monsters and the few cultists who seemed to have leg-oriented mutations. The few bugs that had wedged themselves deep enough into their joints to hang on at the speed we were travelling gave me just enough warning to avoid their attacks.

It was amazing how easily I was able to multi-task, managing at least four separate problems at once, controlling what had to be millions of insects by now. If I opened my awareness up I could even experience sensory input from all of them simultaneously, which seemed impossible. Something to do with my powers I guess, some minor Thinker attribute?

I ducked to the side at the last second as six inch claws ripped through the air above my head. That was a bit close for comfort, maybe a little more focus here wouldn't hurt.

I was almost all ready anyway, and as we reached the intersection I had been aiming for I initiated phase one. The hordes of flying insects I had piled up in the perpendicular alleyways streamed across the street in front of us, completely obscuring the road behind them. Perfect.

They parted as I entered the cloud. It was dense and taller than I could see past, but not more than ten feet deep. Inside the cloud I dropped low, feeling my fingers toughen as they dragged through the tarmac, spinning my body in a controlled slide. As my feet found traction I pushed and leapt smoothly through a coincidentally-inside-the-swarm adjacent shop window. I scrambled to a halt behind the shop counter as the first of the cultists burst past the veil of insects and into the empty street.

I tried to slow my breathing, counting each cycle in my head.

One...

The rest of the monsters joined their vanguard on the street, none the worse for wear. That was ok, I hadn't expected the bugs to be able to hurt the dozen that remained. Natural selection I suppose, those that I could take down with bugs were already incapacitated.

They fanned out, searching. Behind them the wall of bugs retreated back into the alleyway.

Two...

One of the smaller ones was right out the front of my hidey-hole, but seemed hesitant to enter. Several others were loitering just outside the nearby buildings. Veryspecific nearby buildings.

Three...

I dispersed the swarms. Bugs streamed off the rooftops in every direction from several of the shops, causing my pursuers to jump backwards to avoid them. About half of the nearby buildings had been bug free, and I knew it wasn't a coincidence that they had ignored those stores.

As the roof above me cleared the monsters all spun towards me. Fuck.

I kind of wished I had been wrong about this.

I scrambled away as the nearest cultist smashed through the counter, screeching in rage. It leapt after me and I hardened my resolve. This was to survive and to protect.

I reached past the barrier I had set up inside me and connected to the other, feeling the rage and hunger taking hold in me. I held it back with force of will, I only needed enough.

The fire rippled down my arms. As I turned to face my enemy I saw a nearly-human expression of surprise and then I attacked, my blows easily outpacing the desperate swings of my opponent. My fingers tore through fabric, flesh and bone. It was probably just denial at work, but I squeezed my eyes shut and tried not to listen. I don't think I was quite ready to watch.

I opened my eyes again as the last piece fell with a wet thud.

The rest of them were bounding towards me, thinking I was trapped, but there was a reason I chose this shop. Before I could be over-run I crashed through the rear exit and out into my swarm.

Shadow Stalker had comfortably outpaced her enemies, able to cut corners by dephasing through the worn brickwork.

GO LEFT HERE

She didn't like being told what to do, especially orders relayed by bugs messily spelling out messages on walls with their bodies, but she would be the first to admit that she was more of a fighter than a tactician.

Leaping to the left she spun and launched another bolt into her remaining pursuers, catching one in the forearm. It didn't slow it down. She clicked her tongue in frustration, her bolts just couldn't do enough damage.

I GOT ONE. TAKE NEXT RIGHT

She smirked and ran on.

The cultists held back, easing out of the store to circle around and block the exits to the alleyway. They wouldn't risk entering such an obvious trap, not after I had just taken one of them down with ease. Better to wait me out and pounce when the opportunity came.

At least, that is what I hoped they were thinking.

If everything I thought I knew about them was right, this should work. I crossed my my fingers.

The bugs spilled out of both ends of the laneway, but instead of an unformed wave of insects they were condensed into vaguely humanoid shapes. They lurched forward, wading onto the streets. The cultists sprinting around the corners pounced, splashing through the flimsy decoys. They were so much faster than the swarms, and they ripped them apart disturbingly quickly.

I had expected that. My few attempts at making these clones while I had been planning this had quickly revealed they weren't going to set any land speed records, not if I wanted them to be believable as decoys. All those flyers so close together played havoc with air pressure on the small scale.

Thankfully my plan didn't need them to be fast. Each decoy that was cut down broke apart, the constituent bugs flying and scuttling to rejoin a nearby intact clone. When a living clone had gathered enough bugs from the dead, it budded, splitting into two again.

I didn't need to outrun them, or to outfight them. I just needed to have more clones reforming than they could break apart. They were after me, and they couldn't afford to let even one decoy go for fear I was inside.

If I could win this war of attrition, then I could force them to split up.

And I was winning.

My fingers slowly uncrossed. I was right; they could see me and my bugs, much like I could see them. They could find me behind walls, but my bugs blocked their view enough that they couldn't be sure I wasn't hidden inside a ramshackle pile of insects.

Which I was. I was hot, loud and claustrophobic. If I didn't need the mobility there was no way I would have considered it.

So yep, that was my plan. A human shell game, grand scale misdirection with my life on the line.

I had a running theory that whoever was controlling these things didn't have my talent for multitasking. It seemed like they were on longer leashes than my bugs were, their movement was less controlled. My bugs were automata, these things snapped and growled and moved like animals. It was more like Bitch's dogs, like they got orders but not step-by-step directions.

Which was definitely exploitable. If they had to focus to micromanage one set of monsters at a time they couldn't see the wider battle. I could use that.

Divide and conquer. Common parlance among the self-help books from the "fight back" school of dealing with bullies, it was pretty much the only military tactic I had ever heard of. It was perfect here. One on one I knew I could take any of them except maybe the big monsters, even with restraining myself.

If they attacked together I would be overwhelmed. I knew that at a fundamental level, so I couldn't let it happen.

The bug decoys began lumbering into new alleyways, leading the enemies further afield. It seemed like about a half dozen decoys could occupy one of the smaller cultists indefinitely although the big ones needed at least twice that many. I divided the bugs up into units of ten, staggering them so the individual cultists couldn't reach too many too quickly.

While the central CBD was wide boulevards and orderly crossroads, the surrounding area was a warren of little lanes and sidestreets. From my hazy memory of civics class Brockton Bay was an … organic city. It had been a minor port in the early days, overshadowed by the larger east coast cities and off the main railway lines. It had still grown steadily but central planning had been conspicuously absent for most of the formative years.

What that meant was that anyone who couldn't view the area as a whole, or multitask enough to get a general's eye view, was going to have a lot of trouble seeing the big picture. I was counting on that fact.

The wild goose chase was not without risk. I was vulnerable. If this was a shell game, every cup they flipped over could be the one hiding the pea.

I thinned the bugs over my eyes and examined the cultist that was following my personal decoys. It was the first time I had been able to see one at close range for any length of time.

It really was bestial, I think it had previously been male but its face was so twisted and misshapen it was hard to tell, with heavy hairless brows and a protruding mouth full of fangs. It was screaming in rage and frustration as it attacked. Hopefully it was echoing the current mental state of whoever was controlling it; in my recent experience anger led to bad decisions.

It swatted down the decoy next to me, the swarm cohesion collapsing. Surprisingly few bugs died with each attack, but those that did still niggled at me. I rationally knew that they were just insects, and there were near limitless replacements, but they were mine. They protected me without question or judgement.

On this my passenger was in perfect agreement, I could feel its anger bubbling behind my barricades.

The cultist turned towards me, looking for a new target. The decoy to my right lurched drunkenly, looking quite convincingly like it was trying to run, and the cultist leapt at it. In the meantime more bugs joined my swarm and I stepped away from the thing, budding off another clone.

Across the district a few decoys in each group began moving slightly differently from the rest, standing out. It wouldn't do to have irregularities in my group only.

It was just a massive confidence game, one I was determined to win.

It wouldn't be much longer anyway. We were almost there.

ALMOST READY

Shadow Stalker chuckled under her breath.

The bugs on the wall reformed themselves into a string of descending digits.

The first number dropped.

My hypothesis seemed to be right. The circuitous paths of my swarms had not altered the cultists' behaviour. Their leader hadn't noticed a pattern.

Moment of truth. My swarms simultaneously lurched out onto the roadway, converging towards the centre.

Around half of the remaining enemies arrived on time, leaping from the various sidestreets. It was enough.

3 ...

2 ...

1 ...

The last set of bugs fell from the wall. She pulled the trigger.

I rounded the corner as the quicker cultists pounced on the swarms, slashing through them by the dozens.

I could have sworn I saw them pull up as they recognised each other, as the thicket of bugs streamed away as fast as I could move them.

Their Master realised what was happening and they started to run. Too slow.

THUMP

The street exploded as Shadow Stalker fired the cannon Kid Win had abandoned on the ground floor of the bank. Even at this distance I could feel the ground roll and buckle.

My travel partner turned to escape but I was quicker, slashing out from inside my cocoon of insects. It toppled to the ground.

The smoke cleared, revealing a large crater surrounded by smoking debris. Aside from the property destruction it was actually much cleaner than my own kills, whatever energy Kid Win used appeared to disintegrate flesh rather than just scatter body parts and gore.

Shadow Stalker waved jauntily to me from the other end of the street, I returned the gesture with somewhat less enthusiasm. Just because I had made the decision to fight back didn't mean I was going to revel in the slaughter of a half dozen humanoids.

I felt my anger swell as I realised just how many bugs I had lost as bait, the blast had destroyed a third of my decoys. I clamped down on my passenger and the emotion flowing from it. I couldn't afford any distractions now.

The Master would be much more unpredictable after losing half his swarm.

I turned my focus outwards to find the remaining cultists. They were holding back, massing together. It almost seemed defensive, and I didn't know whether I should be happy or horrified that I had done enough to scare them. Him.

Well, fine. If they were playing that game we would have to come to them. Clustering like that was asking for another cannon-blast.

I gathered my swa...

my ...

...

My body became agony and I screamed.

My nerves were on fire, my skin boiling. I couldn't think, could barely breath. It felt like my heart would burst, like my muscles were tearing.

I hissed blindly, screamed, tried to roll away. I retreated as best I could and found myself against a wall. Something was on the other side, burning just as hotly as I did yet it seemed different. Not pain but anger.

It screamed too, calling out to me. I scrabbled at the wall, my hands tearing and cracking as the assault burnt my limbs. I threw myself against the wall in desperation, and it cracked.

A new fire washed over me, icy and incandescent. The pain receded, replaced with an overwhelming rage.

"Are you ok? What the fuck was that?" came a voice.

I opened my eyes. Shadow Stalker, leaning over me. Mine. I tried to speak, but the words wouldn't form, coming out as a strangled growl.

"Yeah, I think you said that already," she said, rolling her eyes. "Fucking pull yourself together. I don't think that was all of them."

All of them?

Right. The cultists. I swept my senses outwards. They were close, coming fast. And...

My head snapped upwards. On the building overlooking us, outlined by the setting sun was a man. Human, probably, in a skintight black suit. And so fucking wrong. A corona of power flared around him, like the negative space of the others if you multiplied it by a hundred. Like looking into an bottomless abyss.

"Holy fuck, what's wrong with your hands?" Shadow Stalker asked wide eyed.

My hands?

The nimbus of not-light flickered around the figure and the other thing inside me flinched.

I swept to my feet, throwing an arm around Shadow Stalker's waist and I heaved, launching her away from me. She tumbled through the air, further than I would have believed possible.

His aura flickered once more, and then abruptly collapsed.

I barely registered it, it happened so quickly. All around me my swarms had gathered, subconsciously drawn to protect me. Like a nova bursting out from the figure above their lights winked out in an expanding circle, extinguished. And then the wavefront struck, and my knees buckled.

I roared back as his scream broke against me, burning through my nerves and my flesh, my armour was no defense. Inside me my passenger reached out with fire of its own, my body a battleground of competing flames. I ground my teeth together and stood, glaring up at him.

His eyeless mask revealed nothing, but his posture spoke of cold calculation.

All around me insects rained onto the street, lifeless husks. He stole them from me. From us.

I pushed, far harder than I had before. A firestorm ignited in me, my legs rippled. I launched myself at the building, my talons slicing into the brickwork, flinging myself up higher with each handhold. I crested the roof, his void right ahead of me...

And he was gone. Not just gone, I couldn't sense him at all. It was like he had never been there to begin with.

I would have questioned my memory of it wasn't for the carpet of dead and dying mine that littered the rooftop.

I screamed in rage and frustration, the noise reverberating in the silence. My augmented hearing took in the echoes bouncing off from nearby buildings, the sound stopped me in my tracks.

I sounded just like them.

The fire died in my chest. I wouldn't be like them. That was the agreement, the promise.

I pushed my passenger back and it retreated reluctantly into its cage.

I took a deep breath and reached out again. They were coming. One group was inside the building I was on, coming up the stairs. The other group was after Shadow Stalker.

I felt tired. There were at least 3 or 4 cultists in this group, bounding up the stairs so close together I couldn't even distinguish between them. I was tapped, bugs gone, emotionally stretched. Something was happening to me when I fought and I needed time to work it out. Time I didn't have.

I wasn't ready for what was coming. I wondered if Alexandria ever felt like this, she always seemed to self-assured.

Maybe, against the Endbringers. And still she fought.

I slowed my breathing. They were one flight of stairs away. Half a flight.

I faced the door and reached into myself. I could do this, without pushing too far. The fire flowed.

I caught them as they reached the top step, the door collapsing on its hinges. All my tricks and traps were useless now, I had no army or allies. Just myself.

So I had to keep them off balance. A pre-emptive strike.

As their claws tore through the flimsy door of the stairwell my own flashed out. My fingers were still mine, but heavy and hard, full of fire. The upper portion of the door disintegrated with one blow, and I caught the first cultist behind it.

I tried to remain dispassionate as I watched my fingers tear through its face, an orbit shattering into the soft flesh behind it. At least I didn't have time to think about it. The two cultists at each shoulder leapt over their falling comrade, trampling it. Trying to catch me unprepared.

They failed at that though; they had already showed their willingness to sacrifice allies on several occasions. I stepped forward and left, catching the first blow on my forearm. It hit like a truck, my bones groaning, but at least I was inside the range of its claws.

I pushed, ducking in with my shoulder, striking it in the chest hard enough to hear the bones snapping. It flew back into the stairway as its chest collapsed, but it somehow managed to bring its claws around, raking my shoulders even as its died. The mutant sliced into my armour, drawing lines of fire along my arms.

I gritted my teeth and stepped back, narrowly avoiding the follow up swing from the third. I lashed out wildly at the pain and caught it on the wrist before it could pull back, severing the limb with the blow. It hissed and leapt forward, swinging its remaining arm in what had to be a vain hope. I stepped inside it and thrust forward, fingers spearing in under its jaw.

Too easy. Something was wrong.

I backpeddeled, but not fast enough as the cultist was bisected by a massive blow, slashing up across my abdomen towards my chest. I managed to stop the attack with my right arm but the force of the blow launched me a dozen feet across the roof.

Somewhere a Master was laughing, and rightly so. He had turned my own trap against me, hiding his deadliest fighter from my sight behind a screen of lesser creatures. It must have run up the stairs on all fours, to not stand out from its brethren.

I winced as I rose. That arm was broken, the armour over my solar plexus rent. Blood welled up through the tear.

Not life threatening. I hoped.

The thing was watching with an intelligence that scared me. With my injuries it had me beat for speed and strength, and now I was doubtful of my ability to out-think it.

Not that it gave me time to think. It charged forward, sensing weakness.

It wasn't wrong either, I could barely see it move. It would be so easy to give up.

Coward...

Maybe it was a cliche, to remember the pep talk Shadow Stalker gave me earlier, her fucked up mix of insults and bloodthirst, but she was right. I had nothing to lose by trying.

I pushed, and my eyes burned. The world snapped into focus, the monster visible again. It wasn't moving slower, but I could see it.

The massive claws on its upper arms swung forward. I eked every ounce of fire out of my passenger up to my limit, even inching over it. My hands rippled, fingers fusing and hardening, bone splitting through the skin and sharpening to a razor edge.

I caught its claws on my own, held it fast. It was strong enough to punch through solid steel. I didn't give an inch.

Rage spilled over my barrier, barely held in check. This servant dared to raise its hands against me?

It strained, trying to leverage its vastly greater weight and height, I pushed in return and it was pushed back. It bared fangs inches long, bellowed into my face. Its lower set of arms swung forward, diving towards my belly. Disturbingly human fingers, I noticed.

I had nothing left to defend with.

It didn't need the claws, the fingers shearing through spidersilk like paper, driving into me. I was struck by how little it hurt, more warm than painful.

It pushed further in, hands grasping and squeezing. Something tore and it felt like I had wet myself. I almost laughed at feeling self-conscious about that. Not really the time.

I tasted metal in my mouth, felt blood bubbling up.

I looked up and we locked eyes. It was different now, not full of rage or even hunger. For the first time I could see something else, the mind behind it. He was watching. Their Father.

And looking into those eyes I knew something with one hundred percent certainty. He wouldn't stop with me, now the cat was out of the bag. Those eyes had no use for people, for the status quo. He had no need to hold back. He was going to destroy everything.

A week ago I might have been ok with that, but it wasn't a week ago.

My mental barriers evaporated away in an instant and the thing inside me burst free. I felt my mask tear as I screamed and changed, and then there was darkness.

AN: So, really long chapter here. I felt like stopping it in the middle would be too mean, hopefully you all enjoyed it, it was a long slog.

My personal favourite part: Sophia talks Taylor out of suicide, in her own way.