120: I won't let you.
I'm going to be sick. I had been so excited, so damn satisfied to finally be done with this storm - and now everything has flipped on its head. Nobunaga is dead, Georgios is wounded, and Heracles has achieved a form beyond what we ever could have predicted.
For a moment, the only noise is the waves, and the badly strained hull of the Argo creaking as it sways back and forth. Heracles gazes wordlessly at the pristine wall of Mash's Noble Phantasm, the tattered cloth over his face fluttering in the slowly dying breeze.
Mash doubles over, breathing heavily as her Noble Phantasm ends - she looks like she's about to throw up, and I, already unsettled, vomit on the rain-soaked deck.
His ability goes beyond 'just' absorbing ambient mana; even my own Od is being sucked out. At this rate, just like my first night at the Mathers mansion-
Breath returns as something warm glows on my back, and Cu Chulainn passes by me to draw a rune on Mash's back as well. He gives a meaningful glance at Georgios, still with both arms broken, and the Rider nods, dematerializing into spirit form to lighten the load.
Finally, I can breathe again, and I slowly rise back to a normal standing posture, glaring at the enemy in front of us who still has yet to take action beyond his opening move.
For the first time in this Singularity, the communicator on my wrist beeps, and a completely frazzled-looking Olga Marie Animusphere appears. Right, I guess the storm's over-
"...Subaru, this is probably a bad time, but what are we looking at here?" She asks. Idly, I note that she looks about as exhausted as she looked during France… I guess losing communication for three days will do that, huh? But still, the look on her face-
"Heracles," I say, wiping the spittle from my lips. I hate this. Don't look at me like that, like you're so glad to see me. I'm going to die, after all. If not from this enemy, then maybe by my own hands. "Or I guess, Super Heracles? He's using that [Total Eclipse] thing Gareth mentioned in the France debriefing."
"Ah, I see," She says numbly.
"Oi, Heracles, what the hell are you doing!?" Jason shouts over our conversation. "Why are you shooting my crew - no, why are you siding with Medea!? She's trying to wipe out humanity, you know!? Look, I get that she messed with your mind a bit, but shake it off already!"
"Alcides." The Archer says, astralizing his bow and raising both hands in front of himself. "Call me Alcides now. I will not bear the name of a goddess. As for the fate of humanity, why should I care? Humans, gods… both are worthless. Burn it all and start anew - the plan of the King of Mages suits me just fine."
Jason's eyes widen, and he freezes.
"My bad, he's Alcides," I find myself whispering to the director. Jokingly. As if everything hasn't suddenly gone to hell.
It hasn't sunk in. Somehow, even though I rationally know it, I still haven't even internalized Nobunaga's demise. I just can't believe that moron would die just like that - she already broke the rules in her arrival, so surely, somehow-!
"I can hear him just fine…" She mutters, and then annoyance glints in her eyes. "Surely you remember that-"
"Yeah, it's his childhood name. There was something like that in the [Okeanos Doom Packet]," I reply.
Finally, strained laughter leaves Jason's lips. "Y-you're joking, right? That's really… not funny, Heracles-"
"No, this is the truth," Heracles - no, Alcides - replies. "That is why I've placed the Nemean Lion's pelt over my face - so that the works of man may never again enter my sight."
"...No. No, that's impossible!" Jason protests. "Even if you were an outcast, you never once resented-!"
"Not when you knew me," Alcides says, cutting him off. "No, even during my lifetime, I still never held a grudge. I thought, somehow, that it was just me. That I was simply a freak who had been born wrong. It's not abnormal for a demigod to have no place among men, but if it was only me, then I could bear that burden. But the mud created by the [Caster of the Stars] opened my eyes. It took two baths in the mud, but I saw it at last."
Caster of the- oh, right, there was a paper-thin disguise like that at some point, wasn't there? He's talking about Alter Ego, in any case.
"Angra Mainyu. All the Evils in the World - that was what it showed me. And what I saw was simply that it was all the same. The loneliness I felt, the cruelty visited upon me - even my own sin, that murderous rage of mine - that was simply humanity. It was no different for anyone else; it could never be any different, for humans are the most wicked, worthless beings in this world," He says, and then, pausing a moment, he turns his head slightly to gaze westward. "Even your kingdom, Jason - I'm sure it would have been just the same."
"That's wrong, Heracles! You know me, don't you? There's no way I'd be satisfied with anything less than utopia, dammit-!" Our Rider protests.
"I admire your ability to dream big, Jason, but… you know what the result of that ambition would have been, right?" Alcides says, almost apologetically.
"...So in the end, it comes back to my failures again, huh?" The Rider mutters as tears begin to pool in his eyes. "But… this doesn't have to be the end! The grail… if we can just get the grail, then this time-! This time, for sure-! This ship, it's still here, so somehow, some way-!"
Alcides shakes his head. "Sorry, Jason. You know as well as I do that it's impossible now. Even with a Holy Grail, humanity cannot change. No matter what path we take, our doom was already written by the Fates. But… for what it's worth, even now I'm grateful to you, and to this ship. If every human was like those in your crew, then things might have been different."
Jason closes his eyes, his gritted teeth grinding with the ferocity of an earthquake. Finally, defiant eyes open upon his friend. "Then how about I show you some more like them!?"
"By all means, show me your new crew." The Archer replies, voice filled with cold amusement. "They have a high bar to reach, though. Not just in terms of the old crew; I'm fresh off of quite the fight, after all. Hauroy - no, Reid Astrea - was quite the foe."
The remaining copy of Benkei takes an iai stance as [Gae Bolg] materializes in Cu Chulainn's hands and Mash forces herself to her feet.
In that moment, as tension crackles through the air, and my eyes are peeled to see every instant of it for the next try-
{Master!} Georgios screams telepathically, and my command spell is already glowing.
"[EMM]!" Beatrice and my absolute defense magic will protect me from his arrow - is what I thought. But as spectral butterflies fill my sight, I realize that I made the wrong call.
"Senpai!" I hear Mash scream over the sound of blows being rapidly exchanged.
"Focus, Shielder! You wanna die!?" Cu Chulainn shouts, and she falls silent.
Just outside of the swarming butterflies, I hear Jason swearing repeatedly. "I'll get you out of there, so just-!"
"[Reincarnation-" The beginning of an unfamiliar Noble Phantasm uttered by Alcides is the last thing I hear before my already strained mana reserves give out, and everything goes dark.
I sputter salt water as I return to consciousness, a more-or-less literally faceless pirate grinning at me as he lowers a bucket. Frantically, my eyes seek information.
An unfamiliar purple-haired woman in the garb of a conquistador. A pleasantly smiling blue-haired girl with pointed ears. Dozens of similarly generic pirates. An unfamiliar island scene, but I can see the stars above. It's still nighttime.
No, there's no time to hesitate. I don't know why they took me captive, but I don't plan to find out. I reach for my head with [Invisible Providence]-
"I won't let you," an all-too-familiar voice rings out, and I feel a searing pain as a knife severs the unseen arm. My head whips towards the speaker, even as I desperately try to bite my tongue, only for him to thrust his hand into my mouth and stop me.
…I guess it makes sense that he could see it.
"You were too slow, dumbass." Says Alter Ego, face twisted in a cold sneer.