His intuition was bound to be wrong at some point.
A thought that occurred to him as he emerged into the broken and battered meeting room. He had no idea what it looked like prior but he knew it wasn't this . For starters, he assumed they had a ceiling once upon a time. He also assumed the floor wasn't littered with debris and 'dead' machinery. There'd be nowhere comfortable to sit otherwise.
Besides that, he felt a bit silly for doubting Chris. As inside of all that destruction, there was a Miranda in the middle, a restrained Miranda. A Miranda that was unable to break out even as Heisenberg used the sharp limb of some robot to poke and prod at her. Black blood coated it, some of it even looked congealed already. Ethan wasn't sure how he felt about such a sight after everything. Lacking the glee Heisenberg had.
Speaking of the man, he was the closest to reach. The rest were either resting further into the room, or they were Umber Eyes in his sniper position. A few pebbles or loose pieces fell as Ethan climbed over the rubble to reach him. One giant piece in particular blocked the view of the woman, leaving only Heisenberg able to see him.
"—ou think of that idea, hm?" Ethan began to make out his words. "Maybe then I'd actually stick around just to see you suffer."
"What are you doing?" he asked.
Heisenberg turned to him with his full set of semi-whites on display. "Ah! You're here! That's strange, but no matter. As you can see, we're all finished up here."
"So… what do we do now?"
"You'll have to ask boulder-puncher for that, I'm a little busy right now." He left Ethan's sight before hearing another, deeper, break of skin and everything underneath it. An exhausted screech followed. "Ah, it doesn't get old~"
Ethan grimaced at the sadism on display, but he couldn't help his curiosity as he moved out from behind the rock. It was quite the sight up close. Miranda panting heavily with such a distorted body, looking less human than he'd been imagining. No eyes besides the eyeball on her forehead, covered with something constructed from her mutation. He had no idea where she was looking or if she could see.
He had no idea that her sight landed on him .
All he knew was that she began to thrash against her bindings. A sudden renewal of strength and energy as she screamed. The woman went from exhausted to berserk, enough to break through and grab him. He heard Heisenberg and one of Chris's men (Canine?) yelling, shouting something as darkness expanded from her hold on him. Black quickly overtook his own sight and rendered all sounds null.
He hardly had any time to adjust in this void before feeling something molten hot landing nearby him. He realized a split-second after that there was a spray of white and sunset yellow that followed whatever it was, and that more was coming. Dodging was never his strong suit, but that didn't matter so much when he was running on instinct and adrenaline. Occasionally, he'd hiss and cry out when… whatever it was landed too close and splashed onto his skin or melted spots in his clothing.
"Fuck!" He looked at the new spot on his jacket that ate through it to his skin. The skin that was now scarred with third degree burns. A mixture of angry red and…black?
"You!" He heard a woman hiss before he could think too much about the strange colour on his skin. "I've spent a lifetime creating this moment! and all of you try to take it away from me? I will take what is due!"
It was a shame he had so many quips just waiting to be said, but it was hard to talk when one was so focused on staying alive. All of his breath saved for the running he was doing to avoid all of her swipes, claws, and molted whatever . It was a miracle that he spotted shapes inside of the darkness. Pillars of jagged black mold shooting up from the ground, in other words; cover.
"Hold still!" She shouted as he ran, another shot he avoided by ducking behind the pillar. His chest heaving as he rested his back against it. Miranda continued as he caught his breath, "The Megamycete saved me from the pits of despair! It granted me this splendid power!"
"It drove you crazy is what it did!"
"The villagers, those four new children…They could do nothing to assuage my years of loneliness!"
"Are you even listening to me?!"
Ethan scrunched up his face as she continued to rant and rave, his words falling on deaf ears. The splashes of her attacks continued to coat the ground outside of his spot. A soft hiss of the mold came with each of her relentless attempts to destroy it and him. Each one burned and worsened the putrid smell that suffocated the space like a humid day. It wouldn't be long before the entirety of it was eroded away.
"I've waited a century! A century! All for this day!"
He could feel it, the pillar about to break. One last deep breath and he pushed himself from the spot. The timing couldn't have been better as it melted away completely behind him. A positive until he felt her presence crawling up his back, getting rapidly closer.
"Die! Die, die, die, die!" With each word he first heard and then felt something cutting through the air. When it became anxiously close he attempted to dodge; the action resulting in his feet not quite finding the right footing, sending him tumbling down. His heartbeat quickening and ears ringing with panic. "Die, and be swallowed into the Megamycete for all time!"
Amidst Miranda's declarations came the sound of crying, Rose's crying. A sound that grew louder and louder, filling the space and seemingly only heard by him. A call from his daughter to live, to come back to her. He didn't know how he could hear her, but he knew it invigorated him. Spurring him on as he rolled over to push himself up.
Before he did so, he felt something through the pitch-black mold floor. The darkness giving way to a yellow glow that bordered on white. He wrapped his hand around it, pulling the sharpened tool from it's birthplace and standing. It's glow radiated off him. While it could very well be the same substance Miranda had been hurling at him this whole time; this one held the warmth of his love, of the weight that bundle of joy had whenever he carried her in his arms, the instinct to protect every strand of hair on her head was injected into his weapon as he turned towards her.
"I will take back my daughter!" Miranda yelled, not caring that he had gained a weapon. Blinded by rage and arrogance.
"She's not your daughter!" He returned with equal ferocity, rushing towards her with full intent to drive the spike deep into her heart like a steak to a vampire. The way she moved, he could see it and it didn't slow him one bit. The way her claws aimed towards him and with the way he was running, no doubt as he drove the final blow in, would she do the same to him. Mutual destruction and in that moment, it was worth it to end the threat to Rose.
Please, forgive me, Rose…
Dad's not making it home.
He felt his body tensing, face beginning to grimace as he anticipated the pain. Any moment, he'd feel it piece into him, and each of Rose's cries tore any hesitation he might have had out of his mind. So focused that he hadn't even registered what happened until after he stabbed her.
He stabbed her, and she had no hands to return the blow.
Where there had once been claws, were now bleeding stumps. Blood pooling from her chest and hands as he stabbed her over and over again. The number? He had no idea, he likely stabbed her about as many times as Chris and his men shot her and then some. Until she laid lifeless on the ground. Her body finally dissolving, eaten by the mold, leaving him standing there to pant.
"You'd be a horrible mother anyway."
The glow at his hand dulled, steadily returning to nothing. His adrenaline mimicked it and so to did the tension in his body. Various places ached, something that would likely multiple later. That didn't matter. She was finally dead. He could return to Rose safe and sound…but how did he?
He took in his environment properly for the first time. Not that there was much to take in. Everywhere he looked was black mold and darkness and the fuzzy areas where they intersected, as suffocating as that damn scent that still lingered in the air. If it weren't for the strange door standing out in the void, he'd be lost. He approached it, immediately recognizing it to be the same as his home. That safe sanctuary, one he had no idea had been infiltrated right under his nose.
And it seemed Miranda wasn't the only intruder as he entered. The house was deathly silent besides the soft noises from Rose, of which he followed into the living room. Only she wasn't alone. So often he'd come home to find Mia rocking Rose in her arms or on her shoulder in the very same place that he found another familiar face rocking Rose. A face he hadn't seen since Louisiana.
The long black hair that framed and spilled over the edge of a round, young face. Hair that Rose was playing with as the girl rocked her.
Eveline.
"Oh no, we are not doing this again!" Ethan stalked closer but paused in his steps as Evie turned her body—and Rose—away from him.
"Ethan—"
"Give me Rose!" He insisted, about to start again before she snapped.
"You have a nasty way of showing thanks!"
"What?"
"That old hag would've stabbed you if not for me! You should be thanking me." She huffed, turning back towards him again.
"That was you?" While his brows remained furrowed, his featured softened in confusion.
"What? Think I'm just going to turn little Rose into a parent-less child like me? You know, I really should have…" She looked down at the bundle and what Ethan saw in her eyes made him nearly lunge. "Then I wouldn't be alone~!"
"Evie—!"
She snapped her head back towards him, "But I didn't! So don't scold me!"
"I have a hard time believing you'd help me."
" Weeell… " The smirk that spread across her features made him sigh.
"You want something out of this, don't you?"
The corners of her lips spread even further along her cheeks into the worst shit-eating grin he'd seen. "Maybe you're not totally stupid."
If he tried to look more disappointed and finished with her antics then his face would concave. Instead he moved to try and take Rose from her arms. "Whatever it is, give me Rose back first—"
As he moved to take Rose, Evie moved to keep her from him. It was a special kind of anger coursing through his veins as Evie kept her ever out of reach. His fists twitched and itching to put an end to this immediately before he lost himself, but he was ever aware that one wrong move and he might hurt Rose instead (or Evie might before he had a chance for anything).
"Rose, Rose, that's all anyone ever talks about! Why not me?!" Her volume raised the longer she spoke.
In contrast, Ethan's went dangerously low. "Eveline…she has nothing to do with this."
"Uh, yeah, she does. Didn't you hear me?"
Ethan's jaw started to hurt with how he was grinding his teeth. "Look, just because you've had a hard time—"
"No one wanted me and everyone wants her, maybe I should just take her over."
"Don't you dare!"
The girl's cruel laughter had him seeing red, frankly it was a miracle he hadn't shot her yet. Rose and a lack of gun were the only things stopping him. "You get worked up so easily! Relax, I'm not gonna do it."
Deep breaths, deep breaths… "Why are you like this?"
"Nevermind, you are still an idiot if you can't put it all together." The deep breaths were hardly working to keep him calm with every instance that Evie opened her mouth or he looked at that clear as day disappointment coating her face. "Everyone always gets what they want, no matter how messed up they are! Just look at those creepy ' children ' you and that Chris guy made friends with. They threatened to string you up and chop Rose into pieces and now you're all buddy buddy with them! Why not me?! Huh? I just wanted a family too!"
"You wanna know the big difference between them and you? I got two examples for you; Miranda and Dimitrescu. Miranda hurt others and only thought about herself, just like you. Dimitrescu is looking out for her daughters first and foremost." He didn't care how hurt Eveline seemed by his tone and words, it needed to be said. "Practice some empathy, damn it, and then maybe you can have what you want."
"That's not what your wife taught me." Evie's smile was strained. "No matter how good I was, she just lied to me."
Right, the girl had some…less than stellar role models. The thought bringing a heavier sigh from his lips than he expected. "Yeah, well, she does that a lot. She did that to me too."
"And how can I know you won't? Ugh, nevermind. You're too straight forward to lie. The entire time I've watched you, it's boring…"
"Uh…thanks?" That…wait, how long had she been watching? The question and it's subsequent thoughts and implications made his face scrunch up. All of which he wanted to ignore and promptly shook them from his head. "Anyways, are you going to keep being a brat or will you try and change?"
"I can't trust you"
"You just said—"
"Not until you prove you won't let me down."
"How the hell—" His question was interrupted by Evie suddenly shoving Rose into his arms. An interruption that he welcomed for once in his life, staring down at his bundle with relief and cradling her close in his arms. He steadily rocked Rose before the faint sound of someone speaking reminded him of where he was. He looked up, expecting to be scolded by Eveline for not listening, only to find himself surrounded by that empty void once more.
The faint conversation grew louder, and while he couldn't pinpoint who it was, he knew it wasn't Evie's voice. It was that of a man. A familiar man, multiple familiar men.
Ethan closed his eyes, focusing on them.