Kiroto held one of the thirteen Roman soldiers in her grip.
Her hand was wrapped tightly around his throat fingers digging into flesh, crushing windpipe, blocking the air that his lungs desperately sought. The soldier struggled, his body convulsing, his legs kicking, his free hand reaching for his weapon.
A broken blade.
He tried to stab her hand to weaken her grip, to force her to release him, to escape the death that was closing around his throat.
She slapped the blade right out of his hand.
The metal spun through the air, clattering against the ground, useless.
Then she began to shed tears.
It was a strange sight this woman, whose face was more manly than most, whose structure was like that of a veteran warrior, well-built and powerful, weeping as she killed. Her body was a weapon. Her hands were instruments of death. But her eyes her eyes were overflowing with grief.
She strangled the man completely.
His struggles ceased. His body went limp. His heart stopped.
But even in his death, his corpse did not have the liberty of peace.
She continued to strangle.
Her hands tightened, squeezed, crushed. The pressure of blood continued to build in his head pushing against his skull, his eyes, his ears. The veins in his face bulged. His skin turned purple, then black, then
POP.
His head exploded.
Bone and brain and blood sprayed across her face, her armor, her hands. She did not flinch. Did not stop. She held the headless corpse for a moment longer, then threw it away.
It tumbled across the sand, limbs flailing, blood trailing.
She cried.
Tears rushed endlessly down from her eyes cutting tracks through the gore on her cheeks, washing away the blood in thin, pink streams.
"My lord Mordred." Her voice was thick, choked, broken. "You have found yourself in trouble."
She wiped her face with the back of her hand smearing, not cleaning.
"I told you." Her voice cracked. "Let's not get ourselves into this. But you still want to chase it."
She looked at the distant figure Mordred, still frozen in the zone, still reaching for something beyond.
"Why do you want to battle against your father?" Her tears fell faster. "Why must you insist on this goal of yours?"
She clutched her chest.
"Why can't you just give up?"
She took a shuddering breath.
"If you give up..." Her voice softened. "...there will be life."
She looked at the battlefield at the bodies, at the blood, at the grey sky.
"This world... it's hell." She shook her head. "But still... I don't see it as hell. I see it as a second chance. Given to men who had incomplete lives."
She paused.
"That is what hell is." A small smile crossed her face sad, tender, hopeless. "But we can make it beautiful."
Her smile faded.
"And then, at the end..." She touched her chest over her heart. "...I'll kill myself for you."
Her face turned red.
Not from embarrassment from resolve. From the heat of a decision that had been building in her heart for hours, for days, for as long as she had served the son of Arthur.
She looked forward.
At Sir Gareth and Sir Lamorak rushing toward Sir Galahad and the others, their bodies cloaked in wind, their path clear.
She cleaned the tears from her face.
Smearing blood across her cheeks, her forehead, her lips. The red mixed with the red tears and gore becoming one.
"I will betray you, Mordred." Her voice was steady now. "My lord."
She smiled.
"But my betrayal is not evil."
She took a step forward.
"I'm doing it to save you." Her voice hardened. "So that you may live longer. And then... truly find yourself."
She smiled after saying that.
Then she jumped.
Her body launched from where she stood soaring across the battlefield, cutting through the air, rushing toward the meeting point.
Where Sir Galahad and the rest would meet with Sir Gareth and Sir Lamorak.
Where the survivors would gather.
Where the future of Camelot would be decided.
Darlington's face was filled with so much dread and anger.
Hate was burning within his heart.
To him, it was as if he could eat his own flesh. The rage that consumed him was so great, so absolute, so terrible that it threatened to tear him apart from the inside. His mind and body actively fought against it trying to contain it, to control it, to survive it.
But at the end
Hate overcame him entirely.
The only thing in his mind he could fathom was hate.
So much that the words kept repeating themselves.
Hate. Hate. HATE.
I hate them. I hate them.
You all the Courts of Heaven and the gods
I'll kill all of you.
With my own hands.
If there was a way to measure his hate, it would be pointless. His hate could kill himself. It was a fire that burned without fuel, a hunger that could never be satisfied.
And yet it defied all logic.
What could make a person hate this much?
What could make a child bring out this much pain from his heart?
In Darlington's head, the memory began to play.
The park.
The frozen people.
The pops.
Hyacinth's headless body. Kito's last, almost-smile.
He played it once.
No twice.
No thrice.
No he continued to play it multiple times. Continued to simulate the fateful event in his mind, over and over and over, forcing himself to relive the moment that had destroyed him.
It was sticking.
Engraving itself deeper into his soul with each repetition.
What Darlington saw was a familiar sight.
The same thing he had seen right after that event.
It was already engraved into his soul. There was no escape.
A woman.
Dressed in a simple white robe, impossibly tall. Her face was hidden behind a smooth golden mask. Her long, dark hair floated around her as if she were underwater weightless, ethereal, wrong.
The same woman he had met in the beginning.
The one who had summoned him.
The one who had taken everything.
The one who had called it an equivalent exchange.
He shouted at her.
"YOU BASTARD!"
Tears came out of his eyes hot, uncontrollable, shameful. He got up, his body lurching, his hands reaching, his entire being focused on a single, impossible goal.
To attack her.
To hurt her.
To make her pay.
He got close to her
And he fell.
His face was pressed down along with his body slammed against the invisible floor, pinned by a force he could not see, could not fight, could not understand.
Appearing from the woman's back was another woman.
Similar.
But different.
She wore a long black gown flowing, shadowy, absolute. Her hair was pure white like snow short, cropped, severe. A silver mask covered her face, gleaming with a light that was not light.
The one with the golden mask spoke.
"Is it familiarity that made you approach me?" Her voice was calm, measured, indifferent. "Or is it hate?"
She tilted her head.
"Tell me, observer. Named Darlington." A pause. "Do you hate me?"
She stepped closer.
"How much hate is in your heart?" Her voice was almost curious. "Honestly... I would love to kill you. Your existence is disgusting. Even the concept of it is trash."
She stopped.
"But I can't kill an observer, can I?" She shook her head. "No. I can't."
She spread her arms.
"That's why I'm here."
She and the other woman both laughed.
The sound was horrible echoing, overlapping, wrong. It filled the void around them, bouncing off nothing, pressing against Darlington's ears like needles.
He found himself there.
Powerless.
Unable to move. Unable to speak. Unable to do anything except feel the weight of their presence pressing down on him, crushing him, destroying him.
He fell into his own despair.
This was the greatest despair that Darlington had ever felt.
He was utterly worthless.
And powerless.
Darlington lay on the invisible floor.
The women stood over him.
And the grey void watched.