[Third-Person POV Back on Earth]
0 seconds since John's Death.
The slowly weakening tether between John's familiar finally snapped.
The armored gauntlets melted away, the nanites completely losing their structural integrity as Ship dissolved back into a tiny, tattered puddle of green sludge. The little Mechamorph dragged its exhausted form across the shattered concrete, leaving a thick trail of leaking, sparking fluid. It crawled right up to John's face, nudging his cold, blood-spattered cheek.
"Ship... ship..." it whined, its digital voice distorting into broken static.
It was trying desperately to wake him up. But John was missing half his waist. His internal organs were spilling from the gaping wound onto the ruined streets of Chicago.
There was nothing left to wake up.
TWANG
A few yards away, the air violently warped. A wooden Tatami gate slammed open with a harsh screech, and Nakime stumbled out.
Now back in her normal Cyclops form, her single large eye blown wide in absolute terror.
The sun was just breaking over the horizon. The first rays of dawn struck her demonic skin, immediately searing the pale flesh and raising deep blisters.
She didn't even flinch in the sun. All she could see was her Master lying in a pool of his own blood.
"Mas... master... MASTER!!"
Her scream tore her throat till raw and more. She collapsed onto her knees beside him, her hands hovering over his ruined chest, shaking violently.
KRA-THOOM
Suddenly, a massive gust of wind ripped through the crater, followed by the deafening boom of a sonic barrier being shattered.
Pepsi-Man crashed into the asphalt, except he too was a wreck. His sleek, metallic skin was covered in deep tears and dents, and his left leg was bent at a grotesque angle. Thick, black fizzy liquid leaked continuously from his gashes, hissing as it hit the hot pavement. He too had felt the tether snap, pushing his broken body past its physical limits to cross the country in a single bound.
"Pep... si?" his voice box glitched, emitting a hollow sound devoid of any corporate cheer.
"Ahh!! Wake up, John!" Nakime wailed.
Her skin was actively turning to char, smoking in the morning light, but she ignored it, slamming her fists against John's chest. She desperately tried to channel the pure Reverse Cursed Energy, begging her biology to output the healing light.
Yet nothing happened. The Polymerization had broken the exact moment John's heart stopped, since the energy supply itself was dead.
Ship tried to help, its nanites stretching into a thin membrane to cover John's severed waist, trying to hold him together.
Nakime was roaring, cursing, pleading. "You promised me… you promised me you wouldn't leave me, you bastard!!!"
"Ship? Shiip!!"
The brave little alien forced its remaining mass to shift, morphing into a crude replica of the defibrillator it had once seen in the Mauler Twins' lab. It pressed two metallic pads against John's chest.
Vweeeee... CRACK!
A surge of electricity arced through the boy's corpse. John's body convulsed, flopping sickeningly against the concrete.
Nothing changed as Zero pulse remained unbudged.
"Please wake up," Nakime sobbed, burying her charred face into his blood-soaked chest. "What would Sir Sebas say when he sees you like this? He asked me to take care of you. He… he…"
Pepsi-Man dragged his mangled body forward, physically standing over Nakime to cast his large shadow over her, shielding her burning skin from the sun.
"Pepsi…" he rumbled softly.
But Nakime violently shoved the heavy mascot aside. "No! Let me die! I'm cursed!" she screamed, tears evaporating off her sizzling cheeks. "First my husband… and now… now it's John. Whoever I love... whoever I get close to, they die! So let me die too!"
Just as her wails echoed through the silent ruins, another sonic boom shattered the sky.
A shadow fell over the crater. When the dust from the impact cleared, they saw him.
Omni-Man.
The heavy, uneven thud of his boots hit the pavement. Nolan limped forward step by agonizing step, his left arm wrapped tightly around his own stomach just to keep his intestines from spilling out of the massive gash Guardians had left him.
"Monster?" Nakime muttered, freezing in recognition.
Nolan didn't even look at her. His eyes were locked entirely on John's corpse.
"So it is true?" Nolan muttered.
He paused. His hearing filtered out the crumbling buildings, the howling wind, and the crying demon, searching for the rhythmic thud in the boy's chest, only to find nothing but absolute silence.
"He… he's really dead."
He limped closer, but Pepsi-Man immediately stepped forward, raising his dented arms to block the Viltrumite's path.
Nolan didn't even break his stride. With a casual flick of the back of his hand, he swatted the metallic hero.
SKRRSSSH.
The ungodly kinetic force launched Pepsi-Man miles away, sending him tearing through three already-ruined skyscrapers with a deafening
Nolan dropped to his knees just inches from John's body. Nakime crouched over her Master defensively, her flesh burning crimson at the edges from the sun, while Ship sparked and whirred, desperately trying to charge another shock.
"That's why… that buzz was gone… that blind crimson that took over my mind whenever I heard his name is gone." Nolan whispered.
His chest heaved. The suffocating guilt he felt about his family had vanished. His lips peeled back over his bloodstained teeth in a ugly grin of pure relief.
He dropped to his knees just feet away from the body. Nakime hovered over John, her body burning crimson at the edges from the sun, while poor Ship was busy shocking John, trying to get his heart to beat again.
"Hahahah!! It really was a curse!" Nolan babbled, tears of hysterical joy welling in his eyes. "I… I wasn't going mad!! I… I wasn't the one who hurt my Debbie… I wasn't the one who hurt… Mark! It was a spell! A psychic trick!" Nolan said, crawling right on top of Nakime and John, craning his neck to finally see his face.
He reached out, his bloody fingers caressing John's cheek.
"It was you… your fault…. your curse…. And I'm finally free," Nolan exhaled, his posture slumping as a profound weight lifted from his shoulders. "Hahah! I'm finally free from you, Worm!"
He casually swatted Nakime aside, sending the demon flying into the rubble in a half-daze, her burnt body half-burnt, smoking from just eight seconds of direct sunlight.
"John Kaisen. What a ridiculous name. I'm almost sorry I wasn't the one to put you in the dirt," Nolan sneered, the Viltrumite superiority flooding back into his veins.
He pointed a finger at Nakime's twitching body. "But no worries. I'll kill that one-eyed witch. And then this puddly goo too."
Still on his knees, Nolan grabbed John by his dirt-matted hair, hoisting the boy's head up to look him dead in his lifeless eyes.
"You hear me, Sorcerer?" Nolan raised his voice, as if justifying to himself that the nightmare was finally over. "I will kill each and every one of your loved ones. I will crush their skulls out and drag their spines out of their bodies. I will make sure they know you failed them, you hear me? I WILL–"
KRA-KKOOM.
He was stopped mid-rant as a fist backed in raw kinetic energy slammed directly into Nolan's cheekbone.
The impact sounded like a cannon firing, snapping the Viltrumite's neck back and launching Omni-Man tumbling backward into the air.
"I'm waking up. No need to yell, fucker!"
An impossibly tired voice came from John's half-risen body, surprising everyone.
Ten seconds had finally passed and the dead had finally risen.
Before anyone could process what they were seeing, John sat up.
His muscles and bones violently slammed together, knitting the gaping hole in his waist shut, but the healing abruptly stopped halfway. A jagged ring of thick, raw red scar tissue sealed him together, leaving him breathing but clearly running on half a tank.
"Mas..ter!" "Ship!!" "Pespi!!" "Chairman!"
Every one of John's familiars perked up.
Deep within their souls, the dead connection snapped back into place like a whip. It was weak, but undeniably there.
"Master… you.. you're back?" Nakime cried, staring at him like a ghost.
John turned to console her.
But the moment he saw her body now half-burnt in black soot and the other half blistering red-hot from the morning sun, his eyes widened in sheer panic.
"Nakime!" John scrambled forward, completely ignoring his own exhaustion and raw scars. "Nakime, quick, get back in the castle!"
He threw himself over her, using his newly healed back to completely block the sun from her body.
"Ship! Quick, cover her!" John called out for his best boy.
"No, Master, I.. I'm cursed! LET ME DIE!" she wailed, wrapping her arms around his neck, burying her face into his chest, feeling the steady, rhythmic thud of his living heartbeat.
The warmth was proof he was alive again.
"Shut your mouth, woman! You're not dying today. Go!" John ordered, his voice firm and protective.
Ship, even though practically falling apart, stretched its nanites wide, forming a solid, dark canopy over what remained of her body.
"No, Master, I'm not leaving without…."
Nakime was interrupted by a blur of red and white crashing violently into the asphalt, ripping John right out of her arms.
"MASTER!!!"
The world blurred into a slipstream.
Nolan rocketed straight up into the sky at Mach speeds, dragging John through the atmosphere with his hands clamped like steel vices around John's throat.
"YOU!" Nolan roared, spitting blood into the freezing upper atmosphere as they broke through the cloud layer. The manic relief in his eyes had been replaced by psychotic rage, once again. "It was gone! The buzz… the red, it was all finally gone! YOU WERE DEAD!"
The pressure on John's windpipe was enough to crush a steel beam.
The thinning air wasn't helping with the breathlessness.
But John didn't panic. He didn't try to summon a familiar as a distraction or run away like he used to when facing Nolan.
He just looked Nolan dead in the eye.
John brought both of his hands up, grabbed Nolan's wrists, and with a sudden burst of raw strength, pried the Viltrumite's fingers open just enough to draw a breath.
Then, John reared his head as far back as he could.
CRACK.
And brutally headbutted Nolan, catching the man directly on his already-fractured skull, splitting the skin and letting thick Viltrumite blood mat over the top half of his face, eyes and matted hair.
Looking like a Tribal warrior on his last stand
"Rumours of my death were greatly exaggerated, fucker!" John roared through the rushing wind, flashing a manic grin.
[A/N]:To celebrate finishing ARC-1, I'm also putting a 50% DISCOUNT ACROSS ALL TIERS until June 1st.
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