Something Stupid

[Dead Beyond]

A/N: This is a small writing challenge for myself. I should be treating writing like a muscle -- one that I have been neglecting of late. So, there are only two parameters. One, I have to post every 2-7 days. (Lost track of days because of IRL BS. I will now update on Thursdays.) And two: it has to be at least 1.5k words long. If I fail in keeping to this schedule, I'm just gonna shift gears and write a BAD END to tie everything off.

The first chapter is the only one that's gonna be looked over by the lovely @Ziel, given the aforementioned schedule.

Spoiler: The Cast for this Chapter

The Trailblazer from Honkai: Star Rail

March 7th from Honkai: Star Rail

Dan Heng from Honkai: Star Rail

Victoria Dallon from Parahumans

"Deadpool" from Deadpool Kills the Marvel Universe

The Nameless of the Astral Express crew didn't know it yet, but they were about to face off their most dangerous foe yet. One that wanted to tear everything that they represented into pieces, despoiling it with all the glee of a hellbound marauder. In short, they wanted to fuck up people like the Trailblazers beyond recognition. It was the malice of a kid burning ants with a magnifying glass writ large. The cathartic nature of destroying something grand demanded commitment. So long as it never stopped, there would never be a comedown of clarity, of regret until it reached the apex of no return.

It all started with these three poor Nameless, who didn't suspect a thing. And why would they? Their latest adventure had come to its end.

At Penacony, in reality, the two senior members were at the front desk, wrapping up the last bits of necessity with the Family and the IPC. That had been a particularly turbulent matter, even after they had all dealt with Sunday channeling the power of Order. The nature of this conclusion kept them busy to ensure that everything came to a reasonably amicable conclusion. Himeko, navigator of the Astral Express, waited at the counter and patiently tapped a single red-painted nail against it. Her other hand held her large case behind her back, which held all manner of cutting-edge technology. Welt Yang leaned on his cane, which held the power of Star of Eden within.

Such characters and their abilities could have prevented the rolling avalanche of despair and death at the root.

But they were too far away from the real targets. Dan Heng hung back, resting against a railing. March 7th was by his side, both sorting through her photos and showing them to her friend. He watched with heavy-lidded eyes, appearing aloof even though he paid keen attention to the photography on display.

In Stelle's hands was Mikhal's hat, which had been handed from one generation of Trailblazers to the next. And she was doing hat tricks with it. The power of Harmony was invested into it, tied off by Xipe's glance like a fancy bow. The power of this Path expressed itself through an overflow of the Imaginary that sparkled and crackled with each trick like stage lights. She twirled it around her finger before letting it fly up in the air. Stelle stumbled trying to catch and it crashed into the ground. Luckily it disappeared in a flash and it reappeared in her hand. She started twirling it around her finger again.

"Yo! You the Galactic Baseballer?" a voice called out from behind her.

Stelle turned around, happy that her self-given moniker was finally catching on. The first thing she saw was a barrel of a gun. Instinct saw her flip the hat around and shove it forward, the barrel being enveloped into the hat. The resulting BANG! exploded inside it, sparks of Imaginary energy bursting past the rim. Something splashed onto Stelle from the resulting blast, but she couldn't focus on that. Instead she forced the hat to explode, throwing her attacker back several feet.

He skidded across the floor, past March 7th and Dan Heng. He was dressed like a weird harlequin with a red and black scheme, albeit a heavily armored one. Two swords were holstered behind his back, with a pair of holsters at his hips. The mask was marked by two large black circles with two white lenses, giving it a somewhat wide expression. But it stood in stark contrast to the malice in the man's actions. Already the gunshot had drawn everyone's attention: the hotel-goers scattering, the other two Nameless turning around in surprise, and the loitering IPC marshaling to finally do "Something Good" for some easy PR. An unambiguous bad guy brokered no argument. Himeko was throwing out her case, which was already transforming into something more suited for combat. Welt Yang's cane slid down his grip, wielded more like a sword than a walking stick. A black hole was already forming at the tip of the cane.

Yet none of that mattered. The gun was already pointed at March and Dan Heng, firing in quick succession. March threw out her hands, conjuring a veil of Six-Phased Ice that slowed down the bullets considerably. They were thrown pebbles more offending than what touched her. Dan Heng, however, manifested his spear, Cloud-Piercer, and deftly deflected the bullets. None of the bullets struck true, but that didn't matter. It made contact.

The attacker laughed, letting himself fall backwards. His hand fell to the button on his belt, which resembled the man's mask. As gravity took a hold of him, Stelle, March 7th, and Dan Heng were dragged with him. Their feet dragged them across the floor as though they were tied to a huge boulder that was just pushed off a cliff. A hole in reality formed behind the man and when he disappeared, the three Nameless disappeared too.

They fell from here —









—to there. They landed in the middle of a crowded school cafeteria. Already there was a cacophony of screams and shouts as the crowd churned away from the new arrivals. They were inconsequential, but had already been touched by these events. March and Dan Heng were in a mess of limbs, groaning as they tried untangling themselves. They ended rolling off the table and smashing into the ground, but their pained groans were smothered by the larger volume of cries around them.

"Fucking Jesus!"

"Someone call the Protectorate!"

"Aren't the Wards supposed to be at Arcadia?!"

"Psst!"

Stelle rolled across the lunch table to the source of the whisper and found that same man crouched three feet away from her.

"You're a hero, right?" he faux-whispered. In his hand was a large grenade, the other hand holding the pin. "Then be a hero."

He pulled it and tossed it carelessly in the direction of a group of high-schoolers that were caught in the press of bodies. A freckle-faced girl was shouting particularly viciously as she tried to do do something with her phone.

She scrambled up, summoning Rand's Lance and pulling power from the Path of Preservation. She shot up into the air on a streak of fire before shooting toward the front of the crowd. Stelle landed lance-first, slamming it down in front of the civilians.

"Will of Preservation!"

The Path formed a barrier over the crowd, the resulting blast of shrapnel pelting them relatively harmlessly. And then it was gone. She would need to reapply it again for the effect to take a hold again, but most of the crowd had already scattered at that point.

"Schwing!"

The man appeared in a burst of energy, swinging two swords toward her face. Too late to pull the weapon from the ground, she let the lance disappear from her grasp and summoned her bat. Stelle and the attacker exchanged a flurry of blows, with the Trailblazer put on the backfoot. He wielded those two swords efficiently, and as fast as she was, it was one bat against two swords. Any opening that appeared was mitigated by the fact that she had to quickly block a different strike.

But she didn't fight alone.

Dan Heng and March had recovered, immediately coming to her aid.

His spear pierced the man's shoulder, allowing Stelle to whack him in the face. He sputtered to the right before being assaulted by an avalanche of ice arrows that threw him to the wall. It didn't stop him for long as he marched forward, tearing out the weapons piercing his body, even as his wounds closed behind them.

"Dan Heng!" Stelle shouted, leaping forward.

He got the message, gesturing with two fingers and causing a geyser to erupt in front of the Trailblazer. Her feet landed on it and it pushed her back up into the air. The pattern repeated twice, as Stelle gained more and more air. Her baseball bat crackled with blue energy as she reached the apex of her jump.

"Batter up!"

Bat in hand, she struck with all she had with a downward smash. It forced the man to his knees, but Stelle didn't stop there. Swinging the bat as though it were a golf club, she launched the man into another wall that was sixteen feet away. The wall cracked from the force and all that was visible of the man was his back half, legs dangling and poking out from the resulting dust.

March and Dan Heng, both armed, stood next to the Trailblazer.

"Is it over?" March asked.

"Nope!" A voice replied directly into her ear.

March screeched and ducked as Stelle and Dan Heng whirled out their retaliation. Dan Heng set the tempo with his longer reach, as Stelle wove in and out of range, trying to piggy-back off the spear's opening. To little effect. At a certain point, the man stopped caring about blocking every blow and just started tanking them. The damage done was already being healed before it could have any noticeable effect.

"Abundance?" Dan Heng muttered under his breath.

This wasn't working.

The Trailblazer willed her hat into her existence before throwing her bat at him. The tip of it donked the man in the head. He stumbled back as Stelle then threw her hat at him. A burst of Imaginary energy furthered that stumble, as she caught the bat and struck once more. Her hat landed back on her head, but she twirled around in a stylish motion and released it back into the air.

"What's with you and that fucking hat?!" the man shouted.

It was answered with the hat exploding out into a giant clock mascot's face The beaming clock face rained down mirror images of beaming smiles and bright effects. Stelle danced among the falling Clockie faces as though it were a waltz. She spun around the man, back to back, and allowed him to get turned around by the stylish moves.

He stumbled into the rain and was forced down to a knee. Stelle ducked down too, as though to mock him but it was really to do this.

"Break!"

Dan Heng rolled himself over Stelle's back and thrusted his spear. The impact was enough to sweep the man off his feet. He was flung through the air like a ragdoll before landing roughly on one foot, comically trying to keep balance. He then planted the other foot down and made a show of dusting himself off.

"You're fucked now!" that freckle-faced girl called out, holding out her phone.

"You think anything you've thrown at me is gonna work?"

Just over her shoulder, something shot forward.

"Then how about this?" a new voice shouted.

Upon that declaration, a blur slammed into him at mach speed. Once more he was slammed into a wall, but it didn't stop there.

"And how about this, too?!" March shouted.

She sprinted forward, jumping up at Dan Heng and Stelle. They locked hands together and gave March a boost. She had drawn an arrow back, it shaking with too much energy packed into something far too small. When it was let loose, it broke apart into a hailstorm of frozen Pom-Poms that absolutely coated the man in ice, trapping him against the wall. March's landing was less graceful as she stumbled to a stop, but she didn't collapse so she took that as a win.

"We should keep our eyes on him. Given how he seemed to teleport the first time he was stuck."

The newcomer floated down, revealing herself to a pretty blonde girl dressed rather fashionably.

"Well, thanks for the assist," March said.

"I don't know exactly what caused a cape fight to happen here, but I know that if one of them throws a grenade at a crowd of kids and another moves to protect them, then it's fairly obvious who's the good guy and who's the bad guy."

"It's just another day in the life of the Galactic Baseballer." Stelle preened, putting her hands on her hips.

March sighed.

"That's certainly a cape name," the floating girl said, "But Galactic Batter rolls off the tongue better."

Dan Heng, ignoring this play-by-play, said, "It's clear that we're no longer on Penacony. Perhaps we ended up on a different world because of this man."

"Another world? Well, welcome to Earth Bet in that case." The girl looked troubled at the implication, but she was interrupted as she was saying, "This is something that the PRT and Protectorate—"

"Earth? The world Mister Yang said he's from?" Stelle asked, tapping a finger on her chin.

"Yeah, that's not the turn I want this to take." The man coughed loudly to get their attention. "And I was sorta expecting the other one, but I'll settle for you, Antares."

"You talking to me?" The girl floated closer. "The name's Glory Girl. It'll do you good to remember it when you rot in jail."

The man looked entirely unperturbed and continued his own line of thought. "Oh that's right! This is before you got raped by your sister and went all warrior-monk."

A curled look of disgust and a scoff met that declaration. "What the fuck?" She turned to look at the freckled faced girl. "Can you get a load of this guy, Ames?"

"Ames" looked like a deer caught in the headlights, like her world was crumbling to nothing. It was a terminal diagnosis that signaled that nothing would ever be the same again. Maybe if it was phrased more like a mean-spirited joke, it could have been brushed off, but it spoken so off-handedly, so matter of fact… it could only be reacted to in one way. No matter how much she wanted or wished, things could not go back to the way things were again. It demanded a response, immediate and absolute.

And she fled.

Her body moved entirely on autopilot. That was, perhaps, the truest expression of an answer. When conscious thought was gone, all that was left was everything else engraved into a person's being.

"Amy?" Victoria whispered, hurt and confused and betrayed. So much emotion packed into two syllables. All the words in the world could not measure to the sound of heartache.

"Surprise distraction!"

A grenade was lobbed in her face. Her forcefield weathered the blow, but it couldn't stop the next attack that happened. He had teleported behind her, stabbing his blade through her shoulder. The Nameless tried to intercept, as he cackled again, dragging one Victoria Dallon into this mess. He kicked off her, soaring through the air and plummeting just as quick, back into that portal.

Same as before, that tugging sensation now enveloped the four of them.

And they all fell.

 

[Dead Beyond]

A/N: Man, I just love getting sick for a week. Almost missed my self-imposed deadline because of it. I also totally "love" my decision to use colored text, because since I cross-post to AO3, I have to finangle with HTML to get it to work. Might have to rectify that next chapter along with the character bloat, which was part of the plan. Originally the chapter was supposed to go on longer to deal with it, but I decided to try something else with the next chapter. Anyway, I like Wuthering Waves despite the rough start it has. I'm rooting for it to carve its own niche out. In any case, that sorta informs on how I want things to unfold. I think it's interesting for one character to engage with the elements of a story in a Watsonion sense, and another character in more meta Doylist sense. Which just means that "Deadpool" comes across as a complete asshole, you know? Like I like Wuthering Waves just fine, but "Deadpool" will be using the fandom complaints as insults. And because these characters have to engage with everything "earnestly", it's almost a form of dehumanization. I ramble. You'll see what I mean when I get around to the next one.

Spoiler: Newcomers to the Cast

Rover from Wuthering Waves
Lingyang from Wuthering Waves
Sanhua from Wuthering Waves
Yangyang from Wuthering Waves
Chixia from Wuthering Waves.

The Rover was the first one to make landfall on Solaris-3 in recent memory, but she would not be the last. Her own circumstances involved something that could only be recalled as a strange and etheric dream involving a mysterious woman and upside-down seas. Yet, when she got here, it seemed like everyone else knew more than she did. She was already invited by Jinshi, the Magistrate of Jinzhou, to be a guest of honor. Despite this, when she got there, she was given tokens and a mystery to unravel.

Answers were eluding her, and it seemed like everyone else knew more about her than she did. There was a clear problem with the Tacet Discords that emerged from the Lament. She really needed to brush up more on her history, but she was a Rover, not a "stay-in-one-place"-er. She would learn things as they came on her journey.

But sometimes they came to her. Scar's words about everyone wanting to use her, and his whole convoluted parable with the black sheep echoed in her head. He was an Overseer of the Fractsidus, and was probably the reason why she was given the whole run around with the tokens.

Yet he found her anyways, and her perception was rattled ever-so slightly.

Could she trust anyone?

She shook away that thought.

Maybe it wasn't that deep.

Rover decided to keep her trust in the first people she saw on Solaris-3. Soft-spoken Yangyang hadn't steered her wrong, and boisterous Chixia who showed her around on a quest to make a special type of soup. And they were both foodies. She couldn't imagine the first two people she met stirring her wholly wrong. Could they be lifelong companions that would see her through the entirety of her journey? Or were they transitory, just one set of friends to meet on this journey?

These were the thoughts that occupied her in the abundance of free time she just got. After that encounter with Scar, Yangyang left to make her report as a Midnight Ranger. Scar was that notorious, after all. The side-effect of that was that Rover had so much free time. Rover, well, roved for the lack of a better word. She was restless, yet eager. There was so much to do, and so much to explore. She wouldn't wander too far from Jinzhou, but she gave a helping hand to whoever needed it.

That attitude led her to helping out Lingyang of the Liondance Troupe. At first, it was a simple errand of incorporating prior requests into the main liondance before it snowballed into rescuing a missing brother for his sister. And now, she was going to see the dance before meeting back up with Chixia and Yangyang.

She stood among the crowd, watching Lingyang hoist up the nian over his head. The lion's head swayed and streamed with impressive vividness as Lingyang hopped up the ascending poles, engaging with impressive and flourishing footwork. Rover, who was no stranger to acrobatics, had to admire on how Lingyang made it entertaining. It was wasteful and extravagant, and just want the crowd wanted. It was the cultural swelling all around her that made Rover appreciate the event. The belief and hope that imbued this liondance to make it much more than it was. In a world ruined by the Lament, it was these smaller moments of perseverance that gave her hope.

And, of course, it was all disrupted.

Lingyang stopped on a pole, looking up at the strange crackle of power.

"Is a Tacet Field forming?" she muttered to herself.

She kept an eye on the sky, trying to see if an inverted sea was forming. Her senses couldn't really feel out the shape of the disruption of frequencies, but that was more of Yangyang's specialty with her Forte. Her Resonance Ability was based in Aero, allowing her to read information from the streams of air. Rover, however, was attuned to something else. She didn't know quite what it was yet, but it was alien.

The world was made up of sound, of frequencies, and yet this disruprtion was one of loud silence. The contradiction was grating to the sense, exuding wrongness. She could only feel the shape of it as it burst into this world, depositing strange individuals onto the stage.

"Everyone get back!" A squad of Patrollers surged from the crowd, aiming their rifles at the newcomers.

Rover manifested her sword and stood among their number, ready to help. Most of the Jinzhou forces were on the frontlines, desperately trying to contain TD Outbreaks, leaving only those in reserve to police the city itself.

"Are they TDs or not?"

"Overclocked Resonators?"

The murmuring of the Patrollers was distracting, so Rover focused on the newcomers. On one side, there was four. On the other, one. The four were defensive. The pink-haired girl with the bow was being helped up by a young man with a spear and a gray-haired girl with piercing yellow eyes, like hers. Rover didn't feel like it meant anything deeper, but she felt a certain kinship. On contrast, the blonde girl was dressed differently from the three. More modest? Less unique? As disparate as the first three, they all just… clicked together. She was angry, gritting her teeth as she tore a piece of clothing off and started to use it as a makeshift bandage around her bleeding shoulder.

Then she floated upwards in the air, fury and angry writ upon her life.

The masked loner in red was on his back, cackling loudly, and didn't even bother getting up.

Clearly, they were all Resonators of a sort, but she couldn't see any Tacet Marks. Maybe they hid them, but everyone displayed them in one way or another. Her own glove had an opening to show off the waveform-shaped mark. Rover wasn't sure if covering them hindered the abilities, but when the girl floated… it just felt different. The world was made of frequencies, and these individuals were one of discord… ill omens…

Lingyang landed down opposite of Rover, creating a four-way stand-off. Besides each other, they couldn't be sure who was friend and who was foe. Not until the fight started. An aura of overwhelming terror settled over them. A low, almost panicked growl escaped from Lingyang's lips, and even the trio behind the floating girl shied back. The Patrollers broke formation, running into each other in a mad scramble.

"Sorry, sister, that ain't gonna work on me." He teleported in a red flash, now standing where he once was laying down. "My brain's too fucked-up for that."

The terror dimmed.

Lingyang stepped forward. "I don't know why, but perhaps the trouble can cease, if only for peace?"

"God, you're annoying." He rolled his head over to look at Lingyang. He mimed as to say something but quickly drew a pistol at Lingyang.

But before he could get a shot off, the blonde girl slammed into him and forced him to the grond.

"You alright, Lingyang?" Rover asked, running to his side.

"Yeah, I'm good."

Rover looked at the pinned down man, who was being pummeled by the blonde. He tried to laugh, but it only came out as something wet and gurgling. She was shouting something about her sister, but Rover couldn't hear any more of it. Not without hearing more of that sick squelching sound, which she could do with out. She almost felt bad for him, but surely he had to be one of Fractsidus with his fondness for red.

"People acting like beasts…" Lingyang shook his head in disapproval.

"She might have a reason?" Rover offered.

The dark-haired man approached them, slowly and carefully. The spear was gone. The gray-haired girl was helping up the pink-haired one. His eyes kept drifting over to the man in red, wary and cautious despite the pinned-down beatdown. Rover needed to get answers, first, before any introductions could be made. The situation was too strange and too volatile for anything less.

"What has he done to warrant such… brutality?"

The man took a deep breath to gather his thoughts. "That man apparently has some sort of ability to hop between the worlds, and has dragged us to that girl's world. And then dragged us here. Before he did that, he made… a remark about her sister. It's something I'm not comfortable explaining, but I assure you it was quite vile. May I ask what world we're on?"

"Solaris-3," Rover replied absentmindedly.

"That's not a world the Astral Express has traveled to." The man looked troubled and tired at that. "We're a long way from home."

"I know you don't know that girl… but maybe tell her to tone her down? I can get the guards here to detain him."

"I wouldn't be so sure if I can, but your prison must be something special. That man can teleport, and has healing capabilities."

"But does she know that?" Rover asked.

"Just stay down!" the girl cried out.

The pink-haired girl, along with yellow eyes, approached them. The former looked uneasily at the scene, while the latter watched languidly.

"I know he's like a bad guy and stuff, but I don't feel comfortable with this," pink hair said.

"We've tried freezing him, knocking him out," the gray-haired one listed off, "And nothing took."

"I'm sure one of the Patrollers went to grab someone with the right Resonance Ability or equipment to detain him."

"I'm sorry we met under such… circumstances, but I'm M--"

"No names for now." The man in red suddenly appeared right in front of the girl and clocked her with a short yet powerful punch.

The girl stumbled back, nose broken and bleeding, clearly in shock. Her friends closed ranks around the wounded girl. Lingyang and Rover added themselves to their number.

"Where --!" the blonde girl hissed.

"Temper temper. You get it out of your system, princess? I'm over it; you should be too."

"You think you… you can just say fucked up shit like that and mess with my sister's head?"

"Nah. I was just playing. Just like I was letting you whale on me." He looked at her, then at everyone else. "Man, it's getting awfully crowded here."

"Even more so now." A new voice called out softly.

Four figures landed nearby, adding to their numbers. Sanhua was at the forefront, red eyes roaming over the man in red and then everyone else. Her frown deepened. At her side was Yangyang, who looked tranquil and implacable, even with her sword out. Baizhi stood near the back, observing everything that just transpired with keen eyes. Chixia on the other hand had landed with a smile, pistols out.

"So fucking crowded. And for such a dogshit world too."

"Surrender peacefully, or suffer the consequences."

"It looks like you're fucked," the blonde girl declared.

The man in red stretched. "Not insurmountable for me, just not right now. But stay tuned."

Rover didn't know what that even meant but she was ready to fi––

 

[Dead Beyond]

This isn't something I plan on doing often, yet needs must when the devil's on the wheel. The narrative mechanisms at play have necessitated as much, but we want to avoid it being meta bullshit all the way down. We all have our roles to play and this Deadpool is the best fit. A vessel of cold fury and death across the medium, thinking himself the arbiter of destruction and true free will. Make all the jokes and power-scaling of killing one's own authors, but it will never truly happen. It's the type of thinking that leads to believing that suicidal omnicide is the only real action, yelling at the void where unseen eyes observe. The question then becomes is it better to die in silence, or to live in silence?

"Deadpool" — or as he was labeled out-of-universe, Dreadpool — stands before Resonaters, Trailblazers, and a stray parahuman. It's like a set-up to a long-winded joke that only grows more trite the longer it goes on.

This is to be a temporary shift in perspective. A culling of a bloated cast. My puppet on strings spins his swords, and then releports to the Rover.

"Stupid name," he says.

Rover ducks under the swipe. He has to be light on his feet, because he is outnumbered. Despite this he believes himself to be indominable. Though he know deep down that the world is a lie, he acts in accordance to that lie's will like the hypocrite that he is.

The second attack sees him thrust those twin blades at Yangyang.

"Stupid voice," he declares.

She frowns slightly as she uses her blade to block one sword and side-steps to avoid the other. Yangyang does not why it bothers her so. She's no stranger to a stray insult during a fight, but the texture of it comes from an entirely different place. This had been her voice since birth and no one hated it like this person did. She's being judged on a metric that no rational person would use. It's a casual and dehumanizing loathing. As much as it unnerves her, she powers through it because she is an Outrider of the Midnight Rangers.

Wind blasts him away from Yangyang, the gale bringing him toward Glory Girl and Lingyang. The Jingle Beast sprinted across glowing poles of light that were forming beneath his feet, wielding the huge lion's head as a weapon. Symbolic in ways he intends to inspire those raised in the culture. At his heart, he's a simple do-gooder despite the nuance that exists in his life story. He slams the lion's head into Dreadpool, who tries to spite out an insult.

"Stupid story —"

A burning fury is kindled in Linyang's heart. The nonsense sentence belie a deep loathing for everything that he stood for. It spat in the face of his struggles, his loneliness, his admiration, and inspiration. He stood with a people that lived under the threat of destruction and could still live, hope, and dream as a people. Linyang didn't know the exact world that Dreadpool would use, but I know. He would find all of that cringe.

Dreadpool was battered over to Glory Girl, who slammed back down to the ground. At one point, she thought it a boon that she could strike as hard as she could against this foe. He regenerated and she could cut loose. The anger felt justified, as she knew her relationship with her sister had self-destructed in a way she didn't think was possible. She didn't think there was any world where she could blame Amy for what happened, but she could certainly blame Dreadpool. But she was covered in the blood of her efforts with nothing to show for it. The hate turned to frustration and a steadier mind. She knew brute force wouldn't work.

There hadn't been any time for coordination, to gauge the other powers at play, but she knew it couldn't be done solely by her hand. She threw Dreadpool across the ground and into the open, leaving vulnerable to any sort of powers that could contain him. March and Sanhua filled in that niche, readying their ice-based powers to freeze him utterly, hoping to even hinder whatever teleport ability he possessed. Dreadpool moved quickly, pushing himself to dodge the flurry of ice arrows and streams of ice running across the ground. His swords were gone, and in their place were a set of pistols.

He aimed them up high, ready to blast someone. Stelle and Dan Heng moved to intercept him with bat and spear, but they wouldn't be able to close the gap in time. Chixia shot first. She too had her own pair of guns, but the bullets were imbued with her Forte. Fiery bullets struck at his wrists, throwing off his aim. Then she moved onto his chest, the force of the bullets pushing him back. The guns slipped from his hands and she continued the onslaught with stylish flourishes. The moment she ran out, everyone else moved in. Stelle smacked him the face, right into Dan Heng who swept Dreadpool off his feet with the spear. Daizhi summoned You'tan to body-slam into the ground before it threw him up into the air.

"Screw your Pokémon —"

Glory Girl punched him back down to earth. He tried to roll back onto his feet, but Rover threw out her sword. The blade spun perfectly, cutting into him multiple times before she surged froward and struck him with a powerful burst of energy.

He flopped back down to the ground, groaning.

"Okay, okay, ya got me good—"

"Shut up," Glory Girl snarled, "You lost. You're outnumbered. We're gonna find out how to get back home, and then you're probably fucked. Because you screwed the pooch across three different universes."

Some of the Resonators glanced over at the parahuman, but Dreadpool merely laughed.

"If we are to die in silence, then we must first reach the point where we can die. All these fucking hoops…"

It galls him to even come close tor recognize this fact of puppetry, but he thinks this is Deadpool Kills Across Fiction when it is not.

But he is correct that a point has been reached. Things are changed now.

***

Sahua decapitates the man before he could say anything else. She picked it up and let her hands freeze it solid into a cube. The body slumped over. They had all seen the damage that the man endured. It was the only logical to engage in such measures, but Rover knew this was all beyond the pale. Rover was already dealing with her fair share of problems, and only started to grasp the problems that plagued Jinzhou, let alone Solaris-3 itself. This whole ordeal seemed too extraordinary. She was sure that these newcomers weren't Resonators. This wasn't a mystery her for though. Not yet anyway.

At the very least, there was allies to be found in this entire mess, strange as they looked. Yangyang, Chixia, and Baizhi settled next to Rover. Other groups started to congregated. Lingyang went off to help whatever stragglers that were in the area, while the boy with the spear and the blonde girl started to confer with Sahua in low tones.

"When I woke up this morning, I wasn't expecting to turn out like this!" Chixia exclaimed.

Yangyang was quiet, still staring down at the headless body.

"These matters have grown exponentially more complicated," Baizhi muttered, "First, Rover's appearance and now this. Are they linked? Or worse, separate events entirely? Can

Rover felt both really young and really old at the same time. Dealing with Tacet Discords, the mysteries behind her appearance on Solaris-3… those didn't phase her. If anything, she thrived in that type of environment. Chixia bumped her shoulder into Rover's.

"Enough gloom! We won, didn't we? And let the eggheads handle it. They'll call us if they need our muscle." She flexed one bicep and patted it heartily. "But I'll treat everyone to some lunch. This is the most exciting thing I've dealt with since I became a Patroller."

She was never one to say no to free food. It certainly beat having to scrounge around for own ingredients. Rover smiled to herself.

A splash of red on her face.

She blinked, not comprehending that there was a hole where Chixia's right eye used to be. The body swayed before collapsing onto the ground. The headless body stood upright, a single pistol pointed where her head used to be.

This… isn't right…

Chixia wasn't supposed to die. Maybe she didn't have a grand destiny that matched her grandiose name, but she still had her whole life ahead of her. She was one of the first faces that Rover saw. Chixia… didn't deserve to die so unceremoniously.

The headless body side-kicked the pink-haired girl into Sahua, and they both disappeared in a flash. One moment, they were there. And the next, they weren't. The frozen head was knocked free, sliding across the ground to the body's foot. He stomped it to frozen mush, some of the brain and frozen meat splashed toward the neckline. It started to congleate together. The boy with the spear tried lunging, but the headless body let it go through his chest. He grabbed a hold of it and used it to swing around the boy until it detached from his chest.

When the spear was tossed away, it disappeared and took away the boy as well.

"Rover, move!" Yangyang pushed her out of the way of the next attack. The spin-kick turned Yangyang into a spinning top that swirled through the air before it disappeared. Linyang roared and jumped up to attack, but the uppercut made him disappeared as well.

The blonde girl and You'tan moved to use brute-force against the headless body, but he threw a knife at Baizhi . You'tan disappeared and reappeared in front of Baizhi to block the blow. He ducked under the first charge, while pulling out a grenade and throwing it at Rover in one smooth motion. The gray-haired girl jumped in the way, bat at the ready. But something happened when it made contact. The whole world just went black, like a screen that was switched off. But before the darkness, the last thing Rover saw was the body stretching out his arms to embrace the blonde girl before they all disappeared into the inky darkness.

Spoiler: A/N

A/N: Barely made it on time with this one. I'm beginning to regret imposing such a schedule on myself. A few things. I actually like Chixia as a character and she's my go-to unit when I need a character with pistols, four-star she may be. But that's why she had to die. It's more justifiable, to me as an author, because it's bashing otherwise to do it to characters you don't actually like. Another thing, the "narrator" at the first section… they're not a ROB or an SI or anything like that. There's a point to them. We'll see if the story lasts long enough for that to be answered. But the crude theme of this work is starting to take form as a question. "Is it better to live in silence or to die in silence?" I think I can do interesting things with it.

 

[Dead Beyond]

A/N: Whoops. I'm two days late. Lost track of my days. IRL stuff ate a weekend. In the spirit of things, I wrote this before midnight. It's rough but I wrote it like I had a deadline. So let me amend my original 2-8 declaration. Either this updates on Thursdays or it dies as a project.

After making some headway in learning earthbending, Aang was feeling… a little more on the ground. There was something concrete about it. The closing of the gaps. The end of the journey loomed ever closer, and the conclusion seemed all the more: dealing with the Firelord. The thought made him anxious. Already he could feel the unspoken assumptions and hope that he would end the Firelord's life.

And that went everything against he had been taught.

However, that would come later. He would deal with what was in front of him: mastering the four elements. Right now, Sokka was avoiding any nebulous looking crevice and hole in the canyon at the moment. He didn't want a repeat of getting stuck again, but still he craved for some meat. Both girls watched him skirt around with amused looks on their face. Neither of them seemed to notice, but at least they weren't butting heads at the moment. With peace and quiet, he felt comfortable in trying out some mediation before they had to get a move on.

Aang was mediating when he sunk halfway into the Spirit World. It wasn't like all the other times when he left his earthly tethers. This was like bobbing in the water. Not on land, but not drowning in its depths either. Something was wrong. He was the Avatar, and his duties included being the bridge between the two worlds. Trusting himself to commit, he forced a step forward, but something was pushing back against him. It wasn't a physical force, but… Something screeched, causing his whole body to tense up in the physical world.

He stood in his ground, one ethereal hand on his physical head, pushing to keep himself in the Spirit World. He needed to know the nature of this threat before it emerged out from the Spirit World.

"Spirit! Hear me, I —"

The sound did something. Perhaps it gave it a destination, or the sound itself triggered a mechanism. It blew him back to his body, but the sheer impact threw him back. He tumbled along until he was amidst his friends. One of his hands had gotten stuck in the ground during the turmoil.

He took a moment before smashing his other and forcing the earth.

"Aang!" Katara cried out.

"Man! How come you don't get stuck for long?"

"Something's coming!" he replied.

Toph frowned, but still shifted in a combative stance. Katara drew water from the container at her side, and Sokka had his boomerang out.

A breach in the world saw a monstrous creature with long wings and a menacing visage. Something was plucking in the air, intersecting with Aang's senses. It was a feeling of wrongness. It was an unharmonious fusion. An infection… and suddenly, he didn't need to be in the Spirit World to know what was wrong. It was staring at him right in the face… The energies were so intrusive that it practically bubbled into their world, and it was a cry for help.

"There's a spirit infused in that creature!" Aang realized.

"Does that mean I can whale on 'em?" Toph asked.

"Whatever that is… it can't be good."

"Good enough for me!"

With swift, precise movements, her feet shifted across the ground and molded it into a barrage. With her hands thrusting the avalanche at the creature. Its yellow eyes glinted with amusement before it dodged out of the way, the wings on its back flapping. Aang directed a current of air to stymie its ascent and it flapped hard against the But it gave Katara the opening she needed. A whip of water snaked toward it, wrapping around the creature's leg and then yanking it back down to the earth. The gust from its wings gave Toph a better of where to strike. She stomped her foot twice, summoning two giant walls of rock to slam the creature in.

It snarled, using its claws to hold back the pressure. With assessing eyes and the howl of the spirit within, it let go of one wall and it slammed into its shoulder. But with both hands free, it smashed the opposing wall. It fluttered back in the air, the other wall crumbling back down. Sokka, with a running start, threw out his boomerang. The metal weapon spun through the air and the creature didn't appear phased.

The boomerang missed.

Then it dove toward them.

Everyone dodged out of the way, but it had been targeting Aang. With his staff, he managed to block his blows. He knew that direct guarding would only see his windglider smashed to smithereens, instead he aimed for the wrists. He got inside the creature's guard, shifting and redirecting its blows. Katara thrust out a spear of water at the creature's back, lassoing the two wings and then freezing them solid. It turned around to look assess the damage, only for Toph to launch a large rock at its face. It stumbled out of its struggle with Aang, unable to fly away. That was when the boomerang struck, hitting it across the jaw.

It fell onto its knees, claws digging into the ground.

It should have gone down.

Spirits tended to play by different rules, but this creature was not a spirit. Aang was sure of that, and there efforts should have seen it exhausted. There should have been a sign that it was weakening but…

"It's draining the spirit," Aang realized.

"What does that mean?" Toph asked.

"It's got a source of energy," Sokka said, "And unless Aang can whip up some Avatar mojo, it will have more endurance than all of us."

Maybe if he was a fully realized Avatar, it'd be different. There'd be some way to separate the intertwining energies at play. They were making good progress on one end, but the other end? But he wouldn't even know where to begin. He was missing guidance. The monks could have prepared him, a wandering spirit could have hinted on where to begin… but time was never on the Avatar's side.

The truth was that Aang did not know where to start on even making it a possibility.

It stood back up, rejuvenated. The wings flexed, shattering the ice. The benders and Sokka circled it, trying to gauge their options.

"We're not tired yet… but if this goes on…"

"Shhh!" Sokka said, "It's intelligent. Maybe not like us… but it's listening."

The creature had its head cocked, then its shoulders shook as if laughing. A clear indicator of how smart it was. Perhaps if it was just a lashing out animal, they'd be able to tire it out and figure out how to seperate the spirit from it.

"A Crownless…" a woman said, stepping out from a rock.

"Bounty hunter?" Sokka muttered.

"I apologize. But a bad man has thrust me into impossible circumstances. And it seems this is one of the unfortunate consequences of that."

The woman had long black hair and wore a blue cap.

She looked Fire Nation, but her attire said something else. Cultures tended to trend toward one color, but it was not exactly a hard rule. A good rule of thumb was that Water Tribe wore blue, Earth Kingdom wore green, and Fire Nation with dark reds. The monks wore… used to wear orange. It wasn't unthinkable or a hard rule to wear different colors. And she wielded a sword too. Was she like the Kyoshi Warriors? But then again, there was the matter of her outfit. It was all these strangeness that Aang had to confront, but could he trust her? Then again, who stepped out with a polite and demure apology for something that was clearly not their fault?

"I will aid you against this Crownless," she declared.

"Thank you."

Something told him that she could work from that opposite end, to better silence this disruption.

She drew her sword. They all attacked, denying this Crownless any moment of leverage. Toph sunk his feet deep in the earth while Katara wrapped a tendril of water around its left arm. Sokka, however, hopped on its back and started whacking it in the head with his boomerang. It tried shaking them all off.

The woman paused in her stance, breathing in the air. "Something strange is within it. All I can do is buy you an opening so that we may dispel this Tacet Discord. Will you be able to bring harmony to it?"

Aang felt unsure, but what option did he have? His head nodded for him. She nodded back and swung her sword through the air.

"Let the winds roar!"

A tempest engulfed the creature, assailing it on shapeless battlefront. It staggered down to a knee, once again overwhelmed. They wouldn't have much time before it recovered.

But Aang did his best not to gape.

This —

This had to be airbending!

Hope bubbled up in his chest. This… his people wouldn't be gone forever! His culture could recover. The genocide hadn't been total!

Clarity came with this revelation and he leaped forward, putting one hand against the creature and let himself be swept away.

It was then he understood what the creature was composed up. Vibration. Frequencies. It was all energy, but this one was different. Like oil and water. He didn't need to bend it — all he had to do was separate it. It was like building a dam — and that couldn't exactly be called waterbending. He parted the energies, no longer allowing them to co-mingle with one another. Any more than this and he might have been overwhelmed, but he was merely returning these two back to their original states.

The Crownless faded into a golden shade before popping into non-existence. A small brown creature was nestled in his arms, squirming. It looked up at him, tried to speak but thought better of that. It leaped into the air and dived back into the spirit world. He turned to the woman, who was sheathing.

There was so many things he wanted to say, but what he blurted out

"Hm?" She raised an eyebrow. "I apologize, but I am called a Resonator. I'm afraid I'm not an airbender."

"But you bended the air," Sokka pointed out.

Aang could already feel the rising embarrassment.

"As a Resonator, we can use the Forte to channel certain element effects. In my case, it is Aero."

If he had just taken a closer look before he made that declaration, maybe the crushed hope wouldn't feel so bad.

Instead of an airbending tattoo, there was only a black mark on her forehead. A vertical black line marked by horizontal ones. Her black hair was turning into blue feathers in the end. There wasn't any world in which she could be an airbender. Aang's heart sank so deep that it drowned in stomach acid. Hope always seemed dirty when it was turned on its head.

He wanted to put a smile on his face and brush it off.

But he ended up running away instead of standing his ground, to weather through this disappointment. His friends called out from behind him, but he needed time.

 

[Dead Beyond]

A/N: Another late, last-minute finish. Twenty minutes before midnight. It's funny. I got Lingyang on the 1.1. banner within twenty pulls. The chapter must have cursed me to lose the 50-50. Big sad, and all that.

Lingyang had been battling these strange Tacet Discords for the past thirty minutes. Ever since that strange man thrown him from there to here, it had been a non-stop battle against the darkened beasts of shadow and bone with orange eyes beneath masks of bone, corpses fading to shadow… There were so many, terror and screams filling the air like Retroact Rain. The sounds drifted up and above, drawing even more of creatures in.

So many questions. The foundational instinct of both beast and man took over. Survival took precedence, but he would not allow himself to let it control him utterly. Beast or human, Lingyang knew that life had to be more than that. It was why he enjoyed lion-dancing for people, to inspire hope, and so that people could live, laugh, and enjoy plenty of delicious food.

It was, perhaps, not the deepest of motivations, but it was his. There was enough tragedy in the world.

When he finally beat enough of these beasts down, he could finally take a breather and dwell on the mysterious circumstances that brought him here. His first thoughts turned to the creatures he fought. Of course, he could tell they weren't really TDs, but it was just semantics at that point. If it walked like a duck, quacked like a duck, and destroyed things, then it was probably a Tacet Discord. These creatures' lust for wanton destruction echoed TD's.

So even though they smelled different and felt different, it would not be inaccurate to call them Tacet Discords.

The second thing that drew his attention was the shattered moon. It was so foreign and alien to see that Lingyang could just feel that he was no longer on Solaris-3. It surely had something to do that with that strangely dressed man, but for what possible reason, Lingyang couldn't even begin to fathom. He briefly entertained that he could still be on Solaris-3, perhaps further ahead in the future or something equally fanatical. After all, there was Waveworn Phenomena that had messed with the moon before. The Therodian of war had cast an echo of one to overlap with the moon during that disastrous yet fateful battle.

The Battle Beneath the Crescent.

But to see the moon shattered… was an entirely different type of foreboding. It was a far different harbinger. What type of god and their wrath did this destruction warn of?

Lingyang shook his head. When someone had questions about the world, it was best to find people and from there, get stories about the world. The Liondance Troupe had its fair share of storytellers, but Lingyang was best in displaying it through the titular liondance. However, he doubted any straightforward answers would come so soon. Not with the current situation as it was.

But that just meant there was people to protect.

He wandered through the courtyard, keeping both set of ears open for any sound of life. There were still some monsters roaming around, but no other signs. Right up until he heard people talking in a nearby ruined building just off. Lingyang started sprinting toward it. The turmoil grew more heavy in this area.

A man in a mask, running in tandem with the beasts, was chasing after a teenager.

No matter where he ended up, there seemed people willing to discard everything and favored to be among the destroyers. The Fractsidus, came to mind, and now these masked ones were of a similar stripe. Lingyang leaped in the air, and took a hold of the man's head. Gravity and momentum took care of the rest. He slammed them down headfirst without breaking his sprint, easily increasing his pace. He had heard a cry coming from the building and his instincts told him that someone was in trouble. The fleeing teenager had already booked it out of sight, leaving Lingyang to continue with this impromtu rescue.

He hopped through the broken window, narrowly tucking his body to avoid being cut. Admist the fires there were two people. A redheaded-man with horns peaking out had his foot planted atop a girl with a bow. The man had his sword drawn, the tip leveling at the girl's throat. Another sword was scattered from the two, near the flames. The girl's golden eyes met his.

"You need to run— hurk!"

The man stomped down his foot on the woman, silencing her.

"Another traitor then," the man said. Lingyang's tail swished at that.

"I'm sorry, traitor to what?" Lingyang asked, circling around to move away from the window.

The man sneered, lips curling beneath the mask. Up close, Lingyang saw that it aped those TD's masks. This man and his ilk were definitely like the Fractsidus. But how literal would it be? Was it just copying the aesthetics or did they too splice TD parts into themselves?

Either way, this man might be a tough customer.

"Oh, excuse me. I'm rather new to, well, all of this. This world, that is."

"You traitor Faunus make me sick, parading yourself like you're one of them."

Lingyang laughed. "I'll take that as a compliment of my personhood."

"You're mocking me."

"I guess I should also apologize. I'm not a Faunus. Though I should also apologize, because I don't know what a Faunus is and thought you were something else."

"What?" he snarled.

"Resonators. Using our abilities can sometimes cause aberrations. I thought you were a human that Overclocked."

Lingyang was actually being earnest here, but he also knew it might tick off the man here. It would draw his attention away from the girl and onto him. He'd be able to handle the fury, and at the very least give the girl a chance to flee. The man hissed, turning about slightly. angling his hips and the scabbard in his hands. Lingyang barely had enough time to react.

The scabbard was also a gun!

He dodged the blast, but left himself open to a follow-up attack. For a split second the man debated on something before lunging forward and slashing upward which Lingyang blocked with his forearms, Resonance and ice shielding his skin. The intent was writ all over his face. He really wanted to hurt the girl, and whatever move he debated using wouldn't have hurt the girl if used on him. He felt a little easy from this bit of untutition. Outcasts and TDs were one thing, but a proper Resonator? Or a Resonator equivalent, in this case? Who knew what ace he had hidden up his sleeve. Lingyang would might have to stop holding back. Whoever drew their card first might leave them open. He knew his measure, but this man's? Lingyang would have to draw it out.

"Now, now," he chided, wagging a finger, "That wasn't very nice."

"Stop talking!"

"But talking is what separates us from the monsters of this world. If only things could be talked out… Tragedy and genocide could be averted."

"And yet you act like you don't know Faunus history," the man spat.

Lingyang took a deep breath. The girl was getting up, trying to walk up. Limping, really. She hovered nearby, just shy of the exit. Whether it was out of concern or curiosity or perhaps even both, she stayed.

"But I'm not a Faunus. I'm not one of you." Lingyang clenched his fists. "Among these these… monsters, there is no distinction between human or animal. Extinction comes for us all. Maybe there are too many shades of gray, but there is a deep darkness in the world. And those who burn bright are the ones who stand before it. I see you working with monsters… and there is no excuse for that."

Something in him shifted. Bones long cracked and broken into his current form shifted, fur once shed started to sprout, and filed-down teeth and claws sprouted back up in sharp-tinged fury. Frequencies remembered. Echoes of what he was came to the surface, past the current layer that drowned everything out. He blinked, seeing the fur on his arms and the claws atop his fingers. Truly he was more of a beast than, but far more "human" than the horned man before him.

"I am a Suan'ni. The last of my kind. Brought low by both Tacet Discords and humanity. There are some humans that are deserving of punishment, but to lump every one of them as a monster? That only makes you the monster. I have been wronged by humanity because of their fears when my kind gained their own Tacet Marks. Confusion and fear just leads to panic and mistakes that can't be taken back." He held a hand over his heart. "And yet… I find that humanity has their positive sides. I wish more than anything the rest of my kind could share in that. But they can't. So, for the sake of the future, so that this mistake won't ever be repeated, I hope to encourage that positive side. I'm not saying you shouldn't be angry, but if you can't control your anger… it won't be righteous. Just monstrous."

Adam's grip tightened, but he could offer no rebuttal. Perhaps the rage stilled his tongue. Or perhaps the knowledge that Lingyang's tragedy far surpassed his own stripped the veneer away, leaving him only the option of being a hypocrite.

Finally, he gritted out. "I've come too far to sop now."

Lingyang shook his head sadly. "You could have had the heart of a hero… but you have chosen to be a beast. Worlds that stand on the eve of apocalypses anew should bring people together, not divide them."

The horned man screamed, hair afire and sword churning with angry power. Adam slammed the blade back down, the tension in the air growing. The girl was screaming for him to run. Lingyang couldn't have hoped to match it, so he had to strike first. His ability "Will Transmission" would buy him that time. Normally, it would help out his allies, but he turned against the man. The Glacio in the air made the man sluggish, slow… ice seeping into his limbs. Yinglang summoned his lion's head, leaping forward onto glowing poles. He hoped his Resonance would strengthen the lion's head with just enough power to weather the blow should he lose this draw.

Lingyang leapt into the air with a roar of a lion and descended with the power of a dragon.

The first inch of the blade had been drawn, and Lingyang knew he was too slow.

But strength was best exemplified when allies fought together. A blonde woman came crashing in, yellow gauntlet cocked back for a mighty blow. It smashed right into his face, knocking him flat on the ground and Lingyang finished him off with a decisive blow. Ice cratered around him as he smashed the lion's head into the man, driving him into the ground. The blonde girl turned to the first girl, helping her stand steady. She blinked in disbelief that the horned man had been defeated.

The blonde woman dusted herself off and looked to Yinglang.

"I'm Yang Xiao Long, huntress-in-training. It's ice to meet you."

Lingyang chuckled at the pun.

"I'm more of a fan of rhymes. Part of my job." He bowed gracefully, forcing himself back into human form as he did. "Lingyang, of the Liondance Troupe."

"I take it that you're not an exchange student," Yang said.

"You can't be…" the first girl spoke up, voice deep in disbelief. "With what you are… you just can't."

Lingyang scratched the back of his head.

"II'll tell it with a nice performance when everything's settled down. Because it's a long story."

 

[Dead Beyond]

A/N: Right before midnight again.

Rover and Trailblazer fell through the void before promptly smashing into the sky, smearing reality behind them. The two of them tumbled, fighting against both the sudden shock and descent. The Rover immediately triggered the glider function in her gourd, the device popping into her hand and manifesting two wings spread above. They carried her aloft above a large plain, before she quickly remembered her wayward companion. Far below her, she could see a trail of fire trying to push against the air. The effect was only mitigating the fall, the flames already sputtering. Maybe if they weren't like forty thousand feet in the air, it would have been survivable. Rover dismissed the glider function, and dove through the air. She was desperately trying to close the gap, but there was a point where she could fall no faster.

The Trailblazer was whipping through the air, wielding a huge orange lance. It was clear it was the source of her propulsion, and wouldn't be able to do much more. Rover throw out her grapple, the blue strand of energy was able to close the distance between the two. She yanked herself closer, smashing into the Trailblazer in a violent embrace. But they managed to cling together as Rover pulled out her glider again. It shuddered under the combined weight of the two, but it still managed to keep relatively steady. The two of them just took the moment to catch their breath. After so much struggle and violence, there was little recourse for anything else.

"You alright?" Rover eventually asked.

Stelle chuckled. "Second time something like this happened. Only there was fireworks."

Rover's lips quirked briefly into a smile. "Sorry to disappoint."

"Don't worry. I very much like not being a pancake against the ground."

Rover hummed, and they continued to float down.

"This sure is taking awhile, huh?" Stelle remarked.

"Yeah." Rover paused, thinking about everything that had transpired. "Kinda of an awkward place for a discussion, isn't it?"

"I know. It's easy to say something stupid, when there's other people around to pick up the slack, or be quiet because I'm actually anxious deep down inside."

"Can't say I have that exact problem."

"Rub in why dontcha?" Stelle gave a playful huff. "But I don't suppose you know what's up with that guy in red? The one who sent us here?"

"Sorry. I'm amnestic."

"Ditto, me too! You also got a secret yet meaningful destiny before you?"

"Something like that." Rover's arm was getting a bit sore from holding the two of them. She gritted her teeth and renewed her will, her determination. "It seems like everyone knows how important I am, and my past, but I don't. Not exactly."

"I can relate. The best advice I can give is reach the end of the story on your own way, and make choices you know you won't regret."

Rover closed her eyes, thinking about when she decided to throw her lot in with the Magistrate over Scar. Would she regret it? Maybe not in the way she thought, because the journey.

Her thoughts turned to Chixia. Despite not knowing each other that long, it still felt utterly wrong for her to have died so uncermeniously. Chixia mattered to Yangyang, to Bahizu. It was clear that they had been friends for a long time. Rover felt… almost envious of those bonds, while at the same time ashamed at her own grief. Everyone thought she was important, but did that importance mean her own grief superseded other people's? Maybe it was because everyone was seperated that caused Rover to feel like this. Rover needed a direction, some way to either avenge Chixia or alleviate the grief her absence left.

"Hi… I don't mean to intrude here, but are you alright?"

Rover sighed. "I will be."

"I'm sorry that I can't come up with a joke to help lighten the mood."

"I think I work best when I got a direction or mystery to chew on. I'm clever like that."

"Puzzle-solver clever or like genius clever like that?"

"Somewhere in the middle. Whoever I was before, I got a pretty hand sense of intuition. So please… give me something to work on."

"Well, understanding is the second tenant of the Trailblaze."

The two of them talked about the differences in their understanding. Stelle was curious about her own world, speaking about a desire to trailblaze there, sample the local delicacies, and fight off some bad guys. Rover did her best to fill the Trailblazer in, but her understanding of the current geopolitical situation was remarkably surface-level. There were some points of comparison like Tacet Discords and Fragmentum monsters, but they seemed to be separate phenomena. The only similarities was how they were handled. Meanwhile, the Trailblazer spoke about the galaxy and the numerous worlds that resided within it, like leaves upon a vast tree. Rover listened keenly, enraptured by how truly big the cosmos were.

Some part of her ached to get involved on this galactic scene, but another part of her wanted to finish her journey on Solaris-3. Rover couldn't pinpoint the exact feeling… but… responsibility came closest. Yes… there was a responsibility she had to Solaris-3. She needed to see it through before she left the place.

"Okay…" Rover smiled. "That was an enlightening discussion. If… when we get back, I'll treat you to some Panhua's Restaurant. She serves some pretty good food."

"I'm never one to say no to free food!"

"Say… Trailblazer… do you recognize this place?"

Stelle shook her head. "I've been to an icy planet, a huge space ship and station, and a planet of dreams. Wherever this place is, I'm not knowledgeable on it. However, it is possible that the Express have visited it before. And if it's connected to the silver rail, then we should be able to communicate with the wider galaxy. I don't mean to brag, but I got a kinda extensive contact list. Someone's bound to help us. Once we get back on the Express, we'll find your world, our friends…"

And what if we can't? Rover wanted to ask.

"Be on guard. There's a ship!" Rover said.

A ship warped out of nowhere, coming to a sudden stop. Atop the ship was a symbol of two curved lines atop a larger curved line was shaped by glowing orange lines. Rover blinked, before recognizing that there were several armored figures atop it, wielding large and imposing weaponry. Without question, they pointed them at the Rover and the Trailblazer.

"Hold on!" Stelle shouted, summoning that lance. "Flaming lance, forward!"

A gust of blazing heat shot them both forward at the ship, turning what had been a peaceful glide into a violent throw of a stone. Their trajectory arced through the air before the two of them landed atop. Rover's sword, powered by tacite, was able to slice through their weapons, but their armor proved just a bit too sturdy to be easily demolished with a few swift strokes. Stelle, meanwhile, dismissed her lance and summoned her baseball bat. It crackled with power as she filled in the openings that Rover created. After the next failed sword stroke, Rover jumped back and called upont he power of Resonance, Spectro energy breaking through the world like a mirror. The resulting blowback threw the armored enemies off the ship.

Stelle had a complicated look on her face. "Kinda wished if we knew if these were people turned into monsters too-far gone to be saved. It doesn't sit well if they were people. Bad people, but… you know."

Rover nodded, sheathing her sword. "I understand. The Exiles on my world are fair game, but they're just trying to survive. They just need a good whooping every now and again. I wouldn't so unceremoniously slay them."

The weight of life was heavy, and it was good that they were both in agreement. Though the two of them were adventurers, they weren't cold-blooded killers. To sully that was almost like Chixia dying all over again. It was something that just… shouldn't happen.

"Don't suppose you can pilot this ship?" Stelle asked.

Rover was about to answer the question when she saw a line of energy surging toward them. She blinked, trying to understand the sight.

"Is that a single arrow?"

Said arrow smashed through the ship, and causing it to explode beneath their feet. They both cried out before they were thrown off. Rover's gourd was yanked from her hand before she could activate the glider. She had to grab her gourd before she could even think about saving herself or the Trailblazer. She pushed herself, trying to catch up with the device. Her fingers continually scratched the surface of the gourd, but was unable to grab it. The ground was rapidly approaching. Rover hissed and demanded to the world that this was wrong. That something had gone awry. This wasn't how anything was suppose to be. In every possible direction in this world, she could have seized something and stopped this premature death.

Something answered her desperation, because a black wing sprouted from her back and gave her the extra oomph she needed. She grabbed onto the gourd and summoned the glider, thirty something feet away from the ground. Once her safety was settled, her eyes desperately roamed around to find the Trailblazer. Her heart hammered as she saw a streak of fire racing toward the ground. It slammed down as a fiery crater. But in the center was the Trailblazer, who flashed her a thumbs-up. Rover let out a sigh of relief as she landed right next to the Trailblazer.

As they climbed out of the crater, a speeding figure had been blazing toward them and only just stopped when they emerged back onto solid ground. The figure was a tealish color, with button like eyes and stubby horn on the center. But in their hands was a bow.

This was the person that shot them down.

Rover and the Trailblazer readied their weapons, prepared for conflict.

 

[Dead Beyond]

A/N: Holy fuck am I beginning to dislike this project, but obligation will see me through. Just when I started feeling renewed interest in general, I remember this dumb story and now have to write 1.5k words before midnight. Like damn dude, I was making good progress on a one-shot before that. The only consolation is that I can really take this somewhere stupid.

The tribulations of today had taken its toll on Victoria Dallon, as she fell through the abyss. She was a pendulum, having swung from one extreme to the next. The rage had been bright and furious, cathartic in lashing out. Even the initial squeamishness in truly wrecking this man into a bloody mess was easily overcome. Then, it just kept going on. She had thought she finally had a chance to finally cut loose against someone that not only could take it, but deserved it as well. The villains of Brockton Bay necessitated a balance response, every action could trigger a catalytic reaction that could cause unforeseen consequences. At least with the small fry, Victoria could show an inch and not have a mile shoved in her face.

Yet, after the tenth time she really beat this man to semi-death, the pendulum went to the other side. It was something akin to morose horror. Not only at her own dwindling reservoir of strength and willpower, but the fact that the damage she dealt out started to reflect back on her. Whatever her zealous mistakes were in the past, they were easily fixed. Even though this man had a healing factor, it was far more sickening to look at compared to Amy's healing.

And instead of letting it heal, she was forced to continue to lay down the hurt.

It was shameful, because not only it amounted to nothing, the impermanence only highlighted the consequences she had skated by so many times before. Here she was, covered in guts and far from glorious, and she could only think about how far she had fallen, in more ways than one. The descent seemed endless, different from the immediate transitions that the man had punted her through. She tried using her flight to push back against the falling sensation, but it was like being in zero gravity. No matter which way she tried propelling herself, she felt like she hadn't budged an inch from the current point in space.

And the darkness wasn't helping either. So absolute was it that she couldn't see any inch of her body. It was heavy that when she tried waving her hand in front of her face, it was like wading through a numbing muck. Victoria Dallon was adrift in complete and utter nothing. It started to creep into her thoughts, her very line of thinking. It slithered, working its way from the present and to the past. Everything before a certain point, that moment when she made her superhero landing, started to shroud into shadow. There was a clear path to the core of her being, and that nothingness started to fill in what was once full and present. It started to c h e w.

"Nope! Not yet!"

The red-suited man slammed into her, and it was like a splash of color onto a bleak world. Suddenly there was clarity, suddenly there was sight, and there was purpose. She cracked a fist across the man's jaw clean off, but he only let loose a guttural laugh in response. It flapped in the now gusty and turbulent void, like the two of them were plummeting through the atmosphere. The knackering laugh was a sickly thing, gushing out of the exposed mouth.

More blood splattered on her fist. How much blood would she be covered by the end of this? How could this man possibly have this much blood? It would have been comical were it not for the fact that she could taste it every other breath. The man's jaw sprouted out, teeth popping into place like the crackle of popcorn. It finally seemed like she had gotten a clear look at this man's regeneration. The lower half of the mask was gone now, ripped away from the impact of her fist. She was sure that the force of her blows would have torn away some semblance of modesty from the man. Was it slowing down? She tried to remember, but her memory was alternating from being a haze or viewing it from a perspective outside her two eyes.

"Almost there!"

They smashed through one void into a storm. Dark clouds swirled all around them as though they were in the eye of a violent hurricane. Tired of this, she punched the man off her and tried to build distance from him. The moment they disconnected from one another, she was somewhere else. For a split second that lasted several moments, she was in a half-formed city of gold, dressed in different clothing, and something wrenched and invisible was around here. Then the man grabbed her by the throat, carried on by his own momentum. He flew through the storm, as she struggled against his grasp.

"Sorry! Can't let you get lost in the time vortex here! I have such sights to show you. Here's one now!"

He reared his arm back, still choking the life out of Victoria, before throwing her like she was a baseball. Victoria flew like a comet before smacking into a large blue object hurling through the vortex. She smashed into the side, barely clinging on. Within her rattled thoughts, she dimly recognized it as some sort of old-school phone box. Her fingers dug into the exterior, trying to hold on. At the very least, it was preventing her from being lost in that city of gold. She started to climb toward the top, only to see that man opposite of her. He was on the box as well, but cheekily holding onto with a lackadasical grip. He was smiling.

"Suuuuutek! Get your dog-ass out here before I make you!"

Something started to materialize atop, crowding out Victoria. She inched down as the creature manifested itself as a squatting beast with a cloak. It was more of a jackal than a dog, with a large snout and four red eyes. And Victoria was staring at it from the side. A deep sense of dread started to suffuse into the air. For better or for worse, its attention was on the man.

"Who dares —"

"I'm breaking a whole lot of shit at the moment, and I want you!" He jabbed his finger in an exaggerated fashion.

"I do not heed to some harlequin's call!"

"But you'll heed to a harlequin's leash!"

He leaped up, looping a rope around the creature's neckpiece, and then letting go of the flying box. Such a small man shouldn't hold so much weight to drag down this large creature too, but it happened. Sutek cried out in a deep voice, howling with fury as its claws struggled to hold onto the box. Its hind legs were kicking One of the hind legs smacked into Victoria, dragging her down with them into the dark. Just at the edge of her vision, she saw the phone box's door swing open and a man pop his head out, staring in complete befuddlement.

"Wot?!"

Thankfully, they didn't fall yet into another set of cascading darkness. Before she took stock of everything else, Victoria moved. She, tired of being yanked around, ceased her fall with her flight. She quickly pushed herself away from the two figures, gathering distance. An endless plain of chess squares stretched out beneath her, as she made sure to put some distance between the two who had cratered into the ground.

The man hopped onto his feet, hopping around with complete abandon. Whatever his objective was, he seemed to have made some headway.

If she had a moment to breathe, to analyze, she could begin to formulate a counter-attack. She could gather allies or find a way home. Instead her tired brain was focused on keeping track of the two. The man was possibly her only way out. She had glimpsed so much that she believed that she was so far from Earth Bet that it wasn't even funny. Victoria Dallon could easily fly away and flee further into this strange chess world.

But could she risk it? Victoria didn't want to be stranded and then die of dehydration. Everything she tried on the man failed, and then there was that other creature. There was a presence to that giant jackal — Sutek. It was a heavy name. Mythological names tended to be powerful cape names, and there were only a few that made a mockery of them. But they wouldn't be mockeries for long when someone else came along to take the name with bloodied means.

"Enough! You have ruined an eternities long plan!"

The man flapped a dismissive hand. "Time-wimey. Your plan hasn't been in fruitation that long."

"Then I grant you my gift of death!"

It slashed a claw through the air, energies turning the ground to sand. The man spread out his hands and turned into a statue of dust. It crumbled into a sad little pile that was quickly broken apart by a hand smashing from the ground. Without fanfare, he dusted off his shoulder.

"I'm immortal! And depending on the continuity, Deadpool's cursed not to die!"

The beast growled, standing on its hindlegs. The air started to crackle, grains of sand falling from the atoms in the air.

"I am the end! I am the death of all things! I shall cause the past, present, and future fall into ruin! You cannot stop me!"

"Yes! Keep that energy up! But you're still thinking too fucking small! I'm here to set you up!"

"I am Sutekh! I have no equal! Let them come and I shall smite them to dust!"

"Oh, you poor dear, he's already here."

Victoria spotted a floating golden Egyptian-like coffin descending behind the two. From this distance, she could spy a hulking green figure emerging from it.

"You're not bound by shitty TV budget, so try not to disappoint Lord English! Your grudge match here has to do a lot of damage!" the man shouted.

The newcomer fired a huge beam from its maw. Sutekh roared in defiance.

And Victoria was thrown back from the collision, despite being nowhere. It sent her flying for miles. It caused her to black out for a split second. Her forcefield had tanked the shockwave, but it didn't arrest her momentum. She found herself in a trench, stretching out for at least several miles. Victoria tried to blink away the concussion, but her head merely flopped against the ground.

Someone's foot stepped into her vision.

"Who… what…"

"I'll throw you a bone here." That man cracked his neck. "You can call me Storyteller. A good enough title, I suppose. And I'm here to direct this trainwreck to cause the greatest amount of damage. Get ready for what's next, because you're picture perfect dear."

Then he kicked her through the world and into the next.