That piano, a single tap on the keys could lead to musical talent filling the room to the brim, and seated on that stool was none other than the Samurai, Ryosuke Satoru. Instead of letting the lighter fronts of his fingers tap against the instrument to bring those signature notes form, he sat idle. Motionless, without so much as an irregular breath, but abruptly, something tapped him in its forehead. A pool of dread opened in his stomach for a monster to crawl out, to feed on his insides, those normal sensations of stillness he couldn't slash apart were infiltrated by that beast. The sense of an abnormality nagging at his entire being, for a demon on his back, washed away as the sound of an opening door withdrew his dead eyes from the discolored console. Just her very presence at the door, her blonde hair so naturally kept in a braid over the shoulder ruffled so the nastier strands could poke out the golden locks, those puffy eyes...
That was all he needed to confirm his theory.
"Understood, Miss Summers," Satoru replied, but her breath hitched, incapable of squirming as his hulking figure inched closer with new advancement.
"But... I... I..." She sniffled, his robed back to her face as she twiddled her thumbs helplessly, faced with her weakness; the inability to make a move to fight with her comrades, her head fell.
"You need not worry, I know you didn't say anything. But I heard it, not with my ears, but from the deepest reaches of my soul. A soul we hold dear has diminished to its final breath... and I intend to avenge her, WITHOUT QUESTION!"
Now with tears streaming down his cheeks and one hand on the sword hung to his hip, his exposed teeth clenched together, he could just barely make out that final declaration with only a cracked voice, for if he continued to speak the way he so naturally continued to walk... he'd break down into tears. Though reluctantly and unexpectedly at the beginning of the chaos, Ryosuke Satoru entered the fight.
But, before getting back to the midst of the battle to avenge the woman who named herself 'Snow', the very ground below his feet shook as if an earthquake was summoned to knock them off their balances. Kelly yelped, falling into his arms before her head could smash against the ground, Ryosuke felt a pebble as he kneeled to her side.
"Are you hurt?"
She shook her head to dissipate any worries from his mind, leaving him to nod, he left his body from sprawled over her own, returning to a taller stance. Quickly revealing his grey-steeled katana from the black-golden cover hung to his waist's side, the signature song of metal accompanying the revelation, Satoru's eyes darted over the oddly-carved architecture of the House's ceiling... once more, it shook.
"What on Earth's going on out there?"
To answer his question, another house exploded in the distance, for as his body sporadically darted from side to side, his pink eyes were barely visible. Bodies flailing out windows so he could come out with explosions fueling his flight, Ed felt the breath creak out the crack between gritted teeth like steam, letting his palms face the ground. Landing on his legs then bending his knees, the force sent them flying back, rifles stumbling out their fingers' grips, another shockwave erupted as he detonated his hand, aimed just right ahead.
They didn't even get the chance to put their fingers on the triggers, as his being detonated leaving nothing but smoke in the wake of the blast, the aerosol prohibited his enemies behind from getting a clean shot. However, that didn't stop the red dots from pointing all across his body, crimson beams trained on his build, Edward emerged from the smoke without care visible from the way he'd moved.
Grabbing one soldier by his face so the back of the head could slam onto the concrete, lifting them so he could blast his damaged body into another preparing to throw a knife into his back sent them to throw an apartment window. Expanding his pupil, he rolled to the right, the very same direction he'd thrown the other two in, leaving a vacant space for him to stand. Holding a new blade in hand as another thrust came at his rear, Singh grabbed the one in front by the throat, detonating his fingers so there'd only remain the charred skull, only chunks of burning flesh remaining attached to the singed bone.
Dropping the corpse to the ground so it could splatter, he just barely backflipped over a blade aimed at his back, landing right behind them and locking them into a chokehold, Edward heard the click of guns as he held this soldier as a hostage.
'No wonder they weren't attacking at once... at least some of them value their lives enough to find their rifles. Poor guys.'
And just like that, he'd ascended with another BOOM rupturing through the City's foundation, leaving those nearby captured in the opening fireball, as he soared away with more explosions left in his wake, he could barely make out the sight of their resting skeletons, burnt to the core.
Just as the bullets were seen soaring past his face, there came a hand touching his hand, for she'd pulled him into nothing, zipping up the space instantly... there remained nothing. No trace of his whereabouts, no sense of his stench, for only his residuals at the scene just some miles down. Then again, the destruction he left in his wake was nothing compared to the chaos she held at the tips of her fingers, like strings that obeyed her every thought, the most miniature of twitches originating from her nerves had sent the same reaction to their bodies. She was their master, and they were her puppets.
Those in power stood tall at the peak of the realm of supremacy, and as the requiem indistinctively quieted, their heads exploded in balls of blood, leaving brain matter to splatter the sidewalks, the apartment walls. The poor men and women left in complete and utter confusion, all they could do was stumble around curiously before their heads were crushed off their shoulders, leaving but a stump. Crying for their families with tears down their cheeks and wails littering the streets, as the blood splashed onto one soldier's visor, they were left stunned, collapsing so their knees could thud against the floor, their hands grabbed the arm of their comrade.
"M... Mom...?"
A son fighting beside his veteran mother in war, humans who had hoped to live onto the next day, those desires were squashed in but an instant, for their insolent minds were reminded of their place in the world. The son watched it occur all around, the giant's foot, the judgment of God bestowed unto those sinners who dared rebel against those with power. Divine retribution in its grandest form, but even so, if this experience were nothing could be heard were truly judgment from whatever Gods or Buddhas resided within the Heavens above, he'd never thought it'd be so gruesome as the horrific beheld before his very eyes.
The next thing he remembered? Standing up, holding the headless carcass of his mother, eyes scraping the battlefield while the pupils stood shaky. He wasn't a religious man, but he'd heard of the end times. Armageddon, the coming of the Apocalypse, the end of all things, signaled by the four horsemen. Oddly enough, he'd hoped for that climax to be beautiful, maybe like plucking a flower from a grass field or feeling your consciousness drift into a slumber. But what lay beneath his feet wasn't flowers, it wasn't an endless field of emerald blades nor was there any comforting water stream... no, for what laid before his very eyes were none other than the embodiment and incarnation of death itself.
At the end of the street, there was light? Was that salvation? Was that... God? That flapping sound in the wind he could hear from some dozen miles away, the more he squinted, the more he'd realized that shape wasn't masculine. No, no God was coming to save them, never. It was in those final moments, as that tremor of spikes continued to push away everything in its path, that he'd realized something. The second those edges stabbed into his person, protruding into his every beating heart to rid him of that life he'd grown to care for so much... he'd realized. At the end of the road, in front of that light, no God was coming to save him.
It was the Plague who'd brought that death, not only onto him but as her palm stood on the ground, she felt it course through her veins. The crunching of bones, the squelching of blood, the clumping of flesh as it smacked against the floor. Moans and groans from the distance over entering her ears just barely, but enough... for her to wince at the very sound of it. Surely enough, that mist of blood was her doing. The distant explosions as tanks' tops flew off their mechanical bottoms, the mangled corpses missing parts of flesh, limbs scattered about.
"That doesn't feel good. Not in the slightest..." She choked, fingers slipping over the mask's innards, but as she readied to remove it, she looked ahead.
The stench. Mei and Ed revealed themselves, Singh turning to the caused chaos, a dejected look in his eyes, but as Mei tended to the younger girl, sliding her hand up and down her back as she hunched over, gasping for air... the mask was still covering her face, up to her nose. And not to mention her eyes were entirely closed.
"Nat... come on, take that thing off. Focus on me," Mei suggested to the younger woman, but she slapped her hands away, falling to her knees with dilated pupils.
"NO!" Natalia cried, for as the tears squeezed out with another blink, just those streams formed streaks in her white cheeks, like a river's flow headed downhill, Smith, in the face of the ultimate destruction she was the cause of, had but one thing to say.
"I don't want to see a thing."
To Be Continued.