"What's it worth? Haha, not the money, not my life just to go there." he knew it was a dream, something he couldn't obtain through means of trying.
Max turned the television off, he went upstairs to write a plan, something that would catch people's attention. Nothing came to his mind, only scribbles, dark scribbles of trying to catch the little ideas that he found. Every letter meant another march to the next, but it was nothing.
He left the paper behind, it was futile trying to describe it, let alone, trying to convince people it exists. He tried to call Dairue, to get a hold of himself, he was falling out of wanting to participate. Nobody answered he tried a couple more times, but nobody was there.
The television was left open, and a broadcast ensued. "J-alert", a singular text in the front of the tv. He went up to it and sighed deeply, rambling about how something like this could never happen. He threw the remote on the floor and kicked the shelves below, the fury of someone who couldn't think straight about what was happening.
His phone was also ringing, a similar warning from the screen appeared.
"To all, stay calm and take action immediately."
"Undergoing power surge, the detonation of an oncoming rogue non-nuclear weapon is expected"
"Power surges are going to take place, in the event of an air strike."
"Lie flat on the ground, surrounded by something that could pad debris."
"Stay away from windows."
"Local institute is to initiate mass evacuation, all underground facilities are open to public use."
Max turned the emergency on his phone off and closed the curtains. The television was repeating the same warnings, he took the plug off and placed the remote back.
"Stay calm, stay calm... No, yeah this is happening right now, we're prepared for this."
His mother called him shortly after, trying to calm him down, but nothing was working.
"Later tonight, I will put you up on the list, the bunkers are already open." his mother kept the tone light, trying to assure of his safety by making sure he makes it.
"No, sign yourself up, I'll get myself signed somewhere else. I have something to do, I'll be fine." Max insisted on his mother, knowing he'll have his backup elsewhere when the time comes.
"I'll put you up on the list, I'll give you the details in case, don't worry okay? We'll be fine." His mother said before they both gave their goodbye.
He turned the call off, trying to resist the urge to run away. Fear was eating away at the few intentions he had to save himself. That he could stay home and wait for the ceilings to fall, that he didn't need to leave the house.
"Come on! Answer damn you! We have to live man!" Max tried, despite knowing he wouldn't answer, he still tried.
The boy called Yuki instead, yet she was just as unresponsive. Maragi did not respond, Niko did not respond, the overwhelming anxiety was too much to attempt trying to call Mari. Max checked to see what was the reason, but the signal was long dead. He stood below the stairs, tucking in.
Yet the feeling of unease was keeping him from staying still, he stood up and tried to take as many things as he could. Max placed everything in his bag, all his ammunition, devices, and a hefty pair of clean clothes. He ignored everything that happened, covering his ears to keep the sound away.
The Tetsu Kabe gave its best, fighting for its life, fighting for the lives of those who sit below. Never-ending sounds, gunfire that rendered everything disabled. Max covered his body with a blanket, the blasting noises were constant. Flickering lights in the bathroom that sat next to the stairs.
Jet's flying over the sky, the sound of rockets, the trail of smoke that showed itself through the small cracks.
A relentless assault, noon was slowly coming to an end, his ears were sore from trying to kill the sounds.
Everything went silent.
The sound of jets died out, the Tetsu Kabe stopped firing.
The sound of something else was growing louder. Max gained the courage to stand, the bathroom windows were pitch black. Outside, nothing was visible. He checked the front door, yet, there was nothing.
Hallucinations, his pale skin was clammy, his veins were pulsating blue, and voices accompanied the great expanse of nothingness. The sky was empty, no smoke, no stars, and not a single noise.
The tension on the black of his head, his neck was pulling at the base of his skull. He felt itchy, yet the ich was an internal sensation, he felt the need to move.
Don't take the gun, you feel peace, you understand how death would feel, but keep the gun away. The bullet is not worth the waste, your life will be over soon, let something else take it for you.
"I should've listened, I should've left."
"Perhaps everybody will regret, everybody will care. My failures don't mean anything when am gone, and when I've failed to fulfill my promise, that's as far as things go, am done."
Max took the gun from his bag, walking to the backroom, his eyes were spinning. He could only see the blurred visions of his friends. The call, the future that wishes for his stay, yet Max had made up his mind. His mind could only hear the deep choirs of thoughts, in his mind, the ocean was chanting.
He looks unto the mirror, the vision of himself, a face full of guilt. The gun in hand, aiming at the mirror. On his reflection, it glowed with white stripe, in ever an everlasting light to which he chose to ignore. The falling droplets of water from the faucet, splashed it on the mirror, wiping it around.
His anguish was taking control, hands shaking on the precipice of falling, the trigger load heavy. The choir kept chanting, no matter what he did, it kept rising, and the voices were louder than the water.
Gunfire, the glass, cracked to pieces.
The boy's ears rang loudly, the room was closed, and the sound was trapped. The mirror shatters, the bullet falls into the sink. He aims at below his chin, aimed upwards to his skull. His ears were bleeding, his hands were injured by the splatter of shattered glass.
A second shot.
The bullet digs into his skull, his body shuts off, and within comes a coating of blood. The clot was fast, the thing was chasing the bullet's trajectory. The blood was wrapping the bullet from within, ever so slightly faster. It leaves through the top of his head, in bleeding combustion.
The sounds return, the fire keeps in check, the Tetsu Kabe initiates its line of fire for a second time, the abyssal border, fading away from the door. The oozing black matter, his eyes came to see, his body was asleep yet he could hear and feel. Twitching limbs, twitching legs, the nerves that broke from inside.
His house begins to crumble, an old roof, built to last, starts collapsing from the core. The mass keeps expanding, hands grabbing into one another, trying to pull each other down. The bullet had built a flesh trail, impaling his head behind it. It kept rising, its hands, blooming like flowers on a spring day.
It began to move, the jet's overhead had missed fire, and the Tetsu Kabe had monitored its presence.
The unrest, a sleepless city for that night, the powerlines fall to their knees. The red mass, a crawling matter of proportions nonexistent, reached out of the sky, pulling the boy behind its body. Fingers to hands, hands to fingers, more kept forming inside. It crawled over the houses, pulling the rest under its weight.
Its hands intertwined, its legs intertwined, aligning themselves with a singular body. Its body split into sections, it crawled mercilessly, crushing everything that came under it.
His body was stuck behind, the jets flew around, helicopters circled its mass. With its hands, it walked, and its legs followed suit with hitting the ground below. Rebar went straight through its feet, piercing the toes, the bone inside that snapped in half. Screaming, on an impaled stick of flesh, he tried to scream, yet nothing was coming out.
Orders to take fire began, the Tetsu Kabe redirected focus, all four domes rotated to face the mass. Powerlines were cut, its hind limbs kept going, and the gunfire could not do anything. Impervious, its rotting skin formed more hands as the gunfire continued, the electrocution made a jolt that kept it straight.
The hands rose, from the floor, it lifted its fingers slowly, yet the strike had twice the speed of its motion. The jets fired rockets into the midsection, forming a growing hole, inside was nothing but a dark oozing fluid. The hole pierced through the side, and the Tetsu Kabe assisted by attempting to cut the form in half.
With each hole that formed, the hands tried to pull, the skin was continuously bleeding, the blood was molding the crust. It severed the post lines, one dome lost its lights, it made its way to one of the domes. The Tetsu Kabe aimed its secondary barrel, a laser that kept the debris from falling to the ground, the other two domes kept firing at the fourth wave of attacks.
The heat cut through the flesh and the bones inside its hands kept forming back, yet it split in half. The form was hanging by a thread to its hind limbs. Hands tried to reach for the sky, the impaled boy, rising closer and closer.
Soon, Max was at the height of the jets, the barrel kept trying to cut, the burning slashes, yet the hands kept reforming. Soon, the mass was thinned out, the trail of crushed concrete, destruction was all it could offer.
"J-3, keep a heavy barrage down its third arm, the Tetsu Kabe will fire simultaneously, over."
"J-1, all protocols point to retreat, we're instructed to return, hangar port, over."
The jet flew back, leaving the Tetsu Kabe on its own. The tower of hands, grabbing into what little comfort it had, started shaking, it was about to fall. Soon, the tower separated into two, Max had been pulled, the muscles became a conveyor, and his body flew through the second half of the tower. The top half collapsed on the Tetsu Kabe, leaving a two-kilometer-long mass of fingers, bone, and dissolved muscle.
Fallen body, fallen form, it began to move. Faces began to form on the side, the voices of people, they asked for help. Screaming from the town that led downhill, one of the Tetsu Kabe's domes was crushed in half. The form began to move towards another dome, the mountains were closer.
The mass grew, overhead the houses, it towered over the skyline. The point of no return kept the focus, the dome was helpless. Everybody was evacuated, and streets were flooding with military personnel that assisted with medical supplies, housing, and potential debts. Mass panic arose, and the mass was filmed as it crawled slowly to the second dome.
Its path was cleared of people, the underground facilities became mandatory, and the alert system started to broadcast its presence. The form was bombarded by artillery, and the holes on its back began to get deeper, widening the pits that seemed endless. The flesh was bursting with blood as they fired with another round of artillery batteries.
Lethal weapons were used on its feet, the legs collapsed as detonations occurred. Soon the broadcasters had zoomed in, the boy was visible from the ground, his hanging body was still moving. They quickly informed a rescue operation to start, the ground level tried capturing its limbs.
The arms were prevented from moving, nets were forming around its body, layered by a second coating. Helicopters returned and tried getting close enough, its path was full of flesh, infecting the concrete, eating away. The rescuer tried to reach their hand out, Max was desperately trying to grab it, yet instead, hands reached out and grabbed the rotor blades.
Its body ate the nets that tried to capture its back spine made of farms, the arms broke the wire mesh that kept it immobile. the military redirected focus, it slowed down the change, the form was reaching a halt. Efforts went back to civilians, the rescue continues.
The television, Yuki's father watched in horror, his face glued to the screen. Yuki was spreading the news about it, telling her friends to check the windows.
Maragi and Niko saw the carnage, the noises that kept them from looking outside, became the backbone of curiosity. Their faces grew remorse, and disgust. The smell that emanated from its body was everywhere.
The military knocked on Yuki's house, soon they were instructed to leave. Yasu was awoken by his mother, a woman in her late forties trying to convince him to leave the bed. Yasu was unfazed, yet after looking out the window, he ran down to the supplies and grabbed everything he could.
Maragi, Mari, and Niko met up together with their families. They all huddled up underground, trying to run for the safest spot. They all wished to be together.
Akemi was rushed to the countryside by her family, her father took the risky way out, trying to fortify the car on the way.
Dairue was mortified, the sounds that kept him awake were deafening. Yet after hearing the steps, he took the risk and stared out the windows. His mind was over it, he couldn't believe his eyes, he couldn't believe the military would ever find out. A single fear he never thought would come true, that the world would know and find out, what lurked beyond the "Arc".