His first impulse was to clear his throat from all the dust. Some even managed to cling to his eyes, so he found himself curling his head forward to frantically rub them. That's when he saw it.
Through a broken piece of glass, he was met face to face with a haunting reflection. Behind him two vibrant wings follow closely. It was a sight he recalled from a dream -or rather, a meeting he'd almost chalked up as a dream.
He immediately crept back, tripped on a piece of rubble and fell on his butt. Once again, Akuma rubbed his eyes this time desperately as he hoped for this to all be some expensive prank.
Akuma took three deep breaths, calming down as he faced that possibility. Besides, even if the wings were real, it isn't that bad of a situation. In fact, they had a divine feel to them, making him feel as if his dream to one day become God had somehow manifested before him. But as his adrenaline faded, his heartbeat slowed, his tunnel vision vanished, and his body was again able to process the things around him. The first being his right hand. There was a warm sensation settled beneath his palms, clinging to the caps of his grip. Akuma looked at his hand, confused as to what it could've been.
Gazing at the crimson dew he was oddly reminded of his own eyes.
"Blood…" He muttered to himself, his mind still confused as to his situation.
He turned his attention to the right, looking to see where the blood had come from.
The decapitated head of what should've been a child brimming with hope and life. Her neck looked as if it'd been ripped off from the rest of her body. There was a part of him that wanted to remove the debris above her head -as if clinging to the possibility that she could be saved. And yet, the more rational side of him knew there was no saving her.
The building around him was completely gutted by flames and only a few pillars of metal were still holding together. Once a restaurant bursting with activity was now a skeletal frame littered with a whole house worth of corpses.
And in the middle of those corpses was Akuma, his fingers trembling from the events that transpired. The pungent stench of iron made him gag every time he caught a whiff. But strangely, what most troubled him was not the sight of dead civilians. It was the fact that the scene played out before felt indescribably familiar. But from where? Where could he have seen such an event? And even if he had seen it somewhere, I highly doubt he would've forgotten. So then how? Where? …It felt like that piece of his brain had been chipped away.
Akuma picked himself up, his mind a tangled mess of confusion, desperation and slight hope.
For some reason he was determined to find at least one survivor. And yet, there was a part of him that prayed… everyone had died. He tried his best to shut off those thoughts, but as he flipped through large rubble here and there his mind often wondered off to the fantastic possibility that everyone had died.
Akuma suffers from a mental disorder. You see, there are two sides to him -like two conflicting people within one mind. And for some reason… no matter what it is… they can never seem to agree on one thing. He's been that way for as long as he could remember.
Once again Akuma tripped, this time on a dead couple, their corpses mangled by a mysterious force. As he picked himself up, he realized something. Truth be told, it was a realization he should've had the moment he saw the first corpse. It wasn't that he was searching for at least one survivor, rather there was one he was unconsciously looking for.
Sweat poured down Akuma's face as begged the question, "Where was Tenshi?"
He desperately looked everywhere, flipping every piece of debris in his path, hoping he would just be there. Perhaps he was already dead. Perhaps he was on the verge of it. Anything could have happened, but the only thing that mattered was finding him. And it was then, as he continued to hopefully look through every debris and organs in his path, that he spotted someone's burnt body. It was the only body he found in one piece, but they were dead all the same.
It was lying face up with some type of short iron pole lodged through their chest. They had a familiar looking skull ring on their right index finger that made him want to take a closer look, in hopes that he was wrong. But standing there above the burnt body, he realized his judgment wasn't wrong. There was no doubt. It was Tenshi.
He fell to his knees in disbelief, as he bared witness to his brother's unrecognizable form. The ring was honestly the only reason he knew it was him. Only he would ever wear such a eggy thing. On his index finger no less. In truth it was just a cheap gift Akma gave him for his birthday that he for some reason kept a hold of, even after all these years.
"Now this is just pathetic." a deep voice proclaimed as they began to laugh. Hearing his voice alone felt as if he were stranded in a blizzard of sharp razors. "Just look at yourself. You're covered in your own vomit and down on your knees like some insignificant little worm. This is just ridiculously funny!"
As Akuma turned his head to match their gaze, the sight of what he could only assume to be a foot, smashed into my face. The sheer impact should have caved in his facial bones and the blow sent me flying into one of the few remaining pillars. The second his back made contact, he felt an intense pain circulating throughout his entire body and fell into a brief unconsciousness. One would question how he could survive such an attack, but that was the farthest thing from his mind. Immediately after opening his eyes, there was a fist waiting to greet him. One that sent him flipping through the wall and into the parking lot, caught by Tenshi's car. Blood pooled down his face, and a mixture of blood and saliva dripped from his mouth.
After such a deadly attack he didn't even need to see that thing to know it wasn't human.
"Such a fragile and weak creature you are." The monster scoffed, walking across the parking lot. "You might actually be worse than an insect. I can't believe I was so cautious as I approached you too! Even after reducing this place to rubble, I stayed back to gauge your reaction! Just for you to be this pathetic? This is just too funny!"
It was the first time since hearing his eerie voice that Akuma managed to catch a good look at him. Laid out on the damaged car, he saw a being equally as unbelievable as the angel in his dream, no, this one was definitely worse.
His lanky body towered over his, a shadowy combination of crimson markings and obsidian skin. And before he knew it, death was only inches away from him, almost in slow motion.
At that very moment, time as he knew it reconstructed itself and a wave of memories began broadcasting into his brain. Events like getting punched by his dad during training and even lying about doing his homework. Weirdly, he even remembered things like, all the times he said "good morning" to his brother, working part-time at a fast-food restaurant and even eating with some friends. Well, that part was from a dream as he had no friends. However, there was one real memory. Alice. How he wished he could have seen her smile just a couple more times. Maybe even just once.
(I see… so this is what it feels like to have your life flash before your eyes… Am I really gonna die here? …Die...Die? Death... Hm. What exactly…does it mean to die? Will I see God? Will I see Satan? ...Or will I simply vanish away? Times like these... I wish I was the one to decide… Then I wouldn't have to worry about judgment. I could be the one to judge others… When exactly did I start feeling this way? How long as it been, since I've started calling myself God… Y'know… I don't think… I wanna die right here.)
With adrenaline cursing throughout his body, he rose up and took a stance that was perfect for both defense and offense. He carried his left leg forward and slightly bent his knees while shifting his weight toward the left leg. Then he put up his left hand with my elbow slightly bent out, and his right fist charged just above his waist.
With this stance he'd be able to block and reflect attacks with my left hand and simultaneously attack with the right hand.
The sight of Akuma choosing to retaliate instead of cowering in fear put a grin the monster's face.
In an instant, his fast made its way to Akuma's face, at a speed beyond humans. And yet, in a way, it seemed slow. The wings glitching on his back became a sold white for an instant, allowing Akuma to react. He used the back of his left hand and shifted his forearm away from himself, leaving his head and torso completely open. Then he used his right hand and fired a quick jab to his nose, followed by a hook to his jaw. Though he seemed to have felt the hit, that wasn't nearly enough to knock him unconscious.
The monster retaliated with a hook using his left arm but expecting this, Akuma ducked and countered with a raging uppercut using his right fist. Which he followed with a sweep to his legs, resulted in him sliding to the left. But this boy, angered and desperate, wasn't going to let him off easy. He sent his fist to assist with the fall by connecting to the monster's right cheek. The connection sounded like an explosion, giving off a large "BOOM!" sound. The force produced shattered the asphalt into pieces, cleared the debris and created an impressive crater.
While most would question where this sudden power came from, and how it came into their possession, the only thing on his mind was destroying this clown.