I Am Rage {Superhero, Action, Tragedy}

You can do this.

Yooou can do this.

Just in and out. No big deal. Today is your day. Traffic wasn't even that bad. No big deal...

You'll get your cut. You'll get your piece. It's no big deal that these three new people are barging in on our score. This one already has one, he doesn't need another. Just another lookout anyway. We already had one of those. Keith does a good job... mostly.

But it's fine. It's all fine. Today is your day. You'll get yours. Just stop staring...

Stop staring at his piece. You'll get yours. You'll earn yours. Stop staring. Stop...

Just breathe. In and out. In... and out. That stupid counselor said to do this. Said it will keep you out of trouble. For all the good her fucking words did... But it's fine. In... and out. In...

Shit. The mantra. Yeah. Need to keep to it.

Look to the light. Feed the fire. Let it warm you. Let it empower you.

Look for that light he showed to us. Look to what fed his great fire. Let its warmth radiate and surge throughout you. Feel his power make you whole.

Let it guide you.

Let him guide you.

Let his ra-

"Hey. You good?"

Huh!

"hu... Y-yeah." Stop staring.

"Our windows coming up. Just take it slow and ease us into that dock."

Like I don't know the plan!

"I...! I know. Just a small routine delivery while they make a mess up top."

While we take back what's ours. What's his.

"Well... you got this. No big deal."

Yeah... yeah no big deal. No big deal.

This guy's alright.

No big deal.

The Hill is no big deal.

White marble and glass expanse. A foyer left almost untouched from memory. Famous heroes and defeated villains. Trophies and monikers displayed and honored. Scenes given wall space to forever immortalize the times. Though the dent in the Kashmir Peace Accord's frame caught Seth's eye. And then the slight line creasing its surface. An immortalized crack on the wall's corner just passed it. And then the tiles absentmindedly walked right over.

A splayed foot just bigger than his own. Deep and marred in blackened melt. Filled in with clear epoxy and preserved for posterity. But forever ingrained in his mind far deeper than they could ever manage. A gouge leading to a trail of them stomping back to the rearranged doors passed the reception desk. That slow methodical path caught mid traverse of this place. Ending in a gashing step that set all this into motion. His break immortalized for all to see. His lowest moment there for all to-

"Welcome! Please step right up and see the history of our great heroes. As only they can tell it! As only they can show it!"

A voice kicked Seth right in the head and out of his own guilty relapse, artificial and grating but trying its best. The address meant for all entering, not just him. Though really hitting the class mulling about in front of Felicia's former position the hardest. A form had reared up in line with the speech, rising from behind the desk. A screen for a face and a smoothness to its moves belying its make only so much. A robot not too far off of the training units, though dressed up to fill in the gaps of its chassis. A brown coat and slacks trying to make it look the part of curator, yet wearing its tag saying as such in desperate reassurance of the sentiment.

"Come along. Your class gets to have the guided tour experience like no other offered. The arrays are primed and history is waiting to be shared first hand."

The original bot leading the class let this new automaton take charge, though seemed to slouch ever so slightly at the curator's pageantry. Following along behind them almost out of reluctance rather than commitment to its charges. Seth slowly approached the desk as they trotted into the periphery hall that seemed to expand deeper and stop following the original floorplan. A cursory glance over the desk's face at least pulled a smile back up on his face. No admission fees and no scanners to worry about. Just the public good of its history freely available. And a donation box for good measure.

Slowly sauntering into the display floor proper, he was met with darkened shapes and softer flooring. A carpeted quarter circle stretching out and carving through what used to be the trainee dorm and the south side of the arena, just about reaching the canteen on the opposite side from the entrance. Nicely toned down floor lights squared up the forms hidden in the dark, leading the eye to plinths and placards just before them. A sudden spotlight caught his eye, as the tour ahead of him surrounded what looked like a diorama stretching out across the floor. Until a plane trundled over it and phased away into one kids reeling head. A hardlight display, complete with beating drum and whistling exchange. Mavers's Marvels going to war.

Seth's slow walk got a bit more eager all the way up to the first stop on the path, as the battle for the fate of Europe played out for the kids. Though it abruptly stopped as the curator shepherded them along to the next display.

'Aw… it was just getting good.'

Seth's hand tapped a white spot on the plinth before him and the squared display illuminated into a slowly rezzing mosaic. A surge of power drew him up to the low ceiling, a single emitter beaming and building up the hardlight where once it needed whole constellations. Though its picture fizzed as it solidified and began to speak its spiel. So maybe not all the way advanced.

"The first age of super humans has always been a work of contention and conjecture. The origins always mixing with fables and myths too clouded to be certain of. Yet, in the face of this obstinacy, scholars can tie the first instances of such extraordinary people to the ancient gods of the Greek pantheon. Or at least their mythological legacies."

The display showed an intricate recreation of some battle played out across a wide circle. Colored tiles and fairly exuberant inlays making the scene shimmer naturally against its artificial instance. An ancient mosaic preserved to a fault. Several characters were haloed in colors mixed into the mortar it was all paced upon. Jagged edges chipped in and smooth flows carved out. Powers displayed in all too familiar fashion. Lightning and fire. Water and stone. Anguishing psionics and turbulent esoterica. Though one among them seemed more mundane than the rest. Just a short straight sword and a large hoplite shield to see him wade into the fray. A rather oddly red sword… but a very familiar shield.

"This mosaic, though disheartening to some, shows the first known battle by these 'Gods' Chosen'. The repelling of a presumed Persian army threatening the region. Though few-"

Seth stepped away from the plinth and the display fizzled out. Most of it old news and ancient history. More a reminder of those halfway sleepless nights Speaker used as teaching moments. Scouring the internet for all the information the Garkah could get and passing it on as lessons for him to fill in for empty dreams.

Whether the Gods' Chosen really started out as actual demigods didn't matter, whether Esche- sorry... 'Schwartzwald' or that hoplite satellite dish Aegis always had with her were theirs didn't have much bearing either. The ones these days were mortals with superpowers and those artifacts were just someone else's tools. Though a thought roused a chuckle out of Seth's dismissal of the ancient past. The image of Ohm with a full jolly beard and all the trappings of a real Chosen.

'Hehhe. Oh man that would be the funniest shit ever. He better still be alive, I didn't save his ass just on he could die on me.'

Seth continued on, though didn't linger at many of the displays. He was fairly caught up on the League's history, thanks unfortunately to Para. Though seeing a small scene of General Advance and Major Nguyen hunkering down together during an unnatural typhoon swept that bad memory away rather nicely. The tension going into the Kashmir Peace Accords was really cemented, until the wave of defections hit and the world got a lot less politically motivated. And seeing the true scale of the Tombstone was kind of unsettling, especially as it started getting beaten to rubble from within.

'Seriously! How was Gold Breaker that strong?! I'm not that strong and I was an actually fucking god for half a second!!'

Failing at not lingering, Seth watched battle after battle play out in hardlight overview. Reliving a nice bit of nostalgia when he used to sneak off to watch the more recent fights. Though it quickly grew more dower in feeling as the timeline inched ever closer to a bit of what he dreaded.

Though really, watching Athena's Counter bounce back Miss Malfeasance's technicolor fury didn't spark much of the emotion it used to hold. Even if his tacky trauma was just in simulation. Neither did the sight of that shield once again, as it dropped to the floor beside her mangled body as she spoke her want of peace for the world. The last voice over trailing off as the sign above the door to the next room became so uncaringly apparent. As the displays dimmed away and a streaking light arced across the low ceiling like an omen of doom. The Laceroid Crisis was next, and awaiting his appraisal.

The room was much lighter, though still dim like a haze hovered over it. The displays were more solid. Demandedly so, as even what was here shrunk the kids still ahead of him to unnerving silence. Relics of Frigateville and Brighton filled glass cases, simple solemn voice overs telling of the events as best they could be. The bases covered in exacting detail, but more careful of their delivery to avoid disheartening. And failing at that.

Pictures Seth had hoped to never see again, that crumpled overturned truck amid burned wood splintered near to tinder. The destruction and rubble of Brighton. Of every town between whose names were all but wiped out, going all the way to Berta. And that damned wall. A piece of it on full display like a relic of the Cold War. Names etched into its surface like an impromptu memorial. Rusted edges and burned surface belying none of its age, but plucking at that fulfilled promise callously. As he read those names, and marked their tally.

An unimaginable want to dust this tiny scar away so it would fade as well, but better thoughts turning him back from that line. Before the voice over tried to show him their faces…

Show him the face he knew too well.

Scratched into the blackened surface with too much anger to not come through.

Tlatoani

Shaky breaths tried to right what happened too long ago to do anything about, tried to calm the guilt already long soothed and move on. Looking too hard at the few artistic renditions that were mixed in amid the solid artifacts. The best hope they had for remembering things once the… Once Seth had demanded that signal keeping his family away from him be held.

The calm failing hard. Turning him to a massive landscape taking up the whole of a section. A massive bird of pure brilliant fire swooping across the still under construction wall. Burning Eagle's sacrifice scorching the land to hold back the tides. The faint image of a sword in each hand cutting flames into being distracting as best it could. Though only just, as what he had seen from Erdwut's trauma filled in the fate that awaited the League's founder.

Finally the laceroid on display took his mind off everything stacking up unmanageably. Scrutinizing its excessiveness of design giving him a break. The claws were too long and the scales too shiny, no damage or healing to make it real. And no emotion curled into its lifeless roar. Just more of that progra- er, sculpted hate. Not true in the slightest, just someone sanitized nightmare.

A bright spot did slowly come into being as the faux hazy atmosphere dwindled. A lack of blame for it all. No solid saying what or who had caused the crisis despite all he'd told Aegis. No Garkah, not even a hint or reference. Just a picture of a big black ball in the blind and the wanton will of the universe pointed at. Whatever they'd managed to do was quiet, if they were even still around that was. The only things left being some fragments of the Ark, though obviously fake under even mild scrutiny.

'Can't just leave such high value metal laying around. And that does not bode well for them having my armor easily gotten to.'

But soon a new dark omen came up to block the path as the next door came closer. A kid was still at the display as Seth approached, hastily scrawling and taking in all it harbored before rushing to catch up with his class. Shiny silver backpack drawing eyes away from what he had found so interesting. As Seth slowly walked up and took it in for himself. A set of shabby drawings made from what materials were available. Crayons and charcoal from the look of it. But all depicting one individual, one bright spot that brought a new dawn to that longest day.

It was him of course, Blinders baseball cap and all. The sole survivor of Brighton in all his numb hollow glory…

Till the voiceover shifted in and brought the lightening tone from interviewed soldiers to that foreboding darkness.

"… Though at the time, none knew just what it was that they had allowed passed. None knew the horror that would remain and return one day for vengeance. All they saw was a child of fortune and deserving of pity. When in reality they had just allowed Kadia's greatest villain to arise from the ash and dust of his slain family. The Sole Survivor… the one who would be known… as Rage."

The dark tone tried to draw Seth down, tried to make him fear and regret ever walking out of that hell. But all he could feel was…

Insulted.

A nerve plucked in the face of all the pain behind him. A worry that something worse awaited him just passed that door. But a need to see what has happened to his name, and too much of a slight so blatantly foreshadowed that to ignore it invited greater madness. So, as bottled up as he could be, Seth advanced. Taking that leap into the next hall and slamming face first into…

His own face.

A slow build up and no bother presented to what happened in the intervening years. Just a long hallway zagging after the Crisis' zigging. And all of it devoted purely to him and what he'd done. Starting easy and inconsequentially, his intake papers and files from Marrow's. A tiny bit of pride even coming up as he realized his life story was getting immortalized and seen by all, but swiftly devolving as the voice over cut into him.

"Though unassuming as a child, Seth's technical acumen quickly showed itself as a concern to his guardians. Secreting himself into nearby armor smiths and factories to steal and fiddle with the delicate and dangerous machinery."

'Really…? What are you going to paint fucking devil horns on me next?'

This trend seemed to continue as he skipped over his career years, unfortunately hearing blame being passed at him for sinking the armor industry because he left the most important player to flounder.

'Do these fuckers not understand data trends or something!? Your museum is run by a robot! What the fuck?!'

Hitting the training course, things lightened up, though seemed to still ooze contempt. Hiding powers for all the right and wrong reasons, hiding his identity because it would draw suspicion, the spying…

'The spying?'

A grainy still and voice over trying to tie him to a break in of the paper records on The Hill. Completely failing at proving it was him and just blanket blaming him regardless.

'Alex, if you're still around, I am going to vent the ever living fuck out of you.'

Passed the lies he smacked right into the truth made worse. Video from the bank 'heist' by Tango. Recordings from graduation against Sorrow. A few strings plucked at, as it at least told everyone that she was his mom. So Aegis at least got that through, but all of it just crumbling apart as the Elite were showed to come out knowing he was evil. It even tried to say Aegis' shield scared him. Like it was his one weakness... Not too wrong in certain circles, but still.

Then the foyer was reconstructed before his very eyes, yet his eyes were solid red and the suit was snarling. His entire life misrepresented and made worse than it really was. All blame just heaped on with no regard for anything truthful. It was like Para was having his revenge and dragging his life through the mud!

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

The battles after just growing stale, his time in Eagleville labeled as hiding in wait to strike as well as something about some Dr. Whatever. He didn't give a shit! They blamed him for dropping the Docker survivors' VTOL on the city as a way to get his suit back. Ignoring everything he did to bring them back to fucking life! Then something about losing himself, too much power or not enough when he broke down in front of Buster's trap memorial. They didn't care about the tears, they just wanted to rationalize it against their own interpretations. To focus everything on when he shattered his suit and showed everyone that he was…

'Fuckers barely know what a Laceroid is and they have the gal to label me one! Guhhhhh!'

A blatant glossing over of walking through Aegis' barrier just cemented things as Seth dreaded looking over to the next wall. The fear of some Parasonic apologist garbage showing up clenching his teeth. But his outward fury stymied as that silver backpack weaved across the displays ahead.

That same intent kid was combing through the plaques, listening to the voice overs again and again like they weren't making sense. Seth stuck his hands in his pockets so his fists didn't give away any of his ire, and joined the boy in scouring the display of the Resent battles. Labeled thankfully as such.

The kid was caught between the massacre at Fort Terrace and Seth's rebuilding of Raffles Memorial Park. A pad in his hands filled with notes reflecting through his squared up glasses. Inconsistencies he'd found. A hopeful breath easing the clench out of Seth's hands, but the attempt to try and blame him fully for everything Resent and Para did still required him to crease the ire out of his brow before he started actually growling out loud.

The boy at some point noticing him but not stopping his inquiry, just speeding up so he wasn't holding up the tour. And failing at getting anything conclusive as Seth looked down in sympathy. Looking back up to the last display after his cracking open of the sky. Looking at the massive collage of him fulfilling his promise. A massive light and titanic earthquake tearing the land apart from every angle imaginable. Even an image from space. Yet… even this, even his death was made worse by-

"Ugh... But why though?"

The kid had scooched passed under his notice, tracking through the transcript scrolling over the last of the plaques.

"Why'd he do all this and kill himself to destroy the cordon?"

He was musing out loud, but it almost seemed like he'd noticed that Seth wasn't convinced of the story either. Asking off handedly without being awkward. And almost daring him to respond.

"Maybe…"

And succeeding.

"Maybe they didn't know him? Kinda seems like he was wrapping up everything having to do with him to me."

He shrugged without looking down, but knew the kid wasn't looking either. His focus purely on the display proper now. Looking at Seth's grand death throws in all its-

"It was for all of us… to know his power."

That sudden voice sent a tightness up Seth's spine. He hadn't noticed anyone behind him, anyone else even in the hall. The absence of those contemptible sensors missed at breakneck speed. They were close, too close. Too close not to have at least been heard or felt in some vague way. Hell, he should maybe have smelled him as he inched his gaze over to the disheveled cloak that narrowly shadowed him. A dirty ragged cloth hanging over a stock still form, messy hair poking and hanging loosely out. The seethe between his lips cantankerous, but defiantly eloquent amidst missing and broken teeth. His eyes covered, but glaring straight ahead. Locked tight on the ground level spectacle of the Seth's devastating end. And all wrapped up in a cold feeling like… no…

No fuck, that's a pull!

A chilling pull emanating like he wanted all there ever could be. And a sudden realization that power was waning from everywhere he'd crossed.

That tightness became fear trying to yank Seth's breath away, mind trying to overdrive too early off the adrenaline surge. Every muscle fighting to stay rock solid in place, to look back ahead in slow unperturbed countenance. And reach down to the kid beside him frozen worse than he was. A finger creaking out, tapping the small shoulder as a breath lurched out in dammed up surprise. A soft lean down like he was looking at the plaque before the both of them, that hand point as hard as his bones could take toward the door out of here. All silent intent turning the both of them slowly away in agreement, in simultaneous flight before a predator waiting to strike.

Yet suddenly caught half way by a massing trundle from both door and hall alike.

*CAkrooo*

"Sir! I have told you numerous times you are banned from these premises!"

The curator bot had stormed back round from its tour group, and gathered a number of other bots to its sides and flanks. All similar in build but more geared toward security, and bearing down on this unassuming existential horror.

"Either you leave under your own power or you... will be..."

"Heh… heheh… Hehehahaha! You believe my faith so weak as to acquiesce?"

The man shifted, but did not lose sight of the object of his obsession.

"You believe my will so hollow as to let this blasphemy remain?"

The strain on Seth's entire body threatened to shatter as the man stretched out his arms to the whole of this subjective indignity. Narrowly cracking his façade as his hand gripped the boy's shoulder and pushed him on. As he saw a complete wrist servo jangle from that man's wrist.

"You believe your lies will go unpunished? Undefied for their crimes?"

The man finally shifted fully to what he hid away, turning down as he reached under his cloak. A form being moving up as the ties holding the cloak came loose. A form Seth knew all too clear as that cloak fell away to the man's rapturous masking. Free hand splaying out, while the other ran off its charge through their rat's nest of hair. Smoothing it in unnatural order. As that harboring visage rose up in reverence, in flattering mimicry to the real one he stowed away. Bleach white metal hammered and welded into the top half of tooth and snout. And eyes hollowed out and glaring its malice.

"Let Rage be my witness to this splendid refutation."

The tension holding Seth's spine ridged snapped apart, lunging him down on the kid unprepared. As all hell sprang loose from muscle so coiled it may as well have broken in kind. The man, this cultist defiling his name, raked about with mundane hands like a whip at the end of its length. As two security bots behind trying to apprehend became nothing but shrapnel against the walls of misinformed exhibits. Seth didn't dare look back to confirm with his eyes, all his power wrapping him tight around this defenseless kid. Because this was no place for a fight, and so they both needed to get the hell out of here!

The other security bots charged, the curator stepping out of its surprise to between Seth and this zealot. Programed preservation overruled by protection of civilians. But its words of interdiction were cut off in a metal hail. Its knee caps shattering as metal tore them away, as what remained of its escort cratered that misguided display and toppling it over frozen mid demand. A sentiment Seth didn't second guess in the slightest, not an ounce of will to stay a full second longer. But the clamp and whip of that raking arm forced a look to react. Just time to see the last of this official protection fly and crash through the door in a storm of splinters unable to spread wide. Only through in overwhelming force.

The only exit open, Seth's frazzled overdrive bolted him forward. The kid scooped up in his arms like an unwilling cat. A sidestep careening him out of the threshold's sight as the curator's modulator fizzed under a sudden silencing hand. Seth couldn't look back, just ahead to safety, only for the scope to widen worse than thought possible.

As his suit flew to the ground before him in ballistic glass sabot.

Shattering against wall and carpeted floor alike. Too complete to be real as it all exploded into scrap more fitting of a fake. A ruse, a-

"WORTHLESS PIECE OF CRAP!!!"

A harsh boom stumbled flight, both Seth and the boy forced to slide to the ground before a wall of muscle and Adonion wrath stamped apart more of his faux armor. A glare predatory falling over both them and the mess that had been scattered like caltrops. That same visage stolen for its menace and its violence. As they stomped malicious with bare feet over the slicing insulting remains toward them. Sending Seth scrambling back up before momentum finally failed to hold. A hand scraping for grip against those same splinters and sharp edges, and demanding a way to get out of this place before-

*KRAKRAKRAKRAKRA*

The low ceiling exploded in true ballistic assault, ringing every ear torrential and splitting under it. A third cultist armed and willing, forcing every head unmasked down by sheer force of overpressure in a confined space. A theme emerging in pain and negated preservation. The lanky gunner gleaming ire over all those he deemed lesser than him. Bearing both his own teeth and Seth's as he blared through the ring he seemed immune to.

"Against the wall profligates!!"

Not a massacre yet, the moment of stun allowing Seth to see a smattering of beaten down heads both large and small. The class had been caught, and other museum goers turned hostages massed alongside against the far wall behind the falling ceiling dust. Seth bucked the stun and ran like it was commanded. Weakness needed or this was going to get bad too fast to stay hidden. A swift pass off of the kid to the huddling bot that had lead this class here, mechanical arms more welcomed and welcoming than his. A flash of the bots digitized face not caught in full, a stun of its own lost in the scurry to meet the demands pressed. But too slow for the likings of the one hanging death over them all.

A boot slammed into his gut like he was a soccer ball and the gunner was playing the wrong fucking sport! A baseball bat of a shin kicking him off to his side as he sputtered under his own power to make sure it looked worse than it was. Crawling away before he tried again and found his attacks wanting for a more real effect. An open space against the wall between two scrunched up kids and a man not ready to die. Seth scooting into place with his head down and his knees near to prostration. A grit seethed out in faux pain. But a focus wrung as well, as more cold pull plied at his being.

This was what scared heroes into furious suppression. Vitriolic zealots bearing his mark and his means. The lithe gunner hovering over his bowed head, passively sucking away the heat of the room. The focal point of that pull strung over his neck like the talisman already confiscated. But firmly pressing into his pale pink skin by overtight chain. A square of armor jagged and cutting, but accepted like flagellation with less ill effects. No scars on his body, on any of their bared to the world bodies. But too many patches of pink fresh, healed flesh. Something they shouldn't be able to get out of his...

'grrrrr. I leave… one good thing behind… and it's misused to NO END!!!'

His promise to heal Ohm twisted by time, the small patch of palm armor passed along to Aegis seen as a source of actual power somehow. Freely available to any who could hold it like… Like all those discordant memories flashed into them made sense.

A small worry that he'd failed to really kill Reset getting eaten away by the prospect that something even worse had happened. Driving him lower, the entrance of the first zealot on to the exhibit floor disregarded as inward scrutiny spiraled through an eternity of recollection for something to assuage this concern. And failing hard as the press of the present echoed through the hall.

"Greatness... is not given! Power... is not offered!"

The zealot's arms were hung out in supplication to the bare ceiling. One empty and open and jangling his servo, the other laden with the curators crushed sparking head. Drawing whimpers and gasps and all eyes on him.

"Fury and wrath... merely break all down to wasted ash!"

Seth couldn't help but tighten his glare up at this lunatic. Feeling the twist in his words of every action he'd taken. As all the dishevel he had worn melted away to smooth preacher. Like a vampire playing with its food.

"So suffering, great sacrifices must be made to rouse an even greater force into being! To ignite a new rage to light up the sky!"

A fight not to burst up from his weak show. To break open this place and splatter this maniac across it. Seth couldn't help squirm and dig into the carpet. A splinter of glass digging in like a reminder that he couldn't. That this wasn't some gang hideout to lord over with free reign, this was a museum full of children and people who didn't deserve to be caught in the crossfire.

These weren't heroes thinking he was worse than he appeared, this was an audience that would remember and tell people about the damage he would do to these bastards out of sheer spite! And he was trying so very hard not to repeat history all over again. He had to calm, had to work through this, had to take away their power and leave them regretting ever wearing it in the first place.

The calm enforced its will down on his focus. Tracked the small motes of siphon and circulation as they prepared for the order dreaded. The armor scrap being compressed into the gunner's neck, the wrist servo being used like a bangle by the zealot. A firm moment of extrasensory attention directing at the bruiser, almost failing as similarities bred recollection. A mote materialized despite the draw down, an armband over his overblown bicep. Pressing a jagged piece of inner Ark metal against him with every pump of his arm. Three pieces, three targets to counter, but only one had a gun and no vanity to mar with defiance. The one leveling the boxy submachine gun offhandedly at every scared face trying to rise and know their doom.

"But that means one must be made! One of you must go and be shown that light first hand! An honor few ever receive, to be the ignition of this grand bonfire that will burn the world!"

The zealot not even looking, not even bothering to know for sure who he was-

"But you are not worthy enough."

A cold press waved out like a prickling breeze. Like an imprecise taking of an extrasensory scent. More inverse radar than actual uptake. Some greater taking of Seth's power than just threadbare healing and strength. Not enough to scry deeper in, not enough to truly know what he had, just to see without seeing in turn. See... something worth taking.

That concern skyrocketed regardless of speculation, the possibilities of just one piece of his armor giving some wretch this much was enough. All of it folding over as that calm found its timing in his bowing lower head.

"Not even a soul to miss in its passing."

The robot teacher's whir wavered in the tracking, highlighting like a light wave crashed out in more nuanced speed. A ripple in that fabric of existence. A small resonance beaten out into the air to take in the surface world. Huddling the bot down over the children in its charge. But as that wave passed, turned its gaze away. Turning down the line.

"Too small a sacrifice. Too much potential to waste."

That barrel passing over every child in the class. Heat of its firing coming closer in the clearly unconscious cold. That wave of sight beyond sight coming and going in its inverted means, and getting baffled against in equal measure. Unequally known measure.

The heat passing closer, the splashing resonance finding nothing worth the ire. Just a simple man accepting his death in wait for-

"Utterly undeserving of this honor."

That moment snapped shut.

As Seth's eyes shot up.

'Now you fucking did it.'

The barrel flashed by, that bleeding hand shooting parallel to its sights, and all the tension they dared breed crashing that sizzle against that wiry gunner's chin! To the sting of shots flailing too late and too high, tearing up the empty wall as an angle was blasted into this heathen's entire body! As Seth drove on through crinkled teeth! And flung his bullshit superiority into the ground!!

Scrunching back before that fire trailed on down, catching the out of control burst raking the ceiling and wrenching it to the carpal tunneling of their wrist. So he could whip it shot put straight into that preacher's turning head. Rattling bolt and receiver fieldstripping themselves against his stolen visage, showing that bastard what he deserves in turn!

Power coursing to high tones like electric adrenaline. Whether they planned it or not, they got what they wanted. Seth was pissed, and stacking his ire with the stamping of his foot. To put him right in line with the bruiser eclipsing him right on time.

That hand flash clenching away its sizzled blood, firing off for its match incoming. Slamming knuckles together in fleshy pop only felt one way! Recoil rippling that overbearing meat head, and only clearing the line of fire for the other hand to shoot up and shatter another smile!

A spray of whites, sweat, and red spun through as he launched up to height. Only to slam back down with that weight wedged still narrowly over his shoulder. Left arm shooting over around the bulk's limp wrist, right pressing up from over indulged bicep, and a mighty toss fighting all that momentum to bring him down. Right on top of the gunners healing head!

A thunder and rumble defying the ballistic wrung ring, the thin carpet heaving as impact cracked the concrete underneath. No horrifying squash or egg cracking scramble, but enough back meat to suffocate on to keep both on the ground. So Seth could show the zealot rocketing toward him that their quest had succeeded. And their due reward was to get the living shit beaten out of them!

A smooth duck under unrestrained clawing, sinew and tendon popping in extreme duress. No need to hold back when every wound healed away, huh? So then, there was no need to hold back on his end! Seth's fist stabbed kidney like a lateral sledge hammer, rising him back up to see the scrunch hit the zealot's eyes. And pound his face in with the other hook. The false visage crumpling like sparking tin, turning this mimicked menace brachiocephalic and this mockery into what it deserved. Recoil turning curt as only just enough power was let in to let out. Because this bastard was going to feel every punch oncoming.

The kidney again, more rib snapping accoutrement. The shoulder and collar in one conjoined impacting. The other shoulder wide to snap the ball into its joint. The hip crunched just so Seth's hand was close to its goal. Reaching back in recoil down the winced left arm, hooking that bangle rightfully his. As his own left foot curled up into battery, and shot this ignorant heretic to the far end of the hall. Through all the wreckage he ordained as blasphemy. The wrist servo snapping clean, yet wrapped up in threading secure. Taken back as one of three needing reclamation. Wrapping around Seth's wrist now, as the groaning bulk shifted aside. And the gunner shot up over him to give Seth the next in line.

Jumping with fist locked hard and broken face in retrograde. Teeth contorting his snarl trying to get back into place. Only adding more throughput to launch that fist with. Knuckle scathed cheek as Seth leaned back in, elbow stabbing chest in doubled force. But rebounding to snatch that arm out from passed him. Couching and catapulting as the other hand counterweighted, tossing the gunner to snapping angle and hammering crash. Not earth shattering but shoulder dislocating, wind knocking free, and head bouncing up. Right into the firing line.

Seth's hands released and came down in barrage, no power needed just plain old fashioned pummel against this fools face. Cracking jaw and cheek and nose alike before snatching that tight chain on their neck and kicking off the retribution. The small jagged plate snapping free and digging into his hand now. As a shadow loomed both cold and crushing from off the floor he'd crashed it to.

The bulk was off his swollen back, coming at him wide to suffocate him in his own squeezed out entrails. But only managed crest over Seth's head before the ebb of power came back in force. A trenching foot twisted him round, that fist bearing cutting metal screaming with it. Hip bone target and wrung harmonic! Impact competing for overpressure's cracking take! Intercepting that crush halfway to contact with all the pain this overstuffed menace thought he could fight through. And adding more to make him truly rue!

The other fist shooting straight, gut check nearing ballistic rippling abs and reversing GI tract by force. And adding urgency to the next hit bunching low and shooting high. Uppercut shutting slack jaw mid convulsion, splintering what was left and chasing that false visage high. As the other fist came back right in line. The whole jaw impacted from a hard left, the universal off button pressed with unequal demand. Flinging the bulk out of his collapsing crush, into a spiraling fall as his knees lost traction. And brought him low before the now looming hammer down.

Both fists pressed together and meteoric in intent, smashing that mask with all the weight of Seth's now clearly tarnished legacy! Shattering it to spalling as the bulk slammed down with everything left over, head bouncing off the broken carpet for all the good measure needing to come off of this.

A seethe almost steam coming down in turn, power raucous in his ear and in his skin as it waned. The wider world and wider objective coming into better focus, that arm band ripped off for its own scrap of what didn't belong free. Both hands now holding tight to their own respective pieces, returning them to the fold and off this... This clearly cancerous creep.

Stopping their pull with exuding excess and righting their waveforms to the better tune he narrowly bellowed with. And feeling back what his focus entailed. As the creak and rumble of his extremes became whimpers and breathless tightening. As he felt, mundane, the eyes of everyone brave enough to look up.

Turning to see that the class he'd followed in was still alright, and catching the gobstopped look of the boy he'd pulled out of harm's way. A slighted smirk unable to be fought down, nearly a chuckle sounding as Seth tried to downplay the beat down he'd perpetrated. But only managing that starting expression before more frantic reactions became apparent. Like heavy footsteps on tile and heavy voices readying to breach. So he needed to get clear pronto.

A hesitant mixed shrugged at the kid, a sudden realization that his rucksack was on the ground where he'd knelt. A bit of power let out to kick over and run away, and all the fear of discovery flooding back as Seth shot to an emergency exit. Bashing it open with no time to pocket his winnings, but just enough gusto left to spin off his shoulder charge. A fingered salute and all the pride he had left beamed in the split second offered back at the kid who gave him back just that little bit of hope.

As he disappeared over the horizon of the stairs Seth just launched himself down, spinning back hard to keep from turning that pride way too soon. And making an escape as the doors to the battlefield burst open muffled…

The... museum turned battlefield.

The exhibit detailing what happened after he died.

The entire reason he'd come here.

…

'fffffffuuuuuuuuck…'