CHAPTER TWENTY TWO
Ives woke in perfect darkness, everything in the penthouse was completely offline.
He followed the vague sounds of explosions and screams to his balcony where he saw Valkreyn in an apocalyptic state.
Everywhere masked gunmen fired mercilessly at frightened civilians, every second an important building or landmark went up in a violent explosion and even worse was the suffocating odour in the air that burned his lungs with each inhale.
"Fuck!" He cursed and dragged his gradually weakening body back to his bedroom where a transparent coffin laid in wait, inside was his recently acquired battlesuit which he had only a few minutes to wear before he lost his awareness from the toxic wafting into the building.
After putting on the suit, he rushed into the kitchen and found a gas mask positioned there in case of fire outbreaks.
Boom! An explosion rocked the building, Ives immediately got into action. He left his room and jumped forward causing the armour to activate its internal levitation mechanism, he shot through the building flying over the terrified residents of his property till he reached the lobby area where gunmen were ruthlessly gunning down people screaming declarations of war.
Ives picked up a broken off piece of rubble with a metal rod still sticking out of it and used it to smash in the head of the nearest attacker before flinging the rest at another, knocking them out.
He didn't waste time in picking up the rifle of the first one he killed and gunning down anyone left. Soon seven attackers lay dead in the lobby, Ives checked for survivors in the rubble and was met with terrified gazes from other people who still remembered what that suit was capable of but thankfully wouldn't be able to find out so easily that he was the one now in control of it.
"It's okay. I am a good guy." He held his hands up and helped a fallen janitor to his feet, making the others ease.
Ives turned to the receptionist and asked, "Is there a panic area within the building?"
"Yes. In our basement floor." She nodded vigorously.
"Good evacuate as many people as you can there." Ives ordered and left the building into the streets which was a chaos of riots and despair, the air outside hurt his eyes which was becoming inflamed and many had begun succumbing to the toxin agent in the atmosphere, struggling for breath on the side or just passed out in the fiery chaos.
Ives leaped, gliding through the city, he received a nationwide emergency message from the government.
"We are currently under attack, heading towards bunkers and evacuation sites. Do not engage, we try to respond as soon as we can."
Reading this, Ives knew that this attack wasn't just happening within Valkyren.
He immediately texted Isolde,
"Where are you?"
Ives receives a reply immediately,
"Leanor Suites. I am with my grandfather, we are still being attacked. Please stay safe."
Ives followed the maps to the building in the message, seeing the battlefields which no longer consisted of only the terrorists but also local gangs trying to cash in on the chaos, Ives felt sick at their stupidity.
In the air, he began firing at anyone with a gun and when he ran out of ammo, he grabbed a cutlass from one of the dead rioters and massacred till nearly fifty people were dead.
Ives flew up, peeking through the windows trying to find Isolde. He found her on the fifteenth floor, Isolde saw the suit and recoiled.
"It's me." Ives said.
"Master?" Isolde said in disbelief. Ives turned and saw Krueger lying unconscious, Ives also watched a drop of blood run down Isolde nostrils.
He rushed and found gas masks and wore them on both of them, knowing that if he didn't find the origin of this disaster the calamity would spread.
He received a call from the person he most wanted to hear from - Zeke.
"Mister Rothschild. Please rendezvous at the Xenith."
Ives flew away alone, he couldn't fly with added weight, something he discovered after numerous tests with the suit.
He thrust his body numerous times to stack up his inertia and accelerate the suit further, he reached the speed of a highspeed car but struggled to see his way or control his movements in the air after a while. The air was freezing cold but thankfully he was above the range of the invisible toxic smug now permeating the city.
His strength slowly returned to him and soon he reached the Xenith which was under siege, then the cops stationed there didn't bat an eye when he ruthlessly tore apart the attackers and subdued any unrest.
Everyone parted ways as he entered the elevator and pressed the unseen button.
"Good evening, Mister Rothschild."
Ives laid eyes on Zeke the moment he stepped out, he didn't waste time to ask.
"Zeke. What's happening?"
Ives' question was immediately answered.
"Are you familiar with the communist state of Guang Union?" Zeke began.
"Yes. Every one on the planet knows what those motherfuckers are all about." Ives returned.
"Good, this saves me a lot of time, I would have originally used for explanations. Well hours ago their leader - Mu Bin called for armed aggression against their enemy sister nation, Huaxia. One of their tactics to kick off this war is to make a strike against supporters of Huaxia by activating all their sleepers already positioned within those nations to make targeted strikes at crucial points in order to weaken and disstabilise those nations. Valkyren is within this battlefield since we are a city within the United States of Columbia, an avid supporter of Huaxia's democracy and secession from Guang's tryannical regime. We recently found out that Zhou gin chemicals stationed on the west outskirts of the city was in actuality a ghost organization, set up and founded by Guang Union, the toxic plume corroding the city might be their doing, same for the explosives and others. They are mostly likely the sleepers main base of operations."
Zeke narrated this chilling information with a face so straight and tranquil he could almost be called a 'Saint'.
"Am I wrong to believe that the Cabal won't openly intervene in any way that threatens their secrecy regardless of how many die or worse?" Ives noted with cold finality.
"Yes, no matter the circumstance we never openly intervene in political or national matters unless our collective survival is threatened which in this event seems to be the the case. The death toll is trivial to us, every single day people die all across the globe in horrifying ways to gruesome for even a horror movie from countless atrocities committed beyond our control. We aren't using that as a main determinant for our movement against Guang's attacks." Zeke explained.
"Then what is our determinant?" Ives questioned.
"Because this pointless war would stand in the way of some of our most crucial plans, we cannot afford to allow it to continue."
"How can I help?" Ives asked.
____________
Beelzebub stood in waiting at the edge of a cliff outside the vicinity of Valkyren in the perfect place to observe the carnage occuring far off.
"Lord Beelzebub." He turned to see the owl mask and the eagle mask approaching, the eagle mask was in his hollow body armour that looked like it had been in serious use while the owl mask was clean and neat like he was fresh of the bath.
"Zeke Igles and Ives Rothschild. Umm… What do you think of this scene?" He pointed to the chaotic city whose screams could be heard even in the distance.
"Is there any particular way I should feel? My property is in shambles because of these assholes." Ives intelligently laid his complaint.
"Oh Darling. Is that truly all that is troubling about this?" Ives heard a voice speak to him from nowhere, he turned hoping to see who spoke to him but found no one else around.
"Wrong direction, Dear." Suddenly, a thin veil materialized and slid off revealing a mouth watering figure of a woman surrounded by three featureless masks, her refined air and carefree atmosphere made her immediately made Ives feel tense. Another one of her notable features was the deer mask protecting her identity. Ives had to now live with the realisation that it was possible for someone to conceal every inch of presence from awareness, having a clear access to his most private and vulnerable states.
"Sorry. I don't understand your question." Ives commented.
"Umm…. What is there to understand? If you were given the opportunity. How would we proceed to thwart this strike against Guang Union. Humor me."
"First, we find a way to gain information concerning the time of their attack, method of execution, the number of personnel involved and possible countermeasures they may have in order to ensure their success preferably from a know Sleeper who have identified themselves by being part of this assault and even then we will make countermeasures of our own in case the information given was false in any way. We use the chaos they will create in their first wave to eliminate them with as little witnesses as possible though there will be casualties it will be much more contained. Then a strike against their main base will be in order, we find a way to infiltrate their main base of operations, finding a way to destabilise their plans before their operation fully commences." Ives laid out a clean course of actions for this hypothetical scenario. The deer mask bridged the gap between them and touched his face.
"I find you interesting. What is your name?" She asked sweetly.
"I don't feel comfortable giving out my private information just like that." Ives dismissed her request.
"I know that voice, Ives Rothschild, Right? It's been a while. Will you assist in the operation?" The deer mask asked.
"When?" Ives asked confused.
"Yesterday." The deer mask stated.
"What if I told you I could still access the past?" Beelzebub began.
Ives kept quiet when he heard this, if this was even through in the slightest bit then the order's capabilities were beyond terrifying.
"Wouldn't such a thing come with significant risks?" Ives questioned the sensibility of even risking such a thing if it was indeed possible.
"Yes, it is indeed a horrifying thing to even perform because it costs the life of an entire universe." The entire place went silent as Beelzebub uttered these words.
"Imagine the universe was a wave, a massive ripple travelling out from its origin point through the cosmic background. Every form of energy, matter and particle arrangement would be miniature distortions in the waves internal structure and each individual oscillation as the flow of events as the distortions interact with one another and the wave travels outward. There exists an informational boundary that ensures that past and current oscillations do not interact with one another but through so dubious means I managed to find a way to bypass this boundary through I can only transmit information and only within a set time boundary that varies depending on the severity of the alteration made. When I change the course of events within a previous oscillation, a new oscillation spawns and travels outward along the path of the previous one which eventually erodes, possibly obliterating everything that exists within the previous oscillation or at least that what I believe occurs but lets find out."
Beelzebub retrieved a device from his jacket and pressed it, suddenly an halo spread out from the device at unimaginably speeds engulfing the horizon and possibly the entire world which began unravelling.
"The boundary exists as a form of cosmic censorship, it keeps things linear and uniform allowing the universe to maintain stability but when that disappear. Cause and effect overlap in ways our fragile minds could have never imagined."
"Beelzebub you degenerate, you didn't inform me that your little toy had such drawbacks." The deer mask cursed angrily.
"You didn't ask and why would you, you enjoyed using it for your little games. How could I spoil your fun." Beelzebub mused, Ives stared in horror as he watched the world unravel.
The outline of things became blurry, a long trail flowed from behind everything stretching behind them into infinity, incomprehensible entities began popping in and out of existence in every location some resembling living entities while others looked like abstract art pieces. Massive spatial aberrations inflated out of empty space revealing their interiors which showed recurring scenes of different events taking place within different possible iterations of their world. Ives watched Zeke torn apart by one of unidentified entities appearing only to reappear out of one of the aberrations completely fine only this time he wasn't wearing his mask and looked around like he was witnessing a nightmare. The world wasn't falling apart, it was mutating.
Ives felt his ears ring as his mind fluctuated across different lifetimes of experience which he didn't have any recollection experiencing each came to an end when similar events began occurring showing that Beelzebub had used this device a multitude of times sentencing countless timelines to this fate. Without the normal causal order, the world as they knew it was taking on a new terrifying form.
"Brilliant. Isn't it, Mister Rothschild?" Ives heard Beelzebub comment admist the chaos.
"I can handle a city being destroyed, the universe? Well, not so sure. I hope this was necessary." Ives responded with rage laced in his voice that at the absurdity of Beelzebub's actions.
"Of course, I have been able to receive information from various waves but I cannot access the experience of my fellow counterparts as they watch their worlds unravel. This handicap has plagued me for some time so I am thrilled to finally witness this." Beelzebub said.
The ground beneath them burst open as a spatial Aberration formed underground, sucking them in. Ives was caught off guard but Beelzebub, Zeke and the deer mask managed to evade just in time.
"Farewell, Mister Rothschild."
Ives fell into a distorted landscape bearing an eerie similarity to a certain dream that has long plagued him. Miles and Miles of cityscape without anyone present to utilise it.
"Ives?" A voice that shouldn't be present called out to him in surprise, Ives looked at his deceased mother watching him from a few blocks away, without any other sound, her voice travelled to him without fail.
Ives knew what was next, he didn't speak. He launched himself at the woman who stood in place watching the armoured being approach her. Suddenly the space behind him began contracting as this remnant fought to keep him away. Ives watched the same shadowy figure emerge and stab her in the back ending her life.
Ives fell into the pull of the spatial contraction, he found himself ejected back into his world as the spatial aberration collapsed launching him into the path of a new one. He saw himself being dragged off by Luke and his gang as the world behind them started to collapse.
'None of these were dreams.' Ives realised, terrified at the prospect that his worst nightmares were more closer to reality than he could imagine.
The space contracted again and expelled him in violent burst back out of the aberration. Ives found himself once again in another aberration, watching Valkyren broke apart pulled in by a massive golden light above them. Admist the screams of fleeing people, Ives saw his Mother calling out for him. Their eyes met adn and Ives removed his helmet to show his face, she ran towards him and flew at her. A thump quaked the world beneath as the body above them pulled them in with increasingly force, their feet left the ground. Their figures became more distorted as the absurd forces now acting on them forced their bodies to reconfigure itself, they were base quantum information was being twisted by the collapsing reality.
Ives saw his limbs stretch out, blossom new appendages and dissolved before reforming. All these happening before he could even understand what was going on. His mother on the other hand was no better, the left half of her part was now skeletal like and this infestation slowly creeped up to the other half of her body, the thing above them thumped again and swallowed everything.
After a brief moment of silence, Ives woke up.