Author's Note- I would greatly appreciate it if you reviewed this story after finishing it; it'll only help me improve my skills.

Empire

He cradled her still-warm body, numbed agony dripping down his cheeks, mind sharply focused on the quick, then slowing, and finally stopping pulse within. He had tried everything: jump-starting her heart, cooling her body. But with all his power, he still couldn't save her. He heard, as though a knife had just whistled past his ear, the sharp hitch of breath, then the sound of scuffling, stumbling hands, and curses as the assassin reloaded their rifle. He turned his head towards the pumice carcass of a former parking garage caught in the Blast. A glint of gunmetal shone in the shadows, then another shot rang out. It hit him in the scalp. He barely felt it. He gently kissed the corpse on the top of her blackish-blue hair, then gently lowered her to the ground. He turned and started walking towards the crumbling garage. Another shot, this time in his forearm. Another, in the abdomen. A third, in the chest. He kept walking.

The sniper continued firing, bullet after bullet. By the time he was halfway across, he would have already been dead five times over, if he had still been human. As he got closer, the shooting tapered down, and the panting spiked. He reached the concrete wall and slowly lifted himself up and over it. The breathing stopped as he settled.

He walked over to the wall a few feet away, placed his hand on it, and pushed gently. It crumbled, revealing a crouched, military-dressed woman with a little girl in a simple white summer dress grasping her gloved hand. The woman looked at him with a look of horrified rage.

"I'm-" she began. He waved his hand and she broke apart, dust to dust, leaving a fading scream behind. The girl began to wail, a single, long stream.

"Welcome to your new life," he said, gazing at her trembling form. "I have a lot of names: Death, Demon of Empire City, Beast. But you can call me Cole." He squatted down to her level and stuck out a hand. "What's your name?"

The girl looked at Cole with terrified eyes and said something softly. Cole heard it, but he said, "What did you say?"

"Julia," she repeated, a bit louder.

"Well, Julia," Cole said, turning away, "come with me. I need to bury my life"

"What do you mean?" she asked in a confused (and still fearful) tone, .

"Oh, you must not have seen what happened, he said as he started his way back to the corpse. "Your mother-"

"Mrs. Jin," she said, voice squeaking, as she began to walk. "She's not… she wasn't my mother."

"Ok, fair enough. Well, Mrs. Jin killed my wife and unborn child, so now I have to go bury them."

"Oh my god," she whispered.

"Don't worry," he reassured her, looking back over his shoulder at her a few feet away. "I won't let anything happen to you."

"Why not?" she cried. "Why don't you just vaporize me like you did her?!"

"Because," he said patronizingly, "I need your power. You're like me, Jul-"

"I'm nothing like you!" she screamed, stopping. He kept walking, tuning out her little tirade as he drew nearer to his shattered heart. When he reached her, he gently scooped her up into his arms and began to climb up to the pedestal of asphalt in the center of the crater. Laying her down, he lifted his arms. The ground trembled as a magnificent mausoleum arose out of the grime. The diamond-encrusted door swung open silently as he picked her up again and strode forward into the burial chamber, where a simple quartz-and-sapphire coffin lay open on a granite pedestal. He lowered her into it and gazed at her for a moment, stroking her face. She would never laugh again, never flash that smile that only he understood. "I love you, Lucy Kuo," Cole McGrath whispered, tear streaking down his cheek. "Forever."