Thanks go to EpicSlayerGuy99, Wingah, Zack Frost, 10burgers, ipadnoodle, Get vectored, Acoolnamme, Jack54311, MadMalitian, CrystalGamer82, Chara Moonstone, WhoWritesThisCrap, Doctah Sawbones, JasherTheDarkened, Okami Endless, Stillnyte, Genowar, Thesaiyan21, NBoss01.

Jack54311, I'm really sorry to hear that you weren't feeling up to reading the fight scene last chapter. I know fights aren't everyone's favorite thing, and that it has been quite a lot of them. I appreciate you reading and reviewing anyway, and I urge you to reread that fight some time when you're feeling more up to it. I work hard to show character in fighters during a battle so that it isn't just a pointless punch fest, and I do think there was some interesting developments in Chara's character shown throughout that battle. Either way, I hope you enjoy this chapter and have a good day. :)

Thanks for reviewing Thesaiyan21! It made me really happy to hear about the impact DoubleTale has had on you and your childhood! Thanks for supporting me this long, I hope you continue to read and enjoy my work! :)

Glad to see you back MadMalitian, it's been a minute. I hope you've been enjoying the story. :)

I'm happy to see you're still following along with the story JasherTheDarkened, I wasn't sure you were still around. I'm glad to know you're still enjoying my work. :)

Whoa kay that was a lotta responses! I'm really glad so many people reviewed last chapter, and that people have haven't reviewed in awhile or don't review often left one for me. That was really nice of all you guys, thanks for the support! Sorry about the late chapter, I've been real busy lately. I promise I'm still working on DoubleTale whenever I can and have no plans of stopping anytime soon! Hopefully my schedule is opening up, and next chapter should be here in two weeks!

Disclaimer: I do not own Undertale.

"I can't guarantee Mount Ebbot's still gonna be standing when me n' him are done."

"W-whoa... So cool..." Pale blue light reflected in large, circular glasses. This light illuminated the otherwise darkened room in which one monster sat on a couch, slouched forward. Down her scaly snout eyes watched intently from behind the glare of her spectacles. She was completely enamored, unable to tear her focus away from her screen.

"Enjoying the show?"

"Ahh!" The reptilian monster jumped suddenly, her glasses slipping down her snout some as her head whipped back around to spot the looming skeleton behind her. Her dark eyes were hard to make out in the shadows, and she snorted with some amusement when she spotted her acquaintance there, her panic from a second ago fading fast. "Badster."

"You know, for someone who's all seeing, you're very easy to sneak up on." Badster's smile was cranked up a little extra far as he loomed over Alphys from behind the couch, his long back hunched.

"I think 'all seeing' is a bit of an exaggeration, doctor." Alphys frowned at Badster for a moment, but then her uneven smile returned. She reached up, pushing the static flickering over her specs back up to obscure her eyes from view. Then, with another nasally, condescending laugh, she gave a question. "How's the hand?"

"..." Badster frowned some at Alphys' ridicule, carefully unfolding his hands from behind his craned back. He lifted his phalanges, showcasing two perfectly healthy hands. Then, a third appeared over his head. This hand was wrapped in medical tape, splints setting the shattered digits in place. "I have spares."

"Trying to shake hands with The Angel. Not the brightest move." Alphys turned her lenses back to the viewing portal before her. Then, over her shoulder she waved one hand dismissively at Badster, like she was shooing him away. "Now go, scram. This is the best part of my show."

"Ah ah." Badster didn't hesitate in taking a step around Alphys with his long legs, getting right in her line of vision. This made her lips curl down in an absolutely disdainful frown, her glasses lifting up to spot the smiling face of Doctor Gaster. "You and I had a deal, little miss shadow broker."

"You wouldn't want me to have to go back on my end of the deal, would you..." Badster's sockets narrowed cruelly, watching the glasses slip slowly down Alphys' snout. Now, in the light of her screens, her eyes could be seen. Or, rather, the lack thereof. Where there should have been eyes, endless back voids resided. But this darkness stared back into those who peered into it. This darkness stared into all. "... CORE Alphys?"

"... You have any idea what I'm losing by giving out a fight like this one for free?" Those vantablack orbs narrowed furiously up at Badster, but his wicked smile only grew.

"Less than you'll lose if I stop my work with these kids." Badster spoke in a wonderfully friendly tone, tilting his skull to the side some. It brought him joy to see CORE!Alphys's deceitful teeth grind together, before finally she shut those empty eyes, and breathed a long sigh.

"... Fine, Badster. A promise is a promise." Alphys reached up, pushing up her glasses with one pointed nail and covering those eyes again. "And you've more than delivered on your end."

"Thank you, my dear Seer." Badster stepped back and out of Alphys' way, the malice disappearing from his cracked eyes. He put back on the friendly mask of his regular smile, folding his hands carefully behind his back. "I think you'll find this choice to be very beneficial in the long run. To both of us."

"Yeah, yeah..." Alphys grumbled moodily, rising her claws up over her head. At this command, thousands of lights flicked on above, illuminating the darkened room and showing a ceiling way higher than one would have originally thought.

Now it appeared that Badster and Alphys stood on a platform in a long, vertical tube. There was only one doorway, that the platform stretched back towards. Below it was all just a straight drop down into the endless shine of endless screens, and above was the exact same. These many portals were all displaying the same show now, identical to the one large monitor that Alphys had been watching from her couch, the only furniture in this place and the centerpiece of her platform.

And Badster watched, sockets slowly going wide. Glee flickered in his white pupils, and for once that smile seemed genuine on his skull. It grew and grew, shaping his features into a bewildered and joyous grin. He slowly spun in a circle, looking out over the labor of all his efforts. It was like he almost couldn't believe this was really happening.

It was finally time.

The Reunion would be before a grand audience.

Chapter 46: Always The Bridesmaid

Part 1

"That is shocking! That is fantastic! That is baffling!"

"Hm hm hmm..." A smile gracing her lips, Aliza leaned a little out of her apartment window. In her hand she held a tiny, cute pink watering can, delicately tilting it over the row of small flowers that was hooked on the outer sill of her window.

The flowers were an odd mix, whites and reds and purples. But, though they might not have mixed the best, Aliza liked them. It was a little freedom that she was very thankful for, being able to decorate and live in her own way. She had a job, she had a home, and it was all her own. Her life was simple, but she found that... Oddly pleasant.

She still thought about Anthony very often. It had only been a little over a week since her voyage through Horrortale at the side of The Anarchist, but things had changed drastically for her. She was still lonely, and still anxious, and she still missed her best friend. Though she had known Anthony for only a short time, and he had displayed some haunting character traits in that time, he had still been kind to her. He had treated Aliza like a person, acknowledged her as something of her own and not just what he wanted her to be. And that meant... Something. In fact, that might have meant everything.

Krrrrcchhh...

"Huh?" Aliza perked up from her usual internal monologue, turning her head back into her apartment and towards her TV. There, as the center piece of her cute little living room, her smaller box shaped television had seemingly lit up on its own accord. In her violet slippers, Aliza skeptically tip toed towards the machine, furrowing her brows at the screen.

Static flickered, waxed and waned, before finally it disappeared. Then, clear as day she could make out a mountain peak, illuminated in the beautiful oranges and pinks of a half set sun. In the spiky peaks of stone, there was an opening where earth flattened into a plateau. And that is where her attention was drawn.

The first thing she noticed was an extraordinary man. He stood tall, violent embers flickering with little crackles of electricity along his body. On his back he was branded with a symbol that Aliza thought familiar, but couldn't place. This brand glowed, burned even with a pure white shade. More outstanding than this strange mark however was the four wings that surrounded it. They were black, carved from obsidian but elegant and malleable like some kind of ink. These wings were alight with veins of glowing red, slowly brightening and dimming periodically.

Aliza stared at this man, this Angel walking the earth for several long seconds. Her brain pondered many things. What strange show was this? Was this real? Was this some program? These questions were stopped short however when she looked to the one that stood across from The Angel, and her eyes snapped open wide.

"A-Anthony?!" In an instant she had dropped to her knees, grabbing the sides of her TV and leaning her face in close to the screen. The pale light of the television reflected in her fearful eyes as she inspected the crowbar wielding albino closer. It was obvious, there was no one with a look like that other than Anthony The Anarchist.

"I thought I should be crowned king before I kill The Angel."

"... Anthony..." Aliza let the name slip past her lips one more time, semi-wide eyes never blinking. Pensively she stared into the screen, brows furrowed as her fingers tightened their grip on the corners of the TV. "... Did you do it?"

"I'm not the cause, Aliza. I'm the effect."

"You must have..." Slowly, she leaned back onto her knees, pulling her face away from the screen some. She reached up, slowly clenching her hand into a fist over the chest of her shirt. "N-now you're finally at your goal, aren't you, Anthony..?"

"Somewhere... Quiet, I think. Somewhere real quiet."

"... Win." Aliza told him, though he would never hear her. But she hoped, someway somehow, he would feel her. From the looks of things, Anarchy was a monster, and he was facing off with some holy being sent to smite him. But Aliza knew Anthony, and she knew that wasn't true. "Y-you have to win..!"

Anthony The Anarchist was not the villain, and Aliza felt she was the only one in the world who knew that truth. He had picked her, after all. She was his one friend in the world, even if she couldn't be by his side anymore. So instead she knelt there, the one in a billion rooting for The Bastard Son. She hoped he knew that. She hoped he understood that someone else believed he was the hero of this story.

"You worked harder for this than anyone else!" She told him through the deaf television, a rare red glint flickering in her purple eyes. "S-so do it!"

"Win, Anthony!"

A gust of wind made the ink dyed strands of Future's hair wave and tussle some upon his head. The sky was overcast, getting darker. He thought it might rain, and that almost made him laugh in a boo-hoo kinda way. It would have added a great level of drama to his current endeavor.

Rest In Peace

He had taken it upon himself to bury Chara. Far away, on Ebbot's highest peak. It was likely no one else would ever reach this high; he'd needed the use of his wings to make it up here. The air was thin, the wind was harsh. But it was as high as he could lift them, and it was the only way he could keep their grave protected.

In the final quarter of their life, Chara had made a species worth of enemies. And of course the Monsters were right in their disdain towards the Fallen Heir; they had in fact exterminated over half of their population. Everyone had lost someone. Future certainly wasn't an exception. But, he didn't hate Chara. That much he knew, and he was glad he'd gotten the chance to make that clear to them, too.

... He didn't tell the Monsters what Chara did. He doubted they would understand. He doubted one sacrifice would make it up to them. Future wasn't even sure if it had made things up to him. But, he did know that in Chara's final moments, they did the right thing. And even if it was too late, and it didn't fix all they had done, that meant something. In fact, at least to Future, it might have meant everything.

He visited them up here every day. It was a long walk, followed by what was usually difficult flying, but he was appreciative of the journey anyway. It was the only time he allowed himself to fly anymore. He had failed as The Angel, he knew he hardly deserved the wings anymore. So a difficult, shitty flight to a melancholy place seemed fitting as the only use he got out of his feathers anymore.

Emerald eyes never leaving the cold obsidian shade of Chara's tombstone - which was not marked with any name or any lifespan - Future reached into his coat pocket. After a moment of searching, he pulled the silver of his flask free, and calmly took hold of its cap in his free hand. He spun the cap until it popped off, and then tilted his head back, bringing his drink to his lips. He didn't drink for too long, just a gulp or two, before he lowered the alcohol away from his mouth.

After resealing his drink and stuffing it back away in his jacket, he let his eyes lower to the ground in front of Chara's headstone, where they narrowed a little painfully. He stared at the flowers he had left them. Glassy black, crafted in hard ink and taking an appearance that was both beautiful and ghostly. Once upon a time he had left their old grave in the Underground one flower, years later he had crafted them an entire bouquet.

"..." The king took a deep breath, shutting his eyes while he considered speaking. It was hard to find any words that accurately described how he was feeling. It was hard to find a reason to say them. The fact of the matter was, he had more important things to do. His people were in disarray, his kingdom's center piece was a massive crater, which was directly next to another, slightly smaller crater. And both of these scorched landmasses were surrounded by shattered roads and crumbled buildings. He had spent enough of his life feeling sorry for himself or for others. Now was the time for action.

Suddenly, light flared in the dark sky, shining right down on Future. He squinted his eyes some at this sudden and less than welcome change in lighting, turning his head up to investigate what could be displaying this strange, blueish white light down upon him. It was a color not unlike that of a television or a computer screen.

The king's eyes widened however when he spotted the source of this light. A mountain identical to the one he stood atop now was on display on some shimmering portal. It was a massive, 2D rectangle that floated in the sky above, blotting out the clouds in favor of its show. And what a show it was, Future deduced with the clench of his jaw.

It was a face he hadn't seen in some time, but one he recognized quite well. Pale skin, blood red eyes, fangs perfect for ripping flesh. There was no mistaking it, that was Anthony The Anarchist, his former best friend. Or, at least some version of him. Future couldn't deny that looking at that maniac's face for the first time in years soured his mood further, reminding him of even more failures he had made.

He didn't have time to contemplate that however, his train of thought taking a separate rail when he spotted the man that was striding right towards The Anarchist. He recognized him too; Cter The Angel. His eyebrows rose, a grimace taking over his face as he looked upon his younger self. The red in his eyes matched Anarchy's perfectly, and the wings on his back set him apart from the rest of his kind. That made it hard to doubt; Future had met this specific Angel before.

"Ah, shit..." Future squinted his aged eyes to be certain he was really seeing what he thought he was seeing. At the same time, he was pulling that flask out of his jacket again, unscrewing the cap. Shaking his head, his eyes never left this display, more and more disbelief appearing in his eyes.

"Is that my munchkin?"

"... What..?"

The Gatherer and The Predator had paused their battle, both of them staring with equal bewilderment at the screen that had just... Appeared in the sky overhead. Surrounding this massive portal was the crumbling green of Melanie's barrier, what was once a dome now a cracking halo forming a perimeter around what was left of Xander's home.

"Anthony..?" Predator murmured, lowering her scythe some as she stared up at The Bastard Son. Her eyebrows furrowed but her eyes were wide. Why were they being shown this? What even was this?!

"Angel?!" Gatherer exclaimed, pupils shrinking with terror. He was following the same train of thought as Predator; this didn't make sense. Anarchy has only ever wanted to fight one Angel, and that Angel was fighting Cliff right now! There's no way he could have gotten to Anarchy that quickly, and there's no way Cliff would have let him by!

Unless...

Xander felt his heart drop right into his stomach, which dropped into his shoes. That pillar of light from minutes ago. The power that had been crackling through the air so intensely, before just... Disappearing. It couldn't be that... That perhaps Clifford had been..?

"Sur-PRISE!"

WHAM!

Predator clobbered The Gatherer in the jaw with a brutal hook, carrying him on her fist and blasting him right over the side with the destructive force of her punch. Xander hardly felt this strike even as it split his cheek, forced his teeth down on his tongue. His brain felt disconnected from his body. He didn't speak, didn't emote at all. He just stared straight up with wide eyes as he sailed right off the top of The Predator's ship.

As he plummeted, he watched Lexi skillfully flip right back into her hanger. At the same time, the rest of her pirates appeared to be rising on one giant gold star conjured by their fluffy wizard. They reached the hanger at the same time as Lexi, hastily jumping from the star and past the rapidly closing opening that lead into the ship. The moment each and every one of them disappeared inside, reality opened in a rift before the ship, and fires blasted out from its engines, firing it right through the hole in space time, which promptly shut behind them, covering their escape.

Xander hardly cared about their escape. Fear had a tight grip on him, trapping him in paralysis as he plummeted down towards the unforgiving Earth. Before he could crash, however, the ground split beneath him, vines and flowers crashing up from the dirt and into the sky. The wonderfully colorful vegetation was a stark contrast to the blueish white tinted world, and it raced right up to meet The Gatherer, opening its petals and leaves for him.

Safely Xander thudded onto the green, barely even blinking from the feeling of his impact. He couldn't tear his eyes away from The Angel. Those wings, that brand... Those cold, heartless red eyes. The greatest thief Xander The Gatherer had ever known. Had he truly let Angel steal everything from him a second time?

Down on the ground, still laying flat on her stomach, Eden winced and gasped for air. She had outstretched one hand, blood trickling down her chin from the painful coughs she had been plagued with ever since The Angel had briefly knocked her out with a rib shattering punch. She propped herself up on one elbow, her outstretched hand trembling as her vegetation hastily lowered Xander to the ground, keeping him safe with whatever strength she had left.

The moment she had set her leader on the ground, her flowers and vines crumpled, and she did as well. Her hand dropped to the dirt, her elbow slid out from under her, and she passed out again before she even felt herself face plant on the ground.

Gaster and Sans were still seated on the floor of Gaster's laboratory, crushed under the gravity of their situation. It wasn't until the cellar door was thrown open and one loud, familiar voice rang that they felt capable of moving again.

"Sans! Gaster!" Papyrus raced right down the steps to the two of them, a panicked tone in his voice. His sockets darted between the two of them, and he continued before either of them could speak. "It is an emergency! Come outside!"

Sans and Gaster exchanged a quick glance, fearing the worst. Gaster had hardly gotten a response out of Cter, just a few words before The Hacker abruptly hung up the phone. Neither of them could make heads or tails of a response like that. Gaster knew one thing though, Cter had certainly confirmed the things Anarchy had said. Those two most definitely had some type of history.

The three skeletons made their way above ground, and Papyrus lead them onto their front lawn. With one orange mitted hand he pointed upwards, "Look!"

Sans and Gaster both turned their eyes skyward, and their sockets went wide. The light of one massive viewer portal reflected in Gaster's glasses, which slipped a little ways away from his eyes. There it was, on clear display to all of Ebbot City. Cter had made it, alright. But he looked different, very different.

From his back four wings were spread wide. Across his body, red lighting and crimson embers flickered and crackled. His Deltarune brand was shining endlessly, its bright light almost blinding when one stared directly into it. With every breath, scarlet steam rose from the corners of his mouth and both of his nostrils.

Gaster should have felt relieved. Things had went according to plan, Cter had achieved that higher level of power. And yet... When he saw those bright red eyes, all he could think of was the wide eyed, furious stare The Anarchist had paralyzed him with earlier. When he saw those wings, all he felt was dread. He should have felt better. He should have felt something positive. But instead, his nonexistent heart sunk. Fear gripped his soul.

He had made a mistake. And judging by the side eyed glare Sans was shooting him, the judge was already more than aware of this fact. But, this was no time for "I told you so"s. The streets were quickly filling. Just a few houses down, both the king and the queen of the monsters were stepping out from their home. From the window of the house's second floor, Frisk was poking their head out their window. They stared with wide eyes, just like much of the populous, clearly completely befuddled by the sight before them.

"Anthony..?" Toriel questioned aloud, squinting to make out the sight of the crowbar wielding albino. There was no doubt about it, that was the young man who had seemed so polite at her door earlier in the day. He looked nothing like that now. Just the sight of The Anarchist was enough to show the madman he truly was. His malevolence shun in his bright red eyes. His skin was covered in blood, and he kept that filthy hunk of metal gripped tight in his hand. Immediately guilt spiked in her heart, and her paw reached up, gently gripping the chest of her dress. He had been right in front of her, and she hadn't even known what he truly was. She was afraid, disturbed by the idea that someone like him had just walked right up to her front door. She'd offered to let him inside... He could have... Have...

Asgore furrowed his brows in a concerned way, remaining silent as he watched this scene unfold. Much of this was confusing, even more of it concerning. He could hardly make sense of the fact that some giant rift had just opened in space time right over his house, let alone what the rift was displaying. But, what he did know was that The Angel was taking a stand against a man that radiated doom. With a form that the King of the Monsters had never seen before, and a level of intensity that he did not recognize.

So he did not speak. Instead, silently, Asgore shut his eyes, and he hoped. For his people's safety, for his family's safety, for his friends' safety, and for The Angel's safety.

What are you playing at, Badster? CORE Frisk squinted their void eyes with disdain, whipping winds breezing right through them without so much as tugging at their clothes or moving one hair on their head. On a high peak they stood, their little hands folded behind their back.

They stared down at The Angel and The Scorpion, watching their fated collision reach ever closer, step by step. But this was not all they saw. Hundreds of worlds, timeline after timeline they watched. Their monochromatic form stood in an uncountable amount of settings, and in each reality, they saw this very battle on display. In the sky, on TVs and computers, all across the void. It was hard for them to look in any one direction and not see Angel and Anthony. Putting their showdown on display like this...

Well... Fine. Jaw clenching with reserved fury, C Frisk let their billion eyes refocus on what now held all the multiverse's attention. Whether they liked it or not, this battle was happening, and everyone was going to see. There was nothing they could do about that now.

If you want everyone to see your freak lose to mine, that's no problem for me.

The grass hissed under my feet. It burned with each step, steam rising up around my shoes with every blade that was scorched. Embers dripped from between my fingers, before they were caught in the whipping winds of my DETERMINATION and carried off somewhere into the sky. My eyes stared straight ahead, right into his. Anthony The Anarchist.

The world seemed to squirm uncomfortably around him. Light avoided touching his skin at all costs, making shadows slip and crawl unnaturally across his body. His endless well of blood still spilled down his face, droplets cascading over red stained skin and dripping off his chin. He didn't look like any human or monster I had ever seen before. Even his albino father would look unnatural next to his offspring.

*I couldn't be more proud.

My fists clenched a little tighter, and static DETERMINATION crackled out from my soul, jumping down my body before running out in a circular wave from around me. The display died down before it reached Anny's feet, his shoe crashing down on the final spark and snuffing it out effortlessly. We were getting closer and closer now, and the air between us was beginning to vibrate.

Step after step, one foot in front of the other. Every second was an hour. Every stride spanned a mile. We were just a few yards apart now, and the closer we got, the more violently our energy grew in the air around us. Another few footfalls went by, before the air around us began to pop occasionally. Short bursts of pressure here and there, growing more frequent.

And then, finally... There we were. Face to face. Nothing but a few feet separating us. He was staring at me with wide eyes, and I could see all of his psychosis flashing in those rubies with which he peered into me. It was like he couldn't believe I was real, that I was really standing there in front of him. I was Santa Claus, and he was a little albino boy who desperately needed a Christmas miracle. I guess I understood that. After all, it was hard for me to believe that he was really there, too. He was the Antichrist, and I was a Sunday preacher who desperately needed a miracle, Christmas or otherwise.

We were the center of the multiverse. All the gravity poured down upon us, but we never felt a thing. We were all there was, and now that we were right in front of one another, it was hard to find any words. I'd imagined what it would be like to stand before him as the man I am now, I'd thought about it every single day these past six months. I'm sure he'd thought himself sick in that same manner. But, now that we were here, all the words I had thought I'd wanted to say had faded from my mind. What words could possibly get my feelings across? How could I ever tell him all I wanted him to know?

Anthony's focus proved more honed than mine however, his chest lifting slowly as he inhaled a deep, calming breath through his nose. It was odd, when the madness faded from his eyes and his smile disappeared, he looked to be a completely different person. That was almost disheartening. It made it seem as though both Anthony and Anarchy were coming together to strike me down. But, I probably deserved that. His filthy, blood stained mouth opened, and from the Ivory Ghoul a hauntingly calm voice rang clear.

"... So." Gradually Anny tilted his head to the side, chilled rubies never releasing me from their grip. I didn't mind; my own scarlet eyes had him trapped in my own grasp. But I don't think he noticed. His porcelain locks dangled over his face with the shifting of his head, curling around his eyes but never obscuring them. "You finally got those wings, huh Angel?"

My eyes narrowed a little. Those words stung and healed at the same time. It was a painful callback to happier days, but it was also acknowledgement. After those years in the gang, where all Anarchy did was deny that we had any history at all, it was almost gratifying to hear that he did remember those days as clearly as I did. That he thought about the playground, and all our silly kiddie dreams just like I did. He remembered Angel, just like I remembered Anny. But, those days were a distant memory now. The present was more pressing than the past ever could be. "... It's been a long time comin', Anny."

Anarchy squinted a little when I spoke, his expression twitched with some emotion. I couldn't tell what it was, but hearing me call him Anny for the first time in damn near a decade made him feel something. Still, he forced his lips up into a smile that was less than friendly, and when he responded, I could hear the venom dripping from his tongue. "Oh yeah, I heard all about your super hard journey."

"Lemme see if I got this right, okay?" Smile curling into some kind of smirk, Anarchy lifted his hands like he was signalling me to wait. Each of his fingers wiggled sporadically, before he lowered his hands, and began counting on those very same digits. "The list goes like this, right?"

"One: You saved the Underground! Two:" Anarchy's eyes darted back and forth, and he bobbed his head back and forth like he was thinking. Then, his eyes darted back to me, lighting up in mocking glee. "You uh, saved the Underground again, I guess!"

"Three!" It was at this point in Anarchy's listing that I rolled my eyes, catching on easily to his belittling tone. But he was glad to keep going regardless. He leaned to his side, pointing past me and back towards where I had left Chara to recover. "You 'saved' the kicker of a lot more than sides back there, assuring that six months later they'd save your candy ass from some fuckin' knock offs!"

"But hey, it wasn't all bad, right?!" Anarchy leaned back then, throwing his arms up and out to his sides dramatically. "I mean, the real wings were all the friends ya made along the way, right Angel?!"

"You done?" I asked him irritably, my jaw clenching to keep further remarks from snapping free. Anny didn't seem to have that restraint though, his expression instantly twisting into a scowl with my question. He swung his body right forward, his head racing in towards mine. I braced for an impact that never came, Anarchy pausing his face inches from mine. All I could see was the fearsome crimson of his eyes, and his voice crunched in a low, gravely tone.

"You'll know when I'm done." He told me, and I could see his body tremoring with withheld rage. I hardly helped soothe that anger, leaning my head right in and pressing my forehead to his, testing him without any hesitation. The wrath in his ruby orbs flared, but his lips curled into a sneer, and he gladly shoved his head back against mine. Now we were quite literally butting heads, both of our necks craned forward and our feet planted while we shoved our skulls into each other.

"OH, so THAT'S how it's gonna be!" Furiously Anny snickered, narrowing his mad eyes into my stern ones. He pushed his tongue into one cheek, shaking his head against mine like he was disappointed. "And here I thought you were gonna give me the 'We don't have to fight' speech, since APPARENTLY you're just the paragon of goodness these days!"

I opened my mouth to speak, but Anarchy yanked up both his hands before I could. He planted a forceful shove in my chest, and I growled angrily as I was forced to stumble back a step or two away from him. "C'mon, douchebag! Where's my olive branch?!"

"Frisk got one, they got one!" Once again Anarchy was pointing back at Chara, before holding his arms out to his sides again. He leaned his head forward, snarling and snapping his jaws at me with his vicious words while leaving himself wide open. It was like he was asking me to cold clock him. "Even the weird skeleton got one! So where's mine?!"

"You got the goddamn Deltarune branded on your back, right?! So tell me this is all nonsense!" Anarchy rose one foot, before smashing his heel into the earth beneath us. Power shattered through the dirt, leveling the ground and making our footing sink instantaneously into a crater. Blood filled spit was flinging from his mouth with each enraged word he spat up at me, all the disdain and indignation he'd grown and nurtured since he was a kid breaking out in scarlet fires across his skin. "Before we start somethin', don't you just wanna say you're sorry?!"

"C'mon Angel, feed me that bullshit!" As Anarchy clenched his fists, several more pops crackled through the air from the rise of his power. Through his shirt a crimson soul ignited, and over his left eye ruby flames burst to life. Around the scorching light of our DETERMINATION darkness was slithering rapidly, eager worms gnashing their teeth while they awaited their master's command. "Tell me I'm your friend! Tell me you don't wanna kill me! TELL ME IT DOESN'T HAVE TO BE LIKE THIS ANGEL!"

"..." I didn't say a word. I just stared, disturbingly calm while he grew disturbingly emotional. This just pissed him off even more, forcing his fangs to grind even more brutally against one another. But even as he twitched and shook with boundless fury, I was motionless. I blinked the icy red of my eyes, and that made the scorching fires of his own eyes burn even brighter.

"Lie to me!" Anny demanded, and cardinal electricity crackled across the sky above us. He paused after his demand, fists dripping blood as his finger nails shredded his palms from how tightly they were clenched. And when I still didn't speak, another color suddenly exploded to life on his soul. Along the left side of that valentine heart, I watched absolute darkness take its form. Black fell over red, turning half of Anarchy's soul to something absolutely malevolent. Something I had never seen before. With a primal roar he stomped one foot towards me, and scarlet lightning crashed down from the sky above, blasting into the earth just a few yards behind The Anarchist. "LIE TO ME YOU SON OF A BITCH!"

"..." I narrowed my eyes slowly, and my wings flexed. With this motion, boiling hot winds gusted out from around me. The winds ripped and tore at Anarchy's already damaged clothing, flicking his blood stained hair to and fro. He never flinched of course, staring my power right in the face as I did his. Bending my elbows, my hands clenched into tight fists, and embers flicked from the red veins of my wings. These flames swirled and spiraled through the air around us, and finally, I spoke.

"... Anny. Every time I let you out of my sight, people die." My jaw tightened some with my words, and crimson fires swirled around my left eye, spiraling high into the air. Some of the anger disappeared from Anthony's face once I started talking, and he squinted curiously, hanging on to each and every word I said. "I can't let you run free anymore. I can't let anyone else get hurt because of my mistakes."

"This morning I thought it was my job to save you. I didn't understand." Slowly, I unclenched my fists. I rose my arms, holding them out to my sides. My soul flared, and rapid pops and crashes sounded throughout the air. Then, an updraft of power lifted my hair, making it sway and rise in the winds just before the fiery vortex of my DETERMINATION blasted to life. Crimson light speared upwards into the heavens like some holy tower, and the red of my eyes gleamed with killer focus. "But I get it now."

"Anthony The Anarchist! It is not my job to save you!" My voice boomed powerfully over the roaring winds and the crackling flames of my aura. I shifted my left arm, and fearlessly I pointed right at my best friend. With a huff, scarlet steam rose up from between my teeth and both of my nostrils.

"It is my job to put you down!"

"... Oh. So that's how it is." Squinting his lifeless eyes, Anthony let any trace of a grin or a snarl melt off his face. It was clear to me when I looked at him that he wasn't the happy little kid I knew, and he wasn't the mad man I had known, either. He had grown now, changed into something new. And if I was a betting man, I'd say this new age Anthony was the worst of his incarnations. "Do me a favor, Angel."

Then, fearlessly, Anny lifted that crowbar. And for the first time in my life, the twisted metal that had shaped both our lives was pointed out towards me. I was its target now, and that somehow felt overdue. As Anarchy pointed his weapon of mass destruction out at me, the light of my soul shining over him, his darkness spread rapidly over the ground beneath him. It formed a perfect circle with about the same perimeter as my tower of light, turning the earth beneath him to an obsidian shade. The corner of his mouth curling down into a snarl, Anarchy's flaming left eye crackled with black electricity.

"Save your hero speech for someone who gives a shit."

Radioactive by Waterflame began playing.

Then, with a boom, a fountain of onyx rain exploded up from beneath Anarchy, consuming him completely in its darkness. The poison madness of The Fountain blasted high into the sky, challenging my holy pillar with a filthy geyser. To my howling winds pouring rains were added. In an instant, the deathly calm of the evening was being turned to a thundering storm. Clouds of red and black were quickly growing overhead, blotting out the setting sun and the appearing stars. Ruby and obsidian lightning crackled occasionally throughout the shadowed sky, the ground quaked, the air popped and crackled.

My wings spread wide behind me, and I planted my feet. My elbows bent at my sides, and scarlet voltage crashed down from the sky above directly behind me the moment I clenched my fists. I could see my crimson reflection in the glassy black of Anarchy's fountain, and it made my expression grow sour. I stared into my own eyes for several long, thoughtful seconds. Seeing the blood red of my orbs for the first time, I realized I'd stared into them before.

*Good luck, son.

Suddenly, my reflection exploded apart, and Anarchy - the blood that stained him washed away by the shadow rain of his fountain - blasted right out from the darkness. He instantly closed the distance between us, his fist cocked back and his face twisted into a furious snarl. I hardly had any time to move before he blasted his knuckles into my jaw, launching me backwards out of my bravado tower. "YOU SELF RIGHTEOUS PRICK!"

I flipped back through the air, landing on the balls of my feet and rapidly sliding back. I threw my arms out to my sides, and my uppermost wings coiled instantly into drill shapes. Then I swung my arms forward, and with that command those drills fired down towards The Anarchist racing closer. Anny ducked under these drills though, running low to the ground and getting underneath my outstretched arms before whipping his body back up to its full height.

This speedy motion caught me off guard, and he drilled an upper cut right into my chin, forcing me to swing my head back. I leaned through though, swiftly planting my palms back on the ground behind me and swinging my feet up at him in a similar uppercut motion. He leaned back in a dodge though, letting me straighten my posture into a hand stand. This pointed my wings right at him, all four of them now coiled into drills that stabbed out at him.

Anarchy was quick to crack his crowbar across one wing, its liquidy form shimmering but not breaking as it was knocked aside. He stomped one foot forward, leaning back one shoulder as another drill wing fired past. He was swaying his body unpredictably, closing the distance between us while perfectly and elegantly evading every strike.

I growled with some frustration as he effortlessly dodged my attacks, pushing off my hands and launching myself over Anarchy. As I spun around in air, I pulled one arm back, clenching that hand into a tight fist. At the same time, a Beat Blaster was rapidly manifesting, and the moment I finished my in air rotation to face Anarchy below, the blaster had taken shape. I threw my hand down at him, and white hot plasma exploded from the Blaster's speaker, launching right over my shoulder and down at The Anarchist.

Anarchy instantly spun around, lifting his right arm to the searing power barreling closer. Just before heat death reached him, a sapphire shield appeared on his arm, and he huddled beneath its protection. Around him the fires of my wrath split, washing over his shield and scorching the earth in a perfect circle around him. Not a drop of fire ever hit him though, and as the stream of heat from my Beat Blaster died down, and I landed on the ground across from him, he lowered his now steaming shield.

"Y'know Angel, gotta say, it's pretty cathartic to finally punch you in the face." Smile dividing his face, Anny rolled his shoulders. Blood shot eyes never stopped staring giddily into the waveless red sea of my own eyes, which glossed down from his malevolent expression, to the crowbar he pointed out towards me, and back to him.

*The old attacks aren't gonna cut it, boys.

"... You sure do talk a lot more than you used to, Anny." I spoke calmly over the whipping winds and pouring rain. It seemed that my tower of crackling energy and Anarchy's geyser of mad water had dissipated into the hellacious storm that loomed over us, now sending sheets of obsidian rain crashing down from above, as well as frequent red streaks of lightning blasting randomly down onto Mount Ebbot. Our combined poison was tainting the world around us, blacking out the sky, scorching the earth, and soaking into all life that it poured over. Without compassion my eyes narrowed, black droplets slipping from my brow down my cheek. "I thought your mom taught you not to speak unless spoken to."

Anarchy's eye twitched at that, his grin changing into a type of snarl. His lips curled back, revealing his rows of fangs. Then, he slammed one foot into the ground before him, causing a spider web of cracks to shatter through the ground beneath our feet. At the same time, lightning cracked down behind him, flashing everything red for only a second. "OH, YOU WANNA SEE WHAT MAMA TAUGHT ME?!"

Then, the swirling shadow beneath him bubbled to life, and a wave of filthy worms split from nothingness. They raced rapidly across the ground, writhing and wriggling over one another and carelessly gnashing their jagged teeth. Hysterically they laughed, like they'd been waiting all their miserable lives to taste my blood. Unfortunately for them, I stamped my foot, and the ground beneath them instantly uprooted in favor of my pens.

Unlike my usual pens, these ones were fountain pens, each one coming to a sharper, triangular point. These blade like edges slashed right through the wriggling filth that was trying so desperately to touch my divine flesh, lopping off heads and body segments. This effectively diced those beasts into wriggling little chunks, stopping their reckless path long before they reached me.

Anny didn't seem to care much about the death of his disgusting pets, diving clear over my pen patch and cranking his crowbar back over his head. My wings beat just as he reached me, launching me back out of range and letting his strike splinter the earth. Shards of stone crashed up unevenly around Anarchy as he concaved the ground, but he hardly noticed, his eyes darting right up and locking on me.

I threw both hands out to my sides, and from the Deltarune on my back ink slipped up my arms. It ran in thin streams along the bottom sides of my arms, steaming with heat. The ink reached my palms, and I threw one hand out towards The Anarchist as he dove from his crater towards me. The boiling ink of my whip wrapped quickly around his throat, smoking against his skin and making his eyes widen as I turned on my heel, yanking my arm out to the left and throwing him with it.

I sent Anny crashing right through the dirt, before tugging my arm back and letting the burning ink of my whip untangle from his now smoldering throat. Just as he got to one knee, I flicked my other whip out towards him, cracking him across the cheek with it and burning a thin slash right through his face. This forced his head to turn to the side, just as my opposite whip slashed out, cutting across his shoulder. No blood was drawn with any of these strikes, the scorching heat of my ink cauterizing every deep but thin gash I left.

Anarchy growled furiously, snow white hair drooping over his eyes and shading them as his skin hissed with pain over and over. I threw my whips to and fro, over and over, turning them to dark blurs in the air between us. I flagellated him for his sins, lashing him over and over and over again and covering him in smoldering black lines of melted skin. He remained knelt, taking his punishment for seemingly as long as I was willing to administer it.

Or at least it seemed that way, until his hands darted up. Effortlessly his fingers snatched both of my whips, the healing red of his misting DETERMINATION mixing with the gross black of his burning flesh. He eagerly wrapped my boiling ink around his palms over and over, being sure to keep it there. Then, those glowing rubies darted up to me from beneath the shadow of his hair, and several more super heated pops crackled through the air.

Then, suddenly, a wildfire of DETERMINED energy blasted out around The Anarchist. It evaporated my already boiling ink whips, freeing his hands and giving him the opportunity to rise right to his feet without any hesitation. But as he bent his elbows at his sides and threw his head back, both of his hands clenched into tight fists, something dawned on me.

Where's his crowbar-?

A gross squelching noise resounded behind me, and my eyes darted over my shoulder just in time to spot some strange, featureless creature. It was shaped like a human, twisting on its unnaturally long upper body from the earth. In the blink of an eye it spun its waist over itself four times, before it rapidly unraveled, swinging its arms up at me. It was only then I realized this abomination crawling out of my own shadow was wielding Anarchy's crowbar.

CRACK!

Eyes widening and blood spilling out through my shattered nose and broken front teeth, I was sent launching to my left, red flames immediately crackling to life over my semi-concaved face. Vision turning to shades of red and becoming polluted with black spots, I still managed to flip back in the air, landing on both feet and sliding back. Growling in pain, I wrapped my hand around my face, clenching my eyes shut tight for a second or two while my nose snapped back into place and my gums popped out more front teeth to replace the the ones Anarchy's sneak attack had just knocked down my throat.

But when I opened my eyes, I was hardly surprised to find that Anarchy wasn't giving me time to recover. He had closed the distance between us, and with his crowbar reclaimed, he was lunging towards me. Madness glinted in his burning left eye, he yanked that crowbar back, but unfortunately for him, my wings beat downward. With a brutal gust of boiling winds, I was launched high into the sky. My updraft caught Anarchy, pushing him back through the air and forcing him back to the ground.

Sky crackling with power behind me, I paused once I reached heights above any of the peaks, opening one palm down towards The Scorpion, condemned to the earth beneath me. Those filthy worms were already racing up through the air towards me, giggling like I hadn't slaughtered the last batch of them with the flick of my wrist. I intended to punish this blasphemy more harshly than I had last time.

Throughout the sky behind me, magic was rapidly shaping into wires and barrels. Three segments were formed on this new creation, three rings. Each ring was progressively larger than the last, the top one being the shortest and the bottom being the largest. This machine was still reminiscent of my Beat Blasters, coming to a speaker like barrel, but its design was significantly more foreboding. These Beat Cannons filled the air behind me, and from deep within their barrels, a crimson light began to shine. The three sections on each Cannon began to spin rapidly, and that light was growing more and more blinding by the second. Finally, in unison, each blaster released scorching red steam from the spaces between their segments, and concentrated scarlet beams rained down from the sky above.

Anny's worms were vaporized in an instant, the scorching rays of my assault immediately closing the distance between me and my brother. I hardly saw a thing, flashing lights engulfing all sight and shrieking energy erasing all other sounds. Shattered stone and smoldering dirt blasted up from the now leveled plateau that had been the arena for Anny and I thus far, sweltering updraft blasting my hair back.

After a few long seconds, the screaming fires of my Beat Cannons slowed to a stop. Their flashing lights dulled to a dim, ruby glow within their barrels, before they finally disappeared from the sky. With my cannons gone, I was alone in the sky. Dark rain steamed back into the black and red clouds above the moment it made contact with my heated skin, and I loomed there in the storm, iced over rubies watching the smoke below as the sheets of rain slowly beat it back into the destroyed dirt.

But then, just as things began to grow calm, and the crashing of the rain was all I could hear, something rose from the smoke below. A massive head, rigid with scales rose up from the earth I'd scorched. Its body was long, very similar to the slimy, writhing mass of Anarchy's worms. But unlike those worms, this creature's blackened body was adorned with bony plates. Uneven scales armored this serpentine monstrosity, and instead of the flat, rounded faces of those worms, this beast's head pointed out into more of a snout. And unlike the eyeless maggots from which it evolved, its face was adorned with more than just a grinning maw. A pair of deep, cardinal eyes snapped open wide above The Wyrm's snout, stabbing right at me. I was hardly affected by glares though, from beasts or otherwise.

Anarchy's Wyrm lurched forward, the sound of its massive body crashing across the earth below overpowering the beating of the rain. Its neck craned down, and with an eardrum shattering scream its jaws spread. Fangs shut rapidly around me, I hardly had any time to move. Instead I lifted both arms above my head, grunting as my hands clamped shut over the two massive fangs barring down from above. At the same time, I planted my feet against the bottom jaw that was racing up to crush me.

Crying out with exertion, I nearly folded. My knees bent with my elbows, and I began to shrink slowly under the pressure of The Wyrm's bite force. But then, I shut my eyes briefly, and drew a deep breath into my lungs. Then, my ruby orbs snapped open wide. My lips curled back in a snarl, revealing my grinding teeth. With a scarlet flare from my soul, I straightened both my knees and my elbows. I rose, my hunched back uncurling as I slowly pushed the jaws of this monstrosity further apart.

Growling and grunting, my wide eyes darted furiously into the black abyss of this abomination's gullet. With its jaws spread wide by my might, there was a clear opening down its throat for the heat rays of the two Beat Cannons appearing at either side of me. And as red light shun brighter and brighter into the dark cavern of The Wyrm's maw, I almost flinched as a pair of beady crimson dots suddenly appeared in the back of the serpent's mouth.

Rapidly those eyes closed in, until Anarchy appeared in the light of my cannons, sprinting full speed down his Wyrm's tongue. He jumped, yanked both knees to his chest, and shotgunned a dropkick into my solar plexus with enough force to send me blasting out from where I was wedged. I folded around where he had kicked me, launching back in a sort of C shape. Without me keeping them apart, the jaws of Anarchy's newest beast snapped shut, once more housing The Anarchist in darkness. Its jaws crashed right through my Beat Cannons, making smoke and flames explode briefly right in the snout of this beast.

I flipped in air, my wings quickly straightening and flapping out with a burst of burning winds and stopping my momentum in an instant. Now paused in air, I watched the Wyrm slither forward and through the smoke of my destroyed cannons, craning its head to the side and darting towards me from my left. Its hissing breaths filled my ears, but my wings beat just as it parted those jaws, launching me over its crunch.

I continued to fly along the Wyrm's lengthy body, and just behind me a row of mechanical pencils was forming. They were larger than my usual mechanical pencils, thicker. And the graphite spikes they launched down through the Wyrm's scales were larger as well, their size tripled. With brutal thunks they were cracking through the tough flesh of this serpent, causing it to stiffen before it swung its head right around to look upon me with wrathful red eyes. Once more it parted those jaws, and a horrible scream blasted out of its throat.

Vibrations permeated the air around me, but still I paused in the trembling sky, throwing my arms out to my sides. With this command, even more graphite ballistas popped into existence in a wave behind me. With a brutal volley more and more spears embedded themselves in the hide of Anarchy's monstrosity, but all that seemed to do was piss it off. With a loud whoosh as warning, one spiny black tail swung up from the earth below.

My wings beat, propelling me even higher into the sky. The air crackled louder and louder the closer I got to the clouds, but I was hardly worried. No lightning would dare strike me. I was the prophet. The one and only Angel chosen to wipe The Anarchist and all of his corruption from this multiverse. The Wyrm's tail crashed through the lines of my ballistas, shredding them to broken graphite and plastic.

Those giant rubies never left me however, even as I nearly breached the clouds. The snout of that massive reptile turned right up to me, before its body shifted strangely. It straightened its plated and spiked back some, puffing out its chest. My eyebrows furrowed with growing bewilderment as I watched a lump quickly rise up this thing's massive neck, before its cheeks puffed out, and I realized I should have moved.

Like a pressurized cannon, black water geysered from the maw of The Wyrm. It blasted up at me like a laser, and though it was liquid, I was certain with the pressure it was fired at that it would peel the skin right off my bones. With that in mind, I threw both hands out in front of me, and from nothingness a keyboard's worth of massive keys were appearing. These buttons were not their usual plastic plates however, they were thicker and boxier. What was once dark plastic was now shiny metal, significantly sturdier than their previous iteration.

The beam of mad water that the limbless dragon was spitting at me broke around my improved wall of keys, spewing out in a cone around me. The shriek of metal slowly being scraped away polluted the air, but I was confident my wall would hold. That was, until a particular thud crashed against it, and a moment later a familiar foot kicked in one of my keys, sending it launching right back at me.

I ducked to the side of this wayward metal chunk, but by the time I looked back I found Anny diving at me. He yanked both fists up over his head, clasped them together, and whipped them down at my head. I was quick though, crossing my arms over my head and catching the knuckle crown he was attempting to plant on me with my forearms. I didn't have much defense for when he pulled one knee up to his chest, crashing his shoe down into my chest with enough force to send me blasting down towards the dirt.

A swarm of worms exploded up from the cracked and uprooted ground I was approaching, gnashing their teeth eagerly. I dropped right into their ranks, body disappearing into writhing darkness and giggling evil. This hardly lasted though, because the second after I disappeared into shadow, a dome of red light exploded out from within the crowding creatures, igniting them in burgundy flames and shredding right through them. Any and all uprooted dirt this searing wave passed over was scorched from brown to an unnatural grey, and any still living grass it hit was quickly wilted. The plants melted under the heat of my soul, turning to a white paste on the grey sands.

What was once a green plateau was now a shredded battleground after the rain of hellfire from my Beat Cannons. A flat landscape now rose and fell unevenly in steep, pointed hills and low, jagged valleys. I stood atop one of those hills for only a moment, before my wings flapped, dragging me back through the air just as Anny crashed down crowbar first from the thundering skies overhead. The loose and burnt dirt of the mound he bashed his weapon into immediately flattened and dented downward from the power of his strike, a shock wave exploding out in a circle around him with enough force to momentarily stop the sheets of poison rain.

For just a sec, everything was dead silent. We stood in a dome of our own power, where no rain could fall and no lightning could crack. Our identical eyes locked. He stared up from under his eyebrows, still knelt with his crowbar in the dirt. I looked down past my nose at him, my chin raised and my eyes squinted judgmentally.

But then, this bubble of force disappeared, and rain crashed over us once more. Thunder boomed so loud I thought the mountain rumbled, and Anny lunged forward at me, cranking his crowbar back to swing at my head. When he swung down at me though, I skillfully swiped my forearm into his elbow, throwing his strike way off course. In the same motion I cocked back my fist, and as I sent it rocketing forward, flames exploded to life along my knuckles. They coiled up my arm in four, swirling strands of fire just as I blasted my punch into The Anarchist's nose.

His face reflexively scrunched around my left hook, the crack and snap of his nose and several other weak bones that made up the front of his skull vibrating up my hand. I wasn't done there though, taking this opportunity to spin on my heel and whip my right side wings back. The boiling ink of my feathers crashed into Anny's face and upper body with enough force to send him firing back through the air.

I planted my left foot to stop my spin dead the moment I finished launching him, but I hardly had any time to catch my breath. A clap of thunder punctuated a scream from The Wyrm, and my eyes darted up to the massive fangs that were crashing down from above. Without hesitation, I yanked one hand up, flattening its palm to the sky at the same time that I stomped my foot into the graying dirt.

With my command, the devastated plains tore apart to my side, and one massive eraser fired up on a pencil's pillar. It launched on an angle over my shoulder, slamming its massive radius right into the jaw of The Wyrm. The beast was clearly jarred by this strike, its ruby eyes snapping open wide as force rammed its skull back, throwing its head to the side.

The moment I had the monster reeling, I clenched my previously raised hand, bending my elbow suddenly upwards. With this order, several more wooden pillars blasted down from the clouds above. Erasers collided with the Wyrm's serpentine body, slamming every wriggling yard of the massive abomination to the ground and pinning it there. Without hesitation I threw up my second hand, circling my first one down at the same time in a clockwise motion.

And as The Wyrm was pushed deeper and deeper into the uprooted dirt, Mount Ebbot rumbled louder and louder. Then, finally, massive spikes in the form of those fountain pens fired up from beneath the furious lizard, stabbing right into its scales. Its bloodcurdling scream once more made the air vibrate, but that really just encouraged me to jam my pens more brutally upward. After a few long moments, black blood spattered up into the air, and the scales along the other side of The Wyrm split suddenly, my pens cutting clean through the beast.

When it finally stopped both its screaming and its wriggling, my eyes darted ahead and back to Anny. He had landed against the massive body of his Wyrm after my wings had slapped him back through the air, and now he sat there, leaning casually against the bleeding corpse of his reptile. To my surprise, he did not look upset about the murder of his newest thrall. In fact, with a red glimmer in his eyes, his face cracked in two with a smile.

I was so focused on his deadman's smile that I didn't realize the corpse of The Wyrm was bubbling and squirming unnaturally behind him until it was too late. Its scales crawled and crept until finally they split, exploded open. From The Wyrm's mass, thousands of its underdeveloped worm siblings blasted free. Still dripping with its shadow blood, maw after maw of jagged fangs fired right by the smiling Anarchist. He didn't seem to feel even the slightest discomfort as those filthy, blood soaked creatures slithered over his body. He just sat there with his warm and inviting smile until finally he disappeared into the writhing ranks of giggling invertebrates, and I was faced with the incoming tidal wave.

Immediately I stomped one foot in front of me, throwing up both open palms to the oncoming stampede. The earth before me shattered apart, a row of pen pikes darting up in the worm's path. I then waved my arms out to my sides, and my wall of spears grew from both its left and right, forming a curved guard in front of me, In the next instant, those reckless freaks crashed right into the points of my pens.

The ripping and tearing of flesh accompanied the endless giggling of the horde, and the sky over me was blocked out as some abominations flung themselves right over my barricade and myself. It wasn't long before the bodies stacked on my pens covered their points however, and as teeth chomped over the peak of my defense and filthy tongues caught my scent, my wings straightened behind me.

The ink of my feathers flattened to a sharpened edge, and I bent my elbows at my sides, clenching my fists so tight that red embers crackled between my fingers. DETERMINED steam rising from my super heated body, my wings darted outward in a V shape, opening around the piling worms that were tumbling down towards me. Then, like a massive pair of scissors, my wings sliced inward, instantly decapitating and dismembering the onslaught from above.

I swiftly spun on my heel, yanking back my right fist and blasting an earth shattering punch right into the face of the worm attempting to flank from my left. The impact was so powerful that my DETERMINATION exploded out from a dozen points down the worm's body in red beams, followed immediately by pitch black blood. At the same time that one worm crumpled limp, I spun around, bringing up one foot to the air. Ink streamed from my heel in a short, thin blade that severed the head of the serpentine gnawing towards me from my right.

I planted both feet on the ground, facing forward once more. The only light in this wriggling horde was the burning crimson of my soul and all the glowing steam that rose from my body, as well as the ever dimming and brightening veins of scarlet that illuminated my wings. Bending my knees, I pulled both hands up from below my waist to over my head, and around me those sharp pens exploded from the earth. They pistoned up and down, slashing through the worms that slithered ever closer from every angle and adding mechanical whirrs to the giggling and slimy slurps of the worms slipping over one another.

For the worms that got by the rows of pens constantly darting up and down, my blade like wings were violently slashing to and fro, sending shadowy ichor spraying left and right with obsidian chunks of flesh. Rapidly my ruby eyes were darting around, and my fists would dart out to deliver a crushing punch to any invertebrate that made it into arm's reach. For minutes that felt like hours I slaughtered those horrors, until their viscera slick bodies piled like walls around me.

From there, I planted my feet, straightening my back and puffing out my chest just before letting out a violent cry. With my roar another wave of cardinal flames exploded out around me, crashing into corpses old and new. Burning worm chunks were sent flying throughout the air around me, but before I had even a second to breathe, one furious albino crashed through the tumbling flesh right in front of me.

Anny blasted right towards me, cocking back his shield bearing right arm and blasting a right hook into my jaw. The force threw my head back and made me skid on my heels, all while he landed right in front of me, sliding forward with his momentum and spinning through his punch. Swinging 360 degrees to build momentum, Anarchy sent his crowbar crashing down at the crook of my neck.

But despite my split lip, my hand darted up, stopping that disgusting metal in my palm. Like a vice my fingers clamped around our Inheritance, and my eyes locked with his in a clear challenge. This made his face contort in a feral snarl, before he spun all the way through, sending the knuckles of his shield baring hand racing for my cheek again.

I was prepared this time however, my palm forcing his powerful strike to a stop. The force of this collision shattered the earth beneath our feet and made several bones in the back of my hand splinter, but still my fingers snapped down, digging into his fist and keeping it trapped there. The both of us frothing with rage, we pulled each others hands down, both our arms crossed over our abdomens and our hands still trapped either with one another or gripping that crowbar.

*Sibling rivalry.

We both pulled our heads back, cracking our foreheads together with brutal headbutts. The ground around us split rapidly, dust exploding up from the earth we shattered with one simple collision. We snarled and growled, blood trickling down our foreheads while DETERMINED steam rose up from them, healing us with freakish quickness. Around us the air popped and crackled, and red and black lightning crashed down again and again, the closest bolts landing just five to ten feet from us.

"Well I gotta say Angel!" Grinning like the madman he was, Anarchy kept shoving his skull into mine. His dirty, beat up shoes dug into the dirt at our feet, which was quickly turning from a grey sand to an almost mushy white paste, not unlike what any plant life near us had already become. "You've definitely grown a pair since I last saw ya! I thought for sure you'd be crying and begging for mercy by now!"

"You n' me both know you don't do mercy, Anny!" My feet, too, were beginning to sink into the softening dirt. The heat around us was sweltering, climbing higher and higher into the triple digits. If either of us ever sweat a drop, we never noticed, any trace of water evaporating from us. The pouring rain never reached us, instead turning to steam the instant it hit the crackling dome of heat around us.

"Can't give," Anny suddenly cranked his head as far back as he could, red flames exploding to life over his forehead before he whipped it forward. With a headbutt much harder than the last he crashed his skull into mine, and I was forced to stumble back. My head leaned back, I momentarily lost a few motor functions, my hands unwrapping from his fist and his crowbar. As I blinked my eyes out of sync and my pupils dilated, Anthony stomped one foot forward, cranking his crowbar back behind him before swiping it through the air with breakneck speed. "What I never RECEIVED!"

A disgusting crunch resounded as he slammed his crowbar into my solar plexus, forcing me to double over. Scarlet ichor spewed out from both my nostrils and my gaping maw, and red energy exploded out from my back from the sheer force of his impact. My knees buckled, and I started to drop down to my hands, before one knee flew up and rammed into my chin, launching me right back up.

"C'mon Cter! I thought you were a nice, friendly guy now!" As I ascended up into the air, I felt Anny's hand clamp shut over my ankle, just before he turned on his heel, yanking me through the air and shitwhipping me back across the shattered plain. "Where's the one liners? Where's the stupid fuckin' jokes?!"

The music faded out as I sailed through the air, red still smoking from me and rapidly healing my wounds. I spun back with a flap of my wings, landing on both feet and one hand. I skidded back across the torn up, scorched dirt until finally my back hit a wall of overturned earth, forcing me to a stop. With my momentum gone, I dropped to one knee, resting my right hand over my still throbbing abdominal while I winced up at Anarchy.

"Don't'cha wanna throw a Pokeball at me Cter?" Anny held his arms out to his sides, leaning his head forward and leaving himself wide open. "Maybe a 'Joe Mama' joke? I heard you're a real funny guy, Cter!"

My hand slowly clenched into a fist in the dirt, red flaring in my soul as my rage boiled hotter. I knew what he was doing. Saying that name over and over. He was mocking me. Insulting me and the entire life I had built.

"At least threaten to diddly darn snap my neck!" Anarchy rolled his mockingly desperate eyes, bouncing his head from one shoulder to the other as he approached me. But then those animal eyes darted right back to me, madness flickering in them like a basement light bulb. "Isn't that who you are now, Cter?"

"Just a funny, easy going, lovable scoundrel, right Cter?" As Anny spoke, lightning crackled some around me. I hadn't risen yet, but my body hardly ached anymore. My muscles tightened, my heart pumped boiling blood. My head stayed low, but my glowing red eyes glared holes in the ground.

"None of your happy little friends and family have to know you were a scumbag, do they Cter?!" Anny was shouting now, looming over me. He kept his arms held out to his sides, his shadow falling over me along with rain drop after rain drop. What had been a smile a moment ago was now a furious frown. His fangs were bared, his eyes were wide and his pupils were shrunken. "NOBODY NEEDS TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENED TO LIL' OL' ANNY, DO THEY CTER?!"

Stab!

King, Scar. Instrumental by scarlxrd began playing.

Anarchy's eyebrows rose with genuine surprise, and as his endless blood began to overflow down his bottom lip, a little smile curled his face. He was suspended in air now, arms and legs dangling limp. My four wings had drilled upwards into his abdomen, skewering him and pushing him up into the air. Now he was hanging there, his tainted ichor trickling down my wings in crimson streams.

Slowly I turned my head upwards, letting the burning red of my DETERMINED eyes land upon him. My face was covered in shadow, the only thing visible being the glow of my eyes. I can't imagine what kind of monster I must have looked like, but the sight of me certainly made Anny giggle. Regardless, my soul flared, and the ground split in a spiderweb of cracks beneath me, scarlet light shining out from below. Under the veil of shadow my mouth moved.

"Cter isn't here."

"Stop it you're scaring me!" Anarchy didn't have any problem continuing with his mockery even when I had his body posted up on spikes, his mad dog smile only growing. I growled furiously at his lack of fear, but before I could punish him further for his disobedience, the tearing of flesh and fabric filled my ears. The shoulders of Anny's shirt ripped apart, and more of his blood flicked through the air as two large black masses slid rapidly out from his split flesh.

These strange appendages were made up of three segments, and covered in a black, chitinous armor. The first two segments worked almost like a bicep and a forearm, but the third was significantly larger than its other two segments. It was bulky and almost of an ovular shape, but split down the middle in a jagged and rough pattern. I recognized these appendages as a scorpion's pincers.

Anarchy's pincers snapped down, crunching right through the ink of my wings and severing the drills with which I held him. I was quick to jump back as Anarchy dropped right back to his feet, my clipped wings bubbling and steaming as they quickly began their regeneration. Anny hardly gave me any time though, immediately leaning himself forward and letting yet another gross rip echo through the air. From his tailbone a third chitinous, segmented arachnid appendage coiled up over his head, coming to a poison dipped hook. A stinger to match his pincers.

Clenching my jaw irritably, I threw both my arms out to my sides to summon two Beat Cannons. But before they could fully materialize, Anny pushed off his foot, launching himself forward at a stunning speed. The ground that he pushed off of exploded back and piled into a small hill, and he reached me in a split second.

Before I had time to react, those pincers darted out, smashing down around each of my shoulders. They crunched bone like paper mache, forcing an agonized scream out of my throat. Feebly I tried to pull myself back away, writhing back and forth in the vice grip that snapped my arms like twigs. My still reforming wings flapped violently, but no amount of struggling could get me out of his predatory grasp.

I threw my head back, and my eyes snapped open wide when I saw his stinger coil up over his head. Stomping my foot, a pen fired up from the ground between us, and it ripped right through the abdomen of The Anarchist. he hardly flinched however, even as his organs were sliced through, and his stinger darted down at a stunning speed.

THUNK THUNK THUNK!

My body jolted back and forth, my mouth agape and my wide eyes missing their pupils. Anny's tail jabbed brutally, stinging once before yanking itself free to stab me again, and then again. Venom was injected into my abdomen three times over, and I felt his vile poison burn through my veins, rapidly spreading across my body from each hole he'd put in me.

His pincers must have released me, because I stumbled back away from him. My dilating pupils darted left and right, eyes wincing and widening to try and make out my surroundings. But it was hard, the world had suddenly went dark. If it was still raining, I didn't feel it. If there was still thunder, I didn't hear it. The red smoke of my DETERMINATION still rose from my obliterated shoulders, bone and muscle reforming while I tried to see in The Dark.

"... I've waited a long time for this, Angel." Anthony's voice was low now. Deep and dark. It was the only sound I could hear as my skin grew more and more pale, my breathing becoming more and more labored. I could hear Anny, but he was nowhere to be seen in the pitch black shadows. His voice echoed around me, like I was trapped in one big onyx square. It reverberated and echoed in my ear drums.

"Feels like my whole life I've been chasing you, you know." When I heard the echo of his words begin behind me, I spun right around, my soaking hair whipping to the opposite side of my forehead with a wet slap when I threw my head around. With confusion I squinted, spotting only a shape made of a strange, grey mist.

"I waited for you every single day after you left." The fog manifested the outline of a familiar little boy, standing politely. He had perfect posture, his hands folded together over his lap. In the shifting shade, I thought I saw his perfect smile, thought I could see the pure, innocent scarlet of his eyes. But when I took a step towards him, when I reached out to him, a gust of wind blew the fog away, revealing it was nothing but a mirage. "It's funny, thinking about it now. I spent every second I could thinking about you, but you probably hardly even remembered me, huh Angel?"

"Looking back, its kind of amazing we ever got along. Even back then, we were so completely different..." I continued to throw my head back and forth while I listened to his voice, blinking repeatedly into The Dark to try and spot him. All I found was more of that grey fog though. It clouded around me, shifted and swirled in strange, incomprehensible shapes. "But, I guess I was just so desperate for any drop of KINDNESS that I gravitated to the friendly kid that you were."

"But you weren't like me, were you, Angel? No, you kept me around for a different reason." Finally, in the swirling smog, I started to see another shape. The moment I spotted it though, I wish I hadn't. It was another tiny little kid, this one possibly more familiar than the last. His head was covered by the oversized hood of his too-big hoodie. Unlike little Anny, his posture was poor. He was held in close to himself, the green flickering of his eyes stinging me with their KINDNESS. "You were just so desperate for attention, you must have loved having someone deify you like I did, huh Angel?"

"Mommy and daddy just didn't hug you enough, did they Angel?" I recoiled when I heard Anny say that, my eyes quickly narrowing. My pupils twitched with rage, and my jaw clenched along with my fists. I watched as a pair of scarred, pale white hands reached out of The Dark behind this mirage of a little boy, slowly wrapping around his face. Ivory fingers shrouded the green flicker of his eyes. "That's why you make your little jokes. That's why you learned to flip your charisma on like a switch. You just want someone to notice you so bad, don't you Angel?"

"SHUT UP!" I found myself shouting, feet moving without me even thinking. I sprinted over the onyx floor beneath me, rage flaring in my red eyes before I finally dove into the air. I jumped, launching towards that mirage and the shrouded figure that stood behind it with some kind of flying kick. Unfortunately, I passed right through the fog, never connecting with anything. I landed on both feet, coming to an abrupt stop and lurching forward some, my scarlet orbs wide with confusion. "What the..?"

"That's why you jumped at the chance to be their hero, isn't it, Angel?" I spun around the moment I heard Anny behind me, but as soon as I spotted what the fog had formed behind me, I jumped right back. I knocked myself off balance, swinging my arms wildly before I landed flat on my ass. Still, as I looked upon this massive structure that the shifting dark had crafted, I crawled slowly back away from it, fearful pupils trembling in my eyes. "Because that would mean everyone's eyes would finally be on you!"

"You're such a special boy, Angel! Surely everyone should pat you on the back and ruffle your hair! You deserve it!" I shook my head slowly, eyes locked on the massive statue that loomed over me. It was in my likeness, standing tall and confident. Behind it, its wings were spread wide, giving it a grand appearance. It made me look perfect, like some holy being meant to be worshiped. It's engraving read clearly,

CTER THE ANGEL

"You want to be deified, don't you Angel?! You think you deserve it?!"

"No!" I shouted, reflexively yanking up one hand. On my command, pens exploded up from the shadowed floor, crashing right through this monument to me. It didn't crumble like the stone it resembled should have though, instead just misting away in streams of grey. "T-that's-! That's not-!"

CRACK!

I flung back across the ground, blood flinging from my jaw. From nothingness a familiar metal stung me, immediately disappearing back into the void afterwards. I was sent sliding across the smooth obsidian floor on my shoulder, red misting from my jaw as soon as it was shattered. Eventually my slipping came to a stop, and I crumpled flat on my cheek, panting heavily. Sweat and blood dripping off my face, I heard Anthony's voice echo again. "There's just one problem. You aren't a hero. You're a villain."

"And you must have been terrified, right?" Slowly, I lifted my head, which still bobbed up and down slightly with my labored breathing. I squinted into the swirling mist before me, watching as dozens of shapes were beginning to form. Person after person, Monster after Monster. Every friend I had made here, lined up and standing together like they were just waiting for me to join them. "That they would find out. About you, about everything you did. About everything you are."

"Because, if they did, you wouldn't be their hero anymore, would you, Angel?" I watched as their friendly expression turned sour, and they all began to shift with unease. My eyes gradually widened as they started to step back away from me, and when they began turning their backs, my hand lifted, reaching out towards them feebly. Everyone, from Asriel to Whimsun, all moved quickly, fleeing from me like I was diseased. I was sick. "They would be terrified. Disgusted."

"You wanted to pretend your actions don't have consequences, Angel. But they do." Then, through the form of Monster Kid in the center smoke, a crowbar swung lazily. This simply wave of the cruel metal was all it took to gust aside the mirages of all my new friends, destroying them in an instant. Now, the only other sight in The Dark was Anthony The Anarchist. He walked with clear purpose through the lifting fog, his crowbar gripped tight in his hand. His pincers loomed ominously over each of his shoulders, and over his head the poisonous hook of his stinger waved slightly from side to side. "Karma: what you did in your past life dictates your fate in this one."

*He wants to take it all from you.

"Angel The Hacker, you don't own all that you have." With a hateful cold his eyes narrowed, his knuckles growing to even whiter shades the tighter they clenched. With long, confident strides he was approaching, and it was all I could to push myself up to one knee. Glaring up at him, I kept one hand planted on the smooth, onyx floors. My free hand reached up, wiping the blood stains from my chin away with the back of my fist. "Your wings sprout from the darkness inside you. The peak you stand at the top of is made from all your lies."

*All the work you put in is going to go up in smoke.

"I'm the effect of your cause." The corner of his mouth curling into a snarl, Anarchy stopped right in front of me again. He loomed there, staring down at me without a single blink. It's like he wanted to take in every bit of this moment that he could, wanted to experience every single second. But that was hardly my focus. The more the gravity of the situation bared down on me, the angrier I got. The longer I stared at his face, the hotter my soul burned. Maybe it's because of what he was saying, maybe I thought he sounded pretentious. Maybe it was the fact that he was striking each of my nerves, each of my insecurities. Maybe it was the way he resembled his father. Whatever it was, the closer doom got, the more power I felt surging inside me. "I'm the consequence of your actions!"

*Are you just gonna let him take everything away, little Angel?

"SO COME ON! QUIT MAKIN' THIS SO EASY!" As Anny challenged me, my hand slowly clenched into a white knuckled fist against the smooth, unnatural floor. My jaw tightened, and fire crackled over my left eye as he leaned over me, his face suddenly splitting in a grin. Like some mad bull I huffed from my nose, sending crimson steam smoking out from my nostrils. "FIGHT ME SO I CAN BEAT YOU! LET ME SHOW YOU HOW IT FEELS ON THE LOSING END!"

*Are you gonna let him talk to you like this?! Defy you like this?!

No! I'm! Not! My lips suddenly curled back, revealing my fangs. The air around us pressurized, before once again red winds blasted out around me, slamming into Anarchy with all of their scorching heat. Beneath my fist on the ground red cracks suddenly splintered the dark floor, shattering out around us. I opened my mouth in a roar, and power surged from my soul, exploding out in a mass of crimson aura. This shock wave of power crashed into Anarchy, making him snarl and throw up both arms to guard his face while he was forced to slide back on the balls of his feet. The music stopped abruptly.

Suddenly, with this massive surge of my DETERMINATION, The Dark exploded apart around us. Shadows receded right back where they belonged, and we were once more atop Mount Ebbot and under the storm of our power. My clipped wings flexed, and the half of their feathers that they were missing suddenly exploded out from them, regenerating instantly.

"Fuck karma!" My wings beat downward the moment they healed, firing me right up into the sky above as I shouted my curses. I ascended rapidly, the force of my uprising sending the earth I'd been kneeling upon exploding up in a plume of dust. In mere seconds I was inches from the clouds, their black and red electricity crackling just behind me.

"Fuck what you think of me!" As I continued to scream from above, Anny planted his feet and bent his knees, preparing to lunge up at me. But, before he could, the dirt beneath him shattered open, inky black chains firing up at him. They wrapped over his bent elbows and his wrists, yanking his arms down to his sides. One chain quickly coiled around each segment of his tail, pulling it flat to the ground at the same time that his pincers were wrapped in ink bindings and forced shut. He snarled and struggled as chains launched up around either side of his chest, wrapping in an X over him. And as he roared defiantly, shaking his head, one final chain flung up, lodging itself right between his jaws and making his eyes go even more wide with even more rage. Violently my ink bonds pulled against him, and despite his violent struggling, he was gradually forced down to his knees.

"And you know what?!" I opened one palm down towards him, yelling over the rain's ceaseless pounding as well as thunder's boom and lightning's crash. In the dark sky, light was beginning to shine brightly. Red dots rapidly took shape as Beat Cannons began to circle below me. The world around us was quickly being illuminated in a crimson hue as rings of light filled the sky.

The widest ring and also the closest to the ground took shape first. The Angel's First Halo, Order.

The second ring was a little closer together and a little higher up than the last. The Angel's Second Halo, Judgement.

After that was another higher, thinner ring. The Angel's Third Halo, Punishment.

Higher into the sky, The Angel's Fourth Halo, Repentance.

Then, The Angel's Fifth Halo, Might.

The Angel's Sixth Halo, Wrath.

And finally, smoothing the top of my Beat Dome was my Seventh Halo. Sacrifice.

My Massive Beat Dome circled the entire peak of Mount Ebbot, shining so brightly that it could likely be seen for miles around. Furiously my expression contorted, fires exploding out around my crimson soul. My eye burned so brightly that its flame covered the entire left side of my face, and its heat made cracks start to split through the skin surrounding my eye socket. Red shined from within those cracks as well, the glow of my soul shining just under my skin. Finally, I roared at the very top of my lungs. "FUCK! YOU!"

The boom was like nothing I had ever heard before. Sound shattered the air, the vibration of my blasters filling the space all around us. Like an atomic bomb my Beat Dome ignited, instantly searing through the top of my mountain. Anything from stone peaks to the littlest caterpillars that couldn't wriggle away in time were instantly melted and then vaporized. Dirt was burned into sand and then into glass. Trees were reduced to blackened smudges on the scorched earth.

The brutal explosion of force and the updraft of all that heat exploded out for miles around. I could feel the skin on my outstretched hand starting to burn off, but my DETERMINATION healed the singed away skin at the same pace that it was destroyed. The power blasting in all directions smashed into the clouds over my head so hard that they parted. The moon and the stars and the blackish purple void in between was revealed, all the previous damage from our collision completely blown out of the water by this one massive attack.

Across my face, my outstretched arm, and even my back between my four wings. Cracks were rapidly and painfully splitting my flesh, DETERMINATION glowing from within. Any blood boiled to a mist before it had a chance to drip down my steaming skin, and my jaw clenched tighter. My eye twitched with pain, but my soul burned brighter than ever. As cracks began to split around the valentine heart flaming in my chest, and the rumbling shouts of my Halos threatened to deafen me, I closed my eyes tightly.

Then, finally, after sticking out the pain for several moments longer, when it felt my soul was going to tear my body apart, I let my numb arm drop limp. The booming sound of my Massive Beat Dome began to quiet, and the scorching heat as well as the blinding lights began to cool and dim. Slowly, the massive dome of fire began to grow smaller and smaller, and my Halos disappeared one by one from the sky.

Unevenly my wings beat, and I gasped for air desperately as my shaky, blurry vision watched the smoking pit below. Then, finally, I blinked my eyes a little too long. When I next opened them, I realized I was plummeting down towards the glassed earth, but I was so exhausted I considered just closing my eyes again and resting a little longer before stopping myself from splattering on the blast sight.

I managed to get a weak grip on my senses however, tilting my head up to look down at the earth I was rapidly approached. With my right arm - the arm opposite to the one I had been commanding the Beat Dome with - I reached out to the ground. I winced as black ink with a few drops of red swirled out of the Deltarune on my back, pouring down my extended arm and to the earth below. I formed a large pillar of liquid reaching up to me, which I then plunged into. I sunk through my ink and blood quickly at first, but eventually my magic slowed me enough for a nonlethal impact.

My ink pillar splattered down to a large puddle with me face down at its center, limbs sprawled out around me. All four of my wings had disappeared into my now cracked and steaming back, the glow of my Deltarune dimming gradually. I laid there, staring off into the settling smoke with my head laying on its side and my cheek smushed against the singed glassy sands. My limbs felt as though they were made of lead, and every gasp I took just inhaled more of the burning smell that i'm sure permeated everything in the tri-county area.

Finally, after one or two minutes, I twitched with life. I gradually got my hands under myself, and low, gravely grunts escaped my throat as I forced myself up. Eventually I leaned back, seating myself on my knees and letting my weak arms lay over my lap, the backs of my hands resting in the dirt. My eyes narrowed weakly at the smoldering red cracks that still ran along my left arm. They steamed red, but they did not heal. I felt a similar stinging pain around my left eye, and down my back and chest. When I tilted my head down, I spotted similar smoking cracks surrounding my still smoking soul.

But then, I looked from my own wounds to the one I had inflected upon the land. Around me there was no longer any green. There were no longer any rising peaks. I had completely leveled the top of the mountain, desecrated it as a land mark. All to kill The Anarchist. I stared into the swirling dust that still lingered before me, and suddenly I felt a tinge of guilt.

I let my head hang low, shutting my eyes on the scene before me. Everything he had said about me had been true. Everything he had said had hurt. I knew he hated me, even when we were in the gang. But to see it, so violent and passionate and true... I suddenly felt as though I didn't deserve this victory, if one could even call this a victory. I was always aware of my mistakes, plagued with my guilt.

But as I knelt there, in the wake of pure unadulterated devastation that was directly my fault in every way, I felt... Empty. Alone. Like I really was a villain, like I really was poison. And like I would never be able to change that. It felt like, just being me was a sickness. And in that instant I was convinced there was no cure. So, pathetically, I let three little words out of my throat, quiet as a whisper.

"... I'm sorry, Anny..."

Crunch... Crunch... Crunch...

My head suddenly darted up, my eyes opening wide. In the shifting fog of destruction, I saw a shadow taking form. It sauntered through the valley of shadow and death, and after several long seconds of staring, one bare, pale foot stepped through the smoke.

His shirt and his shoes had been scorched away, along with his pincers and his tail. His jeans had been turned into uneven, burned and hole ridden shorts. But still, Anthony The Anarchist walked right out of that smoke, back straight and eyes forward. His pale skin was still smoking red in places, burns healing back to his usual scarred up flesh.

Disbelief settled over my expression with just a hint of hopelessness, my shoulders sinking. I just sat there on my knees, watching silently as he sauntered ever closer. His shield was gone from his arm, but in his bleeding fingers he never let go of that crowbar. He walked right out of my Massive Beat Dome, face a stoic mask. His clothes were destroyed, his body was still smoking to close a few brutal wounds, and yet he looked completely unphased. Emotionless.

"... That's your most powerful attack, right?" Anthony finally spoke, his voice the only sound left in this obliterated plain. Behind him smoke and dust still swirled, like nothing existed behind his unstoppable path. I couldn't respond. I was so jarred, so completely in shock, that all I could do was stare at him, my jaw slightly ajar. He smiled just a little at that, a twinkle of sadistic joy in his eyes. "I thought so."

Then, suddenly, the smog behind him shifted. To either side of him a massive, pitch black pincer seeped out of its cover. Over his head, one gigantic, curled stinger rose from the smoke, coiling its pike sized point menacingly. My eyes widened further as I suddenly felt rumbling in the ground, and Anarchy's Scorpion stepped forward from the mist of destruction. The kaiju arachnid loomed behind Anny, every eye on its head darting right down to me while its mandibles eagerly snapped at each other, like it was excited to devour me.

"That's great!" Anthony's chest start to lift and quake, giggles escaping through his grinding teeth. He craned his neck to the side, tilting his head back as his grin curled from one ear to the other. DETERMINED fire ignited over his left eye as his snickering exploded out into full blown, hysterical laughter. He threw both his arms out to his sides, like he was bathing in this lovely scenario. And while his jaws snapped to and fro in his giddy laughing, he shouted his happy threat.

"Wanna see mine?!"

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