Mostly cloudy. 13mph winds blowing south. Forty-eight degrees fahrenheit. With wind chill, forty-two. Unusual weather patterns incoming. Forecasts may be unreliable.
“Before,” Delvin started, breaking the shock in the room and speaking loudly to attract the attention of the others, “you all do anything with that… cure. I want to tell you something important. Or, ask, rather.”
All eyes were on Delvin, who was standing tall in the center of the room. Tension filled the air.
“The fact that we’ve created this cure leads me to believe that we have been observing different things through the microscope over the past few months.”
Dr. D was growing angry. “Delvin, what are you on about? You’ve hardly even been helping us develop the cure.”
“Yes, and I have a reason for that. This virus… we can’t kill it.”
“Delvin, you are out of line. What are you-”
“But we can,” Grif interrupted. “The Schisms—my species—they ended up how they were because of the cure they tried to make. It’s all in the legend they told me. The Schisms got infected by the Magna virus a long time ago, and when they tried to make a cure for it, it corrupted their bodies and gave them mutated Vals. It made their brains permanently underdeveloped. But we fixed that, didn’t we? Wasn’t the corvyte supposed to fix that?”
The group looked at Grif with apprehension, then relented. Delvin spoke again.
“No, that’s not what I mean. The cure you’ve developed will work, yes. What I mean is… we shouldn’t kill it. In the time that I spent studying the virus, not only did I come to the conclusion that it was incurable, I realized that I felt, how do I put this… blessed.”
He paused.
“I found a certain holiness… maybe an unholiness within the virus that I found beautiful. Godly. And with my research I found several unsolved documents from long ago. I uncovered every record of a barren planet that may have once supported life—every planet in the Manim deadzone—and found that every single one contained organic matter that had its DNA wiped—the exact deadly properties of the Magna virus we’ve been studying. What we’re dealing with isn’t something that medicine can cure; no, it’s far beyond that. Far beyond the scale of us and our small lives on this planet. The Magna virus has killed trillions. Dozens and dozens, maybe hundreds of different intelligent species in our corner of the galaxy have been wiped out by this single virus. But we aren’t actually dealing with a virus, we’re dealing with perfection. The perfect lifeform. We’re dealing with the barrier to life itself, the single filter that stops life from evolving. Do you all really think you can beat that? There are five of you in the room with me—do you all think five lifeforms can compete against something that has killed trillions? Can you really fight perfection?”
Delvin paused again. Nobody said a word.
“Science is discovery. It is experience. And so, I want to ask you all to join me in the discovery of perfection. We’ve seen a glimpse, yes, but there is so much left in store for us. I found inspiration long ago in Nova Noctis, the group dedicated to the pursuit of The Shades. Their methods were flawed, but the idea of searching for the ultimate answer to our world is one I can relate to. The Magna virus is the answer to all of the questions we’ve asked together. Wouldn’t you like to experience it in its full glory? If we stop the Magna now, we’ll miss out on what it feels like to experience the ultimate lifeform. Frankly, I’m excited for it. So I want to ask you, my lab partners, my colleagues, my friends and fellows in science to join me as we experience perfection before we die. Wouldn’t you like to get a glimpse of God?”
Azer’s heart was pumping madly. Was it terror he was feeling? Everyone in the room was looking at Delvin with horror and disbelief. But what sickened Azer most was the look of hope and joy on Delvin’s face.
“Of… of course not,” Mrs. Korca croaked, her voice breaking. “Delvin, people are going to die! How can you just stand there like that, like it’s a good thing!”
Delvin’s look of excitement quickly fell off his face into an expression of genuine disappointment.
“I’d hoped…” he murmured. “Do you all… really?”
“Delvin,” Dr. D said, more shocked than enraged. “No. We don’t. You’re completely mad. Get out of here now. NOW.”
The moment Dr. D’s free hand pointed towards the door, Delvin snatched the syringe from Dr. D’s other hand. Without a word or change in expression, in a flash of movement, Delvin injected the cure into Dr. D’s chest.
Dr. D groaned and fell to the floor. His tall figure no longer obscuring Delvin’s face, the others could see a look of sadness on his visage.
“I didn’t want to do this,” Delvin said quietly.
Amid screams, Delvin approached the rest of the group. Azer had to get to Dr. D, fast. Something in the cure was killing him.
“Ortum was the easiest to take out, and my only real challenge,” Delvin explained as he strode closer to the rest of Team Virga. “His body is a glitch between life and death, so injecting him again with the cure that originally revived him has reversed his fate.”
Azer activated his S.R. and tried to jump past Delvin to get to Dr. D. In a swift movement, Delvin grabbed Azer’s arm.
“He can’t be saved,” Delvin explained. “Who knows what will happen to his body now? Besides, you aren’t my next target.”
Delvin threw Azer against the wall with frightening force, then continued walking. Quickly, Azer realized Delvin’s intentions.
Mrs. Korca, too, was frantically trying to reach Dr. D. Upon seeing Delvin approaching her, she screamed again. She was cornered.
Azer tried to lift himself up, but he was too dazed from the impact. Grif tried to tackle Delvin, but Delvin easily threw Grif aside.
And in a quick moment of disbelief, Mrs. Korca grasped at her own throat, choking, and then collapsed to the ground, dead.
Delvin watched her body fall to the floor.
“This is what you chose!” Delvin thundered. “Your death was a waste! A meaningless death at my hands! You could have chosen to experience the ultimate lifeform, but your sentimentality got in the way! You are nothing but a fool!”
Grif was breathing heavily, looking at Mrs. Korca’s motionless body.
“No,” Grif breathed.
“WHAT DID YOU DO?!” Grif roared at Delvin. He looked back at Grif, unfazed.
“She was next on my list. There’s a method, you see, to getting rid of you all. I know your Vals. I’m not a haphazard berzerker. Dr. D was the only truly strong fighter among us, so I took him out first with the cure. Korca could have used her density triggers to thin the air, rendering my wind Vals useless. But, after removing the air in her lungs, I only have Okta, Grif, and Azer to remove from my path.”
“You’re a madman, Delvin,” Okta growled. “You’re unhinged.”
“And you can imagine how insane I think you all are to deny a glimpse of the ultimate lifeform before death.”
On one end of the lab stood Delvin, the bodies of Dr. D and Mrs. Korca at his feet. Grif breathed heavily, tears in his eyes at the sight of them. Azer was too shocked to believe it. On the other end of the room were Azer, Grif, and Okta, horrified at the sight.
“Our first move,” Okta said to the boys, lowering his voice, “is to escape the lab. We’re at Delvin’s mercy in this enclosed space.”
“HE KILLED MRS. KORCA!” Grif yelled. “HE KILLED HER! AND DR. D IS DYING TOO!”
“I know,” Okta growled, voice still lowered. “But it doesn’t change our first move. We’ll all be dead within the next minute if we don’t leave now.”
And, right on cue, Delvin began to walk towards the three. Air whirred through the holes in his hands, a sound that resembled a scream.
“But… we can’t leave them!” Azer said with a shaking voice.
“Our priority is to escape. We can’t save them by dying here.”
Azer took one last look at Dr. D and Korca and then steeled himself. He turned towards the entrance and sprinted up the stairs, followed quickly by Okta and Grif.
Delvin chased the three up and out of the lab. Azer, Okta, and Grif ran up the staircase and pushed open the door, emerging into the outside world.
The sun above shone on Nur with altered light. The ground had an orangish tint as if it were lit by a great fire. Its color held a corrupted quality.
Azer, Grif, and Okta burst out of the Battle Academy, panting. Only seconds behind came Delvin, not bothering to touch the door, having it float open from a gust of wind instead. They ran into the Battle Academy courtyard, trying to distance themselves from the haunting whir of Delvin’s wind.
Okta turned back towards Delvin.
“Delvin’s a powerhouse,” said Okta. “He’s mastered his wind Vals to an incredible degree. And he’s no longer bound by the moral restraints he’d obeyed before.”
“How does that help us?” Grif retorted. “I think we could infer that much. He killed Mrs. Korca instantly.”
“I’m saying that there’s no chance of beating him through brute force. Delvin knows every attack you have, and he can and will counter each one.”
“I thought we were trying to get away!” Grif exclaimed.
“And then what?” Okta snapped. “He gives up? Delvin’s unhinged. His insanity won’t stop at killing us. He truly believes experiencing the Magna virus is like experiencing God. Nur isn’t safe from him.”
“You said it yourself, he’s nearly invincible,” Grif replied.
“Nobody’s invincible. We can win if, and only if we have a plan.”
“Then what’s your plan?”
“Two things: One, we need to get out in the open. Two, I need to touch him. Even a brief graze will do.”
“Why in the open?” Azer asked.
“It gives him fewer weapons to work with. What kills isn’t the wind, it's what the wind throws around. We need to get to the outskirts of town, ideally the plains.”
It was just then that a car slammed down only inches in front of the three, sending shrapnel in every direction and partially embedding itself in the ground. Azer looked behind to see Delvin in hot pursuit, running by parked cars.
“Get out of the parking lot!” Okta yelled. “NOW!”
The three scattered in every direction. Air whirred behind them as the holes in Delvin’s hands circulated immense amounts of the atmosphere. The wind, moving fast enough to create trails of water vapor, flowed through and around his hands, circling behind him into an exponentially growing tornado. The tornado swerved through the parking lot, launching cars into the air with stunning accuracy. They fell only inches away from the three, grazing them with ripped and torn metal shards and glass. Okta and Azer found themselves running side-by-side just as a car soared in Azer’s direction. He activated S.R., his senses sharpened, and dodged the car as it slammed into the pavement with a horrific crunch, showering them in fuel and scrap.
The three gathered again at the parking lot’s edge. The area around them was slowly growing hillier and grassier. They had reached the Octane fields on the outskirts of Nur.
They stopped at the plains and turned back to see Delvin still approaching. He wasn’t touching the ground, rather floating just above it on a layer of wind.
“You’ve chosen a foolish way to disarm me, Okta,” Delvin said. “Just because there’s nothing around doesn’t mean I’m powerless. Never have you had to truly fight me before.”
“That’s objective one,” Okta muttered to Azer and Grif. “Ignore what he’s saying. This is an ideal position. Now, your next priority is me. I need to touch him, and I need to survive.”
“Why you?” Grif challenged.
“I am his next target. He realizes what I can do and therefore wants to kill me next. He’s calculated. Ortum was the strongest—he took him out first. Korca was the best counter to wind—she could reduce air pressure. She was taken out next. I have dual minds, I’m a master strategist. My Val may be our only chance to get into that head of his and figure out what his next moves are before they’re made.”
“Fine. Let’s do this.”
Delvin carefully dropped himself to the ground and aligned his arms in a strange manner, as if he were holding an invisible spear. The whirring sound climaxed for a moment, becoming a high-pitched whistle, and Azer noticed water vapor circling around and around through the holes in his hands, spreading out in a line. The line of spinning air grew more and more visible, the speed increasing further and further, until it looked like Delvin was holding a ghostly white spear through the holes in his hands. He brandished it at the three.
“It was without a doubt from the beginning that the rest of Team Virga would try to stop me should they not decide to join me,” Delvin said. “Enough of the heroics. Your empathy is getting in the way of human discovery.”
Delvin swung the spear. The cylinder of spinning air extended from his hands and cut downwards, barely missing Okta. The ground that the spear touched was instantly cut and wiped away, erased by the cyclone.
Azer dashed towards Delvin, his S.R. activated, his senses sharp and his surroundings moving slow. His body went on overdrive, watching the wind spear in the air as he charged.
Azer noticed something about the rotating spear: the wind had picked up bits of the ground that it had cut away. Pieces of rock and dirt, while miniscule, swirled around the cylinder of air Delvin wielded. Seeing it now, it seemed obvious: the spear didn’t erase what it touched, it eroded its surroundings at a nearly instant rate. The material that was ground away stayed spinning inside of the spear. This gave Azer an idea.
He dodged under the spear’s cutting wind and distanced himself from Delvin, making his way over to Okta. But before he could speak, Okta said:
“Tell me exactly how your ability works. S.R, was it?”
“It’s a supercharge of the body. Your senses go on overdrive, your muscles go on overdrive, and from what I saw from saving Grif on Kular, even regeneration goes on overdrive. It’s pure life at the cost of massive amounts of energy, and I can temporarily give some of it to other people as well.”
“Perfect. I need you to inject me with as much of your S.R. as possible.”
“What?!”
“Do it. The longer you wait, the worse our odds will get,” said Okta.
“I just told you, it drains your energy like nothing else. It could kill you.”
“Do it.”
Azer stood in front of Okta in the heat of battle, thinking quickly.
“Fine. You probably have a plan, but indulge mine as well. His wind spear is just rapidly rotating air, it doesn’t just erase things. You know how Delvin was throwing cars at us? We’re covered in fuel now. If you can get that fuel inside of Delvin’s spear, and if Grif lights it up, it’ll make a huge explosion. The spear is constantly circulating air; it’ll be oxidizing the fire big time.”
Okta peered at Azer for a moment before dodging the incoming wind spear. Azer grabbed Okta’s arm and let the S.R. flow through his body. It moved through his chest to his arm to his hand and fingers, moving into Okta’s body, until Okta’s own skin began to steam, and he nodded at Azer.
Okta dashed away towards Delvin, sprinting faster than any organic body should allow. His shoes pounded on the grass of the fields beneath him, the fields he felt like he was flying over. Delvin turned his focus to Okta and was surprised to see the speed he was moving at. Immediately, Delvin wielded his spear and swung it downwards just as Okta extended an arm towards his face–
A slashing sound rang through the turbulent air. For a moment, nobody moved, all of the combatants on the field watching the scene. Delvin was holding his wind spear below Okta, and Okta’s hand was only millimeters in front of Delvin’s face.
“Touched you,” said Okta.
But just then, Okta’s arm began to fall, sliding off his body and landing in the grass with a thud. Blood poured out of a stump on Okta’s shoulder, and he grasped it while letting out a groan of agony.
“You…” Okta growled between labored breaths. “You made one… fatal… mistake. Smell that?”
Delvin looked down at Okta’s severed arm to see that another liquid was dripping from it other than blood. Liquid fuel. It soaked the sleeve and dripped between the blades of grass below. And in Delvin’s spear of wind, alongside vaporized crimson blood, the fuel swirled in a potent vapor.
“NOW!” Okta shouted.
Grif shot a bolt of electricity towards Delvin’s wind spear, igniting it instantaneously. Arcs of spinning flame ignited the fuel vapor, exponentially increasing in speed, the rotating explosion making its way down the entire spear. The flames were fanned by the rapidly moving air. In the blink of an eye, the colossal explosion traveled down to the holes in Delvin’s hands, surrounding him and Okta in a ball of fire.
The heat of the explosion reached as far away as Azer and Grif, and the air around them was sucked into and then pushed away from the blast. When the smoke and dust subsided, the two were lying on the ground apart from each other, charred and bleeding.
“OKTA!” Azer and Grif yelled in unison.
They sprinted over to Okta, frantically trying to help him up and distance him from Delvin, who was stirring. Okta remained limp, groaning as Azer and Grif dragged him away.
Delvin pushed himself up to a kneel and looked at his bloody hands, shaking.
“DAMN YOU!” he yelled. His face was enraged. “DAMN YOUR TRICKS!”
In Azer and Grif’s arms, Okta began to stir now, too. He attempted to move his legs to standing.
“He’s… not… done…” Okta groaned. “He’s… coming.”
Delvin, after several attempts, pushed himself up to a standing position and turned towards the three.
“I must admit that some compliments are in order,” Delvin said briskly. “You found an opportunity and acted upon it. And for that, I must thank you. I cannot grow until I am challenged, and I am being challenged indeed. But your attempts are still useless. You cannot beat me.”
Delvin took a sickeningly familiar stance and air began to hiss through the holes in his hands. The hissing rose in pitch until it became almost inaudible, and Delvin’s figure slowly faded away into invisibility.
“NO!” Azer yelled. “Get him! Quick!”
Grif sprinted forward towards Delvin to try and catch him. But by the time Grif arrived at his old position and fired a small bolt of lightning, he was gone. All signs of Delvin had vanished into thin air.
Then, a familiar voice boomed around them from all directions.
“Have you ever wondered what truly makes us intelligent?” Delvin asked from nowhere in particular.
Azer and Grif were back-to-back, looking around frantically for the source of Delvin’s voice. Okta, hardly conscious, propped himself up by putting his remaining arm around Grif’s shoulder, back-to-back as well.
“I can hear his thoughts,” Okta managed. “I managed to touch him before my arm was severed, I can hear his next moves.”
“Yeah, but that’s not gonna help us much if we don’t know where he’s thinking them!” Grif retorted.
“Grif, you need to-”
Just then, a slash of cutting wind impacted Grif’s torso. He began to bleed profusely, wincing and desperately searching for Delvin’s presence.
“It’s been found that a number of species on a vast number of planets show intelligence,” Delvin said again, his voice from all around. “Some creatures have the mental capacity to play games or solve puzzles, even build and communicate with each other. So it makes you wonder, why is it us who are considered the intelligent ones?”
“Azer,” Okta muttered, “Azer, HE’S COMING-”
Azer barely managed to throw his guard up before a glimpse of Delvin appeared before him and sent a blast of slicing air at his throat. It hit Azer’s forearms, leaving deep cuts behind.
“The answer is curiosity,” Delvin went on. “All other creatures but us have failed to ask. No beings other than us Zystinians have ever truly wondered about the world around us, not to the extent that we do. Apes don’t conduct science, but we do. Our intelligence is built off the back of questions and answers and the pursuit of both. We aren’t intelligent because we are, we’re intelligent because we have the capacity to ask.”
“Science is the greatest pursuit of humankind. Science is what brought us out of the primitive age, and it is what brings us into the world we live in today. Science is to ask, and to ask is to be human. So for you all to deny me of my ability to ask, to deny me a chance to experience the most perfect creature to ever roam the universe is the greatest crime there is. You are denying me my curiosity. You are denying me my humanity. You are denying me the ability to ask before I’m taken into oblivion. Don’t you see that?”
“You’re a madman! A madman and nothing else!” Okta yelled into the air.
“You will not deny me my curiosity,” Delvin’s voice growled.
Then, the air went silent. All that was left was a light wind.
“Something’s coming…” Okta warned. “I can feel it. He’s preparing something. Something big. Get ready.”
“We are,” Grif replied.
“He’s… he’s thinking about attacking… all of us. All three of us. The next attack isn’t just one particular target. He-”
Everything around them then went eerily quiet. It wasn’t just quiet—there was no sound. Okta’s mouth was moving, but no sound was coming out. Then, in a sick moment of realization, they covered their mouths. The air was gone.
Immediately, Azer felt his skin begin to swell. The sweat on his body was evaporating, and the blood within him was beginning to boil. Their wounds were bleeding profusely, the blood immediately vaporizing as soon as it left their bodies, disappearing into the vacuum around them. Azer felt claustrophobic, trapped in a bubble without air.
Azer ran as fast as he could in no direction in particular, but his shoes made no sound on the grassy earth. He tried as hard as he could to not focus on the timer counting down the seconds in his mind, the 15 seconds of consciousness he had remaining before his body shut down. This is how Mrs. Korca died, he thought grimly.
In a panic, Azer stopped. There was no time left. Something had to be done now. The hypoxia was setting in, his vessels and veins increasingly blocked by the gas bubbles of his boiling blood. He allocated the last of his thoughts to finding Delvin.
Okta and Grif were already unconscious on the ground. Their wounds were worse than his—they didn’t stand a chance. If the air is gone, Azer thought, then Delvin must be somewhere nearby to take it away.
But Delvin was invisible. There was no way of finding him. Unless…
Air refracts light. Anywhere in the atmosphere, refraction is unnoticeable due to the fact that the air pressure is mostly uniform. But like a spoon in a cup of water is refracted due to the difference between water and air, the difference between a vacuum and an atmosphere should be noticeable as well.
As his vision darkened, Azer frantically searched his surroundings for a shadow. Any difference in the light, any sign of refraction. Delvin was nearby, and he had to be in an air bubble of his own to stay invisible and continue breathing. And then he saw it. The shadows of the sun on the grass, in a small patch only a few feet across, were different—a bubble of pressurized air.
With the last of his energy, Azer sprinted towards the barely-distinguishable refraction, fist reared back. With all of his might, all of the rage and anger he felt, he slammed his fist into the bubble with frightening force.
Delvin’s face was crushed with the trauma of the impact, jettisoned from his protective bubble at high speed. With a loud whoosh and a small boom, the atmosphere returned.
Azer heard Delvin groaning and yelling in frustration, grabbing his bloody face. A tooth had fallen onto the grass beside him.
“You made one mistake,” Azer told Delvin, fists clenched. “You messed with Team Virga.”
Azer rushed forward, S.R. burning through his veins, charging directly at him. Delvin summoned his wind spear, streaks of water vapor taking form. They ran towards each other, accelerating and accelerating, until–
They impacted. Azer threw a fist into Delvin’s head once again, shattering skin and bone, the wind spear cutting at Azer’s flesh, until Delvin went flying backwards at a stunning speed. But Azer wasn’t done yet—he followed Delvin as he rapidly flew through the air, sprinting beneath him. When Delvin began to fall, Azer lifted a leg and mercilessly kicked Delvin back into the air again. By the time Delvin landed once more, they were at Nur’s town scrapyard, Delvin leaving a dirt trail behind him on the ground.
Azer stood over him, watching the man’s chest rise and fall with labored wheezes, but he could feel nothing but contempt at the sight. Azer didn’t have an ounce of pity for him. Azer groaned as blood dripped from his chest, a wound inflicted by the wind lance during their clash. Was it critical?
“Stop,” Delvin wheezed, trying and failing to push himself to standing. “Stop this. Don’t… kill me.”
“I wasn’t going to,” Azer said quietly. “As horrible as you are, I don’t want to take your life.”
“I need…” Delvin breathed, “I need to see it. I can’t die without seeing it.”
Azer felt another pang of fury. This close to death, and the man still wanted to die at the hands of the virus?
“I’m not letting that happen. We’re curing this damn thing. My S.R. is the cure, just like Dr. D said. Even though the one we’ve made is gone, I swear we’re stopping this.”
Delvin then looked at Azer scrutinizingly. He breathed on the ground, staring at Azer, a look of disappointment on his face.
“What a… waste,” Delvin said. “At the library… our search for discovery together… I could have sworn I saw myself in you. Like my own face could have gone where yours should be. But I see now… what an oversight that was. You never felt the passion for discovery like I did.”
Then, in a flash of movement, a massive gust of wind pushed Delvin to standing. The air moved past Azer faster and faster, getting stronger and stronger as Delvin reached out his hands towards Azer.
“I will make my escape! I will complete my goal!”
The wind grew stronger and stronger yet, pushing harder and harder on Azer’s body. How does he still have energy left? Azer tried to push forward against the gust, bracing his feet into the dirt, but even the dirt was getting blown away. A terrible clanking noise filled the air as the immense piles of scrap began to fall, carried away by the monstrous gale.
And beneath the largest pile of scrap a gargantuan relic was revealed, glimmering and resolute in the sunlight. Azer took in the sight, astounded, until the wind was finally too much, and he was blown far past the scrapyard’s borders, never to see Delvin again.
Azer stepped through scattered scrap and trash, littered between the trees, until he finally stood on ancient stone again.
The final relic, now revealed, was well-preserved for its age. Unlike the shrine relic that they had come by long ago, this relic was full in size. It featured a large series of towering walls, the tallest stretching almost twenty feet into the air, every inch covered in strange symbols. It had been hidden in plain sight all along, underneath the heaps of scrap Mayor Lindwoter had placed atop it.
But just as Azer began to read the text on the final relic, his head was knocked back with the force of the memories that hit him. His mind spun and whirled, he fell unconscious…
And then he Remembered.
