The End of Heartache

Adam could feel his body moving on its own, as if it belonged to someone else. Time was moving slowly as he exchanged punches with someone with brown hair and blue eyes. Who exactly it was, it was difficult to tell with how blurry his vision was. Words kept repeating in his head, "kill her, your family is in danger, she hurt your family, kill, kill, kill."

Adam was trying hard to understand what was going on, where he was, and why he was fighting but his thoughts were just as blurry as his vision. A few images which were clear to him though, were that of his wife, Kana, and his beautiful, brown-eyed daughter, Shion. Those two were the light of his life, and the only reason he could think of why he would be fighting anyone. He hoped they were ok. Whoever it was that he was fighting was incredibly strong because they were deflecting his punches easily and enduring the ones they couldn't block. They were no match for him though, and he went in for a death blow, but before his fist connected with their face, he heard a familiar voice, "Papa? Papa it's me, Shion." For just a moment, his mind and vision cleared as he changed where he was aiming his fist, narrowly avoiding the girl’s skull. The woman who stood before him looked so much like Kana, but instead of blonde hair like he would expect, it was brown.

Adam stumbled back as his head began to throb. He pressed his fingers into his eyes and tried to rub away the blur, but to no avail. His body began to move on its own again, his fist striking the girl on her forearms, resulting in a blood curdling scream. The girl retreated, popping something green into her mouth before yelling indistinctly at him.

Something inside Adam told him that he shouldn't let himself hurt this person, but his body was acting on its own. The girl yelled at him again and the word "papa" echoed in his ears again before he was struck on the side of his head and he both heard and felt a crunch.

For a minute, the world went black and an image of Shion leading him by the hand popped into his head as his knees hit the ground. Before his body completely flopped over, the girl held him up and gently set his head on the ground next to a shattered mask.

The next thing Adam knew, liquid was dripping down on his face, some cold and some warm. Adam's eyes fluttered as he opened them. For the first time, he was able to see clearly. Looking down at him the girl was crying with blood dripping down one side of her face, "Papa?" Adam's eyes widened as he stared at the battered face of his own child. 

"Shion?" he whispered as he tried to brush his hand against her cheek, but it would not move.

Blood began to rush out of his mouth and tears in his eyes as he realized he had hurt his own child. He softly muttered, "It's ok Shion. Papa loves you. It's gonna be ok. I'm just glad that I didn't kill you."

"I love you too papa," Shion whimpered.

About 15 minutes before, while the two were fighting, Chizuru and Sayaka were fighting a battle of their own. After the Bishop had collapsed, Chizuru approached him to check for a pulse and found none. She stood near his body talking to Sayaka about what may have happened when suddenly she could feel her leg being crushed. When Chizuru looked down she could see a grossly enlarged hand gripping her calf, she drew her blade and cut it off before stumbling back. Almost instantly, a new hand replaced the one that was severed.

Chizuru tried to get up as she heard the cracking of bones and tearing of flesh, but her leg gave out when she tried to stand. Sayaka pulled her away by the collar while looking up in disgust at Bishop Leary's freshly distorted body. He had grown massive, towering down at least 8ft tall, his twisted and distorted limbs hanging low to the ground.

Sayaka spit on the ground, "Why are all these church types such fucking freaks all the time?"

She hid them around the corner as the Leary monster thing spoke, "This is what it looks like to become more than human. I have the strength of a gorilla, the speed of a leopard, and I can heal in the blink of an eye!"

Chizuru got up, impressed that nanites really did work as fast as Shion said. "You just look like a fucking freak to me."

Bishop Leary scoffed, "Precisely, that is why we need to figure out how human gene expression works. So you can be all these things and not look like this. When you force it, test subjects wind up looking like this. Now come, let me take what I need from you."

Leary swung his overgrown arms at the girls and both skillfully rolled out of the way. Chizuru sliced off a few chunks of flesh but it started growing back instantly. She turned to Sayaka and asked, "How are we supposed to hurt that thing?"

Sayaka smiled slyly and opened her brown leather trench coat. It was lined with explosives. "Let's lead him back to Shion then we can blow the whole place to high hell."

Chizuru smiled back, "I like that plan, let's do it."

Chizuru and Sayaka began to goad Leary by striking him on various parts of his body. Step by step, he followed them to the place where Shion and her father fought. When the two were within earshot they could hear Shion sobbing as she cradled Adam's head.

Seeing Shion that way pulled at Chizuru's heart strings, filling her chest with a heavy and achy feeling, but also with rage. As the three approached the magma pool, her attacks became more fierce as she took her anger out on the Leary monster, but the holes she was making were too small and sealed too quickly for Sayaka to toss in the explosives.

Adam regained consciousness, and was finally able to sit up and hug his grown-up daughter. Adam could see the other two struggling and got up to help them. He showed up behind Sayaka, "Is that you little Sayaka? What can I do to help?"

Sayaka smiled and said, "Yes it is, but I'm not so little anymore. I need a big hole in that creepy fucking thing, " she pointed to Leary.

Adam smiled back, "Ok, no problem ." He pumped up his bicep and took off faster than the eye could see and bang, a huge hole popped up on the right side of Leary's body.

Sayaka tossed in the explosive as the wound sealed itself shut then shouted, "We gotta get out of here. There is enough there to collapse the entire cave!"

Chizuru noticed Shion struggling to get up and offered to carry her, but Adam picked her up first and started running. Leary was not far behind. Surprisingly fast for his massive deformed body, Leary caught up to the group hitting Adam in the lower back. He tossed Shion as his legs gave out. Adam was suddenly unable to move his legs at all. He told the girls to run, but they all came running towards him and Leary instead. Stupid kids Adam thought as he began using his arms to crawl. Chizuru reached Adam first and slung him over her back as she turned to run away from Leary again.

Shion looked around at the giant stalagmites and boulders, then whispered to the others "We have to slow it down. The only way I can think of doing that is to pile some stuff on top of it. I’ll keep him busy but my arms are completely useless again. I don't know if either of you is strong enough to do that."

Chizuru looked closely at the structures and said with confidence, "Sayaka and I can do it. Give me your wire Shion. Sayaka. Take us to the top of the big one,” she pointed to the tallest stalagmite.

Sayaka gave Chizuru a snarky look before grabbing her waist and using her whip to pull them both up to the flat granite shelf meters above their heads.  Chizuru jumped onto the top of one stalagmite and tightly wrapped the wire around it, then jumped back and tightened the other end to a fatter stalagmite in a cinch knot. She grabbed the end and started walking around the bigger one as the tension increased and increased until the skinnier stalagmite was leaning forward. She sent Sayaka to stand on top of the leaning rock and, once the Leary monster was in range, told Sayaka to push as hard as she could with her legs. Shion  was running like a madwoman about ten feet in front of it. On three, Sayaka pushed hard with her legs and the large rock fell landing on the back half of the Bishop's body pinning him in place. 

Chizuru put Adam in a firefighter carry and they all ran to the mouth of the cave. Sayaka pressed the detonator as he entered the tunnel where Leary injected himself and the hot air burst out of the cave. The team half expected to see Leary's twisted corpse crawl out of the cave, but to everyone's relief, it didn't happen. What did emerge from the cave was hundreds of those large bats, some on fire. All let out sighs and were visibly relaxed as they continued flying without stopping for a goodbye attack, when a different unexpected and unwanted guest showed up.