Like a dam loosed in explosive fashion, everyone who just saw a kid disintegrate a burned out wreck and revive the literal dead lost any semblance of composure. The triage, both those healed and those who couldn't avoid the blinding light show, converged from behind. The heroes ahead hurrying to him with intent, the bulky woman practically charging. Seth felt he knew her somehow but he didn't really have time to even hesitate before she-

"THAT WAS FUCKING AMAZING!!!"

Before she lifted him up like an overachieving child and raised him over the ensuing crush. What fibers of his being that could still feel tried to drive his fear, but the massing smiles and joyous tears denied them a hold. Only managing to keep a hand on his cap as the vain amazonian woman shook his drained body for all it was worth.

He could see everyone, everything. All the pain and fear from before melting away. All the broken respect for the dead before them splintering to slightedness and overjoy. And those dead, those given back, all those eyes turned back toward him. They wouldn't remember too much, but they knew what he'd done for them. And yet he couldn't escape the flood drenching them away, turning their stifled and still choked up relief to just a few beside many. Feeling their sadness wracked and allowed to keep going, happy tears at refused cessation, awe and… a want of-

"Buster put him down! You're gonna kill him!!"

An almost laughing voice preceded a green gloved hand patting her shoulder to let go. The name rang the world back to scenery, but the joyous shaking had rung most everything else out with it. This Buster apologetically smirked and lowered him down into the waiting throng pooling beneath. Pats on every surface, forced him down before those same hands held him up. Heroes trying their best to not let him get smothered to death. All the while he was feeling the love like never before. Like he never even held hope for. At least not in this world.

The cheering was deafening, the bodies claustrophobia inducing. And it was certainly warmer here, though that was probably just the still smoking excess burned out of him. But this scenery refused to stay mundane. All these eyes and so much common emotion, the flood overtaking again and damn near bleeding into his own. The entourage of heroes that had once been dragged down by the death they had been charged with circling him and warded off the worst, giving him space to breathe and actually accept this en masse praise. But he couldn't help smile under this deluge.

Hand still glued to his cap and head dragged low by hoarse breaths, he could make out his protectors at least. Cauterizer and Depthcharge stopped the worst of the injured and those still healing from celebrating their wounds open. Terawatt was joined in to this group as well, and was keeping that gloved hand and smile to Buster while they kept a space in front of him. The League was either short staffed or these guys were already in place to help. None of them seemed suited to this kind of disaster rescue beyond Cauterizer. Not to mention their reaction time on this. But realties were a little hard to work through, as Buster reached out and wrapped an oversized arm around Seth's neck.

"Seriously, that was amazing! What kin'a power even does stuff like this huh!?"

He barely had a chance to answer buried in muscle and side boob. He half expected to receive a noogie like a looked down on sibling. Grievously fretted it really but-

"Buster!! Suffocation!!"

Cauterizer cut in before Seth's shadowed second hand smile turned blue. The entourage finally got the crowd to clear back a few feet and calm the hell down. And ease Buster's overbearance. Only slightly though.

"Haha! With a power like that you need to be careful!"

A teasing flick to his brim flared his tension back up, but a keeping hand retained it and resulted in only proper eye contact.

"Ya keep going all out like that and you'll burn to a crisp!"

Seth chuckled along glumly as he lowered his head back down, tension eased away by fatigue-

"Here!"

And a reapplied chokehold of his entire chest.

"I say this kid's already cleaned things up for us! So that means we've earned ourselves a little R&R! And I know exactly what our little show off deserves as a reward for all this! Food!!"

Her other muscle bound hand stretched out and pointed over the clearing smoke of the once crash site. At… at the Hill… that loomed in the not too far distance.

Seth hesitated his desperate struggling for none sweaty air. He hadn't realized they were so close. If not for the complete lack of energy he'd have seemed scared, tension passing as just nerves. A bit of determination and want of fresh air finally pulled the arm from off of him, though it more than likely just let go.

The heroes still surrounded him on all sides, Buster pulled ahead and waving him on with a smile that could burn away even the hardest set gloom. The crowd behind spilling along like groupies to a rock star, coalescing with onlookers and concerned citizens walking their drained city. The word spreading faster than Seth could even collect himself from the whirlwind he set off. Out loud boasts of some random kid walking in from out of nowhere and healing a bunch of people. Putting Mediknight to shame in a matter of seconds. The clamoring and cheers following and flanking as he began walking in tepid step.

The survivors given back their lives huddled haggardly together, medics corralling them from joining the throngs around their savior. But thankful drained stares and reaching hands met him regardless. Muted and still beaten brown eyes watched him pass. That little girl, that Tasha, looking on with understanding deeper than her fellow survivors. He could leave her to fear herself like that, even if he really didn't understand how he'd fixed her. But all Seth could manage in return was a smile back between unstable steps. A green gloved hand from Terawatt helped him steady his tired balance, though not without a price as he was corralled and hurried away from his charges.

"So… how did you do that? I mean seriously, how did you do that!?"

Seth's indignation melted to a smirked beneath his cap, selfish admiration helping him get back some stamina, and some reality to the mess he'd put himself in as they passed by the last of his revived. Passed disheveled and weak and happy and… something else.

"I… heh… I just borrowed some matter from the wreck."

She looked down on him a little disbelieving, expecting a lot more than that for the privilege. Thankfully Depthcharge tapped a foam finger on her shoulder and glared rather mothering eyes to get her off his case. She smirked and nervously relented.

"Eh, it's alright. Powers are complicated anyway. I mean I borrow power from the ground, but sheesh you've got it made! The world's your oyster or whatever."

Seth smiled to cover a bit of real nervousness, noticing the metal spikes on her gauntlet that were pretty close to spiking his head if he turned too quick. A reaction that drove her own embarrassment, and the hand back. Depthcharge pushed her ahead and smiled their glowing eyes back at Seth as he chuckled off the mild tension. Though he now truly noticed the crowds as the once wreak strewn street was laid out before him. Cheering smiling faces, the atmosphere of admiration and appreciation. It… it was…

Interrupted by a comfortably warm hand of his other shoulder.

"Take it all in… Trust me this is the best part of being a hero. And the hardest thing to keep."

Cauterizer was steadying him, looking down from alongside and making sure he knew.

"Hold on to this feeling with all your might, because it will make everything worth it in the end. This is what being a hero is all about."

He pressed ahead and left Seth to walk his victory alone. The heroes ahead beaming their own pride and nostalgia. Loudly theorizing and making light of an end of their heavy burden. Blinding all ahead in sheer weight of will happiness.

His steady pace felt like it would last forever, clapping and hollering filling every space and smothering him with the city's love. Eyes full of joy and excitement. Denying Seth the scenery and truly washing over him all that careless emotion. From… from people that barely knew who he was.

That didn't know who he was.

People who would probably pity and then hate him if they knew even a fraction of what he'd done.

Knew what had been done to him.

People that seemed oblivious to the guilt that still pressed down like a mountain upon his back.

He felt small.

Every step getting him less and less near his goal.

Stretching out this… this lie…

This lie he was only just now realizing was his life.

They weren't cheering for him, they weren't cheering for Seth. They were cheering for this disguise he slapped on in a desperate moment. They were cheering for powers they knew nothing about, knew nothing of what… of what they could do. What they had done. New guilt compounding, still needing to be fully taken stock of and yet piling on and on. Being buried higher by every step. Like the crisis meant nothing, like all those lives needing atonement meant nothing. Like all the pain and suffering gone through could just be left in this heap and rot away.

He had made those his, he had chosen to hold them, knew their only just end. But this… This lie. It was something forced on him. Something… he was forcing on himself.

He was forced lower and lower, the shadow over his face deeper and deeper. The pain in his chest quaking like the stone heart of that mountain reviled. A blind core getting buried deeper with every steadying step, pressed to near melting. The world drowning away in the insistent clapping, in torturous cheering, in all that suffocating love this fucking city showed the heroes it relied on.

Everything hurt, every thread resonating this guilt without mercy for the being that had to live with it all. His teeth gritted just trying to keep himself from falling over and crumpling. His hands gripping too tight not to bleed over bled palms. His hidden eyes pressing their hardest to stymy the tears that wanted to blare his guilt to the world. And the pull dragging him forward-

"Huuh!!"

Gave him the ray of truth so desperately craved.

The world slowed, those eyes shot open, and a tear rolling down his cheek as he realized what was ahead of him. Form flaring into being without the need to look up, its outline bright against the faded and drowned world around him, against the supportive heroes waving to him around it. It was laid over a pedestal, stuck fast by the metal that impaled it. He could feel every inch like a second body separated. Metal under concrete, closed away and mounted like a trophy.

And filled to the brim with power that none but him could see.

Power that was alive, that was waiting for him, that was wanting him. His suit was right there, the one truth that could burn all this guilt dumped upon him away like holy fire.

A truth that would damn him, but couldn't be fought.

As a hand slowly rose up to shakily cling to the only barrier left.

To the wall holding that guilt upon his back, to the lie he'd made for himself and offered up to the world.

A lie already scorched but still too damning to retain. Fear of what would come next flaring as he gripped the brim of his cap. But…

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

But he would rather accept the consequences of the mountain below in full. Accept everything that lay strewn across it than have its heart, his heart, meltdown to nothing in the pressure. Rend unfeeling that truth upon this world, that he could not accept their unknowing false praise.

That truth released with the pull down of his disguise. That unmistakable scar he could never escape unfurling. White hair flowing free for all to see and shine his acceptance of the hate he was far more prepared to take. Than the apathy of life that would result.

The world came back as that hat was tossed to the wind, to all eyes watching in slow realization of the tear they knew nothing of. Reflecting in the light he would live in. That of his eyes burning blue. And to him damning the consequences!

To him feeling the strings upon what his being entailed and latching on to that which waited for him to retake its mantle! To hands whipped wide and yanking hold! To the concrete monument stood before him exploding into dust! To pieces unlinking and scattering under reeling threads lighting the air to ionized fire! To a metal storm flying without care for its surroundings, without care for the implications, without a fuck given to the first of many lies he had been subjecting himself to! To each and every part careening into place, skeleton and shell closing around him in a choir of spall! All of it singing in defiance of a cut apart silence, of the hollowing drop that found footing in now blaring truth!

The weight piling on as new guilt was pressed and ignited, fuel for the engine of this titan of conductivity. This cocoon of atonement building like it was always around him, always meant for him. Chest, shoulder, shin, and boot stamping down. Fingers and gauntlet gripping tight. Plate after plate after plate slamming home to where it belonged, where it always belonged! Helmet finale closing around his raised head, split maw slammed shut again completing the visage that had terrified all, that had doubtlessly brought this lie about and did such a piss poor job in hiding its own truth!

That Seth can't keep denying what made him this way.

The symphony finalizing as a flash of plasma burn fused plate and skeleton, burned away dust and debris in a simultaneous instant of choral shrill. In undeniable powered fury. In the final rationalization that the object of so much praise was the one driven away. Was the monster they had wanted to pay.

The crowd stopped in all its admiration, in its fruitless clapping, its worthless joy. Not even gasps afforded as the last of the dust hissed off caustic. As the truth of who they'd been cheering for now accepted his place here. As the heroes who once basked in the second hand pride, who had revealed in the wake of power they knew nothing of, now felt a betrayal that could only be described as total and crushing.

But all of that didn't matter for shit! The weight over Seth was his weight, this was his body! Was always meant for him and him alone, always a reminder of who and what he was, and always a reminder that he…

that he was…

never…

alone

The quiet held, even as he felt out. Felt in. Reaching inward to the city in his head, awaiting a grand reunion and a return to the only thing he'd ever missed about his old life.

But there was no one there.

No sympathetically guilty Threat to be the older brother he'd never had and steer him right. No rigid and regal Speaker to make sure he was doing what he had to do. Matterist pushing the limits of physics and complaining when stuff breaks. Weaver or Concoctor or… anyone….

No voices. No feelings. No filled in silence. No stymy of the emotional hell he learned he'd always lived with.

Nothing…

No one…

The suit was empty, save for the blackening background that filled his senses. The empty void of depowered metal. He opened his eyes to escape it, to deny the reality that all of this was-

"…hu!"

In a break of that frozen instant he saw it, the bare inside helmet plate bereft of its layers and structure, and now bearing a brightening scrawling that glowed off of his exuding admission. A hardcoded tracing of words burned into the darkness. A message that only he could see…

That only he could feel in all its golden wrought thread.

"I am sorry it had to be this way. That we had to leave you in such a state, broken and bleeding. But death must not come for you yet. You must not die because of our mistakes.

"We sent you away to give you a chance to live. That you may have a fresh start without our meddling. A better life than one under the weight of our sins. But if you are reading this, then it means you again chose us over yourself. Again, you chose the ones who destroyed all that you used to be rather than the only one who could rebuild it. That you have denied your own resentment of us for this long is all too telling, that you truly are worthy of what you carry. But we cannot deny our crimes against you and your people. And we cannot delay fate's judgment anymore.

"We are turning ourselves over, admitting to what we are at fault for, accepting what will come of it and all it will cost. Whether you do the same or not is up to you, but know that we chose this not to abandon you, not to escape or leave you to wallow in the pain we spared you.

"It is because we believe in you.

"We chose this path because we believe that you can conquer that pain, that what resentment has built up inside of you will be burned away. That you can live without our price on your head. That you may yet live a normal life like you always deserved to, that you were denied because of us. But we also know that you can go beyond us, that you can use this power of ours better than any of us ever could. That truly you can rise where Threat and our world fell. That our pride is not a cyclical inevitability always bringing pain upon all.

"You can be truly more than we ever could be.

"So we believe in you. Just as you should believe in yourself. We will meet again someday. Let it be because we have both chosen a better path for ourselves, not just for each other. And let it be the day that you have conquered the monster that has been the cause of all of this pain.

"Let it be the day that resentment truly dies.

"Because I believe in you."

Seth's senses unfocused, the message blurring to a glowing swath before. Fading back away to its dormant state. The voice encoded echoing to the silence, for only him to feel and know. Before his eyes refocused out toward what was laid ahead of him. At what damage his truth had caused. At what his guilt burning back down to its core finally found its words with.

Formed concrete statues of five… Well four figures now.

One standing triumphant and saddened over a now empty space where his suit once laid, massive sword still lodged in its place uncovered by the doubtlessly super created concrete. The triumphant too familiar, that vain Buster still blaring herself to the world like it was the only way she could express herself. But the other three sent the pang from his chest all through his body like his blood was that guilt manifest.

Phazer Shock, her husband Glacial Glaz, and the Elite's Ziyou. All looking away and up from Buster's triumph, heroic flight and action stances denoting their departure…

Denoting… their deaths. But…

'That can't- Hrrggg!!"

Another beat tensed his entire body, chilled him to the bone, screamed at him in long healed scars. In physical memories of the gaping hole in his chest. All the hollowed out agony he'd felt… When he was shot right through the heart.

His memories flashing back without mercy, strangling breath, burning cauterized flesh, an empty hole with nothing but-

"Just die already."

Para's words turned the memory to callous life, a fire seeping up despite the guilt refusing in his chest. But this memory would not fade. Clear images played like they were imprinted onto him. Like they had always been demanding to be played, yet had nothing to attach to but the wrong nerves. And so now struck out hard, burning through him like his nerves were molten and connecting despite that incompatibility. Like they were finally a means to the shortest ends.

He saw his mind break as Para spoke those words again and again, felt his chest heal closed around solidified hate, felt himself… change… and lose out to the wrath that he'd thought conquered. But this wasn't the foyer, this wasn't blind, he saw! It was like he was nothing to what had risen in his place.

He took a step toward the statue. Toward the battlefield splitting his vision apart. Toward the placard at its base. Toward the truth he'd feared he'd learn.

The heroes opposite were frozen, some parts fear, whole swaths betrayal. Mostly they were too stunned that their trap had worked. But their target was different than they had expected. Than Buster had expected. It had to be a trick, a desperate attempt to ward off the worst of the punishments he deserved for what he did. But still they hesitated. They weren't expecting power like he had displayed. Let alone that he'd… care… about their ham fisted monument.

Heavy metal feet once again strained the once shattered path, the feeling of talons scraping it to dust reverberated through Seth's mind as the memories flared against him. His steps were bereft of menace, slow and drawn out like a hypnotic pull dragging him on. But his mind raced by without calm or suggestion. Only truth that he hadn't seen, even as it beat against his chest for this understanding to strike home. He jolted as his power surged beyond control, as the maw of his helmet opened and obliterated everything in its path…

As Ziyou underestimated him for the last time.

The sight of her smoking headless body narrowly throwing him to the ground, dashing any semblance of his will to the dust that flaked away… But he couldn't stop walking, even as he looked down at Glacial Glaz. Red eye reflecting in his defiant terror filled stare. Even as-

*SNAP*

His foot snapped his neck against itself and his will, as his knees gave out before those words at last. The weight of the suit cracking the path back to gravel, and rocked the frozen heroes from their hesitation.

But stymied their predatory reactions. Their prey was weak, falling under his own power. But they couldn't press their advantage. Couldn't bring themselves to bear against that blank stare aimed down at the placard that bore his crimes.

In Memory of the Heroes Who Fought to Defend Their Comrade

And Paid the Ultimate Price to Stop This Villain's Rage

Let their names never be forgotten.

-Akina Ziyóu

-Maggie 'Phazer Shock' Fitzpatrick

-Gregory 'Glacial Glaz' Morozov

Every word ate at him like a burning curse. His heart had spread that guilt laden memory to every corner of his mind, but had little else left. But the black hole at its center. He barely registered breaking through Phazer's stellar heartbreak, the… the taste of burning flesh and left over plasma. He couldn't understand why, even as he swiped her away her horror wrought cry and doomed her to crumbling death. Even as he now stared down at Para's broken body, fretting and awaiting the…

The fucking death he deser-

"Gurrhh!!!"

The world came back in the poison sting of the last drop of this guilt, as the hole it all came from tore at him like an assassin's knife left in the wound. Everything was numb, burned out and torn down. What little pride he cultivated never even had a chance to bloom, his actions rendered insulting in the face of everything he did. He just wanted to be a hero. He just wanted to give back for all the death that it took to save him. He wanted to atone for all the death he'd been left with. He just wanted to make the moment the truth was revealed for good a little easier on an already scarred society. But…

No…

You were not allowed a happy ending…

A thought echoed through the dark. Through his being without care or consideration. And broke already broken bonds. The beat of his heart accelerated, despite the hole that spiked through it. A metal hand tried desperately to grip his chest, but only succeeded in snatching its own. But the feeling spread down regardless. A focus, desperate alleviation to one existential attack on everything he had left. The hole tearing his heart to shreds as fast as it healed, a physical bleed matched with the empty space. The pain dropping him lower, shutting his eyes, and demanding all he was. A metal claw cracked the plated chest as it tried to bury itself into it, tried to close a wound that had been bleeding long enough.

The other claw cracking that placard to catch his fall, as full metal talons split open once again and tore into the path from under mounting weight. The clink of moving plates and descending tail lost as the hole began to rise from where it had been left, as the agony found its source. The chest under all that armor shrank in pain as the hole speared up through it, black metal meeting the black void that surrounded it. A shard of Ark metal left over and bearing everything he'd lost to his own broken control. Like a splinter of emotion left to fester. Like a new sliver prison only for what he had done.

So with its passing… everything released all at once.

Those clawed armored hands fought back that visage, the head struggling as horns snapped into place. As that murderous maw tore open. As all that venomously spread pain and guilt rebounded back into its rightful place. The heroes, the still processing crowds, the wounded and bandwagoning and everyone else. All tensed beyond measure as metal was coming to life again. Metal that had stood up against their best of the best. Metal that damn near mimicked their collective nightmares. Metal that had killed in a single fit of unstoppable fury. Metal that now reeled straight up and-

"AAAHHAAahhhhhhhHHHaaahhhh!!"

That wailed for the pain it had caused.

Tears streamed down from hollow eye slits. A wail defeating comprehension in echoing buffeting against frozen tension. A form they had long since known to fear, that had borne its wrath against everything in its way, was now balling its eyes out like it… Like it regretted it. Juxtaposing and competing realities ate away at each other as the heroes recoiled more in surprise than needed retaliation. All they could do was watch their hated enemy bear his sorrow like the true laceroid he had killed. Just so much poorly.

Seth had lost everything. His friends, his family, his dream, his peace. His claws tried to shield his head from the collapse of it all, scrapping against the horns as they tried to reach a head buried beneath metal. There was nothing left, a single lapse had taken the last few vestiges of his life, torn down everything he and the Garkah had built, torn them away from him and left him alone with the hell they had been sparing him from. He'd killed his heroes…

All because of him…

'No! I did this!'

That shielding claw tore at the helmet, raked it as he wailed at himself.

'I killed them! I killed them-'

Because of Para…

Both claws now raked against armored scalp.

'Because I wasn't strong enough-'

Because of the Garkah…!

Frantically trying to rend it off.

'Because I couldn't control myself-'

Because of THEM!!!

'Because of ME!!!'

A claw finally snatched a horn, a foreign object out of place, an offense to everything he'd striven for. An almighty snap of the air, a sudden torrent of sparks both friction and plasma, this offense was shore it away, ripped off and tossed aside like a castigation for a sin. All as the weight of his actions, of his curse, of his suit, of his personal blaring hell all drove him lower and lower. Dropping everything down just to try and die away. Tears spattered against armored claws as they lost their hysteric strength and fell in his lap. This sobbing terror left with nothing…

Not even the abyss that surrounded him could console his pain.

No matter how hard it tried to set it alight.

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