I reached for my holstered blade, overpowering the grip Rai had on my arm.
"Hugh—!?" He stumbled from my unexpected move and released his fingers. As I unsheathed my blade, Vick's hands were already up for Polaroid.
Flow State.
My unmatched instincts kicked-in, recalling the deductions I'd made during my Time Prison. I noticed that Vick held his frame sideways.
Landscape Mode.
I immediately ducked, dropping low to the floor to avoid the width of his frame.
"Cheese!" He'd said his activating catchphrase. However, the frame he'd caught wasn't what he expected.
"What the—!?"
Rai had gotten caught in Vick's Polaroid, while I'd avoided it. On the ground, the two of them stood on either side of me. Before they could react, my arm moved on its own. The tip of my blade led first through Vick's shin, as I spun around and slashed at Rai's ankles. Blood shed from both of their legs, with their mixture getting onto my hand.
Blood.
I immediately dashed aside and retreated towards the back end of the room. I panted, not with tire, but with an edging excitement.
"I fucking knew you were plotting something!" Rai screamed, now released from Vick's Polaroid. He jolted forwards from his spot, with his hands and black fingertips stretched forwards to grasp me with Purgency. In the same motion, Vick began to raise his framed fingers again, primed with Landscape Mode once more.
From that distance, I'll definitely get caught in his frame no matter how I dodge. I have to do something quick.
With the blood from both of them now on my hands, something inside of me felt unlocked. A new potential was ready to tap into.
"Your body will recognize the foreign DNA present, and the Null will be available to activate and erase the Fractal gene detected in that DNA."
By now, I'd completed the steps Ian said the Null required in order to be activated. All I had to do now was say the key word. But with that, I was letting go of something special within me.
"It disappears once you use the Null for the first time."
The moment I would use the Null for the first time would become the last time I'd ever use Flow State. Knowing that, I hesitated for a moment.
Can I really survive everything ahead of me without Flow State?
Rai's hands were soon to purge me, and Vick's mouth began to move and say the word cheese.
Can I really defeat the Sin of Wrath without Flow State? Can I even defeat Delfina without Flow State?
Potential. Instincts. The ability to counter HP Fractals. The way to make time adhere to my will.
Is this really it?
The one thing that got me to where I was today. The only thing that made me noticed, desired, and even feared. The power identity I'd been given in lack of a Fractal.
No.
I shot my thoughts down. It wasn't true. Flow State didn't define me. I couldn't allow it to. I wanted to be my own person. That's all I've ever wanted.
I was born to make a change the way I wanted to, yet I've been forced to inherit Flow State and the Null. If Ian had never intervened with the events in my life, could I have lived it as I pleased until now?
It was a staggering idea. I imagined a life where I wasn't dependent on the validation and recognition of others. Another life where rather than compare what I lacked with those around me, I stood firmly among them with what I had. A life where I had a will to make the changes I seeked without having to be convinced of my potential to. A life where I was my own person.
A life where I was happy with myself.
Flow State was never a gift to begin with. It was a reminder of the moment I faltered. It was compensation for everything that I lacked as a person. It was, and has always been a curse from the very start.
I wouldn't cling to something I never wanted to have. Flow State was good while it lasted, but Klyson Rainer was more than just that. I was more than that.
This is it, then.
I smiled to myself in the face of oncoming danger. I understood the emotions that rose within me. I accepted that it was finally time to let something go.
Goodbye, Flow State.
The blood on my hands stained imminently as I released my curse, tapping into the sensation of a new one as I said aloud the word—
"Nullify."
My body suddenly shivered in reaction, as if it had only just noticed that something foreign laid dormant inside of it. All the knowledge and memories of Rai and Vick's Fractals rushed through my mind as it all happened. It all happened so quickly.
Tap.
Rai had just grasped me in a tight clutch with all ten of his fingers.
"Say cheese!!" Vick yelled from across the room, his hands up in Landscape Mode. Then, the room went silent. Although only a few seconds passed, it felt like a limbo, especially for the two from Chrono who expected an immediate conclusion to me.
"What…?" Rai looked up at me, dumbfounded, his hands still planted firmly on my body. "Why aren't you purged? You should be purged!"
Rai lifted his hands and re-planted them on my body. When nothing happened, he did it again, then again, and again.
"Why isn't it working!?"
He got more aggressive each time he planted his hands, nearly shoving me backwards at one point. My slight stumble drew utmost confusion on Vick's face whom I saw from across the room.
"I used Polaroid… How are you able to move?" Then, like a horrible realization had just been made, his eyes widened as they panned towards the floor, blank, with a frown in pursuit.
"Did you use it?"
With Vick's words, Rai finally snapped out of his angry state. He looked at me with offense as he stepped away from me. "Wait…"
"What's supposed to happen when I get purged, Rai?" I asked him.
The confusion on his face twisted into horror. His eyes were full of dread. Life looked like it withered away from him, and Vick too. Taking advantage of their stunned moment, I drew my blade and took a step towards Rai. I plunged the knife deep into his chest, aiming for where the heart was.
Shank—!
"Hurgh—!" Rai fell onto his back, blood spewing from both his wound and mouth.
"Rai—!!" Vick reacted. But before he could make a move towards me, I pointed my bloody knife at him.
"Don't try, Vick. You've been a ranged Fractal user your whole life. You don't have a lick of close-combat in you."
He hesitated, no longer rushing towards me.
"You're both nothing without your Fractals. You all seek more from a goddess when you're already so dependent with what you've been given. Too much greed and ambition."
Rai as always, even on the verge of death, couldn't contain his anger. "Wh-who the fuck are you to say all of that?!"
"A Fractless," I nearly scoffed. "Someone who's been Fractless his whole life."
"Guh—!" Blood spilled from Rai's mouth. "You fucker…"
With no more words to spare, his body loosened its tension and he soon lay motionless.
"Rai?" Vick breathed heavily. "Rai?!"
"I can do the same to you if you don't cooperate, Vick," I said.
"You killed him! You killed Rai!!" He yelled in shambles. "Why would you kill Rai?!"
"He's too trigger-happy to keep alive. Always acting on impulse. You on the other hand… You actually stop to think."
I planned to take Vick as a hostage and use him to my advantage while in this enemy territory.
"What are you trying to do…? Why are you even doing this? Didn't Time Prison take effect on you?"
"It did, but not in the way you all must have expected. It only gave me more time to plan ahead."
"How? You should have been driven insane with that much time in solitude!"
"If you all assumed that, then you're all underestimating me."
Vick went quiet for a moment, as if contemplating. I could tell he was analyzing the moment. Suddenly, he turned around and made a bolt for the door. My first instinct was to use Flow State and use my speed to get there before he could, but then I remembered.
Oh, right. I no longer have Flow State anymore.
I raised my knife and threw it in a straight line, slicing through the air just past Vick's head as it stabbed into the door. He froze in place at the near-death experience.
"Now that you're Fractless you're just going to run?" I began walking towards him. "So much confidence until you're left with nothing. You can't even count on yourself."
Vick turned around. "A Fractless like you can't comprehend that Fractals define us! Without them we lose a large part of our identity!"
"Shut up." I grabbed my knife from the door. "I understand Fractal identity more than anyone. When you've been a Fractless your whole life, you see it more clearly than people with Fractals themselves.
"I don't want to be like you! I don't want to be a worthless Fractless!" He began to sob. "You took away the only gift I've been given from MONA!"
"Give it a rest, Vick. Fractals were never even supposed to exist. You were never given anything by MONA."
"Shut up!!" He began to spiral. "No matter how Fractals came about, they came from MONA. The fact alone that She was generous enough to provide the potential for such gifts says enough about Her blessings. It's only reasonable to pull her out of a grave She was never meant to reside in. By bringing about the Shattering, we'd be doing Her a favor—one in exchange for all of the blessings She's granted us until now. What Chrono is doing is selfless on a godly level!"
What the fuck is wrong with you people?
The scene reminded me all too much of Draz's last moments. It seemed that once members of Chrono were on the verge of death, they could only confide in their delusions for comfort. It was always a monologue of nonsense—a never-ending spew of selfish fantasy. Vick continued to ramble, as if his point would ever get across. But I was desensitized to it all by now. I'd encountered enough Chrono members by now. I'd dealt with enough psychos by now.
I was going to keep you alive as an advantage, but in your current state, you're no better than a short-tempered Rai.
"When we save MONA through the Shattering, just imagine the gifts She could provide after knowing just how far Her worshippers are willing to go for Her! It would be heaven on earth—!"
"You're better off dead."
I sliced cleanly across Vick's neck, interrupting his speech with a gargle of blood. It began to spray all over me. Soon enough, he too fell to the floor, ending.
He didn't even try defending himself in the end. He only resided in his beliefs. All of these people are the same.
The room was now just left with me.
I've done it. I've used the Null. But what did it matter if it still costed their lives? Shouldn't I just kill them at that point? What becomes the point of the Null anymore?
My questions were the same as when Ian first explained its use to me. I couldn't comprehend the benefit of the Null if I had to shed their blood in order to use it. The risk in killing them was high enough to just consider killing them to begin with. I'd already posed that question to Ian, too which he'd replied—
"You won't need to do that to everyone, rest assured. What's important is that you contaminate yourself with their blood and log their Fractals."
I wondered what he meant by that. Clearly, there was something at large that I wasn't aware of yet. He mentioned that the Null logged every Fractal I erased, like a constantly-updating computer database.
"For the endgame."
From what I knew, Ian's 'endgame' was the erasure of all Fractals in Melysia. That meant I'd need to shed the blood of every Fractal user in Melysia. Yet, he told me I wouldn't need to do it to everyone. He was contradicting himself.
What the hell are you planning, Ian?
For now, I just had to do as instructed until more to the plan revealed itself. If I could get through Chrono on my own as Ian wanted me to, his suspicions of me would lessen, and my openings against him would widen. The window for Soho's safety would widen too.
That's all that matters, and I'll do whatever it takes to get the ending I seek.
That ending, however, had not yet been established. All I knew was that it did not belong in Heathen, even if I currently worked for them. I just had to keep convincing myself that all of this work was also in my own favor, and that at some point the path of divergence would become more apparent than ever.
I'll take that path the moment I see it. I'll accumulate as much as I can bring with me down that path too.
It was only the first of three days to get through all of Chrono. I didn't know their numbers, but I was two-in now. Residing in the very core of their hideout, I could strike everyone down if I played this carefully.
The Null from within was now active.