People across America look to their televisions, phones, computers, broadcasts of what seemed more like a fiction, playing out right in front of them.

  " The hell..? Is this an ad? " A woman says, in a bar. But there isn't conversations going, just a

  silence as people all turn and stare at the television hanging in front of them.

  The population asks questions, expects answers, but gets shut down by the R.C.T.

  A truth was spreading. The lies and rumors about Blight were no longer fairytale.

  They were unfolding in front of their eyes.

  Rogues were no longer the highlight. Something was off.

  [-/-]

  Around the table, multiple R.C.T agents gathered. At the end of the row, the leader of operational and partially a commander of the specialized branch, Harold ' The Dictator ' Tornguard.

  His metal fist rested on the table, his worn eyes covered in battle-scars staring through the agents. " They can see Blightborns. " He says.

  Flame-fist taps the table, a vein bulging at his forehead, " It's his fault, isn't it.. IT HAS TO BE! "

  " Terra? " Limbus scoffs, leaning on the table. " He can't create curtains, let alone visible Blight. Besides, the R.C.T eviscerate him easily in direct confrontation, so he wouldn't pick a fight with the 'Iron Fist'. "

  Courtney's seat was empty.

  " Where is Rose? " Tornguad stares at the seat, " She was pinged, right? "

  " Well.. She ran off. " One of the less significant operational agents mentions, standing in the corner of the room.

  " To? " Tornguard questions, turning his gaze to the agent. The agent straightens their posture, " We found an unconscious agent in the bathroom, and noticed their phone was missing! They were deployed to the Umbral mission, so the- "

  " Got it. " He says. He rubs his chin.

  One of the men from the office branch runs in with a piece of paper. They pant, scanning their keycard to open the door, " Sir! We have gotten information from agents of 4 casualties, a photograph taken on Courtney, an unidentified sporeborn that is related to Terra's schemes, and.. "

  They hand over the picture to Harold. The unmistaking back, the scythe, posture, height, hair.

  " Noble. " He says, staring at the picture. " Well consider me surprised. " He chuckles, his gruff voice shaking the table as he bellows.

  " That.. TRAITOR! What was he doing there? Was he going to sabotage him? I say we send out a full-scale attack and CRUSH him into the ground. And Courtney.. She abandoned her post! She must've ran when she saw Terra's power like the coward she-" Flame-fist's pupils began glowing orange.

  " Sit down, you hot-headed idiot. " Torngaurd slams his metal fist onto the table. The impact cracks the wood open.

  The room goes silent.

  " This isn't Terra. Terra is a sledgehammer. This... " Tornguard gestures to the massive monitor wall behind him.

  The screens display the chaos outside the D.C. station. Civilians screaming, pointing at the sky. A

  news helicopter feed shows the purple dome pulsating.

  " This is a scalpel. " Tornguard narrows his eyes. " Some genius is behind this. The Masquerade is broken. The public sees the monsters.. "

  A frantic analyst bursts through the double doors, clutching a stack of papers. He is sweating profusely, his tie undone.

  " Sir! Director! We have... we have a confirmed reading on the Curtain's composition! "

  " Well? Spit it out! " Limbus snaps.

  The analyst swallows hard. " It's... it matches the signature of Subject K-1. "

  The room’s temperature seems to drop ten degrees. Flame-Fist stops sparking. Limbus goes pale.

  " Kensho? " Tornguard whispers. " The Defector? "

  " He was supposed to be dead. Or in exile. " Limbus mutters, looking across the table.

  " He's planning something, that's for god-damn sure. " Tornguard says, " But right now, we can't rush in. That would just be acknowledging it. "

  " We call it a stunt? " Flame-Fist asks, his eyes still flickering with dying embers.

  Tornguard doesn't answer. He turns his gaze toward the far end of the room.

  E sits there, perched on the edge of a high-backed chair, his knees pulled up to his chest. He doesn't

  look like a top-tier analyst; he looks like a bored teenager.

  " Because if that is your plan, I'd like to remind you that the public image of the R.C.T. will be tarnished the moment people find out about the Blightborn cover-up, " E adds. His voice is flat, devoid of the panic vibrating through the rest of the room.

  The silence that follows is deafening. Limbus stops breathing. Flame-Fist’s jaw drops.

  Tornguard’s eyes narrow into slits, the scars on his face twitching. " ...How do you know about the Blightborn cover-up, E? That information is restricted to Division 1 Oversight. "

  E doesn't even look up from his screen. He reaches out and takes a slow, methodical sip of his tea. It’s always black. No sugar. No milk. Just bitter.

  " It’s very blatant, " E replies. " Your budget allocations for 'Environmental Cleanup' in the southern sectors match the exact biological decay patterns of Grade 2 Blightborn sightings. I noticed it when I was twelve. "

  Flame-Fist slams his fist onto the table, a small explosion of heat singeing the air. " You little—! What do we do then? Sit back and relax like SITTING DUCKS while Kensho turns D.C. into a graveyard? "

  E finally looks up. His baggy, dark-circled eyes meet Flame-Fist’s fiery gaze.

  " Precisely, " E replies.

  " We wait for the standard deviation. We wait for the variable that Kensho hasn't accounted for. "

  Tornguard grips the edge of the table. " And who would that be? "

  " The one person in this city who doesn't care about order, " E says, a smile on his lips as it all is put together. " Terra Umbral. "

  [-/-]

  Denis lay on the ground, holding Polly close to his chest. His best friend bleeds out onto his outfit, the

  bleak reality setting in.

  `` It was Hiro's fault. He rushed in and fought the blightborn, and his ego, got Polly killed. ``

  He bargains. He tries to make sense of this through blunt logic. But what comes out is a truth he

  never wished to hear.

  It was his fault.

  All of it. He told them about the middle. He got Hiro to drag them away. He didn't push

  Hiro to the side to avert a simple crisis that got his friend killed.

  It was, really, his fault.

  He stares up at the sky, his eyes hollow. His uniform's top-half soaks red. His hands wrapped around Polly.

  A shadow drops over them. Stumbling forward.

  He looks up.

  Above Denis, Hiro looms over the two, his dreads crazed and wiry. His eyes bloodshot, his arms shaking. He looked more angry than grieving.

  Hiro’s expression went from unadulterated anger to guilt and sadness.

  He falls to his knees, his tears dropping into the gaping hole.The blight from the blightborn’s leg corroding the wound and expanding it.

  He was furious. But not even his boiling anger numbed the guilt he felt.

  It was his fault.

  He didn't heed Denis's warning. He ran forward and attacked the blightborn. He tackled Denis.

  He got Polly killed.

  Denis pushes polly to the side. Hiro gets up.

  Both stand up, Hiro's wild dreads hanging menacingly over his face and Denis's blood soaked attire

  painting the floor red.

  " We were never heroes. " Denis says.

  "We're cogs," Hiro said. The word felt right. A hero is an individual; a cog is part of a machine.

  If a hero falls, the story ends. If a cog breaks, the machine grinds until the next one takes its place.

  He stepped over the remains of the spider-like Blightborn he had just crushed. "And as a cog,

  I vow to save as many people as I can. Because if I don’t... then Polly was just a waste of parts."

  He stares off into the forest. The silence was broken by the sound of a heartbeat. The curtain expands

  slowly.

  " The core is in the middle." Denis says, his wings begin to unfurl, his eyes narrowing,

  " And there are around 50 other people in this sector."

  " But, if they're just as idiotic as us, then most of them are probably dead. "

  Hiro begins walking, " Then lets get rid of this fucking curtain and find the

  ones that aren't. "

  In the middle of the curtain the core beats like a heart. Purple veins dig into the

  ground, anchoring the pile of Blight.

  On the top, an eye lay. Its iris is a pure black. The veins not red but purple, some of

  the fluid oozing out from the crevices of the eye-lid.

  The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

  River stands close to the core. Surrounded by blightborns. In his hand

  is a gun. " Bring.. It.. On! "

  He yells, his white attire ripped into shreds, his silver ring broken. The wound across

  his chest aches, " Gh.. "

  The blightborns all charge toward the scent of Ether. Pulled to it like moths to a light

  source. He slides under one of them, the blightborns slamming into each other.

  He lifts the gun, pointing at the blightborn's stomach as he passes under it. " BANG. " He pulls

  the trigger. The bullet explodes out from the barrel of the gun, coating with Ether right as

  it leaves the hole.

  The bullet splits into two, then four pieces. Each one begins accelerating, piercing through

  the underside of the creature and flying out 4 different directions, the damage

  amplified by his ether coating.

  The fragments of the bullet begin changing paths, each one hitting a different blightborn.

  Directly in their cores.

  He rolls, now on the other side of the creature, approaching the core of the curtain. The

  blightborns behind him explode into purple mist.

  But on the opposite side of him. Hiro and Denis stand next to the core.

  River smirks, " Shy girl ran away? "

  Hiro sprints forward, a dozen arms forming. He charges toward River, a furious expression. His

  spit foaming at his mouth from pure anger as he ran.

  "WHAT DID YOU SAY?"

  Denis grabs Hiro by the shirt, Hiro stops, his legs planting into the ground, "He's not worth it. And the core is right there. You'll attract more Blightborns. "

  His breathing slows, River's smirk is now a concerned, and slightly fearful expression. " What's

  His problem? "

  Denis glances toward River, his blood-soaked attire shutting him up.

  "Focus, River. Set aside your urge to be an overall bad person, and help us get rid of

  this curtain. "

  "I have a much better question." River's eyes narrow. His gun firmly in his grip. He

  stares at the two. Hiro's rage, which is usually more tame, and Denis covered in blood,

  an apathetic and calm, yet saddened face.

  "Did you two.. Kill another student? " River's voice is calculated, he picks his words carefully.

  Denis opens his mouth, " N... "

  `` I.. I-I'm happy we were friends. ``

  He pauses. A conflict in his mind. He doesn't dare admit it was him, yet he knows well it's the

  truth.

  " Blightborn. " Hiro says, voice shaky, his rageful, bloodshot eyes tearing up.

  River goes silent. At that moment, there was nothing for him to make fun of. Nothing to project.

  " Mmm.. Okay. " River stares at the rotted ground, clicking his tongue, " Right- Let's just... Get out of here, okay? "

  Denis nods. But Hiro walks up to the core. He cocks his fist backwards, The last of his

  Ether flowing around his knuckles up to his forearm, flying backwards across

  his arm as he got close.

  His fist breaks through the barrier's field, Denis and River watch as he yells, their

  eyes wide.

  " I HATE YOU. " His eyes stare at the blight core, tears swelling up. " I HATE YOU, I HATE YOU! "

  Crash. His fist slams into the core. A sickening crunch, and then an explosion. Blight

  shoots out in every direction, splatting across them.

  Hiro's eyes shook. He stared at the ground, and when he expected to see Polly. He saw

  himself.

  Staring into the puddle. He didn't consider a hero to stare back at him. He considered a

  Hiro.

  The curtain burns. Melting.

  Denis turns quickly, sprinting out of the forest.

  Freedom, he expects. Polly. He can save..

  ...

  ...?

  His eyes aren't met by blinding rays of light, nor a clear sky.

  But a field of bodies.

  Students cried on their knees. Others desperately fought back. Some

  held their loved ones who came with them just for moral support, only pieces

  left.

  " ... " Denis's mouth spasms.

  Blightborns, everywhere.

  Hundreds.

  No, more. Much more. He didn't really know anymore. His eyes must have been deceiving him, right?

  River, just seeing a glance of this, began to run. He didn't think twice. " The hell.. WHAT THE HELL IS THIS? WHAT IS GOING ON? " He questions, sprinting toward the edge of the curtain, at least a few hundred meters away.

  Once there, he lifts his gun. He pulls the trigger and a bullet shoots out. But the bullet doesn’t

  pierce the curtain. Instead, it bounces.

  He stares at the mark on the wall, barely even a dent, the bullet’s casing rolling toward his foot.“ Not good... “

  [-/-]

  30 MINUTES TILL THE INCIDENT.

  Kensho sways to the side, Etty's fist covered in a current of black wind, grazing his cheek. His eyes

  narrowed, he wasn't enjoying this.

  He swings his fist upwards into her chest, sending her skidding backwards. But she reverses

  her momentum with a burst of wind behind her heels.

  Etty swings a jab to Kensho's face. And kensho blocks with the bo staff, spinning it and taking a step forward. Her exact movement from before. But this time on her.

  Black wind forms around her side, a side-dash of sorts. Fast enough to evade an attack that created a sonic-boom around the tip of the staff.

  She stood next to Kensho, who was already tracking her movements. A pillar of blight begins

  forming directly under her feet as she moved. " ! " Etty's eyes widened.

  The pillar explodes upwards, veins and eyes across the surface of it. Etty just barely

  dodges the pillar, charging toward Kensho. " Impressive for a monkey. " He says,

  cocking his fist backwards-

  A telegraph to distract her from a sweep. That now sent her off footing. But she didn't fall, as her

  black wind shot out from under her. She tilts her body and readies a kick as kensho began to

  recover from the sweep.

  Her entire body swayed as she executed the kick mid-air, moving at a speed equal to Kensho's finishing move.

  The catalyst high mentor, Etty Bergentroff, had become an equal to Kensho physically, as a result of her second awakening.

  He grabs the ground as he's sent sliding backwards. Picking up heaps of soil behind his gata. regaining footing and mostly unaffected, yet annoyed.

  " Tch. " Kensho glares, wiping a smudge of dirt from his face.

  But in the blink of an eye, Etty stood in front of him. Her legs were primed like a spring, her heels directly in his face.

  " When did- "

  Her legs slammed into Kensho's face, sending him spinning in the air. He flies through the plaza, hitting an emptied registration booth at least half a kilometer away on the opposite side of the curtain.

  " Catalyst… " He coughs. A piece of debris landing on the floor. A toppled computer laid next to him, the words Hiro, Denis and Polly written on it. The screen was

  cracked.

  " All of you. Are the same. ALL of you. " He got up, his haori covered in blood. He had dropped

  onto the corpse of the woman behind the registration booth.

  Etty stares in the distance. His bloodied form, a faint blow on his uniform that made it seem like it swayed in the wind, that look of apathy.

  She remembered. The scene. 10 years ago.

  But she doesn't get to finish the thought, as he has fled elsewhere. She smiles, sighing. Funny how he ran away, in the middle of the fight.

  " I didn't take you for a coward, Kensho! " She yells, chuckling.

  Yet, the feeling of Blight that came from Kensho stayed. She looked up to the station, and on top, stood Kensho, and the core of the giant curtain.

  `` He's.. He's going to expand the curtain. More than the block? Is he going to clear out.. Everyone? ``

  She leaped toward Kensho, a sonic-boom blowing out the already cracked and red-painted glass. But she's blown away with terrifying force as Kensho put his hand to the core and began

  pouring his Blight in.

  `` During the fight, I didn't see him use his blight, at all.. Only once, with the pillar… But that was an ounce. ``

  " You were- "

  " I was stalling so I could reserve my Blight, and I needed an opening. You left one

  open by standing there and dwelling. " His eyes tracked how her expression turned frightened.

  " Don't look at me with those eyes. You're a byproduct of a flawed world, and your gaze uncomforts me. Filth. "

  The curtain began to expand.

  " It begins. "

  25 MINUTES TILL THE INCIDENT.

  [-/-]

  Hiro manifests a fist, having recovered his Ether. It grows, using the same technique from before. Instead of a unified larger construct, he creates lesser small constructs to use up less Ether.

  Denis turns, " We can't keep fighting off these things! There are too many, Hiro! " He yells. A blightborn charges at him with its many legs, 4 arms reaching out. He rises, the two charging blightborns hitting each other directly on the head, dazing them.

  The manifested, semi-fist, slams through an approaching blightborn, destroying the

  core of it. " I don't CARE! " Hiro yells. He swings the fist over and over, hitting and crushing blightborns over and over in a blind rage. Revenge that will never satisfy.

  Denis stares at Hiro, but he doesn't stop him. Nor does he try to talk him out of it. But.. `` That's what got Polly killed. ``

  `` I have to get him to do something else. He's just burning Ether. `` Denis's inner thoughts sounded tired too, just as his real voice.

  He stares past the tens of fighting students, nearly all of them now either bodies or mutating into blightborns.

  `` Wait.. They're mutating.. Mutating, due to their wounds- ``

  His track of thought completely comes to a halt.

  He begins rushing towards Polly's body, his wings flapping frantically. " No, it's fresh. I can still preserve her… " He hoped.

  Denis lands in the forest. The exact path they walked. And..

  His worst nightmare came true. `` She's not there. ``

  " Dennniiisss.. " A distorted voice calls out, the word being stretched. Mimicry. " Friends.. Until the end! "

  " Don't.. "

  He turns.

  " ..Don't use her voice. " He shakes, his usually apathetic and calm tone now a shaky, hopeless one. What he saw was not the shy, thoughtful schoolgirl Polly.

  But a heap of mass, unable to hold its own weight, only able to pull on something else, only able to push another. And plastered on the front is a stretched out version of Polly's face, which even that seems to start becoming unrecognizable.

  " Help... me... " The thing gurgles. Its form ripples, sludge dripping onto the grass like melting wax.

  Denis steps back, his heel catching on a root. He stumbles, falling onto his backside. He crawls backward, his eyes wide and trembling.

  " S-Stop... " He whispers. " Please stop. "

  The creature lunges. Not with legs, but by throwing its mass forward like a wave of vomit.

  It lands on Denis’s legs. It feels heavy. Wet. Warm.

  " Denis... " The face on the front—Polly’s face—contorts. The eyes are on the wrong axis, vertical instead of horizontal. " Scared... "

  It isn't attacking him. It is clinging to him. Just like Polly did in the crowd. Just like she did when she was overwhelmed.

  It is seeking comfort in the only way it remembers, but its touch burns. The Blight sizzles against Denis’s uniform, eating through the fabric and searing his skin.

  " GAH! " Denis screams, trying to push it off, but his hands slip into the gelatinous flesh. He pulls them back, coated in purple slime.

  " Friends... " The creature tightens its grip, the weight crushing Denis’s shins. " ...Forever? "

  Denis hyperventilates. He can't summon his feathers. He can't think. He is just a boy, pinned under the rotting monster that used to be his best friend.

  And for a moment, the world goes silent. His hands trembled.

  " I'm sorry. " He says. A tear doesn't travel down his cheek but his horrified expression might as well have worked the same. Then an expression of immense guilt, sadness, anger, it conflicts.

  " Hiro.. " It says. A hand reaching out.

  Stab.

  His feather slams into the blightborn's head. Ether flowing into it and- Exploding out the other side.

  The blightborn goes limp, directly on top of him. Clinging.

  " I'm sorry.. I'm sorry.. " He repeats, getting up and putting his head to the creature. His entire world is spinning, " I'M SORRY.. " He held the remains of her form. He no longer has anything to bury, only the corpse of a creature that used to smile and laugh.

  His hands sting, but his tired eyes don't flinch once. He simply stares at the blood-red ground, his forehead sizzling at the contact.

  " Forever. " He says.

  He wishes he could get up and move on, right now. But he can't. He lays there, next to the corpse. And stares at the sky.

  `` " That cloud looks like a horse! " Polly points out, giggling. " Yeah.. " Denis says, unamused, but he does see the resemblance. Hiro points, " And that looks like me! " He smirks. Denis turns, " That doesn't look remotely like you. " He states flatly. Polly giggles under her breath. ``

  For a minute. He lies there. Reminiscing.

  A pebble begins to vibrate, right next to his head.

  Rumble. Rumble. It came from outside the dome.

  1 MINUTE TILL THE INCIDENT.