The Six Guns

"What are you doing here?" Demetri asks. "Shouldn't you be helping rest of crew?". Rose was speechless. She couldn't think of what to say, nor did she know exactly why she came back. "Do you have a plan or something?" Demetri asks.

"Not... exactly" Rose says.

"Then you're just concerned about friend" Demetri says. Rose was silent again. "If you want to save them, the only thing you can do is end fight faster".

"How do we do that?" Rose asks.

"The same way Siran always tries to end scuffle" Demetri says. "It's worked for him so far, so maybe it will work for you".

"How Siran does it?" Rose asks. Rose looks behind Demetri, at the bikes they rode on.

"Make another plan" Demetri says, "be more flexible. The best chance we have at saving these two and the rest from death is to end this as soon as possible. This will give me chance to heal them in proper environment".

"Another plan..?" Rose asks herself.

Tory and Kyle attack, one after another, keeping the crew busy with defending themselves. All the while, Garreth simply stood behind them and observed. Tory jumped at Alex, and as he tried to dodge, Kyle kept him from moving too far by attacking Alex from behind. Alex was trapped, getting pinched from both sides. Holly tried to use shields to slow them down, but they tore right through them. As Tory was about to strike Alex with armament magic, suddenly a blade rains down from above. One blade, at both Tory and Kyle, ignites with a blinding spell. From above, Rose was quickly approaching on her motorcycle. Tory and Kyle were caught off guard, and both of them left blinded. Vivi pulls Alex out of the way and Rose ramps off of a tall rock pointing out of the ground. The rock was slanted and created a steep slope, and was large enough to park a bike on. As Rose ramps off of the rock, she uses the boost engine to make the bike lift high off of the ground.

"PLAN B!" Rose shouts as she jumps off of the bike in mid-air. The bike lands right on top of both Tory and Kyle. The weight of the bike from its metal plate armor crushed them both, caving in their skulls and killing them. Rose hits the ground and tumbles.

"Are you okay?" Vivi asks as she helps Rose get up.

"Yeah" Rose says. She then dusts off her shoulders and says "I'm fine. Just a little bit of pain, I'll live".

"That was insane" Vivi says as she smiles at Rose. "I'm starting to like you guys more and more".

"Thanks" Rose says, "glad to see you come around. Can I call you sis?".

"Don't push your luck" Vivi says.

"Uh, guys?" Alex says as he points at Garreth. Instead of Markwood, Garreth stole both Tory and Kyle's endo this time. The skin on Garreth's face began to crack, and the cracks appeared like a black and endless void. Staring into the cracks of his face was like staring into an abyss. The ground began to rumble as Garreth says "Let's begin". Garreth vanishes in the blink of an eye and appears behind Alex. Alex was sent, face first, into the ground from Garreth's elbow. The impact of Alex's body hitting the ground created a shallow dent in the rock beneath them. Alex narrowly avoided sudden death by using a stability buff spell with reactive endo. As Alex rolls over onto his back, Garreth pulls back his fist to prepare a punch. Alex rolls to his side to avoid it, and Garreth's fist digs right into the earth. Rock, dirt and grass shattered in an explosion simply from Garreth's fist. As Garreth prepares for another punch, Vivi tries to kick him off of Alex. Garreth takes the kick, but he barely budged. Alex sweeps Garreth off of his feet with a kick. As Garreth began to fall onto his back, Alex gets his distance. Mikoto charges in with an armament punch, but Garreth blocks with with his bare hand. Without using any spells to block the attack, Garreth negated Mikoto's attack completely with his bare hand. Holly aims her sniper rifle at him, waiting for the perfect shot. As she prepares, Satomi tries to shake up Garreth with her bat. As Satomi comes down on his head with her bat, Garreth grabs her bat with his other hand. With one of the Ueda sisters in each hand, Garreth tosses both of them onto the ground. Tanya charges at Garreth this time. Tanya delivers a punch, but Garreth parried her punch with his wrist. As he does this, he prepares to punch Tanya back. Before he has the chance, Tanya counters with a faster punch. Hitting Garreth in the jaw, Tanya forced Garreth to look straight up from the punch. Above him, Rose came down with a knife. The knife flashes before hitting Garreth, blinding him. However, while blinded, Garreth caught the knife before it hits him in the face with his right hand. Ying approaches from Garreth's right with her baton in hand. Strong electrical elemental magic surrounding the baton, Ying strikes at Garreth. Garreth blocks the baton with the knife he stole from Rose. The electricity passes into Garreth, causing him to seize up and twitch from his nerves being overloaded. However, although it was hard for Garreth to move, he still stood on his feet. Vivi jumps at Garreth, wrapping her right arm around his neck. While coming down, Vivi drives his head into the ground. After Vivi gets off of Garreth, Tanya comes down on his stomach with a drop kick. Using buff spells and reactive endo to strengthen her kick, Tanya drove Garreth deep into the ground. However, Garreth got right back up. As he sits up, he pops his neck and opens his eyes. Upon opening his eyes, he's greeted with a gun barrel from Alex. His gun blasts Garreth backwards, and Garreth is once again sent onto his back. Robin comes in for a distortion punch, but Garreth blocks it with another distortion spell. As he does that, Alex hits Garreth from the other side with yet another distortion punch. Garreth tumbles backwards but lands on his feet. Suddenly, a powerful beam pierces through his back. Holly took the shot, blasting a hole through the center of his body. However, Garreth was able to withstand a lot of the impact from her rifle with buff spells of his own. Garreth didn't seemed bothered by the pain. It seemed as if he couldn't feel it at all, but he now directed his attacks at Holly. Charging at Holly, Garreth prepares a punch packed with a powerful fire spell. Holly creates twelve digital shields, but all of them shattered upon simply touching Garreth's spell. Ruby uses elemental magic to create a small wall of rock from the ground to block Garreth's attack. Most of the attack was stopped, but the rock shattered and some of the impact hit Holly. Holly was knocked onto her back, and could barely maintain consciousness. Garreth picked Holly up by the collar of her shirt and lifted her off of the ground. Holly looked down on Garreth and smiled. Suddenly, a shield wraps around Garreth's head and the shield lets off a bright flash. Holly used a similar trick as to what Rose uses. In his frustration of sudden blindness, Garreth drops Holly on the ground. Ruby charges at him, running at a high speed. Ruby tackles Garreth in a way that lifted Garreth onto her shoulders. When she stopped running, Garreth began to fall off of her shoulders. Before he could touch the ground, Ruby hits him with a concussive wind spell and sends him flying. As he flew, Ruby throws a ball of reactive endo at Garreth and it pierced right through his chest, just above the hole in his stomach. Garreth hits the ground and the reactive endo explodes. There was a silence as the dust clears. When it finally cleared, Garreth still stood on his feet in the rain. His body barely holding together, Garreth slowly walks up to the group. The crew prepared for a counter attack, but suddenly a small beam pierced his skull from behind. As Garreth fell, Robin sat behind him. Crouched on his knees for stability while holding his sniper rifle, Robin held the smoking gun.

"Boom" Robin says. "Headshot".

The crew held their breath, hoping that Garreth would not get up again. Watching and waiting, a tension rose over the crew. However, Garreth did not get up. The crew took in a deep breath, but their troubles were not over. Siran and Zia once again passed by the crew while chasing down Markwood. Markwood stops at Garreth's body and tries to take his endo.

"Don't let him take his endo!" Siran shouts.

Rock spikes shoot up from the ground beneath Markwood from Siran, but he jumps away from Garreth's body. The crew tries to plan a counter attack, but suddenly, Alex jumps up from behind Markwood and tries to blast him with his gun. Markwood deflects the impact and the force hits Alex instead. Alex was sent onto his back, and the crew rushes up to Alex to make sure Markwood doesn't try to kill him. Markwood keeps his distance between himself and the crew. As Markwood gets his distance from the crew, he says "I've got a surprise for you!". Two Predators jump from rooftops and land in front of the crew.

"I hope you like repetition" Markwood says. "You've kept coming to me with friends, so I figured you might like it". The two Predators stand up and cock their heads at Siran. "I'm taking my Endoindustria back" Markwood says, "and you're not stopping me".

The Predators start to crouch over to prepare to leap at Siran. Suddenly, the rain on the ground began to freeze in a snap. There on the ground, behind the crew, Blake was crawling on his stomach. One eye open, barely awake, his hand on the ground and a trail of ice from his hand. The ice went around the crew and snap froze the two Predators. The crew looks back at Blake with surprise in their eyes.

"Blake..." Siran says.

Blake laughs, reaches in his back pocket with his left hand and pulls out a pack of cigarettes. He puts one in his mouth and says "It's what I do" then lights his cigarette. Blake coughs up a little bit of blood and his head slams on the ground from the weakness in his body. He was still conscious, but he no longer had any strength left. As the crew looks back at Markwood, Markwood had already lifted up Garreth's dead body. The endo from the Predator robots were drained by Markwood and then a massive wave of endo poured from Garreth's body and into Markwood. Markwood's face had already begun cracking like Garreth's face before. However, now blood began to slowly spill out of his eyes. Markwood fell to his knees, and coughed up more blood. The blood instantly turns into smoke upon touching the ground and dissipates.

"This isn't good" Alex says. "It took all of us to beat Garreth and he only had the power of three Mages endo. He has all ten now".

"On a scale of one to ten" Vivi says, "how screwed do you think we are?".

"Eleven" Ruby says.

"Fair assessment" Holly says, barely standing herself up.

"Did you think you were clever?" Markwood asks. His voice was cracking and becoming a low growl. It felt like every time he spoke, the ground would shake. "I only needed a couple seconds, and even after pulling out a trick that I didn't even see coming, you still gave me exactly what I wanted like a fool. I no longer need these robots, I'll take all of you on myself".

"No, you'll take me on, by myself" Siran says as he steps forward.

"Syr!" Zia says.

"Don't!" Siran shouts. "Not yet. I'll handle this, as long as he's done running away".

"Oh trust me" Markwood says as the ground begins to crack, "the running ended a few seconds ago".

Markwood rushes at Siran so fast that he seemed to teleport. However, Siran kept up with his speed. Siran grabbed Markwood's fist in mid-air, but Markwood's arm seemed to extend. As Markwood's arm stretches, his skin tears and exposes a body made of pure black endo underneath. Siran holds onto Markwood's hand as he's pushed backwards. Siran sends a magic missile spell through the center of Markwood's arm, powered by reactive endo. The magic bolt travels all the way through his arm, and exits through his shoulder. The bones in his arm were destroyed and Markwood's arm hung to his side without being able to move. However, after hearing a loud and unpleasant series of bone cracking noises, Markwood was able to use his arm again. The ground beneath them turns into a crater. Large chunks of rocks fly into the air as Markwood seems to fly at Siran. Siran uses his arms to brace himself, and takes the punch from Markwood. Siran stops most of the impact, but is still sent flying through the air. Using the rocks flying in the air, Siran slows himself down from his flight. Markwood flies upwards towards Siran. As Markwood approaches, Siran controls all of the rocks and sends them at Markwood like missiles. Markwood punches all of the rocks out of his way and gets close to Siran. Siran puts his fist together and slams his hands down on Markwood's face like a hammer. Markwood hits the ground and makes the crater in the ground even deeper. Siran comes down on Markwood, using Markwood as a cushion as he lands. Siran jumps off of Markwood's body and the ground around Markwood begins to cover Markwood. Siran tried to bury him alive in the earth. However, Markwood's pure black arms break through the earth and he makes it out of the hole in the ground. Markwood composes his right hand like he was about to snap his fingers. He aims his hand at Siran, and when he snaps, a combination of several elemental spells go off at once. A lightning, fire and wind spell go off all at once and explode in Siran's face. Siran tries to protect himself with a digital shield but it shatters. Siran was sent tumbling back from the explosion. Markwood walks up to Siran's body and raises his hand into the air. Lightning from the clouds strike down at Siran. However, after the lightning strikes, Markwood could see that Siran was no longer laying there. Siran appeared behind Markwood with reactive endo in his right hand. Siran hit Markwood with an open palm, and the reactive endo blows up upon making contact with Markwood. Markwood is sent flying through the walls of The Mages Guild conference building. As the walls collapse, the giant flask of Naris's endo is exposed.

With his eyes still closed, Markwood begins to laugh and then laughs harder. "I'm almost complete" Markwood says, "and you just keep giving me what I want".

"No!" Siran shouts as he throws a spear of reactive endo at the flask. Markwood jumps in the way of the reactive endo. It pierces right through him, but changes the course of the spear. The endo spear strikes the top of the flask and shatters the glass, but fails to destroy any of the endo inside. The flask tips over and slams against the rocky ground and breaks open. Markwood stands up and raises his arms in the air in celebration. "Behold!" He says, "the final piece of the puzzle!". The smoke-like black substance called endo completely surrounds Markwood. The cloud of endo quickly gets absorbed into Markwood's body, and then completely clears.

There, Markwood stood but then collapsed to his knees. Unable to stand, he called out. "Siran!" He shouts, his voice changed back to normal and he sounded desperate this time.

"Markwood?" Siran asks. Siran walks up to Markwood and crouches next to his body. Ready to strike at Markwood at any time, Siran listens to what he has to say.

"I don't have much time" Markwood says, "but I'm finally... me again. I felt as if I was dreaming the entire time and finally woke up, but listen. You of all people should hear about why it came to this".

"What do you mean?" Siran asks. "You're not making any sense".

"I'm talking about Naris and The Ly'Lum" Markwood says. "It wasn't me you were fighting just now, it was Naris".

"Was it Naris when you killed The Mahina clan!?" Siran yells.

"No" Markwood says, "that was me".

"Exactly!" Siran yells, "there's no redeeming what you've done".

"WHAT I'VE DONE!" Markwood shouts, "WAS THE HARSH REALITY OF WHAT NEEDED TO BE DONE! The Mahina clan called for their savior to come save the world, but we don't need heroes. We need a world where people can take care of themselves. What I wanted was to create the perfect country, but you... you weren't supposed to interfere. Although, it wasn't so bad... when you came into light, the plan changed completely. None of this would've happened if it weren't for you. Because of you, the plan changed from creating the perfect country, to creating the worst country. Why you ask? A common enemy. That would've brought the world together, and no one else was willing to sacrifice themselves or their country for that purpose, although everyone wants a common enemy. I DID WHAT NO MAN HAD THE GUTS TO DO! I DID WHAT WAS NECESSARY! I brought the world together, and that will help the world grow. Was it bad? Of course it was... but sometimes, the good thing to do is not always the right thing to do. When you came, after I discovered how pointless it was to kill you off, I decided to change the plan and make you the hero once again. It wasn't for you though, it's so all those people who fought over peace could finally see peace in the world from the world of the afterlife. So many have died for it, but none have achieved it. It was about time we had a war that settled all wars. Either a hero shows up to save the world and we live as sheep. Or people picked themselves up and we live as the gods of this world. Obviously, no one wanted what I wanted... so in the end, the world is still doomed to fail".

"And that's my fault?" Siran asks. "That's fine with me. A lot of things lately are my fault. But I'll be damned if I just let someone mold the world how they want, just because that's how they think the world should be!".

"You'd rather have the world depend on you?" Markwood asks.

"No" Siran says, "but not everyone is the same. Not everyone wants the same thing, and not everyone will bend to your will. That's the part you didn't take into consideration before. That's why your goal fails in the end".

"I sure hope it does" Markwood says. There was a few seconds of silence before Markwood continues to speak. "If my plan truly fails, then that means you've succeeded in taking down Naris for the last time".

"What do you mean?" Siran asks.

Markwood vomits a large amount of blood and says "He's coming back. It's up to you to make sure humanity survives this again. This time, not just for you, not just for your friends... but also for me... take that... bastard... down". Markwood goes limp in Siran's hands as his breathing and pulse stops. Markwood has died, but something worse was coming. Siran could feel it. Siran drops Markwood's body, gets his distance from him and prepares reactive endo in each hand. Suddenly, what sounded like a heartbeat echoed loudly through the streets. Then after three seconds, another beat... then another. Markwood's body gets up on its own. His skin ripping apart but barely staying together. The black cracks in his skin began to show a bright red glow in the center. His lifeless eyes grew brighter and brighter, all while somehow seeming more lifeless. His limp body starts to jolt and twitch as the sounds of bones popping ring in the air. Markwood's body straightens out as he stands upright. As he opens his mouth, Naris's voice could be heard.