Factory Reset: Divine Corruption

Chapter Seventy-Six

Chapter Seventy-Six: When Reality Cries

Gods. Goddess. Deities.

If Rallycry was being honest, there was little a creature like him could do to help his teammates deal with this omnipresent threat. Hell, for most of the action, he had been knocked unconscious, his metallic bits dented in and his flesh scarred from being pummeled with brick and stone. If Rallycry was being honest, they were in a living nightmare.

The wind and the rain. The harsh cries of countless wounded protogen as they trucked on. Bailout was ahead of them with Marissa, who had also just awoken, clearing the way of boulders and any debris. Rallycry barely had the energy to process them moving about, leaving afterimages as their Boson Energy rose. Marissa was coughing and spurting hard, a full grown mane around her face as she kept her head forward, trained.

Rallycry's ears flicked against the rain lashing at their bodies, the mud and raptured earth around them slick and sticky, staining their fur and bodies. Flashes of lightning ignited the dark, cloudy sky as the light dimmed even further. Mason and Ja'Kle panted beside Rallycry, the Mosomarian flapped his wings as he held onto Mason, who was struggling to keep awake.

The darkness flickered as they ran, the earth trembling as Boson Energy shattered the local reality. Rallycry stumbled as reality screamed and clawed as it was torn asunder. There was something indescribable about how reality could scream out against the torment it was under. Even after everything, even after facing the God's, there was something horrendous about having to hear that.

They could only hope to reach their ship, they could only hope to withstand the efforts of the Gods. Altered rain poured harder from the sky, angled sideways as the Bathysphere attacked. Flashes of lightning cracked against the sky, freezing in place as if everything were in slow motion. The planet's time was gone, and all that was going to be left was death.

"It's not our time, keep going!" Ja'Kle screamed, his voice coarse and rough. Like gargled gravel, his push gave more inspiration to the group. Mason could hardly hold onto consciousness. He was weak. Too weak to run, too weak to even fight at this point. And Ja'Kle hugged him close, eyes trained forward as they reflected what little light could be produced.

Rallycry's visor split open, the nanites gooey and sparkling as they were unused to the tormented reality around them. They needed to get going, they needed to get going, they needed to get away. Those words stung Rallycry's mind, and the protogen felt his body shake like back at Gold-Standard. He just felt overwhelmed, he felt the need to cry and just cuddle in a ball. There was no way they were getting out of this. At least, not all of them.

And just like Gold-Standard, Rallycry glanced back at Mason and Ja'Kle. His captain, his creator, his father, laying near motionless in his boyfriend's arms. The Mosomarian carried him steel-hearted and yet comforting, gentle, with the rabbit. The love was palpable in the air, even as the air boiled and the ground rupture

Rallycry felt his face sting as his visor displayed tears streaming from his eyes. Pixelated and purple, shining bright even as the light vanished and reappeared, the individual photons disappearing and reappearing. Rallycry steeled his own heart, feeling the anchored sadistic God's behind them. He heard the screams of a protogen from behind him, as a flash of bright, sizzling golden light lit up the atmosphere.

The sheer courage that the Protogens behind him had to face against the gods. And to face off against whatever caused that burst of golden light, made Rallycry realize that everyone else was giving their all. Either to burn or shed away the many things impeding their path, or to keep those that cannot walk with them close.

Rallycry searched within himself, and he could only find a coward. He could only find a baby, a cold cowering child against the backdrop of amazing and powerful heroes. He could only feel the shriveled emaciated corpse of a protogen against those shining statues and paragons. He could only see himself, unuseful and cowardly, as they all risked their lives.