The Tale of a Dog Hero

Downfall

It didn't take long for word to spread through the city about Oscars presence. Soon, a city wide alarm rang out. "All citizens, please take shelter in your houses. There is a monster level threat roaming the streets. Repeat, a monster is in our city. Take shelter." A few blocks away, Oscar heard yelling and ran to help. People were fleeing the streets and getting trampled in the sudden chaos. "Hang on, everyone! I can help!" Oscar snapped into action, quickly made his way into the crowd, grabbed two people laying on the ground, and led them to a safe spot on the side of the street. As he went back in, the crowd engulfed Oscar. He quickly made his way through the scrambling bodies and found three more people getting trampled. Oscar lifted them all up when the crowd began to thin. He set the people down on the side of the street, and the five civilians began thanking Oscar. "No, really. I don't need thanks. I'm just trying to do what -" One of the last people in the street ran up to Oscar and mistakenly poked him hard in the side, trying to get his attention. He immediately spun around and summoned his pistol. Before anyone could tell what happened, fragments of the civilian's head blasted into the air with a sudden boom. Panic spread again as the rest ran away to their homes. "Why are you running? I stopped the monster!" The people's cries rang in Oscars head. "Monster!" "Trickster!" Murderer!" "Psycho!" The words that heard hurt deep in his heart. "STOP! I... I'm a hero! Im helping pe-" Behind Oscar, someone shot him in the back. The spread of pellets slammed into Oscars jacket, causing patches of fabric to rip and his back to bruise, and sending a force strong enough to leave him winded. Oscar fell to his knees, struggling to breathe, when the man marched up and aimed the gun at the back of the skull. "Sheriff Collins. Great to meet the man who slaughtered one of my lower class teams. And judging from how you just survived a shotgun to the back, I can't say I'm surprised. Those people had families. Had lives. You took them all away..." Oscar quickly swept his arm against the shotgun, causing it to fire toward the sky. Making his chance, Oscar jumped away and got back to his feet. "They attacked me. Im just defending myself." Collins recollected his professional demeanor and reached in his pocket and pulled out a cigar box. "One poor kid was left traumatized. Can barely drink and eat without freaking out. Seeing him like that is the reason I decided to hunt you down myself. Only took me 10 minutes to follow the chaos you brought." As he turned to light the cigar, the sheriff's lip slightly burned in anticipation, and took the cigar out from his mouth. "So it seems... you used to be a man of honor, judging how you spared at LEAST one... How about we do this the old way? No guns."
Oscar stared at the floor, his gaze unfocused. Sheriff Collins tossed his shotgun to stretch his legs. "Does the guilt of those lives weigh on you yet?" Just as the sheriff bravely took his stand against the lone tortured soul, Oscar summoned his pistol and blasted a hole through his vital cebernetic components. With a few words muttered under his breath, he turned to walk down the empty streets. "No. It doesn't."
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Zuko finished up the first part of the story and got up from the table. "That's as much as I will tell you for now. I can continue later, but I'm tired. Get some rest... You need it if you want to see Oscar after he wakes up." As he left toward his room, Tippy reluctantly got up and went downstairs. In the training room, Nexus was practicing using her upgrades against some holograms for effective combinations. Making quick work, she opened the seams in her exoskeleton and filled a section of the room in steam. In the cover of the cloud, a grapple was shot into a hologram's chest and pulled in. A hue of pink illuminated inside the fog as she barreled out and clotheslined the closest target she saw. With a click of a gun behind her, she expanded a shield from her arm and spun around to block the incoming fire. Nexus closed her shield and launched a ball of gasoline from her opposite forearm, splatting into a nearby hologram. She ran towards one of the other free targets, and slammed her left palm against one of their chests, then firing an electrical plasma, both stunning and electrocuting the augmented enemy. Just as quickly, she kicked its leg to knock them to their knees and grappled another hologram hiding behind it. She wrapped the cable around the first hologram's neck, jumped off its propped up leg, and yanked the cord as she went into the air. The neck snapped and broke off as the grappled hologram was slammed into the decapitated body. The head flew into Nexus' hands so she could finish her combo in the air. She fell toward the gasoline soaked hologram and threw the head into its chest. As she landed, she struck her ankle against the decapitated head, throwing sparks and igniting the gas. While Nexus kept up the fight, Tippy watched some numbers on a screen that changed compared to how hard she hit. While she watched, a sudden, shattering crash could be heard from the floor above. Tippy jolted up and ran upstairs to the kitchen to catch B3AST, trying to escape its container. It managed to knock itself to the floor, which scared Leif enough to cause him to drop a plate. Tippy angrily walked up to grab the container. "B3AST! You can't see him! Not yet. We don't know if this was your fault or not, and if it is, then you're gone... Zane won't come back for Oscars sake, so I'm making sure you stay away from him." Leif glanced at B3AST, then his mother. "I don't think it knows English, mom." Tippy picked up the container and put it back on the countertop, ensuring that it couldn't fall off again. "It understands us. Just can't talk back. I don't know why, but it only communicates through whistles and... apparently low hums. Did you check on your dad yet?" Leif shook his head. "I was about to make him some food before that thing scared me." Tippy got the broom and headed to the broken plate on the floor."Well, it's okay, bud. It's just a plate. We can go see him together in a second, then." Together, Leif and Tippy made Oscar a plate of food and checked in on him. When they opened the door, Oscar was sitting up in the bed, staring downward. "Oscar?" Tippy asked as Oscar lifted his head. "In about 15 minutes, I'll be gone, and you'll be gone... But you're always gone."
Tippy placed the plate on the nightstand and sat down beside Oscar. "Hey. I'm right here, and I'm as real-" He interrupted her with his muttering. "How many times... have I seen this nightmare?" Tippy laid a hand on Oscar's cheek and turned him toward her. "What have you been through?" Leif cautiously stood from the edge of the bed and approached this stranger, called his father. With only stories and his thoughts, the opinion he shared of Oscar had not been positive. Tippy took Leif's hand and put it in Oscar's. Before realizing what they had done, a spark could be felt through all three as Oscars dull, greyed eyes filled with color again. His perspective, seen as broken and distorted realities clashing through each other, had finally cleared, and he was given the luxury of witnessing his son as a child for the first time. Tippy and Leif could feel a tingling through their arms afterwards. That split second was just enough to burn that image in their minds. When Oscar's sight returned to its horrid nightmarish view, he didn't react. He wasn't worried anymore. He only stared at the clashing dimensions of his wife and son. "I really am home..." Oscar laid back down and breathed a sigh of relief. "Oscar. Do you feel good enough to tell us what happened while you were gone? Zuko told us a bit about an old town you were at. Apparently, you had started a rampage in a city a few states away, a few months after you left? I hope it's not true..." Tippy questioned Oscar, as he stared at the, again shifting, form that was his son. "Yes... I hurt people. I took lives. I stole. For the time that I was still alive, I had lied... I broke my promise to you. Artemis abandoned me, and now I'm apparently what's called a 'false god'... Leif, know what I did, I always did it with the purpose of coming back home. I never thought it would be in such a pitiful way, though... I had something to show you, but it will have t-" Leif interrupted in a fit of anger. "Who do you think you are?! My family wants me to be like you, but you're an awful person! What a joke!" Tippy tried to defend Oscar, "Leif! That's still your father. Respect him, and the fact that he protected us before he was gone." Leif interrupted her as well. "MOM! How long have we had to do HIS job while he was gone? You wanted me to have the life I want, but I dont want anything to do with him now. I heard about who you were before you left, and it wasnt good. Maybe I could have forgiven you, but not anymore! I had to learn how to fight since I was five years old! I'M TWELVE NOW!" Oscar began to pull his legs off the bed to stand. "Leif, understand that I left to protect you all from Pollux and his minions-" Leif marched over to Oscar. "THATS CRAP! We have still had to fight monsters and other creatures, ALONG with keeping the city happy. The whole town hates you for what you did!" Oscar got to his feet and stood tall over the room. His body looked weathered, despite healing. He appeared to be bulkier, yet old. Scars could be seen through his layer of fur and his eyes were more greyed and dead than the shining blue he once had. Oscar's presence gave the feeling of a spark dying out. "I made sacrifices and deals I'm not happy with. I even died so you could be safe." Leifs anger could be felt in the air around when the floor began to creak. "Then why didn't you do that 8 years ago?!" Leif threw a punch directly into Oscar chest. He stood unaffected, staring disapprovingly at Leif. He looked up at Oscar with wide eyes as he took a step back. "If you wanted me dead, then you should have let me alone..." oscar turned away as Tippy let out a small gasp. "Go to your room, Leif." Tippy motioned her son out of the room as he glanced back at Oscar. Before he made it to the door, Oscar spoke up. "No. I understand your anger. You have questions and deserve answers. Let's continue from how much you already know."
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Oscar wandered out of the town and into the next. Quickly causing panic with Perses and Mania following behind him. Slowly, the three would cause madness across the world, creating panic. Once villains and monsters heard that Oscar was missing, crime had increased as well. A full year had gone by before something changed. When all seemed lost to Oscar, as he paraded his way through an open field, his chest was filled with a sudden pain. As he reeled forward, his body wanted to move in the other way. He could feel Tippy with him. Her warmth, her voice, it felt so real. In the pain, he could hear her shouting in pain... something he never thought he would have to hear. Tippy's pain led him back toward his home. Upon seeing the city, Ohm began chirping. "Sorry buddy... we can't go back. Not till I stop Pollux. If I beat him as a kid, why would I need everyone else? He turned to make his way in the other direction when he could hear distant crashing. In a panic, he ran to hide away in the woods. The pain could be felt greater when a distant boom sounded off. Now forced to choose risk the booms be the god and titan following behind, or leave cover to keep an eye out. When peeking around quietly, Ohm flew into the sky for a better view and after a moment, dived toward a street some yards away. Oscar stuck to the roof as he went along to chase Ohm. Before he could make it to the edge of the roof, he was snatched away and slammed into a corner. "Ugh! W- what the he-?" Oscar had his face shoved into the wall, preventing him from whistling for Ohm. "Who are you?!" Whatever had Oscar pinned spoke out, then grabbed him by the hood of his jacket. "Why so you have HER PRIME VITALS!?" Oscar was suddenly zipped upwards. In a single blink, Oscar was exiting the atmosphere. As soon as B3AST covered his body, he was slammed in the chest by something so fast that he could barely keep the suit together. Faster and faster, Oscar would be away from Earth until he became isolated in space. Out in the loss of space, B3AST stared at the sun and its brilliance of light, watching the rays and arcs blast off the surface. Looking back at Earth, he remembered glimps of a figure in a solid white cloak. So familiar... Something so close, yet so far. In space, thoughts still clouded his mind, but he could no longer run from them.
"Oscar. What have you done? Coward. You're too fragile to do anything against any god. You sit on a pedestal of greed and gluttony." Oscar's eyes were wide. "I'm... not greedy." He spoke, trying to reassure himself.
"You begged for power, then abused it by killing your family. You stared upon your fate and ruined everyone else's in order to escape. You broke promises to the ones you loved most, and now... you're alone. Nobody believes in you..." Oscar narrowed his eyes. "No. Tippy does. I still have strength, so people still believe in me." The voice echoed deeper into Oscar mind.
"They worship your god. Not you..." Shaking his head slightly, he replied. "Wrong. I was the last person to worship her before my divinity. I spread her religion..."
"Spread lies throughout the world. They all believe in a cause that should have died out. She isnt good." Oscar began shaking and curled into a ball as he drifted through space."for five seconds... please..."
"You know it, I know it. You were wrong to trust kyler. You were wrong to trust Artemis... You are wrong, starting with your birth..."
The last thing he thought before succumbing to the dark void was his failure as a father and husband. Failure to help when needed. And failure to think of anyone but himself...