Feoli’s intel was off. Gurl wasn’t here, and why would she be? If a fight did break out, why would they keep her where we could easily find her.

He stared out at me, pressing his earpiece, “Aye, thanks for the heads up. I’ll get ‘em out of here. Keep your eye’s down love, watch the traitor and them, and remind Sruthan ta come in from the back of the lobby, go at them from both sides.”

He brought his hand away, and spoke to me, “I’ll be honest, I forgot about ye. Until I read your file again. You’re the one who’s gonna kill me den?”

He laughed as he kept eating away at his meal. I took a step back, the fact that Sruthan was coming in on them scared me. The fact that Gurl wasn’t where we thought- that she could be anywhere, was terrifying.

The buzz came from behind me, I turned to see that the windows and door had been sealed with a light grey metal sheet, the black smoke disappearing as it did so.

“Well boy, I’m the man that’s gonna break you, doesn’t matter if you kill me ‘r I kill ye.”

Belfast stood up, sandwich wrap in hand, “The rest of yas... git.”

The second worlders filed for the exit.

“Except the one who scouted Gurl.” Adonis’ feet froze.

“Three of us have some talking ta do, some questions to ask.”

As the door closed behind those who were leaving, Belfast asked, “Answer me lads, are you Prods or Cathys?”

Adonis swallowed and looked at me. I answered with a slight pulse throbbing in my head, trying to keep the focus on me.

“I have no people. I’m nothing.”

His smile was gone, “you’re an a-theist then?”

“No. Atheists don’t believe in a god. Agnostics think there is a one. I haven’t found anything worth putting stock in, but I don’t have the brains to find my own way. I don’t know what I believe in. That’s as close yo nothing as you can get.”

He finished eating his lunch, licked his fingers, “eh, it was a better answer than most. How’s about you Adonis?”

Adonis looked over at me as he started. “Sir... I don’t put much thought into that sort of thing, I’m- I’m a material person. I- I believe that we can solve this conflict-” He choked, “-peacefully. The Mountain’s men are out in the open, now would be a better time than ever to crush Clover, who I'll remind you, is Shamrock’s enemy as well.”

He spoke to me now, “-what do you gain from helping the Mountain? You're giving them the whole island, north and south. With Belfast gone they’ll face little resistance in-”

“Shut up Adonis.” The words escaped my mouth. I knew that this wasn’t going to go well for anyone.

Belfast laughed as Adonis stammered, “Shamrock, whatever Feoli’s angle is, you can change her mind. You, Clover, Feoli- you can fight on the same side. For the same goals. You’ll work on expanding the market to other territories, we can build a proper organisation, one policed by you, in time we’d make a proper country-.”

Belfast stopped him, “Right, I haven’t got a clue what the fuck your talkin’ ‘bout. I asked which side you’re on.”

He looked at me pleading with his eyes.

Then Adonis answered, “I’m on your side, sir.”

“Good. You do understand the question. Then why are ya tryin’ talkin’ him into joinin’? If you're on my side- my side, not some hippy gyppy neutral ground bull, then why are ye talking to him when he doesn’t want to side with us? I think you need to realise, the people we are and the person he is... there ain’t nothin’ similar about ‘em.”

He squinted his eyes, “Have you even read this cock sucker’s file, or are you just basing this off of who you want Mr hero to be? What you want him to do for you.”

Adonis was quiet, he couldn’t say anything else.

I took a step forward. Belfast noticed.

There was a split second. The man lifted his hand as if he was clutching something, black buzzing around him. I leapt in, it was so obvious that I couldn’t miss it. Belfast brimmed with murderous intent.

As I stepped between the two men, a gun formed in Belfast’s hand and he shot. The bullet fell off of me. My breath became ragged suddenly. I reached out for the gun, but not quick enough. The room had already filled with buzzing, though I could never place where exactly it was coming from.

A steel girder fell from the ceiling, landing directly on top of me, pushing me through the ground. I could hardly react fast enough to tilt it away from Adonis. It fell to the side with a crash.

My legs dangled through the ceiling of the room below as Belfast aimed again, closing one eye and sticking his tongue out.

I pulled myself up as best I could, but the broken floor was wavering. I went all in, I slammed the ground beneath Belfast, falling with the broken mesh of steel and concrete.

I landed on my knees; Belfast didn’t land at all. He floated. I jumped back up as soon as I could, disregarding that last point.

As I came up, I collided with Belfast, his gun firing as I did. Again, it was a miss.

I checked back at Adonis to make sure he was okay. I cursed myself. The window I’d gone through was gone, if I was going to get Adonis to safety, I'd have to take him out past Belfast, or waste time looping through the hole in the floor.

I finally decided what I was going to do. I was already on Belfast, I resolved to finish things here.

I threw a quick punch at him, it was hard enough to break his jaw, but he turned his head back to look at me. He gazed into my eyes, his stare... There was absolutely nothing remarkable about it. It was the kind of glance you’d give someone you pass by on the street.

I hit him again, and then again. His face reddened, bruising quickly as I sat up. He taunted me with a laugh.

I cursed and he raised his gun.

I hadn’t a clue why he wasn’t out, but it didn’t matter, if I just held him down- He'd be out of the fight.

“Adonis! Get the fuck out of here!”

That really made Belfast cackle. I snarled before hitting him square in the face with my free fist.

I should have known better. That buzzing was still about. The only thing that made me look away from Belfast was an out of place twang sound. I quickly looked back to see Adonis. I didn’t even realise what had happened.

“Adonis!”

Then I heard a thud.

My face fell away as I looked behind me.

“What,” Belfast taunted, “aren’t we fightin’? Didn’t you say you were nothing? That you had no people?”

My left leg jerked, I was rushing to Adonis, past the pit to where he was lying. Blood was pooling from... somewhere. I searched all over him while he told me to stop.

There was a god damn pole lodged in his back.

I tried to make sense of what was happening. I told myself that I could still get him out of there, that it wasn’t so bad. But my eyes were stuck to the fucking pole stabbing out of him.

He finally took me back to reality, he said, “No, you’ve gotta...”

The pain was clearly unbearable, he wasn’t going to be conscious for much longer.

Belfast was still saying some shit, I wasn’t listening to him.

I wanted to shout at him. Adonis I mean. For being so stupid. It’s not like his family was poor, he didn’t have to walk into this sort of situation. He had everything, why did he have to go looking for more? Because he wanted to be independent? Because he wanted to be ‘self-made’? Worst of all was that he had an issue with the fact that Gurl was soaking up this life when he helped lead her to it.

I cursed, because praying would never save him.

I gripped onto him as he spoke, “I’ll be alright, just- fight. I’m sorry, I’m really sorry mate.” I tore at my face. He was killing me.

“Adonis, I- I can’t- I'm not going to save you. I’m not the person you’re looking for.”

I couldn’t feel my costume anymore. I could hardly breathe. It was like all feeling had left my skin; all blood gone.

He was quiet as I said that.

Then he finally said, “Oh? Then who are you?” He really was going.

I instantly reached for my mask. As I grabbed it by the face there was something else that stopped me. I felt that I shouldn’t take it off, I was reminding myself that it was ‘wrong’.

A moment of humanity seized me. I took off my mask, and it was as if a wave of emotion crashed, one that I hadn’t experienced in a long time. My vision was still blurred as I stared at him.

He was trying to stare at me but even that was a struggle. I gave him a shake, “Adonis, it’s me! Please just- just hold on for a little longer!”

I’d changed my mind, I didn’t care if it was illogical, I could save him.

As I was trying to shift him, he groaned as and said, “It’s you? Heh, what are you... Hehe...”

I’d put a smile on his face. It wasn’t right.

I realised I was trying to lie to myself again.

I rested him on his side so he could find some comfort.

He murmured, and I leaned in.

The clearest thing I could make out was, “You’re the guy who told Gurl to go to the beach and you’re the reason I was on that beach. Wow. Just... wow. Thanks, Sham... I know. I... way too picky...”

He said more after that, but I couldn’t hear it. I suddenly remembered my surroundings.

I made the mistake of looking down at his body again. I honestly- I honestly had no clue that a person could bleed so much. I was half soaked in it.

A part of me said that this was my fault. That my intervention had caused this. Just like with Grey.

That isn’t what I was thinking.

I put on my mask before rising. The floor creaked and the air buzzed. And I looked over to Belfast.

I tried to formulate a sentence, but he spoke first.

“So, you’re a bloody liar, aren’t you? You said all that stuff about being nothing, a ‘non-entity’, but look at ye, cryin over some fuck who was screwing with you from the start. Honestly, I didn’t plan on killin’ him, cause I'd forgotten about ye- but I fucked with the princess enough, and you didn’t even know those other people, right? If I was like you, I'd dress this up like a lesson. Lie about it, say something stupid like ‘this is what ye get for not being true to your core’- no, I just like doing this. I like killing people. I don’t get off to it, but it feels right, ye know? Like it’s the best way to spend my time.””

“Yeah, actually. I know exactly what you're talking about.”

I stood up straight, moving around to him.

“I spend all my time tormenting people too. I go looking for trouble, beat the shit out of people who, honestly, have more of a life than I do. They’re out on my street, where they don’t belong. Where only people like me belong. People like us. I hate them for it. I resent them. They could do anything, they could stay home with their family, go to the pub with their friends- they have things that-”

I welled tears in my throat, “No. The thing is, I've been deprived of that normality, I’m starved for it. My whole life I've been looking for someone to blame, the other kids, the government, my mom- but the harder I stared at those things the clearer it became that they were all victims of the same monster that was stealing everything from me, the monster that I’m attached to.”

A smile crept over my face as I thought back.

“For a moment, I thought things were getting better. That things could only get better, seeing as they were at their worst. Saoirse, Feoli, Mullet, Bob, Grey, Adonis, the hotels, the zoo, the fact I was allowed to share in their happiness- fuck, Bailey forgave me, I thought there was no way I could fix myself- the fact that all these people were willing to stick with me... It’s the greatest feeling in the world. It made everything worthwhile.”

There was no smile.

“And you’ve stolen it from me. It’s a mercy that you’ll never have to experience what that’s like.”

He wasn’t smiling either, “That’s... presumptious, aye?”

“Presumptuous. I don’t care. Why should I? You were babbling about some file; I'm guessing it had something about me not having a soul? That I can’t be persuaded? My mind can’t be changed, I just act on the information I'm given, react and think according to my own laws.”

“I’m sorry, but this is the only way. I promise that once this is over I'll bring order, that I’ll build cages for animals like you so that you can live to suffer. You won’t hold this against me, will you? It’s your own philosophy, kill or be killed.

“It would be better for me- for the world, if you didn’t exist.”

He managed a laugh, faking a smile with his fat face, “You really just think about yourself, don’t ye? You’d have hit me harder after what I did to those kids last night if this was about the world. Well anyway, here’s what I think. I think the world’d be better off if everyone else just... offed themselves, ya know? Guess that proves we’re on opposite sides in the end, aye Adonis?”

Something snapped.

I bolted forward, smashing into his chest and through the room door. I was analysing everything, cycling through all the data I’d collected on him, adding the fact he was durable to hurt to the list. I got a good look at his face while was smashing him throw a wall in the hall. That’s when I realised his face was no longer bloody. It wasn’t even bruised.

I put my frustration into the next hit.

I went over everything as I hammered down on his head: he materialises metal objects, he can deconstruct objects, he can produce that black buzz, he’s durable, he’s self-repairing-

In the corner of the room we found ourselves in, the black cloud was forming an object- a cross bow of some sort. It launched the same pole at me, knocking me half way across the room. I gasped at the air, trying to fill my lungs. My legs wobbled, but they had enough energy to push me forward.

He smiled at me with a cocked eyebrow, inviting me to tackle him again. Before I could, the floor fell out from underneath me. The room below had been restructured by his power into a sort of slide to move me out onto the street. I came falling down into an open road, a car screeched to a stop as I came crashing down in front of it.

I struggled to catch my breath, once again rising to my feet. I took a look around and found I was on the opposite side of the building from the others. I couldn’t help but look around at the people on the street. Their looks of shock and concern. I told myself to get out of there, to spare these people the storm that was coming.

I looked up to see a black cloud- a true cloud that blocked out the sun for a moment. It was swirling in on itself as I got ready to counter whatever it was about to throw at me. Out from the black mass emerged a giant cylinder that covered a good distance between the hotel and the next building over. Then it started to fall.

I twisted to the car that had stopped behind me and ripped the door off of it. There was a man inside with his infant daughter, I shouted for him to get out, as I pulled the back door off to get the kid.

He got out- not because I asked, but because I just ripped his baby out of the car. It took little time to convince him to move; there was little lime left.

I lifted the car hastily, holding it over my head, it was hard to stand straight after everything I'd just been hit with, but I needed to stand firm to catch it.

If I'd tried to catch the pillar with just my hands, it would have nailed me into the ground and flattened everything nearby. If I had something to catch it with, I could at least hold onto it for a moment. The difference is like trying to lift something with two fingers compared to a full hand.

As the pillar collided into me, the first part to buckle was my feet- my legs soon began to bend under the weight, and the centre of weight started to shift, as the giant pole tilted back and fell into the hotel. The black cloud was soon swirling around the pillar, seeming to reabsorb it into itself. I could hardly walk after keeping that thing up. If he pulled something like that again-

From the black mist something else came down, it was him, the blood gone from his face. Around his feet and back was the swarm, and it slowed his descent. He again threw a girder at me, but this time I was able to swat it away with my forearm, then I grabbed out at him.

I found a solid hold on him, repeating the same move I'd used on Bea. I tossed him hard and far. To where I didn’t know, just as long as it was out of the city centre. The black buzz washed over me, leaving the pillar and following after him. I coughed as I breathed it in.

I turned to check that the pillar would stay put, before leaving in his direction.

It was then that I realised that something wasn’t right.

The same black cloud that had disintegrated Clover’s friend, did nothing to me... Was it the cause of my lethargy? My sore limbs? There was a chance that he couldn’t disassemble me, maybe I was too tough?

No, he could reduce sub-terrainium to atoms, he could do the same to me.

Then why hadn’t he?

I reminded myself that he’d only ever reassembled metals, he never did anything organic- no, that’s what the ‘healing’ was.

I couldn’t put it all together. Not with what I knew.

I chased after him, hopping across the rooftops to stay out of the open sky where he could shoot me down. That black cloud was towering, strands breaking away and circling around buildings, integrating them into itself, growing larger.

Whatever it was, there was a finite amount of it. He was trying to make more.

I got close to the epicentre and searched for him, careful not to be taken by surprise again.

Another spear shot out at me, I caught it, tossed it, and kicked off in the direction it had come from. Into the storm. I rocketed as hard as I could manage.

I hoped that what I was about to try would actually work. I kept my arms loose as one foot kicked me off, and the other stopped me nearly instantly. The concrete of the roof I was standing on ripped, as my arms tossed forward. With the rest of my momentum, I pushed them forward, clapping together.

Two objects that had been approaching Mach 1 were forced to collide.

The cloud parted in ripples and my hearing left with it.

I could see through the cloud freely now; I could see the roof he was standing on. Jumping over the streets below, I smashed into a pole he’d formed quickly, it managed to tear into my shoulder, but not far. The fact he wasn’t currently using sub-terrainium should have clued me in on what was going on.

I was able to collide with him again, his body folded but it felt like I hadn’t done any real damage to him, like this was still all for nothing. We fell off that roof and back onto the streets. He slowed our fall as we crashed into the table of an out-door pub, I never got the chance to check for people, as I got swept in Belfast’s violent rush again.

It was suffocating, half literally; I couldn’t breathe, but I could operate with very little oxygen, my blood would make the most of what I had.

Again, I thought wrong.

Through the swirling black mist, I was batted off the street by a spinning bar, then by another, cracking into the side of the low end of a concrete complex. I lamely gripped to what I could: a head shaped crack and stony jut.

All of the great black mass conjoined, and I spied him lifting slow within it.

Lifting, I thought. Finally, I was right.

It wreathed far above, and a wrecking ball dropped my way. I had a sudden and sharp spark of heroism as I booted it away with a high kick, the impact dented it, but also damaged the wall I was against, sending me through and compromising its structure.

As I scrambled to a solid position, I knew how much worse it could have been, I took one look up to the windows of the building above, this was an apartment complex. I had been smashed into an indoor parking lot.

Once I regained my footing, I tried to jump back out, but he had out planned ahead of me, a flood of shrapnel streamed out of the hole. I blocked my eyes, and pressed on, I knew that I had to get out of there.

The wall had been reconstructed. I blindly patted for it as he came in from somewhere else, he was laughing now.

He was ready to claim his victory. But I was never going to take a defeat gracefully. I ran at the sound swatting hard, and I was attacking him again. I slapped for his face, then I found it, and then I smashed at it. Hard metal poles that were hastily made to distract me shot into my sides .

Once the rumbling started, he cleared the fog. For a scouring second, I looked to the corners, and support poles where the black ran around in streams, like lines of ants they marched idly, yet always ready.

That image helped a lot.

The thought was in my mind, but I wanted to say it out loud, to try and work anymore info out of him.

“I know what your power is you son of a bitch.” I hadn’t noticed how harsh and gruff my voice had gotten. From the screaming buzz charging in and out of my throat and the raw emotion.

“Aye? That makes one of us. All ye ‘Units’ care too much ‘bout the specifics of this crap, just summarise it. You hit and get hit, I eat and shit, that’s our powers”

The building was still rumbling, and my head twisted to the pillars, falling apart around us.

“I own this place ye know.”

I rolled my eyes back to him, and forgot about talking, I wasn’t getting anything out of him that way. I needed to beat him.

Despite the crap he’d pulled on Clover, he was an idiot, a simple man you could have lifted out of any trailer or slum.

I was going to go about it my way, ‘hit and get hit’, he was right about that. That’s all I needed.

“If ye care so much about specifics, hows about we stress test ya. Around a hundred tenants mr ‘I don’t believe in nothing’. Hundred and thirty people here now.

The humanity of it drained me, more than before.

“One pillar,” he said, “stand under it, try and keep this place from falling. You don’t have choice. Kill me now, and the black shit’ll eat everything. Maybe the whole city.”

I shook my head, “I don’t believe-” He roared, “Ye don’t believe!”

The black streams cleared from one part of the building, and the ground tilted, the lights gave out for a moment.

I rushed to the pillar in question, the buzz wormed away at it as I approached, leaving space for me to stand under a jagged column.

“Aye, let’s get to it then. Everythin’s sorted, it’ll eat away at the other bits and walls, just enough so that the weight of the building will be pressed on you, just not enough that the floor’ll cave under ye. A main support dorta thing.”

I struggled to speak, the weight was rising, I tried one last time.

“Nano machines! It’s nano machines!” I wasn’t speaking to Belfast anymore; I was basically filing my sporadic thoughts for Schism.

“Nano whats?”

I gritted my teeth as the weight rose.

When they were flying Belfast down, he wasn’t swept up in it like a storm, they formed a rigid structure along his clothes. They operate independently from conscious thoughts, more closely following will or emotions. That would explain how he could create complex structures, even with someone like him behind it all, and why Schis couldn’t get a good idea of what it was.

They consume mass, and like cells, they multiply when enough resources are present, they even cannibalise each other to form structures like beams and pipes. One power is his link to them, the other is probably something to do with their creation, or storage. It might be a leap to say that they’re nano machines, though they are most likely atomic in scale, or close to it. The bottom line is that they’re organisms so simple in structure that they cannot be detected or traced individually.

Belfast said they could destroy this city, read his damn thoughts, you know he wants to destroy it all, including your country, you genocidal monster!

I huffed and puffed, as for a solitary moment the weight pressing on my back left my focus.

The fat middle aged man just stood there.

My eyes flickered, and as the reality began to sink in, I pushed against the weight harder, hoping that I would be relieved of it eventually.

Schism wasn't going to help me. Worst case scenario, he was looking for me to die first.

“It doesn’t matter, I've ye pinned. You have two choices, two different people you can choose to be, and nothin’ else.”

He pointed up, “Stay here, keep these strangers alive and I'll go back to the hotel. I’ll start with your fish friend, then the armed lads, then, if Gurl disobeyed me, if she was still watching when I told her to look down, then I'll kill her. Hey, I’ll keep the Mountain girl alive. Just barely. Don’t forget, you’re not the man I’m after.”

He smiled, “I’ll let her watch as your stamina fails, as this big ‘ol building and my smoke wears you out. I’ll have it perfectly timed; you’ll give out just after I finish buttering her up.”

I was still thinking over all the points of his ability, I believed with all my heart that I could beat him- only, it was after all the cards had been placed on the table already.

There was a crack in my knees, as a hole opened in the wall.

“Don’t worry, I'll wake you up when it’s time to go. You're not done suffering boy, you deserve a hell of a lot more, ye ‘middle of the road’ bastard. 'Better if I was dead' ye said, but you never tried to snap me neck. Do as you say. That's the lesson.”

He couldn’t put me out. I had concluded that he couldn’t disassemble me; he could dismantle sub-terrainium, that must’ve been because it was a pure metal.

The nano machines worked primarily with metal, though they could brute force biological material. But not me, I'm too tough, supernaturally so, there wasn’t an inch of my body or a sliver of flesh that they’d be able to tear apart.

Then I remembered the blood. Like a negative placebo, a wooziness overcame me.

My veins weren’t pumping my blood currently. I had a blood transfusion at Babel, to remove the toxins in my system.

Ordinary blood, that the could dismantle or dissassemble.

I was slumping slightly, when I felt a sort of rigidity keep me in place.

He said something and laughed, but I wasn’t hearing it, I was barely conscious. That was his intent. He’d given me a choice.

I felt the terrible mass of one hundred souls on my back, and that’s what really broke me.

The hopelessness was welling.

He opened a hole in the wall again, leaving through it. The lights went out eventually, they must’ve been motion detecting.

I could only move my lips and jaw. My arms, back, legs, toes, neck, all of it was going up against the crushing.

They screamed to let go, but the void where my soul should have been, said otherwise.

It was as dark as the cell.

My mind was so caught up thinking about Feoli and the others, the weight, Schism, and how to win, that I scarcely noticed a creeping, unfeeling thought.

‘Drop it when he gets here. Kill him, kill Clover, and maybe, yourself. Ireland will be free from these people, the Mountain will get a chunk taken out of it.’

‘And you won’t have to feel any more pain.’

A sharp sting rang through my body against it all.

I lifted the building and readjusted my foot.

‘God no’, my heart shouted.

‘Emmett’, the creeping said, taking a shape in the dark.

With the scuffling of my foot, and the flaking of the walls, the light returned.

And something was not there.

There was not a girl standing there, red haired and freckled.

She was not there.

Not in mind or body or soul.

It was everything that was not.

It was my friend.