The Zero Countdown

Chapter 21: Fitting end

The steps they take echo along the premises. Everything is dark and dull, the light coming from the room of horridness beckons their curiosity until they stepped inside, facing the Time Keeper for their final act of ending the distortion in reality in time.

The instance they went in, the apparent footsteps of blood from the floor is drawn clear recently. Just as Elyon had already seen, Brina's grimace became ostensibly visible upon taking a glimpse of what she originally visualized.

The shelves around the corner display human organs in clear containers, ledges on the walls where the bonsai trees should hang instead keep flesh and innards of decaying human remains. Some were already infested by crawling maggots all over, some are fresh and recent, the rest are disfigured human parts they can no longer recognize.

All they know is the fact no one was there means their enemies are a step ahead in their way, so just as her prediction gets clearer, Brina pushed Elyon to the other side and bent over backward, keeping her balance well and maintained seeing how the shear her adversary used in her assault is right above her midriff, to which she rolled on the floor and threatened her target employing her firearm as last resort.

It happened so fast that Elyon came to his senses, the scene that triggered his flight or fight response and bursting adrenaline rush was when Saya appeared from behind them holding the same shears that she used to butcher him alive.

"Freeze! One wrong move or we'll bore a hole in your head!" Elyon coldheartedly intimidates Saya, sweeping his feet a few steps behind creating a distance between them.

"I have no idea why you knew all this. I let you go with just overrunning my private property, and but I won't forgive you for abducting my daughter! Tell me where she is, or I'll add you to fools in my collection."

She's gritting her teeth so hard her gums are literally bleeding, her hands are soaked by the redness of her previous victim, her posture and intent are to eliminate and kill, yet her resentful bloodshot eyes tell a completely different story.

In closer inspection, Saya's legs waver a little bit, demonstrating that even a bloodthirsty criminal has fear. But the cause of fear wasn't death, rather she's frightened because her daughter is missing and she couldn't find her by her side.

"Madela came here, that's why we're here." Elyon tried clearing their name, but he realized their situation.

It's too late as he discerned that Madela must've orchestrated the entire thing and brought them to her trap of facing her mentally-ill mother who murders people by planting them in containers for her reasons.

"My daughter... What had you done to Madela?! After I showed you my greatest hospitality and kindness, this is what you return? Look at the mirror and see who is the monster, Elyon." Saya's voice has a glint of sadness drawn within.

She revealed another set of shears attached to her leg belt, drastically adjusting her posture as she wields the weapons she has in her hands with the intent of fighting back.

"We have no idea where your daughter went, woman. Back off now before we call the police and report the pile of dead bodies over that room."

No matter how demonic and twisted Saya's mind has become, Brina understands very well that she's still someone they shouldn't kill because she isn't part of the game. Anyone other than Fantasm is civilian or bystander. The likes of them getting killed by a player in Zero Countdown calls for punishment, hence she commend that Madela sending her mother as a decoy is a bold move.

She meets Elyon eye to eye and blinked twice, gesturing that shooting Saya would bring more trouble than it's worth keeping her alive.

"We're telling the truth. We aren't here to hurt you, Saya." Elyon attempted cooling down the heated situation, though he knew there was no turning back.

"You has taken my daughter and that fact won't change!" Saya shrieks a loud cry skillfully spinning the shears in her hands. She then turned over to Elyon, the intent of slaughtering him is written from her grimace before she comes running towards the one she believed to be the abductor of her daughter.

Closing his eyes worrying he'd end up killing her again, Elyon randomly fired his g*n in front of him, followed by a shattering noise and thump on the floor that spelled the silence of his adversary crawling below him.

Curiosity peeks at the beholder, Elyon cleared his vision and saw a shear penetrate the wall behind him. Meanwhile, Saya was rendered writhing on their footing, a bullet penetrated her shoulder bone before she threw the shears at Elyon, missing exactly an inch or else it will pierce right in his skull.

"I won't tolerate who hurt my daughter! I'll shred your body to pieces and—"

Preventing her from doing anything risky, Brina battered Saya's spine pinning her on the dirty mat, edging the g*n directly on her head this time rendering her checkmate.

"I'll restrain this woman here as much as I can. Turn this place outside down or whatever you want. Find that little girl and eliminate her no matter what it takes!"

Brina kept her trampling Saya's posterior with everything she has. Even though their adversary is already bleeding, she can verily fight back if they do not restrain her, which could lead to them killing her and they don't want any punishment, especially it's from the Unknown Entity.

"....." Elyon had no choice but to take the chance Brina had opened for her.

He may not know where Madela went, but he is sure there is one place he hadn't uncovered in the Hestia Flower Shop that he noticed from when he first met his end.

The chamber of collections Saya was keeping houses another door towards another room. And so he went inside the room of horrors and paced forward not bathing an eye to the mountainous corpses around him until he gently opened the door, entered, ready to face the exact same scene from the previous compartment.

However, instead of throwing up from the gore that he had already anticipated—what he beholds is opposite to the horrors he visualized.

The clear white fluorescent lights the very room. He barged into an ordinary bedroom of a girl, the colors of the walls are themed in pastel, shelves at the left corner contain assorted books and notes, and pretty much anything he can find in any normal household.

There was no blood nor death, there remains no sign of sadness nor sorrow. All Elyon sighted is the adorable small girl on a soft pink mat, reading advanced mathematical publications together with her doll by her side as if she was inside her own little world.

"Oh, you're here Elyon! Wait here I'll get the tea okay." Madela set aside the book and her doll Dionsy. She dragged the table near her bed where the tea set is prepared.

"Madela... Why? Why you won't run away and escape your inevitable end?" Elyon hid the g*n in his pocket, he clenched his fist not because he lost hope, but because he found his resolution written right above Madela's head.

The distortion of time forces every living entity in the world to die exactly when the Time Keeper unleashed her power. For that accord, even Madela is subjected to the same concept as she's still inside the box, hence the reason why Elyon's ability indicates their death within the distorted time should be fated at midnight.

Yet Elyon gazes at the countdown the depleting minutes Madela has, which concludes that he will definitely seal the deal and end the loop for one final act.

Since fate cannot be changed unless he desired its cause, Elyon relaxed on a wooden stool Madela brought out below her bed for them.

"Asking questions won't rest the mind and soul, Elyon. We are at a tea party remember? The purpose of this gathering is to relieve stress in the first place." She gracefully carried the small teapot in her hands and poured tea into their cup.

"But that doesn't answer why—" And Elyon ceases whatever he's going to ask since the act of inquiry won't be entertained.

Accepting the cup of tea and sipping the lukewarm drink he was offered just as Madela casually had done, Elyon didn't care anymore whether the liquid substance he's intaking is poisoned or drugged.

All he wanted to do is respect the pristine girl relishing her tea with the company of someone other than herself.

"Ephemeral moment fleeting so calmly in the edge of our wits. The very question you seek an answer for is once my ambivalence, a paradox of contradiction fills my head that even thousands of years aren't enough to answer them all... But I find myself in the wrong, a mistake I learn to accept." Madela speaks the enigma of her own experience living in a static world, unparalleled and beyond.

"......" Elyon never said a word. The silent background was being filled by the cries of her mother fightback Brina's constraints.

As they overhear the turmoil from the premises, Madela gently placed her cup on the table and grabbed something under her skirt.

She revealed a familiar serrated knife to which he handed in Elyon's hand.

"This is the knife Brina gave..." Elyon thought Madela must have gotten the blade from when she crawled on his leg up to his back and so he didn't wonder how she had it.

"Elyon... No, Fate Weaver. I, the Time Keeper who violated the continuum and entropy hereby declare my end. I'm sure you can already tell from the remaining time above my head I don't have much left."

The image depicted in her eyes isn't that of a child, she's the resemblance of someone who achieved enlightenment as if the answer she was looking for was dead all along.

"But..." And Elyon threw the question he's going to ask out of his mouth and clenched the serrated knife he's holding.

His heart race fast, his determination haven't changed, willing to deliver a fitting end to the girl who stood above the restraints of time.