The Zero Countdown

Chapter 16: Checkmate

The flow of casualty has completely changed and transformed to a weighted degree, eliminating the outcome of Elyon's fated death weaved by the distortion in time.

Neither the change he sought nor the outcome he predicted was correct, for the remorse he harbors cast his heart instead into the sin he committed, proving he's no different than a murderous deed born from spite.

Putting away the g*n he had used of killing Saya in front of her very own customers, and most of all, before the sight of her only daughter, Elyon found himself guilty of what he did.

Even though he already declared he desired to slay in order to survive, he still couldn't accept that despite his power should tell the others when they are going to die, that their fate is meant for change; he is forced to use his power over the complete opposite reason for his supernatural ability.

"No, no...!" The resounding tremors in his mind reminding him what he turned into burst forth. He picked the g*n from his pocket once more not to eliminate any witnesses, but he clung his firearm's muzzle directly on his temple in an attempt he'd suicide.

Although, the beholder of time had seen it coming. The chimes at the entrance rang aloud and Brina appeared out of nowhere taking the g*n away from his hand.

"As I said, not on my watch!"

Offering a solid kick right at Elyon's left kidney, the firearm was fired the instance Brina had disarmed Elyon, taking the weapon for herself. Knowing that he's currently under his irrational state, she points the pistol she has at the little girl who's frightened from losing her mother.

"Stay put and follow my words. You're being a drag while I'm keeping the fort so don't blame my methods. Anyways, things have changed, I'll bore a hole in that girl's head if you don't follow my order, is that clear?"

Brina threatened the already mentally unstable Elyon, to which he regained his senses that he no longer want anyone dying because of him, forcing himself to comply with whatever Brina may ask him for.

"I... I understand." Elyon lifelessly extends his hands in the air as a sign of compliance.

"Good. Now, step outside the premises and follow me. Remember, you're no more than a slave of this rigid game. You're my tool, Elyon, never forget the reason why we're even existing in the first place." Brina went to the extent of kicking his spine pushing him from leaving the crime scene.

By the time the local authorities arrived at the Hestia Flower Shop, both the perpetrator had fled somewhere the park where they came from.

Staying under the crown of the tree resisting the cold breeze from the same unchanging wind, Elyon stayed underneath its canopy, wavering from the very words he swallowed down his throat.

There stand in front of him is Brina, delivering him another firm pound by his thigh, disappointed from stabbing his own words and choosing to run away from his resolve.

"Look here, I don't care if you're being melodramatic by shooting a criminal when she had already taken your demise twice; what I wanna say is that there's a weird thing from the strings of events I've learned so far." Brina concentrates on their survival rather than addressing Elyon's trivial existential crisis.

"Say it... Don't mind my boneheadedness. I'm fine, really." Elyon lies under his breath.

The situation turned worse since Brina's speculations compared to the result he's supposed to get from the event's variables that led to the concurrent point deviating in an inexplicable direction.

"Good. I'll explain in the simplest of terms; that is-if that woman you killed is really the Time Keeper as you have inferred, then why I can't peek at the future beyond this day? The reversal of time prevents me from using my ability, it completely renders my power useless, concluding that the Time Keeper isn't her, and rather someone from amongst the crowd of people who went out, I reckon."

Brina wasn't sure why her Fantasm Ability doesn't work. Her only guess was that their initial guess of the true Time Keeper is false.

"What?" Elyon looked at her. "I'm confident she is the Time Keeper. Her assertion had always matched the impression she's aware of the time loop. I wouldn't mistake my experience as well as how versatile and quick in reflexes she is when protecting herself for survival, but I might also be wrong as you have stated." He's critically reflecting on the things that had happened.

Elyon would never accept that he just killed the wrong person. Saya was certainly a skilled killer, yet there remains doubt within him that she isn't actually responsible for the distortions in time now that he contemplates over it.

The altered reality surely had thoroughly changed for preventing his imminent death, however, in order to confirm Brina's hypothesis, he looked right above her head to see whether her remaining time had also altered, and he widened eyes, spooked from what he saw says it all.

"See? Your premise is wrong." Brina reminded him of his mistake.

"No way... Are you saying that is all for naught? I killed Saya for nothing?" Elyon felt the coldness of the wind, shattering the belief that he had already taken a step.

He's once again on the verge of losing his mind but Brina flicked his forehead, telling him, "We're actually clueless now. Let us hold onto the hope that Saya is the Time Keeper because her disappearance affects the movement of the guy who holds the Void Passage Fantasm Ability.

Brina wouldn't let the candle of possibility gets douse out. She knew going forward is always their option, although she understood fixing Elyon's tainted perception of the world comes first, so he can ignite the flames of his will and use him like the tool she wants him to be.

The open park has become their temporal solace. Elyon and Brina sit silently under the shade of the tree, words were fewer than the falling leaves, the grasses dance along the passage of time, and the night of illumination would not let them rest in the solemnity the scarlet dusk had given them.

They already had the answers they needed for that very moment, what they await is the expiration of time. It was past 11:58 PM when Brina looked at her phone, the ticking time resounded like the howl of silence, and just before the time distortion resets it all, the stewardess of future whispers.

"Whatever fleeting nightmare you may have... Never forget stars are alone in the dark, yet they shine the brightest amongst the heavenly skies above."

Elyon heard Brina's melancholic voice reaching for heaven, and by the time he could reciprocate—he found himself sitting on the same wooden bench in a park with his group.

It was as if he refused to hear whatever Elora and Ruther were uttering because he already knew what they are going to say. He waited until they left, and as soon as he waves back at Elora, the couple disappearing from the faraway street, he remembered what he missed of asking her.

"Ugh... Why did I forget to bring Elora for help? I'm such a fool..."

The ever-changing wind blew the same coldness upon his guilt, Elyon knelt with all his four, he tries to weep but no tears came out; only his regrets, and the past that he owned alone in the distorted reality God had endowed.

"How many?" Brina hinted.

"Four... And this time, I know who's life should I take."

Since Brina mostly knows the situation even though her powers are mostly restricted, Elyon still filled him with what he learned so far and the things he should accomplish from the beginning.

"Time is the key, and hesitation is my doom. A perfect moment calls for the opportunity, and taking that chance is why my Fantasm Ability exists; to deliver death and not herald its arrival."

Elyon said while they are outside the flower shop at exactly the moment when he entered the premises in his first run.

Gripping the g*n in his pocket, the composed and calm demeanor he exuded was off Brina felt he has turned into someone else.

"So you've found your resolve in the darkness then? Be wary, never be drowned in your own shade before you could find the light." Brina uttered, she coiled her sideburns behind her ears, assuming her position and acting as Elyon's lookout along the sidewalk in front of the Hestia Flower Shop.

"What are you, some kind of wise old man? I don't get Generation Z nowadays." Elyon commented. He still cherished what she told him and vowed he'll remember once he's lost again.

"Tsk. I never heard tools talking back like that. Just get it over will you?"

Her g*n's c****d and ready, Elyon entered the flower shop the fourth time, the chimes of death rang the echoes of death when Saya, the man picking a flower on left ledges, and the girl looking at the bonsai trees in a corner stares at him carrying his g*n in the public.

"No–No... Please spare me! I'll be wedded with my fiancé next week and I—"

The dreadful man who was the first to react upon seeing someone carry a firearm, stepping backward until his spine hits the counter became the first victim; a hole bore on his forehead with accurate precision.

"AAHHHHH!!!" The shy and modest high school girl admiring the blossoms and greenery shrieks from witnessing a murder right before her very eyes.

However, the opportunity Elyon calls for shows no mercy; he pointed the g*n and doubled-tapped the trigger unwavering, depriving the poor innocent girl of her peaceful life.

And lastly, the one Elyon scorn the most stands behind the counter. She's grinning not because she sees blood running like a river or her life's at a maximum risk but instead, she's euphorically ecstatic because she recognizes herself at Elyon's miserable face.

The face of a man who lost the will to live, the man who let himself be changed, and most of all, she can't get enough of the countenance of a murderer who's out for more.

"Ahh...! You are the perfect embodiment of a man! Blindness and corruption, sorrow and rage... An impeccable exhibition of the heaven that—"

As Saya's speech curtailed along with the deafening gunshot, she fell on the floor motionless, killed in action before she could even get the shears hiding under the shelves below.

"The loop should end now... This is checkmate, Time Keeper."