Era of Madness

The mistakes you can't fix 8

Seeing the kid lunging toward him, the man was to simply knock him out or immobilize him, but he was suddenly distracted when, at the periphery of his field of vision, he perceived a small object flying towards him at high speed. A bullet maybe?

No... it was a blinding grenade!

Everything after that happened too fast. A brutal festival of light came out of nowhere, blinding all of them. The man lost control of his movement. A bullet came flying toward his head, and once again a wall of ice came in its way. But this one hadn't been finished, and it could only deflect the deadly projectile away from his head, and the latter finished its course right in his arm.

The man gasped from the pain, as another imposant person holding a rifle arrived in the half-frozen garden. John's face lightened up: finally, Clark was here... they could work together to escape and, finally, they'd be able to start a new happy life...

However, John's smile instantly disappeared as another event entered his sight. Because of the sudden complication, the man seemed tohave lost the control of his strange power... and a long shard of ice had perced the kid's body. The latter was now laying in a bed of blue tulips and orange poppies, that were gradually soaked in the dark red colour of blood.

"NO!" John exclaimed as, forgetting the situation he was in, he ran toward the kid.

Meanwhile, seeing how the situation had developped, the man had decided to retreat. He took a picture of John with his digital watch before he started walking away toward a nearby floating ship that was still intact, groaning due to the pain in his arm. However, Clark didn't seem too excited about the idea to let him go, as he ran after him with his rifle to engage in a fight.

John wanted to tell him to stop and to just run away together, but he was like paralysed, he was unable to form complete sentences or to look away:

"Kid... why you..." he started. "Hold on a bit more, we'll get you some medical Fefnir tech and youll be back in great shape again. Just hold on a little..."

But the kid already couldn't hear him anymore. Trembling, he weakly extended his hand toward John, as if he could be saved if he managed to reach him:

"Sir... I thought... the hero never died..."

The light in his eyes diminished and, finally, he pronounced his last sentence:

"Does that mean we're not heroes?"

He closed his eyes, and his heart stopped beating. shaking, John touched his forehead. It was cold.

"No... No... Not that..." John said, before snapping back to reality and turning around. "CLARK! DON'T GO-"

He froze on stop. He fell on his knees. He looked again. He got up and ran to a newly formed cone of ice. His entire body shaking, he put his hand on the ice, but couldn't reach what was inside, or rather who. Clark, entrapped in the ice.

"No..."

He screamed:

"Clark! CLARK! CLaAAAAAaAAaaaaAAAAaAAaaaRK!"

The ice shattered, and Clark did the same, disappearing into brillant shards. John fell back on his knees. He didn't even think about chasing the mysterious man to take revenge. He just stood there crying.

.

.

.

Days after, as the battle had ended and the planet had been relocalized in a safer zone. John was taking care of Clark's funerals. But his mind wasn't at it, he was just acting in automatic, like a robot.