Endgame (Book 3)

Chapter 49: X

That's the funny thing about death: as one person dies, another is born.

The first image that flooded my mind as I entered the world wasn't a hospital room with doctors, my father and mother watching their newborn son in awe as he entered the world.

No, I got to see firsthand what being joined with a demon was really like.

I had Di-Men by the throat. In his pure form, separated from any and all versions of Jay, he was...well, pretty ugly. A much uglier version of himself when Zero attacked the hospital, I guess. Totally black. No green, no blue.

It was over, and I was forcibly joining him with me so he could never hurt anyone ever again. He was too powerful to destroy, but if I could keep him under wraps, I would be stuck with him for the rest of my life. If I couldn't...my life would be short-lived, anyway.

White energy melted off my skin, attached itself to the black of his, and enveloped his darkness in my light. Before he could break my grip, Di-Men was already inside of me. He had no hope of breaking free— he had the combined power of three Jays in one body working against him. My body was now his prison.

Once the process was complete, I let out a huge breath, my shoulders slumping.

"Who are you?" A girl's voice came at me from behind.

I turned around. She had blonde curls that reached just past her shoulders, and she was kind of pretty. But her face looked hostile, and she had a hand stretched out towards me.

Feelings washed through me, hot and ugly. Anger. Resentment.

And then...regret. Confusion.

"Who do you think I am?" I asked.

"Well, you look like Jay, but you don't feel like him. Your thought patterns are different."

She paused, then said, "You're a different person, aren't you?"

I nodded my head tersely. Could I trust her? I knew I had memories of her, but none of them were accessible right now. In fact, most of hers were locked up tight behind a mental wall I wasn't even going to attempt to get through right now. All three of the consciences had memories I could access at any time, but for some reason, both Jays didn't want me remembering anything about her. They couldn't exactly communicate with me—I was them, after all—but I could tell what they would want based on the emotions my body felt and how well my memory served me.

She lowered her hand to her side, but that didn't ease my concern. I got the feeling she didn't need it to use her powers.

"Well," I sighed, extending my arm for a handshake. "It's nice to meet you. I'm X."

"Cassie. But...X?" she asked warily, carefully taking my hand. "That sounds familiar. Isn't that your superhero name or something?"

"Maybe?" I said, shrugging as I withdrew my arm. "It kind of just popped up. I like it, though."

X. I really liked the way that sounded.

"Okay. So what now?" Cassie asked.

"Now," I said, drawing in my forearm so I could thrust it out. "We need to go to my house."

"What about Zero? Did you-" She slid her hand across her throat.

"It's Di-Men, and no, I can't. That's why we need to see if the Jays' mom and dad are okay. I should be able to kill him, but I can only do it if he's all together. Right now, I just have a small portion of him."

"So you mean to tell me that all that was just a little of him?" She was referencing the battle between Zero and the last Jay.

"Yeah," I said dejectedly. Sensing her rising worry, I added, "But don't think I can't handle Di-Men in full. I'm much more powerful than all the Jays combined, even if I don't have all of their powers."

"Uh-huh," she said disbelievingly.

"You'll see. Now let's go before it's too late."

I threw my hand back out dramatically, and a rift was torn open in time and space. A circular portal formed, glowing a nice, bright white. I could see a glimpse of the house on the other side.

"Now wouldn't be a good time to ask where Metagor is, would it?" I asked her.

"He's already at your house. Left a while ago, in fact. He said...he said something didn't seem right, and then he took off," Cassie said, something tinging her tone. "You don't think Zero hurt them, do you?"

Shame again. "I don't know," I replied. Then, I grabbed Cassie's wrist and pulled both of us through to the other side as quickly as I could. It required a TON of my power just to make a single portal. It wasn't an ability I would be able to use in a fight, just a little something I picked up from Zero's memories.

We stumbled onto the grass like we had just been standing on concrete. Other than that, it felt no different than taking a few steps forward. As it should have been.

My eyes widened. Everything had completely fallen apart.

The house stood in ruins. It was completely on fire, black fire, and an entire section of the roof was gone on the right side. The windows had imploded, and there was no sign of the front door.

I should've seen this coming. No, Jay should've seen this coming. He knew her being unconscious for so long seemed suspicious.

I still had to get through all the things that were going to happen because of the predictions of the last Jay's time in the pod. I thought my birth would be the last of them because it was his last vision, but apparently I was wrong. His house being destroyed occurred then, and my guess was that Di-Men had spread the rest of himself into either his dad or Sage. If my hunch was correct, both.

I waved my hand over the premise, and the fire was instantly extinguished. Di-Men's altered abilities were still variants of energy, and I could still manipulate it.

"Come on. We need to see if anyone is still in there." I waited for Cassie to nod, then ran through the front doorway to begin sorting the mess.

Cassie and I hurriedly made our way through the wreckage, her with telekinesis (huh) and me with lightning, lifting beams and pieces of furniture a person could hide under.

A crowd gathered to watch, but no one helped. The firefighters came too late to do anything, and they stood outside with everyone else. Even if they had tried to assist, I would've pushed them back anyway. They had no business here.

After half an hour of searching, Cassie had enough. She put the last bed back down with a thud, sweat pouring down her forehead and the sides of her face. She wiped it away with her forearm.

"Jay. I mean, X." Cassie corrected herself, seeing me grimace. Calling me Jay just made me confused. "No one is here. They must have taken your mother and Metagor with them, wherever they went."

I sighed. I had been multitasking, sifting through both of the Jays' memories while I worked, and I had an idea of where Sage and their father had gone. I just didn't know why they were there.

If they had taken my mother with them, it could only be as a hostage. They would kill her the moment they didn't need her anymore, which was problematic. Metagor, though, would serve no purpose without Di-Men splitting himself up more.

Unless...

I closed my eyes, looking deep into Zero's memories, pushing past all of his experiences in the few months he had lived, going back to his creation. What were Di-Men's motives? What was his goal? He said he wanted my body so he could see the future, an ability I still had, but beyond that, nothing. There had to be more.

Then, an image popped into my head.

"Oh, Cassie." My voice caught in my throat.

I really needed to pay more attention to the world.

"What? What is it?" She levitated herself to place herself in front of me, hesitating before placing her hands on my shoulders. "Hey," she said gently. "Look at me. Whatever it is, just tell me."

Tears welled in my eyes. "Di-Men is...he...he doesn't want me. That was never his plan."

"Then what is it?" My shock was working it's way into her, urgency making her grip tight.

"He..." I swallowed, forcing the words out. "He wants to take over the world. And he's using Mr. West to do it."