(TAYLOR HEBERT) CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

The watch gave its warning tone, the green light turning red and beginning to blink, and before Taylor could dive back beneath the surface, the transformation ended. Her Pyronite body shrank back into her own human form.

For a moment, she remained standing next to the water, staring down into the dark where another building waited somewhere below, and then the exhaustion finally caught up with her legs.

She sank to her knees.

A part of her was relieved, though the thought made her feel sick. She had spent so long searching, carrying people to the surface, returning for those she had missed, and forcing herself to keep going whenever she found another building beneath the waves. The watch had made the decision for her before she could make another attempt, and while Taylor knew there were still people down there, she also knew that she could no longer keep doing this.

Her face remained as blank as she could make it, even as everything inside her seemed to be tearing itself apart.

It wasn’t fair.

She had only wanted to kill Leviathan. She had wanted to prevent the suffering that came with another Endbringer attack, and after everything that had happened with the Simurgh, she had honestly believed that she might be able to do it. She had prepared, gathered people around her, and gone into the fight knowing that things could and would go wrong. But she had been reasonably optimistic about her chances.

So why had this happened?

Why had the fight she had thought would save people turned into this?

Taylor stared at the water next to the still-floating building, watching scraps of debris drift past while the questions continued to circle through her head without finding anything resembling an answer.

Then someone landed in front of her.

The warm golden light of the afternoon sun caught against metallic blue armour, and for a moment Taylor was reminded of the first time she had seen Armsmaster. She remembered how intimidating he had seemed then, how little she had understood about the PRT or the world she had suddenly found herself involved in, and how he had nevertheless helped her through it instead of treating her like a problem that needed to be contained.

He had been there when the Simurgh came, during her training, and when the watch had been tested. He had been there when she struggled to understand what she could do, and when she needed someone willing to tell her where she was going wrong. Looking at him now, Taylor finally understood why she had always admired him, even if she had never really put it into words.

This was what a hero was supposed to be.

Someone who kept showing up when things became difficult, even when there was no guarantee that doing so would end well.

She wasn’t that. She was an opportunistic child who had gotten lucky with a strange alien device and decided that being powerful meant she could fix things she barely understood. She had threatened Lung, she had promised to stop the ABB, and then she had walked straight into a fight with an Endbringer because she thought she could make a difference.

Now countless people were dead.

Tears began to gather before she could stop them, and Taylor lowered her head, trying desperately to keep them from falling.

A hand settled gently on top of her head.

Taylor looked up.

Armsmaster’s arm remained extended, his gauntleted hand resting against her hair with an awkward gentleness that finally broke through the last of her restraint.

“I’m sorry.”

The words escaped before he could say anything, and once they had started, she couldn’t seem to stop them.

“I’m really, really sorry. I should have—I shouldn’t have—”

She stumbled over the words almost immediately, trying to explain things that refused to fit into words. She apologised for the people who had died, for fighting Leviathan, for believing she could win, and for every decision that had seemed reasonable when she made it and looked monstrous now that she knew where they had led.

Her voice broke, and the tears finally came.

She didn’t care who saw her or what she looked like, and whether the other heroes were watching or anyone would remember this moment later no longer mattered. She simply cried, her shoulders shaking and her face twisted as she finally stopped trying to hold herself together.

She wasn’t even sure what she was apologising for anymore.

Was it the decision to fight Leviathan? The people who had died because she had chosen to be there? The promise she had made to stop the ABB when she still had no idea how to replace what Lung provided for the people under his control? Maybe she was sorry for getting the watch at all, or maybe she was simply sorry that she had ever thought she could become the sort of hero who could solve problems like these.

The reasons blurred together until she could no longer separate one from another.

She was sorry.

That was all she knew.

“Taylor.”

Armsmaster’s voice instantly cut through the mess in her head, and she lifted her eyes towards him.

He seemed to be searching for something to say, which was strange enough coming from him that Taylor found herself wanting to laugh despite herself. He remained there for another moment, studying her through the visor of his helmet before finally letting out a breath.

“Next time, we will prepare extensively for every possible contingency.”

Taylor stared at him for a moment as she tried to take in what he had said.

He hadn’t told her that everything would be fine, and he hadn’t tried to convince her that the deaths around them somehow weren’t her responsibility. He hadn’t even told her that she shouldn’t feel guilty, which was probably the one thing she would have been least willing to hear.

He had simply said next time. As though there would be one, and as though he still expected her to be there when it came.

After everything that had happened, he still believed she was worth preparing for another fight.

The tears slowed, and Taylor wiped at her face with the heel of her hand while she tried to calm her breathing. It was such an Armsmaster answer that she wanted to smile, although the expression never quite managed to reach her face.

She nodded.

“Okay.”

Armsmaster gave a small nod in return, and Taylor pushed herself upright. Her legs still felt weak beneath her, so she waited until they felt strong enough to support her before looking around at the wreckage once more.

Rescue teams had arrived and were helping pull people from the water, while other heroes recovered the dead. Somewhere beyond the ruined streets, an entire city would eventually have to make sense of what had happened to it.

Taylor could deal with all of that later.

For the moment, she simply stood in front of Armsmaster and tried to pull herself together.

Then she noticed that he had stopped moving.

It was subtle at first, although Taylor had spent enough time around him to recognise when something had caught his attention. His posture had gone rigid, and the slight movement of his head as he listened to the communications coming through his helmet had ceased altogether.

“Armsmaster?”

He didn’t answer.

Taylor watched him for another second before his head snapped towards something behind her.

She turned.

A blue-white distortion was opening in the water.

For a fraction of a second, Taylor simply stared at it, trying to understand what she was looking at. Then something pale and feathered reached through the distortion.

It passed through Armsmaster’s chest before Taylor could even react. His armour buckled around the intrusion as plates tore apart and blood spread into the water, but the arm kept moving, reaching past him with its hand already closing around Taylor.

She tried to activate the watch, but her fingers had barely reached her wrist before the hand caught her and dragged her backwards. Armsmaster’s body was torn apart by the motion, his armour splitting as the Simurgh pulled her through the distortion.

The last thing Taylor saw was his metallic blue armour tumbling into the water beneath the golden light of the sun. Then the portal closed around her, and her scream followed her through it and out the other side.