In the trash planet formed by a coincidence, there were a particular set of skills that every one of inhabitants needed to know if they were to survive the harsh environment.
One of them was how to run.
It was one thing to die from the air chock full of toxins, carcinogens and pollutants.
It was another thing to die from something you could run from, especially when that thing you're running from is a lot slower than you were.
And as a child born on this planet, if there was anything in the universe that he was able to claim a modicum of skill in, it would be his ability to run.
It was just that instead of a hive of an incredibly pissed off steel ants, Ester was now running from a wildly twitching Corrupted dead set on murdering anything that so much as moved.
He was the thing that moved in this case, and he wasn't that happy about it with the sound of cracking glass constantly on his tail as he shoved the rusty case into his coat.
"Eva! Corrupted! Got the Key! Prepare! Run!"
Hurriedly barking those words into the communicator located on his shoulder blade, Ester grunted as a sizeable chunk of plastic struck him in the chest.
'Ouch, that's going to leave a bruise.'
Hurriedly stumbling forwards as the wind whipped at his shins, large chunks of concrete rock began to crumble from the load bearing pillars behind him, hurtling at break neck speeds towards the Corrupted, the sound of it all being drowned out by the sound of shattered glass.
'!'
Already regretting how he didn't bring the Hoverboard with him he hurriedly swung his limbs, fumbling with the gauge on his torso as it began to ramp the Respirator up from its previous sneaky silent mode to its current Oh Shit time to run mode.
Trying and failing to drown out the noise created by the Corrupted, Ester corrected his previous statement of the Noisemaker being able to raise even the dead, clearly he never had his ears tortured enough.
Grunting with pain as the sound of nails on a chalkboard clawed at his eardrums, Ester stumbled behind several relatively intact walls, gaining only a brief respite from the gale force winds before the walls fell apart behind him.
Repeating these motions several if not dozens of times as he desperately tried to escape the sucking force of the Corrupted's mouth, he grunted as he stumbled.
'Architects Above!' Cursing underneath his breath as he hurriedly pulled himself up, Ester ducked behind a load bearing pillar, feeling the weakness from his arms and legs.
How long had he been running from the Corrupted now?
A minute? Five minutes? Ten?
'I don't fucking no but I can't just keep on running.'
Grimacing as lactic acid burned in all of his muscles, Ester blinked in confusion as the wind slowly weakened around him.
'What the...'
Risking a glance backwards, he spotted the empty faced woman slowly walking towards him with what he imagined was an ugly smirk.
'Ah.'
Ester belatedly realized something.
'It's fucking playing with me.'
Now that he had the peace of mind to recall it properly, while a Second Mind would still try to kill every living being in their sights for reasons that only they knew, they also had the nasty habit of playing with their food.
Something to do with inflicting the same pain they felt when they transformed from a normal biped to a twisted and corrupted one that didn't necessarily need to be bipedal.
Feeling a sense of anger from being played with, that same sense of anger was replaced with hopelessness.
'Damnit, but I can't do anything but let it play with me. There's nothing I can do against it.'
If the fact that the entirety of C-Point was emptied and destroyed by this lone Corrupted wasn't enough proof of how strong one could become when they let their inner Aether stagnate into Corruption then the fact that it was able to break apart the load bearing pillars supporting the cave was proof enough that it would be futile to fight against it.
'Wait. The load bearing pillars?'
Hurriedly looking up at the Load Bearing Pillar he had rested his back against, the dim lights of protective and enhancement wards flickered weakly against the tall pillars, large gouges of concrete and metal torn from it, tearing holes in the Ward schemes.
Plastic dust fell from above.
Risking a glance backwards at the Corrupted's mouth face stretching unnaturally wide to form a grin, a rather insane thought welled up in his head as the wind slowly picked up as it neared.
'What if I...' Ester's mind raced with ideas as it filled out the steps needed to fulfil the goal of his insane plan.
The crazy thing?
He thought it was achievable.
Feeling the wind intensify as the surroundings were sucked into the Corrupted's mouth, Ester felt a crazed grin crawl up on the side of his face where a frown was previously.
'Oh this is driving me nuts.'
Letting out a foolish laugh, Ester felt the pillar behind his back crack loudly as the Ward scheme finally collapsed thanks to the Corrupted, its concrete made shell collapsing faster than ever.
He ran.
Letting out what he sword could be laughter in the form of crackling glass, Ester swung his limbs as the wind whipped at his limbs, dust flying all around him as he ducked behind the rubble.
But unlike before where he was just ducking behind the rubble to extend his life in any way that he could, now he was ducking behind the rubble to do what only the properly insane would do.
He was going to collapse the entire place.
Consulting the mental map in his head, Ester ran.
And ran.
And ran.
And ran.
He continued to run even as his limbs became as heavy as lead and his breaths came out sparse and brief.
"Huff huff huff."
Sweat poured down his back like a heavy rain, drenching his shirt and soaking it through with sweat as he continued to run beyond normal limits, his breaths running harsh against his chest as the Respirator operated weakly.
He stumbled against the ground as he reached his last stop.
As for why it was his last stop and not the Corrupted's?
Well it would be because he had realized halfway that if he caused the entire cave to collapse in on itself, he wouldn't be able to escape in time.
Not after he already burned through all of his stamina and was forcefully sustaining himself through drugs.
'But. I don't see things. Halfway.'
Thoughts coming out haltingly, Ester's hands fumbled at his belt, grasping the last of the syringes as he stabbed it into his thigh riddled with needle holes.
Shaky fingers pressing down on the plunger, a cool sensation instantly spread from across his limbs, his breaths coming out easier as he looked up at the two load bearing pillars above him.
'Well this is... I forgot the word.'
Staring at where he first started running from the Corrupted, it seemed that it was also going to be the place where he last ran from the Corrupted.
Ester's eyes shook as they struggled to take in his surroundings, the number of drugs flowing through his system struggling to keep him up for just a bit longer.
"Huff Huff Huff." The Respirator let out a cry of dismay and it finally gave out, the pumps within popping from the strain as the sound of it all was drowned out by the crackling glass behind him.
"Huff" Ester let out a small laugh. "This- Huff- Respirator is definitely- Huff- Slagged."
Falling onto the ground, he rolled his head round at the Corrupted still walking with a leisurely gait, completely unaware of what would happen if it got just a bit closer to the load bearing pillars, the Second Mind more focused on sadistically watching Ester struggle with his final breaths then looking for anything that could potentially harm it.
And why would it? By the looks of his surroundings, nothing was able to threaten the Corrupted with even the remotest signs of danger.
Letting out a chuckle as the drugs in his system struggled to fight off the tiredness as easily as it did the pain, he felt the ground shake from underneath him.
'Ah, its starting.'
Looking upwards as the amount of dust falling from above increased to the point that the air currents flowing into the Corrupted's swirling black mouth was visible, he glanced at the two load bearing pillars flickering with immense stress.
*CRACK
Then the wards broke apart.
Piercing even the sound generated by the Corrupted, she paused in shock as its face darted upwards, trailing along the long black lines that had suddenly appeared on the two load bearing pillars.
It only made things worse as the sucking force was unilaterally applied to the pillar.
Guess what would happen when something already underneath a significant amount of stress received more pressure from an outside source?
Well it didn't take much to tip the boat, Ester could tell you that much.
Large chunks of rock the size of his body fell from the ceiling, crashing down around him and the Corrupted, scattering concrete dust and plastic everywhere.
The Corrupted stared upwards with the barest remnants of a face before it instantly snapped its head towards Ester, its unseen eyes seemingly boring onto his own as he met it with a defiant gaze.
*...Ker Crac KRek CRACK
Letting out several sounds of cracked glass in a way that somehow carried out the tone of anger, the Corrupted still a couple hundred meters away from him instantly broke into a run, its twitching body carrying it forwards with supernatural grace.
The ground underneath him shuddered as the Corrupted slammed against the ground, the ceiling breaking apart more and more as it let out a roar.
The sounds of shattered glass screeched into the air as larger and larger chunks of metal began to fall from above, the broken cars and skeletal starships finally breaking free from their plastic coffins as they plummeted to the ground.
The ground underneath him shuddered.
The Corrupted now Two hundred meters away as its limbs slammed against the ground with deadly grace.
The space below him shuddered.
One hundred fifty meters left as the Corrupted let out a rage filled crackle of glass.
The underground shook.
A hundred meters left as the pillars leaned towards the Corrupted.
The ground shook.
Seventy meters and closing as the Corrupted dragged Ester towards it with its mouth.
The ground split open besides the Corrupted.
Caught off guard, the Corrupted was unable to react to the sudden turn of events as a ground Torpedo began to drill into the Corrupted's body, knocking it away and forcing it to deal with the weapon first.
"What the?" Letting out a gasp of confusion, the shaking ground he once dismissed as just the aftereffects of the collapsing cave split apart to reveal a familiar metal beast.
[G-Get the F-FUCK in!]
Slamming open the doors on the side to reveal the familiar interior, Ester blinked in surprise as his body moved faster than his mind did.
Leaping into the air lock and turning to shut the door, as he was doing so, he was able to catch sight of the Corrupted removing the Ground Torpedo with nary a scratch on its pristine white body.
Turning its empty gaze towards Ester, he shuddered and pulled the door shut, the Driller roaring with life as it instantly descended back into the earth, escaping both the Corrupted and the collapsing cave.
Ester collapsed onto the ground.
Closing his eyes as he let out a sigh of relief within the air lock, he felt the vibrations sooth his body as the Driller hurriedly bored through the ground at its highest settings.
'Architects I'm sleepy.'
Maybe it was the aftereffects of pushing himself beyond what he normally could with the help of several drugs or maybe it was because the danger that was chasing him for so long had just now disappeared, but Ester couldn't help but feel like he could sleep for an entire week.
Eyes feeling as if they were weighed down by heavy mountains, the Destruction of C-Point left behind reverberations in the ground that struck the Driller.
Paradoxically, instead of making it harder to rest, The Destruction of C-Point made it all the easier to find sleep.
After all, the Corrupted was now dead.
+++
Tree that wonders if he's setting the pace a bit too fast.
[Rewrite]