The humid air within the eighteen thousand kilometer sanctuary felt heavy with the scent of fresh wood and the faint metallic tang of the cooling towers. Lifeless moved with a silent grace as he carried the limp body of Jarvis toward the central bed of moss and silk. The boy remained unconscious, his breathing shallow and his skin pale from the grueling labor and the constant battles against the island's terrors. Lifeless placed him down with a tenderness that contradicted his own scarred and brutal history. He looked at his friend and felt a surge of responsibility that he had seldom known. He knew that Jarvis needed more than rest to recover his strength. He needed the raw essence of the island's life force.
Lifeless turned away and stepped out into the emerald shadows of the jungle. The night was alive with the sounds of predators, but he moved like a ghost through the ferns. He searched for the nesting grounds of the advanced pit vipers that haunted the lower canopies. He found a massive hollowed log where a clutch of iridescent green snakes guarded their eggs.
With a swift movement, he killed the snakes, his hands snapping their necks before they could even coil. He took their eggs, the shells glowing with a faint phosphorescence, and returned to the manor. He cracked the shells and carefully fed the golden yolk to the boy while he was unconscious, letting the nutrient dense liquid slide down his throat. The yolk carried the vitality of the current, a spark of energy that would mend the boy's fractured strength from the inside out.
The morning light began to bleed through the wooden slats of the house, but Lifeless knew he couldn't stop. He needed to eliminate the threats that lingered too close to their home. He reached into the storage crate and grabbed the shards of obsidian that Jarvis had used to make the saw. He wrapped the same obsidian the boy had used on his own fists, securing the black glass with tight strips of leather and cotton. The jagged edges of the volcanic stone protruded from his knuckles like dark claws. He went to hunt the advanced furged sun bears that had been circling the perimeter of their clearing.
The hunt was a methodical slaughter. Lifeless moved through the trees, his senses heightened by the silence of the forest. He took them one by one. The bears were massive, their copper fur shimmering with heat, but they were no match for the focused aggression of a man who felt he had everything to lose. He used his obsidian fists to shatter their skulls and rip through their armored hides. He took out six bears in a row, the forest floor turning into a graveyard of golden fur and crimson blood. However, as he engaged the seventh bear near the entrance of the manor, the beast managed a desperate swipe. Its claw whistled through the air and caught the edge of the porch where Jarvis lay near the open door. The tip of the claw scratched the cheek of the boy, leaving a thin line of red on his pale skin.
The sight of the blood on the face of Jarvis triggered something primal in Lifeless. He grabbed the bear by its throat and drove his obsidian fist into its chest, puncturing the heart and lungs in a single, explosive strike. He killed it instantly, the massive body falling with a thud that shook the wooden floors. He checked on Jarvis, seeing that the scratch was shallow, but the event left him with a lingering sense of dread. The island was becoming more aggressive.
The environment he had built was a beacon for the darkness.
He decided to clear the surrounding waters to provide a buffer for their sanctuary. He headed for the ocean, diving into the deep blue with his sword gripped tight. He hunted the whales and the sharks that patrolled the reefs, his movements in the water reaching a level of speed that made him a blur of silver and red. But this time, things weren't the same. The water felt heavier. The current was cold and carried a vibration that made his teeth ache. As he killed whales and sharks, the ocean suddenly fell silent. The schools of fish vanished into the depths.
Lifeless surfaced and looked out toward the horizon. He sensed a huge wave coming, a displacement of water so massive that it felt as if the ocean itself was rising to meet the sky.
"Oh shit, shit, shit, shit," Lifeless panicked, his voice a frantic rasp against the wind.
He dived back into the water and used a white current to swim faster, trying to reach the safety of the shore, but he was too slow for the nightmare that emerged from the deep. A shape loomed beneath the surface, a shadow that stretched for hundreds of feet. The water erupted as a Megalodon breached the surface. It jumped at him, its jaws wide enough to swallow a cathedral, ready for a small snack. Although it wasn't a normal megalodon, as a normal bomb would defeat a standard creature of that species, this was something far more terrifying. It was a Divine Megalodon.
The creature was a biological impossibility. Its scales were not skin but a series of overlapping, celestial plates that shimmered with a cold, blue light. It possessed over one hundred and thirty IQ, a mind as sharp and malicious as any human tyrant.
It had the ability to traverse both water and land, its fins acting as powerful limbs that could propel its massive weight across the forest floor. It was indestructible against anything Lifeless possessed. It was more like an undefeatable kaiju than a mere animal.
Lifeless shed a single, hot tear as he watched the beast crash back into the waves.
"I am too weak for this," he whispered, the realization crushing his spirit.
He made a hard decision. He knew the manor was no longer a sanctuary. It was a target. He ran to the island interior, his heart hammering against his ribs. He grabbed food and water as fast as he could, stuffing them into his leather satchel. He sprinted back to the manor and grabbed Jarvis, slinging the unconscious boy over his shoulder. The ground behind him began to shake as the Divine Megalodon dragged its gargantuan body onto the beach, the trees snapping like matchsticks beneath its weight.
He took the raft they had made, a sturdy construction of ironwood and vine. Lifeless ran toward the edge of a high cliff overlooking the sea. He planted his feet and jumped a huge distance, the momentum of his sixty four kilograms of mass combined with the weight of the raft and Jarvis sending them soaring through the air. He threw the raft toward the landing point in the water far below and landed squarely on it, the impact sending a shockwave through the timber. He did not look back. He began to paddle with a frantic, rhythmic intensity.
He paddled for seventeen days. The ocean was a vast and lonely desert of blue. The food ran out on the thirteenth day, leaving his stomach a hollow pit of fire. He was starving, his muscles beginning to waste away as his body consumed itself to maintain the current. On the seventeenth day, his vision began to blur. He saw a beautiful looking, strange land on the horizon. It lacked the jagged peaks of his island. It was flat and covered in structures of glass and steel. There were people there.
He pushed the raft toward the land with the last of his strength. When the water grew shallow enough, he dived in and began to swim. He moved faster than a shortfin shark, a waterborn creature that can travel over ninety seven kilometers per hour. He reached the shore in less than six seconds, his body cutting through the waves like a torpedo.
People were standing on the beach, their clothes colorful and strange. They were shocked by his speed, their faces pale with a mixture of awe and terror. As he got on the land, he saw that the people were holding small, glowing rectangles. They were phones, and they recorded him as he dragged the raft onto the sand.
"How the hell did you do that, man?" a random stranger said, stepping forward with his device raised high.
"No time to explain. I have an emergency on this guy," Lifeless responded, his voice cracking from dehydration. He pointed to Jarvis, who was finally beginning to stir.
The crowd erupted into a flurry of activity. People ran and carried Jarvis to the nearest hospital, their voices a chaotic wall of sound. Lifeless followed them, his eyes wide as he took in the sights of the modern world. He had never been in a hospital.
When he got injured in his past, no one cared. He had to endure the pain in silence, which is why he was so resistant to pain now. The clean, white halls and the smell of antiseptic felt like a dream.
He was stopped in the lobby by a group of men in camouflage uniforms. A military soldier stepped forward, his hand resting on the holster at his hip.
"Tell me now, who are you? No human would ever be able to do that," the soldier asked, his eyes scanning the scars on the arms of Lifeless.
Lifeless looked at the man and felt a sudden, desperate urge to belong. He knew that if he told the truth about the current and the island, they would see him as a monster or a weapon.
He wanted to be loved for once. He wanted to be seen as something special, something they could understand.
"Don't you know about the current?" Lifeless asked, testing the waters.
"The current what? An event?" the military soldier responded, his brow furrowed in confusion.
Lifeless stared at him for a long moment and then fabricated a story that would change his life forever.
"I am an alien, bred to be like an earth born. I have the power to generate electricity," Lifeless said, his voice steady despite the lie.
People in the lobby gasped, and the soldiers stepped back in shock.
The news spread through the city like wildfire. Within hours, the story of the alien boy who saved his friend was on every screen in the country. He was popular due to his fake words, the public embracing him as a hero from the stars. He sat in the hospital waiting room, watching the images of himself on the television, and felt a strange, hollow satisfaction. He was finally loved, even if it was for a person who never truly existed.
The Divine Megalodon was a world away, but the chaos was still there, hidden behind the smiles of the strangers who now called him a god. Lifeless closed his eyes and waited for the next chapter of his life to begin, knowing that the current would eventually demand a price for his deception.