Derrek was floating in the emptiness. He couldn't tell if he was facing upward or downward, or even if up or down had any meaning. The pain he had felt before was far away now, the searing ripping of his shoulder nothing but a memory of a memory. His eyes were open, but he couldn't see a thing, his vision filled with a tangible darkness.

  “What will you do?”

  The question reverberated through the void and rang in Derreks’ ears, the voice alien and familiar all in one. He twisted, trying to find the source of the ethereal voice, but to no avail. “What do you mean?” He asked, not knowing if he was spinning or still. He realized he hadn't really spoken, his mouth refusing his commands, but it seemed the voice caught his meaning regardless.

  “Your world is ending.” The voice came from all directions at once, each word shaking in Derreks’ skull. “Your rightful victuals are at risk. What will you do to preserve that which gives us sustenance?”

  It was the question he had been asking himself for weeks, albeit framed in a unique light, the question he had been wishing for an answer to all the while. The voices’ word choice was odd. Victuals? Sustenance? Us?

  “Who are you?” he mutely asked the void. The void laughed.

  “I have always been with you, waiting for you to come into your own. Watching, waiting, wanting.” It didn't make any sense, but Derrek could feel the void smile. “You have come so far, grown so strong since your first meal.”

  Realization dawned on Derrek, and his far-away blood ran cold. He knew exactly who this was, or rather, what.

  “You're the Devourer,” he said into the nothingness. He felt the darkness closing in in response, the endless void growing cramped.

  “You are the Devourer. I am little more than a passenger.” The voice came right in his ear, neither low nor high, neither male nor female. “What will you do?” it asked again, pressing into Derreks’ shoulder with invisible fingers. Digging, ripping, tearing, the pain growing with every passing second, searing, burning pain that spread through his chest like the roots of a tree. He wanted to scream, but he couldn't even feel himself breathe. How could he scream without air?

  “I don't know!” He screamed in his mind, echoing into the blackness,“I don't know what to do!”

  Past the blinding pain and deafening emptiness, he felt the Devourer smile. “You will. There is a reason I chose you, young one.” It whispered in his ear, the faint sound still ringing over the ever-worsening pain. “Of all the creatures I’ve inhabited, you are by far the most promising. When you were born, I knew you would be the one. My final host. My own flesh incarnate. That is what none understand but you and I; to devour is not to consume, but to integrate. To assimilate. To adapt.” The voice crept closer with every word, speaking within Derreks’ ear now as the pain soared to new heights and cascaded to new depths. “Allow me to grace you with one of the sayings of your predecessors: ‘when the city is bound to burn, the wise man moves away.’”

  The sharp fingers began to spread out, slowly, slowly, agonizingly slowly, ripping his goddamn arm off. He wished he would pass out, but he wasn't really awake in the first place. He wished for death, but for all he knew, this was death, the eternal torment he knew he deserved.

  “Find a way,” the Devourer whispered in his skull, each word a nail in his brain, insignificant blips against the overwhelming pain in his shoulder. “Take what is yours.” The pain waned for a brief respite, then exploded into an impossible burning agony, somehow worse than the ripping. It was as if someone had taken a red-hot piece of metal and pressed it where his arm used to be, except it kept getting hotter. It burned worse with every second, Derreks’ mind on the verge of shattering from the excruciating pain. “Raise them up, empower the masses, show them the way. And then…” Deep within his mind, in the same place from which Derreks’ thoughts came, the Devourer grinned impossibly wide, the depths of his psyche filled with nothing but starving, gnashing teeth.

  “Devour. Them. All.”

  By the grace of whatever forces controlled him, Derrek finally began to fade away, those last three words repeating in his mind as his shoulder fell further and further away. The pain was so far away now, almost as far away as he was from his true body. His mind felt further away as well, thoughts taking longer and longer to form. He closed his eyes, making no difference in the empty blackness that engulfed him. He surrendered to the void, letting his mind go blank as he fell into oblivion, the final sliver of his mind finally coming to rest, those words echoing one last time as it all shut off.

  “Devour. Them. All.”

  Discord chewed his thumbnail as he watched Estamos apply his finishing touches to Derreks’ shoulder through the observation window of the surgical suite. The device was halfway between a screwdriver and a soldering iron, the red hot tip tracing a line where the synthetic skin met the natural, leaving a raw pink line in its wake. The real doctors had done a decent job, but they had given up hope of reattaching the arm, content with just sewing him up and being done with it. After they had treated the wound, but before they had closed it and discarded the limb, Discord had barged in with Estamos and the hospitals’ director in tow. She owed him six favors, and it took every one of them to get her to allow Estamos to operate on Derrek alone, in flagrant disregard of almost every hospital guideline and several laws. He had pulled off tougher sells, but even still, it was hard to explain why Estamos needed a mechanic-sized toolbox when he was keeping the director off of the up-and-up.

  His teeth clicked together and his mouth filled with salty blood, along with something else. He looked at his thumb and found nothing but a bloody stump. He sighed and spit out the top digit of his thumb into the opposite hand. He put it back in place and held it for a few seconds, allowing his digit to pull itself back together for the eighth time in the last hour. It was a nasty habit, biting off his fingers, only ever flaring up when he was anxious. Not counting all the times he did it for fun, of course, that was different. It was infuriating, being reduced to a bystander as that slippery little fuckstick pulled Derrek apart and put him back together, doing who knows what with those tiny wires he connected to the nevers, with those thick metal rods he rammed into place, with all those injections he kept applying to the limb throughout the operation.

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  Estamos set down the flesh-welding device and stepped back, pulling down his surgical mask and nodding with pursed lips as he assessed his work, apparently satisfied. As far as looks went, Discord was satisfied as well; the damage had been fully reconstructed, the arm firmly and cleanly attached, aside from those raw pink borders at the shoulder, elbow, and wrist. Functionality was another matter, but that wouldn't be settled until Derrek woke up. Estamos looked up at Discord through the window and gave him a thumbs-up, grinning like an idiot. Discord flipped him off.

  He heard the door open, and a moment later Shale was standing next to him, his head bandaged and his arm in a sling. “How is he?” He asked, an unfamiliar worry laced into his words, a far cry from his well-earned easy confidence. Discord sighed.

  “He’s alive and in one piece, which all things considered is pretty damn good. Stable, but we won't really know how he is until he wakes up and tells us.” He clenched his fists, knuckles clicking as his nails dug into his palms. “I found the snipers’ nest, clean as a whistle. Not a fucking thing to tell us who did this or why..” The only way he knew he had the right spot was the faint smell of gunpowder. No casings, no trace of any aura, not even any footprints. Even if there was a lead, the who wouldn't matter nearly as much as the why, which was still a mystery. Well, not quite a mystery, there were just so many reasons to pick from. The children of Ragnarok could’ve picked up his trail, or the poachers, or Desk guy making a circuitous move, or any of a thousand potential enemies. There was nothing to go on, so everything was still on the table. It pissed Discord off beyond belief.

  “This is all my fault.” Shale had his good hand pressed against the glass, his head bowed and eyes closed, his face a mask of agony. “I put him on this path, pushed him right into the crosshairs.” His fist slammed against the glass, Estamos jumping at the sound. “What was I thinking? He’s all I have, how could I be such a fool?”

  Discord put his hand on Shales’ shoulder, causing the older man to look up at him. “Don't be an idiot, if it's anyones’ fault, it's mine. All you did was give him the job he was born for so you could take the job you were born for, I'm the one who puts his life in mortal danger on the reg.” His grip tightened. “And not to pull rank, but I'm the one who didn't get there in time to catch the bullet. He went back into the line of fire because you raised Derrek to be a man who wouldn't sit back and let someone he just met die. I refuse to let you take blame for that.” He sighed and released the shoulder, wanting to change the subject. “How is that guy, anyway? Did he make it?”

  Shale stared at him for a moment, his eyes unreadable, his mouth slightly open. He shook himself, pain creeping back into his expression. “Deejay, that's his name. The doctors are hopeful, but they're still operating. He took the full brunt of the blast.” He looked back at Derrek, silent for a moment. “He’s the reason Derrek barely got hurt beyond… his shoulder.”

  Discord patted Shale on the back, pointing at Estamos. “I hate to admit it, but that guy right there can do the impossible. If Deejay pulls through, I guarantee you Havok’ll have him put him back together. And if he doesn't, I’ll do it myself.”

  Before he could parse whether his words were a comfort or wasted breath, the door clicked again, and sharp footsteps resounded as the newcomer fell in line next to Discord. “He’s alive, then.” The man in the suit was completely unmoved by the patient covered in tubes and wires before him, eyes almost as dead as Discords’ own. He reeked of mid-priced cologne, his black hair as disgustingly sharp and presentable as the rest of him. There could be no other.

  “No duh, Dick.” Discord sneered.

  The man only smirked, still looking at Derrek. “It's Rick, or ‘agent Sanders,’ if you're feeling froggy.” Agent Richard Sanders: he was just as insufferable as the last time they met, but at least he hadn't brought that asshat Garnder with him. He’d almost killed that prick on the spot when they were interrogating him over that masked tyrant who took over New York for a year and a half, of which he had a middling part in at worst, not to mention the attitude he gave Discord over that business at the Schadenfreude.

  “Whatever you say, Dick.” Discord produced a flask and took a slug, the tequila-antifreeze cocktail he only sipped when he was depressed. “Got any leads?” He asked, already knowing the answer.

  “Nada.” Sanders threw up his hands and shook his head, still smirking. “For now, that is. The bureau has their best people on it.” The slimy bastard winked. “Including yours truly.” Discord scoffed as the suit leaned to address Shale. “It goes without saying both you and Snowe are officially under protective custody. As of this moment, this hospital is Fort Knox; no one gets in or out without proper clearance, and once you and Snowe are discharged, we’ll have protection on you both around the clock. Safehouses, cloak-and-dagger transportation, the works. You're in safe hands.”

  Discord resisted the urge to scoff again. Half of the shit he had to do he had to do because stiffs like Sanders were so confident in their own abilities, blind to their shortcomings. Discord was painfully aware of his failings, and was reminded of them almost daily, whether he ignored them or not. He tried not to bother having disdain for humans, they rarely lived long enough to deserve it, but he set that rule aside when it came to feds. He tucked the flask back into his coat and turned on his heel, making for the door.

  “Sounds like you've got it covered then, Dick. I'm gonna head out.”

  “Discord.” He stopped with his hand inches from the handle. That was Shales’ voice. He turned to see the man he had known for years returned in full force, his eyes as full of determination as ever. “This isn't your fault either. I fear we may have to come to terms with the idea that neither of us could have done a thing to prevent this, but that doesn't make us culpable. I know you, Discord. And you know me. This was outside of either of our loci of control. Derrek will pull through, and I know you'll do everything in your power to make sure it never happens again.” The older man, whose face seemed like it would never entertain humor again, smiled warmly. “And you know I’ll do the same.”

  Discord was no stranger to heartfelt entreaties, but from Shale it hit the mark square in his dead heart. His hand lingered, hovering an inch or two from the handle. Out of everyone he had ever known over the millennia, only a handful had the character Shale possessed, and not a single one of them possessed his heart, save for the man himself. He was truly one-of-a-kind, even more so than Derrek, who was blessed enough by fate to be put under the care of someone as caring and genuine as Shale. A lot had clicked together when Discord realized Derreks’ relation to the man, and just like his adoptive son, Shale continued to surprise him.

  He gripped the door handle, smirking at the older man with a confidence he did not feel. “You've got more faith in me than most. I’ll be keeping an eye out on top of Dick and his cronies, so just let me know if you need anything Clancy and his kind can't provide.” He winked, giving a glimpse of the man he pretended to be, the confident, happy-go-lucky, over-powered moron he was written to be. Before Shale could say anything else, Discord passed through the door and was gone, off to beat the ever-loving shit out of anyone who might know anything about this mess.