The Heap part 3 (finale)

Jennifer Sawyer sat at her desk, filling out some paperwork, her back to the large window behind her. The sun was rising, sending an orange glow into the office. It was peaceful. Calming. Sawyer typed away at her laptop and over her shoulder, a figure leaped into the air, creating a dark silhouette against the early morning sky. Sawyer continued to work, her back turned. The figure raised its arms and legs as it descended and a second later, it slammed through the glass.

Just before Astra Machina crashed through the window, Jennifer darted sideways, the glass exploding in shards around her. Astra landed on the desk with a thunderous crash, splintering wood and smashing the laptop. The marble floor caved slightly under the impact, sending cracks radiating across the room. Sawyer brushed dust off her shoulder and straightened her black blazer, “One of these days, I hope to be reimbursed for the damage you’ve done to my property.”

“You killed him, Sawyer!” Astra shouted, pointing out the shattered window. “That’s Tetsuo Miki down there!”

Sawyer briefly glanced out. The charred, twisted remains of a giant humanoid heap lay below, surrounded by military barricades. “Yes, I suspected it was him,” she said coldly.

“It wasn’t enough that you turned him into that thing, you had to kill him too?” Astra barked.

“Of course I had to kill him. He’d have killed me otherwise,” Jennifer circled the room, her heels clicking on the cracked marble.

“Why can’t you just leave people alone?”

“If I never infected Tetsuo with that nano-virus, he’d have spent his life as some minimum-wage earner, ignored by society.” Sawyer folded her arms behind her, “My actions ensured he’d become a unique life form, unlike anything else on the planet. In my opinion, dying as something special is better than living as a nobody.”

Astra lunged, her fist smashing into Sawyer’s face with thousands of pounds of force. Sawyer crashed into the wall, cracking plaster, before hitting the floor with a grunt. Blood trickled down her nose, and her hair fell out of her bun and into her eyes. She bounced to her feet, limbs morphing into weapons: a long spike and a massive axe. The spike stretched across the room, narrowly missing Astra, who ducked and rolled to the side. The axe swung low. Astra flipped, shoulder-mounted lasers emerging while in mid-air. Twin blasts tore through Sawyer’s torso, sending her sprawling across the marble once again.

Astra landed gracefully and rushed in with elongated limbs. Sawyer’s shapeshifting powers caused her flesh to ripple; she healed in seconds, springing forward with two sets of metallic claws. She slashed across Astra’s right shoulder, shattering her laser. The force of the attack made her spiral into the air 180 degrees before she slammed into the floor. She recovered instantly and when she rose, Sawyer stretched a second claw out, crushing her left laser. Astra grabbed Sawyer’s outstretched arm and flung her into a nearby wall, scattering concrete and plaster.

“You’re angrier than usual,” Sawyer muttered a she picked herself off the floor.

“You killed an innocent person! You’re evil!”

“Evil,” she scoffed, “A purely subjective term. You’ve been spending too much time with my former employees.”

“What drives you to do this? What have you gained today?”

Sawyer used her powers to tie her hair back without using her hands, “I’m sure by now you’re familiar with the satellite weapon I proposed to the military.”

“… Yes?”

“The Pentagon wasn’t entirely sold, but when I demonstrated it on an immediate threat in LA, they signed off. Tetsuo Miki’s thirst for revenge made a very lucrative business deal possible.”

Astra roared and tackled Sawyer, sending both crashing through a shelf and through the wall where they hit Sawyer’s personal washroom. Sawyer ripped the sink from the wall with a snarl and the backswing sent Astra back into her office. Water erupted from a broken pipe and spread along the floor as Sawyer exited. At first, there was no sign of Astra. Curiously, Sawyer looked up to the high ceiling just as a metal foot dropped down, embedding her into the floor.

Outside, military personnel and emergency services set up barricades around the large chunks of scrap. Unseen by them, something broke off from inside the human-shaped heap. The figure dropped down onto the pavement, hidden by the huge shadow cast by the colossus. Tetsuo quickly sprinted down an alley before he was caught. Once he was away from the authorities, he made a break for Jennifer Sawyer’s building. It was only half a block away, and it was an easy run for someone as powerful as him. Moments later, he smashed through the glass of the front door. The security guard behind the front desk rose to his feet, but a lobby chair was hurled into him. Next, Tetsuo took the stairs, running up multiple stories. When he reached the top floor, Sawyer’s bodyguard Hank was in the path to the penthouse office. Hank reached into his suit for his gun once he saw Tetsuo, but he was quickly backhanded into the closest wall and rendered unconscious.

Back inside, Astra’s forearm extended into a large, spiked fist. Sawyer ducked under the punch and clamped down on the limb, then swung her axe-arm. Sparks and scraps of metal were flung into the air. Astra spun, kicking Sawyer into the air. Her left foot sprouted spikes which she used to slam into the wall for leverage, propelling herself into a spinning kick that flattened Astra against the wall. Then they were both given pause as they heard commotion outside.

The office door flew off its hinges as Tetsuo appeared. He was back to his normal size and his features were more visible, but his skin was still discolored: silver and brown, with small bits of debris covering it. “Sawyer!” he bellowed. “That was you, wasn’t it? You tried to kill me!” He surged forward, knee striking Sawyer’s forehead, sending her into the shattered desk. “Did you forget, Sawyer? That big thing out there was just what I’ve accumulated over the past few months. That’s all you destroyed: a husk! An empty shell! There was someone alive inside!” Sawyer began to rise, but Tetsuo brought a heavy fist down, knocking her back, “You hear me?” He kicked her in the side while she was down, sliding her across the floor, “I’m alive!”

Astra rushed past him to attack Sawyer again, but Tetsuo snatched her by the arm, swinging her into the wall. He turned his back away from Sawyer as he shouted at Astra, “I don’t need your help!”

Sawyer flew in behind him with a kick between his shoulder blades, sending him hurtling toward Astra. She formed two large clamps that caught Tetsuo, and she angrily pulled him in close to speak to him, “I wish you’d stop hitting me.” With that, she shoved Tetsuo back into Sawyer, and they both tumbled toward the large broken window.

When Sawyer tried to stand up, Tetsuo propped himself up on his palm and gave her a final kick to the face. She flipped head-over-heels, passing the shattered window frame. Her arms flailed as she tried to catch herself, but it was too late. She disappeared from sight. There was a pregnant pause.

“It’s over,” he murmured, surveying the destruction in the office.

Astra approached cautiously, “Tetsuo…”

He turned away form the window to face her, “I know it’s not what you wanted. I’m sure you wanted Sawyer to be arrested or whatever, but save the lecture. She’s dead and it’s over. I’m not in the mood to —”

“No,” Astra interrupted worryingly, “… I was gonna tell you Sawyer isn’t dead.”

A stinger-tipped tendril shot through the windowsill from outside, the tip finding its way into Tetsuo’s lower back. He screamed and collapsed, only to be caught by Astra. She laid him on his chest, inspecting the small, bloody wound. A scuttling sound drew their attention. Sawyer crawled in like a spider as the tendril shrank back into her body. Astra glared. Sawyer stood, hands raised in surrender.

“Truce,” she said, “I’m not attacking.”

“Then what the hell are you doing?” Astra roared as she held Tetsuo tightly.

“Plan B,” Sawyer said, pulling a strange syringe from her blazer, “I’m curing Tetsuo.”

Tetsuo groaned, “What?”

“Your outer shell is tough. I needed to puncture it to administer the antidote.”

She plunged the syringe into the wound in his back. He arched, screaming, then collapsed against Astra once more. Metal receded into flesh, spreading along his limbs, until his rough, metallic face melted back into something human. His old Nantox uniform reappeared. Confused, he touched his face with trembling fingers.

“Nanobots designed to subdue pre-existing viruses,” Sawyer explained. “It’s not entirely out of your system, but it converted everything back to its organic form. You no longer need to consume manmade substances.”

“But why?” Astra asked as she helped Tetsuo to his feet.

“I don’t like loose ends. He was much too difficult to destroy, so I needed to find another solution. As I said… Plan B.”

Tetsuo stormed forward, “But you took months of my life, turned me into a freak… tried to kill me!”

“I will also compensate you. How does 3 million sound? I can put you on a flight back to New Jersey today, and you can go home to… I believe there was something about a girlfriend?”

Astra turned to Tetsuo, ““Don’t take the deal!”

“I’m not,” he told her and then faced Sawyer again, “I should still kill you.”

“If you once had the power to do so, you no longer do.”

“I can blow the lid on this!”

“Yes, but you’d be implicating yourself,” she stated plainly. “You just rampaged through LA and likely caused billions of dollars’ worth of property damage. You can blow the whistle, but there’s a good chance you’d end up in the Ice Box as well.” She clarified, “And I say Ice Box because, while you no longer display any powers, you are still infused with nanotechnology, which technically still makes you a metahuman.”

“Damn,” Tetsuo muttered to himself.

“I can help you,” Astra told him.

“Yeah, you keep saying that, but things haven’t gotten any better for me,” he snapped. “Don’t think I don’t remember why Sawyer infected me to begin with! She wanted me to capture you! Both of you have ruined my life!” He stormed out of the office. “I want nothing to do with either one of you!” Astra hung her head sadly as Tetsuo made his way out of the building.

“You wanted him cured,” Sawyer said finally. “Why wouldn’t you consider this a win?”

Astra tilted her head to the side, “Sawyer… your satellite. How much did it cost?”

She furrowed her brow, “Two hundred million. Why do you ask?”

“No reason.”

Astra launched herself out the window. When she flew into the air, her lower half shifted into a cluster of thrusters; she transferred all power to them and hit escape velocity before shooting across the horizon. She picked up the satellite’s signal a day earlier, so tracking it was easy enough. Entering the exosphere six minutes later, she found the satellite still in orbit. She raised her arms and pressed them together, transforming them into a single battering ram with long spikes. When she hit the satellite, there was little sound; the weapon was ripped in half, with both sides falling to the surface. The pieces burned up in their descent, with one piece landing outside the Nantox building in New Jersey and the other hitting the Atlantic Ocean.

The following day, she bid farewell to Kim’s parents and sister as they were leaving the city. Outside, Wally helped get their bags into their car and Astra finished telling them about her mission.

“I‘m sorry about how things ended between you and Tetsuo,” Mrs. Park told her.

“Me too,” Astra said solemnly.

“He may blame you for some of what happened, but the important thing is, he’s cured. Even though it was Jennifer Sawyer who cured him, we can still be happy that he’s back to normal. Sometimes, we have to accept the good things in life, even when we don’t like how they happened.”

“Thank you for that. Maybe Tetsuo will forgive me but even if he never does, I can at least be happy he’s safe.”

“It was nice meeting you,” Mrs. Park said as she shook Astra’s hand.

Mr. Park shook her hand next, “Hopefully, Jennifer Sawyer will end up in jail one day.”

“Hopefully,” Astra agreed.

“It wasn’t that bad, was it?” Kim’s sister quietly asked her.

“I dunno yet,” Kim replied. “I’m honestly pretty hungover at the moment.”

In another part of Jersey City, there was a knock on an apartment door. Sara Kimble opened it and gasped, “Tetsuo!” The last time she had seen him, he had pieces of metal jutting out of his flesh, but he was now whole—at least physically. “Yeah, it’s me,” he told her. She flung herself into his arms and began to sob.

Back in LA, a team repaired the damage done to Jennifer Sawyer’s office as she watched. She thought about Astra and how angry she was. It was curious to her that a superior being would allow themselves to be that emotional. It was something she could explore further the next time they met. She reached into her pocket and removed a remote device. There was something else for her to play with.

Tetsuo Miki was cured, or so they thought. He no longer had the urge to merge his flesh with inorganic material, but the techno-virus wasn’t gone. Not completely. It was dormant.

She had the key to activate his powers and control him if she saw fit. For now, she’d let him live his life. She’d have need for him at another time.

Next: Welcome to the Machine