Nearing the End

The story opens in the vast emptiness of space, a serene field of stars stretching endlessly in every direction. Slowly, the view glides forward, revealing the fractured planet of Copper 9 and its distant, lifeless moons, hanging in the void like silent spectators. As the view zooms in, the attention shifts—descending toward the surface—where the eerie silhouette of the Corpse Spire looms in the planet's pale, sickly light.

Inside a rusted-out car, two skeletons sit motionless in the front seats, long since reduced to brittle remains. The atmosphere is deathly still—until a blinding flash of light ignites the horizon. A few heartbeats later, a shockwave slams through the wasteland, shattering the car's frosted-over windshield in a violent eruption of glass. The impact jolts the radio to life, crackling with static before tuning into a hauntingly melancholic melody. The screen flickers, displaying one word:

NULL.

Cut to another grim scene—a half-buried skeleton, its bony fingers locked in a death grip around a Worker Drone's severed hand, lying abandoned beneath a flickering traffic light, its glow the only sign of life in the desolate world.

Inside Doll's abandoned home, the air shifts unnaturally. Insects, once crawling aimlessly, begin to drift upward, their lifeless bodies rising as if pulled by an unseen force. In the closet, old, yellowed drawings—Nori's sketches—detach from the walls, floating like ghosts of a forgotten past. Outside, the frozen corpses of Worker Drones—Uzi's victims from the class trip—begin to lift into the air, their bodies twisting in slow, unnatural motion.

Then—the shockwave reaches the lake. A deafening crack echoes as the ice fractures, splitting apart in jagged, gaping wounds.

Cut to the classroom. The Teacher, hunched over a desk, flips through an essay titled: "Dumb Stupid Essay." The entire page—covered in the phrase "I AM GOD"—repeated over and over in increasingly erratic handwriting.

Papers. Desks. Chairs. The entire room begins to rise. Gravity loses its grip as everything lifts into the air, swirling in a chaotic mess. For a moment, there's weightless silence. Then—everything crashes back down.

A powerful gust of wind tears through the classroom, rattling the windows—before the outside world peels away like paper, revealing an endless expanse of stars. The Teacher, confused but still comically unbothered, strolls to the door.

Downard, where Copper 9's surface should be, there is only a colossal abyss. A massive, gaping hole—stretching all the way to the planet's core. 

Zooming in, descending past layers of floating debris, until the AbsoluteSolver's core comes into view—a pulsing, eldritch heart of yellow light, its vein-like tendrils stretching outward, gripping the broken remnants of Copper 9's crust. The tentacles writhe, snaking through the ruins, pulling them downward.

One of them—without warning—slaps the Teacher directly in the face. Teacher pauses. Raises both hands in a universal "why?" gesture. The tentacle grabs the classroom. With an ear-splitting screech, the entire structure lurches forward, dragged toward the core.

How's Uzi doing? She watches from far above, suspended in the weightlessness of space. Her body spins out of control, flipping wildly as she struggles to stabilize herself. Just as she regains focus, a massive boulder, guided by someone's AbsoluteSolver abilities, hurtles toward her. She barely manages to grab onto it, stopping her uncontrolled tumble.

In the distance, Nori leaps across the floating rocks, closing in on Uzi with unnatural agility. Uzi says something—but there's no sound. The vacuum of space steals her words. Nori smirks, grabbing a chunk of rock, spinning it in her hand, and scratching a message into the surface.

"WHOOPS." She casually points at the core of Copper 9, then shrugs.

Uzi's visor flickers. "HOW STOP?"

Nori scratches another message. This time, it's an image of the Crucifix Patch, with the word "PATCH?" next to it.

Uzi hesitates—then shakes her head, gesturing that it's been destroyed. Her visor updates. "SOLVER CONTROL ME AGAIN?"

Nori doesn't respond immediately. Instead, she removes her choker and tosses it to Uzi. Uzi catches it—then tilts her head as she reads the scratched message on it: "IF YOU A LIL B-"

The rest is censored, with a parental advisory warning crudely drawn over it. Uzi sighs, puts the choker on, and waves at Nori. Nori grins, scratches another AbsoluteSolver glyph into a rock, and adds: "NEEDS HOST - DESTROY CYN'S HEART <3" The heart symbol has a giant line through it.

With one final nod, Nori pops in her headphones, turns up her MP3 player, and launches herself toward the battlefield below. Uzi takes a breath. Her arm shifts, warping into a radioactive sword, crackling with energy. Just as she prepares to follow—something slams into her.

A landing pod crashes into Uzi at full force, sending her spiraling backward. Nori and her pickaxe are flung away, caught in the planet's gravity, their bodies burning as they plummet toward Copper 9.

Uzi scrambled for footing as her boots slid against the smooth metal of the landing pod's hull. She barely managed to catch onto the ladder, her grip tightening just as her weight threatened to pull her off entirely. The door hissed open above her.

A Disassembly Drone tail shot out, wrapping around her wrist in a vice grip before yanking her inside with zero ceremony.

"Spaceship piloooot!" N declared with a gleeful little giggle, proudly spinning in his chair like a kid showing off his new toy.

Uzi, still processing what just happened, snarled, grabbed the nearest wrench, and hurled it at N's head. It bounced off with a clang, sending N spinning wildly in his chair.

The pod's alarms immediately blared, red warning symbols flashing across every screen as the entire ship momentarily glitched out.

"What?! No! N!" Uzi barked, her eyes darting between the flashing errors and the endless void outside. "My mom was back there! And where's Y/N?!"

"I- I didn't know! I'm sorry!" N yelped, flailing as he grabbed the controls to steady himself. The alarms gradually died down, leaving only the faint hum of the ship's systems running.

Uzi's glare could've melted steel. "You were supposed to get away while I went back for them! What happened?!"

"Yeah, so, funny story, I'm actually, like, super mad about what you did," N muttered, very pointedly not making eye contact as he focused on piloting.

Uzi's expression darkened. "Oh, you're mad?"

Mercifully for N, the alarms blared again. "But we can talk later!" he yelped, dodging the conversation the same way he was now dodging massive chunks of debris hurtling toward them.

The landing pod twisted through the chaos, barely scraping past a jagged, tumbling rock the size of a building. N pulled up hard on the controls, and the ship blasted off the surface of a much bigger asteroid, using it like a springboard.

Both of them gritted their teeth, the ship rattling under the force. They were both sweating. They quickly patted down their hair, glancing at each other, breathing heavy.

Uzi narrowed her eyes. "Then DIE MAD, because I'm not leaving my emotional support sibling behind, BI—"

Everything went black. Weightlessness set in instantly. The ship's power flickered out, leaving only the dim glow of floating emergency batteries.

A massive, glowing tendril slithered through the darkness, its eerie yellow light piercing the shadows as it coiled around the ship like a predatory serpent. The interface flickered back to life, displaying a message in bright, cheery text: "STOP :)"

Uzi and N both spoke—but no sound came out. The vacuum of space stole their voices, leaving only the eerie silence of absolute nothingness. Outside, Cyn grinned. The tentacle clenched. The ship snapped in half like a brittle twig.

A violent shockwave erupted, and before Uzi could react, she and N were thrown into freefall, plummeting toward Copper 9's atmosphere. The sheer force sent their bodies spinning wildly, their forms catching fire as they punched through the planet's exosphere.

The blazing descent should've torn them apart. But it didn't.

Uzi's Atomizer Drone upgrades nullified the heat enough to keep her from frying instantly. She squinted through the blinding flames, forcing her arms to move, grabbing N and pulling him close to shield him.

Her eyes frantically scanned the chaos around them. There, you. Suspended in the distance, tangled in the clutches of a massive AbsoluteSolver tendril, your body limp in its grip. Uzi's rage flared. Her wings ignited, thrusters burning hot as she angled herself downward, rocketing toward you.

Uzi's visors flared to life, displaying a familiar message: "MURDER MODE: ENGAGED." She cartwheeled through freefall, thrusters kicking in to stabilize her spin as she locked onto the AbsoluteSolver tendril dragging you toward the core.

"No one hurts my sib and gets away with it. Time to murder a planet!" Uzi declared, her voice laced with unhinged excitement. She and N angled downward, rocketing toward the writhing mass of Solver appendages. The tentacle retracted further, dragging you deeper into the fiery abyss below.

CUT TO BLACK. SMASH CUT:

J sat atop a rusted metal tank, idly holding up a scrap of paper. Scrawled in N's terrible handwriting, the note read: "IOU 1 SPACESHIP :(" J deadpanned at the paper before flicking it away like a used napkin.

Behind her, a massive tentacle unceremoniously dropped the landing pod onto the frozen wasteland below—hard. The impact sent a shockwave through the ice, followed by a spectacular explosion.

J gave a lazy, sarcastic salute. "Yes. Thank you, boss! Good as ne-" Before she could finish, Cyn casually patted the wreckage with a tendril. "Yep. There is cool. Thanks," J hummed. She slowly turned to look at the smoldering wreckage, then at Cyn, then back at the wreckage.

Off to the side, the upper half of the landing pod spiraled down and crashed nearby. She glanced toward Lizzy, Thad, and Khan—still gathered around the busted school bus stranded on the ice. Khan gave it an acknowledging nod, then gestured toward the bus. The bus, without hesitation, rotated one of its wheels in response.

Thad, completely ignoring the exchange, reached for his wrench—only for it to slide off the side of the ice. He let out a strangled noise of frustration before trying to grab the railgun instead—only to find it just out of reach.

J sighed, rubbing her temples. "All right, 'sentient mass.' Time to go into the scary planet... hole... thing." She attempted to fly toward them, only for gravity to immediately betray her. With a heavy thud, J slammed into the ground. "Ow." She pushed herself up, but her leg was stuck in the ice. J took a long, deep breath, exhaling slowly. "Gravity. Okayyyy." With a sharp crack, she yanked her leg free, then stomped toward the trio. "I'm FINE, and calm, and..." Without warning, J switched to a missile launcher, her left eye glowing as a crosshair locked onto them. "Go away."

The missile launched. Thad and Khan's faces immediately drained of color, while Lizzy, unfazed, simply rolled her eyes. Before the projectile could reach them, a thick wall of ice erupted in front of the group, courtesy of Z's ice blaster. From the top of the ice barrier, V casually landed.

"Hup! Hyah!" she vaulted off the shield and delivered a brutal midair kick to another missile behind J.

The projectile detonated instantly, sending up a plume of fire and debris. Before J could react, K charged toward her, red-hot blades searing through the air. V was right on her heels. J snapped her arm up, firing two precise bullets at V—but K intercepted both with a flash of her superheated blades.

Z raised his ice blaster, unleashing a freezing beam toward J. J sidestepped just in time, ice crystals forming where she had stood a moment before. She glanced back—only to realize V was gone. A beat of silence.

"Can't betray us that easily, narc!" V's voice rang out from behind.

J barely had time to turn before—CRACK. V's leg slammed into the side of her head, sending J flying across the battlefield. She crashed into a floating island with a metallic thud, leaving a J-shaped dent in its surface.

J groaned. "AGH!" From the crater, her voice muffled and exhausted, she grumbled: "It's senior informant."

"Working with CYN?!" V's voice cracked with fury as she lunged at J, aiming a kick straight for her face.

J barely managed to jet backward in time, dodging the blow by inches. The two took to the sky, clashing midair, exchanging a flurry of brutal strikes that sent shockwaves through the air.

CUT TO: Lizzy, standing off to the side, completely ignoring the aerial battle as she casually texted on her phone. The screen lit up with a chat log. It was revealed she had been texting V this whole time.

V: Did you find J?

Lizzy: yeah. u want her dead or nah?

V: just distract her, don't die lol

Lizzy: oh okay also your ship just got carbombed

Before she could hit send, a pair of ominous glows reflected off her screen. Lizzy blinked. Slowly, she looked up—C and T loomed behind her, their elemental energy humming ominously. Her eyes darted to Thad and Khan, who looked equally worried. Meanwhile, C and T simply smiled and threw up a peace sign and a thumbs-up, respectively.

Behind them, V landed a devastating kick to J's chest, sending her crashing into the ground. The impact detonated on contact, sending ice and debris flying in every direction. The shockwave sent everyone else tumbling back.

"Ugh! We were supposed to get away, J!" V snapped, dragging J up by the collar and slamming her against a metal support beam. "You said we do our jobs on this planet-"

"Oh, grow up, V!" J shoved her off.

V stumbled but recovered, narrowing her eyes. "And it leaves us alo-"

J cut her off with a brutal punch, sending her skidding back. "It tricked you." J's tone hardened. "If I promised you anything..." she hesitated for a beat, then admitted, "It tricked me, too."

Before V could react, J launched a missile straight at her. The explosion rocked the battlefield. Flames illuminated J's silhouette as she surged forward, blade flashing in the firelight. With a single, precise swing—she sliced through V's left leg.

V hit the ground hard, gritting her teeth as sparks flew from the severed limb. J stood over her, offering a hand. "You know there's no escape, even in death." Her voice was eerily calm. "I promise, it's better on the winning team. As a team."

V glared at the outstretched hand. "Oh, how about you bite me?!" With zero hesitation, V lunged forward and ripped J's hand clean off. J barely had time to scream before V drop-kicked her across the ice.

Cut to Uzi and N, plummeting together toward the core. Uzi's eyes locked onto the massive tendrils reaching for them. Her AbsoluteSolver flared to life, electricity crackling around her arms. "HEY, CYN! SUCK! ON! THIIIIIS!!!"

With a wild grin, Uzi and N spun together midair, twisting like a bullet. Uzi's hands tore through the fabric of reality itself, summoning a miniature black hole in her palm. With a powerful throw, she hurled it straight at the core.

BOOM.

The explosion ripped through the abyss, tendrils convulsing and flailing as the sheer force of the attack sent shockwaves throughout the structure. Uzi and N landed on a catwalk below, striking a triumphant pose as the battlefield briefly fell silent.

Then—Cyn emerged. Her glowing yellow tendrils twisted in the darkness as she rose from the depths. She wasn't alone. You were clutched in one of her tentacles.

But something was wrong. You weren't struggling. Because you weren't you anymore. The black hole—the same one Uzi had just thrown—floated in midair. Suspended. Held in place. By another AbsoluteSolver. Its glow was green.

Uzi's stomach dropped. Her gaze snapped to your visor. A message flickered across the screen, and if she were human, it would've made her blood run cold.

"Hostname: AbsoluteSolver. Takeover was successful."

Cyn grinned. "Dropped these, silly." With effortless malice, she made you crush the black hole in your grip.