XCEL

“I’ll call.” Hideyori Hakana pushed another sixteen-hundred yen’s worth of poker chips forward on the coffee table. The man reclined in his lounge chair—glass of whisky loose in one hand—chewing on the butt of his cigarette.

“I’ll call as well.” Tan’in Mokuzo pushed forward the same amount. A quick look at her cards to make sure, then to the table. Ironing out the front of her blouse, the woman sat proper, straight-laced from her voice to her shoes. Her face had an almond-like quality to it; smooth at first, but once you got close enough, a few wrinkles began to show. Brown hair was tied back by intricately patterned wooden hairpieces. The lacquer on the wood didn’t shine so much as faintly glimmer, given the painfully low ambience of the Glass Eyes’ break room.

The day had been slow, and they all felt it. The mood in Nowhere had been tense since the infiltration days ago. What a fiasco that had been. The atmosphere was hazy, no thanks in part to Hakana’s noxious habit. How many cigarette packets the man had hidden up his sleeve, stuffed down his trouser leg, or concealed goodness knows where else, was a question none of the Glass Eyes wanted answered.

Dimly lit by sparse yellowing lamplight, the Glass Eyes’ breakroom was as depressing as it was orderly; the funk of a high-class club with no customers. Backlit shelves stacked with drink, a thin layer of dust coated the glass. The room felt empty without its usual background music. One of their musicians had been violently decapitated, and the other was currently passed out, drunk, over the countertop. His wispy grey comb-over awry, Sasuki Yoshine’s lined and sorrowing face had practically melded with the polished wood, an expensive bottle of seventeen year-old Yamazaki clutched in one bony hand. No-one paid him any mind. How long he’d been there was anyone’s guess.

“Come on, Atsura,” grunted a rotund man opposite Hakana. “It’s poker, not your taxes.”

Casual conversation centred around a low coffee table and set of sofas filled whatever part of the room wasn’t choked with smoke.

“You pay your taxes?” Hakana raised an eyebrow and offered him a cigarette.

The man accepted with a chortle. “And miss out on a hundred Big Macs? No way.”

Hakana lent a light, then looked to one side. “Tomorrow would be nice.”

Rikiya Atsura wore a studious look. He shuffled his two cards in his hand for a moment longer before going all in. Placing his cards face down on the table, the man stood and harrumphed his way over to the bar. Draining a nearly empty glass of Asahi, the man fixed the pins in his messy bun of hair and made to leave.

“Not having fun, Mr. Samurai?”

“I’m going on patrol,” Atsura growled. “I have no patience for your silly games.”

Hakana rolled his eyes. “You’re no fun.”

This didn’t seem to bother the man. The sound of the door was as much of a farewell as they’d get.

“Anyone else want to take up Atsura’s hand? I bet he’s got a good one.” Hakana looked around the room. “How about you?” He asked a young woman with plaited strawberry hair. The woman perched on a bar stool, legs crossed—a cautious six feet from the unconscious drunk to her right. She scrolled idly on her phone. The device reciprocated her undivided attention with a rather unflattering flash illumination of her features.

“As if.” She flashed a sharp grin. “The only people who gamble are you washed-up old folk who have nothing left to lose.” A click, and her front-facing camera took another photo. “I’m still in my prime.”

“You wouldn’t happen to be using your phone on company time, would you?” Hakana returned an even sharper grin. You couldn’t beat the shark in a battle of edge.

Busted. Eyes widening, she pocketed the thing. “Don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I’ll play!” Offered Meguru Yoha. He’d been silent for so long the rest had thought—hoped—he’d since gone to sleep. Everyone still left around the table sighed. The man was, as you’d expect, lounging off in the corner, spinning some sort of implement—drumstick, pencil, knife—between his fingers in an attempt to look cool. His efforts, if you could call it that, were wasted; the room was so dark, you couldn’t see much of anything.

Hakana ignored him. “Bango, you game?”

Dentaku Bango had also definitely not been on his phone, not at all. Dark circles under his eyes, the boy drifted over to Rikiya Atsura’s recently vacated spot. The groove the man had left in the faux leather sofa was uncomfortably large. Atsura had a bodybuilder’s frame, only switching out the steroids for an equally lethal amount of sake and meditative brooding. Bango picked up the cards, and his heart sank on seeing the pitiful pair of twos, heart and club. Useless. For all his talk of dignity and honour, Rikiya Atsura was a notoriously sore loser. Bango caught Hakana’s knowing gaze, and felt his eye twitch: the man had it all planned.

Meguru objected. “How come you’re letting that little nerd play and not me, huh? What happened to seniority in this company?”

Meguru Yoha, who was only twenty-six, had long since been banned from playing poker in the Glass Eyes break room due to, as HR had put it, “nearly bankrupting several colleagues on account of an irritatingly flawless winning streak.”

Meguru Yoha knew this.

“I’m raising.” The rotund man shuffled forward an additional five-hundred yen, and scratched his ginger goatee. Toji Yamashita prided himself on it, apparently the result of “two decades’ careful cultivation,” convinced it was what everyone else knew him by.

Everyone else knew him by the size of his gut.

“Now we’re getting somewhere.” Hideyori Hakana put his cards back under his hat for safekeeping and shuffled forward his due. Tan’in Mokuzo did the same, giving Bango a cautious side-eye. Their backs were competing to see how straight they could sit.

Bango didn’t have a choice to call or fold. He’d have to wager his—Atsura’s—money on a pitiful pair of twos.

Mokuzo asked his age.

“Eighteen, ma’am.”

“Don’t take that tone with me.” She sighed. “I’m not that old.”

Hakana raised an eyebrow.

“Old enough to be forever single,” Yamashita chortled. The punishment for that comment was a carefully aimed hundred-yen chip right between the eyes.

“I’d still hit.” Meguru Yoha’s comment was somehow even worse.

“You’d get with a corpse if it promised you a good enough time,” Hakana quipped. That got a few laughs from the company, including the inebriated Sasuki Yoshine. The laugh-stroke-hiccup was enough to slide his red face off the bar stool and send him to the floor with a dull thud. No-one bothered to pick him back up.

Hideyori Hakana was about to deal the final card of the round, before the door at the far end crashed open. Everyone flinched. The sheer gravity of this new presence bent heads, gazes pulled towards the floor. Bango’s hand clenched so tight his cards started to warp. Tan’in Mokuzo stiffened, breath held, eyes shut. A bead of sweat trickled down Toji Yamashita’s face and into his beard. The light spilling from the central corridor outlined a man who took up nearly the entire width of the doorway.

Hakana looked over his shoulder, tipping his hat. “Take it easy, boss. I only got the door replaced last week.”

“Is that so? Pity.” Gus Ishimatsu slammed the door behind him. The room shook, and the door promptly fell off its hinges. “Get a stronger door next time.” JPRO’s very own CEO strode into the room, stopping before the comatose Sasuki Yoshine on the floor. He prodded the man with his foot. No response.

“Someone had better deal with this pathetic drunk before I obliterate him.”

No-one dared say a word. Gus kicked the man out of his way and strode to the other side of the room, stopping before the full-length windows. Those windows never provided much light, only an outlook to the murky darkness, occasionally crackling with bolts of purple psychic energy. “Hakana. It’s nearly time.”

The Glass Eyes shared a tense look, one that eventually fell to Hakana. As head of command, he was usually privy to—and often devised—their plans of action.

“Already?” Hakana checked his watch. “Wouldn’t you look at that. How time flies. Where are you planning on confronting him?”

“Tokyo Skytree. I’ll bring the fight to him.”

Hakana groaned. “That’ll be a pain, especially without an elevator pass.” He stood, reluctantly abandoning his dear whisky. “You do know it’s closed at this time of night, right?”

“I don’t care.”

“What’s the function?” Meguru asked. “You get another dinner invite from the PM, or something?” He made no attempt to sit up straight, look proper, or anything like that. There weren’t any consequences, for him at least.

“I’ve received a challenge.” A sheet of ethereal lightning made Gus’ glee look rather ghoulish. “From one of the Nine, no less.”

This mention sent a spark through the rest.

Tan’in Mokuzo dared question, “the Nine Primordial Phenomena?”

“Explain the situation,” Gus ordered. “Your team deserve to know.”

Hideyori nodded. “The boss received a warning last night. The phenomena that govern, they deemed our mission a threat, and attempted to subjugate his will before he could take possession of the full Ascension Blade.”

Dentaku shivered, but didn’t dare voice his concerns in Gus Ishimatsu’s presence. He’d received the brief shortly after joining JPRO. The Nine were formidable thoughtforms, entities of psychic energy that perpetuated the forces most present in the collective unconscious. If they all perceived what the boss was doing as threatening to their rule over humanity, they had ventured into truly terrifying territory.

“I took it as an opportunity.” Gus took over. “They had the gall to try and subdue me in my sleep, and so I challenged them to a fight.”

Meguru barked a laugh. “Oh, this I gotta see.” Whoever was idiotic enough to challenge the boss must be strong enough put up a good show. In a move that shocked all the Glass Eyes—him included—Meguru stood.

Gus smirked. “A god becomes surprisingly petty when he perceives a threat to his empty throne.”

Hakana conjured an orb and shook it. A picture of someplace else soon came into focus. “The closest point I have is an insurance agency almost a block away. We’ll have to walk from there.”

“That’s fine.” Gus straightened his tie, clapping a large hand on Hakana’s shoulder. “I’ll show these gods who’s truly arrogant.”

It took too long, but many orb-jumps later, the three made it to the Tokyo Skytree’s top observation deck. At such a great height, the bustle of the metropolis seemed so far away. They had ascended, and were one with the heavens. Spread out beneath them were a blanket of blinking lights, a carpet of urban fireflies, shining defiantly against the looming clouds of the November sky.

“It’s fucking freezing out here, good god.” Meguru Yoha shivered. In his laziness, he had left without a coat. The man’s baggy sweatshirt and tracksuit offered no protection against the biting wind.

“No-one’s fault but your own,” commented Hideyori Hakana, propelling a foul cloud of smoke to join the condensation of their breath. He’d already gone through another three cigarettes.

Meguru wished the lung cancer would just hurry up already.

Hideyori tucked gloved hands into the front pockets of his overcoat, hiding his chin in the neck of his pullover. He was much more comfortable in the cold anyhow. “Quit your whining, or else you’re going to miss the show.”

Gus Ishimatsu stood at the very edge of the platform overlooking the city, hands clasped behind his back. Chest puffed out, the man revelled in the grandiose atmosphere like he’d been raised to perform. The railing had been quickly taken care of, torn from its foundations with ease. Now, Gus teetered on the edge of the abyss, gazing down at the world laid before his feet.

“Don’t look down, son of man.” A voice boomed from the heavens. “You must rise above.”

A torrent of wind nearly swept them off their feet, as the clouds parted. A truly gigantic figure—jet black body outlined in heavenly splendour against the dark of the skies—then began its descent. No arms were visible; the surface of the black body, rippling like the fabric of a cloak, trailed strands of black ether that whipped in the wind. The cloak extended in a hood to surround a mask of a face, white like bone; forlorn slits for eyes, and cracks chipped into the corners. The features did not move. The deity simply towered over the three.

“An audience with a phenomenon.” Gus Ishimatsu, utterly dwarfed by this cosmic titan, could not look more beside himself. “Tired of hiding behind the clouds, O great coward? Come down here, and let me beat the fuck out of you.”

“Your hubris will be your downfall, as has been that of many before you. My name is Ashinaga, phenomenon of the Fall. I come to you with a warning: cease your aspiration, lest it be your undoing.”

“I don’t care for your warnings; you’re wasting your breath. Though, since you’ve been generous enough to descend from your empty throne for my sake, I’ll at least hear you out.”

Ashinaga remained silent, studying the man who dared to oppose. “You have enjoyed success in your life, son of man.”

This was a statement. It knew.

“All carved out of the jaws of defeat.” Gus clenched both fists. “The world set me up to fail from the onset, but I have pulled myself from depths again and again by my own two hands.”

“Do you truly know how it is to fall? To descend from vantage, to lose what you hold dear. It is a fear shared by all of humanity; you would not be alone. Tell me, son of man: do you truly know how it is to fall?”

“I have never fallen.” Gus grinned. “I started from nothing; given nothing, I took everything. I won’t ever fall. When I die, and I will, it will be surrounded by those who have truly bested me. Only then will I be satisfied. What about you, demiurge? You sit up on such a hypocritical vantage; you have nowhere else to look but down. I will see to it that you with fall first of all.”

“Your intentions are dangerous, son of man. I cannot allow you to succeed.”

“Why? Don’t tell me you’re afraid? A mere man surely doesn’t pose a threat to the Nine!”

“You intend to tear apart the very fabric of existence in order to carve reality into the form you see fit. You intend to shatter the world itself, just so you can be the only one standing.” The skies rumbled. “You are leading a doomed mission, just like the man guiding your hand did thousands of years ago.”

“Don’t associate me with that vile scourge. His power is already mine; I will tear it away from him if he does not yield. This mission is my own, and I’ll be damned if I let a false god determine my fate!”

Gus stared up at Ashinaga; his words rang around the empty winter sky.

“If you do not heed my words, you leave no alternative.” Ashinaga proclaimed. “Ignorance of the ramifications is not the issue; Inka’s presence through your associates has made you aware. You have choose to pursue this path of your own free will.”

“You’re goddamn right.” Gus thrust forward a hand. Beyond a certain point, however, it stopped. An invisible barrier stood between him and the phenomenon. No matter how hard he pushed, his hand refused to move. What was this sensation?

“Foolish. You cannot hope to reach me,” boomed the false god. “My power far outstrips anything you are capable of understanding. The distance between us is greater than between heaven and earth.”

Gus’ brow furrowed. A force field? No, he couldn’t detect any psychic signature. His hand was still moving, but incredibly slowly. It had to be distance. Compared to the infinite distance it was trying to cross, his hand may as well not be moving at all. Such an immense distance had been compressed into the space between them, all attempts at approach were null and void. This was his first hurdle to Overpower. His smirk warped into a grimace. Another symbol carved itself into his back, another searing pain. The flow of his psychic energy began to change; the spokes of the Dharma turned within.

“Power corrupts the human mind through a lack of perspective,” Ashinaga stated. “Humans become shortsighted. They overvalues personal facets to their own peril. I have observed this thousands of times over. You are but another. How will you react when you, like all the rest, plummet into the void?”

Gus Ishimatsu faced off against the towering deity with a gleam in all three eyes. “Let’s see who falls first.”

Psychic energy crackled in a torrent around him, the purple electricity arcing a dangerous current. The man grabbed at the insides of his unbuttoned shirt, and in a merciless shredding of fabric, tore away the top of his suit, exposing a powerful physique to the cold winter winds. Symbols in their hundreds had been carved into his flesh, forming a complex, interlocking pattern: an intricate tattoo, with myriad serpents coiling into the malefic figure of a man, held at crucifix-point and bathed in a sea of fire.

“Hakana, Yoha.” He shot a warning glare over his shoulder. “This is not your fight. Leave.”

Hideyori seized Meguru by his shirt collar—much to the other man’s protest—swallowed them both into another orb.

“You’re sparing your subordinates?” Ashinaga sounded surprised.

“The concept of loyalty is alien to you, I’m aware, but those two are some of my most agents. They possess such strength that you won’t even be able to comprehend. They have heart. Do not speak as though you know a thing about compassion, you false god. Millions have perished throughout history to fuel your endless self-preservation. You crush the masses under your heel, and for what? Just so that you may live to perpetuate the cycle once again. Your kind are the exact antithesis to the world I strive for!”

Gus lowered his centre of mass. The Tyrant hadn’t sought to stand in his way this time, and he had an inkling as to why. It mattered not; he’d make the most of this opportunity. After all, their goals aligned. The wind swept a circular breeze around him, crouched, as the open skies loomed overhead. Legs glowing with a mighty aura, Gus kicked off the ground with enough force to make the top deck tremble. Soaring through the air, Gus wound back a punch, and unleashed a bellow that shook the heavens.

“You are the weakest of all!”