"khaos. don't do this."

NOW

A restless anxiety that Khaos had never felt before battle was creeping up on her. She had never gone against Ikaris, against her brother. None of them had, and for that, they couldn't help but think they'd fail.

Those of them that remained assembled to put on their armor. The familiar black suit that fit like a second skin morphed around Khaos, bringing her a little comfort. She raised her hand to her chest and watched as Phastos's bracelet latched onto her wrist, the gold shining against the matte black material.

"I've always wanted to add some color to this thing," Khaos said, a small smile on her lips.

"Ready?" Sersi asked, looking at them all before finally looking to Druig. It was all on him now.

"Ready," he said, nodding.

The Domo sped to the Indian Ocean where the Emergence was beginning. As Thena remained on the ship to hopefully lure and distract Ikaris, Druig went down to the base of the erupting volcano with Makkari, Sersi, and Khaos.

"It's time to put a god to sleep," Sersi said, trying to hide how nervous she was.

Before Druig could activate the Unimind, Khaos grabbed the collar of his armor and pulled him down in a passionate kiss.

"I love you," she whispered, pressing their foreheads together.

"Til eternity," he finished.

With a shaky breath, Khaos stepped back, joining Makkari. Druig turned the bracelet on his wrist, activating the cosmic energy. Each of them felt their bracelets tapping into their energy, drawing from them.

One by one, they all were suspended in the air, golden energy flowing from them to Druig. His eyes began to glow and he reached out to Tiamut with his mind. Before their very eyes, the rumbling earth began to calm and the volcano slowly began to settle back down.

Druig was putting a god to sleep.

Sudden, cosmic beams struck Druig in the back, knocking him to the ground and breaking the Unimind. Ikaris flew at him from behind, ready to end this.

Khaos's feet had barely grazed the sand as Ikaris grabbed Druig by the throat.

"I should've done this five centuries ago."

They couldn't even react as Ikaris flew them both high in the sky. Then with unmatched strength, he threw Druig toward the earth with as much force as he could. Cosmic beams burned into Druig as Ikaris pummeled him into the earth, deeper and deeper, until there was nothing left to fight.

Khaos's mouth was open but she couldn't even muster a scream, only a hoarse cry.

But Ikaris wasn't done there. He flew back toward the Domo and in one sweep, cut it in half with his beams. The ship was sent crashing to the ground, and Makkari ran Khaos and Sersi out of harm's way just in time. Then she rushed Thena and Phastos off the ship and to the safety of the beach.

As Ikaris flew down and met them, Khaos shakily stepped toward him. "W - what did you do to him?"

Ikaris wouldn't meet her eyes. "I'm sorry, sister. Druig's gone. It's over."

There was no time to process as Makkari rushed at Ikaris, repeatedly attacking him from every angle over and over again as she mourned her friend.

And Khaos, well, Khaos was frozen. Of everything that had happened in the last week, this — Druig — was the tipping point. It felt as if her entire world had ended, buried deep beneath the Earth where Ikaris had left Druig. She couldn't breathe. She couldn't think. She couldn't move.

She didn't even flinch when the volcano exploded, fiery magma rocks flying at them. Sersi had to pull her unresponsive body behind her, turning oncoming boulders into water and flocks of birds.

"Phastos," Sersi said as the rain of fire ceased, "I have to try and stop this. I need to get closer to Tiamut. Keep Ikaris busy."

"We've got you," Phastos said, glancing at Khaos. "Go."

But before the three of them could even move toward Ikaris — could Khaos move? — the prime Deviant arrived, having morphed into something almost humanoid.

Everything was escalating too quickly. Druig was dead. Thena disappeared into a cave to kill the Deviant. Druig was dead. Ikaris caught Makkari, breaking ribs as he threw her against a boulder, burning her with his eyes. Druig was dead.

Druig was dead.

"Khaos!" Phastos shouted, grabbing her shoulders. She stared almost blankly ahead, tears gathered in her vacant eyes. "Khaos you have to do something."

"I - I can't," she stuttered out. "Druig - Druig—"

"Druig is dead, Khaos!" he yelled as if she didn't know that. "He killed him, Khaos. There is no eternity with him because Ikaris took it from you. And you're not even gonna remember it. Remember him. He's dead, and you're going to forget him—"

Before Phastos could continue, Ikaris shot his beams at him, blasting him away from Khaos.

"Where's Sersi?" Ikaris asked. He didn't even glance at his sister.

Phastos looked to the volcano, but then his wide eyes fell on Khaos. "You always did underestimate her."

Khaos was shaking, smokey wisps swirling around her head. Phastos's words played on a loop in her head, accompanying the vision of Druig being pummeled into the ground over and over again.

Druig is dead.

"And what do they call you, little one?"

You're going to forget.

"Don't close your eyes, pretty girl. You'll hide away my favorite color."

Druig is dead.

"We Eternals may have no need for religion, but I'd happily pray to you each day."

Ikaris killed him.

"Marry me?"

Her brother killed Druig.

Brother and sister. Day and night. The sun and moon, always battling for their time in the sky above. Sunlight chased away the darkness, but she could just as easily eclipse him.

Neither stronger than the other — that's what they'd always said at least. Now it was time to put that to the test.

A violent mass of black surged from Khaos, coming from every inch of her body. It was as if the sun had been destroyed from the atmosphere, nothing but darkness for miles as the shadows swallowed them all whole, so thick they could feel it on their skin.

Ikaris couldn't see five feet in front of him, only darkness. Darkness like he'd never seen his sister produce. Not even the burning volcano stood a chance to be seen or heard, all the sound being absorbed, casting an eery silence over him.

"Khaos," Ikaris called, his voice echoing around nothing. Phastos and Makkari could only faintly hear him even though they weren't that far from him.

"You killed him."

Ikaris whipped around, frantically searching. It sounded as if she was coming from all directions, her voice bouncing off the shadows. Though he didn't know where she was, he could hear how much pain she was in. Pain he had caused.

Pain he would pay for.

Khaos was in front of him in a second, appearing like a ghost. But she didn't attack right away, only stared.

"Khaos," Ikaris breathed out. He took in her drastic change in appearance. Her eyes were completely blacked out, dark veins under those eyes pulsing under her skin, the tips of her fingers stained black as more and more darkness emanated from them. "Don't do this."

"You did this."

Ikaris's eyes began to glow, but she was much quicker. Shadows wrapped around Ikaris's ankle, flinging him back into the void. He couldn't tell which way was up and which was down to right himself and fly off. Then he crashed into what felt like a mountain, the breath being knocked from his lungs.

He couldn't even recover as shadows surrounded his head. If Ikaris thought it was dark before, he was suffocating in the nothingness now. He screamed and yet heard nothing. Next thing he knew, he was being shoved into the sand. The shadows around his head dispersed and he looked up to see Khaos above him.

Khaos screamed in frustration as she kept him contained, using all her energy as he fought against her. It was growing harder and harder, and she could feel her previous injuries reopening, but she couldn't let Ikaris see her weakness. She turned his head with shadows, forcing his eyes to the ground.

The ground began to shake from under them, the first real thing other than darkness that Ikaris could feel. Tiamut was emerging.

"You can't keep this up forever!" Ikaris yelled through grit teeth. "And I can't let her do this!"

A low groaning sound broke the barrier of shadows keeping the rest of the world out, and only one thing was loud enough, big enough to breach it. Tiamut. Sersi was doing it. She was beginning to kill it.

The ground shook again, beginning to cave in on itself, and Khaos stumbled. And the stumble was all Ikaris needed. With a yell of exhaustion and determination, he broke free of the shadows holding him down.

He didn't bother with fighting Khaos, knowing that wouldn't end well. Instead, he followed the sound of Tiamut, using the low rumbling sound to locate Sersi, flying through the darkness until he spotted the soft golden glow of her hands, luring him like a beacon.

Khaos arrived a second after he did, materializing behind Sersi, ready to protect her from Ikaris. Sersi had stopped trying to transform the Celestial, putting her hands up in anticipation of his attack.

But it never came.

Ikaris's eyes started to glow, but before Khaos could attack him once more, he stopped. Ikaris just froze.

He looked at the only two people he had ever dared to care about and he had been ready to kill them.

Thousands of years of memories flashed through his mind. Sersi dancing in Babylon with a smile on her face. Khaos throwing crumpled up Christmas wrapping paper at him. Helping Sersi grow crops in undeveloped fields. Khaos sitting on his shoulders at an ABBA concert to see the stage past the crowd. Marrying Sersi in the Gupta Empire. Surprising Khaos with a picnic in Central Park on the anniversary of Tenochtitlan to cheer her up.

"It's beautiful, isn't it?" Sersi asked, staring down at the blue planet from the window of the Domo.

He couldn't. Ikaris couldn't do it anymore. He couldn't fight them. Not because he thought it was what was right, but because he loved them more than he loved Tiamut.

Sersi saw it in his eyes and her hands began to glow once more. Slowly, she touched Tiamut's palm once more. Then, just as they had earlier, cosmic energy surrounded them all, even Ikaris, and lifted them in the sky. They could feel their energy surging from their bodies and into Sersi.

As Khaos lost her control, the mass of black shadows surrounding them caved in, sucked back into her body as quickly as they had formed.

Sersi dropped down onto Tiamut, and in an instant, he began to transform again. The Celestial morphed into lifeless marble, half a head and hand emerging from the sea. The light in his six, burning eyes flickered until dying out completely.

And just like that, it was over. The Unimind link was broken, each of them landing back on the ground. Khaos landed on her knees, overtaken with exhaustion, the adrenaline and effect of the darkness wearing off.

Ikaris looked around at the stone corpse of Tiamut, comprehending the gravity of what they'd done. Of what he had allowed. Then he looked at them. At Sersi. At Khaos. A tear slipped down his cheek.

Slowly, with shaky legs, Khaos got back on her feet. More tears fell from his eyes as she walked to him. Both siblings shut their eyes as she pressed her forehead to his, letting him know that somehow, she would find it in herself to forgive him.

"I'm sorry," he whispered, his voice cracking. Then Ikaris placed a kiss to her forehead, his lips trembling.

"It's okay," she said, beginning to cry as well. "It's okay."

But it wasn't. None of it was.

As his lips left her forehead, so did his feet leave the ground. Khaos and Sersi looked up at him as he floated higher and higher, eventually turning away from them and shooting upward, out of Earth's atmosphere.

"Where's he going?" Khaos asked in confusion. "He - he's coming back, isn't he?"

But Sersi didn't have an answer for that. Not one that Khaos wanted to hear anyway. "We need to get back to the others."

Khaos nodded, and since they were in the shadow of Tiamut's hand, she grabbed Sersi and transported them to the beach, near the cave that Thena had defeated the final Deviant in.

The others were there — Makkari, Phastos, Thena. As soon as they spotted them, Makkari sped to their side, hugging Sersi and then Khaos.

"How?" Phastos asked Sersi, glancing at the giant, marble hand. "How did you do it?"

"When I touched Tiamut's palm, I felt energy surging into me," Sersi explained. "Tiamut joined our Unimind."

"I always wondered how we survived the destruction of other planets that were on," Phastos mused. "By being connected to the Celestial as it emerged."

"We became one," Makkari signed, deep in thought. "Even Ikaris and Sprite, all because of Tiamut."

"And Khaos," Phastos said, looking at her and laughing. "What the shit? I have never seen you use so much power. How on Earth did you do that without something like the Unimind aiding you?"

But as soon as he asked, he knew the answer. Grief was a powerful motivator, but not one she ever wanted to use again. With the battle over, all Khaos felt was numb, empty, dead.

But then—

"Say, who turned the lights back on?"

Khaos turned, hearing that familiar voice, and felt as if she could properly breathe for the first time since losing him. There he was, walking toward them through a thick fog, Sprite helplessly trailing behind him.

It was Druig.

Her feet moved faster than they ever had as Khaos ran to him. Druig was already grinning before she had even reached him, hugging him so hard that she almost knocked them over. Druig wrapped his strong arms around her, content to never let go.

"My beautiful, beautiful Khaos," he whispered, their foreheads pressed together and noses bumping. "Marry me?"

"Yes," she breathed out, laughing in relief and happiness. "Yes."

Druig cupped her face and leaned down, kissing her forcefully. Khaos melted into him, warmth filling her as she wound her fingers into his hair. And as they parted from the kiss, Khaos tucked her head under his chin, remaining in his arms.

Only one of the group wasn't smiling at the touching reunion between the lovers.

"Is he gone?" Sprite asked, looking around for Ikaris with teary eyes.

"He's coming back," Khaos said, doing her best to ignore the doubtful look on Sersi's face. It didn't cause any harm to let her hope. "He's coming back."

"Sprite?" Sersi asked, getting the girl's attention. "I still have energy from the Unimind. I think I can make you human. All the things you said you wanted, you can have. But your time will be fleeting and you'll die one day. Are you ready for that?"

They all looked at Sprite, and a tear slipped down her cheek as she nodded. "I am."

Sersi nodded and held out her hand for Sprite to take. They all watched as the cosmic energy flowed from Sersi to Sprite. The girl may not have changed visually, but everything was different for her as Sersi finished.

The Eternal was now human, mortal.

"You know we're gonna send you to public school, right?" Khaos asked, getting half-hearted laughs from the rest of them. Then she looked out over the giant hand and head coming up from the ocean. "This is gonna turn into a bitchin' tourist trap."

☽︎

[ oof i hate writing fight scenes. sorry if that was difficult to picture. it was clear in my head, but fight scenes are not my specialty unless I have something to reference ]