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There is a reason why Brimstone had initially banned relationships between agents within the Protocol. First of all, it’d create problemsome biases. And second of all, it would result in this.
Cypher doesn’t think he can find any space in his lungs anymore to breathe at the sight of Chamber’s blood-stained corpse. Each struggle for air is another liter of blood to be soaked into the sand of his home, and another shade of color lost in the glossy eyes pointed right to the sky. The wind has kicked up some dirt that coats the body now in a dull shade of brown. Cypher’s entire body shudders.
The fact that Chamber’s dead is one thing. If that was the end of the story, then perhaps Cypher could manage to handle himself a little better. Had he not been the one to discover the body, but somebody else, he could rest assured knowing Chamber will be escorted to Sage immediately for resurrection. The process was simple enough; he’s been the one being revived enough times already to know. But that isn’t the entire situation here. Chamber’s body is cold and rigid against the floor of Rabat. His murderer is hiding right around the corner, as made clear by the tag attached by Cypher’s camera.
He couldn’t just run away and save Chamber’s body. With the enemy lurking steps away from him, Cypher could easily be the next one to be eliminated. Or worse, the enemy could plant a spike where the last of Cypher’s fondest memories remain.
He couldn’t allow it. Vengeance and yearning mix together in his veins to pump bloodlust through his body. Chamber’s face pressed helplessly into the sand lingers in the back of his mind. He’s never seen the man so unkempt; it haunts him. It drives him forward, closer to where the tag’s signal is picked up. Swiftly and silently drawing his pistol, he swings the corner and fires without a thought.
The bullet is shot into a wall, and crumbles hit the ground where he’s certain his enemy should be standing. A moment passes with Cypher caught in confusion until a warping sound precedes the feeling of a magnet forcefully dragging his body down to the ground. He recognizes the sunset marbled ground to be the trademark of Chamber’s. The enemy ’s, that is. His body weight seemed to have tripled in his trap, and Cypher can barely hover inches off of the ground. His teeth gnash together as he notices the speck of fabric with his camera’s dart attached to it on the floor beside him, and he realizes much too late that he’s moved his piece just where the enemy wanted him to.
Two footsteps and the scraping of soles against the loose pebbles scattered across the ground drag Cypher’s eyes up and to the approaching figure. An immediately vile feeling overtakes him as he registers the face of his enemy, and how he disgustingly looms over him. The dark chuckle is grating to Cypher’s conscious, and the last thing he wants to do is hear the other speak, but he has no other choice but to hear the voice of the man that’s supposed to be dead assault his mind.
“Cypher, what a pity. I see you have too much of a reliance on your tools. You should know best of all that trusting other people—or things —always has its consequences.”
Fury fuels the strength Cypher uses to pull his arm up and shoot at Omega Chamber. He hears the bullet land into another wall with a small scatter of rock immediately after the warping sound of Chamber’s teleport.
“Bravo! Impressionnant , you really almost got me there. It’s a shame I’ll have to end your talent show here short, however.”
“ Bastard ,” Cypher spits under his breath. He certainly doesn’t mind if Chamber hears him, and he certainly has, given how the other draws another step closer.
“I beg your pardon? Bastard ? What a selection of words, coming from you.” Chamber slowly lowers himself to the crumpled Cypher, his hand reaching for the pistol still held in Cypher’s grip. Cypher holds tight, but his entire body is wavering from fatigue, and enough of his energy is already being spent not being squished to the floor. When Chamber rips the pistol out of his hands, his fingers can only resist so much before they give in and release.
Cypher mutters a curse under his breath. “No. It’s true for you.”
Chamber scoffs and slips Cypher’s pistol into his pocket. Then, squatting down, his eyes drill holes into the back of Cypher’s head pressed against the sandy floor. “Have you lost all sense, Cypher? Do you know how dangerous this situation is for you? I’ve already killed the two responsible for surveying the area. I assume you came when you stopped receiving signals from the first one I killed. Tell me, did you call for any backup while you stormed over to kill me so eagerly like that?”
Bile builds up in Cypher’s throat. Shit .
“Your silence, mon ami , it is music to my ears. I never would’ve expected this Earth’s Cypher to be so stupid .”
All energy is gone from Cypher’s body. He can’t even find the power to clench his fists in frustration, let alone escape. Panic does no good for him but leaves him lightheaded as he breathes in whatever specks of dust make it through his mask.
“Then it makes sense why you think us to be the bastards. I suppose if we could afford to be more arrogant like yourselves, we would just accept the downfall of our world and loved ones in silence.”
“That isn’t my problem to fix,” Cypher rasps, and Chamber laughs.
“No, not at all. So why don’t you just sit tight and let us do what we must until we’ve made our repairs. That doesn’t sound so bad now, does it?”
“ Bullshit .”
“Bullshit!” Chamber echoes, incredulous to the displayed audacity. His foot stomps against the side of Cypher’s head till the jagged pebbles threaten to pierce the fabric of his mask and his skull feels like it’s about to explode under pressure. Even when he lifts his foot, the weight lingers, and the throb of his head leaves him aching throughout his entire body. Still, Chamber seems unsatisfied with it. He grabs Cypher’s head and forces it up till he’s looking at Chamber in a horribly arched position, his neck positively about to snap off, and Chamber viciously snarls, “What’s bullshit is that I fight to cherish everything that I and everyone I’ve loved have worked for, and your Earth only pushes back because you deny us of our very existence.”
Chamber’s Headhunter materializes in his hand shortly after, and he’s moments off of aiming it before a bullet pierces right through the arm that summoned his weapon. Chamber recoils at once, letting go of Cypher as part of his recoil and hissing as he turns sharply to the weapon that had just been fired.
With dire eyes and ragged breathing stands Killjoy, and beside her Viper with a Vandal in hand. Shouting and the scattering of more dust and sand pick up, but Cypher’s body feels only half as heavy as his mind does at the moment, and his eyes can’t help but slip shut, following the rest of his conscience into complete darkness.
Cypher jolts up, his entire body screaming at him in immediate response to the sudden motion. Burned into the back of his mind like a brand is the sight of blood pooling out of a gunshot wound—a heinous gash right in the middle of Chamber’s forehead. And with it are words of his voice, but it isn’t his.
Rather, it’s Omega Chamber’s. Bullshit . Cypher isn’t one to let moral dilemmas like the one that faces the mirror Earths get to him, but he clenches his fist. Amir, too, fought for everything he and his family loved, back in Rabat, and yet he still had it revoked from him. It’s not like he doesn’t understand the struggle—in fact, he understands it better than anyone. The pure loss of everything, his world stripped away from him with a single fell swoop; he knows that pain all too well.
He’s tried to move on from it since then, but the pain still lingers like an irritated scar across his heart whenever he’s reminded of it. Chamber— his Alpha Chamber—does a lot to soothe the pain whenever it strikes, but admittedly he can be half of the irritation itself, too. And now there’s Omega Chamber whose hostile eyes still strike him dead in the eyes even now in the medical bay. Cypher can’t shake off the look, or the feeling of being crushed by him (both mentally and physically). He hates it. He hates it so much.
But he should be thankful he’s alive, at least. Perhaps his idea to run into Omega Chamber’s setup alone wasn’t the most bright idea, but Cypher always has tricks up his sleeve—naturally he wouldn’t be so bold as to confront an enemy without a back up plan. Although he didn’t wish to rely on something as drastic as the emergency transmission system he’s wired into some of his pocketed technology, he really has that and those who came to save him for the fact that he’s alive right now.
Obviously, he wouldn’t mind dying there had that meant his body could be safely retrieved, but with what Omega Chamber’s words were implying, he doubted that he’d make it out of the situation without any permanent harm. Still, he can’t manage to take a sigh of relief after everything.
His Chamber is healing, and so is he. All is in order, yet his mind remains a wreck.
Omega Earth, fighting for its right to exist . Nonsense. It’s all nonsense!
Yet Cypher can’t put the idea to rest. He sits and waits for clearance from the medical bay mulling over the idea endlessly. The apathetic, coldblooded information broker wasn’t known to have a streak of sympathy for others, so why now does his heart resonate with Omega Chamber’s cause?
The more he thinks about it, the more he finds that Omega Chamber is entirely right: Cypher’s solution to all of this has always been to eliminate Omega Earth—to revoke them from existence. It would all simply be much easier if they didn’t have to deal with it. No moral dilemma would be needed if there was no dilemma to be had. There was no need for two of the same person anyway! That was always how it was, and how it should be.
Eventually, once he finds himself in the comfort of his office, he finds that not even his blue screens ease his mind. He doesn’t know what possibly could ease his mind, except for—
No, Cypher’s certainly lost his mind. There must’ve been some brain damage Sage hadn’t accounted for during his stay in the medical bay, because why of all things would Cypher’s first thought be to see him again? What good could hearing Omega Chamber out be on the matter? Would it lead to peace between their Earths?
No. Absolutely not. They’ve established already that peace can’t be the answer.
Cypher sets his head against the desk. His head is swimming, and his body is still heavy with fatigue. He can’t work like this. He can’t think like this. Hell, he can barely function like this. His bitterness is thrown as darts to a Chamber-shaped target. He avoids Chamber for now, because his mind can’t rid itself of some select words he has for a different Chamber that’s been on his mind, and he questions how much self control he can muster in this current state of deliriousness.
This feeling is torturous. And as he soon quickly discovers, it won’t go away. Not unless he gets to have his turn to speak on the matter to the mirrored other half of his heart.
Cypher doesn’t return to Bind for any reason beyond work. He has no reason to; his “home” is here, but the things that once made it his home are not. Thus, the hollow shell of what it once was only leaves bitterness in him. He must admit, recalling the events that happened a few days ago, he’s even more bitter now, standing atop the red sands of Rabat.
He’s managed to figure out by now why Omega Chamber’s resolve hits him so deeply at his core. With the same appearance as the man he’s lent his heart to, his words hold more impact than they should. His brain knows he’s the enemy—he’s already been battered by him before, so surely his body should know that too. But his heart responds in different ways; it drives him in loops, feeling guilt, despair, and unsettled. Had it been for any other reason, Cypher would’ve kept away. But if this is what it takes to put his heart at ease and love his Chamber the same way he did before without these chains, so be it.
Cypher’s already made the proper arrangements. He watches as the short-range teleporter in front of him changes hues, and it stirs violently before ejecting the man of the hour.
“As promised, monsieur ,” the visitor says cordially, summoning his tech—his two weapons and his trip—in hand and then setting them to the side, out of reach. “Now you.”
Cypher cautiously slips his pistol out of his pocket and throws it behind him. He pats the rest of his pockets to reveal himself as unarmed, and then says, “Can you recall your weapons at any point?”
Chamber smiles, as if appreciative of the keen observation. “They have to be in my call for me to recall and resummon them.”
The information broker hardly feels at ease with this set up, but he’ll take it. Seeing Cypher’s acquittal, Chamber takes the initiative to speak.
“Well, you mentioned you wanted to speak with me?”
“...Yes. I did.”
“Hm. And about what, may I ask?”
Cypher fights the urge to bite off his tongue as he says, “About your world.”
“Ah, I see!” As if purposely finding the time to best aggravate Cypher, Chamber bursts out into a pompous laugh. “Then you must’ve been thinking about what I said during our earlier encounter! Who would’ve thought you Alpha people had actual hearts?”
Clearly unamused, Cypher mutters, “Of course we do. Say, do you think your Earth is any better, ruining our home for your sake?”
“Do you think this is a matter that can be settled by which Earth is better ? Then allow me to explain why you’re entirely wrong about your Earth. We were gifted the more potent radianite on our Earth. We were granted the power to give life, and to solve problems that made those on our Earth infinitely more happy. Yet those uneducated buffoons at Kingdom decided to mess around with a power too strong for their hands, and foiled everything. We were set to have it all, and then revoked of it.
“My family, Cypher. After so long of trying to please them, they were finally happy—and now it’s all gone. Don’t you see? It’s all your Earth’s fault. Kingdom unnecessarily believed collaboration between your Earth and mine would benefit us at all, and all you did was sap us of our life instead.”
Cypher quickly and harshly interjects, “Alpha Earth had nothing to do with that. Kingdom doesn’t speak for all of us—”
“Kingdom Industries provides over half of your world’s supply of energy, and yet that still isn’t enough for them. Their greed led them to encroach into my world. The Large Radian Collider was only meant to supply more energy to a world that wasn’t even in need !”
“Omega Earth was part of its creation. The research was not solely for Alpha Earth.”
“And yet they began development of it on Alpha Earth anyway, despite the clear need on Omega Earth . Don’t you see? Nobody is allowing us to live. Both Kingdom Industries and your Protocol have only resisted, and never collaborated. We didn’t have to live in this constant war.”
Cypher is caught speechless for a moment. Chamber takes the chance to take a step closer to Cypher, who is caught off guard when the other’s hand raises to caress Cypher’s masked cheeks.
“ Mon amour ,” Omega Chamber coos in a sickeningly familiar tone, “you can be different from the rest. If you could just help us, just tell us we can exist and live in the same way that your world does now—”
Cypher realizes by now what’s happening, and he mumbles a curse as he shoves Chamber away and draws the knife he’s been hiding up his sleeve to quickly take a jab at the enemy. This was a mistake. He could never help the enemy; this is all utter storytelling for pity. But Chamber teleports away before the blade can get near him, appearing again around the corner where his guns are located.
He’s been played .
Chamber grabs his Headhunter faster than Cypher can scramble for his gun and by the time his hand can wrap around the grip of his Ghost, there’s a searing pain ripping through his thigh. Shit!
“Ah, what a shame. I really thought for a moment you’d listen—perhaps you’ve still got some sense left in you.”
The sole of Chamber’s shoes crunch against the rocky floor beneath him as he approaches, gun pointed right to Cypher’s forehead, and his smile twisted into a sickening display of pride. “But to give yourself to me again, entirely alone. You really are a fool , Cypher.”
Cypher’s mind is finally cleared thereafter.