Chapter Four: A Walk Down Memory Lane

Echo and Runaway walked through the halls of the orphanage ready for Oni to attack them at any moment. They walked past children sleeping in the hallways and some passed out on the stairs.

Runaway: He’s using the same tricks.

Echo: You’ve seen him do this before?

Runaway: Seen him? He’s used it on me.

Echo promptly shut up at that. He didn’t know how to talk to someone when a family member ruined their life.

Runaway: This way.

Echo followed Runaway through the orphanage. He trusted his instincts.

Echo: How do you-

Runaway: I can sense the supernatural.

Echo: Oh, cool.

Runaway: It’s almost gotten me killed.

Echo: Oh, not cool.

The two of them walked up a staircase and over the sleeping body of a child.

Runaway led them down a hallway and stopped in front of a closed door.

Runaway: Here. He’s here.

Runaway tightened his grip on his scythe, and looked at Echo.

Runaway: What do you want to do?

Echo: Just give me a sec?

Runaway: I don’t know how many I can give you. Eraser’s in there.

Echo stared at the door and shook as the thought of opening crept up on him. What if Oni mutilated Eraser? What if there was a sacrificial altar with dead kids’ bodies? What if…

Runaway: If you see something in here you don’t want to see, close your eyes. It helps.

Echo: Uhm, thanks.

Runaway: No problem.

Echo gripped the door knob and felt a chill run down his spine.

Echo: Let’s go.

He opened the door and saw a depowered Eraser hanging from the ceiling by a smoky tendril and Oni was sitting on a child’s desk.

Oni: Took you long enough.

Runaway: What did you do to him?!

Oni: Nothing. He just powered off after a while.

Echo: Barry, listen, we can talk about this.

Oni: I know we can.

Then, a tendril emerged from Oni’s back and hit Runaway back into the hallway. The tendril closed the door and Echo gasped as it wrapped around his neck.

Oni: Let’s talk, Jon.

Echo struggled in the tendril’s grasp but Oni tightened it every time he tried to free himself.

Echo: Barry, please.

Oni’s face contorted in anger as he made the tendril strangle Echo harder.

Echo: Plea-se

Oni tried to hold his anger, but felt it slipping as he realized he was strangling his twin brother. The same brother who he had to save countless times. The brother he had failed to save when it mattered most.

Oni shook those thoughts out of his head and replaced them with what he believed to be reality. Jonathan should’ve never taken that deal. Jonathan should’ve stayed away from her. Jonathan should still be here, but it was this imitator, someone that doesn’t remember him, or what they went through.

Echo: I’m--sor-ry. Puh-lease. Bar-ry.

He has his voice, but it’s not him. He kept trying to reassure himself, but Echo kept struggling to breathe and pleading with Oni.

Echo: Bar-ry.

Oni: SHUT UP!

Oni threw Echo onto the wooden floor with his tendril and screamed. Was it in anger? Pain? Or a little bit of both?

Echo gasped as the tendril retreated from his neck. He tried to stand up, but his left leg buckled and he was back on the floor. He couldn’t feel his knee and that assured him he wasn’t going to be using that leg anytime soon.

Oni: Why?! Why are you like this?!

Echo: Listen, Barry-

Oni: Shut up!

One Oni’s tendrils lashed out as he yelled and nearly took Echo’s head off his shoulders.

Echo ducked instinctively and looked at Oni with fear in his eyes. He was immobile, weaponless, and his backup was in the hallway. He needed to solve this with his words. Too bad he wasn’t the next with those.

Echo: Barry, look, I know you have a lot going right now. I know you want to kill me, but leave Eraser out of this. Let him go.

Oni looked at Eraser and was about to say something until they heard banging on the door and Runaway’s voice coming from the other side.

Runaway: Inex! Inex, are you okay? What’s going on?

Echo: Run!

Oni glanced at the door with hatred in his eyes. He looked at Eraser’s deactivated, motionless body and a wicked grin spread across his face.

Oni: I think you’re right. I’ll let him go.

Then, a tendril wrapped around Eraser’s body and gripped it tight. Oni chuckled ominously.

Oni: Hey, Liam, catch.

He then threw Eraser’s body at the wooden door and it smashed right through it. Eraser’s body hit Runaway and sent both of them onto the floor with wooden debris poking out of Runaway’s legs and arms.

Echo: Run?! E?!

Oni: That felt good.

A tendril quickly wrapped itself against Echo’s neck again.

Oni: There’s no more stalling, Inex. You’re not Jonathan, and you never will be. He died the day he was taken from me. Now, I’m gonna make sure some faker isn’t using my dead brother’s body!

Oni extended his hand in a fist and the tendril tightened around Echo’s neck tighter than it ever did before. Echo struggled against the grip, but there was no escape this time. He punched and scratched at the tendril, hoping and begging for a miracle.

Then, Oni and Echo heard footsteps from in the hall. Echo thought Runaway or Eraser had got up. He really needed an interdimensional fighter or an electrical robot right about now, but all he heard was singing.

Magneta: Please hurry, leave me. I can’t breathe. Please don’t say you love me.

Oni loosened his grip on Echo’s neck and looked into the hallway with fear in his eyes.

Oni: You brought her here, didn’t you?

That question wasn’t an accusation. It was a grim realization. There was no blame. No resentment. Just realization.

As Echo started to wonder who “she” was, a woman appeared in the doorway.

Magneta: Kidnapping a whole orphanage? I’m surprised, Barry. Your powers really have grown.

Oni: Stay away from me.

Magneta: I’ve done that a few years too long, don’t you think?

Echo was confused as to who this woman was, but, then, he looked down at her hands. She was carrying something. Something Echo recognized.

Echo: Merch’s shillelagh? How did you-?

Magneta: Oh, I forgot you were here. Yes, I beat your boyfriend and girlfriend up outside. Really easy, for “Tributes”.

Magneta threw Merchant’s shillelagh at Echo, the war club looked like it was gonna hit him square in the face. Echo brought his hands up instinctually and braced for impact, but it never came.

He uncovered his face and saw that the shillelagh was inches away from his face surrounded in a blue aura.

Magneta: I love it when people think they’re about to die.

Oni lashes a tendril at Magneta’s head, but she simply tilted it at a fifty degree angle and it sailed past her.

She clutched her fist and the shillelagh sailed from in front of Echo towards Oni, piercing him in the stomach. Oni clutched his stomach and stared down at the metal war club protruding from his stomach.

Oni: I- I-

Oni didn’t finish that thought as he collapsed onto the floor.

Magneta: Still, slow as ever.

Echo: Barry!

Magneta walked over to Oni and kicked his collapsed body.

Magneta: Stay dead.

As she stood over Oni’s body, she heard a scream come from behind her. She looked at the bunk bed to find the once unconscious child screaming her head off.

Magneta: Ugh! I hate kids.

Magneta then ran head first into the bedroom's window and leaped out of it.

Child: Help! Help!

Echo ignored the child’s screams and crawled towards his brother. He outstretched a hand on his abdomen and felt it go up and down unsteadily.

Echo: He’s breathing! He’s breathing!

He looked at Oni’s far away gaze and felt the cries build up in his throat.

Echo: He’s alive! He’s still breathing!