Beyond The Impossible

Years ago, when he was just a boy, Max Black saw his brother Alex die in his arms after he was shot. Now that he’s the hero Quantum, the sight of the bruised and battered body of Noriko Null, laying in the arms of Vesta, brings back those painful memories.

<Is she going to be okay?> he asks, briefly changing into X-rays for a quick check-up. She has several broken bones and she’s bleeding internally, but he knows that’s probably not why she’s passed out. He can sense the Nexus, the device shaped like the symbol for infinity that’s stuck inside her brain, is still extremely active but very erratic.

<She’s very weak. She’s put her nervous system through a massive shock, and absorbing Blood energy from Artemis can’t have been good for her> Lily explains, doing her best to check Noriko’s vitals without medical instruments.

<She’s fighting Abyss for control of her body. Unless one of them stops, it’s going to tear her very soul apart> Torn explains.

<Quantum, the Hero of Earth, shall now approach the arena> Thoth says, repeating his words from a few minutes ago. His voice betrays annoyance at the need to repeat himself.

<How long can she last?> Quantum asks Lily.

<I don’t know. Minutes, at best> the Lampyrian answers.

Quantum looks at his dying friend, then at the sword she gave him: the Heaven-Slayer. He couldn’t save his brother, but he won’t let his friends down.

<Keep her safe. I’m gonna fix this> he says before transforming into lightning, zapping himself directly at the center of the arena.

Enyo, the Goddess of War, is already there looking down at him. She’s wearing her black armor and Corinthian helmet, which doesn’t leave much beyond her red eyes exposed.

Being a full head taller than him, she would be intimidating even if he didn’t know she’s able to vaporize mountains just by yelling at them.

<You already expressed the wish you desire to fulfill. Do you intend to change it?> Thoth asks.

<Yes. Kill…> Enyo answers, pausing to recover from the strain of talking so much and turning towards the divine audience.

<…Hera.> she finishes, smiling under the helmet.

<WHAT!? You ungrateful little b##ch!!! After all I’ve done for you!!!> Hera shouts, loud enough to scare her other two daughters, Ilithyia and Hebe, who are sitting at her side.

<M-mother… maybe she doesn’t mean to…> Hebe suggests timidly, earning a smack on her face.

<Shut up you incompetent fool!!! Enyo, you dare to insult your own mother like this!? After you’ve disgraced this family by not giving children to your own brother, the flesh of my flesh!? I will cast you into the deepest pits of Tartarus for this insult!!!>

<Kill. First.> Enyo answers, proudly pounding her chest.

<I should probably change my wish too> Quantum awkwardly inserts himself into the conversation. He was supposed to make the same wish of Noriko… to have Hera love all the children of Zeus in the same way. But considering she’s just basically sentenced her daughter to death, it might just make things even worse.

<Express your wish, Quantum> Thoth pushes him.

<Okay. I wish to kill Abyss. But just Abyss, not Noriko. You can do that, right?> Quantum asks.

Thoth looks at Inanna, who considers the possibility and then solemnly nods.

<Your wish is valid. The final prize of the tournament is decided: the Strongest Under The Heavens shall either win the death of Hera or the death of Abyss. The ultimate stakes are now decided, until defeat or death. Quantum versus Enyo. FIGHT!!!> the Egyptian god concludes.

There’s no time to waste: Quantum transforms himself into a laser beam, bouncing off Enyo’s armor. Undeterred by this, he changes his trajectory to hit again, and again, then returns to human.

<Yeah, I had a feeling this wouldn’t work…>

<DIE!!!> Enyo shouts, unleashing a wave of pure devastation that hits the arena like a nuclear blast. Quantum escapes the destruction by changing into neutrinos, which let the debris pass through him without any effect.

<C’mon, Enyo, we’ve been through this before. You’re invulnerable, I’m intangible, we both know this could go on forever right?>

<Wrong.> the goddess answers, flying towards him at almost the speed of light. Having a solid object move this quickly annihilates the particles in the air when they hit her body, effectively surrounding herself with a trail of nuclear explosions. The sheer amount of interference created by this makes it impossible for Quantum to get near her, and he opts to retreat just in time to avoid her punch. He hangs in the upper atmosphere as radio waves, observing in awe the hole that Enyo just punched into the planet: a crater the size of Hawaii being filled by ocean water.

“Holy crap, that woman’s WAY out of my league!!! How the hell am I supposed to…”  he thinks.

<FIGHT!!!> he hears Enyo shout, despite being hundreds of miles away.

“Alright. Let’s see just how invulnerable you really are”  he thinks to himself, hoping that she can’t sense radio waves. He spots her on top of a volcano and charges in, transforming back into flesh at the last second… but not flesh made of matter.

<Anti-Matter Punch!> he shouts, hoping that she doesn’t have enough time to react.

The heat from the reaction melts the rocks of the volcano: in contact with the matter in the air, Quantum’s antimatter particles are constantly being annihilated. He manages to remain intact by re-absorbing the gamma rays created during the annihilation. Unfortunately, he can’t do much else.

To his surprise, Enyo has intercepted the punch. And her palm is not exploding in contact with his hand: it’s not doing any damage whatsoever.

<Okay. That’s really, REALLY invulnerable> he concedes, deciding a change of strategy.

To Enyo’s eyes, he simply vanishes. And also to her eyes, something is pulling her down.

Her power of flight mitigates this, but once Quantum has transformed into enough gravitons it’s too much even for her: he drags her down, sinking through the rocks and inside the planet’s mantle.

“I still feel her struggling. How stupidly strong are Hera’s children!?” he wonders, having to strain himself to prevent Enyo’s escape. Exactly how a field of gravitons can feel anything at all is something he prefers to ignore.

With her constantly trying to fly upwards, the journey towards the planet’s core is much slower than the attack that was successful with Herakles. This gives Enyo enough time to try something else: punch the magma so hard that the pressure waves she generates reverberate throughout the planet.

“Just great; even if I could take her to the core, she’d probably break it in half or something. How do I stop someone more durable than… hey, I’ve got it!”  he realizes, changing back into neutrinos.

No longer forced downwards by the increased gravity, Enyo is free to fly back to the surface, emerging from a sea of boiling water that is being vaporized by the erupting lava.

Quantum knew she’d take the most direct route: Enyo is nothing if not straightforward. Not wanting to give her a warning this time, he waits as ultraviolet light until she’s in position, then turns back into his human form and swings the Heaven-Slayer sword at her head.

When it connects to her helmet, it cuts it like it wasn’t even there. The helmet splits in half, exposing Enyo’s head and the very surprised look on her face.

The edge of the sword managed to reach her forehead and to draw blood… a single drop of it, from a wound not even as deep as a paper cut.

Quantum is pushing with all of his strength, using the sword with both hands, while Enyo is just pinching it with two fingers. She had only a fraction of a second to make her move, which is a lot more than what she actually needed.

<So, uhm, no hard feelings right?> Quantum asks to the goddess he just tried to decapitate.

Enyo pushes the sword away from her face, touches the tiny wound that’s already healed, and looks at him like he was a toddler that just did something cute and utterly pointless.

She then unleashes a psychotic scream of primal rage, Quantum’s cue to get as far away as possible.

Which is a good thing for his survival, since nothing mortal could survive her war cry. He’s seen her destroy mountains with it, but somehow she even amps up the volume.

“What’s the worst that could happen if she kills Hera, really?”  he wonders, watching her tear up the planet “Every other god tries to take her place, most of them get to war with each other, and the entire galaxy blames us somehow. It’s not that much different from now, right?”

<FIGHT!!! ME!!! NOW!!!> Enyo shouts, removing boulders the size of mountains from the now exposed bedrock and throwing them away like a child throwing the most extreme tantrum.

“And Noriko dies” he realizes.

Enyo calms down a little, once her target is out of sight for a while. Thousands of years of abuse are still boiling inside her, making it harder and harder to think. She finally sees Quantum in front of her again, wielding the Heaven-Slayer in his hands.

<Do. Your. Worst.> she says.

<You’ve got it, sister> Quantum answers, standing in a battle stance. And then disappearing.

Enyo looks around, expecting him to attack at any second. But he doesn’t show up, and she can’t sense his location either.

 

The arena

With exception of a few gods, nobody was able to witness any part of the fight. But everyone can see Enyo finally return to the arena, landing triumphantly to face Thoth.

<Victory.> she announces.

<The fight is not over> the God of Knowledge answers, looking upwards. He can see an extremely faint light approaching the planet; Enyo’s eyesight isn’t so phenomenal, but she can see it once it’s close enough. Soon she also sees that the light has the form of a human carrying a sword.

She smiles. If this is the mortal’s trump card, the tournament is already over: Ilithyia has told her about the move that Quantum used to take down Dionysus, the Infinite Mass Punch. She expects Quantum to regain his mass at the last second, at a significant fraction of the speed of light: a move that is powerful enough to destroy a small moon. It wasn’t enough to kill Dionysus and it certainly won’t be enough to stop the Goddess of War.

She waits for him with open arms, ready to claim the title and to finally, finally kill her mother.

<War. Always. Wins.> she says once Quantum reaches the atmosphere.

She feels a radio pulse. Then she recalls that the Heaven-Slayer is made of super-compressed Neutral Matter. Which, once de-stabilized, can weigh as much as neutron star material.

Her smile fades in the nanosecond that the Neutral Matter needs to increase its weight from five pounds to over a billion tons, while it’s still traveling nearly at the speed of light.

Nobody can see any of this for very simple reasons. First, everything happens much faster than the blink of an eye: Quantum didn’t even have the time to yell “Infinite Heaven Breaker” like he wanted to. Second, the amount of energy released is so fantastically astronomical that even the gods are forced to look away.

Finally, after what feels like an eternity, Quantum returns to his human form, kneeling and completely out of breath. He’s leaning against the Heaven-Slayer, using it as some sort of cane now that it’s returned to its reduced weight.

<Was… that… enough?> he asks, looking around: the small patch of ground beneath him is the only thing left of the arena, other than the amphitheaters protected by Thoth’s barrier.

Which are floating in space, now that the entire planet has been destroyed by his attack.

<Holy… does that mean that…?> he wonders, when Thoth appears before him.

<Enyo, the Goddess of War, is no longer able to fight. By the authority invested in me by Inanna, the Goddess of Sex and Violence, I Thoth, God of Knowledge, hereby declare that Quantum, the Hero of Earth, is now the Strongest Under The Heavens.>