"Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past or present are certain to miss the future." — John F. Kennedy
The Fault of Violence stared at Bryn with an intensity that felt like a held blade. Bryn crushed his soda bottle in one practiced motion, the plastic crumpling beneath his fingers like an afterthought, and fixed Basil with a measured look. Basil seemed to understand immediately; without a word he slid toward the back of the bar as if obeying the gravity of the moment.
"So," Bryn said, voice low and dry, "you're the little rascal terrorizing this sector."
The Fault of Violence cocked his head in a puzzled tilt, the motion childish and oddly vulnerable.
"Does something like you even know what you are?" Bryn asked, as if the question were both accusation and test.
"I—" the Fault of Violence began in a thin, young voice.
Bryn's expression flickered—surprise, curiosity, something faint and reluctant. He speaks... The thought skimmed across Bryn's features like a shadow.
"I am the key to the promise," the Fault of Violence replied, words earnest and earnest to the point of naïveté.
Bryn snorted. "Pft. Who told you that? One of those lousy adults?"
The Fault blinked slowly, eyes blank for a breath.
"You're no fun," the child said after a pause. "Why aren't you killing anyone? Why aren't you after me?"
Bryn's lips twitched with a mix of boredom and sardonic amusement. "I have no interest in seeing the promise. I've already been there, and I'm free to return anytime I want."
The child's brow furrowed. "What... is the promise?"
"You were just saying you were the key to the promise a second ago," Bryn replied, tone threaded with impatience. "Don't tell me some adult told you that and it stuck in your impressionable little mind."
Again: "What is the promise?"
Bryn breathed out, slow and almost fond. "I— The promise is a perfect utopia. There are no taxes, no bills to pay; it's almost like living in an everlasting dream."
"Why am I the key to it?" the Fault demanded.
"B—Because people are cruel," Bryn said finally, the admission clipped and simple.
The Fault considered the answer, then: "Very well." In a blink, the child's arm flicked out—lightning quick—a jab aimed straight for Bryn's neck.
Bryn did not panic. He caught the smaller wrist as if catching a stray twig and, with the economy of someone who knew how to move and when, hurled the Fault through the bar's wall. Splinters and plaster exploded, and the child went flying out into the night. The hole in the bar sealed and stilled like a wound stitched shut.
Bryn straightened, shoulders folding back, and looked to Basil. "I suppose this is where I go. It was nice talking to you."
Basil's reply was courteous, deferential. "It was nice talking to you too, sir." Bryn cracked his neck—one sharp, casual pop—and began to step out of the ruined doorway.
Outside, without warning, the Fault of Violence lunged. A punch rocketed toward Bryn's face, fast and furious. Bryn smiled in a way that made the motion look almost playful as he slipped the blow, barely deviating his gait.
"I teach you something new and you immediately try to kill me? You kids really are just ungrateful nowadays!" he chided, voice amused as the Fault unleashed a fusillade of kicks and punches. Bryn kept his hands in his pockets, ducking and weaving through the onslaught with a lazy, infuriating ease.
"But at least I understand that you can't control this urge." He moved out of a kick's path, then delivered a clean punch to the Fault's stomach. Blood spat from the child's mouth, a surprised, ugly flare, as the Fault folded backward and hit the ground. He scrambled up in an instant, charging again with teeth and anger.
"I'll give you an offer that you just can't resist! I'll help you resist your urge to commit violence!" Bryn called out, voice bright and theatrical even as he danced away from another barrage.
"Jeez, are you even listening to me? Like, come on—this is a once-in-a-lifetime chance! Anyone would want me as their mentor!" He jabbed the air with exaggerated sincerity while the Fault continued to throw himself into the fight.
"People in this sector must be weak as shit to die to you! You're just very fast and strong—you're all substance, no skill!" Bryn said, seizing the Fault's wrist and slamming him down hard onto the ground. A pent-up gasp of pain escaped the child.
"If you meet someone who could actually fight, you'd one hundred percent be dead!" Bryn warned.
"Die already!" the Fault snarled, rising and lunging with a swift jab.
"You must not know who I am, you little shit," Bryn said, stepping aside like the insult was part of the choreography. He evaded the jab and a quick kick with minimal effort.
"I'm the strongest human in the world and the best fighter of all time!" Bryn declared, and the proclamation was a blade disguised as bravado. He snapped a precise chop across the Fault's neck; the child toppled onto his side, moaning, "Ouuch..."
As if producing it from nowhere, Bryn produced a heavy iron chain and launched it. It wrapped around the Fault with practiced efficiency, binding limbs and intent alike.
"Grrr!" the child hissed, struggling.
Bryn hoisted the bound body over his shoulder with the casual burden of a man carrying a sack of routine errands. "You're coming with me."
"Free me!" the Fault spat, claws flexing against the chain.
Bryn threaded his way through the village streets, the night alive with the hiss and glow of flames. Houses burned in jagged tongues; the scent of smoke and char smeared the air. The Fault fidgeted and strained on Bryn's back, a restless, dangerous weight.
From shadowed alleys a figure stepped forward—a random man, breath shallow, an axe glittering in his grip. "Hey! Is that the Fault?" he cried, voice cracking with a mix of fear and recognition.
Bryn glanced back just once, his gaze a hard, cold pin. The man froze mid-step; the axe tumbled from his hands and clanged against the cobbles.
"Bryn... Foldin..!" the man stammered, a name sliced into pieces by terror.
Bryn allowed himself a small, almost smug smirk, the kind that curved and vanished like smoke. He kept walking, each step a punctuation on the night, until the flames and the cries dwindled behind him.
Bryn squinted down at the bound, struggling thing slung over his shoulder and spat out the question with lazy curiosity. "You got a name, kid?"
The Fault of Violence seemed more intent on testing the iron links than answering. Its whole body writhed as if the chain were a puzzle to be solved rather than a prison to escape.
Bryn's patience thinned. "I asked you a question, dumb-nut." He delivered a quick, decisive smack to the top of the Fault's head.
"That hurt! Do it again!" the Fault yelped, voice high and oddly delighted.
Bryn's face went flat. "The hell is wrong with you... Right—Fault of Violence, you must love violence."
"What's a Fault?" the child demanded, genuinely puzzled.
Bryn blinked, incredulous. "Tch—so you're telling me you've been alive this long and you don't even know what a Fault is?"
The Fault merely nodded, as if confession were unnecessary.
Humans really are just the scum of the world... The thought passed through Bryn like a cold wind, unspoken and sour.
"You don't need to know, really," Bryn said, almost indulgent. "But as I asked—what's your name, young name?"
"What's a name!?" the Fault shot back, bafflement folding into defiance.
Bryn's temper flickered. Oh God, now this is really pissing me off! He let the feeling sit, then let out a sound that was half laugh, half groan. "You've gotta be joking."
"What does that word mean?" the Fault asked, earnest ignorance plain as a child's stare.
"You're really exposing how bad humanity has treated you," Bryn said, voice flat with a touch of contempt. "You're undereducated, and all you care about is violence. Do you even know why you want violence so much?"
"What does that word mean?" the Fault asked again.
Bryn's jaw tightened. "My point proven. You're no different from a rabid animal who just so happens to know how to talk. You operate on pure instinct."
"Free me!" the Fault screamed.
"Screaming isn't going to free you." Bryn walked until he reached the jagged rim of the branch where the village clung, and peered down into the swamp water roiling far below.
"Let's find you some food now. I'm starving," he said, turning away from the void.
Time later, the world shifted beneath their boots to a broad forest that grew on another colossal branch of the world tree. The Fault of Violence remained shackled; Bryn threaded through the trees with a sure, economical gait.
"We're looking for a Wolverine Red Ant," Bryn said, scanning the foliage. "Those things cook themselves once they die. Scream or something if you see one."
"I want to make something die. I want to kill that thing," the Fault replied, eyes narrowed and hungry in a way that made Bryn's skin crawl.
"You know what 'kill' and 'die' mean, but you don't know the meaning of 'violence'?" Bryn asked.
"It doesn't matter! All I want is to kill," the Fault snarled.
Bryn kept walking, voice low and instructive. "To kill things, you need violence. Violence is the bane of all death, you know."
"Really?" the Fault murmured, suspicious and eager at once.
Bryn's gaze locked on a distant shape: a giant, red, hairy ant—claw-like legs gripping the trunk of a tree that dwarfed everything around it. The beast crawled up the bark with a steady, predatory patience.
"Yep. I'll show you a thing or two about violence, matter of fact. Pay close attention!" Bryn coiled and then detonated forward in a single powerful leap.
"Anytime you hit something VERY hard, that's an act of violence!" he called as he closed. The ant sensed the motion and scrambled, claws scratching the bark, but Bryn's fist slammed into the tree with such force that the trunk cracked like a brittle reed. The great tree snapped clean in two; the ant tumbled free from its perch and twisted midair to land on Bryn.
The Fault gasped, "Woah!"
Bryn arced aside, and the ant crashed to the earth before him. It lashed out with a gout of lava spat from its maw—molten, angry—and Bryn slipped the burning projectile with the grace of someone who'd dodged worse.
"Apply enough violence to something, you kill it," Bryn said plainly. He wrapped his fist and rocketed forward again.
"False Weapon Style: Sniper!" His fist blurred beyond sight, a spear of intent detonating through the ant's abdomen. A neat, circular aperture opened in its red carapace; hot innards cascaded outward and steamed as they hit the ground. The ant convulsed, then rolled onto its back. Heat bloomed across its corpse until the body glowed a fierce, ferrous red.
"What was that..." the Fault breathed, a crack of awe threaded with hunger.
Bryn set the chained child on the ground and approached the ruined ant with a deliberate slowness. He stripped its head free with his bare hand like a man peeling a fruit—efficient, unromantic.
"It's a fighting style I made," Bryn said, eyes cool. "It's especially good at killing things." He turned toward the Fault. "May I learn... how to use that fighting style?"
"That was my intention," Bryn replied. "I've got some ground rules, though. We can go over them when we're eating. False Weapon Style: Knife." With a small, authoritative flick of a finger, he snapped the chains loose.
Instinct took over; the Fault lunged in a jump kick at Bryn the instant it felt freedom. Bryn stepped aside with the bored precision of a man deflecting a fly and tapped the child sharply on the crown. The Fault bruised and flopped; a moment later Bryn straddled him, chewing thoughtfully on a piece of the ant.
"You've gotta work on those instincts of yours," Bryn advised between bites.
"Get off of me!" the Fault squirmed, furious and humiliated.
"I can't trust your small ass," Bryn said, unbothered. "You'd probably try to kill me." He took another bite of the ant, the sound small and utterly mundane against the forest's hush.
Bryn lodged a charred shard of the ant's leg under the Fault's nose, steam still curling from the burned meat. The heat kissed the creature's skin, leaving angry, red impressions where the flesh met flame.
"Eat." Bryn's voice was flat, almost parental.
"Ow—ow—ow, that hurts!" the Fault yelped, voice high and frantic as it recoiled.
"It's better when it's hot," Bryn said, annoyed and oddly matter-of-fact.
Reluctantly and with a hiss, the Fault bit down. The bite scorched, a small, involuntary groan ripping from its throat, but hunger — or something like it — pushed the creature through the pain.
"Tired day," Bryn muttered after a few deliberate chews, the embers of dusk painting his face. "An old man like me needs some sleep. So we're gonna sleep right here." Without ceremony, he dropped down and arranged himself directly on top of the bound Fault, using the creature as a living pillow.
"Hey! I said—get off!" the Fault protested, struggling under the weight.
"Once again, small ass, if I get off of you you'd probably try to kill me in my sleep," Bryn replied, unmoved.
"I can't help it. You look so vulnerable," the Fault blurted, voice fraying with a mixture of truth and childish longing.
"And my point is proven once again!" Bryn shot back. "If you wanna get me off, grow some damn muscle and push me off."
"Why are you so heavy!?" the Fault demanded, flailing.
"Why are you so annoying?" Bryn retorted, irritation softened by a yawn. "Go to sleep." He closed his eyes almost immediately.
"Hey!" the Fault called again, small and desperate.
Bryn was already gone—breathing slow and even.
"Hey..." the Fault whispered into the canopy, the word hanging there like a question that had nowhere to land.