The sewer tunnel was a tube of cold, damp darkness, the only sounds the slow, rhythmic drip of water and the distant, metallic screech of Tarsus's men working on the Crimson Altar's main doors. Zero was a creature of that darkness, his body pressed against the cold, rusted rungs of the ladder, his eye pressed to the narrow gap he had created in the sewer grate. He was a ghost in the machine, a hidden variable in an equation that was rapidly approaching a violent, chaotic solution.
He peered into the vast, circular chamber above. The Crimson Altar was even more unsettling up close. The faded, obscene murals on the walls seemed to writhe in the dim, ambient light filtering down from high, grime-choked windows. They depicted scenes of ritual sacrifice, of mortals offering their hearts to a many-limbed, shadowy god that looked disturbingly like a more complex, more powerful version of the beast now curled at the base of the central, blood-stained altar. The very air of the place was thick and heavy, saturated with the psychic residue of a century of pain and devotion. It was the perfect nest for a creature that fed on such things.
And then there was the beast itself.
It was a nightmare given form, a creature that seemed to defy the very concept of a stable physical existence. Vaguely humanoid in shape, it was easily seven feet tall even when coiled, its body a shifting, semi-corporeal mass of shadowy limbs and too many joints. Its form constantly flickered and warped, its edges dissolving into a blur of what looked like television static before re-stitching themselves into a new, equally impossible configuration. It was like watching a living glitch, a piece of corrupted data that reality itself was struggling, and failing, to properly render. Zero's [Intuitive Analysis] flared, but the data it returned was a string of nonsensical errors and corrupted symbols, a reflection of the creature's own chaotic nature.
[TARGET: Glimmer-Hulk. CLASS: Anomaly (Unraveled). RANK: ???]
[ANALYSIS: Physical state is in a constant quantum flux. Unable to acquire stable data. WARNING: Target's presence is causing localized reality degradation.]
Reality degradation. The words sent a chill down Zero's spine that had nothing to do with the sewer's damp air.
The screeching of metal from the main entrance grew louder, more insistent. The heavy bronze doors began to groan, the ancient metal buckling under the determined assault of the City Watch. The beast stirred. It unfurled from its coiled position, its shadowy, multi-jointed limbs stretching with an unnatural fluidity. It had no face, no eyes, but Zero could feel its attention shift, its strange, alien consciousness awakened by the intrusion.
It moved. And its movement was a profound violation of physics.
It did not run. It did not leap. It glimmered. Its form dissolved for a split second into a cloud of black, buzzing static, and then instantly reappeared ten feet to the left, with no discernible travel between the two points. It was a perfect, instantaneous teleportation.
Zero's analytical mind, a mind that had deconstructed every problem into a series of logical, predictable steps, was utterly baffled. How could he fight something that did not obey the basic laws of motion? How could he set a trap for an enemy that could simply choose to exist somewhere else?
He needed more data. This was no longer just about killing the beast; it was about understanding it. He had to test its properties, to find the rules that governed its impossible existence.
He slipped from the sewer tunnel, a silent wisp of shadow, and took up a concealed position high in the crumbling, ornate rafters of the chamber. The place was a spiderweb of ancient, rotting wood and deep shadows, a perfect perch for an observer. He watched as the Glimmer-Hulk moved around the chamber, its short-range teleports becoming more frequent, more agitated, as the sound from the main doors grew into a series of rhythmic, booming crashes.
From his new vantage point, Zero picked up a small, loose piece of stone, a shard of a fallen gargoyle. It was heavy, sharp. A perfect projectile. He focused his will, wrapping the stone in the subtle, invisible energy of his kinetic skill.
[ECHO OF KINETICS... CONTAINED.]
He took aim, not at the creature's "head," but at the center of its shifting, unstable mass. He waited for it to complete a glimmer, to be momentarily "solid" in a new location. Then he unleashed the echo.
The stone shot through the air, a silent, deadly missile. Its trajectory was perfect. But the result was a complete, baffling failure. The stone passed directly through the Glimmer-Hulk's form as if it were a hologram, a ghost, a puff of smoke. It didn't impact. It didn't connect. It simply went through, clattering harmlessly against the far wall of the chamber.
The beast, however, reacted. It had not felt the physical impact, but it had clearly felt the chaotic, glitched energy of Zero's skill. It whipped its non-face around, a featureless void that somehow managed to convey a sense of pure, focused rage, and "looked" directly at Zero's hiding spot in the rafters. It had sensed him.
A silent, psychic scream of pure, territorial fury echoed in Zero's mind, a wave of raw, chaotic energy that made his teeth ache.
And then it glimmered.
It did not reappear on the floor. It reappeared in the rafters, ten feet away from him, its shifting, shadowy form unfolding in the darkness like a nightmare unfurling.
The fight, if it could be called that, was a confusing, terrifying, and utterly one-sided affair. Zero drew his knife, a useless sliver of steel against a creature of smoke and static. He lunged, his movements precise, aiming for a point he knew should be a vital organ. His blade passed through nothing, the creature's form becoming completely intangible at the moment of impact.
The beast, however, was not bound by the same rules. Its shadowy limbs struck with a solid, bone-jarring force. A multi-jointed appendage, looking like a spider's leg woven from pure darkness, lashed out and slammed into Zero's shoulder. The pain was a bright, explosive flare, and the impact sent him crashing from the rafters.
He fell, a sickening, twenty-foot drop, his body twisting in the air. He landed hard on the stone floor below, his already-injured ribs screaming in protest, the shock of the impact driving the air from his lungs. He lay there, gasping, his vision swimming, the world a blur of pain and confusion.
He had failed. His logic, his analysis, his clever kinetic tricks—they were all useless. He was an analyst, a strategist, and he had just encountered an enemy whose very existence was a paradox, a walking, killing embodiment of chaos that defied all analysis.
It was at that moment that the main doors of the Crimson Altar finally gave way. They burst inward with a deafening, groaning tear of ancient metal, and the yellow, torch-lit forms of Tarsus and his men began to pour into the chamber.
The Glimmer-Hulk, momentarily distracted by the new intrusion, let out another psychic shriek and glimmered down to the center of the room, positioning itself between the Watchmen and the altar, its form swelling with a new, aggressive energy.
This was his chance. His only chance.
Zero ignored the searing pain in his shoulder, the fire in his lungs. He pushed himself to his feet and, with a final, desperate surge of adrenaline, he made a humiliating tactical retreat. He scrambled to the open sewer grate and dove through it, plunging into the darkness below just as the first sounds of the chaotic, three-way battle began to erupt in the chamber above.
He landed in the shallow, filthy water of the sewer tunnel, the splash a sound of pure, undeniable defeat. He was wounded, outmatched, and for the first time, he had encountered a problem that his mind, his greatest weapon, could not solve. The hunt was a failure. He was back to being the prey.