"Aaron?" Kat whispered. "Are you still there?"

Aaron didn't respond. He remained as still as a statue, keeping his hand on Kat's so she couldn't fire her gun. He looked angry as he gazed into her eyes, but he wasn't. In fact, he felt nothing. It was a struggle for him just to show emotions now thanks to the Ambrosia.

"I'm not sure if you remember, but it's me. It's Kat. Katrina Mathis? We met back in London. I was thirteen and you were twelve. If I recall, I stabbed a man in the leg and the world started ending. I mean, it didn't end because I stabbed that guy in the leg, but—"

"I remember you, Kat," Aaron replied with the same playful snark he used when he was alive.

"Oh shit, you are still there," Kat chuckled.

Aaron lowered his hand, simultaneously lowering hers as well. He nudged the gun away from him until she timidly holstered it. However, she kept the tip of her fingers on the holster just in case if she had to pull it back out.

"What are you doing here?" Aaron asked.

"Trying to find your evidence," Kat replied. "Believe it or not, Shaw suggested I find this."

"Are you sure he wasn't just trying to get you killed?"

"Are you kidding? I'm the reason our squad even managed to last over an hour. In fact, I bet they're probably being picked off one by one as we speak now that I'm gone."

"Then get out of here. Get to safety."

Kat raised an eyebrow. "Excuse me?"

"You got everything you need. Get out of here. I'm this close to getting revenge on Schaefer, but it's too dangerous to be around me while this is happening."

"What the hell, Aaron? You make this sound like it's normal. Like if nothing's different."

"Kat, my problem here is that everything going on right now is not normal, which, in a way, makes it normal. I've just accepted it."

"How can you accept any of this as normal?" Kat asked angrily. "Matheson is under a Deadman siege, you've turned into Wolverine, you're ripping Schaefer's limbs off like nothing, and you've teamed up with a wanker who kinda looks like Wolverine!"

"Yeah, that's just Bloodletter. Believe it or not, he actually felt like taking off his helmet today."

"Stop trying to make light of this!"

"I'm not making light of it. I just stopped caring."

Kat froze. Her anger transformed into disappointment. Had Aaron really becoming this apathetic?

"But I still care about you, Kat," Aaron continued. "I have enough memories intact to know who to trust and enough empathy to avoid killing for kicks. For your sake, I need you to get to safety please."

Kat ignored him and took a swing at his face, nailing him in the eye. He shook it off like nothing. "Don't know what that was all about," he said. "But I bet the DZI needs you more than I do."

"Shut up!" Kat screamed, her eyes getting watery.

"It's too late to save me, Kat. But you've still got a chance to save yourself."

"I said shut up!" She punched him again. Once again, he remained unmoved.

"Take it out on me all you'd like. I feel nothing. But that's the difference between you and me. I'm a dead man walking. You've still got years to live. You've got things to do, feelings to feel, people to love."

"All the people I loved are either gone or have betrayed me!" Kat screamed. "All of them, except you!"

"Kat," Aaron spoke softly. "I'm gone, too."

Kat leaned her head down as tears drifted down her cheeks. She turned around so Aaron wouldn't be able to see her, but he could still hear that she was hurt.

Jonah stood beside Aaron, watching with a broken heart as one of the bravest people he had ever met had finally lost hope. Aaron wanted to feel sorrow, but he still couldn't. He knew he should've felt heartbroken, but he also knew he needed a heart in the first place.

"She can't be here, bruv," Jonah told Aaron. "She's got too much to live for." He moved away from Jonah and placed his hand on her shoulder. Even though he knew she couldn't see, hear, or feel him, he still tried to comfort her.

"Jonah misses you, Kat," Aaron said. "He really does."

"Does he really?" Kat asked, obviously not believing him. "Or did he just tell you to say that?"

"Believe it or not, I said that before his ghost appeared. Right now he's got his hands wrapped around you. He really misses you."

Kat paused. "Could you tell him...he's not that bad of a kisser?"

Aaron didn't say anything nor did he want to. He just waited as Jonah's spirit did a little victory dance right next to him.

"I can't tell if you're being sarcastic," Aaron replied. "But I think he knows."

Kat bolted toward Aaron and threw her arms around him. She let the sobs out again, finally ready to leave. Aaron still couldn't make himself feel empathy, but he did what he could and patted her on the back.

"I'm gonna miss you," she whimpered, still hugging him.

"I already miss you," Aaron replied. "Do what I couldn't do. Change the world. Show them what Schaefer has done."

Kat let go and wiped away her tears. "I will."

Before she could walk away, Aaron placed his hand on her shoulder. "Kat."

"Yes?"

"Remember a few days ago when I considered using the sniper rifle, but I let you take it? The one you have strapped to your back?"

"Yes," Kat replied nervously.

"I'm gonna need it."

Kat quietly stripped the rifle off her back and handed it over to Aaron.

"One more thing," he said. "I need you to run back to my flat to get my journal and take it with you to Lovecraft. For sentimental reasons."

Kat nodded silently as she picked the case of evidence off the ground.

"Take these with you, too," Aaron said as he pulled his old drawings out from his pockets. He nearly forgot he even had those.

"Let me guess," Kat said, still trying to choke back tears. "Another way to bring back painful memories?"

"Actually, these ones are important. Those are the few Deadmen I met during these last couple of days. I was hoping you could show them to Lovecraft's DZI to let them know they're not your enemies."

Kat formed a small grin on her face, and she took the crumpled papers from Aaron and carefully stuffed them into her pocket. "You've got it, mate," she said.

"Well," Aaron paused. "I guess this is goodbye."

"I don't like goodbyes," Kat replied. "How about see you later?"

"Fine with me." Aaron turned around and walked in the opposite direction of Kat. "See you later, Kat."

Kat flashed her smile one more time before disappearing into the stairwell with the evidence. Now that she was out of sight, she was free to shed another tear.

* * *

It was hard to believe Aaron and Kat were able to say their farewells and go their separate ways without any distractions. There were two noises filling the air of the top floors of Matheson: Bloodletter's maniacal laughter and Schaefer's agonizing screams. That bite mark was the biggest game-changer of Schaefer's life, in that it marked the end of his game. He finally remembered what the feeling of being human was like.

He was leaned against the wall, his body laced with lacerations as a result of Bloodletter's crimson blades. There were cuts stretching across his arms, legs, and even his face and a critical one on his torso that was the biggest source of his blood loss. His left leg was broken, the fibula penetrating through his skin. He was starting to resemble the Deadmen he used to hunt: pale-skinned, dark-veined, and neither living nor dead.

"You know what I hate most about killing you, Schaefer?" Bloodletter asked, waving his blade around. "I only get to do it once."

He plunged his blade into Schaefer's stomach, resulting in another one of his harrowing screams. Once he pulled it back out, he took a disturbing amount of blood with him, splashing it all over Schaefer's clothes and the floor in front of him.

"You and the others never had a reason to live!" Schaefer exclaimed as he clenched his wounds with his hands.

"Maybe you're right," Bloodletter replied. "Maybe you're not. But we certainly didn't have a reason to die. In fact..." He paused to twirl his sword around. "This is for Sarah."

With a quick swipe, Schaefer was depleted of his broken leg. He screamed again.

"This is for Artemis," Bloodletter continued. Another swipe of his blade resulted in the removal of Schaefer's right arm.

"Just kill me!" Schaefer screamed. "Please!"

"This is for Edgar."

Another swipe of his blade. Schaefer lost everything on his right leg below his knee.

"Don't you dare bring my son into this!" Schaefer cried.

"And this..." Bloodletter crushed one blade into red dust and placed his hands around the remaining one, preparing to run Schaefer through. "This is for everyone else."

He dug the blade into Schaefer's sternum. He tried to scream again but only managed a choke as the oxygen vanished from his lungs. In an instant he grew extremely pale, to the point he looked like a ghost. Bloodletter raised him above the floor like a prized fish.

"Tell me something," Bloodletter spoke in a soft but sinister tone. "Before I blow both us along with half of this tower to bits, I've always wanted to ask. Why did you kill Sarah?"

Schaefer didn't respond. His breaths grew slower, probably the last few he would ever take.

"What did you want to accomplish from that? Was this a part of your Ambrosia Project or were you just bored?"

"I..." Schaefer replied slowly, declaring his last words. "I...just wanted...to break someone I'd thought...could never be broken..."

Schaefer's head sunk back, and he hung limply on Bloodletter's blade. He was unconscious, passed out from blood loss.

"Congratulations," Bloodletter said. "It worked."

He bit into his wrist and let some of his blood spill out before transforming it into his infamous floating bombs, spreading them around him like bubbles. However, one remained hovering in the palm of his hand and it glowed bigger and brighter than any other. He let it stay above his hand and watched as it grew in power and size. He was hoping to disappear with his enemy now that he had finally got him.

"Daddy," Sarah told him, her ghost standing beside him. "Are we going home?"

"Yes, darling. It's finally happening."

Then Bloodletter spotted Aaron standing behind the rails of the ninth floor on the opposite side of the building, aiming his sniper rifle at him.

"I'm not stopping you, lad!" Bloodletter shouted. "In fact, here!" He raised the biggest crimson sphere so Aaron could have a clear shot. "Here's your target! You shoot this and you'll never have to see me or Schaefer ever again." 

Aaron didn't speak. He only cocked his rifle.

"Do it, O'Connor. Reunite me with what I've lost."

Struck with brief sympathy for this monster, Aaron took his shot. And once the bullet struck the crimson sphere, the top of Matheson was obliterated by a series of explosions. Aaron bolted down the stairs to avoid the impact, the whole tower rumbling like an earthquake. Fire and debris rained down on the people below in the Commons.

Bloodletter and Schaefer, the two most dangerous people in the Dead Zone, were finally gone.