AN: Short chapter this time, forgive me! Getting things to their final stages though. So, ENJOY!

ARC Nine: Infinite Crisis

Chapter Ninety Six: Shaula and Flugel

She was the first to notice it.

A young indigo haired girl, a cute sight to behold.

Meili was her name.

She was safe from the onslaught of disasters that had come to take their lives…

But it was the very cause of which that had her slightly troubled by it. Wandering around, the roses around her feet, she looked and looked...but it was quite evident.

"Where did Shaula onee-chan go?"

She seemed hurt, both of her most important friends...were nowhere nearby.

Petra had been doing her best to ease Otto of the turmoil in his heart. She patted his back as he looked up in the sky…

"Wait...huh…"

Then Petra felt tears escape her eyes. She rubbed them, trying to stop the action in its place, but it didn't. She then noticed Otto was crying as well, leaving him confused as well.

Then she heard a footstep behind her, she glanced back and saw Meili…

"Meili-chan?"

"Wh-"

The indigo blue hair girl named Meili had tears trickling down her cheeks.

She looked at her palms as the watery drops splashed on them.

"Why...Am I Crying?"

Neither of them knew.

But they all feared the worst of outcomes, which could only instill them with anxiety.

Shaula floated over to Subaru, making him back away slowly in return.

She seemed hurt by his action, holding her hands as if they felt pain.

"Flugel sensei...what are you doing?"

"The only thing that is going to save us all from the impending disaster that is...my love."

"Love?"

He nodded to her confusion.

"Satella. She's the reason I've kept going for the last four hundred years."

"But-"

"-Shaula."

She was a bit happy to hear her name again, but tensed up when he uncrossed his arms.

"I gave you the duty of protecting the tower did I not?"

"Yes...but it was destroyed by this 'Society' we've all been fighting."

"It doesn't matter."

"HUH?"

He spread his arms wide in a powerful motion.

"I had you protect the tower...for the sole reason of Satella."

"R-Right to keep her sealed away and have the star kept away from others unworthy of it, right?"

"...NO."

Emilia was just as surprised to hear this as well, though Shaula seemed to be trembling from his harsh tone.

"I had you protecting Satella from those idiots from the Witch's Cult, especially Petelgeuse, that idiot. He couldn't even do his job properly, but oh well. Besides that, the star inside the tower was meant to be used by me someday...to summon whoever was going to be the vessel to her. I would say I'm lucky she summoned me when I got trapped in this body."

"S-Sensei. What you're saying isn't normal, like at all."

She thought of the moments she had of learning magic from him, speaking with the dragon, running away from a teasing Reid...of her having her hand taken by his and led into a new wide world.

"The sensei I know...the Sensei that I love, wouldn't be speaking like this!"

"Maybe...but the Sensei you know died the moment he became trapped in this body. When he became stuck inside NATSUKI SUBARU!"

"Th-Then let me help you! I can see if-"

"-Shaula, stop it!"

She became terrified by the crazed look stuck on Subaru's face.

"I have waited two decades trying to get control of this body, and now that I have...I know what has to be done."

He slapped his cheeks loudly and with intensity, making them bright red.

"I have to let Satella possess Emilia. Once that occurs then I can be with her, we can sit in our own dimension or even atop some random mountain...once that happens, once that happens, then she'll stop her rampage. We can be together."

"But...BUT! The Anti-Monitor will keep destroying everything! Are you just-"

"-Sit around while it happens? Yeah."

Her eyes widened to a terrifying point, simply unbelieving of his words to her.

"I refuse to protect a world that stigmatized my woman, her people and used their own bigoted views to wipe out entire species. I was friends with giants, onis, steel humans, wolf men, SO TELL ME WHERE THEY ARE?!"

"I…"

"I'll tell you! They're all are either wiped out or on the verge of extinction! And you want me to save a world like that?! THIS WORLD CAN GO TO HELL!"

Shaula floated back away from his cold and angry voice.

"Sensei...you've...gone mad."

"MAD? Heh, probably. But after all the stuff I was forced to watch alongside Subaru, one of us had to go crazy."

Emilia shook her head and had a theory.

Through Return By Death, Subaru was forced to helplessly watch as many of his friends and loved ones died around him, failed to be saved or even died horribly in order to save them.

The trauma would not be an easy thing to overcome.

However, Subaru always seems to be his bright and usual self many times in the resulting days.

So what happened to the haunting memories?

The painful trauma?

The mental scars?

Simple.

Flugel took the brunt of trauma.

And combined with his already fragile psyche...he at some point snapped inside of Subaru. When did it occur? At what point?

That was unimportant to them at this pivotal moment.

What was...was that the Great Sage had gone insane and was now their enemy. In essence...

...THE LAST SOCIETY MEMBER.

Emilia saw her chance summoning her ice dragon attack and blasting it straight it Subaru. He narrowed his eyes at it...forming a light boomerang above his hand and launching it straight at it. They collided, breaking both attacks apart. Emilia charged forward, creating two ice handcuffs in an attempt to stop his movement.

Only to be stopped by a pleading Shaula.

"Shaula-san?!"

"Please stop! Sensei, he...he isn't himself right now!"

Then she created a rift in front of Emilia, transporting her back to her starting point. Shaula created a spear of light, possibly in an attempt to keep Emilia at bay. Emilia summoned countless weapons around herself, all of their points aimed at Shaula.

She launched them, forcing Shaula to spin the spear around rapidly, breaking them apart seamlessly. Emilia got close to her and created a short sword, clashing with her spear.

"Shaula-san, please! I have to save Subaru!"

"And I have to protect Flugel-sensei!"

They struck at each other, but even Emilia was being overwhelmed by her strength.

"Flugel is...THE SAGE IS GOING TO GET EVERYONE KILLED!"

"NO! I'll talk him out of it! Sensei is a kind person! He's just not thinking straight!"

"...?!"

"You'll see! Everyone will see how great my sensei can be!"

Her forced smile was met with a look of concern from Emilia...only for Subaru to show up behind Shaula.

"Shaula…"

"Yes?"

She didn't turn around, but smiled a bit with excitement to be acknowledge by him.

"You have done an excellent job being the guardian of the tower. You've become so strong, so beautiful and capable. I can easily say...I am proud of you."

"Sensei…"

She blushed intensely hearing him say this to her.

His green eye, his robotic one...they reflected her back...and for a moment, he did remember the day he took her from her shabby living and made her his apprentice.

He smiled.

"But I can't have you hurting Emilia that badly. I need her in top form."

"Sensei? What do you-"

Before he punched her through the stomach.

"But you've outlived your usefulness. Thank you for your hard work."

She coughed out some blood before she flung forward, being caught by Emilia.

"Shaula! Shaula!"

She began healing her with everything she had, as Subaru looked at his hand, which was gravity infused.

"Graviton Strike. I bet Subaru would've called it that. Heh."

Though he did feel his muscles ache a bit from the stress of the added gravity, so he deactivated it.

Emilia then noticed Subaru was behind her. In front of her, the Subaru there shattered like glass.

"Authority of Vainglory. Let's see...I bet he'd call it 'Prestige Illusion' not as powerful as Pandora's skills or attacks, but it could have some use. Still, the idea that someone has to look away for a second for it to activate, is kind of problematic…"

He reached his hand out and touched the back of Emilia's head.

"I'm sorry you had to see me dispose of her like that."

Then he looked down and saw Shaula looking up at him.

"But...But I love you...I did everything for you…"

"I know you did. But right now Satella is more important to me."

"Even me?"

"Shaula…"

He closed his green eye and looked down at her with his robotic one.

"You are...just a pawn. I can't love a pawn now can I?"

Those words stung her with more agony and pain than any other. She began to cry painfully. She sobbed and wailed.

Her world was crashing down as she knew it. Emilia felt such sadness for her. She couldn't imagine what it would be like to hear those words from the one you loved…

"Now take a nap Emilia."

He knocked her out with a sudden shockwave, he held her in his arms. Looking down at a still slightly injured Shaula...he softly tapped her away, letting the sobbing girl hold her face as she continued to float away.

Subaru caressed Emilia.

Looking at her face.

"She really does look...like her."

So he kissed her passionately.

"It feels different, then just being forced to watch."

He even went as far as to sniff her silver hair and even suck on some strands of it.

"Woah, woah."

He stopped himself, getting to better collect himself.

"I need to compose myself...besides, she is almost here."

He looked back and saw the door that would lead them to the next step in his plans.

"Hurry, hurry. I am here for you….SATELLA."

Flugel forced the face of his possessed self, to smile.

Anti-Monitor glared down at what he considered nothing more than insects, so he threw punch out at them, only for Superman to return the favor and punch his fist. The resulting shockwave nearly knocked everyone back. Black Adam fired countless lightning bolts at him, but it only slightly pushed him back before he fired a massive beam from his mouth. Both Batmen opened a tear in space, making the beam miss them and having it crash into the mountain nearby the House of Mystery.

Superman and Black Adam tackled him, but his slammed the both of them through some branches of the Algol Tree.

But it was the sudden pain in their heads and hearts that made them panic. Descending down was a woman who looked exactly like Emilia, but clothed in dark attire, surrounded in dark energy.

Everyone was trembling, they knew exactly who it was.

She tilted her head at them for a moment, before she moved away and opened a door next to her...it was the very door needed to get to where SUbaru and Emilia were.

But everyone was being incapacitated by her Miasma…

As the door opened, they realized they were going to miss their opportunity.

Until Deathstroke ran forward and stabbed her through the neck and tossed her away.

"IDIOTS! What the hell are you waiting for?! GO!"

Batman nodded before he gave his orders.

"Rem! Frederica! Sarah! Fate! Come with me! The rest of you, get back to Earth and warn the others!"

Batman grabbed the mentioned party, while Fate handed Daphne to Minerva, nodding to them as he flew back to his own group. Daphne reached out to him, but sure enough a portal was beginning to open behind them.

The Anti-Monitor then had energy flow around himself as he began to laugh. Then the branches of the tree began to move…

"The time for the truth of all things to be revealed is here! I will attain the powers! I will unleash them! AND I WILL DESTROY THE UNNECESSARY MULTIVERSE! I WILL FIND THE SOURCE OF EVERYTHING!"

Batman and his group made a break for the door, only to see Satella glaring at them...before her head was shot by countless bullets...then she appeared to have no damage.

She snarled a bit as hundreds of Unseen Hands formed around her, her dark energy had purple eyes like her own staring out the perpetrator.

"Ohhhh. Huhuhu, so scary."

Deathstroke aimed his sword and assault rifle at her.

"I'm taking you on, Witch of Envy."

"Subaru...Flugel...not them...then die...die...die, die, die, die, rot, rot, disappear!"

As the two faced each other, Superman and Black Adam saw that outside the coid, the branches shot out into the vast reaches of space…

Anti-Monitor held out his hands.

"Let us end this pointless conflict."

Seeing victory in the distance, Anti-Monitor leered down at Superman and Black Adam.

"Nuisances must be stomped out though."

The branches continued forward, nearing an infinitely large structure that was at the very edge of the universe.

Meanwhile, everyone back on Earth, seemed to notice something very troubling, Halibel being the first to speak about it.

"Uh, um...is the ground shaking?"

It was.

The final moments of this destructive conflict was nearly at reach.

AN: Next time; death, destruction and the truth for all of existence?! Chapter 97! "The Source of Everything." SEE YA THEN...