The world below didn't yet know what had happened. Not fully. But the damage was there—etched into the bones of Manhattan, scrawled across the skyline like a scar. Entire blocks lay in rubble. Flames still rose from shattered rooftops. Sirens blared like cries for help no one could answer. And in the sky above, two godlike men had rewritten the course of history.
Only one returned.
Maxwell descended slowly through the clouds, body limp with exhaustion. He didn't fly—he floated, hovering just above the shattered ground as though afraid to touch it. Ash coated his cape. His boots were cracked. His gloves long gone.
People looked up.
Some cheered.
Others wept.
Many simply stared, unable to decide if the man before them was a hero or something else entirely.
Government agents were already on the scene. Journalists with cameras. Soldiers with wide eyes and trembling hands. No one approached.
Marvelo-Man landed in what was once Times Square. He could barely hear the voices—just a rush of white noise in his ears.
Elijah's last words rang louder.
You should've left me be. This is all your fault.
Maxwell looked around. Children clutching their mothers. Men screaming for loved ones in the wreckage. Bodies pulled from burning cars.
And he had stopped it.
Hadn't he?
A man in a military coat stepped forward. "Sir? What happened up there?"
Maxwell didn't answer.
He walked.
Through the devastation.
Through the smoke and the debris.
And when someone called him "hero," he didn't turn.
He only kept walking.
Past the flags. Past the praise. Past the headlines being scribbled in real time.
He walked because he couldn't stop.
Because stopping meant feeling.
And he didn't know if he could bear that yet.
Above him, the moon hung still in the sky.
Silent.
Watching.