Chest Island’s Doctor, Crank Getz
Getz’s Clinic
INSIDE the clinic’s cellar after Grinzam had left, Getz stitched together the slice in Erie’s chest, though she no longer moved.
“Don’t die, Erie!”
He understood the soul of the girl he knew was gone, but her body wasn’t dead yet. Without the cube that powered her body, Erie’s vitals were nearly nonexistent. Combined with the amount of blood she had lost, her chances of survival were close to nil.
But Getz didn’t want to give up on her. His sickly wife, his daughter born with the same illness, and the Golem bearing the same name as his daughter—having failed to save every person most dear to him, Getz could only think, Like hell am I going to go through that horrible experience again…!
Regret inevitably filled him for failing to stop Erie from confronting Grinzam. Thinking back, his life was full of regrets. That was why he was doing whatever he could in this dire moment. Impelled by those feelings, Getz treated Erie to the best of his ability.
After a strenuous procedure, he finished her stitches. The anesthetics affected her pulse, weakening it to a dangerous level. Getz began preparing for a blood transfusion despite the odds. As he prepared the IV, he suddenly saw something move out of the corner of his eye.
Is something here?! He spun toward what had moved. It sat up in the corner of the room—the boy, who had stopped moving entirely after the cube was removed from Erie’s chest, sat up.
“Heath?!”
Heath, covered from head to toe in red Engrave Incantations, began to move once more.
“I-Impossible! You have no Tamer now…”
Despite decades of research into Fresh Golems, this was a first for Getz. He had never seen a Golem, berserker or otherwise, move without a Tamer.
Heath picked the knife up off the floor and looked at Getz. Getz froze, his muscles stiffening. Heath merely gave a tiny bow and quietly ascended the stairs.
✦ ✦ ✦
“Wh-What was that?!”
Lightning flashed through Getz when he saw Heath bow. His mind went straight to one conclusion, as he was the very man who had concluded that Berserker Golems evolve into a separate life-form.
“It can’t be…”
A Berserker Golem was liberated from the Restrictor placed on their bodies. They attacked their Tamers to free themselves from the final Restrictor—their link to the Tamer.
But Erie’s soul was long gone. Grinzam had taken the embodiment of who she had been this past year and embedded it in Sephiroth. Her red cube, Getz knew, was most assuredly inside Sephiroth now.
The last Restrictor binding Heath had vanished. Without anything to bind it, a life had been born in the truest sense of the word.
“That’s Erie and Heath’s…”
That was no Golem—no embryo. It was a person born of Heath’s body, the father, and granted life by Erie, the mother.
It was their child.
✦ ✦ ✦
Cliff
CLIFF and Lovel returned to the Church to find Sephiroth destroying the tall perimeter fence, trying to force his way inside the grounds. Chaos fell once again upon the Church that had sat stiller than death after the last battle.
“God save us all! What is that monstrosity?!”
“Is it a Golem?! Who’s controlling it?!”
Screams and shouts could be heard from inside Church grounds. Some of the Rabbis were still around.
Dram entered the Church complex through the chapel and raced through the winding corridors until he exited into the center courtyard, where the Great Bell Tower loomed. The archipelago would perish if this tower was destroyed.
“Where’s Sephiroth?!”
Cliff and Lovel wildly scanned the area until they saw something jump over the building surrounding them on all sides. The silver giant landed on the ground inside the courtyard with a deafening BOOM! Cliff felt the shockwaves through the ground twenty meters away.
Cliff stared speechless up at its mighty form. Sephiroth softly lowered Grinzam and Jair down from his arm.
Cliff and Lovel weren’t the only ones out in the courtyard trying to protect the Great Bell Tower. One of the elders, clad in magnificent vestments smeared with blood, staggered from the shadow of the tower.
He was one of the Church elders who often gave sermons inside the chapel. A Brass Golem, just under two meters tall and dressed in knight’s armor, stood at his side.
The elder glared at Sephiroth and strained his hoarse voice to shout, “I won’t let you heathens get away with this…! Do it, Saint Rollins! Defeat Sephiroth!”
Obeying his voice, the Golem bestowed with the name of the archipelago drew his sword of gold. Sephiroth’s spear flashed as Saint Rollins lunged.
The spear cut through the air in an ear-piercing whoosh, eclipsed only by the shriek of metal. The Brass Golem’s sword and head were severed in a single blow.
“Oh…” the elder uttered in a dumbfounded voice. The headless Golem slowly collapsed onto the ground.
Grinzam watched it fall and bluntly said, “Why are you so surprised? You’re the ones who had this monster created.” His voice had lost its gentle, mild-mannered tone, sounding more like Jair’s. Cliff guessed this was how he spoke when he was still a Rabbi.
“EEEEEKKK!” The elder tripped over his own feet as he tried to flee. Sephiroth swung his spear without mercy. The spear flattened the elder, reducing him to a slab of bloody meat.
“Grinzam…!” Cliff yelled. Cliff and Lovel dismounted Dram and glared at their enemies. Grinzam and Jair slowly turned toward them.
Aru chose then to finally make his late arrival. He hopped over the complex’s tall roof and landed inside the center courtyard. Sandwiched between Sephiroth and Aru, four people exchanged deadly glares.
Her face radiating with anger, Lovel questioned, “…Grinzam, is this what you wanted?”
“This isn’t all I wanted. My true objective comes after the Church’s demise.”
“Your true objective?”
“I’m going to bring back two lost lives: Jair’s and yours,” Grinzam said, heading for the Great Bell Tower. He opened the door as he gave his final command. “Jair, this is my last order for you. Use Sephiroth to destroy this Great Bell Tower—with me in it.”
“What?!” Cliff and Lovel frowned. Only Jair nodded, his face flat and devoid of emotion. “Grinzam, what are you trying to do…?”
Grinzam spoke to Jair without answering Cliff. “I’m counting on you. Once you finish this, you will be Asusrad Grinzam.”
The tower door shut and Grinzam vanished within, leaving Cliff and Lovel behind. Jair looked up at the bell tower, as if contemplating something.
Cliff addressed the side of his face, “Jair…no, Master Roche.”
Jair turned around slowly. No expression showed on his face.
“You’re Master Roche, aren’t you? I heard all about how you used to be Grinzam’s disciple.”
Jair didn’t answer.
Cliff looked at Aru and said, “Do you remember when you created this Prime Body with me? We said we’d bring him to life someday, but today he moved thanks to Lovel.”
Memories of his time with Roche flickered through Cliff’s mind as he spoke. He pressed on, to break free of the nostalgia. “Master Roche, didn’t you once tell me, ‘The girl I love lives on Head Island. That’s why I worked my butt off to enroll in the Academy’? I can now really understand how you felt. So, I will be the one to stop you, for Lovel’s sake too.”
Lovel nodded in agreement. Then Jair, who had kept quiet, finally spoke. “…How many times must I tell you for it to sink in, your Master Roche is no more.”
Cliff thought he heard something sentimental in his voice.
“I am Asusrad Grinzam’s other self. Jair is merely a name used for convenience’s sake while Grinzam’s still alive.”
“You’re another version of Grinzam…?!” Cliff couldn’t believe his ears.
“But I can tell you were a very important person to Roche. It’s the least I can do out of respect to you both to crush you with all the power at my disposal,” Jair said. Sephiroth brandished his spear. Aru stepped forward to protect Cliff and Lovel.