**Chapter 39 – The Future That Killed Elara Millions of Times**
Elara lifted her face.
Her storm-gray eyes were dead.
Empty.
As if they had seen hell and could never see light again.
— I held Lysithea while she died in my arms…
She smiled at me… with blood in her mouth… and said "take care of my girls"… and died.
I saw Mirella broken like a twig… she looked at me and said "run, Elara"… before her neck was twisted.
Graciela… was crushed screaming my name… until her last breath.
Sylvara was dragged by the hair… screaming for me.
Rina was chained like an animal… her eyes… I will never forget those eyes.
Lirien… they tore out her eyes… to use her visions…
Kuroe… was cut open alive on an altar of Loki…
Astrid… they broke her in the mines until she turned to dust…
Marina… they drowned her in a tank… she reached her little hand out to me… and I didn't get there in time…
Elara clutched her own chest as if she were going to rip out her heart.
— I walked the world with all of you dead inside me.
I killed everything that moved.
I screamed your names at the moon every night… until my voice disappeared.
I died a thousand times in battles no one will ever know about…
and came back just to suffer again.
I carried the weight of not being strong enough…
of not saving a single one of you…
She looked at Joker and Harley.
Two small children.
Innocent.
Who should never have existed.
— You two… are the miracle I begged for on my knees in blood… and never received.
You saved my family…
before I even came back to try to save them.
I trained… suffered… destroyed myself…
to return and find that you had already done everything.
I am so happy…
and so broken…
because all my suffering…
was in vain…
and at the same time…
it was what brought me back to you all alive…
She collapsed.
Face to the ground.
Sobs that seemed to tear pieces from her soul.
Her entire body convulsing as if she were dying right there.