It had been what many would define as a long day. For Dominic Dusk, also known as Albert Lichtenstein it had been pretty average. He had grown up in a superhero household, and underwent his own training. Gained his own powers, had his own life fall apart. It's part of what drove him in this life. He allowed his mind to wander as he walked the streets, as Evening gave way to Dusk.

He knew the way to Paloma's apartment, when she first went missing he had staked the place out. First in the hope that she had found her wayward lover, and had just spent the time catching up and forgot to tell him. Then as the weeks turned to months in the hopes that there would be some indication on what had happened to her. The letter arriving at his office with the two envelopes within it granting him power of attorney and asking him to settle her affairs should the worse happen wasn't the most positive sign, but he had still held out hope. That's why he started this job, well. After what happened in the police between him and-

"Shit."

Walking with the flow of pedestrian traffic he turned his attention to his jacket, going from one pocket to the next. Personal cell, keys, Palomas keys, pad, pencil... He pulled his work cell from his pocket and nearly winced at the number of notifications he had. Missed calls, voicemails, emails, texts. Emails were easy, payment notifications, payment missed notifications, deals, spam, the occasional threat from a spouse who he had caught cheating. Texts, there weren't really that many. Mainly missed call notifications.

Dominic put his phone up to his ear as he went through his voicemail, his feet followed an unmarked path through the other people walking the streets. They had thinned out for a while as he walked the streets, Palomas apartment was far enough away that he should really have used some form of transport. That said he did his best thinking while he was on his feet, walking the streets. Guided as if by instinct, he flicked through the messages. Only one today was someone demanding payment, which was a nice surprise. Everything else was the usual. Jaded lovers, what definitely wasn't an attempt to get blackmail material on the mayor, trade secrets. Amongst these jobs, there was always something. Always one request that reminded him why he did what he did, and as if on cue the very last message loaded in:

"Hi. Um… hi. This is Joanie. Joanie Porter. I… I’m not sure if you remember me. You came by the St. Dymphna’s a while back. The group home. You gave me your card when you left.

Anyway. We need your help. Look there’s a chance we’re just overreacting but one of kids here has gone missing and we don’t know what else to do. My friends and I have been trying to look for him ourselves but it is getting… I just have a feeling this is more than just a kid running away.

Can you give me a call back when you can? Even if it is just to tell me I am overreacting. I would take that right now.”

It stopped him in his tracks. St Dymphnas wasn't just a home where unwanted or runaway children ended up. It was a home where unwanted or runaway children that were grays ended up. Arguements with his father, and occasionally William, had led him to spend a few nights there over the years. Largely because his best friend Alex had been a resident. In his professional life the occasional lost kid case led him there. Some, with loving parents who actually want them to help, he found. Others, who were escaping abuse or neglect, strangely evaded him.

A missing kid from a home of missing kids, a kid who was probably a gray. Dusks gut churned unhappily, it wasn't unusual for kids to either move on or move home unexpectedly but they usually told someone or left a note somewhere. The fact that his peers were looking for him, at a time where Grays were disappearing with frightening regulatory... He saved the voicemail as he approached Palomas building and made a reminder on his personal cell to phone her back in the morning.

Looking up at the nice high-rise Dusk smiled to himself, he remembered the first time Paloma described her place. Nice building, nice neighbourhood but there was always something about it that upset and plagued her. When he first visited her apartment, while spacious with grand views. It wasn't the top floor.

The Docks district was waking up around them as the trio made their way through the tight streets and old brick buildings. Delivery vans rolled past, their engines rumbling against the brickwork, and they passed groups of people heading about their day. A pair of dog walkers chatted outside a corner shop. A cyclist weaved through a line of parked cars. Someone swept outside a café, sending the smell of warm bread into the air. The pavement still held the cool of the night, but the sun was already warming the tops of the warehouse roofs, turning the windows into pale gold mirrors. The whole neighbourhood felt like it was stretching its limbs after sleep.

Joanie followed suit. They’d gotten home late last night from the Slats, which maybe hadn’t been the best idea given she was due to start her new job at Old Prue Gables in half an hours time. She was surprised the others had dragged themselves out of bed to join her on her walk in this morning. She had a good group of friends.

Trey was currently mid-way through his rant, which he did every year during the draft season.

“The Calder Coyotes have lost their minds,” he moaned, hands tucked into his pockets. “Drafting Harker over Quinn? Ridiculous. I could run that team better than half their management.”

“You can barely run your own life.” Mina laughed, rolling her eyes.

“I’d still do a better job,” Trey insisted. “Give me a clipboard and a headset and I’d turn that team around in a week.”

“You can’t even skate!” Mina exclaimed.

Joanie let out a quiet laugh. Watching the two of them bicker was a good distraction, something light to hold onto while her nerves twisted in her stomach. Her hands stayed tucked into her sleeves as her gaze drifted toward the road that led to Marth’s family’s bed and breakfast. The thought of starting there today made her chest flutter.

Mina caught the look on her face.

“Hey. How’re you doing?” She asked, playfully bumping her shoulder.
Joanie hesitated.

“I’m nervous.” She confessed, trying to smile. “You didn’t have to walk me there, though. I appreciate it, but you really didn’t need to.”

“We wanted to,” Mina said. “It’s a big day.”

Trey nudged her lightly with his elbow from the other side. “And after your shift, we’re getting food. I’m starving already.”

“You’re always starving,” Mina said.

Joanie breathed out slowly. For a moment, everything felt simple.

Her phone buzzed in her pocket. She pulled it out and frowned as she read the name of the sender.

Caleb.

Good luck today. You’ll do amazing.

Joanie stopped walking as her stomach tightened. He had messaged her a few times since their meeting at Sandra’s the other day, apologising for everything that happened. She had ignored every single one. So how on earth did he know about her new job?

Trey saw her expression change.

“Who’s that?”

Joanie turned the screen so they could see. Mina frowned in response.

“Caleb?” She asked. “What does that asshole want now?”

Joanie locked the phone, shaking her head as she began to move forward again.

“He keeps messaging. I haven’t replied.”

Trey hesitated, then spoke quietly. “I… might know why he texted.”

Joanie froze.

“What?” She asked, turning to look at her friend in confusion.

“I talked to him. Last night.”

“Trey, you didn’t.” Mina gasped, her eyes widening.

“I was worried,” he said. “You’ve been different since Harborlight. And you wouldn’t talk to us. I didn’t know what else to do.”

Joanie’s chest tightened as her pulse jumped.

“I thought you said you had my back.” She exclaimed, her fist tightening slightly. He knew how she felt about Trey. Especially after everything that had happened and everything they had seen. How could he betray her like this? After everything he had said the night before.

Trey’s expression softened, guilt flickering across his face. “I do. That’s why I messaged him. I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”

Mina stepped closer to Joanie.

“Trey, she doesn’t need this right before her shift.”

“I know,” he said softly. “I just want her safe.”

Joanie opened her mouth to answer. To tell him she didn’t need protection. But before she could, a voice interrupted her train of thought, cutting across the street.

“Morning, kids.”

They turned.

A battered white van was parked across the road, half in the shade of an old warehouse. Four figures leaned against it, watching them like they had been there long enough to enjoy the conversation.

She recognised the one who spoke immediately from when Trey had pointed him out to her back at Harborlight. It was Detonator Dane, the club’s champion.

“Seems like we’ve stumbled across something fun.” He jeered, rolling a small metal sphere across his knuckles, tapping it lightly as if daring it to ignite.

The bass hit first.

It rolled through Bret’s chest before he ever reached the entrance, rattling the corrugated steel walls of the converted warehouse like distant artillery.

The sign above the doors simply read:

THRICE

Inside, Calder City’s forgotten youth had found religion.
Hundreds packed shoulder to shoulder beneath rusting girders and hanging speaker arrays. Sweat clung to the air. Guitar feedback screamed across the venue as the lead singer threw himself into another chorus, the crowd erupting into a violent sea of elbows and bodies. Thrice was an alternative music venue in Wicklow that lay in stark contrast to finer sites like The Velvet Room. It was dark, dingy, loud and full of life in all its sacred forms; good and bad.

Bret stood just inside the entrance, rain dripping from the hood of his coat. His phone vibrated once. He pulled it out as So-Mi’s face appeared on the screen in the same pixelated form it had earlier.

“Find him Bret.”

That’s all she said before she disappeared. His pulse quickened. Somewhere inside this crowd, Tae’s phone had finally resurfaced. So-Mi, and her strange and wonderful tech ability had apparently got a ping from it. When pressed why she couldn’t have done that earlier, all she said was that the signal was way too erratic to follow. This further mended credence to an idea that had been forming in Bret’s head for a while now. Tae was using Blood and he was being granted some sort of teleportation ability. Yet, if the church man had to guess, he would think the boy had little to no control over it and was bouncing around like a ping pong ball, making it damn near impossible to track.

Entering Thrice, he handed his coat to the young man at the counter. He was genuinely surprised cloak attendance still existed in this here twenty first century. Bret descended the stairs briskly, the Pilgrim scratching beneath his skin. The crowd below parted and closed in waves around him. Every movement created another possibility, another route. He slipped between dancing bodies with practiced ease, his eyes never stopping, his ears filtering conversations beneath the roar of distorted guitars. There were drug deals, arguments and the laughter that could only be heard from young people in the prime of inebriation.

Then…

A smell, rusted and metallic. Blood.

His head turned sharply. The scent was wrong, it was way too fresh, way too familiar. The Pilgrim whispered danger was close, very close.

A scream tore through the music.

At first almost nobody noticed. Then there was another. People nearest the stage began backing away, not in panic, but confusion. The mosh pit opened unnaturally, like water flowing around a rock. Bret pushed forward as the band faltered. The guitarist stopped playing first. Then the drummer followed.Finally the vocalist turned. His microphone slipped from numb fingers. Standing atop one of the towering speaker stacks, silhouetted against strobing white lights, was something no human mind could immediately understand.

Tall. Far too tall. Its body was all tendon and bone, stretched into proportions evolution had wisely rejected. Digitigrade legs bent beneath it like those of some impossible hunting animal, while jagged antlers rose from a blood-soaked skull, scraping sparks from the lighting rig overhead. Rainwater dripped from matted black hair. Its breathing echoed through the now eerily silent venue. It was less loud than it was heavy.

Bret felt an old word surface from somewhere deep within memory. His grandfather pointing toward distant fells. A story from childhood. A creature glimpsed between ancient trees. A name; Hart. Not a stag but something older, something wilder.

”Bollocks.”

The Hart slowly turned its head, its black eyes swept across hundreds of terrified faces. Then it screamed. The sound was almost human, almost. The venue erupted. Bodies crashed toward every exit simultaneously as people climbed over one another in an attempt to escape. Someone fell. Another disappeared beneath the stampede. The Hart leapt. It didn’t jump. It covered the distance between the speakers and the dance floor in a single impossible bound, landing hard enough to buckle concrete beneath its feet. Panic became chaos.

Bret moved, not toward the creature but toward the people. “LEFT!” His voice cut through the noise. “There!” He grabbed a fallen woman beneath the shoulders and hauled her upright before shoving her toward a side exit. “You two!” A pair of security guards looked at him. “Open the loading bay!” They hesitated.

The Hart crashed through a steel support behind them.

That got them moving.

Another high pitch scream. A lighting truss snapped loose overhead. The Pilgrim had already seen it. Bret sprinted. Three strides. He vaulted a barricade and caught the falling aluminium rig before it crushed a cluster of teenagers. His shoulder exploded with pain. Old injuries reopening beneath fresh strain. It was always in these moments, in the midst of fear, chaos and pain that he wished that he had been gifted with some sort of super strength or durability like nearly everyone else. Instead, he’d have to fork out for more bandages and painkillers and the bloody church didn’t pay him well enough for that to continue.

It didn’t matter in the long run, he had to keep moving.

The Hart hit him from the side, he didn’t even see it coming. The impact launched Bret across the venue. He smashed through an empty merchandise stand before crashing into a stack of spare amplifiers. Everything rang in his head and his vision doubled.

The creature didn’t wait. It was already moving again and it was bloody fast. No, not merely fast. The Hart was erratic. One moment it was galloping across the floor, the next it was clambering halfway up a concrete pillar before then ricocheting sideways across a walls d launching itself toward another fleeing concertgoer.

“No!”

Bret threw himself into its path, using his entire body to knock it off its charge. The antlers missed the civilian by inches. One tine ripped through Bret’s sleeve instead, carving a line of fire across his upper arm. He answered with an elbow beneath the creature’s jaw.Bone met bone. The Hart staggered. He doubted it was from pain, more likely it was from surprise.

Bret didn’t press the attack. He couldn’t. Another section of balcony gave way. More people. Always people first. The fight became movement. The Hart bounded through the venue like a terrified animal, every instinct screaming for escape while its immense strength turned every collision into catastrophe. Bret followed as best he could, reading paths, predicting collapse and redirecting momentum away from the people.

He made a point not to try and chase the creature away, instead only intercepting where innocent lives intersected its panic and trying to herd the Hart away.

A charge sent Bret through a window and into the rain-soaked alley behind the venue. The Hart rounded on him there. For the first time, there was no one else around, just the two of them. Steam rose from the creature’s body as it breathed in ragged, desperate bursts. This was not rage, it was exhaustion, fear. Bret had been around animals enough to know the difference.

He lowered his stance. “I’m not here to hurt you.”

The Hart answered with a broken, mournful cry, then it charged.

The alley became instinct. Brick walls. Fire escapes. Overflowing bins. Every surface was a potential path. Bret slipped beneath slashing claws and kicked off a wall. He twisted around the antlers, running purely on adrenaline and probably one too many energy drinks. He scrambled toward the rusted chain suspending a construction scaffold overhead and with every ounce of strength he had, pulled on it, forcing the steel to snap.

The scaffold crashed down between them, though it did not trap the creature. It did but Bret a few more seconds. The Hart stumbled, trying to get back to its feet. Its movements then changed, becoming slower, its body jerking.

The King’s Blood was burning itself out.

Another step. Its antlers cracked, breaking away from its skull and hitting the floor. A sharp report echoed through the alley. One tine shattered against the pavement. The creature stumbled again then collapsed. Bones began to move, not outward; inward. Legs folded back into human anatomy with wet, sickening pops. The remnants of the antlers splintered, shrinking beneath torn flesh. Muscle receded. Hands returned. The impossible monster shrank into a young man curled on cold concrete, naked save for torn articles of clothing clinging to bloodied skin.

A boy, no older than nineteen, lay bruised, shivering and utterly terrified.

Bret did not even think. He unbuttoned his shirt and pulled it off as quickly as he could, revealing his blood stained torso to be washed by heavens tears from above. He covered the young man up and then leaned back against a wall, trying to catch his breath. He could hear the sirens in the distance, no doubt to quickly be followed by Vanguard’s best and brightest come to take the glory.

The boys eyes fluttered open. “…please…” Barely audible. “I…” His body trembled violently. “…I couldn’t…”

A voice broke through the rain. “Billy?”
Bret turned.

So-Mi stood at the mouth of the alley, soaked through, breathing hard as though she’d sprinted the last mile. Her confidence was gone. In that moment, she looked impossibly young, like the girl who had first appeared to him at St Brigid’s, looking for her brother. She hurried forward, dropping to her knees beside the boy. “…Billy?”

His eyes found her and recognition flickered. “So…” He tried to smile and failed. “…Mi…” She stared at him in disbelief.

“Oh my God…” Her hands hovered uncertainly over his shoulders, afraid to touch him. “I know him,” she whispered, more to herself than Bret. “He… he and Tae used to skateboard outside my apartment.” A tear escaped despite herself. “He’d come over after school.” She laughed once; broken. “He could never beat me at Mario Kart…”

Bret leaned his head against the wall, the heat from fresh wounds beginning to sizzle on his skin as whatever chemical inside him that allowed him to carry on, evaporated. Silence settled over the alley for a brief moment as the weather masked the sirens. Rain washed diluted blood toward the drains.

Among the shattered concrete lay a single broken antler. Ivory. Still warm. Bret looked at Billy. Then at So-Mi. Then at the fragment of the Hart resting on the floor. And he came to two realisations.

The first was that So-Mi had been right before when she said he needed help. It seemed clear that this El Jefe character was going to keep sending people out onto the concrete wilds of Calder City, doped up on King’s Blood, consequences be damned. Bret had options, paths branching out before him. He could leave it all alone, forget about Tae, forget about So-Mi. He could go to Cressida and hand everything over to Directorate Nine. He could do that. He could also leave it for the police or Vanguard but he doubted anything would come of that. People like them, people from the streets, they’re forgotten about so easily.

The second realisation was much easier to contemplate. Bret’s eyes fell on Billy and then drifted down to an open slash across his torso and the glass protruding from his left wrist. He was angry.

For the first time, in a very long time, Bret was really fucking angry.

|| T_^HE H_{^{AUNT -}} M_{^{ILK STREET}}

The ceiling of the Haunt's basement was a winding maze of various pipes, conduits and ducts. Most of it had been capped, valves shut off, wires pulled, but enough was still working that the basement was filled with a subtle, dull hiss. Pipes creaked and moaned while the snap of shifting metal in the ductwork echoed through old concrete rooms with ceilings low enough to make even a person of moderate height duck through cement-block doorways. "I hope that dial stays locked in on WKNT as our 'Days of Remembrance' special... Crackling audio echoed through the narrow corridor, the broadcast illuminated on a cracked monitor hoisted above a desk littered with electronics and soldering equipment. Cables in neat braids were zip-tied into harnesses that ran parallel with the raceways on the ceiling above. The makeshift workspace was shared with various keyboards and synthesizers alongside other recording equipment.

________________________________

Smoke rose from the tip of the soldering iron as the hooded figure continued to work on the circuit in front of him. The hum of a 3D printer in the corner added a constant drone behind the broadcast as the figure nodded along. He looked up from his work, his eyes fixing on the angular caricature of a rat's head that made up the large mask in front of him. A smile crossed the man's face, the scars that marred his visage twisting with the grin while he stared into the glowing green LEDs that illuminated the face of the mask. He'd been considered a rat his whole life, a bilgerat raised in the Wharves, destined never to amount to anything. Mikołajek Kamiński may not have been a household name, but DJ R3TCH!D R@T was on the tip of everyone's tongue. Now the people of Calder City worshipped the rat. ...Becca, I have to ask, since you know your Calder Capes pretty well, do you remember the Piper?" The Piper, Landin Johansson. He had left a tremendous impact on Mikołajek's life. Or rather, an impressive void. His sperm donor of a father, the Piper had used his abilities to assault Mikołajek's mother, coerce her into relations with him and then bailed the minute those actions had consequences. Naturally, no other suitor came calling once word got out that his dear mother had been a Graybanger. Even the Molls wouldn't take her.

Given the difficulty that Krysia had in proving her consent was coerced to the police, let alone any lawyer that would hear her out, Mikołajek's mother had never been able to press charges against the alleged super. "...dead, killed in a shootout with the Pointe District Police in the middle of Swashbuckler's Splashdown." The female host stated, only serving to widen Mikołajek's grin as he stared into the rat mask beaming with pride. It had been easy enough to procure the Piper's armaments, offer to sign a few autographs, take some pictures, all the while lying through his mask to the Calder City Police Department about what a fan he was of the Piper. Grease the right palms, and evidence from closed cases was fairly easy to acquire. But Mikołajek was not some overly confident, arrogant fool either. Once he had successfully reverse-engineered the Piper's technology using equipment he had discovered in a similar hideaway to his own beneath the Swashbuckler’s Splashdown Park, Mikołajek had simply returned the originals. His version greatly improved upon the design anyhow. Frequency dialation allowed Mikołajek to target specific age groups, giving his music almost a hypnotic quality that compelled the listener to do exactly as their new Rat God desired. Lyrics for several new songs sat scribbled in front of him, Mikołajek finding himself humming along to the hook of 'I'm Robin H00d, B!t₵h'. A monitor beside him began to play a snuff film while his latest single filled the room. Reaching across towards the glowing green mask, Mikołajek removed an ear, pulling out the circuit board before replacing it with the one he had been working on and reconnecting the quick connector. "Local DJ 'R3TCH!D R@T' is the talk of the local scene again with his new single 'Break Stuff (& Kill Ur Rents)'. The evocative title is followed by even more vulgar lyrics which encourage the listener to do exactly that, all while set against a heavy bassline and disorienting instrumentals. Using snippets of local news segments, spliced with TockBox and SnapShot videos, the song is unfortunately catchy with a rhythm that will hype you up and make you want to follow its earworm lyrics." A broadcast from another of Calder's radio stations played concurrently with the video unfolding in front of him. Mikołajek began to smile as the teenager at the focal point of the video began to swung around an aluminum baseball bat, destroying their parents' living room decor before moving on to family photographs and even awards that dotted the mantle. "...not just "edgy" or "rebellious." It is a direct incitement to violence. In what world is it acceptable to market a track that explicitly encourages teenagers to harm their parents? We are living in a society that is falling apart at the seams, and this person is actively pouring gasoline on the fire for a few streams..." Screams began to drown out the talk show as the video displayed the teenager now turning the bat on his father. The older man's jaw hung at an unnatural angle, an eyeball had been freed from its socket while teeth and blood collectively littered the accent rug in the middle of the demolished room. As the father's laboured breathing came to an end, the enraged teenager tightened his hands on the bat, moving around to target the mother. Mikołajek grimaced slightly, a glimmer of humanity causing him to look away before the screaming suddenly resumed. "Oof, that is rough, buddy. Anyways, folks, here's local artist and current Calder City favourite, DJ R3TCH!D Rat with 'I'm not Gray (& I Luv It)."

O<sub><sup>nce was a man who lived a life so mundane, it could only be true.

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Practically invisible to the world around him, life carries on while he felt perpetually stuck treading water just to keep his head

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afloat. Fortunately for the man, fate had different ideas and intervened with a heavy hand. Pushed into a corner, the man

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was driven to hide amongst dusty shelves and heavy tomes. In the silence, he could hear his name being whispered,

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over and over again, until his hand touched one particular opus. A worn book, bound in leather and tarnished steel. Though

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sealed, it opened for a price, and upon spreading its pages, the man's life was changed forever.
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Now, he is the Warlock they call...</sup></sub>

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LOCATION: THE WAMPANOAG APARTMENT COMPLEX - MILK STREET

URBAN GOTHIC #1.11: HAVEN

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INTERACTIONS: NONE

PREVIOUSLY: HARD KNOCKS

It was absolutely fascinating how the Grimoire had adapted to its new form. Perfectly emulating Archie's lost phone, by the time he had finally arrived home, it had racked up an impressive missed call and text count from both Harri and Boz. The young lawyer was completely enthralled as the device functioned not only exactly like the one it had replaced, but far beyond the capabilities of a mundane cellphone. It was intuitive to his every thought and whim, cycling through emulated applications and composing messages as they came to Archie. Thankfully, it still seemed to require his input before sending. But it was not texting that Archie wanted. No, instead he found himself rapidly pouring through the pages of the Grimoire. The book's author, Zechariah Auber, had left behind a complete manual to mag'ik and a history of the lineage of Emyrs. His emerald eyes had watched in surprise as the book filled out his own name beneath Auber on the 'family tree.' Beside his own name was another direct apprentice of Zechariah Auber, but the name had become corrupted, ending his lineage as the floating symbols refused to form a word or name that was legible to Archie. Continuing to thumb through the pages, the sandy-haired man laid his eyes on every word on the screen. Foreign languages instantly translated, glyphs became graphemes. Illustrations were suddenly animated, showing the precise movements to conjure forth bursts of flame and bolts of electricity. But what stopped Archie in his tracks was one of the earliest pages of the Grimoire. THE RULES OF MAG'IK ᴍᴀɢ'ɪᴋ ɪꜱ ᴀ ʟɪᴠɪɴɢ ᴇɴᴇʀɢy, ᴡɪᴛʜ ᴀ ᴡɪʟʟ ᴀɴᴅ ᴡʜɪᴍꜱ. ɪᴛ ꜱᴜʀʀᴏᴜɴᴅꜱ ᴀʟʟ ᴏꜰ ᴜꜱ ᴀɴᴅ ʙɪɴᴅꜱ ʟɪꜰᴇ ᴛᴏɢᴇᴛʜᴇʀ. ɪᴛ ꜰʟᴏᴡꜱ ᴛʜʀᴏᴜɢʜ ᴇᴠᴇʀy ᴩᴇʀꜱᴏɴ, ᴄʀᴇᴀᴛᴜʀᴇ ᴀɴᴅ ᴏʙᴊᴇᴄᴛ, ᴀʟʟᴏᴡɪɴɢ ᴛʜᴏꜱᴇ ᴡʜᴏ ᴜɴᴅᴇʀꜱᴛᴀɴᴅ ɪᴛ ᴛᴏ ʙᴇɴᴅ ᴀɴᴅ ʀᴇꜱʜᴀᴩᴇ ᴛʜᴇ ᴡᴏʀʟᴅ ᴛᴏ ᴛʜᴇɪʀ ᴡɪʟʟ. ᴍᴀɢ'ɪᴋ ᴄʜᴏᴏꜱᴇꜱ ᴜꜱ ᴀꜱ ᴍᴜᴄʜ ᴀꜱ ᴡᴇ ᴄʜᴏᴏꜱᴇ ɪᴛ ᴀɴᴅ ᴏɴʟy ᴏɴᴄᴇ ᴄʜᴏꜱᴇɴ ᴄᴀɴ ᴛʜᴇ ʙᴀʀʀɪᴇʀ ʙᴇᴛᴡᴇᴇɴ ᴡᴏʀʟᴅꜱ ʙᴇ ᴩᴀꜱꜱᴇᴅ ᴛᴏ ᴀᴄᴄᴇꜱꜱ ᴛʜɪꜱ ᴩᴏᴡᴇʀꜰᴜʟ ᴇxᴛʀᴀ-ᴅɪᴍᴇɴꜱɪᴏɴᴀʟ ᴇɴᴇʀɢy. ᴍᴀɢ'ɪᴋ ᴀʟᴡᴀyꜱ ᴄᴏᴍᴇꜱ ᴡɪᴛʜ ᴀ ᴩʀɪᴄᴇ, ᴀ ᴩʀɪᴄᴇ ᴡʜɪᴄʜ ᴍᴜꜱᴛ ʙᴇ ᴩᴀɪᴅ ɪɴ ꜰᴜʟʟ. ᴛʜᴇ ᴩʀɪᴄᴇ ᴡɪʟʟ ᴠᴀʀy ꜰʀᴏᴍ ᴩᴇʀꜱᴏɴ ᴛᴏ ᴩᴇʀꜱᴏɴ ᴏʀ ᴀᴄᴛ ᴛᴏ ᴀᴄᴛ; ᴛʜᴇ ᴜʟᴛɪᴍᴀᴛᴇ ᴩʀɪᴄᴇ ɪꜱ yᴏᴜʀ ʟɪꜰᴇ. ᴛʜᴇ ᴩʀɪᴄᴇ ᴍᴀy ʙᴇ ᴩᴀɪᴅ ɪɴ ʙʟᴏᴏᴅ, ᴇɪᴛʜᴇʀ yᴏᴜʀ ᴏᴡɴ ᴏʀ ᴏꜰ ᴀɴᴏᴛʜᴇʀ, ᴍᴀᴛᴇʀɪᴀʟ ᴄᴏꜱᴛ ᴏʀ ᴛʜʀᴏᴜɢʜ ᴛɪᴍᴇ. ʟɪᴋᴇ ᴀ ꜰʟᴏᴡɪɴɢ ᴄᴜʀʀᴇɴᴛ, ᴍᴀɢ'ɪᴋ ʀᴇqᴜɪʀᴇꜱ ᴀ ᴄᴏɴᴅᴜɪᴛ ᴏꜰ ᴡʜɪᴄʜ yᴏᴜʀ ʙᴏᴅy ɪꜱ ᴛʜᴇ ᴄʜᴀɴɴᴇʟ. ᴇᴠᴇʀy ᴛɪᴍᴇ yᴏᴜ ᴄᴀꜱᴛ, yᴏᴜʀ ʙᴏᴅy ᴩᴀyꜱ ᴛʜᴇ ᴩʀɪᴄᴇ, ᴛʜᴏᴜɢʜ ᴛʜɪꜱ ᴄᴏꜱᴛ ᴄᴀɴ ʙᴇ ᴏꜰꜰꜱᴇᴛ ᴛʜʀᴏᴜɢʜ ᴛʜᴇ ᴜꜱᴇ ᴏꜰ ᴀɴ ᴇxᴛᴇʀɴᴀʟ ᴄᴏɴᴅᴜɪᴛ ᴏʀ yᴏᴜʀ ꜰᴀᴍɪʟɪᴀʀ. ᴀ ᴄᴏɴᴅᴜɪᴛ ᴍᴜꜱᴛ ʙᴇ ᴄᴏᴍᴩʀɪꜱᴇᴅ ᴏꜰ ᴍᴀᴛᴇʀɪᴀʟꜱ ʙᴇꜱᴛ ꜱᴜɪᴛᴇᴅ ᴛᴏ ᴡɪᴇʟᴅɪɴɢ ᴍᴀɢ'ɪᴋ ᴀɴᴅ ᴅɪꜰꜰᴇʀᴇɴᴛ ᴍᴀᴛᴇʀɪᴀʟꜱ ᴡɪʟʟ ɪɴʜᴇʀᴇɴᴛʟy ʜᴀᴠᴇ ᴅɪꜰꜰᴇʀᴇɴᴛ ᴀꜰꜰɪɴɪᴛɪᴇꜱ ʙᴀꜱᴇᴅ ᴏɴ ᴛʜᴇ ᴅᴇᴇᴩ ᴍᴀɢ'ɪᴋ ᴡɪᴛʜɪɴ ᴛʜᴇᴍ. ɢᴇᴍꜱ ᴀɴᴅ ᴏᴛʜᴇʀ ᴩʀᴇᴄɪᴏᴜꜱ ᴍᴀᴛᴇʀɪᴀʟꜱ ᴍᴀy ɴᴇᴇᴅ ᴛᴏ ʙᴇ ʀᴇᴩʟᴀᴄᴇᴅ ᴏᴠᴇʀ ᴛɪᴍᴇ ᴀꜱ ᴛʜᴇɪʀ ᴜꜱᴇ ᴇxʜᴀᴜꜱᴛꜱ ᴛʜᴇɪʀ ᴠᴀʟᴜᴇ. ᴏɴᴄᴇ ᴄᴏɴꜱᴛʀᴜᴄᴛᴇᴅ, ᴀ ᴄᴏɴᴅᴜɪᴛ ɪꜱ ʙᴏᴜɴᴅ ᴛᴏ ɪᴛꜱ ᴩʀᴀᴄᴛɪᴛɪᴏɴᴇʀ. ɴᴏ ᴏᴛʜᴇʀ ᴍᴀɢᴇ ᴍᴀy ᴜꜱᴇ ᴛʜᴇ ᴄᴏɴᴅᴜɪᴛ ᴏꜰ ᴀɴᴏᴛʜᴇʀ ᴛᴏ ᴄᴀꜱᴛ ᴜɴʟᴇꜱꜱ ɪᴛ ʜᴀꜱ ʙᴇᴇɴ ᴡᴏɴ ɪɴ ᴄᴏɴꜰʟɪᴄᴛ ᴏʀ ɪᴛ ʜᴀꜱ ᴏᴛʜᴇʀᴡɪꜱᴇ ʙᴇᴇɴ ʀᴇʟɪɴqᴜɪꜱʜᴇᴅ ᴛᴏ ᴛʜᴇᴍ. ꜱᴇɴᴛɪᴍᴇɴᴛᴀʟɪᴛy ᴀɴᴅ ᴇᴍᴏᴛɪᴏɴᴀʟ ᴡᴇɪɢʜᴛ ᴇɴʜᴀɴᴄᴇ ᴛʜᴇ ᴩᴏᴡᴇʀ ᴏꜰ ᴀ ᴄᴏɴᴅᴜɪᴛ, ᴅʀᴀᴡɪɴɢ ʙᴏᴛʜ ᴅᴇᴇᴩ ᴀɴᴅ ʙʟᴏᴏᴅ ᴍᴀɢ'ɪᴋ ɪɴᴛᴏ ᴛʜᴇᴍ. ꜰᴏʀ ᴛʜɪꜱ ʀᴇᴀꜱᴏɴ, ꜱᴏᴍᴇ ᴏꜰ ᴛʜᴇ ᴍᴏꜱᴛ ᴩᴏᴡᴇʀꜰᴜʟ ᴄᴏɴᴅᴜɪᴛꜱ ᴀʀᴇ ᴏꜰᴛᴇɴ ꜰᴀᴍɪʟy ʜᴇɪʀʟᴏᴏᴍꜱ. ᴀ ᴄᴏɴᴅᴜɪᴛ ɪꜱ ᴀꜱ ᴍᴜᴄʜ ᴀ ᴛᴏᴏʟ ᴀꜱ ɪᴛ ɪꜱ ᴀ ᴡᴇᴀᴩᴏɴ. ɪɴ ᴛʜᴇ ʜᴀɴᴅꜱ ᴏꜰ ᴛʜᴇ ʀɪɢʜᴛ ᴀʀᴄᴀɴᴇ ᴍᴀꜱᴛᴇʀ, ᴛʜᴇy ᴀʀᴇ ᴜɴꜱᴛᴏᴩᴩᴀʙʟᴇ. ᴛʜɪꜱ ɪɴꜱᴛʀᴜᴍᴇɴᴛ ɪꜱ yᴏᴜʀ ʟɪꜰᴇ; ᴅɪꜱᴀʀᴍᴇᴅ ᴏꜰ ɪᴛ, yᴏᴜ ᴀʀᴇ ᴠᴜʟɴᴇʀᴀʙʟᴇ. ᴀʟʟ ᴛʜᴏꜱᴇ ᴛᴏᴜᴄʜᴇᴅ ʙy ᴍᴀɢ'ɪᴋ ᴀʀᴇ ᴩᴀɪʀᴇᴅ ᴡɪᴛʜ ᴀ ꜰᴀᴍɪʟɪᴀʀ. ᴛʜᴏᴜɢʜᴛ ᴛᴏ ʙᴇ ʙᴇɪɴɢꜱ ꜰʀᴏᴍ ᴛʜᴇ ʀᴇᴀʟᴍ ᴏꜰ ᴍᴀɢ'ɪᴋ, ꜰᴀᴍɪʟɪᴀʀꜱ ᴍᴀy ᴛᴀᴋᴇ ᴀɴy ꜰᴏʀᴍ, ʙᴜᴛ ᴛʜᴇɪʀ ᴅᴇꜰᴀᴜʟᴛ ꜱᴛᴀᴛᴇ ꜱʜᴏᴜʟᴅ ʙᴇ ᴀɴ ᴇxᴛᴇɴꜱɪᴏɴ ᴏꜰ ᴛʜᴇɪʀ ᴍᴀꜱᴛᴇʀ. ꜰᴀᴍɪʟɪᴀʀꜱ ᴀʀᴇ ᴛʜᴏᴜɢʜᴛ ᴛᴏ ʙᴇ ᴀɢᴇʟᴇꜱꜱ, ᴡɪᴛʜ ᴍᴀɴy ʙᴏɴᴅɪɴɢ ᴛᴏ ꜱᴇᴠᴇʀᴀʟ ᴅɪꜰꜰᴇʀᴇɴᴛ ᴍᴀɢᴇꜱ ᴏᴠᴇʀ ᴛʜᴇ ᴄᴏᴜʀꜱᴇ ᴏꜰ ᴛʜᴇɪʀ ɪɴᴄʀᴇᴅɪʙʟy ʟᴏɴɢ ʟɪᴠᴇꜱ. ᴀ ꜰᴀᴍɪʟɪᴀʀ ɪꜱ ʀᴇqᴜɪʀᴇᴅ ᴛᴏ ʀᴇᴍᴀɪɴ ʟᴏyᴀʟ ᴛᴏ ɪᴛꜱ ᴍᴀꜱᴛᴇʀ ᴜɴʟᴇꜱꜱ ᴛʜᴀᴛ ᴍᴀɢᴇ ᴅᴇᴇᴍꜱ ɪᴛ ꜰʀᴇᴇ. ꜰᴀᴍɪʟɪᴀʀꜱ ᴀʀᴇ ᴇxᴩʟɪᴄɪᴛʟy ꜰᴏʀʙɪᴅᴅᴇɴ ꜰʀᴏᴍ ᴛᴀᴋɪɴɢ ᴛʜᴇ ꜰᴏʀᴍ ᴏꜰ ᴀ ʜᴜᴍᴀɴ. ᴅᴏɪɴɢ ꜱᴏ ᴡᴏᴜʟᴅ ᴄʀᴇᴀᴛᴇ ᴀ ᴅᴏᴩᴩᴇʟɢäɴɢᴇʀ ᴏʀ ꜰᴇᴛᴄʜ, ᴛʜᴇ ᴜɴɴᴀᴛᴜʀᴀʟ ᴅᴜᴩʟɪᴄᴀᴛɪᴏɴ ᴏꜰ ᴀɴᴏᴛʜᴇʀ ʜᴜᴍᴀɴ ʙᴇɪɴɢ. A sound of discontent escaped the lithe male's mouth, a scowl upon his face turning to a frown while reading the rules. Re-reading them, he found himself both unimpressed and utterly underwhelmed with how vague the guidelines actually were. Bookmarking the page for later, Archie made a mental note to return and draft a secondary reading of the rules, something more rigid for himself to follow. If this 'mag'ik' was as dangerous as Galloway had made it out to be, then there ought to be more rules than the one listed above. Still, the apparently arcane-touched Archie couldn't risk the temptation to try to cast something as he flipped until he found a simple illumination spell. Following the directions on the page, Hardwick moved his hand along with the animation several times before muttering to himself. "S-solas, uh, n'hir-a." Sparks crackled from the palm of his hand, a quick flash of light barely illuminated beyond his hand in the musty corridor of the apartment building. His green eyes went wide in shock that it had worked at all. Waving his hand in shock as though it were on fire, he held it out in front of himself again before repeating the phrase, only this time louder and more confidently. "Solas n'hira!" An orb of light appeared in Hardwick's hand, casting a soft white light over the corridor of the apartment before the fledgling warlock rounded the corner towards his unit. Continuing to walk down the dimly lit corridor, Archie was so enamoured with poring through the Grimoire and the success of his first spell that he didn't even notice Harri waiting outside his apartment door before nearly tripping over her.

"Where the ₣ʊ₵κ have you been?" Harri stood, ripping into Archie almost immediately before wrapping her arms around him. Archie felt his cheeks begin to flush before the sensation of something wet started to soak through his shirt. Harri lifted her face; her mascara was smudged, her eyes red with fresh tears welling up in their corners. "I have been worried sick." Harri sniffled, wiping her eyes on her sleeve. "I didn't know what to think when you didn't reply. First you went missing, then Tess-" "Wait," Archie interjected, "Treasure's missing?" He asked. Beyond having two doting parents, there was another reason Archie had always envied Harri. She had a younger sibling, a built-in friend for life, in the form of her sister, Treasure. "I might not have been completely honest about yesterday..." Harri tucked a long strand of her dark hair behind an ear. Her eyes looked off to the side before looking up at Archie again only once she had released him. Nodding, Archie moved to his apartment door as Harri followed him while Archie unlocked it. "Of course, I wanted to celebrate you, the brown-eyed woman reassured Archie, "But Tess has been acting out more and more lately, ever since she found out she was a..." Harri had to take a moment, struggling to say the word out loud. "Y'know, a g-." "She's a Gray, Harri," Archie replied softly, "It's not a big deal." "I know, but Mom and Dad are having a really hard time with it, and now Tess is acting like she doesn't know who she is." Harri explained.

________________________________

"I knew she was going to the Haunt last night, and I used your promotion as an excuse to keep an eye on her. I mean, you saw how the Dragons are practically all over that place." Archie watched Harri intently, feeling like he should maybe hold her hand or hug her. Instead, he just awkwardly stood, listening to her while she leaned against the doorway of his apartment. "Look, I deserved everything you unloaded on me last night, but is there any chance you can come with me back to the club. You seemed to hit it off with that bartender chick, maybe we can use that to find a lead." Harri suggested, "Or you have that friend in the D.A.'s office still, right? Look, Arch, I'm spiralling here, I don't trust the police." Good call. Archie deadpanned to himself. His experience earlier that day was rightfully still quite fresh in his mind. "You've seen all the missing posters littering the city. Grays turning up dead with shaved heads, I can't let that be, Treasure." Harri pleaded. "Look, Harri, I want to help, I really do," Archie replied, "But I don't know how much help I can be." "Can you call Boz and have him meet us at the Haunt at least?" The woman batted her dark brown eyes at Archie. Any resistance he had instantly melted. "C'mon, it's for Tess, you have to know she was always a little sweet on you." No, I did not in fact know that. "Okay, I'm i-" Archie began to answer, only to be interrupted by a loud bark as Marrok suddenly opted to make himself known. "You got a dog!?" Harri asked, her tone torn between confusion and excitement. "I think it might have been a drunk decision from last night; the details are a little foggy." Archie lied. "His name is Marrok." "Marrok, such a handsome boy," Harri replied, approaching the black dog without any semblance of fear and scratching him under his chin. "He's of course, coming too, right?" Marrok barked again, no doubt to answer Harri's question himself, before Archie slowly nodded. "Let me call Boz and freshen up." He stated, leaving Harri in the living room with Marrok before searching the bathroom for some Advil. Most of his hangover had subsided, but he wasn't out of the woods yet. "I'll, uh, drive, I guess." He called, poking his head back out before shutting the bathroom door. What he wouldn't give for a quiet evening to curl up with a certain book.

“Who the hell are you guys?” Mina demanded, her voice sharp

The street seemed to empty around them as the four figures straightened from their lean against the van. The morning bustle of the Docks faded into the background, replaced by a heavy, watchful silence. Joanie felt Mina begin to stiffen beside her as she spoke, the excitement from moments ago draining from her face as she took in the strangers blocking their path.

Joanie recognised the first two instantly.

Detonator Dane stood at the front, leaning against the van lik#e he owned the street. He had the kind of sharp‑boned, effortless beauty that made people stare without meaning to. Dark hair tied back at the nape, stubble along a strong jaw, eyes bright with a restless excitement that never seemed to settle. His sports jacket hung open over a bare chest, the fabric scorched in places. He continued to roll the metal ball between his fingers.

Beside him stood Cinderjack, broader and heavier, dressed like he had been dragged out bed only ten minutes ago, his blonde mullet an absolute mess. A fitted black T‑shirt clung to his chest and shoulders, hiding the mess of old burns and inked tattoos. The fresh black eye swelling beneath his brow was new. Joanie noticed it instantly. He hadn’t had it at Harborlight.
He avoided her gaze, jaw tight. Was it guilt? Shame? Something worse?

The other two were strangers.

One perched on the bonnet of the van, legs swinging casually despite the weight of the hammer resting across her lap. She was small, barely five feet tall, with a compact athletic build that made her movements sharp and fast. Her hair was shaved on one side, the rest dyed a violent red that fell across her cheek. Her grin was wide and mischievous, the kind of smile that belonged to someone who enjoyed chaos far more than she should. The hammer looked almost comically oversized in her hands, but she held it with the ease of someone who had been swinging it since childhood.

Behind her stood a giant of a man. A large Black man, broad‑shouldered and heavyset, with the kind of presence that made the space around him feel smaller. His skin was smooth and dark, his features strong and calm, but his forearms told a different story. They shifted subtly, the surface rippling like wet clay being stirred by an unseen hand. Cracks formed and sealed across his arms whenever he flexed, shedding tiny flecks of dried mud that crumbled to the pavement. The rest of him looked normal, grounded, human. Only his arms betrayed the mutation simmering beneath his skin.

Dane pushed off the van and sauntered forward.

“Relax. We’re not here for a fight.” He pointed at Joanie. “We’re here for her.”

Joanie’s stomach dropped.

Mina stepped closer. “Why would you want her?”

“The Icelander wants a word.”

Trey frowned and raised an eyebrow. “Who?”

Joanie swallowed.

“Caleb’s boss.” She replied quietly. Trey and Mina turned to look at her in unison, confusion crossing their faces.

Dane grinned. “He’s your boss too now.”

Joanie’s throat tightened.

Her eyes flicked to Cinderjack again. He still wouldn’t look at her. She had saved his life. Surely that meant something? Apparently it didn’t, as he wouldn’t meet her gaze.

“Why?” Trey asked.

“Because he saw what she did the other night. Shook his whole club,” Dane said. “You think he didn’t notice?”

Joanie’s breath caught. “I didn’t mean to.”

“Doesn’t matter. He wants you. And when he wants something, we fetch it.”

Trey stepped in front of her. “You’re not taking her.”

Dane merely smiled.

“I was hoping you’d say that.” He turned his head slightly. “Pummel. Mudline. Get her.”

The hammer girl hopped off the bonnet, cracking her knuckles.

The world exploded.

She sprinted first, swinging the oversized hammer in a blur. Trey threw up a bubble so fast it shimmered like glass. The hammer slammed into it with a deep, ringing thud that vibrated through Joanie’s bones. Trey staggered but held.

“Back off!” He shouted.

Dane flicked something from his fingers. A tiny bead, no bigger than a marble, glowing a faint red. It arced lazily through the air, then detonated with a sharp crack that rattled the windows. Trey threw another bubble, catching the blast before it hit them.

“Cute trick,” Dane called. “Let’s see how long you last.”

The giant moved next. He charged, his arms softening into heavy mudlike masses that wrapped around Joanie and Mina’s wrists, pinning them together. The weight dragged Joanie down. Her knees hit the pavement. Panic flared.

“Let go of her!” Mina shouted, struggling.

Joanie felt the familiar pressure rising in her chest. She exhaled.

The ground trembled. A sharp pulse burst from her body. The mudlike grip shattered into clumps that scattered across the street. The giant stumbled back, staring at his cracked hands.

Joanie fell forward, breath shaking.

Mina grabbed her arm. “You’re okay. You’re okay.”

The hammer girl was already back on them. She swung again, forcing Joanie and Mina to duck. Joanie felt the rush of air over her head. Mina kicked out, catching the girl’s shin. She hissed and swung again, closer this time.

Another pulse burst from Joanie’s hands. Smaller, focused. It caught the girl square in the torso and sent her flying back, skidding across the pavement.

“Agnes!” the one known as Mudline shouted. So that was her real name.

He surged forward, his arm liquefying into a muddy fist that shot toward Joanie. She barely dodged, stumbling sideways as the limb splattered against the pavement and reformed. A chunk of brick behind her cracked from the impact.

Mina grabbed Joanie’s sleeve. “Stay with me!”

Before she could reassure her, a rush of heat tore across Joanie’s right side.

Cinderjack lunged, flames racing up his arms. His fist was a ball of fire, aimed straight at her head. Joanie ducked, feeling the heat scorch past her cheek. The last time she had seen those flames had been on the Harborlight stage, aimed at opponents. Seeing them aimed at her now was terrifying.

“Why are you doing this?” she shouted. “I saved your life!”

He hesitated for a moment, as if his guilt was flickering. He still wouldn’t meet her gaze. “You shouldn’t have. It wasn’t yours to save.” He finally said. His voice was angry, although she could hear the fear in it.

“What the fuck does that mean?”

“The Icelander decides who lives. Not you. Now I have to prove myself.”

He lunged again.

Joanie ducked. Mina shoved him. He stumbled but caught himself, flames flaring hotter, eyes locked on Joanie like she was the test he had to pass.

Behind them, Agnes was back on her feet. She swung the hammer at Mina’s head. Mina stepped in close, grabbed the handle with both hands, and held on. Joanie was as the veins in her hands glowed white hot. The metal began to soften, the handle sagging. Agnes screamed as the heat melted part of her palm and the skin along her fingers.

“Let go!” she shouted, dropping the hammer.

Then she drove her forehead into Mina’s face. The crack was sickening.

Mina screamed and fell, blood pouring from her nose.

“Mina!” Joanie lunged toward her.

Cinderjack reached Joanie first. His hand closed around her arm. Heat seared through her sleeve. She cried out and swung blindly. Her fist connected with his jaw. It barely moved him.

“You should’ve stayed down,” he growled.

Mudline grabbed Joanie from behind, arms wrapping around her torso, crushing her ribs. She gasped, panic clawing up her throat. She tried to twist free, but his grip only tightened, the mud along his forearms hardening like stone.

“Let go!” She begged between breaths.
He didn’t.

Joanie’s breath hitched. Her vision blurred. She looked toward Trey.

He was still holding the line, but barely. Bubble after bubble flickered around him, each one thinner than the last. Dane kept throwing explosives, each bead glowing hotter, brighter, more unstable. Trey’s jaw was clenched. Sweat ran down his temple. His hands trembled. He was shaking under the strain.

He wasn’t going to last.

Joanie felt something inside her crack as her hope slipped away.

The pressure rose in her chest, too fast, too strong, like her whole body was about to tear open. She couldn’t hold it. She couldn’t stop it.

She released it.

The shockwave tore out of her in a single violent burst. The entire street shook. Mudline’s grip shattered instantly. He was thrown backwards, skidding across the pavement. Pummel was knocked off her feet, the remains of her hammer clattering away. Cinderjack staggered, flames guttering as he slammed into the side of the van.
The shockwave didn’t stop there.

Windows shattered. Dust rained from the rooftops. The nearest building groaned, its brickwork cracking like ice under a boot.

Joanie stumbled forward, catching herself on her hands. Her lip split as her face impacted the road. She tasted blood.

She looked up to where Trey’s duel with the Detonator was taking place.

Dane was already winding his arm back, a sphere the size of an apple glowing deep red in his palm. He hurled it with all his strength.

The building behind Trey shuddered again, as Joanie realised what she had done. The shockwave had weakened the structure, and Dane’s explosion had now inadvertently finished the job.

The entire top floor began to fall.

“Move!” Trey shouted.

Everyone scattered. She wasn’t paying attention to where the majority of them went, her eyes instead only going to the people who mattered. She was grateful to see Mina scrambled across the pavement to safety, shielding her head with her arms.

Dane on the other hand wasn’t fast enough.

A slab of concrete crashed down onto him, his body disappeared under the rubble in a burst of red splatter.

Joanie stood frozen in place, her limbs not willing her to move as carnage rained down around her. Thankfully, Trey was not in the same state.

He sprinted toward her, grabbed her shoulders, and shoved her with everything he had. She hit the ground hard. A slab of concrete crashed down exactly where she had been standing.

Whilst she was now safe, Trey was in the centre of it all.

“Trey!” She called, panic rising in her voice.

He threw a bubble around himself as rubble landed around him, quickly burying the sphere. Joanie could barely see him inside. He mouthed something. She thought it was her name.

Relief washed over her as she realised he was safe.

Then, right as another chunk of wall began to cover it, the bubble collapsed inward like a soap film popping.

And Trey vanished.

The debris crashed into the empty space where he’d been. Dust billowed. The street shook. Joanie’s scream tore out of her throat.

<“Lift with your legs, Qing Yuan!”>

<“Oh sure, he’s not an air conditioner. So now you know all about lifting! I’m taking all of the weight here!”> Qing struggled with the crumpled Little Mountain. He was heavier than he looked.

Together, Qing and Bo Wen got him situated in the back of the van. His blood began pooling on the subfloor. All Qing could think about was how hard it would be to clean after this, probably to keep himself calm.

<”Stay with him, I’ll drive.”> Sliding the van door shut on the other pair whilst Qing’s stunned eyes could only stare back wide-eyed as the metal interior filled his vision.

<”But it’s my van!”> Qing protested, but Bo Wen was already climbing into the driver’s seat. Qing slid, before grabbing a handhold as Bo Wen hit the gas, saving the wounded hero from a blow from falling drywall with his other hand.

Looking at him, Qing Yuan didn’t know exactly what he should be doing that would really do him any good. He looked like Qing might have if the man from the alley was actually worth his salt with a sword.

He had cuts all over, big bruises, broken bones. Part of his chest looked caved in. Qing could at least try to stop the bleeding. There really is a lot of blood filling the van, isn’t there..?

Problem was, the closest thing he had to bandages were the rags he used to cover the floor during paint and other messy jobs. And they were hardly hygienic, let alone sterile. He raised his head to ask his father for suggestions, but was stopped short as he recognised the streets flying by out the front of the van. <”This is not the way to Calder General!”>

<”He is a superhero! They do not do regular hospitals!”> Bo Wen countered. He yanked the wheel and the van made a noise of protest Qing felt in his soul.

<”Then where do you suggest?”> Qing asked, incredulous. He realized he knew the route Bo Wen was taking. <”No. Noooooo. You’re bringing him to the shop!? This is not something we can fix! Once again, he is not an air conditioner! This is beyond duct tape and resin!”>

<”Have faith, Qing Yuan. We will figure something out at home. Maybe the Vanguard will come get him.”> Bo Wen said, as if his faith would keep the Little Mountain from bleeding out in the back of Qing’s work van.

<“Between your driving and his health, my faith doesn’t spread that far! How much blood can you even have in you?!”> Qing Yuan had his hands over the worst of the Little Mountain’s bleeds. His blood was warm but his skin was cold to the touch.

Cold. Ohhh. That’s not a good sign.

The dwindling flame of a candle.

<“Shit.”> < “Is he–”> “Eyes on the road! Let me worry about back here!”>

Breathe in.

Qing’s eyes closed. He dived deep internally. His hands moved as he felt his own body’s energy pool and sluice within, then took control. Diverted the flow.

Breathe out.

His hands aglow, he rested them over the fallen hero’s sunken core. It took a level of concentration beyond his ability to re-open his eyes. He felt certain he sensed a heart beating stronger, and pushed on choosing not to give way to what must have been overconfidence. The glow to his hands faded as he pushed the flow beyond himself and it re-dispersed, finding its level in the form that lay before him.

The next barrier he hit certainly wasn’t overconfidence, and he noticed it wasn’t concentration that was knitting his eyes. The lids started to feel heavy.

That’s not right, I know he’s messed up pretty bad, and I know it’s been a long day but I shouldn’t be–

As Qing slid down beside the fallen hero, his father’s words and a single thought went through his head.

Just because I wanted to buy drywall…

<“Qing Yuan! Your chi!”>

The words fell from Qing’s mouth absent of thought. < “Do not. Crash. _{mY vAn...}”>

Qing drifted away free of the moorings of consciousness, until being shaken awake once more at their destination by a father who couldn’t lift their wounded guest alone.

---

---

The bell chimed, the buzzer sounded, and a pair walked in - a young woman and an old white man. Qing realized in their rush to get the Little Mountain to a bed upstairs, he flipped the sign to ‘CLOSED’ but in his exhaustion had failed to actually lock the door.

“I’m sorry, we’re actually closed.” Qing put on his best smile, half-lidded as the events of the car ride still left him weary, and hoped he hadn’t missed any bloodstains trailing from the door up the stairs.

The woman and the old man did not turn to go. Instead she fixed Qing with a steely gaze.

“Ah, we’d be happy to help you another time but right now we --”

“What have you done with my brother!?” She cut Qing off. She had her hands wrapped in fists, thumbs tucked inside, like she’d never thrown a punch before.

Her brother…? Could this be the Little Mountain’s sister?

Qing put his hands up. “We didn’t hurt him! We just found him in a bad way. We tried to help.”

“And you brought him here instead of to the hospital?”

Qing Yuan cringed. He knew it was a bad idea. He saw Bo Wen at the bottom of the stairs, roused from their guest’s bedside by the commotion and gestured to him. “Ba, that question’s for you.”

The old man put his hand on the woman’s shoulder. “It was probably for the best, Shenden. Everything going on in this town, who knows what kind of farshtinkener got to him. The hospital might not have been safe. Better I can take care of him here.” Qing spotted the leather bag he carried. It was about as stereotypical of a physician’s kit as they come, complete with the ears of a stethoscope hanging out the lip.

“See. Was right! Superheroes don’t do regular hospitals.” He pointed to the doctor.

“It was literally the first thing she asked, Ba, and she’s his family…”

Bo Wen swatted away the criticism from his son like a gnat.

“Where is he?” The woman, Shenden, asked. Each syllable was measured, and her fists were still balled. Qing kept one hand open in passivity, and with the other he pointed to the sky.

“Yes, yes. This way, follow.” Bo Wen bade the pair upstairs with him.

Qing moved to follow the trio, then remembered himself and set to locking up Liu’s Fix-It properly. All three of the locks and the rolling shutters.

By the time he joined them upstairs, Bo Wen managed to convert the hallway outside the Little Mountain’s door into an impromptu waiting room with three mismatched chairs. Shenden sat in the middle, no longer looking ready to punch him or Bo Wen out, instead maintaining a steady focus on the door. Bo Wen stood by, wringing his hands, not in any of the seats he dutifully brought out, making a face that told Qing he was holding down a fit of nervous laughter.

”Ba?”

”There you are! This Qing Yuan, my son. We found your brother together.”

Tactful, Ba. Qing’s brow furrowed at the older man. He then noticed the seating arrangements. Middle. You sneaky old–. He picked the closest seat.

“I’m Shenden.” She nodded to him. “I’m very sorry about earlier. I was a bit panicked.” She said, not looking too much less panicked. Qing would be too, at the sight of her brother.

”Don’t worry about it.” Qing waved her concerns off. ”Where’s the Doctor?” Qing asked, trying to fill the silence. Stupid question.

”Doctor Idell is in with him now.” She answered anyway. “He says my brother doesn’t look good, but a lot better than he expected. He says you two stabilized him. Is one of you a doctor?”

”Only to air conditioners.” Bo Wen said.

”Ba!” Qing chided. ”Not doctors, no…” Qing scratched the back of his neck. How do you even explain chi to a layperson…? “Maybe he must have just got lucky..?” It didn’t even sound convincing to himself as he said it, and when he dared to make eye contact with Shenden he could see it hadn’t been with her either.

”You don’t have to say. Whatever you did, thank you.” Her grace shocked Qing to silence, a rare feat. They had essentially kidnapped her brother off the street, and now she seemed willing to give them carte blanche. Qing supposed it turned out well enough, but…

The silence hung over the hallway for a moment as each turned the day’s events over in their heads. Soft yiddish mutterings passed under the door.

“I’ll bring tea for everyone!” Bo Wen said, seeing his moment to diffuse the tension and disappearing around the corner into the kitchen.

<”Just for our guests, Ba.”> Qing called after him in Wu.

“You speak Shanghainese?” Shenden asked.

“We speak Wu.” Qing flatly replied. Just as the Liu family didn’t care for the North’s ideas to make China a monolithic culture where all regional dialects would give way to Mandarin according to the wishes of the Party, they also held true to their attitudes regarding the notion that their own native dialect was purely for those of ‘the city’ as it was so often colloquially called. Qing more than most.

“It’s okay.” Bo Wen re-entered the room with tea, wide smile across his face. “Qing just… get weird about these kind of thing. He’s a good boy, really.”

”I understand. I can ‘get weird’ about Burmese. It is one of the few things that belongs to us.” Shenden said. ”I have only had the pleasure to study Mandarin, and some Cantonese. My specialty is the South Eastern languages, Thai, Filipino, Vietnamese…”

“Well, it makes sense academically in respect to China. If they don’t speak Cantonese, it's a fair bet they’ll speak Mandarin.” Qing conceded. “So have you got your brother microchipped?”

She smiled sadly, flicking her gaze to the door where her brother fought for his life. “I really should, for all the trouble he gets himself into. He had one of my Dad’s old utility belts, and it sent a distress signal. It used to go to the Vanguard, but he hasn’t used it in so long it defaulted to Dad’s phone.” She fished it out of her purse and showed an ancient flip phone.

“...And anthropologists dusted that thing off and realised it was some kind of a communications device.” He jibed at the age of the phone. “So he went in alone, and got himself…” He trailed off. Had this guy alienated himself so much from everyone, or was he just so hot headed that he jumped in without backup?

If he were honest with himself he could see himself doing both. Because he had in his own past. His own experience just went very differently. He was the one who walked away when it was all done.

Qing yawned openly. His father never missed the opportunity.

“Oooh. You need Qigong in morning. Don’t forget!”

He needn’t have said anything. They never forget, but that wasn’t the point. Before Qing could find a way to stop him, Bo Wen continued, smiling broadly to Shenden.

“Qing and I. Run Qigong every morning before open shop. Moench Park. Very good way start day. Every day. Good for mind. Good for body. You should try some time.” Incredibly cheesy grin accompanying the open invitation.

Qing had not yet discovered a method to manipulate one’s chi, causing spontaneous combustion with only a glare. As evident by the fact that his father was not currently on fire.

Bo Wen instead moved on from the scene of the crime, returning to matters pertaining to her brother.

“Vanguard not with him?”

“Pardon–?” She struggled to follow the sudden rapid change in conversation.

“Brother.” Bo Wen pointed to the door. “Vanguard not with him?”

”Not exactly. Rock quit all this superhero stuff when he was a teenager. I saw him for the first time in a long time at the funeral and… He’s just been spiraling. But I…” She wrapped her arms around herself. “I think this is my fault. I think I told him something I shouldn’t have.”

Qing looked at his father. “I get that. Funerals, and their causes, can do that.” He winced at the clumsiness of his own choice of words. That funeral would have been for her father as well.

“Sorry. About your father as well.” He added.

“We always knew this was a possibility, him being a superhero. We saw so many of his friends go over the years. It just never seemed like something that would happen to him.”

It was a crazy thing to hear in such a matter-of-fact tone. A superhero. As if that were something someone could just decide to be.

Made only more crazy that in this case, the person in question actually unquestionably was one.

The word coming from someone who had long since made her peace with the nature of that being a perfectly reasonable thing for one to be. Over tea.

“Now that he’s gone it feels like the family is shaking itself apart. It figures that The Mountain disappearing would cause an earthquake.” She said, and she laughed, but Qing saw the tear in her eye.

“Is a lot. Time when, family have to really come together or everyone can fall apart. Is good thing that you’re here. Show that important, at time when he most needs.” Bo Wen was clearly getting frustrated that his English was falling short at this time in particular. “Qing like that when happened too. Even when people don’t show appreciation, sometimes just making sure to hold close when people need.”

Don’t do that. That’s not what this is. ‘Trauma bonding’ over dead parents. She’s not– He wanted to scowl at the old man, to tell him to shut up. But it was clearly too sensitive a situation for him to even call his father out.

“So he tried to go and beat the world into making sense himself.” He left no question to it and realised he could have been describing both Rock and himself, after his mother. An affirmation of understanding.

”It’s all he knows. Dad took him in in the first place to show him a better way, but he’s been fighting the whole world since before we ever knew him. We gave him so much love, and sometimes I wonder if it wasn’t enough.”

Qing wanted to ask exactly who ‘we’ was, in this family which was shaking itself apart. But knew he couldn’t plainly ask given the secretive nature of the lifestyle. He knew she’d probably just politely decline to answer because it was too personal, but for some reason he didn’t want to seem ‘stupid’ to her in asking it in the first place.

It was one of the few times he regretted that his father knew more about the lives of these types than he did. He looked across at his father for any sign of clues and only saw him nodding solemnly in understanding to what she had said.

He wanted a problem to fix. But all there was were feelings and hurt.

“Do you know what he was looking into? We found him only a few blocks from our place. If there’s someone or something that can do THAT to someone like your brother, I’d kind of want to know about it.”

Shenden looked at the ground. ”It was his father.”

”We’re ready for you, bubele.” Doctor Idell said, appearing at the door with his surgical mask drawn down. His face was perfectly neutral, no sign of how Shenden’s brother was faring inside. Qing could only hope it was good news, for her sake.

”Coming.” Shenden said, gathering herself. ”Thank you. Thank you both. For the talking and the tea, and the everything else. Wish him luck.” She followed the Doctor, the grief of her face giving way to focus as the door closed behind her.

Qing's brow furrowed with confusion once she had left. Wait... his father? Your father's dead..? Or is this how people in this business "retire"... nobody seeks revenge against a dead man...

"You’ll live to fight, and fight to live, or I will end you myself."

<“Lift with your legs, Qing Yuan!”>

<“Oh sure, he’s not an air conditioner. So now you know all about lifting! I’m taking all of the weight here!”>

"Get up, Rock. You can do this."

<”Qing Yuan! Your chi!”>

"What have you done with my brother!?"

"The Mountain and The Rock never quit."

"Sorry. About your father as well."

"Strike harder, whelp."

"If you hadn’t found him when you did, he’d be dead already."

"Will he make it?"

"If I have anything to say about it…"

"Wherever you go, kiddo, I’ll believe in you."

”Rise and shine, Rock…”

Rock woke to the circling ceiling fan casting a revolving shadow across his face. The room was still and spare, blank walls and no sound but the gentle thrum of the fan and the murmur of the city beyond the walls. He was wrapped in warm sheets, lying on a bed that felt softer than any he’d slept on in a decade. How did he get here?

He remembered the beating, the pain. The Count’s face twisted in disgust as he dragged Rock across the sand. Then nothing. Rock expected the pain to redouble any second now, but all that was left in its place was a dull ache.

“Ah, the nudnik is finally awake.” Rock blinked the sleep out of his eyes and turned to the familiar voice. An old man sat on a chair pulled up to Rock’s bedside, leather bag lain across his lap. He smiled at Rock and his eyes twinkled behind his bifocals.

“Doctor Eye?” It was a face Rock hadn’t seen in a very long time. The last he could recall was Saw’s last battle against Darksaber. Doc Eye was Saw’s de facto physician, though The Mountain rarely needed such a thing. His grey abilities meant he could see and identify people’s ailments better than about any other doctor in Calder City. X-ray vision, telescopic vision, magnetic resonance vision, thermals, and more. When Rock was still a sidekick, Doc Eye was the chief medic of the Vanguard, but looking at him now in his old tweed coat and his bent spectacles, he looked like any other haggard primary care.

“The very same,” Doctor Idell opened one of Rock’s eyes wide and shone his ophthalmoscope.

“Where am I?” Rock tried to piece together more details, but the room was spartan, almost entirely unfurnished. It looked like an unused apartment. He saw Shenden snoozing in the corner, a handmade blanket thrown over her.

“Above a repair shop in Hudson,” Doctor Idell said, concluding his exam. “No brain damage, looks like. Besides what you’ve always had, anyway.” Rock glared at him.

”How did I get here? Doesn’t look like a Vanguard safehouse.”

”A couple kind souls plucked you off the street,” Doctor Idell said. He tucked the last of his equipment into his bag and stowed it under his chair.

”And then you found me from the belt signal?” Rock asked.

“I didn’t. She did.” Doctor Idell nodded at Shenden. “Asked me to come out of my retirement from this farkakte superhero business to make sure you were alright. I could never say no to her. You know, she’s the strongest person I’ve ever met.” Rock snorted.

“Aren’t you doctor to the superheroes? I know you’ve seen plenty stronger.”

“These old eyes have seen a lot. Have learned a lot. For one thing, I’ve seen that strength doesn’t always come from the muscles, shlemiel.”

“Don’t give me that bullshit,” Rock said. He’d heard enough nonsense like that from Saw and from his Senseis over the years. Esoteric philosophizing about what strength is. No high minded philosophy could explain why he was brutalized and left stuck in this bed.

”How’s about you settle with the kvetching and give an old man a moment to say his piece?” He reached into his bag and produced a lollipop.

”Trying to bribe me with candy? I’m not five, doc.”

”You do act like it. But this is for me, something besides a cigarette I can suck on while dealing with difficult patients,” He said. He unwrapped it and stuck it in, rolling it around his mouth. “Now where was I… Ah! I’m sure you remember how tough Saw was, eh? Pain tolerance like I’ve never seen.”

It was true. It was something beyond his regeneration. Even through the brutal lethwei training before his abilities awakened, the worst of the body conditioning, the microfractures across every bone in his body, he’d push through like nothing happened at all. He could get shot dozens of times and smile about it.

“I can tell you Shenden doesn’t have it. You can always see the hurt in her eyes. And like your old man, she can’t use any painkillers either, her body shoots through them too fast. But still, I’ve had her on my table more times than I can count. A heap of topical griseosporine and I can open her up, let her donate things most people only get one or two of. Through it all she won’t whine or thrash, she just curls her hands up and lets herself cry about it. Then by the time I’ve wiped my ointment off and she’s knit herself up, she’s the one asking me when I’ll be ready to go again.”

Rock looked back at her, snoring softly. He put a hand against the ribs The Count shattered. They were intact, sore, but firm. ”Are you saying she just…?”

Doctor Idell nodded. “You were destroyed. Bad as anyone I’ve ever treated. But with her help, we took a recovery time of six months and shortened it to six hours. Her blood loses its potency the longer it's been out of her, but I was able to IV you two together directly. It did a lot to patch you up, and she was able to donate the parts the blood couldn’t hack. But it sure wiped her out. She’s been sleeping a long while.”

“She didn’t have to,” Rock said. This was his mess. He could get out of it on his own.

“Didn’t she? Her brother nearly kills himself and she’s just supposed to let him wither away? You might have missed it kid, but she’s the one that’s been fighting to hold your family together, you included. She’s never fought in her life but she marched in here ready to tear heads off if that was what it took to get to you.”

”She would never,” Rock said. The Shennie he knew wouldn’t hurt a fly, literally. She always made Rock or Khaing Min deal with the bugs around the house growing up, and insisted they put them in a cup and release them.

”She’d do anything for you,” Doctor Idell said. His tone did not brook disagreement.

”I’d do anything for her,” Rock said. It was Doctor Idell’s turn to snort.

”As long as you don’t have to push your ego down first, right?” Doctor Idell crunched into his lollipop.

”You’re on thin ice, old man.” Rock cautioned.

”That’s another thing about your sister. She’s always kind, to a fault. She’ll welcome anyone into her heart. She’s already gotten some kind of close to the folks running this place. But you? You push everyone away, with all that piss and vinegar. You’re too weak to let anyone get within spitting distance of you.” Doctor Idell tossed the stick of his lollipop into the trash as Rock stewed. What the hell did the old man mean by that? Where did he get off? Rock heard a pair of footsteps coming from somewhere else in the building.

“Ah, here come our hosts. The kid’s a real mensch, and his dad’s one hell of a balebos. Make sure to show them gratitude, sheygets, more than you’ve shown me. I’m going to go fix myself some more of this yuhua tea.” Doctor Idell grabbed a used coffee cup from Rock’s bedside table and excused himself as a pair of Asian men walked in. One was young and lean, with a beard that looked like it hadn’t seen a trim in a few days. The other was a little bigger, rounder, looked like an older version of the first. Father and son, Rock figured. The younger one’s eye held on the blanket his sister was curled up in, or maybe even Shenden herself, for a beat, before returning focus to the now conscious Rock.

“You’re awake. Supervillain hit you with a truck?” The younger newcomer asked, immediately undercutting everything the doctor had said about them.

“Felt like it,” Rock said. He laid back into the pillows and looked up at the ceiling fan. ”Ever think you’re gonna have an easy time and then it blows up in your face?”

“I caught a bullet today and forgot about it. So yes.” He uttered, accompanied with a yawn. Rock sat up and locked his eyes on the young man. Not just some slipshod repairman, was he?

”I might’ve been alright if I was that fast. How did you manage that?” Rock asked. An inkling squirmed at the back of his mind. Something about the way this guy carried himself, the tone of his body.

“No it’s not like that. I’m not… in your ‘field’.” He waved Rock off. “Just… wrong place, wrong time.”

“You don’t catch bullets by being in the wrong place,” Rock said, feeling the edge creep into his voice. He bit the inside of his cheek. He was supposed to be grateful.

“I’d say it’s the only place you catch them. If you’re in the right place, you dodge them. So… agree to disagree.”

”You seem like you get around to a lot of those wrong places,” Rock said. He looked experienced, trained. His hands looked right for it, thick and rough, not the kind you get from doing just anything. They looked like the hands of his senseis, seasoned after decades of striking. “What’s your name, anyway?”

“Qing Yuan Liu. Just like the name on the front, Liu’s Fix-It. Well, you weren’t awake when we got you in here, so I can get how you’d miss that.”

”I’m Rock,” Rock said, offering his hand, “but I’m sure Shennie or the Doc already told you that.” When Qing accepted the handshake, Rock pulled it closer, turning it over and examining his fist. “For someone not in my line of work, you sure seem like it. Your knuckles are worn down from it. You fight,” Rock said, a declaration more than a question.

“I didn’t like having to catch a bullet.” Qing glibly replied, half-lidded.

“Who are you, really? The ‘God of Water’?” Rock asked. The pattern followed. Qing clearly had a lot more experience than he was letting on. The flow of his movements, even the way he weaved away from Rock’s questions. He said he could catch bullets. Even The Count had to dodge them. A guy with all that expertise, floating around The Count’s lair just in time to snatch him up? It was too perfect.

“That sounds ambitious. God of Plumbing, maybe. Apprentice to the God of Plumbing, more likely. I’d be happy to let you write my online reviews though, with that attitude.” Qing said. If he was a liar, he was a good one, but Rock didn’t put that past him.

The older man laughed at the thought of Qing being a god. Then laughed some more. Then laughed uncomfortably long until Qing closed his eyes and sighed, weary with everything. Maybe Qing was telling the truth. It didn’t track with The Count’s grandiose explanation that one of his ‘Gods’ would be living with his Dad in a mom-and-pop repair shop.

”Maybe I will. Not every day I get fished out of hell by a couple good samaritans, I can thank you with a review. I’ll make sure to mention you both, Qing Yuan and…?”

“Bo Wen Liu. And it’s my name on the front. That you weren’t awake for. Like Qing said.”

”I’ll remember it,” Rock said, realizing he actually meant it. Most people felt like set dressing to him. He couldn’t recall the names of any of his fellow pupils from his time in Japan. But these two, Qing in particular, had something special about them.

“You pick fight with gods? Lead with face? And things not as easy as thought?”

“Yes, he’s not short on confidence. I think it’s probably part of the lifestyle.”

”I was supposed to be out of this ‘lifestyle’ already,” Rock sighed. ”You know how it is. One last job.”

”Rock has a hard head…” Rock’s head snapped to the corner and saw Shennie was awake, still wrapped up in her blanket, smiling at him softly. “Some days it seems like what will get him killed. Most days it seems like it's what keeps him alive.”

”How long have you been awake?”

“Long enough.”

Qing’s eye again returned to the blanket, and his mouth fell open he turned to the older man, before he thought better of it and chose to say nothing at all. He changed tack and decided there was something more important than whatever was on his mind.

“We’ll just give you some time to talk. Knock sense back into his hard head. Things like that. Ba, downstairs.”

“Thank you both again. I’ll never forget it.”

Bo Wen gave Shenden a wide smile before Qing realised he wasn’t being followed. “Now, Ba.”

As the pair went back down the stairs, Qing’s words floated back into the open door.

“What a nice girl,” Qing said. Rock heard the footsteps stop.

“Not a damn word.” The older man’s laughter faded as the pair descended out of earshot.

”They’re amazing people,” Shenden said. She folded her blanket so it would fit onto her lap and pulled her chair to the other side of Rock’s bed.

”Amazingly odd, Rock said.

”Rock. They saved your life.” She leaned in, punctuated her point with a hard gaze. Rock’s expression didn’t shift.

”Maybe they shouldn’t have,” he said. He saw her heart break a little behind her eyes.

”What are you talking about, Rock?” She worked to keep her tone level, but she couldn’t hack it.

”Maybe if I died down there the Vanguard would have enough reason to come down on him and find proof of what he did.” It might be the only option left to them. The Vanguard would never move on him without something more substantial. The Count swore up and down he hadn’t been Saw’s killer, but what other lead was there?

”Why do you even believe it was him?” She kept the edge of the hurt out of her voice this time, but the question still cut Rock.

”Really, Shenden? Isn’t it obvious? Why even tell me he was in the city if you didn’t think he did it?” Rock snapped. He expected her to recoil, but she just scoffed.

”Because it was the right thing to do. Your biological father shows up to your dad’s funeral, and I’m supposed to keep that from you? I didn’t think you’d go on a tear through the city going after him. I didn’t think you’d wreck Uncle Phone’s store. I didn’t think Ben Knight would be calling me asking why you were beating on his son, and I certainly didn’t think you would go and do this to yourself.” She gestured at him up and down. His injuries were gone, but Rock got the point.

”Well what the hell did you think was gonna happen?” Rock said. Shenden knew him well enough to know this was how he solved problems. The way The Mountain had against his worst enemies. The way The Count did, he realized.

”I thought you might come home and grieve with us. I thought we might all work it out together, as a family. Make right of this.” She reached out and squeezed Rock’s arm. ”All this time, we just wanted you to come home.”

”We? Come on, Shennie. You know as well as I do how pissed Khaing Min and Thiri are. You know how much we fight.” He pulled his arm out of her grasp and rubbed where she touched like it would leave a scar.

”They did a lot of growing up while you were gone. I had hoped you did too.” She held her hand close to herself. It made Rock feel like he had slapped it away.

”It’s not about ‘growing up’. Do you remember that night when we were all at Doc Eye’s?” He offered his hand to her as a silent apology.

Shenden nodded cautiously, put her hand in his. It was one of the nights after Saw’s last fight with Darksaber, lacerated to the bone, hanging on in the way only he could. All his children gathered around, supporting him.

”Do you remember what we all promised him?” He met her eyes, deep and intelligent brown, grasping the memory.

”That we would always be there for him,” she whispered.

”Of everyone who made that promise, who left?” Rock asked.

”You’re a special case Rock, you know that. You had to go and heal on your own terms.” She massaged the back of his hand with her thumb.

”Our siblings don’t see it that way. I don’t see it that way. I thought he had nothing left to teach me, so I left to become stronger, but I couldn’t even manage that. I left, and now he’s dead. I wasn’t there to protect him like he protected us. It’s my fault.” He drew his legs up to his chest.

”He knew the risks, Rock, made sure we all knew them. Is this what all this is about? You can’t face us, you can’t forgive yourself until you catch whoever did this?”

Rock shook his head. He couldn’t. He fought the stinging feeling in his eyes. Shenden bit her lip and thought for a beat.

”I can’t tell you I wouldn’t want to see justice done. But I can tell you it wouldn’t matter to Dad. He died doing what he believed in. All he would want is to see you grow into a good man.”

”I’m trying,” Rock said.

”I know,” Shenden said. She wrapped him in a hug. ”Maybe part of the trying should be making amends. If you really feel you did wrong, you could apologize to Thiri and Khaing Min. I can come, keep them honest. Keep you honest.” Rock looked away.

”I can’t,” he said.

”Maybe you just can’t yet.” Shenden rubbed his back. ”What if you started with something smaller, and worked your way up? Try apologizing to Scott Knight.”

”I…” Rock sighed. ”I can try.”

---

I open the blinds of my window, letting what little light remains of the day bounce from the adjacent building into my apartment. I turn back to my desk and take a seat, staring at my laptop’s screen left open on an unfinished beat. I don’t know if I even have the energy to try to hunt for samples or what synth preset I want to use, but this is the first time I’ve been able to actually sit down and work on something in weeks at this point.

I click through the dozens of sample packs trying to find a decent sound selection for the drums, but every poorly chopped snare and way too bass boosted kick makes my head pound when I hear it. My ears start to ring the longer I cycle through sounds, my mind wandering. The Gray I couldn’t save at the warehouse, the girl that went missing at The Haunt. I can’t do anything to help anyone. Can’t even find a good hi hat.

I hear a knock and wonder for a moment if I was looking through the percussion folder instead of the hi hats folder. Then it sounds off again, louder, and I realize it’s coming from the window. Panic surges through me and I jump out of the chair, summoning my sword. The tension releases when I see Rock perched on the fire escape outside, only to quickly be replaced by confusion. After a moment, I dispel the sword and step over to the window, lifting it open.

“Rock? What are you doing here?” I ask.

“Just checking in. I realized I left you in a pretty bad way,” Rock says.

“You couldn’t have called?”

“International sim card. Didn’t want to pay the fees.”

I blink in astonishment before shrugging. So he’d rather climb up my fire escape? “... Fair.” I look behind me, then back to Rock. “You coming in?”

He nods and ducks inside. I see he has something tucked under his arm. He grabs it and holds it up, a nice bottle of a vintage wine. “Saw and your mom used to drink this after the hard nights. He’d have a glass every year on the anniversary.” He puts it on my creaky ass desk and looks around. “Figured we could crack into it and talk shop,” he says, “you got a corkscrew?”

“Uh, no. Don’t exactly drink much wine,” I say, picking up the bottle and looking it over. “... I got an idea.” I move over to the coffee table, clearing off some clutter, and set the bottle down. I step back, summon my sword and mentally hone its edge, then swing at the top of the bottle. The neck is sliced through cleanly, and the top drops. I realize it will shatter against the hardwood, but Rock snatches it out of the air.

“Clean cut. You’re getting better with that thing already.” He runs his thumb over the smooth glass.

I stiffen at the words and for a moment I’m standing over the two dead men behind the warehouse, soaked in blood. I clench my eyes shut but the image remains. “Yeah... I guess.” I dispel the sword and take a seat on the couch, sinking into the worn out leather.

Rock’s brow furrows at me, but he doesn’t say anything about it. “Glasses?” he asks. I point him to the right cabinet and he selects a pair of coffee mugs, one reading ‘Sandra’s: Calder’s Gourmet Coffee’ and the other depicting the logo of UMBC’s music program. He pours and sits next to me, wine between our mugs.

“Scott.” He takes a sip and his face scrunches up. He pushes past the taste and swallows. “You look like shit.”

I take a sip from my wine as well. It's awful but I swallow as well out of respect for Saw… Even if he had bad taste in wine. “... Yeah. I uh, had another run in the other day.”

“You don’t look any more banged up than when I left you. Did you win?”

The blade slid right between his ribs and punctured his lung. The other guy’s head rolled right off of his shoulders. They were dead before they hit the floor.

I take in a shuddering breath. “... I had to. It was them or it was me.”

“Like that, huh?” Rock struggles through another gulp of wine. “First time?”

I close my eyes and nod. “Yeah. There were five of them trying to kidnap this guy. I knocked two of them out before they got the upper hand, had me on the ground beating me half to death. I was only able to get back up because the guy they were after was a Gray. Then another guy showed up, knocked out the Gray, and got away with him. I managed to knock out a third guy before the last one told the other two to kill me.”

I pinch the bridge of my nose as I clench my eyes tighter. I open my eyes and take in a breath, looking at Rock. “Like I said. It was them or me.”

Rock reaches out like he’s going to pat me on the back, but he changes his mind and puts the hand over the top of his mug. “Been like that for me before. But I can’t say it ever bothered me. I’ve killed on accident before. Someone’s not as tough as I think, something hits too hard. It’s usually easier when it’s on purpose.” I see him turning over old memories.

I wonder for a moment if any of those times were when he was working with Saw. Everything I know about the man tells me he wouldn’t have allowed that. I consider asking before deciding it’s not my place. “... It didn’t feel easy,” I say. “I keep turning it over in my mind wondering if I could have gotten away without having to kill them. But at the time it just felt like that was the only way I’d survive.”

Rock nods and sips again. He grimaces, but looks like he’s getting better at handling it. He sits the mug down and meets my eyes. “When I fight someone, or someone fights me, I go all out. It’s how I respect them. That they’re worth it, worth the effort. To me, nothing hurts worse than when I can tell someone isn’t giving their all.” He squeezes his fist. “Especially if I lose. Saw hated it.”

“... Is that supposed to make me feel better?” I ask.

“I’m trying to say that he taught me that restraint is the better path. Tried to teach me, anyway. He had Eagle Eye talk to me about it. You remember him?”

“A little bit,” I say. Eagle Eye floated around my Mom’s ‘clique’, if you could call it that, but according to her stories he was a lot closer to Shield than her. Like, a lot. Mom thought the two of them would have tied the knot eventually if she hadn’t lost Shield. After that he’d come by occasionally, talk to her in hushed tones about what happened and cry about it when they thought I had gone to sleep.

“You know he’s the first to become a Crow War Chief since World War II? Bunch of requirements for it, ones that don’t usually come up. Lead a war party, steal an enemy’s horse, take a bad guy’s weapon. But the one he was most proud of, the one he was trying to impress on me, was to touch a living enemy without killing them. Fight, preserve your own life, not take your opponent’s, and still win.”

I nod. “That seems like something that a lot of heroes value. Your dad, my mom, Eagle Eye, Shield, Anvil… Even if your powers are something where it’s easier to kill with, you’re supposed to find another way.” I look down at my hands. “Mom never killed anyone.”

“Knowing how to kill someone is the first step to not killing someone,” Rock says. ”When we fought, you barely knew how to swing your sword. Now you know how to use it properly, how to cut. Most of Queen’s escapades were before my time, but I know she wasn’t just swinging her swords around like bats. She’d cut precisely, decisively. You just need to learn how to cut better. You’ve already proved you’re learning fast.”

I mull over what he says for a moment before sighing. “I don’t even know how she could do it, how she learned to do it. I don’t have anyone to show me how to be better. She could have, but…” I trail off, raising the mug of wine to my lips and taking a sip. Still really bad.

“They’re always gone too soon.” Rock slams the rest of his mug and shudders as he chokes down the last of it. “I thought I learned everything worth knowing from Saw. By the time I find out there’s more, he’s already gone. For instance, how he stomached this fucking wine.”

I snort, almost choking on my laughter. “... Yeah, this is fucking terrible.” I stand, walk over to the kitchenette, and dump the mug into the sink. “Y’know what’s funny?” I say, watching the last of my cup circle the drain. “I don’t think my mom even liked wine. She was a liquor girl.”

“No kidding? It was Saw’s favorite. He swore she loved it. That old dog.”

“My mom was the most stubborn woman I’ve ever known but she always had a soft spot for him. I know she hated every time she had to drink it, but I guess his company made it bearable.” I look back to Rock. “We’re never drinking that again, by the way.”

“Not like we can recork it,” he says. He holds up the sliced top of the bottle and tosses it in the trash before pouring the rest of the bottle down the drain. We watch it swirl in the sink. “Apparently my old man was a hell of a drinking buddy, if you could get over his taste. He couldn’t get drunk either, so he was always good to drive.”

“Yeah, apparently back in the day when they had to get somewhere as a group, mom would fly, Anvil would use her jetpack, Eagle Eye had his helicopter… And Saw and Shield would drive in Saw’s car.”

“He loved that thing. Wouldn’t put a cent into it, said the money went better to charity or to the soup kitchens, but he cared for it like it was one of us kids. Every time Techtronic or Anvil offered to upgrade it, it was like Christmas.”

“Mom was the same way with her PDA. It was a gift to Shield from Techtronic so he could keep in touch with both of them during missions. After Shield died, she redesigned her outfit to mount it on her wrist. It was like having a piece of him, I guess.”

“I remember that old thing. Saw told me Techtronic made it back in ‘99. Queen, Shield, Eagle Eye, and Saw were looking into a string of kidnappings and needed to stay in touch with home base. There were a bunch of missing Grays, they thought it was all connected. They made some arrests and it all quieted down, but they could never find a ringleader.”

That makes me pause. “... Missing Grays?”

“Yeah, tough times back then.” He looks over to the fridge and gestures to it. “You got any Calder Cola here? Need to get the taste of this wine out of my mouth.”

“Rock, that guy at the warehouse. He was a Gray too, the guys were dressed in all black with batons and tranq guns and then hauled him off in a van. And there’s been other cases all over the city of Grays going missing.”

“Shit. Maybe I need something harder than Calder Cola.” He opens the fridge to find my half carton of eggs and rotten pint of milk. He reaches for the only other thing inside, the twelve pack of Calder Cola, and realizes the whole sleeve of cans are empty. He slams the fridge door.

“I’m trying to get out of this superhero stuff but it's like quicksand. I put one toe in wondering about Saw and now I’m waist deep. Truth is, I came over here to…” He chokes on his next word, “apologize for hurting you, and it seems like my shitty wine isn’t cutting it. I’ll help you out with this Gray stuff, but then we’re square.”

For a moment I wonder if this whole conversation was purely transactional for Rock, but I hope that it isn’t. “... Deal. I’ve got a guy we can call, he said to contact him if I found out anything about this case.” I pull out my phone and the business card I was offered at Sandra’s earlier this week.

“You ever heard of Dominic Dusk?”

The hallway at St Dymphna’s was hot that summer morning. Pretty soon the heat would be unbearable, save for the pockets of cooling that the clunky AC units brought them. It had taken Joanie a few minutes to rouse herself from the sofa she had found her sweaty back stuck to when she had been called.

Mrs Qadir had been waiting for her near the door to her office. She smiled as she approached and Joanie quickly realised she wasn’t alone.

“Joanie, this is Trey,” Mrs Qadir said, her voice gentle as she stepped aside.

A boy emerged from behind her. Thirteen, twelve, maybe. A young kid with dark skin and curls that stuck out in uneven directions, as if he had tried to flatten them and given up halfway through. His eyes were wide and uncertain, taking in the hallway as if he wasn’t sure he was allowed to look at anything for too long. When he finally let out a smile, it was bright and warm and completely unguarded. It lit up the whole hallway.

“Hey,” he said, lifting a hand in a small wave. He was clearly nervous yet masking it behind a front of confidence.

Mrs Qadir gave Joanie’s shoulder a soft squeeze before leaving them alone.

The silence that followed felt thick. Joanie stared at him, unsure what she was supposed to say.

Trey shifted his weight, glancing at the scuffed skirting boards, then back at her. He looked like he wanted to say something but didn’t know where to start.

Joanie cleared her throat. “Um… I can show you around. If you want.”

Trey’s shoulders eased a little.

“Yeah. That’d be cool.”

She started walking, slow enough that he could keep up.

“The living room’s usually loud. People play games in there. Or argue about them.” She said, gesturing to the first room they came to.

Trey’s eyes flicked up.

“Games?” He exclaimed. “They let you play them here?”

Joanie nodded before replying. “Vanguard Brawl, mostly.”

Trey stopped walking altogether and his whole face lit up. “No way. You have that?”

Joanie blinked, surprised by the sudden burst of energy. “Sometimes.”

“Who do you main? Please don’t say Frostbite. Everyone says Frostbite.”

Joanie felt the corner of her mouth twitch.

“Ember.”

Trey gasped like she had just revealed a secret treasure.

“Ember is amazing. The aerial combos? The fire spin? So good. You’ll have to show me sometime.” He rambled excitedly. “She’s got nothing on Stillpoint though! That guy is so cool.”

Joanie shrugged, but the warmth in her chest surprised her. The guy certainly knew his stuff.

“Maybe.” She teased. “Reckon I could still beat you as him though.”

“Nah,” Trey grinned, shaking his head. “Come on. You’re going down!”

The two raced towards the game console by the TV, the flare of competition rushing between them.

And that was all it took.

---

“Jₒₐₙᵢₑ”

The voice jolted her awake. Her eyes flickered open and her head pounded. The voice was familiar, yet in this moment she couldn’t place it. Instead she tried to focus herself on the chaos around her.

Dust drifted through the air like ash. Joanie lay half‑curled on the pavement, cheek pressed against cold stone, her breath catching in shallow, uneven pulls. Her ribs hurt with every inhale. Her vision pulsed in and out, colours smearing at the edges like wet paint. She couldn’t stop seeing the moment Trey vanished. The bubble collapsing. The empty space where he had been. The way her scream tore out of her throat before she even realised she was making a sound.

He was gone. Trey was gone.

Voices rose above her, sharp and frantic, cutting through the ringing in her ears.

“This is bad. This is really bad.”

“Dane’s gone. He’s actually gone.”

“We shouldn’t have been here. We shouldn’t have done this.”.

Joanie tried to lift her head. Her body didn’t listen. Her heart felt like it was breaking open inside her chest.

Hands slid under her arms. Her body lifted, dragged across broken pavement. The world tilted sideways.

Trey was gone.

She had watched him vanish.

She had caused the collapse.

She had killed him.

A voice came from somewhere above her, low and shaking.

“We need to go. Now.” They said.

Cinderjack’s reply followed, tight and strained. “Put her in the van. I’ll get the other one.”

The world spun.

---

Her mind went back again, this time to when she was fourteen.

“Leave her alone.”

Trey’s voice cut through the alley before Joanie even realised he was there. He stood a few steps behind her, shoulders squared, curls sticking out in uneven directions, his jaw set in a way she had never seen before. The three older teenagers who’d been cornering her turned toward him, their expressions shifting from amusement to irritation.

The tallest one, a guy from the grade above her, let go of Joanie’s backpack and stepped forward.

“What’s it to you?” He barked.

Trey held strong. “She said no.”

Joanie’s pulse thudded in her ears. She could feel the rough wall at her back, the cold strap of her backpack still twisted in her hand.

“You trying to be a hero?” the boy asked, taking another step.

The punch came fast, with a sharp crack of knuckles against skin.

Trey’s head snapped to the side, and he staggered, catching himself on one knee. His lip split, a
thin line of red forming at the corner.

Joanie’s heart skipped a beat as she watched her friend fall. Panic turned to anger as she felt her body pulse slightly. She couldn’t risk a power flare up here though.

She had to do something else.

Before the boy could laugh, she stepped forward and kicked him square between the legs. He folded instantly, gasping as he dropped to the ground.

The other two shouted in surprise, but Trey was already grabbing her sleeve.

“Run!”

They bolted out of the alley together, the group’s shouts echoing behind them. They didn’t stop until they reached the main road, where the noise of traffic drowned everything else out.

“You kicked him in the nuts.” Trey laughed between pants. “That was amazing.”

Joanie nodded, still catching her breath.

“Thank you” was all she managed.

“No problem.” He smiled. “I’ll always have your back, pal.”

And he had done so until the very end. Protecting her had killed him, and Joanie would never forgive herself for that.

“Aᵣₑ yₒᵤ ₒₖₐy?” Trey asked. His voice was different now. “Wₕₐₜ’ₛ wᵣₒₙg?”

Joanie paused in confusion. That’s not what he had said that day. That wasn’t right.

It brought her back to the present.

---

Metal slammed. A door shut. Darkness swallowed her.

Joanie lay on her side in the back of the van, cheek pressed against cold flooring. Her ribs throbbed. Her head pounded. Her breath came in shallow, broken pulls. Every inhale felt like it scraped against something sharp inside her chest.

Mina was somewhere behind her, crying softly. The sound cut straight through Joanie’s heart.
Joanie tried to reach for her. Her fingers twitched. Nothing more.

She wanted to tell her she was sorry. She wanted to tell her she didn’t mean for any of this to happen. She wanted to tell her Trey was gone.

Her mind went back to the voice she’d heard. It had happened again; awoken her from unconsciousness. It definitely hadn’t been Trey speaking to her.

She breathed.

She needed help. Badly. Her mind screamed for it, latching onto the calming voice she was hearing for comfort.

The van hit a bump. Her head struck metal. Her vision went black again.

---

This time she was seventeen. Sandra’s Diner felt softer in the evenings, the lights warm against the red vinyl seats and the smell of frying oil drifting lazily through the air. Joanie sat tucked into the booth beside Trey, Mina across from them, all three sharing a plate of fries.

Mina flicked one at him. It bounced off his shoulder and landed in his lap. Joanie snorted, grabbed one of her own, and sent it sailing after the first. Trey threw his hands up in exaggerated despair.

“Why is it always me being attacked?”

Mina grinned.

“We’re just training you to defend yourself better!.”

Trey reached for a fry, but Joanie was faster. She tossed another at him, hitting his cheek this time. Mina burst out laughing, the sound bright enough to fill the whole booth.

Trey tried to look offended, but the smile kept breaking through.

“You two are impossible.”

Joanie leaned back, warmth settling in her chest as Mina wiped tears of laughter from her eyes and Trey pretended to shield himself behind a menu. For a moment, everything felt simple. Just the three of them, sharing food and sunlight and a kind of happiness Joanie wished she could hold onto forever.

She hated that this moment was over now. That there was no longer a possibility to make more memories like this.

She longed to throw fries at her friend again. To hear his laugh. To just see him.

---

Light hit her eyes as she heard the voice again.

“Jₒₐₙᵢₑ” It said. He said.

She pleaded back to him.

Please, Trey. Please come back.

She was being carried. Her head rested against someone’s shoulder. The movement jostled her ribs, sending sharp pain through her chest.

Her eyes opened softly for brief moments. It took her a moment to realise that the brightly lit warehouse they were moving through was Harborlight’s main floor. The club felt wrong without music, without crowds, without the heat of bodies pressed together. The silence made the place feel hollow, like a stage after the actors had left.

The arena floor was still in the process of being repaired she could see, evident by the fresh wooden boards over where she had damage that had yet to be painted. The faint smell of varnish still clung to the air.

Joanie’s vision wavered, catching glimpses of the empty stands, the quiet bar, the long stretch of polished floor where she had once stood terrified under the lights.

Her mind screamed outwards at the realisation. Not here. Why did they have to bring her back here?

Another voice spoke. This one was new.

“Put them in together for now.” He said. “Afterwards we can give her over to the client. He might have more use for her than the boss will.”

Her mind raced as she took in what he had said. Was he on about Mina? And who the hell was the client? Icelander?

There was another lurch as she was moved into a hallway.

Every step they took away from the street felt like a step away from Trey. A step away from the boy who had always protected her. A step away from the boy she had failed to protect.
Her heart felt like it was tearing itself apart.

---

It was last night again. She sat with Trey and Mina on the edge of the pier at the Slats, legs dangling over the side, the city lights flickering across the surface of the river like scattered coins.

They weren’t doing anything special. Just talking. Just being together.

Trey kept making Mina laugh, leaning back on his hands as he told some exaggerated story about a kid at St Dymphna’s who had tried to skateboard down the hallway and crashed into the laundry cart. Even Joanie had found it impressive to witness. Mina snorted so loudly Joanie had to cover her mouth to stop herself laughing too. Trey grinned at both of them, that bright, vibrant smile of his.

Joanie remembered how good it felt. How rare it was to feel that kind of warmth.

The three of them sat close, shoulders brushing. The waves lapped quietly against the supports below, and for a moment Joanie felt like the whole world had slowed down just for them. Trey nudged her knee with his own and said he’d always have her back, no matter what happened. She told him she’d have his too.

It had been a rough few days. Harborlight. Rowan disappearing. The constant fear had been sitting heavy in Joanie’s chest.

But there, with her friends beside her, the night felt soft. Safe. Like nothing bad could reach them as long as they stayed together on that quiet stretch of pier.

She wished she could have held onto that feeling. She wished it could have lasted.

But now that was over.

The pier dissolved. Trey’s laugh thinned into nothing. Mina’s snort faded like a light being switched off. The river went dark. The memory slipped from her fingers before she could hold onto it.

For a heartbeat, there was emptiness.

Then the voice came again. It wasn’t faint this time. It was clear and warm. It reached into her mind like a hand reaching through the fog.

“Jₒₐₙᵢₑ…”

Her breath caught. The sound wrapped around her like a blanket she hadn’t realised she’d been freezing without. Her pulse steadied for the first time since the collapse. Her ribs still hurt, her head still throbbed, but her mind leaned instinctively toward the voice.

Toward him.

“ⱼₒₐₙᵢₑ…ₜₕᵢₛ ᵢₛ ₘₐᵣₜₕ. ᵢ ₙₑₑd yₒᵤ ₜₒ cₐₗₘ yₒᵤᵣ ₘᵢₙd ₐₙd fₒcᵤₛ ₒₙ ₘy ᵥₒᵢcₑ. ₒₖ? Wₕₑᵣₑ ₐᵣₑ yₒᵤ?"

Her chest tightened. She knew that tone. She knew that worry. She knew that softness.

“Marth…”

She didn’t speak it aloud. She didn’t need to. The name rose inside her.

“Yₑₛ, bᵤₜ ⱼₒₐₙᵢₑ, fₒcᵤₛ fₒᵣ ₘₑ. ₜₑₗₗ ₘₑ wₕₐₜ ᵢₛ ₕₐₚₚₑₙᵢₙg.”

Her mind tried to climb toward him, but everything was heavy. Trey’s death. The collapse. The van. Harborlight. Mina’s crying. The cold. It all pressed down on her until she could barely breathe.

How was he doing this? How was she hearing him? Was he a grey?

No. No, he couldn’t be. She would’ve known. Wouldn’t she?

Her thoughts trembled.

“They’re taking me to him, Marth.”

The words formed in her mind, shaky and frightened. She didn’t know if she was doing it right. She didn’t know if he could hear her. But she tried.

"ₜₐₖᵢₙg yₒᵤ? Wₕₒ'ₛ ₜₐₖᵢₙg yₒᵤ? ₜₐₖᵢₙg yₒᵤ ₜₒ wₕₒₘ?”

“I’ve messed everything up.” She cried. “He’s going to hurt Mina.”

”ₙₒ ₙₒ ₙₒ. ⱼᵤₛₜ bᵣₑₐₜₕₑ. ᵢₜ’ₛ gₒₙₙₐ bₑ ₒₖₐy. ⱼᵤₛₜ ₜₑₗₗ ₘₑ wₕₑᵣₑ yₒᵤ ₐᵣₑ ₐₙd ᵢ’ₗₗ…”

Then a surge of coldness overcame her.

---

When she came to again, she realised that she had been placed into a chair, with cable ties tightened around their wrists. Joanie’s breath hitched as the plastic dug into her skin. Her arms felt heavy. Her chest felt hollow. Her throat burned.

The cold reached her next.

It was not the sharp sting of winter air. The air felt thin. The space around her felt emptied. Her skin prickled with the sensation of heat leaving her body rather than cold entering it. Every bruise throbbed harder. Every injury felt deeper, as if the temperature were pulling at the pain and widening it.

She turned her head slightly and saw that Mina had been placed into a chair next to her. She couldn’t tell whether she was relieved or upset by the sight. At least she was alive.

She couldn’t stop seeing Trey’s face. The way he looked at her through the bubble. The way he mouthed her name. The way he vanished.

She tried to shake the thoughts away and attempted to take in the room around it. Warm lighting spilled across the floor, catching on dark wood and polished metal. The office felt too clean, too deliberate, too expensive for the building it sat in. Joanie’s vision swam, but she could make out the shape of a large desk, shelves lined with bottles and trophies, and a wide window that looked out over the empty arena.

She quickly realised this was the room she’d been looking up at all those nights ago. Her throat tightened at the thought.

Yet the cold made everything feel distant, as if she were looking at the room through glass.

Her fingers were numb. Her shoulders trembled. Her injuries pulsed with a deeper ache, as if the cold were reaching inside her and taking whatever strength she had left.

She thought the two of them were alone for a moment until she heard the groan from the corner behind her. She attempted to swivel her head at the familiar noise but she couldn’t quite turn enough. She had a pretty good idea of who it was though. She knew that groan, although she was used to hearing it in very different circumstances.

The air behind her felt thinner, as if someone was drawing the warmth out of it.

Footsteps followed.

Slow. Heavy. Controlled.

With each one, the temperature seemed to drop further. Not in a way she could see, but in a way she could feel. Her breath came out shallow. Her chest tightened. Her heartbeat slowed, as if the cold were reaching for it. Her ribs ached. Her vision flickered at the edges.

A figure stepped into view from behind her, his expression unreadable. His presence filled the room like a shadow stretching across the floor. The cold surged with him, rolling over her shoulders and down her spine.

She longed to speak to Marth again. To hear his reassuring voice in her head once more. But unfortunately, no one was there to save her.

He stopped just behind her chair, in the space just where the turn of her neck could reach him fully.

He leaned forward slightly, allowing the light to catch his features. Short curls framed a strong brow. His beard was full and neatly kept. His eyes were a pale, icy blue that seemed to hold their own temperature. Up close, his face looked carved rather than grown, every line sharp, every angle deliberate. The cold around her tightened as if responding to him.

“Joanie Porter” the Icelander said. There was a measured cadence to his speech, as if he weighed every syllable before releasing it. “I was wondering when you would awake.”

Maybe she would be seeing Trey sooner than she thought.

Dominic rubbed his hand over his weary face as he walked through the halls of the old warehouse he called home. It had been a long, well. He wanted to say 48 hours but it had really been a busy couple of weeks. Between tackling the missing greys, and trying to find a connection between them and the death of the Mountain he had been busy enough. Add on all the small cases that kept the lights on, Rock returning to the city for information before running away and (near) midnight rendezvous with the daughter of a notorious monster. It was a busy time to be a detective.

Looking up towards his door, he froze for a second. A silhouette moved behind the illuminated door. Lowering his hand to his holster he withdrew the revolver and held his thumb loosely on the hammer, ready to draw it back. Very slowly he approached the door, he could hear talking now. Great. Talking meant that there was more than one, and Dominic was already tired and really couldn't be bothered with this. Momentarily he considered just turning around and leaving, he didn't have anything of real value in the office/apartment. Except his files. Sighing to himself he approached the door slowly, drawing the shadows around himself like a cloak. Ready to cast them out below the door-



He could head the music now, AC/DCs Thunderstruck and it's half sung half forgotten lyrics and, if even possible, he sighed and even deeper heavier sigh. Holstering the pistol he released the shadows back to their natural state and opened the door to the bright interior.

The space was slightly tidier than he had left it. The desk against the far corner of what should have been the living room was still an organised mess, though the myriad mugs, cups and plates had promptly been removed. Leaving a corner of the desk barren, no doubt awaiting the next mess Dominic had planned for it. The sofa had been tidied up and the pillows and blankets returned to their normal pre-Rock state. The door to the kitchenette revealed a clean kitchen. The three remaining doors remained closed. He walked over and pressed the stop button on the stereo.

"Hey! the indignant voice called from the kitchen, quickly followed by a black haired (clearly dyed with a blue streak) teenage girl. A brief glimpse of her shirt that seemed like a pink cry for help before she pulled an old AC/DC shirt over the top meanwhile her jeans had seemingly lost an arguement with every sharp object in the city. "I was listening to that."

"Your key is meant to be for emergencies.

"It was an emergency! The teen retorted indignantly. Dominic returned the retort with a scowl. "It was! Mum and her new boyfriend were being completely insufferable."

"That isn't an emergency."

"Yes it is."

"No, it most certainly is not.

"It most certainly is."

"Elizabeth," he said flatly. "You cannot check into hospital with a bad case of, my mum and her boyfriend are having awkward middle aged sex-"

"Ew gross!" Dominic dodged the incoming projectile without even looking at it, which drew his attention to his desk that sat with it's back towards the window.

"-furthermore what in the name of all things holy have you done to my desk?" Bypassing Elizabeth entirely he walked to the far side of the room, and began filtering through various files and photographs. Receipts, notes, printed emails and texts. All delicately and purposefully placed and arrayed, turned into several neat and unpredictable piles. It was the kind of desk and accountant might have had, his stomach churned. The thought made him feel more ill than that of any murder scene he had been too.

He rummaged through some, organising it into the correct collections. "I tidied it up, you're welcome."

"It didn't need tidied. It was organised."

"Could have fooled me."

"Clearly I did." pulling the new photographs from his jacket he deposited them on the table then collapsed on the sofa. Kicking his shoes off as he did so, he let out a sigh as the removal of his shoes apparently released all the stress that he had gathered through the course of the last forty-or-so hours. Leaning back he allowed his eyes to close and just rested there for a long moment before he spoke again, Elizabeth shuffling as he did so. By his reckoning she was perched on the edge of the desk. "Did you go to the memorial?"

She sorted derisively. "Why would I honour the man who took my father from me?" Dominic had been covering his eyes with his hands, he splayed his fingers to look at her and when he saw how serious she looked he removed his hands and sat up.

"Liz, the Mountain saved your father." He saw her go to mouth off, argue or offer a witty retort but he cut her off with a raised finger. "It was a different game ten years ago, a lot of the Capes back then wouldn't have went as easy on your father as Saw did. Saw wasn't the first, but he was a massive proponent for imprisonment and rehabilitation-"

"But you-"

"I know what I did to help your father get a reduced sentence. You don't need to remind me, I just mean. If your dad has faced a cape any earlier. Someone like Beacon, Shield, Piper or Goliath well, then the story of the infamous Scotty Sparks might a different ending entitely."

Elizabeth rolled her eyes as she looked down at him, the inclination of a smile toying with the scowl etched upon her face. "You know dad hated that name. Dominic merely shrugged as he laid back on the sofa, kicked his shoes off and put his feet up on the coffee table that Elizabeth had clearly included in her relentless cleaning attack.

"Yes, but street gangs aren't often very original or clever with their aliases." Dominic mused, much as if to himself. "It worked out for him later in life anyway, made for a catchy radio jingle."

"You know he never forgave you for that."

"I know." He sighed heavily, and the two of them sat there for a long minute just basking in the weight of the silence, we the odd stray sound wandered in from the outside world.

"I miss him."

"Me too." They sat for a while longer, until finally Elizabeth cleared her throat and clapped her hands together, walking back to the desk and ruffling through the collection of new files Dominic had brought back from his foray to Paloma's apartment. He could hear her, but he sat with his head back and eyes closed. Not asleep, but perhaps not fully awake.

"So why were you out so late? Working a case? Dusk nodded and grunted an affirmative. "Bit late for that isn't it?"

"I do my best work at night."

"There was nothing in the calendar, that you make me fill in, for you to never follow it."

"Perks of being boss."

He could hear him get to the envelope containing the photos, shuffling through them one by one. "How did you manage to get these, drone?"

"Trade secret."

"They say Paloma on the back." She scrumpled up a bit of paper and tossed it at him.

"Darn."

"Wasn't she-"

Dominic nodded, while keeping his head as horizontal as possible. "The gray who worked as a 'bike' messenger," he lifted his hands to do the air quotes. His arms resisted him and made the whole effort half assed. "Yeah she turned up dead last night. Her body was dumped just a few blocks away from the Harborlight. She must have been doing her own adjacent investigation."

"Do you think she died because-?" Because of us, because of the investigation. The possibile conclusion to the question had numerous possibilities and he wasn't entirely sure he liked any of them.

"No. The way she was dumped doesn't match any of the others, but in it's own way that seems to fit the pattern of our mysterious person or persons. Everything else lines up. Both the body and clothes cleaned and sanitiser, hair removed. Blood removed, and internal organs and muscle structure indicating a high level of physical stress." A heavy breath he didn't know he was holding escaped him as he went to continue. "I did think there was a mafia connection but, I've kind of run around there-"

"Wha-"

"The important thing is now we have a lead, or rather. I have a solid lead. Which is one more solid lead than what I had yesterday."

"You didn't have any yesterday."

"Yes and last time I checked, one is more than none. What do they even teach you at school?" He looked up at her as she shrugged, and his eyes promptly betrayed him and returned to their close state and he allowed his head to fall back.

"So what's our next course of action?" Dusk opened an eye again and found her eying him suspiciously.

"I'm going to trace those vans to their origin, and then go for a nice little chat but more importantly," Elizabeth stood a little taller, attentive. Ready, eager. "We're going to get some much needed sleep." He jabbed his thumb to point at the door behind him. "There's clean sheets on the bed, I changed them for you this morning."

"But how did you-?"

Dominic Dusk smirked as he allowed himself to fall back into a prone position on the sofa. "I'm a detective Liz. I detect things."

---

It was the smell of Calder City that always woke him. Not the sound. Not the light. The scene. That unique concoction of smoke, salt water and something he never could quite figure out.

Rafael Garza climbed out of the bed slowly, like men of his vintage of fifty one often do. Years of aches and pains finally catching up to him. He did not mind getting older, it was nature's way of providing a new challenge different to the impetuousness and energy of youth. Like most mornings, his shoulder was giving him the worst of the pain but he wore it like a badge of honour, a scar of his time representing his country as a goalkeeper for Mexico. Still, that was another life, another time.

He started his morning as he always did. He said a prayer to the Lord and then one to the picture of his father that hung on the wall on his side of the bed.

His wife had already gotten up and gone to work. She never could be tempted to stay in bed any longer than what was required; her work was too important to her and Rafe understood that. Her passion and drive were simply two of the many of thousands of things that he loved about her.

The mirror reflected his moustachioed face back at him and he smiled at the reflection as the little tuft of grey at the front of hair stuck up. Something in the air made him think it was going to be a good day, he wasn’t exactly sure why. His dark eyes drifted to the nearby window as outside, dawn had only just begun to colour Calder City’s skyline. The neighbourhood was quiet and respectable. The sort of suburb where children still rode bicycles and neighbours knew each other’s names. Rafael liked it that way.

After his shower, he dressed himself impeccably as he always did. He adorned himself in a beautifully pinstriped white shirt and grey slacks. Like is dear Abuela used to say, “Appearances are everything.” He descended the stairs before slipping into the leather shoes which sat at the bottom of them. Time for breakfast. He turned on the radio to listen to DreamWave FM, his favourite station. It only played retro eighties classics, what could be better?

By the time the kettle boiled, Rafael already kneaded dough he’d prepared the night before into neat rounds, pressing each one flat before laying them into a hot pan.The smell of fresh arepas filled the kitchen, as did the amazing vocals of Luther Vandross on “Never Too Much.”

Only then did little footsteps thunder across the landing above. “Dad!” A blur of pyjamas launched itself down the stairs. Rafael caught his youngest daughter before gravity had the chance.

“Easy, Mercedes. I’m too old and you’re getting too big.”

Another pair of footsteps appeared, slower this time. His eldest son wandered into the kitchen, headphones around his neck and school tie hanging untied. “Mornin’.”

Rafael nodded toward the tie. “You know how, Esteban.”

“I know.”

“So why am I still looking at it?”

The boy sighed dramatically.

Within minutes the kitchen had become chaotic. Lunchboxes flying everywhere. Homework sitting half undone. One missing shoe. Even arguments over orange juice. Domestic bliss. And for Rafael it was normal, wonderfully normal.

By seven-thirty the children were climbing into the family SUV. Rafael looked at each of them before pulling away. “Rules?”

His daughter groaned. “Dad…”

“Humour me.”

She rolled her eyes. “Be kind.” His son continued. “Work hard.” His daughter smiled. “And always come home.”

Rafe nodded. “Exactly.”

The school gates buzzed with parents and teachers. Rafael crouched beside his daughter. “You’ve got your spelling test.”

“I know.”

“You’ll do brilliantly.” He tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear. ”And if you don’t, then we’ll just practice some more and be ready for the next one.”

She smiled. “I love you.”

“I love you more, caramia.” Mercedes laughed as she ran toward the school entrance.

His son climbed out next. “Dad? “You coming to my match Saturday?”

Rafe didn’t hesitate. “I wouldn’t miss it.”

The teenager nodded, pretending not to care. It mattered anyway.

He watched both children disappear through the gates before returning to the car. Only then did his smile fade. Not because he became someone else but because another part of his day had begun.

Calder Metropolitan Hospital occupied six city blocks. By eight-fifteen Rafe was wearing a white laboratory coat, surgical gloves, and an identification badge that identified him as:

Dr. Rafael Garza
Consultant Forensic Pathologist

The morgue smelled faintly of disinfectant and steel. Exactly as he preferred.

“Morning, Doctor.” His assistant handed over a tablet. “Male. Thirty-four. Possible overdose.”

Rafael accepted it with a nod. “No obvious trauma?”

“None.”

He approached the stainless-steel table. The deceased lay peacefully beneath a white sheet. Rafael pulled it back with the quiet respect he’d afforded every patient for nearly fifteen years; living or dead. “They all deserve dignity,” he’d once told a medical student. He still believed it. He began the examination. The scalpel moved with astonishing precision, with every incision exact and every observation dictated into a recorder. Then he paused. A single droplet of blood rested beside the incision. It should have remained perfectly still.

Instead…

It rolled. Against gravity. His assistant looked away, busy updating paperwork. No one noticed. Rafael raised one gloved finger and the droplet floated into the air where it then divided. One became two. Two became eight. Tiny crimson spheres orbited one another in perfect silence, hanging above the body like a miniature solar system.

Rafe studied them thoughtfully. The blood was speaking. Telling him everything. High cortisol. Trace narcotics. Elevated adrenaline. Microscopic haemorrhaging invisible to conventional tests. He closed his hand gently and the droplets merged once more before settling back exactly where they had begun. No evidence remained.

His assistant looked up. “Anything unusual?”

Rafael removed his gloves. “No.” he said before waiting a beat. “Cause of death is consistent with accidental overdose.”

The assistant nodded, making notes. “I’ll notify the detective.”

Rafe watched the covered body for another moment. His expression softened. “So young.” He drew the sheet respectfully back over the man’s face. “Let’s make sure his family gets the answers they seek.” He meant it. Every word.

An hour later, alone in his office, the pathologist unlocked the bottom drawer of his desk. Inside sat a polished wooden box. Nothing about it appeared remarkable. He opened it anyway. Nestled within the velvet lining rested a black and gold luchador mask. He picked it up, holding it against the morning sunlight streaming through the window.

A thing of beauty.

Rafael glanced back down at the box and what had been hidden beneath the mask; a single vial of glowing orange liquid; King’s Blood, his blood. More and more dead Gray’s were coming to him and the blood was always flowing to the point it almost felt like it was an endless supply. It was all he really needed to keep the plan in motion

The next phase was already in motion. Wicklow was under his and by association the Cartel’s grasp. It was the perfect foothold for them to begin the expansion of King’s Blood into other territories. Rafael had already begun developing through lines. There was going to be pushback, probably from the likes of the Raciti’s but that was ok. He’d offer a hand in friendship first. If they didn’t take it? Well then what happens would be their own doing.

He carefully returned the mask to its box, locking the drawer as he went. Rafe straightened his lab coat and walked from the office with the same gentle professionalism that had made him one of Calder’s most respected pathologists.

No one he passed looked at him twice. No one suspected. Because monsters, Rafael had learned long ago; rarely looked like monsters.

“Fuck you.” She spat at him, hitting the floor near his shoe.

Joanie’s mind clung to the last echo of Marth’s voice as the darkness thinned. She wished she could hear him again and feel that warmth in her head, that impossible safety.

A part of her wanted him to show up and to pull Mina and her out of this place. Yet at the same time, the immense guilt she held at the thought of him getting involved here twisted hard. She didn’t want him anywhere near Harborlight. She didn’t want him hurt. She didn’t want him dragged into this nightmare because of her.

She swallowed, glancing to the unconscious Mina next to her, and then back to the man who had plagued her recent nightmares. Her throat was tight. She was on her own here.

He looked down at the small splatter of spit, then back at her with the same calm expression.

“You seem to keep making a mess of my club.” He said it lightly. Almost conversationally.

He stepped around her chair, letting the warm lighting catch the edges of his curls and beard. The cold followed him like a tide. Even now the coolness of his eyes unnerved her.

“The boards can be replaced,” he said. “The lights can be fixed. Damage is only damage.”

He paused, studying her face.

“But the trouble it has caused you…” He tilted his head slightly. “That is far more interesting.”

Her stomach twisted as he moved a little closer.

“Detonator Dane.” He began. “And your friend.”

He said Trey’s death like he was listing ingredients.

“Losing a Gray with such potential is always a waste.”

The words hit her like a bruise pressed too hard. He said it so casually, as if Trey’s life were a misplaced tool or a broken ornament. Hearing him reduce Trey to a waste made her chest tighten until she could barely breathe.

She wanted to scream at him. She wanted to tear the cold out of the air with her bare hands. She wanted him to feel even a fraction of what Trey had felt in those last seconds.

Her fists balled, the cable ties digging into her wrists.

“I said, fuck you.”

The side of his mouth curled upwards as he watched her, clearly bemused. She scowled in response. If this was how things were going to go, then she could at least get some answers.

“Where’s Rowan?” She demanded, doing her best not to sound terrified.

He blinked once.

“I do not know who that is.”

Her stomach dropped. He was telling the truth. Rowan was missing for another reason entirely. The fear rose so fast she almost choked on it.

She swallowed hard.

“I heard someone say Mina was being sent to a client.”

His expression did not change.

“That does not concern you.”

The words felt like a door slammed in her face. Panic clawed at her ribs. The idea that she could just be handed over to someone else made her throat burn. How on earth wasn’t that her concern?

Her voice cracked.

“Then what the fuck do you want with me?”

He stepped closer. The temperature fell with him. Her breath trembled.

“At first,” he said, “I wanted only a taste.”

“What the fuck does that mean?”

He studied her face with a calm that made her stomach twist.

“A taste of your energy,” he said. “When I first saw you the other night, I sensed it then. The force you carry. It was something new.”

The cold around her shifted. It felt different now. Not just cold. Empty. As if something was being pulled out of her rather than pressed in. She felt her heartbeat slow. She felt her breath thin.

And suddenly she understood.

The cold was him.

He had been feeding off of her since she had woken up.

She felt sick.

“You drain people.” She furrowed her brow into a glare.

“Not fully,” he said, as if that somehow made it better. “Not unless I choose to. I take only what I need. A thread of power. Just enough.”

Her breath caught. The cold around her tightened.

He continued. “The more I learned about you, the more intrigued I became.”

Joanie’s heartbeat slowed. She felt the cold reach her ribs.

“I’ve heard rumours for years,” he said. “A care home for Grays. Hidden. Redacted from public record. Restricted to certain social workers. A place that should not exist. I searched for it. I found nothing. Every mention cut out. Every file sealed. Every trail ending in silence.”
He stepped a little closer, pale eyes narrowing with interest.

“After some digging, I realised Vanguard had its hand in it. Their fingerprints were faint, but present.” He paused, studying her face. “It became my blue whale. A myth too large to be real. A hunt I assumed would never end.”

“So imagine my surprised when I spoke to dear Caleb after i saw your little catchup the other day and realised the two of you grew up there together.”

She saw it now, clear as ice. He wanted access to the children. He wanted to drain them.

The horror of it rose so fast she almost choked on it. Her fear burned away, replaced by a sharp, furious heat that filled her chest until she thought it might crack open. She would not let him find out. She would not let him touch them. She would not let him take one single child from that home. Not while she was still breathing.

Her pulse hammered as her jaw tightened and her glare sharpened. She felt the cold pressing in around her, but it couldn’t smother the anger now or smother the thought of Trey. It couldn’t smother the memory of every kid who’d ever sat beside her on those worn sofas or eaten toast in that cramped kitchen. She thought of Mrs Qadir. She thought of Mina. She thought of Caleb. She thought of Marth’s voice in her head, warm and terrified and searching for her. She thought of all the people she refused to let him hurt. The determination settled in her bones like steel.

“I’m not telling you anything.”

The words came out steady. Stronger than she felt. Stronger than she expected.

The Icelander watched her for a long moment, his pale eyes unreadable. Was he accessing her? Deeming whether she was actually a threat to him?

He lifted two fingers and the air shifted.

Something invisible pulled tight, as a body slid across the floor from behind, dragged by a force she could not see. It came into view beside her chair.

Caleb.

He was bruised. Bloodied. Barely conscious. Her suspicions slammed into place; that had been him she’d heard moaning before.

Joanie’s breath hitched.

“Fuck you.” She repeated, looking from the body to the monster before him. She practically spat the words at him that time.

The Icelander looked at Caleb with mild irritation.

“He tried resisting me. Annoyingly his mind is practiced.” He said, turning back to Joanie. “Yours is fresh.”

Practised?. What on earth did that mean?

Mina stirred beside her. Her head lifted slightly. Her eyes fluttered open. She saw him. She saw Joanie. Her breath trembled.

“Joanie…” she whispered.

The Icelander glanced at Mina.

“If you will not help me,” he said, “she will.”

Joanie’s determination faltered. She had been all for suffering through this if it meant saving her family, but she didn’t want Mina hurt. She didn’t want Mina anywhere near him.

But Mina’s voice shook as she forced the words out. “Don’t tell him.”

Joanie froze.Clearly she’d been listening.

“Mina…” She began, panic returning to her as her anger faltered slightly.

“Don’t.” Mina whispered. “Even if he hurts me. Even if he kills me. Don’t tell him.”

Icelander just watched, clearly bemused. Then, as if this were some routine appointment, he spoke. “Right then, let us start with you then.”

He reached out. His fingers brushed Joanie’s cheek. The touch was not cruel, nor was it gentle. It was simply cold.

“I learned this ability decades ago,” he said. “A Gray in Reykjavík gifted it to me in the event of his death. He could read memories. It has served me well.”

He paused, then added quietly:

“In my country we say, ‘Blind is a man without books.’” His eyes burrowed into hers. “So it’s time for you to become my library.”

Joanie tried to pull back. Her body refused to move.

He placed his hand against her temple.

She screamed as the cold reached her mind.

Her thoughts scattered.

Her vision blurred.

Her heartbeat slowed.

And everything went dark.