Chapter 1 #2
The bedroom was crowded with shadows and the familiar bulk of his teammates.
Tex stood by the window, fully dressed, jaw set in that way that meant decisions had already been made.
Bondo leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed, his expression grim.
Flash, Shark, Twister, Dagger, and Brawler filled the remaining space, all carrying the same haunted look, the residual echo of shared visions still ghosting behind their eyes.
"Astraea," Tex said quietly, his voice gentle yet commanding, "we need a moment."
She looked between Easy and the team, reading the situation the way she always did, smart, intuitive, understanding that something beyond her experience was happening. She squeezed Easy's hand once, then slipped from the room without a word.
Easy was already moving, rolling out of bed and reaching for his clothes. His legs felt unsteady, but his purpose was crystalline. "They're in trouble. We've got to go."
"We saw," Tex said simply. "All of it."
All eyes turned to Flash. "What's happening?"
Flash shook his head, his expression contained but worried. "This might be our first battle, guys, and we're losing."
"Fuck that shit. Talk to Veil guy…the Guardian," Bondo ordered.
Flash looked at him, his eyes heated. "What the hell do you think I've been doing through all of this, twiddling my thumbs? He's…not responding, and I'm getting this—"
"Sense of doom," Brawler added. He shifted his shoulders, rubbing the back of his neck.
"Emily says the Veil enhanced something that was already there.
Like it amplified what I could already feel, made it sharper.
" His jaw tightened. "Right now? I'm picking up terror.
Not just yours, Flash. Something bigger. Something ancient is scared shitless."
The room fell completely silent. The weight of that statement settled over them like a lead blanket.
"Is that firecracker onto something?" Twister asked, his usual humor strained. He hugged himself. "Because all the feels right now are pretty fucking dark."
Brawler snorted, but there was no humor in it. "Yeah, she's onto something."
"We know Twister is safe. We never break our medic," Dagger said, his voice steady but his eyes sharp.
“We could bruise him a little bit,” Brawler said, giving Twist the side-eye.
Twister chuckled, but the sound was hollow. "I have immunity, big guy, and I don't even need a necklace."
* * *
The sound of his teammates' conversation drifted to the background as Flash tried once again to reach the Guardian.
He'd carried the ancient being under his skin since the night the trident first burned beneath his heart, the night a voice named him keystone.
What the Guardian looked like, Flash couldn't have said.
He arrived as a voice more than a sound, vast and patient and old as the dark between stars, and on the rare times he showed himself at all, it was a shifting blur of faces, a thousand of them, never settling into one.
Most days he was the hum that he heard in his mind.
He closed his eyes, reaching along the thread of energy he'd come to recognize, the connection that had become as familiar as his own heartbeat.
Nothing.
The connection felt severed, not just silent.
Like trying to call through a dead phone line.
He pushed harder, feeling the trident mark pulse weakly, the fractured edges of it sending sharp stabs of pain through his chest. But instead of the Guardian's steady presence, he got static.
Discord. The sound of something vast and desperate struggling against forces he couldn't see.
His head started to pound. The force built behind his eyes until he thought his skull might crack. He pushed deeper, forcing himself along the broken connection, and tasted copper. Blood.
"Flash." Easy's voice pierced through the static in his head. "Your nose is bleeding, brother."
He opened his eyes, wiping the blood with the back of his hand. His teammates were staring at him, concern etched in every face.
"The connection is fucked," he said, his voice rough. "The Guardian...he's fighting something. I can feel him struggling, but I can't reach him."
Normally, the being was incredibly responsive, but Brawler had been right. Something was terribly wrong, and it all centered around the fact that their tridents were fractured. It terrified him what this meant.
Had they lost Lechuza? Was the war over before it even began?
Was she dead?
He hadn't been able to breathe since he woke up with the horrible pain and dread. If something had happened to her, if that's why the Guardian wasn't responding, he should feel it. Shouldn't he? The key should know if the lock was broken.
But all he got was static and the echo of ancient fear.
"We move anyway," Tex said, his voice edging through Flash's spiraling thoughts. "Those kids are in immediate danger. Whatever's happening with the Guardian, we deal with it after we secure Fly and North."
Flash nodded, forcing himself to focus. "You're right. But, LT..." He met Tex's eyes. "This feels like the beginning of something really bad."
"Then we'd better make sure we're ready for it," Tex replied. "We're going to California."
Flash's head recoiled as if he'd been struck. The tension behind his eyes spiked, and his knees buckled. He hit the floor hard, his vision whiting out as the connection suddenly blazed to life.
Flash.
His name resonated like a sacred prayer through fractured space, holding command, like Tex easily held leadership within his team, but heavier, massive, and Flash had to breathe through the sense of connection, the bond that was forming between them.
The Guardian's voice was barely a whisper, but it traveled through Flash like silver twisting through silence, a presence flooding his mind, threads of exhaustion and pain woven through every word.
Static crackled around the edges, and Flash could feel the entity's struggle like a physical weight pushing down on his chest.
"Guardian?" Flash gasped, pressing his palms to his temples. "What happened? The tridents, they're—"
Broken. My fault. The voice fractured, came back together. Chaos...tricked me. He attacked and pushed the Veil out. A trap. I tried to stop it and caught them instead. Two minds. Young. Strong. The backlash...
"Fly and North," Flash said, understanding flooding through him. "You conscripted them by accident."
The vow is in jeopardy. They are caught between realms. Now... A pause filled with what sounded like distant screaming. Assassins. He sent assassins. They know the boys are vulnera—
The connection wavered, static drowning out words.
"Guardian! Stay with me. How can we help you?"
We will prevail. The voice hardened with ancient determination. As we always have. No matter what it takes. The Keepers are with me. But you must get to them now! They are dying, Flash. The unsanctioned transformation is tearing them apart.
"How? We're three thousand miles away."
Slip Corridor. No time to explain, and this is unprecedented for me to do this without training you all first, but there is no time!
You are military men. Hold fast to your convictions!
I can pull you through the buffer between realms. But listen carefully.
You have fifteen minutes of your real time.
Whoever travels with you must be touching you.
Use your energy to bind them. Hold them tight.
Desperation bled through the connection.
You are the only one who can keep them from spiraling out of the stream.
Your connection to your brothers...it's everything!
His teammates moved closer, Easy's hand on his shoulder, the others forming a protective circle around him.
I have to go. The rifts are spreading. Save them, Flash. One of them cannot fall.
“What? Who?”
He gasped. Someone shouted in the background. Aurelion, we have to contain them…we need the Shadowguard!
They are in peril. We will have to hold on as we have always done! He gasped again, his voice fading. Forgive me. Save them, or all of this will be for nothing.
The connection severed like a split cable, leaving Flash gasping on the floor, his nose bleeding freely now, ears ringing from the sudden silence.
"Flash!" Easy hauled him upright. "What did he say?"
Twister pressed a warm, damp washcloth to his face. “Tip your head back.”
Flash wiped blood from his face with the terry, his voice hoarse. "We've got fifteen minutes. Fly and North…they're dying, helpless, and there are assassins coming for them."
Flash dragged in a breath, forcing air into lungs that didn’t want to work. Fifteen minutes. That wasn’t time. That was a countdown to body bags.
“They’re not just dying,” he said, pushing to his feet, wiping the last of the blood from his face. “They’re being torn apart, and Aurelion—” The name was unfamiliar, musical and ancient all at once. “—he said assassins are already moving on them. We can’t lose him, or we’re really done.”
No one questioned the name. No one asked what the hell an assassin meant in this context because they all felt it. That sense of something already in motion.
He looked at Easy, speculation in his eyes. “You contacted them. Names?”
“Lieutenant Flynn Gallagher and Lieutenant Nathaniel Locklear. He’s Bear’s brother. Joker’s team trained them when they were wet-behind-the-ears teenagers. Graduated with honors from Annapolis.” He swallowed. “I was their BUD/S instructor.”
“Everything is connected,” Tex murmured.
“What do we have to do?” Bondo asked.
Tex didn’t hesitate. “You’re not going?”
Bondo’s head swiveled toward him, eyes narrowing. “The hell I’m—”
“We need to get to base. I have the paperwork on my desk to choose two junior officers for the mentoring program. Those two are on my list. No coincidence. We have to get that order paperwork going, and I’m not the one who pushes the paper. It’ll move faster if you’re with me, Angelo.”