Daniel Shaw - September 2120
Once we're far enough from the danger, I retract the vines binding Ethan, not before checking the locks twice. I don't trust his sense of self-preservation. He's the type to believe momentum is optional if you're brave enough. Films have a lot to answer for.
The moment the vines loosen, he pulls away and turns to the window. He doesn't look at me. Just sits there, rigid, silent.
I glance at the back seats. The woman is slumped against the glass, eyes closed. She looks unconscious, or close to it. The leg is worse than I thought. She must have forced herself to walk on it for hours, maybe days.
When I glance back at Ethan, his hands catch my attention. He's twisting his fingers together, over and knowing, the same nervous habit he's had since I met him years ago. That, more than his silence, tightens something in my chest.
I exhale slowly. "Ethan."
Nothing. He keeps staring outside.
"We couldn't stay," I say evenly. "It was too dangerous."
"But it was fine to leave Kai?" His voice is cold, sharp in a way that's meant to hurt.
It lands, but I don't let it show.
He can be angry. He can hate me for this if he wants, but at least he's alive. That matters more.
"He told me to take you back to the school," I reply. "So that's what I'm doing."
Ethan scoffs, finally turning just enough for me to see his expression. "And since when do you listen to him? You don't even like him. You just wanted to leave him behind."
The words sit heavier than I expect.
Does he really think I'm capable of that? Leaving someone to die because I don't trust them? Because I don't like what they bring with them?
I keep my voice level. "You are right, I don't like him," I say. "but that doesn't mean I'd sacrifice him."
What I don't say is that Kai attracts danger like a magnet, that every instinct in me screams to keep Ethan away from that kind of chaos. What I don't say is that staying would have put all of us at risk, and I won't gamble lives to prove a point.
I make decisions. I carry them. I don't justify them unless I have to.
Ethan looks away again, jaw tight.
The silence stretches, thick and brittle, until it snaps with a distant impact that rattles the road beneath the tyres.
"I just don't understand why you can't get on with him," Ethan says quietly. "You're supposed to be my best friend."
I keep my eyes on the road. Leafs slowly drop from the trees signalling the start of Autumn and for once I'm grateful for something simple and mechanical to focus on.
"I am your friend" I say, a little too sharply. I steady my tone before continuing. "That's why I don't like him."
My hands tighten on the steering wheel. I don't look at Ethan when I speak next. If I do, I'll see the disappointment forming, and I won't back down when I should.
"You're reckless" I say calmly. "You trust people easily because you believe they all mean well. I just... don't want you hurt."
"And you think Kai will hurt me?" Ethan asks. His eyes narrow, searching my face.
"Yes."
The answer comes without hesitation.
"He's trained to kill" I say. "Efficiently and quietly, without even leaving a trace. Someone like that doesn't need intent to cause damage. One mistake is enough."
Ethan's silence is sharp. When I glance at him, the hurt on his face is unmistakable. It settles in my chest like a bruise I don't have time to examine. I turn back to the road.
"Or," he murmurs, barely audible, "you're just projecting yourself onto him."
That's the moment it all clicks into place.
Because he isn't wrong...
I wasn't raised in a home, I was raised to protect myself and survive.
My father was abusive and my mother disappeared behind chemicals and excuses until she was little more than a body occupying space. I learned early that no one was coming to save us. Especially not for my younger brother.
So I became something people didn't want to challenge.
I found a group that understood strength the same way I did. Fear was currency and violence means control. If people were scared enough, they stayed away and if they stayed away, we survived.
Then came the vial.
Lunex, they called it. A shortcut to power. A promise wrapped in glass.
They said it would make us untouchable, so I took it.
I wasn't the only one in our group, two of them died screaming within seconds. Their bodies just couldn't handle it, but for some reason, mine could.
The vines answered me like they'd been waiting and power like that convinces you you're invincible. It convinces you you're right.
That illusion lasted until I came home one night and found my father beating my brother while my mother sat slumped at the kitchen table, vacant and useless.
I didn't even think.
The vines moved before I did, coiling around my father's throat. I kept tightening until the resistance stopped and his body collapsed to the floor.
I remember my mother screaming. I remember my brother shrinking away from me, terror replacing relief.
I tried to go to him. To explain and promise I'd keep him safe so matter what. But then pain exploded through my shoulder. My mother had stabbed me with a kitchen knife and panic broke my concentration.
The vines reacted the way they always did, to protect first.
They impaled her through the chest, through her heart and she was dead before she could even hit the floor.
Silence followed. It was so crushing and disorienting.
I dropped to the floor, struggling to breathe, staring at the bodies of the people who had ruined my childhood and realising I had ended them in seconds.
Then I heard my brother.
"Hello? Police? Yes… my brother killed our parents."
He was hunched in the corner, shaking, whispering afraid I might hear him. When he looked at me, there was nothing left of trust. Only fear.
I had wanted to protect him, but instead, I became the thing he needed protection from. He had so easily gave me up to the police when I did it for him.
So I ran.
Blood soaked through my shirt and my vision blurred, but I kept running. I didn't know where I was going, only that staying meant punishment.
It wasn't until I collapsed on a forest road when a car pulled up beside me.
At first I thought it was the police, but It wasn't. Instead an older man stepped out, calm and unhurried, grey threaded through his hair.
"It's late," he said gently. "Shouldn't you be at home?"
"I don't have one," I told him.
He smiled. Not pity. Not suspicion. Just acceptance.
That was how I met Edmund and how I came to Trinity.
It became the first place where control mattered more than strength. Where restraint was taught instead of feared. Where I learned that power didn't excuse damage.
And then there was Tessa.
She didn't try to fix me. She didn't flinch from what I was capable of. She reminded me that care could be deliberate, chosen.
She made me into a better person.
I will never forget the night I destroyed my own life. I never forget how easily power turns into violence when fear takes the wheel.
That's why I don't trust Kai.
He's strong. Too strong.
And if he ever loses control, it won't matter who he means to protect.
People will get hurt and I won't let that be Ethan or anyone else at Trinity.
The silence stretches on, long enough that the road starts to feel unreal, like we've been driving through the same stretch for hours.
Eventually, I speak.
"You're right," I say quietly. "I am projecting."
Ethan turns to look at me. He doesn't interrupt. He knows better than to rush this.
"That's why I'm scared," I continue. Saying it out loud feels like setting something fragile down between us. "Because I know what it's like to lose control."
My eyes stay on the road.
"I've already lost everything once. I won't do it again."
I adjust my grip on the steering wheel, grounding myself in the pressure.
"I can't risk anyone hurting the people I care about," I say. "And I can't risk being wrong."
Kai doesn't show off his power, or has an ego. That makes him more dangerous, not less. From the brief time we fought, I knew it. He was faster, stronger and more efficient that I could ever be. He even took down Ray without hesitation.
If he ever lost control, I'm not convinced anyone here could stop him.
I lost control because I saw my brother being beaten.
What would someone like Kai do?
Someone raised in violence. Broken by it. Trained into a weapon.
What would happen if Ethan was threatened? Or Noah?
I don't voice the rest. I don't need to.
The thought alone is enough to make my hands tighten on the wheel as the road stretches on ahead, dark and unforgiving.
"Daniel," Ethan says, but I don't turn to look at him.
"I trust Kai, no matter what" he continues, voice quiet but steady. "He's been through enough to push him to the edge, and he didn't break. He kept going. That's why I'll never leave him. I love him."
I love him.
The words hit harder than I expect. My mind immediately flashes to Tessa. She is my everything. My anchor, my light. If anyone had spoken about her the way I just spoke about Kai, I'd have been hunting them down before they finished the sentence.
But Ethan isn't like me. Even now, angry, probably angrier than I've ever seen him, he doesn't lash out. Doesn't curse me. Doesn't strike. He simply speaks, and it leaves the weight of my guilt pressing down like a physical thing. I feel smaller, worse.
He's right. Just because I lost control once, just because I know what unrestrained power looks like, doesn't mean Kai is the same. I can't project my fear onto him.
I slow the car, letting the thought settle. Then curse myself for ever considering turning back. It's reckless... Dangerous... A terrible idea. But leaving him… I don't think Ethan would forgive me if I didn't try.
I pull over.
"What are you doing?" Ethan asks sharply, finally meeting my gaze.
"I may not trust Kai," I say evenly, "but… I trust you."
I turn the car around. Engine hums, tires gripping the asphalt. We head back toward where we left Kai.
A small, almost imperceptible smile crosses Ethan's face. He's relieved.
Ethan cares about him and that means, for now, I'll do the same. I'll keep him alive.
Even if it makes everything harder for me.