The Phenomena of Fireflies and Star... - Chapter 32: Chapter 32

Enforcement Holding Truck
5:15 PM
The holding cell they were in was situated at the butt end of the truck and gave off power-suppressing radiation, a useful tool made by Division to keep captured superhuman rogues from misbehaving during transportation. Max sat on the seat, Ames's head on his shoulder. The clear but glimmering force field that kept them in place had never looked more ironic.
Max could still feel Ames's powers resisting the radiation.
Max's own powers, however, had already rested. Well, except for his empathy and his physical capabilities. His first-exposure perks, specifically. They were still pretty strong. He could tell.
Outside their holding cell were opposite seat rows of NAIs. Additional NAIs had been sent to the subdivision prior to the transportation for understandable reasons.
Max watched as Battle Cry, who had been tasked to lead the NAIs for the transportation, approached the holding cell. She stopped just outside of it, checking up on Max and Ames politely.
"I never thought I'd ever see you in that cell, Gab," Battle Cry commented, a slight frown on her face. "How's he doing?"
"Confused, tired...," Max reported, momentarily caressing Ames's face. "His powers are resisting."
"I agreed to come so that he and I can have a shot at a normal life," Ames suddenly spoke, looking up at Battle Cry. "A shot at a normal life."
"I don't want to have to be that person, but I don't think we can all go back to normal, really," Battle Cry replied. "But thank you. For helping us in the dome."
"He had to be stopped," Ames pointed out. "Would've enjoyed killing him better if he was Malign."
The remark seemed to take Battle Cry slightly aback. She looked surprised by the anger in Ames's voice. Her gaze upon Ames, however, was ultimately empathetic. Relating.
"I used to have that much anger inside of me, too," Battle Cry said, nodding emphatically as her eyes glowed faintly in violet. "Must be why I scream so loud. So much inside begging for a way out."
Max found it interesting to hear such vulnerable and personal words from her.
"You ever got to get it out?" Ames asked, sounding much more respectful. In fact, Max could tell that Ames really was empathizing.
"I got a lot of it out," Battle Cry admitted, a faint contemplative smile on her face. "Still got a bit of it inside. Baby steps. I hope we both find our peace."
With that, she nodded at the both of them, turned on her heel, and walked away.
Max was actually surprised by that. He wondered if Battle Cry had told him about that before. He hoped she hadn't. Otherwise, he'd feel a lot guiltier for not having been fair to her and to the others. For not having been as attentive to them as they'd been to him. Still, he needed to settle things with Lazaro. Max had no idea exactly where they currently were, but they'd been traveling for about twenty minutes now.
"Never thought I'd hear that from Battle Cry," Ames commented.
"Same," Max humbly admitted.
When the force field dissipated, the NAIs stood up in full attention.
Battle Cry led the way for Max and Ames, each pair of oppositely seated NAIs they walked past moving in to follow them.
'HQ,' Max thought, feeling a mixture of nostalgia, annoyance, and the need to flee. The irony of being back felt so grossly insulting to him. 'Here we are again.'
"The attack earlier was an eye opener," Battle Cry spoke as she walked toward the container door to the right, just behind the truck's cabin. "In more ways than either Division or Wang Industries could afford."
"Eye opener...," Ames echoed, stopping just behind the Enforcer. "I think I like you, Battle Cry. But how is it that Division hasn't opened its eyes to the dangers of its experiments before the attack?"
Battle Cry glanced at his direction.
"We already have," she said quietly. "But not all of us."
Ames tilted his head in agreement.
Battle Cry used her hand on the scanner on the container wall, parting the doors and revealing the nighttime view.
"I need you calm on this, Ames," Max whispered to Ames, who nodded slowly in response.
"I don't wanna' be here," Ames replied, looking back at him. "But I wanna' spend my tomorrows with you. I can't do that dead."
"I love you," Max said, gazing right into Ames's eyes. "No matter what, tomorrow is ours."
"I love you, too," Ames replied. "We'll make that happen. Together."
"Sorry to interrupt," Battle Cry spoke, glancing at them for a second before hopping off the truck. "Let's move."
Max hopped off first, landing on cemented ground. Ames landed beside him right after.
"Ames," Max said, his eyes scanning the wide lot, the tall fortified walls around it, the armed personnel walking about, and the large white building before him that was a unique mix of modernity and artistry. A large spherical structure poked out into view from behind the building, glowing alluringly. A sigh of disappointment left Max's lips. "Welcome to Division HQ."
They moved forward, following Battle Cry as she marched on. Max noticed how the armed personnel paused and stared at him in disbelief, as if seeing a ghost. Even in their saluting gestures for Battle Cry, they were more preoccupied by the sight of a familiar face believed to have been deceased.
Division HQ, composed of two main buildings, had been built on top of—and into—a mountain near the rural outskirts of Falco, illuminated strategically to highlight the buildings' sophisticated architectures and how the headquarters' design contrasted the humble beauty of its immediate surroundings. The outer building's polygonal structure resembled a large pentagon, with tower-like sections marking the edges. Tinted windows were aplenty, but strategically placed. The pentagonal outer building housed the second building at the center of its expansive courtyard. The large central building heavily resembled a humongous ziggurat of offices and facilities from ground-level view, but an overhead look of the central building revealed that it was actually shaped like an eight-rayed sun. Its grand architecture was topped by the large spherical structure made of metal and tough glass that made Division HQ stand out from the rest of Falco City. The crystalline sphere was suspended via an axis, much like a globe, at the peak of the central building. It was accessible from the outside via wide staircases reminiscent of those of ziggurats, and it had an almost kaleidoscopic lighting pattern to it, resembling the Creaton. Tinted windows studded the central building's walls, adding an interesting touch to the building's undeniable magnificence.
Division HQ shone majestically against the darkness of the night sky.
"Humble abode...," Ames commented dryly, slipping his hand into Max's.
"Don't sweat it," Max replied, holding on to Ames's hand. "We're not staying long."
The Grand Lobby
Division Headquarters
5:57 PM
The lobby was as beautiful as Max remembered it. While the interior walls were pearl white, the columns and the floor tiles were in black marble, made more elegant in appearance by gold detailing especially under the adequate illumination of the place. Golden sigil-like designs containing Baybayin characters were patterned on the floor. The office exteriors were designed beautifully, too. The place was almost a hotel in its appearance but made of bulletproof materials. Glass walls included.
The employees walking about looked sophisticated as always. Office workers didn't really have a solid uniform template, except that their work fashion had to be office-appropriate and white. Accessories were kept at a classy minimum. Overall, it was a pretty upper-class aesthetic.
Also, in terms of employment opportunities, Division opened its doors to every Filipino from every origin. If there was something Division did right, it was full inclusivity in the opportunities it offered, from its work force to its scholarship programs. Everybody who dared to try had a fair chance to try. Such openness was especially beneficial for applicants who came from indigenous tribes. Their development potential and national importance were too significant to be overlooked.
The armed personnel were also well-equipped. Each one was clad in a special black body suit laced with a hidden sheet of flexible armor, plus sufficient weapons rigs and external body armor. They also had psionic scrambler helmets on, but their visors were never down indoors. Faces needed to be seen.
Both the armed and non-combatant personnel greeted them with initial reverence followed by frank surprise.
The lady on the front desk, clad in a richly amber pantsuit, looked at them in shock.
"Um, hi...," she stammered, blinking in disbelief as she stood from her seat. Her eyes alternated uncertainly between Battle Cry and Max. "Good evening. How may I help you?"
"Ring the Director," Battle Cry said. "Tell him Gabriel wants to speak with him."
"Right away, Ma'am," the clerk replied, taking her seat at once and grabbing her phone to make a call.
"Alpha's already in the Director's Office," Battle Cry informed them. "I hope the both of you have prepared your explanations. Today has been hell for the Admin."
"Good evening, Director," the clerk said on the phone, her eyes on the entourage before her. "Yes. Yes, sir. They're here. In the lobby. Escorted, yes. By Battle Cry and NAIs, sir. A lot. Okay, sir. Right away. Thanks."
Ending the call, she nodded at Battle Cry, who returned the gesture before signaling to the rest of them to follow her.
The Underground Facilities
Division Headquarters
The metal elevator doors parted open, revealing the circular hallway around the cylindrical shaft. The décor's color motif was no different than that of the lobby. Sliding doors stood before them, right across the hallway, made of bulletproof glass and metal frames. Battle Cry stepped out first and made her way to the doors up ahead, followed by everybody else. Max and Ames stopped behind her. The NAIs lined up on both sides, making an about face toward the elevator shaft and standing guard.
'I guess Intern demeanor was retained,' Max thought, observing the NAIs' response-ready poise.
The central device connecting the glass doors ejected a blue holographic keypad.
'One-eight-nine-six,' Max remembered, his recall confirmed by the memorable beeping of Battle Cry's typing of the code. Each number had a distinct beeping sound. He used to mess around with those holographic keypads back in their early days, fascinated by the sounds they made. He used to compose tunes with them. Needless to say, he had annoyed quite a number of tech people. With a puff of exhaust, the glass doors parted, allowing access to a long and well-illuminated corridor. Overhead lights were sufficiently bright just like the floor lights. Glass walls lined the sides. Max remembered them to be of multiple layers, reinforced by nanotechnology and protective force fields to keep them adaptable to impact and extreme elemental shifts.
"Where are we?" Ames inquired.
"On the way to the Director's Office," Battle Cry replied, stepping into the corridor and walking forward. Max took Ames's hand into his own and followed after the Enforcer. He looked to the sides, through the glass walls. He remembered them to be simulated battle rooms. As expected, there were NAIs inside.
"Colorful," Ames commented. Max checked up on him, finding him observing the NAIs sparring against each other in a simulated arena. Energy blasts of various colors, aura emissions, and flying superhumans provided an impressive spectacle on either side.
"The NAIs training right now are our top agents," Battle Cry explained, her hands gesturing to both sides of the corridor.
The walk forward was a visual delight, but also a motivator of difficult existential questions.
Max observed the simulated arena on his side of the corridor. One of the NAIs released a green orb of energy through his hands from afar. Another one responded, turning herself into pure crystal to receive the orb. She then redirected the projectile to another NAI, who erected what seemed to be two portals: one before him and one above him. The orb moved right into the portal before him and out the other as a counter attack. A flying NAI moved in, erecting a blue force field before herself and shattering the green orb. The NAIs then shifted positions.
"We train them heavily to work together as a team," Battle Cry said. "Just like we did, Gab."
"Talk about a walk down memory corridor," Max replied.
"Their training is much stricter than ours," Battle Cry added, glancing back at him. "Much stricter."
"You're recruiting pretty young, too," Ames chimed in. "You lost one in the Diameter. I handle teenagers and a lot of minors. I'd know."
Max was hoping Ames would reserve that remark for Lazaro.
"We voted against it," Battle Cry answered, not looking. Her voice was regretful. "I sure did. I worked with kids back in the day. I'd know."
"You a teacher?" Ames inquired.
"Missionary," Battle Cry's more quiet response. "Stationed at an orphanage."
A sudden thud on the glass wall to the right stopped them in their tracks. Max pulled Ames and Battle Cry protectively to the side.
"Fucking dammit," Battle Cry cussed.
From behind the layers of glass, a strange humanoid creature stared at them, its hands pressed against the glass wall. Max had never seen anything quite like it before. He'd seen shapeshifters before and had even adored one who could transform into a dragon to the bone, but he'd never seen a more terrifying version of the uncanny valley. He was, fortunately, rather used to facing the incomprehensible, and he now gazed upon the creature with curiosity. Its body was very human in structure, and most probably male, but its skin color was a deep crimson, evident on its exposed face and hands. Its face was almost beautiful, with its strong cheekbones and delicately defined jawline, but its eyes were pitch black, irises indicated by their glaring scarlet color. They were like red gemstones, and they alternated focus on each of the observing trio in a strange, bird-like speed. The creature's smile had an uneasy steadiness to it. Its hair was medium-length and messy, and it glistened in the blackest black. Its three pairs of black avian wings were long and wide, every feather appearing like dark metal with tips like rubies. Like blood crystals.
The creature then focused on Ames with a look of curiosity. Max tried to read its emotions, and he could, but they were strangely incomprehensible. They were, however, oddly familiar. On a personal level, almost, but not really. The empathic reading was unnerving.
Max allowed Ames to move toward the wall.
"Amaranth," Battle Cry said. "Found him in the farming town of Sanguira. In Davao-I. One of the fiercest additions to the NAIs."
"Amaranth sure sounds like an interesting call sign," Max commented, keeping a watchful eye as Ames put his hands on the glass wall, too. The creature adjusted its placement of its own hands to match Ames's. It lowered itself to the ground, its wings retracting. "And Sanguira, huh? Place has a reputation. What is he?"
"Unknown," Battle Cry replied. "Classed as a shapeshifter. For the meantime, anyway. He's definitely an offspring. Has to be. No clear origin, to be honest. When he came in here, he was already like that."
"He's got a human form?" Max asked, approaching Ames's side and observing the creature more closely. He felt a strange zap of déjà vu as he stared upon the creature. He really couldn't pinpoint it. Couldn't define it, either.
But there was something about how the creature looked and moved, and how it masterfully mimicked Ames that was disturbingly familiar. Somehow. Somewhere.
"He does," Battle Cry answered. "Mestizo. Japanese-Filipino features. Polite in casual interactions, too. Speaks in phrases. No name, though."
Max gasped a bit when the creature's skin began to change in color, turning from crimson to rosy white. Its eyeballs recolored to normal, like that of regular people, but the alien reds of its irises turned into a deeper, tamer red. This time, the creature looked human. A male human.
For some reason, Amaranth had a lot of physical similarities to Ames. They looked evidently different from each other but also very similar in a more distanced, more general sense. If anybody were to describe them, the words wouldn't differ much. Plus, they seemed to share the same height and were both svelte.
The differences were obvious in how Amaranth's facial structure seemed stronger and in how his eyes were more expressive and slightly rounder despite being very implicative of his presumed Japanese-Filipino heritage in their sharpness.
There was an innate darkness in Amaranth's eyes, too. There was a ferocity. A bloodlust.
There was also a commanding intelligence behind his gaze.
Max noticed that Ames was making his pink eyes glow stronger. Amaranth did the exact same thing, his eyes glowing in a sickening red.
"Amaranth's a damn consistent mimic...," Max remarked.
"Never seen him act like that before," Battle Cry commented. "He's normally focused in battle."
"What does he do?"
"A mixture of things. Stuff of horrors, really."
"Like?"
"He's a sanguinaire, for one. Bloodsucker. Gross, but we can't judge here. Blood manipulator, too. His cellular regeneration works like nobody's business. Witnesses said he disoriented an entire town using a single hallucination via a type of fear-inducing gas emission from his body. Locals had interesting adjectives for him: aswang, maligno, black witch, bampira, et cetera."
"Wings like his, he looks more like a Seraphim to me," Max commented. "But in a horror movie kind of way."
Without warning, Amaranth's gaze transferred on him.
It was such a striking gesture that Max had to gulp down the sudden lump in his throat. Amaranth simply stared at him for a few seconds before parting from the glass and stepping back. The shapeshifter's retreat was slow and cautious, but his eyes lingered on his observers.
From out of Amaranth's back, his wings sprouted again, baring their patterned feathers in full glory like a peacock. Except that his rendition was much darker. He returned to his creature form, and with one bird-like shriek, he flew back into the simulated battle in the distance, where other flying NAIs were alternating between energy blasts and powerful physical blows against each other.
"That was an interesting experience," Battle Cry scoffed. "I'm not even being sarcastic."
"More than you know," Ames commented, parting from the glass wall.
"What?" Max wasn't sure he understood Ames's statement.
"Let's go," Battle Cry said, tilting her head toward the end of the corridor, which was still far. "They're waiting for us."
The Director's Office
The Underground Facilities
Division Headquarters
"Director Lazaro," Battle Cry called out as she stepped into the large office. It had been a while since Max had last been here. It still pretty much looked the same: amethyst-colored walls, glass shelves containing fine antiquities, intricately designed overhead lights, smart illumination, tall cylindrical aquariums in each corner, a silver composite workstation laden with advanced and publicly unreleased computer technology, functioning TV screens on the wall up ahead, emergency elevator on the left wall, and rest room door on the right.
Two chairs facing each other stood before the workstation.
The Director, standing next to Alpha, was preoccupied by the news reports on the television screens, all about the explosion in the Diameter, the death of Current, Malign and The Legion's unexpected fates, questions of public safety in an age of increasing superhumans and Creaton advancement, and a dark unknown figure fleeing from the dome's remains.
"They're here," Battle Cry announced.
'Time to set things straight and get what I want,' Max thought, no longer planning to hold back his truth. Ames's truth. He wasn't feeling even the faintest sliver of apprehension. They were all past that.
Far past.
"Ah," Lazaro said, turning to face them. It had been a while since Max had last seen the Director in person, but the man remained to be quite the sophisticated fellow, looking sharp in his icy white three-piece suit. A lavender brooch of Division's insignia was attached to the suit jacket's peak lapel. Max kept his face straight, hoping Ames was doing the same. Lazaro didn't exactly look furious, but the age on his face and the ghastly whiteness of his hair gave him a stern visage, made even sterner by the fact that he had the capability to conceal the true height of his anger in his speech and his expression. "The former Alpha of the Enforcement. He comes home."
Battle Cry stepped aside to the left while Alpha positioned himself on Ames's right.
"My home...," Max started, keeping his composure. He tilted his head toward Ames. "Is with him. Nowhere else."
"I don't think we've ever met," Lazaro said, walking toward Ames with his hand out for a shake. "I am Doctor Emilio Lazaro. Director of Division."
"Hi," Ames replied nonchalantly, taking Lazaro's hand for a brief handshake. Max could tell that Ames was trying his best not to have the gut to dislocate the Director's arm. "Ames."
A side smile appeared on Lazaro's face as he turned on his feet and walked away.
"Do you know what happened to you, Ames?" Lazaro asked, entering his workstation and stopping just behind his work chair. "Do you know what you've become?"
"Enlighten me," Ames demanded, crossing his arms over his chest.
"Dangerous," Lazaro answered, mirroring Ames's attitude. "Extremely dangerous. To yourself, to other people, and to him."
"Oh," Ames said. "Just like your pursuit of making contractual super-soldiers."
Lazaro was silent at that, but his steely gaze remained on Ames.
"I would love for us to have a proper chat under better circumstances," the eloquent Director said, keeping his tone maintained at a professional center. "There's so much obscurity lingering between us. I understand that you want to get fixed up. For him. We can help you."
"Thanks," Ames sounded a little bit politer this time. A little bit. "But what's the catch?"
Lazaro scoffed at the statement, shaking his head slowly as if pushing down his annoyance at not making Ames submit. Max knew that while Ames was not unreasonable, he was never really the type to just roll over on his back.
"There's a catch," Lazaro replied honestly, his tone still professional except for the audible suppression of his breath. His eyes then latched onto Max. "But from what I can see, I'm going to have to explain it a lot harder to Gabriel here than to you. For now, you just worry about going back to normal."
"I'm holding on to a chance to speak with you, Doctor Lazaro," Ames declared. "I have many words to say. I can't promise you that you'll like them."
"I know," Lazaro nodded at him understandingly before gesturing toward Alpha and Battle Cry with both hands. "Please escort Ames to the rehabilitation center. Give him whatever he needs. Gabriel and I need to talk in private."
Alpha and Battle Cry moved in compliance, but Max turned to Ames and held him by the shoulders.
"I love you," Max reminded him. "I promise you. We'll get through this, too."
"I love you, too, Max," Ames replied, looking up at him. Ames tiptoed a bit to kiss him on the cheek. Max held on to the kiss's warmth as his man stepped back, both of them refusing to let go of each other's eyes too quickly. "I'll be alright."
"Let's get you help," Alpha said, guiding Ames politely toward the door. Battle Cry followed closely. The sliding doors closed behind them when they walked out, leaving Max alone with Lazaro.
"I don't need to be an empath to know how you're feeling," Lazaro said.
Max turned toward him, hooking him with a strong stare.
"But what I don't understand is why," the Director continued, hands gripping the backrest of his work chair. "Enlighten me."
"You should be in jail right now. Put in solitary confinement. Forced power suppression. You should be very, very regretful."
"And you should be held accountable for the promises you failed to deliver, Lazaro."
"This foolish desire for a normal life has led you to do the stupidest thing you've ever done, Gabriel. Wake up! You even dragged a civilian into your crusade, and now he's the fucking Omega. An Omega! Turned by the forging of some new semi-fucking-Creaton using variant shards! Do you not see how big this problem is?"
"Oh, wow. Now, you actually care about some civilian's life?"
"Why the hell did you think I'm on this horse, Gabriel? Public security is the end goal. We get there by moving forward. By being empowered. By being careful."
"By attracting the rogues to a chance to fight and take over?"
"That shouldn't have happened."
"Well, it did!"
The conversation wasn't going well. Max had been trying his best to not glow even a single lux. It was more strenuous than lifting a plane. Lazaro's hand was trembling a bit as he took a sip of his whiskey.
"You," Lazaro pointed at him with a shaky finger, upturned eyes sharp like pit spikes. The elderly man rested his back against the wall below the televisions. "You are my biggest disappointment. You used to be the prime example! What the hell happened?"
"I woke up," Max replied sharply, rearing up for the words he'd been trying to say. "That's what happened."
"So, what was it?" Lazaro walked off from the wall, his free hand gesturing aggressively. "You wake up and you realize that you just want to throw everything away?!"
"I wanted to live!" Max shouted, his voice filling the room like a thunderclap. "I wanted a life! For fuck's sake! I was a weapon for eighty fucking years!"
"Then you quit like a fucking professional!" Lazaro shouted back, throwing his glass onto the floor. The glass exploded upon contact, sounding almost as threatening as a gunshot. Lazaro's normally squinting eyes were now wide with anger. "You don't fake your death like a fucking simpleton who can't write a proper letter!"
"You would never let me off the hook when I finally wanted it," Max reminded him. The internal politics of Division could never stomach cold hard professionalism. It never could. Max had lived through it, and Ames had already experienced it for himself.
"Absurd!" Lazaro snarled, walking over to his workstation and tugging at folders of documents from alloy metal organizers. He finally grabbed one and flung it to Max's chest, dismantling the entire folder and scattering sheets of paper in the air. Max grabbed one of the papers and scanned it. He'd seen it before. Multiple times. He'd seen some Enforcers and Interns try their hands at it only to still be working three months later and more depressed than ever. "What the hell do you think that is for?"
"Bullshit," Max remarked, crumpling the document in his hand and throwing it away. "You act like I don't know how dirtily this system plays."
"You could've tried better with wanting out," Lazaro pointed at him intently, approaching him slowly. "And all of this wouldn't have happened. You really think you can't be replaced?"
That was the trigger that Max needed.
"If replacing me was easy, you wouldn't have triggered the New Age Initiative that quickly," Max pointed out, making Lazaro hesitate in his approach. "But no. Right? It wasn't easy. It wasn't easy for Division when Midnight Sambac died. It wasn't easy when Dragon followed. It wasn't easy for the Director before you. Wasn't easy with you, even if you promised it would be. I counted on it. All of us waited for the reform you promised. Better treatment? Psychological support? Irrevocable retirement grant? Nowhere to be found. If anything, things got worse! And when I jumped ship, this place suddenly has a ready army."
Lazaro's glare remained on him, but it was no longer steady. It was faltering in the face of the truth.
"The program harvested so much of my energy, milking me like a fucking cow day after day," Max recalled the nights that he couldn't even get a decent sleep. He used to be a living battery for Division because of its need for his energy. In these walls, he was a hero in the eyes of his comrades, but he had once been a gullible energy source for the scientists and their need to fuel their experiments. Whether he'd been suffering from an injury or if he hadn't eaten or whatever else he'd needed to deal with hadn't been considered to be an important matter. Only his energy. His power. Considering that Current used to be an Enforcer himself, Max understood, at most, why the rogue had eventually wanted to flip the switch and go dark. "And whenever I started to realize what I'd lost? Whenever we did? Whenever any of us did? We get a counselor schedule. A fucking "therapy". Hooked in wires. We get demonized for thinking for ourselves. We get the guilt forced down our throats like it's a fucking drug! You break us down, play with our heads, and then you reformat us like computers. After the sessions? All those trips to the psych? We suddenly just can't wait to get started with getting back to work. We wake up the next day regretting waking up! And at night, we're smiling away like idiots to the slaughter until we're on the way to dreamland and shit gets real. And it never ends! And this place is professional?!"
"It's not that easy...," Lazaro said, nervously gesturing for a chance to speak.
"You're the goddamn Director!" Max shouted, walking toward Lazaro, who held his hands up in the attempt to get another word in. "You have the switch under your fingers! It's supposed to be easy!"
"You don't understand!" Lazaro was trying to interrupt, but Max took another step forward. He wasn't about to be unheard again. Not this time.
"And when you thought I was dead," Max continued, holding up a finger firmly between his face and Lazaro's. "You jumpstarted the NAIs. All hundreds of them. Prematurely. So you could have a spare battery. You put them at risk. Even minors!"
Lazaro looked away in a resistant snap, trying to blink down the voiceless struggle he was finally feeling.
"I should be in jail?" Max demanded, grabbing Lazaro by the lapel of his suit jacket, much to his surprise. Max glared right into Lazaro's eyes, struggling to not make his own eyes glow. "You should rot with me for everything that made me flee in the first place. You want a list? Hmm?"
"You need to hear me out...," Lazaro tried to say, but Max had had enough of not being heard, of being shut down mentally so they could manipulate him again. He could remember. He could remember everything.
"Psychological torture!" Max cried out, his voice cracking. Lazaro blinked defensively, unable to squirm away. "Physical torture! Gaslighting! Illegal employment of minors! Bribery and piles upon piles of voidable contracts! Human experimentation! Red tape! You have no soul! You took over, and you held our hands, and you spat in our faces not long after you won the vote."
Max was trembling inside. All of those decades that he had kept quiet were now coming back for revenge, and he wasn't about to hold them back in for finally screaming out. His voice was, at long last, blaring away in front of the very person who needed the full blast of it.
"You have no soul," Max sputtered through gritted teeth. "You are a liar and an enabler, and you have no soul. I should be in jail? You should be in hell, you lying, spineless, useless son of a bitch."
He pushed Lazaro away, watching the old man as he staggered back and struggled to maintain his balance for a while.
The Director looked breathless, but his demeanor stubbornly held on as he fixed his clothes. His eyes, however, were losing sharpness. Max hoped that his words were clear enough to sting Lazaro's brain.
"When you took over," Max recalled, his voice still trembling a bit. He wanted his next words to really stick the landing. "We thought things would get better. We really hoped they would. You broke every promise you made and left us to swim in the flood of our pain. And then, you painted all over the blood stains and perfumed the stench. You really think that resignation paper's gonna' do the trick? Try it yourself."
Lazaro couldn't maintain eye contact. Instead, he made his way slowly back to his workstation. He was nodding on the way there, as if his thoughts were racing. He was wordless, but the slump of his former sophistication was indicative of how much he'd taken into his system from the words that had been spat onto his face. He made his way to his chair, pulled it aside, and retreated onto it. His breaths were heavy, his eyes on purposeless space.
"And Ames?" Max added. He really would've liked it better if Ames had been given the chance to speak and vent earlier, but if there wouldn't be another chance, he wanted to make sure that the person he loved the most in the world was heard. Speaking on Ames's behalf felt odd for him, but he would do just that before Lazaro and whoever else could try and avoid hearing the words they deserved to be hit with. "This whole bullshit took away the love of his life. Took away the dream he had of helping people become better people. And then to save me from the mess you caused, to stop the monsters that have come out of Division's experiments on the Creaton one way or another, he let it take away his humanity."
Lazaro stared back at him, eyes unmoving and contemplative.
"All we ever wanted was to heal and live in our peace, but the ghosts of this whole program never stopped eating away at us," Max continued, feeling a lump in his throat and the tears in the corners of his eyes threatening to interrupt him. He had started his rebellion against his fate with different reasons in mind. This time, he wasn't alone. He wouldn't allow himself to be again. "I love him, Lazaro. I haven't loved in a long, long time. Not like the way I love him. I've come to love him more than I've ever loved anybody in my whole life. Including the life that living forever has taken from me."
"You know, kid," Lazaro's voice was now calm, but it was also hoarse. Hoarse with regret and humbling realization, Max hoped. He didn't think anybody had ever spoken back at Lazaro like that, if at all. "I do thank you. I thank you for cleaning Current out. I mean, I'm thankful that you and Ames helped. That Ames took him out for good. You went to the Diameter for something else, didn't you?"
"We went there to stop Division from making a huge mistake," Max confessed, his words clear and loud. "From taking away the humanity that made breathing and laughing and crying make sense. From sending this country, and maybe this world, into chaos. Chaos disguised as a new order. We went there to open everybody's eyes about what everything really is. About how dangerous this pursuit of power really is."
Lazaro looked away again, shutting his eyes hard for a while in the stress. If he had a heart condition, he would be on the floor by now. Max was glad that Lazaro didn't. Max wasn't here to let anybody die. He had come to speak. And so he had spoken.
And if the receiving end had a clear conscience, words wouldn't sound like a court sentence.
"Fix him up," Max said. "Let us go. Let us be people. Let us live, and then let us die. We deserve a chance."
Lazaro stood from his seat, carefully walking over toward Max. The man still wasn't maintaining steady eye contact, but he wasn't being stubborn anymore. Max could feel it. That was a good thing, at least. Lazaro stopped before him, finally looking him in the eyes.
"Nobody else knows you're alive?" Lazaro inquired. "Not a civilian soul?"
"No one outside Division," Max replied, curious as to where this was going. "I covered my tracks well."
"I suppose you did," Lazaro said, sighing loudly as his eye contact faltered again. Lazaro returned his gaze toward Max after a while of looking contemplatively at a random space. "You're "Max" now, right?"
"Max Angeles," Max clarified. "What's on your mind?"
"You can have your out, Max," Lazaro finally said. An involuntary stammer broke out of Max's lips as a flicker of hope in his mind spread all throughout his body in an instant. He held back. He knew there had to be a catch. There was always a catch. He just hoped it would be a manageable catch. "You can continue pretending that you're dead. I'll hold everybody else to a contract disallowing them from ever telling a soul about you being alive. I can do that."
"Okay?" Max said, urging the Director to continue.
"We'll have a place for you," Lazaro went on. "A safe place. So you can start over. But you will be on daily suppression. We can never really suppress your powers. Not fully. You're too strong, but we can weaken them enough to allow you to pretend you're normal."
"Go on."
"You will be disallowed from interfering with public security affairs just like any normal civilian."
"What do you mean?"
"Once you sign this deal, you are no longer a superhuman Enforcer. No longer a superhero. In any capacity. No legal authority to use your powers on operations or any similar situation that would've called for your response as an Enforcer had you not decided to leave. You know the things that were within your level of concern as an Enforcer. They no longer are any concern of yours. You are now a civilian in the eyes of Division, and you will be treated as such. But as far as the rest of the world is concerned, Gabriel Clemente, the Alpha Phenomenon, is dead."
Max wasn't quite sure about that all of a sudden. However, Lazaro exerting this much effort was a hopeful start. It was a spark. Hopefully.
"What about Ames?" Max hurried to get to that point. So far, he hadn't heard of any clear verdict about Ames. At the mention of the young man's name, Lazaro's face registered a big "unfortunately". "Lazaro. What about Ames?"
"Ames really needs rehabilitation," Lazaro said honestly. "There's no sugarcoating that. He's too dangerous. If we let him out with you now the way he is, your tomorrows together will be numbered. He has to stay."
'Wait, wait,' Max's thoughts raced.
"How long?" he inquired, his chest tightening.
"I don't know," Lazaro blinked insecurely as he spoke. "He didn't turn the way we intended our subjects to turn. We are hopeful that his transformation isn't permanent, and we will do our best to fix him. We just don't know how fast we can bring him back to normal."
"Do everything you can, please," Max uttered, feeling his tears breaking out.
"Be careful with your choice of words, Max," Lazaro said. "He's going to need intensive rehabilitation. If we push him over the edge, we could risk a catastrophic event or his eventual destruction."
"How long will it take?" Max didn't mean to sound so desperate or repetitive, but he was running out of wit. He was falling short on the perseverance needed to stay composed. The battles had been piling up, and he was frankly tired. That didn't mean he was ever giving up. "Just give me something. Just something. A hypothesis. An estimate. I'll prepare for it. No matter how long."
There was now a look of sympathy in Lazaro's face, and a quick empathic scan confirmed it to be truthful.
"Could be a year or two," Lazaro said. "Could be longer. Could be less. We'll be counting on him, too. If he doesn't make it, then there's nothing we can do."
"Do your best," Max pleaded. "Do your best. Promise me you'll do your best, and I'll wait."
"Is that final?" Lazaro asked. "Because it'll be immediately effective. We don't have a big window of opportunity for a cover-up."
"Yes," Max said without hesitation. He would take it. He would take the chance. Whatever allowed for a life with Ames, he would take. He'd wait patiently. He'd find his way around. He'd do it all. All of it, provided that Ames would recover.
Provided that Ames could be with him just like they had sworn to each other.
He just needed one last thing.
He needed a chance to say goodbye.
"I'll disseminate a formal announcement," Lazaro said, taking a deep breath. "They will press on me hard for this."
"Who?" Max inquired, observing Lazaro in his discomfort. "The Chief Officers? The government?"
"Neither," Lazaro scoffed, walking swiftly back to his workstation. "There's nothing the government or even Division can do when things really escalate. I was trying to tell you."
The words didn't sit right with Max. They had a very ominous tone to them. It was the first time he'd heard such bothersome words firsthand from a Director's mouth, and he'd worked with multiple already.
"What am I missing here?" Max demanded, confused by the words that had come out of Lazaro's mouth. "I know where Division and the government stand individually and mutually. I'm not naïve. It's never been stable. But what are you trying to say?"
Lazaro looked at him with a disturbingly telling gaze.
"There's always a bigger fish, boy," Lazaro said, the glow of his computer screen illuminating his face and highlighting the worried expression on it. "Neither Division nor the government was ever really running the show."