Act VIII: Nine Years Later, Chapter IX: Neon Blue

"You wanted me?" Dylan Blood sat himself down, black telephone placed firmly against his left ear. Across the glass was some young woman he had never seen before. This woman was of Filipino origin, long black hair going down to her shoulders, with a layer of bangs in front. Her black eyes- or dark brown in the light- stared near lifelessly upon his own. "What can I do for you?"

"First of all, you have no idea how much was paid for this..." Stella started, "and how much was given to the guards to look away and have some technical error with their surveillance."

Dylan turned his head left and right, now noticing that the two guards posted behind him had gone away to each of the corners of the room. "Ah, so you're an elite."

"Oh, no, not me," Stella corrected him. "A friend of mines would like to hire your services to-"

"I don't think I could work for a high-class individual again. If you both have done your research, then you should know I've killed the people I've worked for. Not only that, but I've chased some bastard who stole from them halfway around the world to get my hands on the money he took. And... No one knows about my failed attempt to break into an elite academy. Well, I did break in but got thrown out of a window on the second floor."

Stella scoffed, trying not to even smile in humor. "Alright, you have a mad hard-on for the one-percent, I get it. But my friend isn't like the others-"

"So you say," he cut in.

"I do say, but I mean it. She didn't ever care about status or whatever you wanna call it. She treated everyone equally all her life. I could go on about how normal she is, and beyond, to convince you that she's one of us inside, but that's not why I'm here."

"Get to the point..." Dylan impatiently voiced.

"Right. Okay, so at the start of a decade, there was a party for her, and her grandfather, who just so happens to be the late Lord Tetherby-"

Dylan blinked in response and shot his free hand right upon the glass. "Interesting. A Tetherby wishes to make a slave out of me. What does she want, exactly?"

"Answers to why he died that day, and why a bunch of three girls a little older than us decided to just take his life."

Dylan only glared back into her eyes, trying to see if she was serious. Then- "I don't think you understand what you're asking here. There should be plenty of evidence that indict that senator Peter McMahon as being the mastermind behind it. All the files are out there going in circles. His damn niece was the one responsible, I would know. I've met her and she passed the vibe check. She's the killer-" And her face changed drastically, even darkly, which got him to be silent.

"That just isn't good enough..."

"Hm, then what would be satisfactory for your friend?" He pulled his hand away from the glass. "The Korp was shut down, most affiliates were arrested, but not everyone knew about the secret circle's involvement with Vial and the network so the innocents were let go. The right people are paying the price, or already have by dying in that shitstorm. There is nothing left to do but let those bastards serve their time in prison." He looked down at his hands and thought of himself as one of those bastards.

"And that will never be good enough. However..." Stella tapped her fingers on the table, nails clicking around. "Those three girls had to be involved. We believe that at any rate-"

"You're gonna have to tell me who these three girls are..." He had an idea but he had to be sure. The Tetherby woman had sent her friend to come to Dylan Blood to go after-?

"Leia Prescott and her two cat burglar friends."

"You want me to find them and bring them to Miss Tetherby?" Dylan hypothesized. "I suppose you have files for the three."

"Everything, the works."

"Then do it yourselves," Dylan rejected. "No need for an errand boy to do your slave work. I don't see what an inmate can do for you-"

"Two weeks of freedom," Stella counter-offered. "We can let you loose, we have a lookalike ready to be you for however long you're gone. Go after them, bring them back, and get yourself two weeks bonus right after you bring the three to the Tetherby mansion in Royal Woods."

"Hm, you thought of everything, it seems."

"She picked you for this, and some millions were dropped just to get you out. Obviously money isn't gonna be a problem, and she believes you might want something. You name it, she will supply it. Just tell me and I'll be happy to relay the message."

Dylan rubbed his chin, analyzing the situation. Do they not know I've personally met them? Even in the written statements, it has to be mentioned I've made contact with Leia Prescott- No, Leah Reed, that was her real name, and I've cleaned up an unsolved mess between her and the dirty mayor of Greenwood. Unless... That's the reason I'm chosen for this.

"Well?"

"Why me?" he asked cautiously. "What the hell are you picking me for? I don't chase thieves-"

"But you chased the likes of that Kirkwood guy to an island?"

"Tsk..." He rolled his eyes. "That was different. I would have rejected, but all that money in the cards, I could have gotten access to it and changed the game."

"And you failed with nothing to show for it, ending back up as a tool in Cornelius Dietrich's pocket. You've stuck around and dealt a powerful blow to him and his friends- and you still got defeated, but by freaks with powers who you decided to focus on for some reason. C'mon, you had to remember you were just a common human being. What could a simple human hope to do to a pheno?"

"What, indeed?" Again, he was faced with his defeat at the hands of the Loud clan and their allies, humiliated still and knowing the depths of his anger surface once more. Why, these phenos, the likely next contender to replace the members of high-society, just had to be wiped for the balance he wished would come true. No powers. No rich people living like they were kings and queens of the world. None of that. Ever. Why have they fought me? D-don't they know how destructive they can be? Don't they all know-?

"Life in prison is no life at all. I'd take this chance and get to work, and who knows? We might just be very happy to look the other way if you decide to run after you've given us the trio. I need an answer right now, I'm afraid."

This could be it... "Yes," he agreed. "I just have one more thing to ask."

"Shoot."

"Why now?" This was the million-dollar question now. "I imagine this could have been asked of me earlier."

"We needed to be sure all talk of you would die down," Stella explained. "Dylan Blood, or Isaac Sanger, was a big nobody who drew fans and supporters. I do believe you know you've become a symbol for the anti-pheno movement. You, and that silly mask you've put on for the audience. You've become a martyr here, and maybe that's not the effect you wanted but you've done something at least, until-" She laughed. "Until everyone forgot about you. You're no longer relevant, which is the best time to get you out."

"Ah, to avoid any unnecessary noise, I get it. Well, tell your friend I agree to any terms she'll have for me, as long as she fulfills her end of the bargain. I'll be waiting." And with that, he hung up the phone, letting it hang back in its resting place, valiantly moving out of the chair with the grandest of confidence. This game will continue if I play my cards right... I'm going to come for you all, phenos. You mark my words, I will reset this world back to how it was, and then I'll go after the one-percent!

The Next Day

He trusted them to be fast, and fast they were. He walked out through the checkpoints and front gate with no issue or worry over being shot by sniper guards posted at the front towers. The only car in the street was a classic black limousine he was sure was his ride. Lo and behold, it was. He walked to it while feeling terribly uncomfortable in the clothes of his replacement, attire that belonged to a hipster, which even had a few sweat stains around. The humiliation never ceased.

He let himself in the backseat and met a young woman of short ginger hair, sporting a pink jacket with a light brown skirt, her legs set in cross position. A nasty, arrogant smirk had taken form across her face, eyes staring down across him with some malicious intent. There was a type of cruelty in her that so suggested she was going to have it all her way, and that the three women she was after were going to experience what true hell was if she got her way.

Seeing her now, he understood the other woman was spitballin' nothing but pure lies to sell him what they were not like the rest. Why, he hated her already and decided she needed to die right then and there. But of course, he was separated from any such weapon at the moment, and all he could do was hear her out. "I take it you're the Tetherby woman I've heard about?"

"The one and only!" And her tone of voice matched her face expression. "I need this done fast if you can make it happen. I've all the files you need about the three, and anything else you'd need for this. Money isn't a problem, and I'd have no issue in giving you however much you ask for. However, I'm not giving you a cent until the three are brought before me."

"That's fair, you figure I'd take the money and run," he laughed. "Classic joke."

"Funny, isn't it?" On her lap, he finally noticed a folder she gave attention to. "We can talk about the price for your time now or later. Here, this is for you, what I've got on the trio, which isn't much given they've gone off-grid at young, hence the thin size of this."

"I guess we can talk about money after I've done my job. I'll take that." He accepted the folder from her, opened it up and skimmed through the files and verified that it had been of the same three girls he'd met nine years ago. And he made no change of expression with his eyes, in case she was observing him; he wasn't looking to fulfill, but to reach his hand out and take down the Tetherby woman. Simple as that, and fuck the money in play. "Ah, girls younger than I am..."

"Will there be a problem?"

He took his head off the open folder and looked up at her. "Not at all. You want them, I'll find them."

"That's what I like to hear." Paige turned and knocked upon the window behind her, signaling the chauffeur to pull out. "Since we're far aways from my place, I've purchased an estate close around here. Consider that a gift for you. While I can't officially get your personal items released, you'll have to run around with fake identification I'll show you when we're back at the estate."

"Of course," he reluctantly accepted, feeling like a criminal at long last. "How humiliating, all of this, but I can say I appreciate that I'm remembered and needed by someone at least."

"Believe me, I'd have done this earlier if I could. This is to avoid-"

Dylan lifted and waved his hand out to silence her. "I understand that, I'm just expressing how much I hate it."

"Sure, I'd imagine it would be bothersome." She didn't form or voice sympathy for him; she didn't care, but he knew that already. "But I'm glad you understand."

2027

"I'm glad you understand," the melodic, overly-feminine voice spoke pleasantly. "If you didn't..."

Dylan Blood tumbled out of the van once the rope that kept his hands bound were cut away, the sound of the closing doors following right after he fell onto the dirt road. The gang that the young woman controlled had done him in, beaten him enough to leave him bloodied and banged up to the point he could not move right away. The healing would happen overnight, but at least the feeling in his arms did not numb down. Whatever she said, he didn't catch, and had no care to know the last of her words; all that registered in his mind was the battle he lost, vowing again to stand again and lung into the next one. This silly, stupid chess game he waged with that damn girl, that Anne Kingsmann, a French-American girl he'd known since the days of high school. She was a formidable one in terms of intelligence, but a secret type that hid beneath her exquisite beauty. Anne was a doll of blonde hair usually long and messy, her height being five feet and four inches, and her body, the slim type that had most guys turn their heads and eye-fuck her when she walked into the scene.

This was the true Anne Kingsmann tonight, however. The one with no such mask who ran an operation when she was out of school grounds, an operation that had turned her rich enough to buy as many servants and bodyguards as she pleased, and no soul was none the wiser. There you have it, young Anne created a guild from the ground up and continued to run it for the money and the connections it brought upon her. It didn't matter if she was the root, for she had established a root and grew it herself.

But he didn't like that, all that power through that money was greedy of a sort, and when someone was greedy-

"Oh, Isaac..."

"Don't talk down to me," Dylan sat upright and turned away from the headlights of a Toyota that had stopped. Its driver- a dear friend he could so comfortably label as such- had gotten out to help him. "I had her in my grasp. She was there, but-"

"I saw everything, I know," the angelic lifeform softly said. "You're too reckless, it's a miracle you're not dead..."

"Sometimes-"

"Stop," the female said, delivering a hug to him after standing him up. "You're an idiot but I'm glad you're alive. Please stop this, they'll do much worse-"

"Ha," Dylan laughed. "If they kill me, they will draw suspicion to themselves. They'll do their best to scare me away, Emma."

"That's..." The female, Emma, paused. "You're..."

Dylan dusted himself off. "Okay, I was wrong... The tracker idea was a good idea after all."

Emma nodded in agreement. "Keep it on you."

If there was ever an angel in this world that predated the time of superhumans and altered human beings, it would be Emma Reinhardt. Emma Reinhardt, a sandy-blonde haired girl of eighteen years, five-four and a history of loss and tragedy, but despite all of that, she had a big heart and tended to care for the ones who needed to be cared for. It was weird yet, but not as much these days. He considered her a parasite with ulterior motives, up until she was genuine about her intents and helped nurse him back to health after some fighting. If anything, she had become a sort of nurse, but remained persistent to try and dissuade him from staying in this horrible dead end of a life.

The one thing he realized again was that he made her worry about him and wished he could simply walk out of her life- but would not, could not bring himself to, for he knew it would hurt her just as much. If only she was smart enough to walk before she herself got hurt in the inevitable crossfire. "S-sorry..."

"She has to go down."

"N-no... You've done enough for tonight. I'm taking you home."

Now

What would you say to me if you were still around, Emma? He moved around the estate that was now his, following Paige Tetherby around for the grand tour, and was he impressed to have this given to him as a mere bonus incentive for his time and service. After that, she led him to the kitchen, directing him to the counter to show off forged documents he needed, ranging from identification, birth and health records, to car registrations and special access passes to specific corporations. The woman had thought of most things, he admitted, but not everything. She thought out her scenarios for him as if he were to be a simple civilian blending in the shadow, but his way was, and had always been of a stealth manner, a shadow creeping through the night's cover to avoid detection and ensure no one would ever even think he was back as someone's pawn. He, now made a symbol as the face of the anti-pheno movement, and to be discovered- Would you tell me to run, Emma? Would you have told me to take off and hide forever?

"I'll be leaving back to my mansion now," Paige said, exiting the property. "You'll have to fetch your own personal things by yourself."

"Of course, I'll see to that myself." He turned his back to her, wandering away into the basement to examine it again.

2027

"No, just lay down and let me tend to you," Emma insisted. "You've done quite enough today."

"That's-" He seethed and groaned in pain again as he rested upon her bed while she went to work on undressing him roughly, removing his jacket and pants, leaving him only with his shirt and boxers. "Stop it already!"

"No, let me- Damn you, Isaac Sanger, you're gonna let me-" Emma put her hands onto his shoulders and gave all her force to push him down again. In that moment, he stopped fighting back and just let it happen. He stared at her eyes and saw the glimmer of pain and hurt in them, and in a rather odd moment, he turned his own away and felt something like guilt. Guilt and the disappointment in himself for failing her. She had grown tired of it all. "You're going to be the death of me. R-remember that?" Her voice was soft, but not a loving soft; the type of tone like she was just a thought away from giving up. The type that hurt him where it never usually hurt. "You said that about me... You told that to me, Ben, Andrew and Josh, remember? You said that because-"

"I never forgot," he finished, closing his eyes and pulling his head far back into the pillow. "Trust me, I never forgot."

"And now here we are, back in society, some parts of the role we've been playing switching like nothing..." With a warm, wet rag doused in cleaning alcohol, she wiped away at his wounds gently, removing the blood away. "Don't mind the stinging, it'll last until the wounds are gone, so don't remove or tug at the bandage wrap I'm gonna set."

"I know, we've done this before."

Her hands froze as they circled around the final wound right on his chest. She only looked at him not as an injured figure but as the same person she had come to know on the island. That Dylan Blood, careless, of so little regard for his own safety, just some nut with a death wish and using the good name of balance and righteousness to excuse his actions. "Too many times than I should be used to, honestly."

"The door's right there."

"I can't leave, you should know that better than anyone by now."

"You're not obligated to me, Emma," he sighed, then biting his lip as she set the bandage wraps on the wounds. "You never were-"

"No... But I'm here because I want to be." She moved back and took her hands to her side. "There, now get some rest, and I mean that. Stay with me for the next few days."

"I don't understand you yet..." He opened his eyes and turned his face to her. "Why do you bother with me if it means-?"

"Because you know why!" She broke, crossing her arms and pacing around. "You've always known why I've stuck around you, and I don't know what you feel, I never know... But I don't think I need to know, because you choose this over..."

"Just say it," he nudged.

"O-over a life with me..." She ended with a painful moan and showed him the tragic agony in her eyes.

"Hmmm."

"Our lives are over, we're dead now, but we can start over!" Emma clenched her heart with her hand. "The both of us, new names, new looks, living off the grid! W-we can make it work, we've survived the island! We can do it!"

He blinked in response.

"Why... Why don't you want this? I..." She dropped her arm only for the other to rub on it at the joint. "I wish you would just love me back the way I love you. I wish you'd give it all up for something far more healthier. You, me, just... Far away from here."

"I'm sorry," he simply said, void of any emotion. "I can't give you that."

And to her, it was a stab to the heart that hurt unlike anything she ever felt before. Nothing like past rejection, or the same heartbreak from being dumped or broken up with, but something much more painful. For all Emma Reinhardt had devoted to him, it had no value, all her effort flushed down the toilet. "You... You never could, couldn't you? There was no way..."

He turned to the side away from her, ignoring her just once, of all the time they've spent together. It was just the one time, and the last time he'd turn his back to her.

"I need you to do it yourself..." Emma started over. "Maybe it won't be me you'll help, but you can certainly help other girls lost in this world. Maybe it won't be tomorrow, or anytime soon, but there will be at least someone in need of guidance and support, so please... That's the least you can do for me, Isaac. Continue this cycle..."

Far From Now

"...And save someone who needs to be saved, as many times as you can... Maybe more than just one... Whenever you see it-"

And as he carried young Bethany Kira Chang in his arms, he thought of Emma again and the wordless promise he kept in mind. He owed her that much, and he had known that. There had to be a degree of honor between them, the very same degree they shared in those moments when they walked around together in the island, when they exchanged quick glances at each other. They never knew each other, but they could see the dead in each other's eyes, and that had always been worth respecting enough not to pick a bone with.

"-Save them all."

It started here officially, with the little girl bearing a diagonal cut across her face. He'd give himself to the cycle for the sake of this victimized foreigner and move forward to find others down the path he stayed on. And those lost girls, as mentioned once so long ago, were still awaiting their own savior, their own Emma. Him. Dylan Blood and the band of pupils he'd call the-

"Primers needed this lesson," he justified it after hearing it from Laika Letenko's aging lips. "Most certainly, Bethany needed this hard lesson for her own good. I just hope it registers as hard love and nothing else."

"Da, she understand soon," Laika supported. "She come around and not open her mouth again."

"Mmmmm, but this mistake was on me. I believed her... to be ready to be in that field Carly Evans-Nguyen occupied too. I know what that one did for Bethany, but..."

"Is maybe in need of more discipline?" Laika proudly suggested. "Keep in line, no sharing future secrets. Keep Bed out of field for missions in last timeline. Doing so will-" And Laika went silent once her emperor shot a hand up to quiet her down. "Sir?"

"My sentiments exactly, she wasn't ready for this..." He turned and looked through the clear glass, looking down on Bethany, still downed by her punishment, huddled around her were Lissandra, Alex, Liberty and Rose. "If not one, then maybe none of them at all. Can I really expect them to be mentally prepped for all assignments I have for them?"

"Cannot say, but you've trust them to do without me, that say something. You put trust on Primers without leader, me."

"That was my call-"

"Is problem, you decide, without me. I part of this unit, I should be watching over them! I not there because you think they need less discipline and strict orders, da? Idea of them bonding as team a lesson weak!"

"No!" He banged his hand upon the glass. "This is not how it was to be! Certainly not this, not for this teaching moment to backfire the way it did..." He felt nothing but shame in himself just as he did in Bethany. "Taking action to reassign Bethany is going to affect her. She's nowhere near an ignorant child, she'll know this is another consequence- one that she will know is pushed because I've lost trust in her."

"And you have-"

"Which is not the ideal relationship I should have with my units and the members that make them up."

"Worry you! Worry about personal image!" Laika protested openly, "Be strict leader you, worry not about minds of weaker girls! Tell you, little Bethany need discipline, and who breaks rules and endangers us! Discipline by pain be necessary, sir!"

"Hmmm..."

"I think you done right, letting me handle this myself. But all this be avoided if you keep us together. All assignments from here on out, you keep me close to them, we do together. The six of us, one steady unit. They need me for proper guidance, this is why you put me as Prime Commander first place."

"I trust..." A slow exhale escaped him. "I trust this is the right call. That they know this is a lesson founded on tough love they need."

Laika nodded in agreement. "They need more of, not care what they feel. They are not little girls, they are-"

August 7th, 2030

"In need of guidance," he told Leia, arms crossed, back leaned and feet at the edge of the table as the blonde girl sipped from her cold fruit drink. "Your life before was no life, only the inevitable downfall for you, a one-way ticket to prison. Certainly you didn't think you'd be ransacking households forever, right?"

Leia took her lips off the straw and tried to form an answer but ended up shrugging her shoulders. "I don't know, I might have kept on until they caught me."

"That's not a future I would agree with," he argued. "You can do better, you're still young. You're lucky to have me-"

She laughed innocently at him. "Sorry, that was a little funny coming from you. I mean, you did cut at my issue..." And then, she gagged briefly. "Still sick."

"My gift to you, Leia, is finally getting justice for your parents after years of nothing and nobody having done anything."

"And I appreciate that..." Leia gestured with a nod. "You've done what I could never. I just wish that I had your courage, your bravery, your... Whatever you have that I still don't."

"And that's why you need the guidance, Leia. The trauma in you formed barriers that need to be penetrated-"

"Now you sound like one of those therapists," she moaned.

"If it means you take it as the truth, then by all means call me a therapist," he jokingly grinned. "I think you know by now I'm trying to help you, even as odd my methods may be."

"Pfffft," she went before sipping from her drink again. "I do."

He broke away from sight of her and let his eyes wander around the endless passerby. "One day you'll be properly integrated back into society like a normal person..." But after he spoke the words, he didn't feel satisfied with the thought.

"M-maybe..." Leia shared with a hint of doubt. "I hope so, I mean... That girl in the burning van died long ago, so I'd... I guess I do need a new identity. I mean, officially. I chose the name I bear today to remind me how happy I was before, seeing the real Leia Prescott on the screen-" She frowned. "-but... I see now that she was just playing a role, being someone she's not, nothing different than what I was doing."

"You're growing inside," he complimented with no tone of pride or joy. "Is this the end of Leia Prescott?"

"It will be soon, I imagine," she confirmed, taking yet another sip of her drink. "I like the name Leia these days, over the other variation I was born with, so I wanna keep it."

"Respectable, I like that you know it in your heart," he praised, "so I wish you the best in your future, as well as a long life. After today, we'll part ways."

"Gotcha."

"Stick to the cover story, I kidnapped you as a hostage. Doesn't matter if they buy that, they won't have another idea why I took you with me."

"Right," she agreed. "Thank you. Thank you for..."

"No need for that," he stopped. "If I'm to be honest, I should be thanking you."

Now - Hours Later

Leia Loud had listened to Dylan's fast job, her heart already racing before he had finished. For her own life, and again, she was dreadfully terrified. After all these years of growing and being protected by the twins Lola and Lana personally, she reeked of a sort of fear with the stench of something far worse than a pair of unwashed gym socks. Her fingers kept tapping about the tree she was leaning her back on, breaths being shaky as she took them. "I- I didn't kill- No, none of us killed him, we saw the shooter!"

"I trust you did," Dylan responded back from the other side of the tree; he, too, was leaning, but showed to be calmer than her. "Three girls didn't do this, I know that. I think she knows that too, but she wants someone's head on a platter anyway."

"Why us?" Leia tried to solve. "It wasn't us! C-can't you tell her it was that psycho niece of that senator?"

"A dead girl can't be saved," he sighed.

"How do we know Allie Taggart is really dead?" Leia suggested, trying to keep hope alive. "She must be in hiding, I'm sure of it!"

"No, she's dead," Dylan had decided. "Take it from me, I know what I'm saying."

"H-how do you...?" she questioned. "Oh, my God, d-did you-?"

"I made a mistake..." he sighed again. "I sent her to die after arming her. I sent her after Lincoln Loud, and that was it."

"You... She... He killed her?" Leia pressed both hands over her mouth. "Mmmm..."

"No confirmation but that is the likely outcome... Forgive me, this might not be what you needed to know."

"Y-you've endangered me, then..." she realized. "Just by being here and talking to me, y-you might have led a tail she put on you here. How do you know-?"

"I wasn't followed, I'm sure of it."

"Maybe they were but they're keeping their distance," she nervously suggested. "How do you really know?"

"Then we're both dead, and the tail is already far from here, and the Tetherby woman knows we have some... Well, whatever this is."

"B-but- Why do I have to die?" Leia not only couldn't, but didn't want to wrap her head around it. "Can't you do something?"

"I do have an idea, but I'd like to know where you stand in it..." he offered, "I require your trust, and I mean all of it, and maybe we'll get out of this alive."

"I... Uh, I have a question..."

"Go on..." he accepted, being curious.

"Were you keeping tabs on us all?" Leia circled around the tree and came to him, taking his attention for the sole reason of knowing the answer that he'd give with his face. It might have been a different one than the one that he spoke, but she'd know for sure. She could trust him, she knew that by now, even when he was a magnet for attention, a personification of dark things that should never be. Trust that never went all the way, but enough to put her life in his hands, especially now since he had brung the danger directly to her. Trust that was forced; all or nothing. "No, I'm not stupid, I know you did, as much as the news could cover. But... Did you know I was getting married?"

"Is that so?"

Leia saw his half-smirk, but he turned away from her to hide that inappropriate joy that was undeserved and uncalled for in this moment. "It'd be stupid to be killed before my wedding."

"Congratulations-"

"If I give you the keys, will you guarantee my safety a hundred percent?"

"I can, but you need to do as I say, and only as I say..."

2025 - Rakkai Island AKA "Death Land", Somewhere Over The North Atlantic Ocean

"Your heart is bigger than this island-" he started, but cut short by Emma's reaction; she blushed and concealed her face, acting out of a childish nature. But while it was true that her heart was only young yet, the unsaid deduction was that it was also dangerous, the package deal that would never be separated. He let her have it, waited for her to come back to their convo. For one, he admired that there was someone with a clean heart around, and two, she was a force that he secretly liked. Her aura, her essence and character, it was beautiful enough that he wanted to be around it as much as he could.

"It is?"

"I mean to say you have admirable qualities," he explained, "but just be wary of the others. Don't want the others trying to take advantage of you or anything... And never be alone with one of the guys."

"Pfffft," she went, "trying to protect me? Does that mean you care about me? Do you loooooove me?"

"I'm saying be careful, that's all," he cut to the chase. "I can't always watch over you but you'd do better staying within the camp perimeter."

Emma set her hands in front of her, reheating them with the fire in front of them. "I'm not sitting this one out, Isaac. We all need to do our part if we wanna survive this place, the girls are doing it."

"Stick with them unless I'm doing my scout runs, I do need the extra assistance."

"Wouldn't that mean I'd be alone with you?" Emma joked with an eyebrow raised. "Hmmmmm?"

"You wouldn't mind that, even I know that. Look at you, you're all red and you seemed flustered a minute ago."

"Shuhhhhh..." Emma moaned. "Liar!"

"Am I?" Dylan glanced around the area. "Come scout with me tomorrow. Maybe we'll find fruit or maybe wild game."

"Sounds good, I- I'd better get some sleep."

"I'll watch over, just in case."

"Not sleeping?"

"Not eager to dream tonight..." He shooed her away with a flick of his hand, staying in range of the campfire to keep it company, and for it to remain his company. He added no more wood, planning to let the fire die for the conservation of their supply of wood. A torch would do just fine, but he yawned after she had taken off and felt drowsy, already feeling a secret ray of the illumination of the sad shade of neon blue strike down upon him. Not of the moon, and not even of some real nightly event, but a sign of a sort, a dreading backhand feeling that things were going to get much worse before it got better.

And wherever he felt the neon blue, he knew it was already set in motion.

Neon blue and the letters on signs he'd often see, a thing nothing more than to advertise and attract and label the connecting building it was housed to, meant far more and unconventional and deeper to him than anyone would be bothered to make it mean. It was the light that shone over Brianna Bridges' body after she had jumped out the second-story window. In that case, a color of suicide in which her death made it into the papers and circulated around his high school for the next three weeks.

The next time after that, Erin McCain, a quiet girl he had befriended only because they had the same part-time job, had asked him for a ride after being fired. She waited for him just outside a motel about half a mile southeast from the workplace, where the big neon blue letters cast about, taking his attention away from her after he had pulled up to the curbside. Neon blue, a color of sadness that either mocked Erin or recognized her having a bad night. The next time he saw her at school, she wore a long sleeve, and would go on to wear them until she disappeared two months later.

Think it was a fluke, right?

No one had made the connection that Isaac Sanger was a fan of Brianna Bridges' poetry podcast, as anonymous comments were set as default upon the audio show she ran, new episodes weekly. He supported her, but had never made it known of his true identity. And nothing else.

Neon blue was like a curse, but in no way it was a real one, he thought. Colors were colors, nothing more. But he wound up thinking, and he had known that red was synonymous with some cruel and dark things, in this plane or the next one. Red was some evil color, the color the devil wore on his sinful skin. Red, a color that represented the common fury of man, so why wasn't it farfetched to believe neon blue was a color of sadness?

The only reason they came into mind was because he slipped up and let himself fall asleep and dream back into hell again. Bridges and McCain were two girls infected by the color, probably were exposed long-term enough to have turned their minds. All the more reason he disliked the color, and any other color in the neon spectrum. But while he hated that, he detested having night activities even more. Anything to avoid the light of the common nightlife. A lifetime ago, a young Isaac Sanger was wishing a humble goodnight to the moon. Never again.

He woke up three hours later, scrambling woozily towards the sleeping Emma and laid right beside her but turned his back to her, so when she awoke by dawn, he was dead asleep but had indeed kept her company for the night, it seemed to her. And her heart pumped faster than before.

The Tetherby Mansion - Hours Later

"I promised you three girls, and I delivered the fastest I possibly could." Dylan played the role well, walking through the front entrance with Paige and the two silent guards front and back, armed only with handguns concealed beneath their top-dollar Armani wear. Two only, but perhaps there were more around, he didn't know simply because he could not do recon without being discovered at this time. He had left the keys in the van, along with the precious cargo left unattended in the roundabout on the front.

Six bullets in the chamber, revolver still concealed where he had put it on himself. The atmosphere could go so wrong so fast, sleight of hand required to get out of it alive. Then again, living some more might have been too much to ask for in the end. The contingency was allowing himself to die here after getting the single kill that mattered. Dying and ensuring Leia's safety. The files Paige had on the trio degraded to ashes, and he ran under the risky assumption she had no copies of the file; she'd want nothing of this to exist, nothing to be traced back to her. The shootout here would bring attention, and at every possible outcome, the heat would be raised upon the Tetherby woman.

Live or die, he simply won by pretending to play the game Paige wanted him to play. Only-

"Sorry, I'm gonna have to do a check on you," Paige pulled out of nowhere, guiding her two guards to pat Dylan down head to toe. The weapon was stripped from him, shown right to Paige's face. "This thing loaded? Check the chamber, will you?"

The bodyguard opened the chamber and let Paige see for herself, then closed it and set their hand down, keeping the firearm away from Dylan. "Bad habit, you know how it is."

"I don't see the need to carry around, I have protection here as you can see... Unless you were perhaps intending to use it against me?" Paige led the way to the wide living room, allowing her guest to sit down- right before Paige took the revolver and went back out the front, ordering, "Watch him, make sure he doesn't move, and if he does, shoot him."

"What is the meaning-?" But she left without giving him attention, throwing Dylan into a corner. The one who was steps ahead had turned from him to her, but what had she known? Did she truly have a tail on him at every second? He cursed himself, but it didn't matter what had given him away. He raised his hands up slowly, passing himself off as a neutral person. "Easy, gents. I'm unarmed."

Paige went over to the van and opened the back, finding only one out of three girls only. She made a sour face and aimed the revolver at Leia. "Out, out you go and say nothing!"

Leia gulped, understanding that Dylan's only card had failed them both. "D-don't shoot! P-please-"

"Shut up! Hurry, hurry!" Paige impatiently beckoned. "Inside the mansion, you little whore."

"Going!" Leia hurriedly scampered inside, jogging with Paige keeping up in the same speed until they reached the living room, where Paige proceeded to strike the back of Leia's head with the revolver. And down the blonde youngling went, knocked out and fallen over on her face, lying backside up.

"I was promised the three girls, so what is this?!" Paige moved and aimed Dylan's precious signature weapon i between him and Leia. "I've offered you freedom again, at the risk of being killed myself by you. But I didn't care about the power and money I have, I just wanted them to see justice for what they did to my grandfather. Why do you deny me something that shouldn't matter to you?! Huh?!"

What-? Does she not know we've met before? Then, what-?

A female cackle broke the air and rattled the atmosphere, echoing throughout the mansion. If he hadn't recognized the maniacal source of the fiendish laugh, he'd be out of his depth, to be filled only with mystery and the feeling of being ignorant, played a real fool. "Well over a decade, but not enough of a change from you, huh? Huh, Isaac?"

"Anne Kingsmann, in the living flesh!" Dylan's breath escaped him, exiting after a shock of gasp.

"Didn't I say he wouldn't fulfill for you, Paige?" Anne Kingsmann asserted her place in the board, walking up right behind Paige and putting her hands on the Tetherby's frail shoulders, rubbing them near roughly. "The Tacitus booger would backstab someone like you for even, let alone, inheriting daddy's million-dollar estate."

"What are you up to, Anne?" Dylan let his arms fall to his sides, now focused on Anne with true hatred forming in his eyes. "Befriending a wealthy brat isn't really your thing."

"That was true back then, sure, but I expanded my horizons, and not by antagonizing the daughters or sisters of the elites I tried to control-" Anne giggled, tapping her lips. "I get way more fun, not to mention more money and resources at my disposal. It was I who suggested using you to help her, not just for her but for you, to see if you had changed over the course of those nine years. You've been nothing more than a tool the likes of Cornelius used. Man had the right idea, but putting you to do the dirty work was his fatal mistake. That massacre at the theatre, that was ballsy of you-"

"Shut the hell up already," he yawned, "so, what happens now?"

"Girl here dies, not by gun," Anne addressed. "Bury her body vertically in the estate and Paige will pay for a patio deck to be built over. And you... You go back to prison, and none of this ever happened. The end. Paige, go enjoy yourself with the body, I want some personal time with the hired help."

"Certainly!" Paige carried the unconscious Leia in both arms, leaving the group to handle her business in the basement.

"You, up!" Anne swung her foot and kicked at Dylan's legs. "Men, stay here, I don't need protection."

"Where are you taking me?"

Anne unexpectedly held out her hand for him to accept. "Come on, big man. You really don't have a choice, so might as well."

Dylan merely rolled his eyes in response, getting up without accepting. Anne escorted him out through the back, wandering out past the wooden deck balcony, out to the vacant field of a grid of three hundred plus acres. Anne brought him into the center of the field and focused on him, arms crossing over her chest. "You were a nobody, I've seen you come from nothing and grow into something seemingly promising. You were our Robin Hood, we all praised you for your continuous raids. You took and you gave to the lower class the stuff they'd never dream of owning. Money, or highly valuable items that were pawned or sold off right away, doesn't matter. You cared for those who had trouble making it in life. So tell me..."

He knew where she was going with this, but he had no reason to stray from her question.

"What made you turn away to focus on these freakshows some stupid company made?" Anne presented the question that usually kept living on life support in the mind, being direct only to know what the answer of his would be. "You halted your own agenda, going around chasing after those types when they could kill you easily. I don't know how, but you really lucked out in your pointless war with them. How is it that you managed to make it out alive while countless thousands, many of them being innocents, got robbed of their own lives? You say you're about balance and equality, but being alive, as you are, while morally better people died- I don't know, isn't that unfair for them? It's a middle finger from God, if you believe in God."

"Just get to the point."

"I'm saying you lost your way," Anne concluded, "you couldn't be like us, and you couldn't even stay as you were originally. Who even is this Dylan Blood supposed to be, if not Isaac Sanger?"

"Who, indeed?" Dylan heard enough of Anne and rushed her as if she were a rival player on the other team of a football game. His shoulders supplied the sufficient force to knock her down, may have been a little excessive at most, seeing as how frail and skinny Anne was in reality. He connected his right foot over her face to kick at her, driving her face hard to the side- snapping her neck in turn so easily. The bitch was all brain and no brawn, the only disadvantage he could pick out and focus on when she wasn't having a TED talk. "You really loved to talk a lot."

He wasted no time and searched Anne's body, obtaining her phone. Thankfully, she had no pin lock set at the home screen, making it easy for him to access. He dialed a number quickly, putting the phone up to his ear. "Move in, the contingency is in play!"

"Advancing into the perimeter," the voice on the other end replied before Dylan hung up. He dropped the phone and jogged lightly back towards the mansion. Not even halfway when the ringing of guns firing fill the air, prompting him to sprint all the way. Oh, no...

He counted the shots to four, entering through the backside, running to the front where he saw the two fresh bodies of Paige's guards lying dead at the steps of the staircase. He heard two distinct pairs of footsteps echoing about above his head. For sure they had to have belonged to Paige and Leia, and hurriedly, the man raced up, snatching one of the guards' handguns. "LEIA, HANG ON!"

"GO AWAY!" one of the voices shrieked above, albeit muffled, unable for him to recognize it. "YOU PSYCHO!"

Dylan reached the second floor and pursued the voice, stopping only when he heard nothing, and then going through the labyrinth of the house when the footsteps picked up again. He paused after the sound of yet another gunshot and glass breaking away, then moved in slow footsteps once he figured out where the pair had been. Right down another hall at the east end was a balcony with a nice view- but Paige laid down over the leftmost side of it, accompanied by glass fragments and the blood that flowed out of the bigger hole punctured on the back of her head. Leia let go of the revolver as if she had forgotten she had been holding it, only glaring down at the gruesome aftermath of her simple action. The life of her eyes evaded the body, the soul had gone cold and quiet, but otherwise existed inside. "She- she..." Leia stuttered incoherently. "She w-w-wanted to k-kill-"

"H-how did...?" It was his first question that came in mind. Leia got the upper hand and turned the tables on the Tetherby woman somehow. It was nowhere near part of either plan he brainstormed, but it turned out as good as both of them hoped- or as good as could be, minus the part where they were dropped and placed in the heart of danger. "We need to leave right now, Leia. Those shots were surely heard by someone!"

He ran over to her and picked up the revolver, tucking it back where he had put it. As for the borrowed handgun, he could not leave it behind now that he had put his fingerprints on it. A miracle none of the occupants here did any touching- at most, Paige only put her fingers on Leia's clothes, unless... What had he missed? What had gone on in the basement? Could it be they've touched each other before Leia got her hands on the gun? Had to be a struggle of some sort at least... But there was no proof thereof until he probed her brain for the recollection of events. In any case-

"To the van!"

"I t-took care of her guards," Leia hiccuped. "Did we finish this-?"

"Go, go!" He rushed her out, backtracking his steps back outside, entering and starting the van. Leia pounced on the back, making a metal thud in the middle. "Close the back!"

Leia pulled the back doors shut roughly, then had her smacked against them as Dylan revved the van out of the roundabout. "Hey! A little warning-"

"You're not fast enough!" His eyes scouted the upcoming road, where he expected the contingency to arrive in the form of- "There! We're home safe!"

A trailer truck of eighteen wheels awaited them at the far right; it was their transport in reality. The truck's trailer was opened, awaiting for its special load of one van and two persons.

"What, that truck?!" Leia had forgotten the contingency plan already. "What about-?"

"I've said it before, I had to make a move of my own very carefully-"

"-and one that ensures we go home, safe and sound," he told Emma with an enthusiastic hope, praying she would buy it- and of course, she did end up buying what he sold. He sold it perfectly. He sold it genuinely. He had a warm demeanor attached to that typically-cold voice of his, made that way exclusively for her. One could even say-

And she smiled, and it was the smile of a thousand suns, it was the smile of a beautiful landscape, where the animals galloped around, it was the smile of true hope that led to a brand new day, and maybe more if he had her kept at his side. It was that perfect smile that did something to his heart, yet he had not taken notice.

"You and me, we're taking the money, and we're going into hiding. No more of this-"

2030

Dylan observed the pheno Darcy Holmandollar run through a crowd of passersby, knocking them to the side or on the ground. He was perched on the rooftop of the building across the street, watching with binoculars in his right hand, and cell in his left hand. "She's making her kind look bad, I'm seeing it now, yes," he confirmed to Cornelius Dietrich. "If she goes rogue, I'll be the one to kill her."

"Don't act like one of us, this is not your responsibility! May I remind you that, for your island fuck-up, you serve me until I say you can fuck off."

"Sir."

"DON'T SIR ME, YOU PSEUDO-SANCTIMONIOUS FUCKER!"

"...Sir."

"Okay, get outta there, you runt, go get yourself a burger or something."

"Yes, sir," he said again like the obedient child he was forced to play. "Goodbye, sir."

Goodbye, Emma...

On the roof of a long archway leading to a motel, four letters in darkened neon blue spelling APEX shone as brightly as they were allowed. Underneath the archway, the generic van pulled up and into a slot, engine being killed right away. I see it now...

"What are we doing here?"

"We're staying over for the night. Hang here while I get a room for the night."

Leia nodded and went back to tampering with her phone. "I need a charger, fast."

"Sorry, but do you have someone's phone memorized? There might be a landline phone in there."

"What's a landline phone?" she itched away at.

This is the end of the line... Dylan exited the van, carefully closing the door from behind, heading to the main office. I leave you here to put an end to this. No more me in your life, no more danger I can bring you-

And when he went back to the van, opening the passenger door, he decided to withdraw from the promise he had made long ago. Emma, there's no easy way to help anyone, not like this. I can't really guarantee their safety- and that's why I guess you had to leave. You knew you'd never be safe with me, not that I was a lost cause.

"Th-the room-" he could only form gibberish, thinking he was coherent and comprehensible. "H-here is the-" He plucked the room key over to Leia, plopping it on her palm.

But I made it this way.

"Y-yeah-" Leia unbuckled and stepped out of the van. "I need a shower real bad."

"You go do that..." Dylan set his eyes on the ignition, slowly going around the van. What if I can't save them all? What if...? Why would you have me failing you...? That's- That isn't what I promised you... But then-

He pictured her dear, starlight smile again as he restarted the engine. Leia was halfway up the steps on the further end of the motel when she caught the ripping roar of the black vehicle, of which reversed and turned. "WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING?! UH-" With what little energy she had left, she tried to run to catch the van, but failed to keep up, and there it went, rolling past out of the lot and through the archway- exiting past under the neon sign.

This was about me being able to succeed where... Where I already failed you... Emma...

And Leia Prescott would never be a witness in this lifetime. Not a witness of the tears that had streamed down his face. It was meant for no one to see but the dead of his past, and most certainly that woman he shed these for.

I'm so sorry, Emma...

And the glow from the neon sign continued to shrink within the mirrors until they faded from view. Once and forever.