The empty lobby of the so called 'TD Tower' reached three stories high, the highest ceiling Gale had ever seen. Fancy shiny polished beige rocks used as walls and floor. The group's footsteps echoed in the emptiness as they reached the elevator.
Gale helped Ollie into the elevator, still on his shoulder. The shorter boy's shoulder slumped. Dark circles under his eyes beca much clearer under the harsh lights of the lobby.
Tank Top and Red Jacket followed them into the elevator, dragging their feet against the floor. Ollie pressed 54 and then 58. The numbers ticked up until the first destination.
"Tomorrow," Ollie said. "My office. 9PM sharp. We'll discuss details of our new arrangent."
"Yes sir, Mr. Glory, Sir!" Tank Top and Red Jacket scooted over to the corner.
Gale noticed both n, at least taller than 6 ft, cowered at Ollie's presence. That was a given from how the fight played out. But seeing it up close and how Ollie was shorter than himself was much more amusing.
"And bring proper docuntation this ti." Ollie failed to straighten himself. "No more off-the-books nonsense."
The elevator doors opened onto the 54th floor. Red Jacket and Tank Top practically bolted out, vanishing down the hallway without looking back.
"Pfft, criminals," Ollie chuckled weakly. "No spine when you actually confront them."
The elevator continued up to the second destination. When the doors opened again, Ollie and Gale walked to the end of the hallway to et the heavy double glass doors and glass walls.
"Office sweet office," Ollie said.
Through the glass, only one desk sat in the middle by the floor-to-ceiling windows. A panoramic view of downtown Toronto stretched across the view. A bar cart sat in the corner just beside the minimalistic wooden desk.
Gale opened the door and helped Ollie inside and laid him down behind his desk onto his chair. Glass cracked under his shoes. Looking at it, he saw a picture fra beside the wall. Broken glass fragnts everywhere. A mark on the wall told him that the fra had been thrown.
Ollie didn't even glance at it.
"You look like shit," Gale said.
"You should see the other guys." Ollie laughed but quickly turned into a grimace. "Actually, you did see them."
"I'm serious." Gale leaned onto the desk, looking to the side at Ollie. "What happened to you?"
"? Nothing happened to . I just... adapted. Built sothing bigger than myself." Ollie's smiled, looking down. "What about you? Last I saw, you were..."
Last I saw, you were staying behind so we could escape. Gale knew what he wanted to say and neither of them could say it.
"Got out eventually," Gale whispered. "Took longer than expected."
"How long?"
Gale looked over the windows behind Ollie. City lights flickered below and people passed by even though the sun hadn't risen yet. "After I got left behind… maybe two months. I don't know. It was always night there."
He paused. "Then I made it back here. They told 10 years passed."
Ollie's smile cracked for a mont. He sighed. "For the record, we only ca back five years ago. But… we really thought you were dead. People lost hope after the first year." He reached for the bar cart, fingers trembling as his legs buckled under him. "Shit."
"Here." Gale grabbed the bottle he was reaching for. He filled the glass with sothing amber to the top. "Drink so water and rest."
Ollie narrowed his eyes at Gale. "You trying to force to rest with that much alcohol bud?"
"Alcohol?" Gale looked at the bottle. He's never had alcohol. Adults liked this kind of stuff.
Ollie laughed, then took the glass from his hand and chugged it down in one go. "I've got etings in three hours. Can't stop the machine once it's running. Besides, you haven't told how you got out."
"That can wait." Gale put the bottle down. "What's really going on, Ollie?"
Ollie's smile returned, "Maybe I just pushed too hard tonight. That stuck-up maiden was also a Resonant."
[Target continues to display severe physical deterioration. Muscle tremors indicate systemic fatigue beyond normal paraters. Threat level: Minimal.]
No one asked you, stupid Guide.
"You're burning yourself out," Gale said. "Even back then, you… you didn't stop looking for the exit."
"Back then." Ollie stared into his empty glass. "We were different people back then, weren't we? Simpler. Just trying to survive that place."
Ollie set the glass down. "Now look at us. with my empire built on… it doesn't matter. You're still the sa. Still innocent."
"I'm not as innocent as you think." Gale moved to pick up the shattered picture fra by the wall, but Ollie's voice stopped him.
"Don't." The word ca out sharp. Then softer, "Please."
Gale pulled his hand back. The glass crunched under his shoes as he returned to lean on the desk. "You can talk to , you know. Like before."
"Before." Ollie closed his eyes. "That's the problem, isn't it? There's no going back to before. Not for ."
Ollie leaned back on his chair. "So, tell about these new abilities of yours. That fighting style was sothing else."
"Ollie-" Gale started but was interrupted.
"Please." Ollie said while his eyes were closed. "I can't... not yet. Let have this mont where we're just two buddies sitting sowhere in the forest, and you telling so weird thing your parents taught you."
Gale wanted to push, unsure of what to say to get him to talk. But there was pain in that voice that he recognized. Was it right to push? Ollie was different from before. For all he knew, the man in front of him probably only felt like he was seeing an acquaintance from long ago. Maybe they weren't as close as he thought they were. It was better to leave it.
"Fine." Gale sat in the chair opposite side of the desk.
"What happened after we left?" Ollie smiled softly as he opened his eyes. "You never said how long you fought those things alone."
Gale's fist clenched, rembering the world that only wanted him dead. The Blue Moon's gaze that shot out blue lances that could burn through the darkest stone. The army of thralls had poured out from the castle. Elliot's deranged smile and the insanity of the dark knight.
The shadow this office would have made him double check everything. Look for any potential threat and set a trap at any given choke point.
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That wasn't socially accepted here though. No enemies out for his neck. Only stubborn bureaucracy that he couldn't kill. Here was a different kind of forest. Behind the vast panoramic view were trees made of concrete, bricks, and tal.
"Co on," Ollie said. "You can't drop 'two months alone in hell' and leave it at that. I'll even let you say 'as you know'"
Gale's face burned hot. "How do you know that?"
Ollie laughed. "You know, you were always the topic of conversations. Especially with Rachel. She'd bring you up whenever we'd et, wondering if maybe… well, she kept reminiscing. You know. Won. Always wondering."
"Rachel?" Gale's heart skipped a beat as he heard her na. "How is she?"
"Wouldn't really know right now." Ollie wrapped his fingers around the armrest. "Haven't talked to her in a couple of weeks or maybe a month. Keeping to my own circles these days. Business takes up most of my ti."
"What kind of business needs this much from you?" Gale looked him up and down.
The smile fell from Ollie's face. He reached into his desk drawer and pulled out a small vial. His fingers tightened around the vial. "This is Dust. Performance enhancer for Aurians. Gives them a boost in power, makes them feel invincible. But there are... side effects. It gives you a rush of pleasure while on it as well. Highly addictive as an awakened. Mundanes getting exposed to it is a whole different matter."
Gale analyzed it.
[Modified Dust Vial]
[Description: Lethal combat enhancer.]
[Effects: Efficiency base 15 x 105%, Max Load base 15 x 105%, restores essence by 50% of max.]
[Duration: 600 seconds.]
It was similar to the one he used against the dark knight, but he didn't feel any of the side effects that Ollie ntioned.
"They call it dust corruption." Ollie set the vial down softly. "It starts small, unnoticeable. At first, you don't even see it outside the skin, and then just a crystal or two breaks through the skin. That's when you know it's too late. It spreads faster. Grows. The pain... The screams never stop until they're fully crystallized. Takes about eleven days from first exposure."
That sounded like what happened to the holess man. His face… he had run away from the man who was clearly in pain. Nothing else he could've done. Running away, like always.
"Every lab, every deal, every bit of research..." Ollie's voice grew quiet. "It's all focused on finding a cure. Sothing to stop the spread, reverse the crystallization. The Path… the Path doesn't care about civilians. They're just expendable to them. So soone has to step up."
"Why push yourself this hard?" Gale asked. "You're killing yourself over this."
"Don't." Ollie said firmly. "Just... don't ask about that. Please."
Silence filled the office. Far below, early morning traffic began to build. A car honked its horn. A garbage truck's hydraulics hissed from picking up garbage bins.
"You know Carl or Jonathan or whatever he told you his na was?" Ollie asked suddenly.
"Yeah." Gale said. "He found half dead. Took to a dical facility and then told to join the Path."
"Shit." Ollie sat up in his chair. "That was you? He ntioned soone coming out of the Red Hollows last month, but I didn't think..."
"Red Hollows?"
"Big chunk of west Toronto. Lakeshore West Heights specifically." Ollie pulled up a map on his phone. "About a kilotre wide. Ten years ago, sothing happened there. Exactly when we were all sent to that hellhole. The governnt covered it up and called it a terrorist attack. But really?"
Ollie zood in on a circular area marked in red. "Everyone inside just vanished. Thousands of people, gone in an instant. Transported to the Eclipsed."
Gale stared at the map. The centre of the circle was right at the orphanage. "I was in that circle too when it all happened. I was just in the orphanage."
" too. My master dropped off to a house and told she'd be back after getting milk. And then bam. Shit hit the fan. Wait, hold on a second." Ollie looked Gale up and down. "You look like a hobo. You even got proper ID? Background that makes sense here?"
"The Path set up with basics," Gale said. "Enough to blend in."
"Blend in?" Ollie snorted, pulling out his phone. "You look like you've been sleeping in alleyways. Are you even eating? Give a day to set things up. I'll get you sothing proper. Set you up everything: money, docunts, whatever you need."
"Ollie-"
"Don't argue. Consider it paynt for saving my ass back there with the Knights. Besides..." Ollie glanced at the broken picture fra again. "I owe you. For getting everyone else out back then."
The man in front of him had definitely changed. Years of it distanced them apart. However, in that mont, Gale saw flashes of the old Ollie. The one who'd joked about becoming rich and buying up whatever he thought of while they huddled around the campfire made in the dark forest.
"You know what the worst part is?" Ollie said, lifting up the vial of dust again. "Sotis I miss it. That place. At least there, everything made sense. Stay alive, keep moving, watch each other's backs. Now it's all politics and money and watching people die slowly while I try to..."
Gale put a hand on Ollie's uninjured side's shoulder. All he wanted was for his friend not to pretend in front of him. Not here or ever in front of him.
Ollie looked at him with one brow raised. "Getting sappy Mr. Shut up and Keep Moving?"
Gale laughed awkwardly. "But, I don't think I'm like that anymore. I'm… trying to be more normal."
"Normal? You're fine. It's better to not be normal." Ollie leaned back, so of the tension leaving his shoulders. "Normal people try getting close for reasons. They want the connections, the money, the guy who can make things happen. But you? You just want to crack bad jokes like we're back in that hellhole."
"Soone has to and those were so bad jokes back there."
"Thanks." The word ca out soft, genuine. Then Ollie's eyes lit up. "Speaking of surprising things. Since when can you go toe-to-toe with two Attuned? That was so fancy demonic footwork back there."
Gale shifted in his chair. "Not clear on all these rankings yet. How do you even know soone's level?"
"Right, you missed orientation day." Ollie pulled up a holoscreen from his desk. "Rember what I told you about power levels back in the forest? It's all about how the energy manifests. Awakened, that's you by the way, it's like looking at a blurry photo. No real shape to it."
Ollie manipulated the image, showing different patterns. "Attuned starts getting clearer outlines. You can actually track it. You can start doing more things like shooting streams of water that cut tal."
"Makes sense." Gabriel and Helena did so things that were clearly out of the norm that literally broke reality. Mary and David as well.
"?" Ollie grinned. "I'm a Resonant, just a rank above an Attuned. If you thought making giant balls of water was fancy, wait till you see what I can do with my telekinesis now. I can literally fly, bro. Would've handed both their asses to them if I wasn't running on fus. Though watching you fight, you've changed your style."
"I had to…" Gale paused, not sure what to say about a knight beating him until his body learned how to move. "To learn not to die."
"Sorry," Ollie whispered. "You know, I could use soone with your skills. My operation's growing, and I need people I can trust."
"What kind of operation?"
"Legitimate business, mostly." Ollie's eyes slid to the vial on the desk. "So side ventures. Research."
The night sky beyond the view turned from night to an orange colour. It was Gale's first ti being this high up in the world. Even higher than he was when he climbed the highest tree in the dark forest, hiding from shadows. Here, those shadows represented a different kind of danger.
"Tell more about these side ventures," Gale said.
Ollie's face lit up. "Well, first thing we'd need to do is get you proper gear. No more running around looking like a hobo… unless that's your thing. I'm thinking custom kit, maybe so-"
A notification pinged on Ollie's phone, cutting him off. His expression shifted as he read the ssage. He pushed himself up from the chair, swaying slightly. "Gotta go right now. Lab results are in. Rain check on that chat?"
"You sure you should be heading anywhere right now?"
"Ti waits for no man, my friend, not even those ladies that could spew out golden vomit at you." Ollie went to the side of his office and opened a closet. Taking off his current torn jacket and shirt, he put on another white shirt and a blue blazer that fit his dinsions perfectly.
Ollie walked to the glass door and continued. "Especially not in this business. But seriously, it'd be nice to fight side by side with you again. My door's always open for you."
"Before you go," Gale stood. "That picture fra..."
"Don't." Ollie's tone was much firr, his smile clearly fake, as he walked to the door. "So stories are better left for another ti." He paused at the door. "But Gale? It's good to have you back. Really."
"Try not to pass out before you reach the lab."
"Please." Ollie waved dismissively. "I once ran ops for three days straight on nothing but coffee and spite. This is nothing."
Ollie hesitated a bit before continuing. "Although if you're not busy... How about I give you a tour of where I'm going, Lab 7?"
A tour sounded nice. Tours were sothing rich people paid for. This one was free. He's got nothing else to do anyway and be like a normal kid that skips class. Besides, he could see more of Ollie's world. He could also watch his friend just in case he falls over.
"Lead the way," Gale said finally. "But you're buying breakfast first."
"Deal." Ollie laughed. "Fair warning though. My breakfast etings usually involve at least one assassination attempt."
"Got it. My senses got us covered."
"That was a joke, Gale." Ollie laughed.
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