Aiden
“No—” I cough, gasping for air. “Let her go!”
Susan grips Ember’s throat tighter, causing her to choke when she says my name.
“Oh, how nice of you to wake up.” Susan cackles, and her flickering sparks appear in the air. “But you’re too late.” The crow’s feet around her eyes deepen with her wicked smile. “We’ve won.”
The world slows.
The sparks brighten around Ember, reflecting in her wet green eyes.
Her lips tremble as she mouths, I love you.
Then she’s gone, disappearing with Susan.
The world dims. Grows colder.
I blink, not wanting to believe that what I’m seeing is real—that Ember’s gone—but she is, and my heart is now more destroyed than my arm.
My anguished scream rips through the night.
All my anger. All the sadness. Grief. Pain. Sorrow. Rage. Everything breathes life to the uncontrollable monster dwelling inside me—and I allow it.
Electrical energy reenters me and gives me life. My bright burning veins bulge, making me look monstrous. Adrenaline allows me to get to my feet, and the burning pain coursing through my bloody arm adds to my fury. A blast forms in my left hand, and electricity bounces wildly, angrily inside of it.
My lips curl, and I focus on the last standing villain.
My target.
“Where did she take her!” The intensity of my burning white eyes reflects in Johnny’s stare. “Tell me, or I’ll make you wish you were never born!”
“Aiden!” Valentino’s unexpected warning fills my ears. “Stop! You’re going to destroy yourself!”
“Why would I listen to you?” I shout over my shoulder. If Valentino was here moments ago, she could’ve stopped this, or if she had done her job right in the first place and arrested the dean, this wouldn’t be happening at all. There’s no way Warwick didn’t have a hand in Ember’s kidnapping. The Guardians failed Ember again.
We’ve all failed her again.
“Tell me!” I scream back at Johnny, spit flying from my mouth. “Where did Susan take her?” The red thickens in my vision, and my pulse comes in hot waves, causing every inch of me to feel as if I’m on fire.
Johnny opens his arms widely, wearing a crazed grin. “Might as well kill me, then. Because I won’t tell you a thing, Sparky!”
A blast of energy resembling my forcefield expels from me like a sonar wave, blasting Johnny backward. I’m a raging lightning storm, with bolts shooting from me in all directions. Branches fall from trees, and the smell of burning wood invades my nose.
“Aiden!” A warning blast of light shoots off in the far distance. “Stop!”
I shoot a look over my shoulder, locking gazes with Valentino’s red eyes. “The dean’s secretary took Ember!” Shock spills over Valentino’s face. I quickly glance around at some of the other Guardians with her: Shapeshifter, Bone Piercer, White Banshee. “Because all of you failed to do your job and protect us!” My chest constricts, and my heart flutters wildly. “And because—” Sobs choke me, and I gasp for air, acknowledging the truth. That no matter how hard I’ve worked or all the training I’ve done… I’m still not strong enough to protect anyone. “I–I failed.”
Stella emerges between Valentino and Shapeshifter. The bottom of her gown is filthy with dirt, and Lime sits on her shoulder, holding his head as if he’s crying. Tears roll down Stella’s cheeks, and her chin trembles. “Billy and I were trying to find you… We didn’t know where you two went.” Her crying intensifies. “I–I’m sorry we were too late.”
Billy appears next. “Aiden.” His brow is creased with worry, because he understands I’m falling apart. “Ember wouldn’t want you to lose control like this. You’re going to kill yourself!”
I glance at the orb in my hand, burning brightly and pulsating with electricity. Its blue light casts an ethereal glow on the grass. Billy is… is right. Ember wouldn’t want me to lose myself like this. She’d be here trying to calm the beast inside me.
Steam escapes from my burning eyes as my tears evaporate.
“But you’re right, Sparky!” Johnny mocks. “You did fail her! The Guardians’ daughter is ours now!”
I grit my teeth so hard that my jaw pops. My entire body swells, and it feels as if I grow five inches with my raging power. A flash of terror crosses Johnny’s face as I chuck my blast straight at him. It explodes against his chest like a shooting star, and he collapses.
The rest of the world around me disappears.
I’m not me. I’m becoming something else. Something that doesn’t care about any repercussions. Serum induced or not. My head throbs with intense pressure, and my vision narrows, letting me only see Johnny unconscious on the ground. Smoke rises from him, like his soul is leaving his body.
I need to ensure that’s the reality.
Another blast forms in my hand, and I raise it above my head, tensing my muscles in preparation to throw it.
A voice whispers, Aiden, in my ear.
Ember’s voice.
“Ember?” Startled, I kill the blast and look frantically around. I definitely heard her. It was like she was right here. Right next to me. “Did you hear her?” I ask Billy. “Ember?”
Billy eyes Stella, both looking worried for my sanity.
The will to breathe escapes me. Of course, they didn’t. She’s not here.
She’s… she’s gone.
The weight of everything falls on me, like a landslide. Of what I’ve done. Of what’s happened. Of losing the woman I love to villains.
Now I’m losing my mind as well.
My hands burn like they’re on fire, heating me from my wrists to up my arms. Intense pain shoots through my destroyed arm, up my neck, and through my skull. I scream. My head feels as if it’s splitting open, and I’m immediately sick. I heave, expelling only bile. White spots flash in my red-tinted vision, warning me I’m at my breaking point.
“I’m so sorry, Aiden.” Valentino’s voice breaks.
I’m blinded by a bright light right before everything goes black.
* * *
Everything is a blur. A red-hazed blur. Hands are on me, trying to control me.
“Let me go!” I shout angrily. “I have to get out of here!”
“Aiden!” My mom sobs. “You have to calm down!”
“No!” I grab the IV and rip it from my arm.
My dad tries to stop me from getting out of the hospital bed. A few nurses attempt to hold down my shoulders, but it’s to no avail. I’m too strong for them even with my right arm in a cast.
“I have to find Ember!”
“Son!” My dad shouts. “You’re hurt! You’d be no good to her right now! You need to take care of yourself first!”
“You’re wrong!” I shove the nurse’s hands off me. My red vision blurs with my tears. “The villains could be doing anything to her right now! We need to save her!”
A woman doctor, with six large purple eyes, rushes through the door with a needle, and before I have a chance to react, she sticks it into the side of my arm. It burns where it punctures my skin, and a heaviness seeps over me.
“No!” I say, but it comes out slurred.
I stare at my parents, feeling betrayed, and so helpless. Always helpless.
Their eyes reflect their heartbreak and worry.
My vision spins, and my head becomes increasingly heavy. “Please… let me… go.”
I collapse, surrendering to the darkness.
* * *
“Honey, you can’t blame yourself,” my mom says from my bedside. “There was nothing more you could’ve done.”
I stare out the hospital window, at the skyscrapers and hills of Stalwarth, but don’t really see anything.
“Aiden?” My dad pats my leg covered by the white blanket. “We’re here for you, son.”
The steady beeping of the heart monitor is the only thing that responds.
“Aiden.” My mom blocks my view. She’s careful not to bump my cast as she reaches for my left hand. “Your father and I want to help.” Her eyes, the same color as mine, fill with tears. “Please don’t shut us out.” She tenderly strokes my cheek with motherly love.
The touch breaks me.
A flash of Ember fills my vision. When she held my cheek, trying to convince me to let her go. The way her pain was etched across her face.
“I–I wasn’t strong enough, Mom,” I say, barely above a whisper. My eyes burn, as if they can’t possibly cry anymore, but somehow more tears come. “Just like all those years ago… I–I’m still that scared boy who can’t save anyone.”
“Oh, Aiden.” My dad appears at my mom’s side. His short brown hair is disheveled, and he seems to have even more white strands around his temples. “You can’t continue beating yourself up like this. It wasn’t your responsibility to save Ember or her parents. Plus, you saved a lot of people during the attacks last year.”
“I couldn’t protect Ember then either!” I bite back harder than I mean to. Anger runs alongside my grief, causing tremors throughout my body. “She had to protect me. Always me!”
A knock comes from the door before it cracks open. “Is it okay if I interrupt?” Valentino peeks her head inside.
Our gazes meet, and my anger simmers. My anger toward her—toward all the Guardians—for failing to get there in time to save Ember when I couldn’t.
“If you’d like to explain to me how villains got onto campus,” my mom snaps, taking me a bit off guard. She flips her long vanilla-blond hair behind her shoulder. “I thought the University of Stalwarth was supposed to be safe, but my son is in here because you and your people failed to do their jobs!”
Valentino steps in, dressed in her pristine white Guardian outfit, and shuts the door behind her. “Mrs. Stiles, I can only say that—”
“No!” My mom stands. The tension in the room thickens with her fury. “If my son’s dream wasn’t to be a Guardian, I’d be done with the lot of you! My family has paid the price for the Guardians’ mistakes for too long, and now my house is surrounded by the press, on top of everything else!” She points at me but keeps her focus on Valentino. “You will take the time and explain to my son that he is not responsible for anything that happened to Ember or her parents. That it was your responsibility to protect them!”
Fighting the urge to tell my mom to just shut up because none of this matters until they find Ember is like wrestling with a raging bull. But my mom’s tears and white hairs remind me that it wasn’t only hard on me all those years ago. My dad wraps an arm around her shoulders. “Ann. This isn’t the way to handle this.”
“You are right, Mrs. Stiles.” Valentino’s head hangs a tad lower. “It is the responsibility of Guardians to protect everyone, including our students, from villains.”
So many emotions fight inside me regarding the Guardians—them and their secrets. I want to scream. I want to cry. I want to tear apart this room and try to escape to search for Ember, but all that’ll get me is another sedative.
“And what are the Guardians going to do about it? Hmm?” My mom crosses her arms. “What are you going to do to find Ember? To help my son?” She waves in my direction. “He almost lost his arm! If Stalwarth didn’t have some of the best healers in the world, it would’ve been amputated.” Hot, angry tears streak her cheeks. “His arm was broken in over twenty places, and don’t even get me started on the nerve damage! He may never get the full feeling back in his fingers!”
The conversation between my parents and Valentino continues, her trying to reassure them that they’ll do whatever they can to help me and to find Ember. My parents push back, making it seem like no matter what Valentino says, it won’t be good enough. But all they’re doing is wasting time that could be spent searching for Ember. We don’t know whether they’re just holding her captive, torturing her, or if they’re experimenting on her with the serum. Who knows what else.
Nonstop horrors flash through my mind.
I stare at my white cast in an attempt to shift my focus before I fall apart again, concentrating on the way my arm aches as if an entire bruise has consumed it. The way my right fingertips feel fuzzy. I should be thankful that this is all Twisted Bill did to me. He could’ve easily snapped my spine instead.
It is a bit curious; why did he only break my arm?
Because they don’t want me dead. They’re going to use me to manipulate Ember like they did the other night. But I wasn’t the only one they used against her.
“Is Eliza okay?” I ask Valentino, taking her attention from my parents. “Was the threat true?”
Valentino shakes her head. “It seems not. Eliza never saw Black Mold near her residence.”
Even though I already know the answer I ask, “How… how is she?”
Valentino frowns, looking painfully sad. “She’s about as good as you’d expect.”
I nod, feeling my already broken heart managing to break a little more for Eliza. She must be devastated right now. Even if things have been tough between her and Ember, there’s no denying Eliza loves Ember as if she’s her own daughter. Whatever the villains need Ember for, they need me and Eliza alive to make sure she’ll do it.
It still baffles me as to why exactly they took Ember. Valentino suspected it’d be me taken to discredit the Guardian program and to claim it’s priming villains instead of Guardians. She’d felt they would only go after Ember once she officially joined the program next semester. But, by taking Ember now, especially during an event when a lot of elite Guardians and all Defender students were present, they have single-handedly discredited both the program and the Guardians in one night. Ember is too well known, and there’s no way they could cover up her kidnapping. My mom has refused to turn on the TV in the room so I can’t hear the news reports, but Valentino may shine a light on what’s currently going on.
“Mom, Dad, would you give me and Valentino some time alone?”
“If that’s what you want, hun.” My mom’s lips press hard together, looking at Valentino. “I’m only allowing this because Aiden asked.”
Valentino nods, looking at the floor.
My mom walks over and places a kiss atop my head. “We’ll be back soon. We have a lot more to talk about when we get back. Do you understand?”
Everything Billy said about asking my parents for help and telling them about everything that’s happened rings true. I need them. Especially now. “Yeah.” I swallow hard, realizing they have no clue about the serum. About what happened last year with Iron Forge. I’ve kept them in the dark about too much for too long. “I’ll tell you everything. I just haven’t wanted to worry you.”
“Aiden,” my dad says, reaching for my mom’s shoulder. “It’s our job to worry about you, not the other way around.”
“Exactly.” My mom kisses my forehead. “Our worries are just that. Ours. They should never affect your life, do you understand?”
“Sure,” I say, not quite understanding. “Yeah.”
Valentino sits in the side chair next to my bed as my parents leave. “Aiden, I owe you an apology.”
“I don’t want it,” I snap. “The Guardians can keep their apologies.”
“An explanation, then?” Valentino replies, trying to shake off the harshness of my response. “I came as soon as I got—”
“No offense, Professor. I don’t want that either. It’s not like it’ll change what happened.”
Valentino raises an eyebrow. “Then what is it you want?”
“I want you to fill me in on what’s going on.” I lean forward. Electricity crackles in my eyes. “What’s being done to save Ember and to stop whatever the villains have planned?”
“Aiden, you must realize our intel is confidential. You’re not a Guardian. I can’t share top-secret information with you.”
“There’s absolutely nothing you can tell me?” My voice gets louder with each word. “Really? After everything I’ve gone through? After everything that happened the other night?”
“One of the reasons I am here is to find out what exactly happened when the villains appeared. Disguiser, Twisted Bill, Johnny… they’re not talking, and some of the Guardians are concerned about the behavior you displayed. Without the full context of what led up to it, I’ve been unable to provide them with answers.” Her face grows firm, but worry resides in her gaze. “We wanted to intervene as soon as you moved to attack Johnny, but we couldn’t get past your forcefield.”
Shock reverberates across my face. “What? There wasn’t a forcefield.”
“I was wondering if you were aware of the barrier.” She frowns in a way that makes her seem concerned for my sanity. “We moved to stop you, but Billy warned us. He was the first one to notice it. This forcefield was unlike the others. It was all but invisible besides a few bits of electricity fluttering in the air.”
“I-I didn’t know,” I say, remembering when I first attacked Johnny, I expelled a blast of energy, but no visible energy connected me to the barrier. Does that mean I was somehow manipulating the energy in the air without channeling it first? “I really didn’t know.”
“I believe you.” Valentino’s shoulders relax. “Sometimes our emotions are the most powerful thing in us, and they can unlock fierce abilities.”
“Help me,” I say with determination. “Help me manage all of this. Recommend me the best therapist and trainer you can. I know I’ve pushed the boundaries many times, but we both know the Guardians failed to provide me with the assistance they should have years ago.” I take a long, shaky breath. “Give me that help now.”
“I want to help you, but I need you to tell me exactly what happened that led up to Ember getting taken.”
The story sits in me like a cancerous tumor, threatening to kill me if I retell it, but I know I have to. I start at the beginning. I tell Valentino how Ember and I left the ball to get some air. About the arrival of Scott, who turned out to be Disguiser. How Johnny froze me in time and took Ember. What happened after I went into the woods, catching up with Ember and the villains. How Susan showed up with Twisted Bill. I even tell her about the serum and Johnny’s claim that they never used it on me. About the way Ember and I have some kind of strange connection with our abilities, but I was too weak to handle the immense power. How I was sure I was going to die after Twisted Bill destroyed my arm, but Ember saved me, and in return sacrificed herself.
Valentino stays quiet, listening intently.
My face is drowning in my grief and failure. “And… you know the rest.” I refuse to relive the moment when Ember’s warmth disappeared from my life, but I remember a thought I had when Valentino came on the scene. “Have you questioned the dean? There’s no way he didn’t have a hand in all of this.”
“He’s gone.” Valentino stares out the window at the overcast sky. “Seems he got wind of what was going down in the woods after I left with the other Guardians, and he took off.”
“No one stopped him?” I shout with outrage. “How could they have let him escape?”
“Other than me and Shapeshifter, no one else was aware of our investigation.” Her disappointment with herself is apparent in the way her red eyes droop. “They didn’t know he should’ve been stopped, but we’ve issued an arrest warrant.”
I can’t bring myself to say anything, knowing it’ll just fuel my temper, but this warrant is too late. Warwick could be anywhere by now, but unfortunately, it seems they only take meaningful action after something horrible happens.
“There’s a lot for me to look into with the information you told me.” Valentino exhales loudly and rubs her eyes. “If Scott has been Disguiser this entire semester, it opens up a lot of other questions. We don’t know who else could be compromised.”
It’s sickening to think the villains had infiltrated the university for so long. “Do you think he was?”
Valentino shakes her head. “No, but I need to investigate more before I say anything further.” Her face grows determined. “I’ll also talk to the lab about expediting the testing so we can find out for ourselves if what was said about the serum is true or not.”
“What if it’s not in me?” The brittle strings keeping me together fray apart. “What does that say about me?”
“I think that says you need the best tools we can give to help you. Serum or not.” Valentino stands, and the room seems to grow a tad brighter. “I’ll talk to your parents about a therapist I think would be best suited for you. As for a trainer… as much as I hate to say it, Striker is the one you’d want.”
Deep down, I think I knew this. I don’t like it, but none of his comments before matter. All that matters now is getting stronger. Saving Ember. “Do you think he’d reconsider the internship?”
“I can try to pull some strings. But he won’t easily forgive you for telling him no twice.”
“Perfect.” A new sense of self rises in me. One that’s more determined than ever to become the best Guardian this city has ever seen. One who will do anything to find Ember. “He won’t go easy on me, then.”