From Moving Crates to Killing Gods-Chapter 24: Secrets

Petra laid her hands on the joint where Silas’s wooden frame met the torn, sun bleached fabric, and I watched as something miraculous happened. The materials didn’t just touch, they melded, becoming a single unified piece as if they’d been born that way. Her fingertips traced the borders with deliberate precision, leaving behind a bond stronger than any adhesive I’d seen in the warehouses.

"How does it feel?" Petra asked, stepping back to survey her work. She stood waiting, the unspoken weight of it hanging in the air. If he said it was good, they might fly. If he said it was weak, they would fall.

Silas ran his palm over the seam, pressing hard with his fingers. The joint held without so much as a creak. "Perfect." he said, his usually reserved expression breaking into something like wonder. "It’s not just sticking, it’s fused."

I pulled out my yo-yo, letting it dance at the end of its string while I watched the transformation continue. One by one, the skeletal frames became actual flying machines. Petra moved methodically from glider to glider, her hands never still, her focus absolute.

"I thought my ability was useless." Petra confessed quietly as she worked on the glider Kira and I would share. "Make things stick together? What good is that when others can create fire or control the wind?"

"Out here, there’s no such thing as a useless ability." I replied, surprising myself with the sincerity in my voice. "Just abilities we haven’t figured out how to use yet."

Kira appeared at my side, her hair seemed darker because of the sweat and dust. "It’s strange, isn’t it?" she said, watching Petra work. "Back in Argent, they assigned us roles based on what they thought we could do. But out here... we get to decide what we’re good for."

The philosophical moment was shattered by Darien’s sharp command. "Gather up!" he called, gesturing us toward a clear space where he’d sketched a crude map in the dust. We gathered around him, fifteen survivors bound by desperation and the shared trauma of exile.

Finn knelt beside the map, his finger hovering over a distant point that I knew represented Argent. His face was tense with concentration.

"Tell them what you told me." Darien instructed.

Finn swallowed hard. "The distance to Argent is greater than I initially estimated," he began, his voice small but steady. "I can sense the silver clearly, but calculating the exact distance has been..." He paused, searching for words.

"Challenging?" Mira offered.

"Yes." Finn nodded gratefully. "Challenging. Based on the strength of the signal and what we’ve traversed so far, I believe we’re looking at a flight of approximately three miles."

A murmur passed through the group.

"Three miles doesn’t sound that far." Coco ventured hopefully.

Gale shook his head. "It might as well be thirty for what we’re attempting." he said, his usually cheerful demeanor subdued by the weight of responsibility. "I can only hold my breath for about ninety seconds at maximum exertion. That gives us bursts of tailwind, not continuous flight."

"What he’s saying." Darien translated bluntly, "is that we’ll barely make it to Argent’s outskirts, even with every advantage." He looked at each of us in turn, his gaze lingering a fraction longer on me. "There’s no room for error. No second chances."

"So we just need to reach the barrier?" Ember asked, her fingers absently playing with a small flame that danced across her knuckles before she extinguished it with a wince.

Something happened between Darien and Mira, a look so quick I almost missed it. A question in her eyes, a barely perceptible shake of his head in response.

"Once we land." Darien said firmly, "We run straight for the barrier, no stopping, no waiting. The moment your feet touch ground, sprint towards Argent like your life depends on it." He paused. "Because it does."

The conversation shifted to launch strategies and landing zones, but my attention was snagged on the exchange I’d witnessed. It wasn’t the first time I’d seen the Zeros share these cryptic glances, little moments of silent communication that excluded the rest of us. In the tunnels, on the shore of the black lake, at the edge of the Corruptor filled street, always when Argent was mentioned, always when specifics about our return were discussed.

A silent dialogue conducted over our heads, a conversation that excluded the rest of us entirely. They held a secret about the place we were all desperately trying to reach. The barrier wasn’t just a goal, it was a topic that triggered some private, urgent calculus between them. The question that chilled me wasn’t what they were thinking, but why they couldn’t say it.

What did they know about exile that we didn’t? And why keep it a secret?

I thought of the canteens, the second ones they carried, filled with black water from the lake, protection against Corruptors they hadn’t shared with the rest of us. I remembered Mira’s hesitation when we’d discovered the Ward in the Bloops sanctuary.

My fingers worked the yo-yo harder, up and down, the familiar rhythm calming the storm of suspicion brewing inside me. Switch was a power of exchange, of seeing connections, of understanding how things related to one another. And right now, every instinct I had was connecting these dots into a picture I didn’t like. 𝑓𝘳𝘦𝑒𝑤𝑒𝘣𝘯ℴ𝘷𝘦𝓁.𝑐𝑜𝑚

"They’re hiding something." I murmured to myself, too quiet for anyone to hear.

"Are you okay?" Kira asked, suddenly beside me again. Her perception had always been unnervingly accurate when I was concerned.

I forced my expression to neutral. "Just thinking about the landing." I said, not entirely a lie. "There’s a lot they’re not telling us."

She nodded, her eyes drifting toward where Darien stood issuing instructions to his team. "I’ve noticed. The question is why."

"I have a theory." I said, lowering my voice further. "What if the barrier doesn’t work the way they’ve told us? What if..." I paused, the full weight of my suspicion settling like lead in my stomach. "What if they don’t want all of us to make it back?"