I'd been to the Governing Council's headquarters before.

That time, I'd been dragged up to Councilwoman Myers's private office and into a meeting with both her and Angelo Lawrence. It had been…tense. I'd thought I was in serious trouble, and that they'd fire Jessie and exile me from the city for hunting Paragons.

This was different. I wasn't in an office; I was in a conference room. A half-dozen councilmembers—including Myers—sat in comfortable-looking black chairs on either side, along with three guild leaders, Deborah Callahan, and an A-Ranker whose name I didn't know. He wore a patch with a simple, unadorned shield and a 'G' superimposed over it. A Guardian.

There was no chair for me. I stood at the far end of the portal metal table in a pair of slacks and a white dress shirt, even though several chairs were empty. And at the far end sat a hulking mass of a man.

Councilman Nathan Anders. S-Rank. The Phoenix Reborn. Until he retired, the gray-haired, steel-eyed man whose eyes had been locked on mine since I walked in had been the strongest delver west of the Mississippi River, and one of the top two or three on the continent. Even now, he was a rival to most of the S-Rankers in the city.

I couldn't look away. It wasn't his aura. It was more subtle than that—his presence. It was all focused on me. Not enough to flatten me. Not weaponized. Just the most intense person I'd ever met. Even more intense than the God of Thunder when he'd sparred with me.

"Delver Noelstra, we are here to understand the events that occurred within the Hurricane Break," he said. "We have already determined most of what happened from interviews with the rest of the convoy delvers, Delver Carrol, and your team, assisted by written testimonials from the Light of Dawn, the Portal Tyrant, and the Spark of Life. The timeline of events, including the unique set of circumstances that allowed you to defeat the Paragon boss within, is already documented.

"As such, your personal experiences will be used to fill in a few holes in our understanding, not to paint the entire picture. You may decline to answer questions. Do you understand?"

I nodded.

Councilman Anders nodded once. "Excellent. Let's get started. The Governing Council is mostly interested in what happened from the point where the A-Rank monster Tathrix died onward. Delver Traynor has told us that the two of you attempted a push to B-Rank for her, using your Mana and her leveled skills. She's filled us in on the details from her perspective. From your perspective, what happened, and was it the correct set of moves for you to win?"

"It was," I said. Then I told them everything—or as close to everything as I could. The struggle to get Ellen enough Mana to push to B-Rank. My core fraying at the seams even as we pushed. The Dual Skill Advancement we'd undergone, and the skill we'd created. I kept out Eugene, Pepperoni, and Cheddar; those holes in the story had to remain holes in the story.

"How did you fuel Delver Traynor's attempt at a B-Rank consolidation? As a striker, you shouldn't have had—"

I interrupted the councilman—I had no idea who he was—before he could finish his sentence. "Enough Mana to make it happen? I agree. A striker couldn't handle it. But I'm not a striker. I'm a spellblade, or a magical duelist. A hybrid. And both Ellen's build and mine were built with a lot of Mana regeneration. It was enough—but it did cost me."

Then I got to the part where my core disintegrated. The council members leaned forward. It was almost imperceptible, but it happened; the interest in the room doubled from everyone except for Deborah. She alone stayed leaning back in her chair, a smug look on her face.

"I cut Ellen loose. She was in the phase where an empty core helped with Consolidation, and I didn't want to hit her with backlash from my own core. I had a choice to make between letting my core collapse and trying to apply the Laws I'd learned to what was left of it. I didn't see a way forward for Ellen—not with Mana Burn and without my core providing her with Mana. So, I decided to fight the collapse. It worked. Sort of."

"Sort of?" Councilwoman Myers asked.

"Yeah. I mean, my core is still broken. It's not going to fix itself, right?" I laughed awkwardly. "But it gave me just enough time with my skills to take the fight to Queen Mother Yalerox."

"Who was the Paragon and portal boss, correct?" Councilman Anders asked.

"Correct."

"How did you kill her?"

I looked at the councilwoman who'd asked. Then I shrugged. "I've spent a lot of time thinking about that. Two answers. First, I got extremely lucky. I had an open skill slot thanks to the Dual Skill Progression merge Ellen and I did. That filled with the exact perfect weapon to kill Yalerox. Then, she was so busy charging her Eye of the Storm that she couldn't focus her energy on destroying me, which gave me a chance to survive until it was fully charged. And my core's energy stuck around for just long enough. A lot of things went right for me and wrong for the Queen Mother."

"That's one answer," Deborah said. She yawned from her seat; I almost expected her to put her boots on the table. "What's the other one?"

For a moment, playground fury filled me. She was gloating. Not in her words, but in the way she'd asked the question. I took a breath, closed my eyes, and counted down. Then I opened them and looked right at her. "I wanted it more than she did. I was willing to completely destroy myself to beat her. She wasn't. My head was only in that fight. Hers was focused on the one she thought she was about to have, against the Light of Dawn. When you're giving it your all and your opponent isn't, anything can happen."

I was talking too much. I knew it. So, instead of saying more, I stared Deborah Callahan down until she looked away.

Councilwoman Myers cleared her throat. "That is an incredibly unlikely victory, especially for a C-Ranker. Do you believe you could replicate it?"

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"With my core in the shape it's in? Absolutely not. I'm a glorified unawakened human right now—not much stronger than you, and that strength is all because I've been pushing my body to its limit even as my team's healer helps me recover." I paused. "As it stands, I'm in no shape for delving E-Rank portals."

I bit off the end of the sentence, which was 'right now.'

They didn't need to know my future plans. They didn't need to know about Eugene. So, as the questions poured in, I answered them as best I could—but without revealing anything I didn't think Ellen and Jeff would have told the council. The grilling lasted a long, long time, until eventually…

"Delver Noelstra, we have one last question," Councilwoman Myers said. "This one is of critical importance. What happened to the A-Rank Paragon's core?"

"What did you tell them?" Ellen asked as her car rocketed us across Phoenix and toward my apartment.

"I told them the truth," I said. I leaned back in the passenger seat as pulsing, annoying drum and bass music filled the cab. It was a security measure; according to Ellen, her dad couldn't spy on her effectively while it was running. But it wasn't perfect, and we both knew it, so I was keeping it vague. And she knew that, too. "I told them that it got lost in the chaos as the Eye of the Storm collapsed."

"And they bought that?"

"They had to. It was the truth."

Ellen snorted. "You and I both know that wasn't the whole truth."

"I never so much as saw the core," I said. "It disappeared before I could get my hands on it. Otherwise, it'd be in the GC vault right now, and chances are that one of the S-Rankers would be here trying to use it. Hopefully, it'd be the Light of Dawn. He'd be the most likely to stop Deborah from whatever she's planning."

"You really think she's planning something?"

I shrugged. "Probably."

But then I thought about it for a minute. She'd had every opportunity to make a move and kill me on the four-day drive home, and she hadn't. She didn't want to anymore. It wasn't that she didn't care. It was that, from everything she knew to be true, she'd won.

So I shrugged a second time. "Actually, yes. She's definitely planning something, but it has nothing to do with me, and that means it's not my problem. I need to focus on what is my problem, which is my broken core. But right now, I want to focus on getting home, and on Jessie—and on you."

"Me?" Ellen asked.

"Yeah, you. This is the first time we've been alone since…Roswell?"

Ellen stared at me as Deimos swerved around a truck. Then she nodded. "Yeah, since Roswell. Wow, it's been a while."

"If you don't count trying to push you to B-Rank, it's been over a week." I took a deep breath. "How are you feeling?"

"You mean my core?"

"Yeah. Your core. You. Just, like, in general."

Silence. Then a big sigh. "My core's…not happy. I'm…okay, listen, we made a choice in there, and it had some consequences. While we were pushing me to B-Rank, I knew this was a risk, but…I'm stuck. Shadowstorm Battery can't grow without you. It's stuck at E-Rank, and that means I'm stuck at a max of A-Rank. Maybe even high B. I'll have to dig into that. So, from a delving standpoint, I'm frustrated—and a lot of that frustration is your fault."

I opened my mouth, but Ellen's hand went up. "I know it's not your fault, really. You made a decision to cut me off mid-consolidation. I made the decision to keep going. And we both made the decision to try Dual Skill Advancement. I just…"

"I'm working on it."

"I know, Kade. And I wouldn't change anything you did. You've been thinking about it a lot, right? Well, so have I. I don't…I don't think we could have won any other way. And it's not fair to blame you—you've got it worse than I do. But…I've been catching up on what Bob's been up to ever since we got back into Phoenix's comms bubble. I'll tell you later. It's not good, though."

"The team he's been trying to assemble and level?"

"Yeah. The team." Ellen's hand snaked across the center console and found mine. She threaded her fingers between mine and squeezed gently. Her voice dropped until it was so soft I could hardly hear it over the music. "Kade, I need you back."

Then, before I could respond, she continued. "I'm not ready to give up on us just because of this one setback. There's a solution. And if there's not, you can put your energy into running our guild once it gets off the ground, and I'll take over the team. If I'm stuck at A-Rank because of this, that won't be too much higher than Jeff. We can probably still clear stuff together."

It hurt. The whole idea that the team was making plans as if I wouldn't get back into the game. That Ellen was making those plans. We were supposed to be in it for the long haul. But she wasn't abandoning me. Her hand was still in mine. And I was making those plans, too. Plans for what to do to keep my promises to Dad and Jessie if the God of Thunder was wrong, and if I couldn't recover.

So, instead of letting myself get frustrated, I changed the subject. "What are you doing tomorrow night? I know someone who's about to have a lot of money, and he's looking to take you out for dinner and a movie."

"That's cute, Kade. I'm not up to anything, but I need to check in with Bob. He's probably got all sorts of events planned for me to show up at…" Ellen trailed off, looking annoyed.

I grinned. "How about I show up at one with you? That could be fun."

Ellen raised an eyebrow. Her eyes panned across me.

"What?"

"Nothing," Ellen said. She looked away.

"That doesn't sound like nothing."

"Okay, listen, Kade." Ellen reached over with her other hand. It rested on top of mine, and she patted it. "I like you. A lot. But I'm pretty sure you don't own a suit, and Bob's events aren't the kind of place where you can show up looking like…that. Your sister's infinitely more equipped to make an appearance, because we've at least gone shopping."

I sighed. Then a mischievous grin crossed my face. "Okay, so, tomorrow, we're going suit-shopping?"

Ellen rolled her eyes.

I kept staring, my grin plastered on. And eventually, she nodded. "Fine. But tonight, you need to focus on Jessie."

Then Deimos rolled to a stop, and Ellen reached across the console for a quick hug and a peck on my cheek.

I stepped out of the car, face a little red, and Deimos pulled away. And that left me with nothing between Jessie and me except for a handful of walls and two doors—one to the building, and one to our apartment.

Jeff Carlton had won.

Mostly.

Lamar was still on his list. And Nevaeh was dead. But he'd had a lot of time to think on the way home. The team's desert patrols hadn't turned up much of anything, and the few C-Rank monsters they had found had died to Ellen's ridiculous B-Rank spells. So Jeff had mostly been escorting her around and watching her delete monsters.

It had given him a lot of time to think, and one thing he'd realized was that, even though he'd won, he'd never put any thought into what he'd do after he reunited with his friends.

He'd just kind of assumed that everything would fall into place after. That he'd be staying in Carlsbad. But that wasn't really an option. Not when those same friends had all been evacuated.

They—Kent, Amanda, and Turner—were in temporary housing, along with most of the others. Angelina and Nicholas were in the hospital for a couple of nights until they got checked over. Neither of those were options for Jeff—and he'd sold his truck, canceled his apartment lease, and everything. A hotel might work, but it was getting late already, and Jeff didn't want to deal with that.

If he'd been any kind of smart, Jeff would have kept his apartment—or his truck. But he hadn't been. He'd been so convinced that his place was at Carlsbad Fortress that he hadn't considered any other possibilities.

So, without many options, Jeff sat—in full delving armor—at a bus stop, waiting for the next ride to Peoria. Kade's apartment was there, and if Jeff had to crash on the couch for a couple of nights while he got his shit together, then, hey—he knew Kade would let him.

Plus, it'd be calmer than any of the motels he could find this late, and Jeff was so tired.

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