Chapter 11

The Road Runner sat idling in the shadows across from the main checkpoint of Starlight Studios. Outside the reinforced glass, two and a half square kilometers of prime surface land stretched out, dominated by seven massive warehouses that looked like sleeping giants under the artificial lights. Jake leaned against the steering wheel, squinting through the windshield. The studio's perimeter was surprisingly thin on security. A lone gate, a few swiveling cameras, and a handful of guards who looked more interested in their coffee than a potential breach. "They aren't even trying," Jake muttered. "It’s like they don't expect anyone to actually have the balls to hit them." In the back seat, Raven Sinclair shifted, her boots scuffing against the floorboards. She stared at the back of Jake’s head with a look that could peel paint. "Remind me again why we’re doing this? We’re risking our necks to poke Seraphina Stone in the eye for a personal favor? This is a suicide run for a guy who doesn't even pay us." Julian Blade didn't look up from his lap, where he was checking the seals on his armored gauntlets. "Urban Outlaw wants the pressure on Grants. Besides, there’s a good chance we won't even see Seraphina. She’s got a city to run." "And if you’re wrong?" Raven snapped. "If she decides to fly in and melt us into the pavement because we stepped on her lawn?" Jake ignored the bickering, but a cold prickle started at the base of his spine. It wasn't the usual pre-mission jitters. It was the heavy, suffocating sensation of being watched. He checked the side mirrors—nothing but empty road and the flickering neon of distant Olympus City. He checked the blind spots. Empty. Yet the feeling persisted, a greasy weight in the air that suggested they weren't nearly as alone as they seemed. To kill the silence, Jake reached out and clicked on the Epoch Radio. The dial glowed a soft, anachronistic amber, and the speakers crackled before settling into a broadcast from The Republic. A deep, oratorical voice began discussing grain subsidies and senate debates from a timeline that had been dead for two millennia. "What news channel is that?" Julian asked, tilting his head toward the dashboard. "The accent is... strange." "It’s my Epoch Radio," Jake said, tapping the glass casing. "Listens to channels across space and time. Mostly time." Raven let out a harsh, mocking laugh. "Work on your stories, Jake. Radios didn't exist two thousand years ago. You’re listening to a podcast or a LARP broadcast." "In one version of the past, they did," Jake replied, his voice deadpan. "You can't have multiple versions of the past. That’s not how history works," she dismissed him with a wave of her hand. Jake adjusted his top hat, catching her eye in the rearview mirror. "That’s exactly how time works. You’re just living in a very narrow slice of it." "You’re a delusional prick," Raven spat. "Maybe, but I'm a prick with a great coat. Want to see what’s under it?" Jake winked. Raven’s face twisted. "I’d rather eat the car." The tension broke when Jae-eun Kim’s eyes fluttered open. She had been slumped against the window, her mind out in the vents and crawlspaces of the studio complex. She sat up straight, rubbing her temples as she disconnected from the swarm of rats she’d been piloting through the warehouses. "What did you find?" Julian asked, his voice instantly sharpening into professional focus. "Seraphina Stone isn't there," Jae-eun reported. "They’ve got someone filling in for her on the set." Julian leaned back, a small, triumphant smirk tugging at his lips. "I knew it. She doesn't do her own stunts. She’s too busy playing queen." "Don't get too comfortable," Raven warned. "An alarm goes off, and she can fly from the city center to here in under three minutes. We’re still on a timer." Jae-eun shook her head, her expression grim. "It’s worse than that. Olivia Hayes is the one filling in for the stunts. And Rocket Kelly is there with her." Jake whistled. "Olivia Hayes? The Golden Blueprint? The one who gets powers based on what she’s wearing?" "A weak version of the real thing," Jae-eun clarified. "As long as her costume stays intact, she’s a threat, but she’s manageable. It’s Kelly I’m worried about." Raven groaned, hitting the back of the passenger seat. "Golden Blueprints are absolute bullshit. Why does the universe reward people for playing dress-up?" Julian ignored her, his brow furrowed. "Why is Rocket Kelly there? He’s usually with the Circus." "Guest appearance," Jae-eun said. "He’s in the movie." Julian looked at the studio gate, his resolve visibly wavering. "Maybe we should abort. This just got complicated." "Abort?" Jake turned around in his seat, incredulous. "Is Rocket Kelly really that big of a deal? He’s a kid." Julian hesitated, his voice dropping an octave. "He was one of us, Jake. Before he went over to the Circus." "So he’s a spy?" "No. He’s having a teenage rebellion phase," Julian said, looking pained. "And we are strictly forbidden from endangering him. If we hurt him, the fallout with the Circus—and within our own ranks—would be catastrophic." "Don't let him touch you," Raven added, her voice uncharacteristically serious. "If he gets skin contact, he’ll turn you into a human pipe bomb. You won't even have time to scream before you’re painted on the walls." Jae-eun nodded. "He can transform anything into an explosive with a touch. He’s a walking demolition crew." "Is the movie using CGI, special effects, or stop motion?" Jake asked, genuine curiosity cutting through the tactical discussion. "They use CGI," Jae-eun answered, looking confused by the pivot. Julian tapped his fingers against his knee, making a quick decision. "New plan. Jae-eun, I want you to flood the studios. Release everything. Every rat in the district. Create a ruckus, make them think there’s an infestation or a sabotage attempt, and then we leave. Immediately." Jake stared at him. "Wait. We don't fight anyone? I put on the mask for a pest control mission?" "No," Julian said firmly. "We don't fight. Not with Kelly on site." "You can't do this to me, Julian," Jake said, his voice rising in dramatic mock-betrayal. "I have a reputation to maintain. I’m a man of action, not a spectator to a rodent parade." "I'm not letting you get into a firefight with a kid who can blow up your molecules," Julian replied, sounding almost apologetic. Jake slumped back into the driver’s seat, staring miserably at his gloved hands. "You’re killing me. Literally. This boredom is a slow-acting poison." "You'll live through it," Julian dismissed him, then looked at Jae-eun. "Are you ready?" She gave him a small, determined smile. "I'm your girl." Jae-eun closed her eyes again, and the air in the car seemed to hum with a low-frequency psychic pulse. Outside, the shadows near the studio fences began to move. At first, it looked like a shifting carpet of darkness, but then the sound reached the car—a frantic, high-pitched scratching of thousands of tiny claws on pavement. Thousands of rats poured from the sewers, the gutters, and the nearby fields. They surged toward the Starlight Studios checkpoint like a gray tide. Within seconds, the guards were screaming, dancing on top of their desks as the swarm engulfed the gatehouse and flowed over the fences toward the warehouses. Alarms began to blare—high, rhythmic shrieks that cut through the night. Jake watched the chaos through the windshield, a slow, impressed grin spreading across his face. "My, my. This city really does have a rat problem. Someone should call the health inspector." "That should satisfy Urban Outlaw," Julian said, watching the first warehouse door burst open as panicked staff fled the rodent invasion. "We made a statement. Now, let’s go home." Jake sighed, shifting the Road Runner into gear. "Home. Great. Maybe I can find a wall to watch dry. It’ll be more thrilling than this." As they pulled away, weaving through the outskirts of the studio grounds, Jake couldn't shake the feeling of anticlimax. He’d been geared up for a clash with Grants’ champions—Seraphina Stone or even the costumed Olivia Hayes. Instead, he’d watched a bunch of animals do the work. Compared to the sheer, brutal competence of Maxwell’s Circus, Grants felt like a soft target. A bunch of actors playing at war. "Is he sulking?" Raven asked from the back, her voice playful for the first time all night. "I think he’s sulking." "I expected a road bump," Jake grumbled, steering the car onto the main road leading back to their safe house. "A little resistance. Instead, I got a National Geographic special." Julian leaned forward, patting Jake on the shoulder. "Cheer up. You’ll finally see your girlfriend again soon. That’s what this was all for, wasn't it? Clearing the board so you can get to Chloe?" Jae-eun looked over, her curiosity piqued. "What is she like, Jake? Your girlfriend?" Jake’s expression softened, the sarcasm receding for a fleeting moment. "She’s the reason I'm doing all this. I’ll present her to you guys when the time is right. Just... try not to be too much of yourselves when you meet her." They pulled up to the shared house a short while later. It was a nondescript building, tucked away in a quiet neighborhood where the streetlights flickered with a tired rhythm. Jake killed the engine and leaned back. "I’m going to stay here for a bit, listen to the radio," Jake said. "Julian, call Urban Outlaw. Tell him the rats have moved in." Julian opened the door, stepping out into the cool night air. "Will do. You coming in for movie night later? We’ve got some old Republic-era dramas Raven found." Jake waved a hand dismissively. "Maybe. I need to decompress from all the ‘action’ first." Jae-eun stepped out after Julian, but as her feet hit the pavement, she froze. She tilted her head, her nostrils flaring slightly. Her eyes darted toward the darkened windows of the house. "What's up?" Jake asked, noticing her sudden rigidity. "The rats," Jae-eun whispered, her voice trembling. "I left dozens of them here to watch the place. I can't sense them. They’re gone." Julian frowned, looking at the silent house. "Did they scamper off? Maybe the connection broke?" "No," Jae-eun said, her voice turning firm and fearful. "I explicitly told them to stay and watch. They don't just leave. Something happened to them." Raven didn't wait for the debate to finish. She drew her sidearm in one fluid motion, her face hardening into a mask of professional aggression. She marched up the front steps, her eyes scanning the shadows. "I'll check it out. Stay back." She reached out, her fingers brushing against the cold metal of the door handle. The world turned white. A massive, concussive blast erupted from the center of the house, a roar of fire and pressure that tore the front of the building into splinters. The shockwave hit the Road Runner like a physical fist. The car’s reinforced windows, built to withstand small arms fire, shattered inward in a spray of crystalline glass. The alarm began to wail, a lonely, pathetic sound against the backdrop of the inferno. Raven Sinclair didn't even have time to scream. She was at the epicenter, her body caught in the blooming heat and shredded by the very door she’d tried to open. Jae-eun, standing only a few feet behind her, was swept up in the same wall of flame. "No!" Jake roared. He lunged for the door, but his world was already slowing down. The *Time Stop* triggered instinctively, the golden hue washing over the scene. But it was too late. In the frozen world, he saw them. Raven and Jae-eun weren't people anymore; they were silhouettes of ash and fire, their forms already beginning to disintegrate in the heat of the blast. Beside him, Julian Blade was slumped against the side of the car. His high-tech armor, designed to protect him from almost anything, was sparking violently. The blast had caused a massive electromagnetic surge, short-circuiting his internal systems. Julian’s body jerked in the frozen time, blue arcs of electricity dancing across his skin. He was being electrocuted by his own gear. Jake stepped out of the car as the time stop bled away. The heat hit him like a furnace. He stood on the cracked pavement, staring at the charred remains of his friends. The silence that followed the explosion was worse than the noise. Julian collapsed to his knees, his armor smoking, his face pale and contorted with agony. He looked at the spot where Jae-eun had been standing, then up at Jake, his eyes wide and wet. "We have to... the hospital," Julian gasped, his voice a broken wreck. "Jake... help them..." Jake stood there, his navy blue trench coat fluttering in the hot wind. He looked at the piles of ash and the burning wreckage of the house. "It’s useless, Julian. They’re dead. There isn't enough of them left to bury, let alone save." Julian stared at him, a look of pure, venomous fury crossing his face despite the pain. "How can you... how can you be so cold? They were your friends! Jae-eun... Raven..." "I'm not being cold," Jake said, his voice flat. "I'm being observant." He felt a pang of genuine sadness looking at Julian’s distress, but it was overshadowed by the analytical part of his brain. This wasn't a random hit. This was a trap. A meticulously planned execution. "I'll bring them back, Julian," Jake promised softly. "I'll bring them all back." Before Julian could respond, a shimmering whistle sliced through the air. Jake’s head snapped to the side. Black shards, thin and sharp as razors, were flying toward him from the shadows across the street. At the same moment, Julian let out a strangled cry as his armor surged again, a fresh wave of electricity frying his nervous system. The killer was still here. Jake focused. Glass. The shards were glass. And Julian’s armor wasn't just short-circuiting; it was being manipulated. Someone was frying the tech from a distance. A silica kinetic? Someone who could control glass and silicon? Or maybe they were using some kind of mirror suit for invisibility—an optical illusion created by manipulating the light hitting the glass. *Time Stop.* The world froze. Jake stepped to the left, the black glass knives hovering in mid-air exactly where his chest had been a millisecond ago. He scanned the street, looking for the ripple in the air, the tells of an invisible attacker. He saw nothing. No footprints in the dust, no heat shimmer. He let the time flow. The knives whistled past him, shattering against the Road Runner. Jake reached for his gun, but he never felt his hand touch the grip. A sudden, sharp pressure exploded at the base of his neck. His vision tilted, the world spinning in a dizzying circle. He saw the ground rushing up to meet him, and for a brief, confused moment, he saw his own headless body standing by the car, blood geysering from the stump of his neck. Nearby, a fresh swarm of glass shards descended on Julian Blade, shredding his already broken form into a crimson mist. Darkness took him. Jake gasped, his lungs burning as he slammed back into reality. He was behind the wheel of the Road Runner. The engine was idling, the soft amber glow of the Epoch Radio illuminating the dashboard. The voice from The Republic was still droning on about grain subsidies. He snarled out loud, his hands gripping the steering wheel so hard the leather groaned. "Twice," he hissed. "Twice he had me." He was back at the beginning of the loop. They were still parked outside Starlight Studios. In the back seat, Raven and Julian were still bickering. Jae-eun was still asleep. He didn't move. He didn't speak. He just sat there, the phantom sensation of the glass blade severing his spine still echoing in his nerves. Someone was hunting him. Not just a common thug or a Syndicate junkie. Someone who knew how to wait, how to trap, and how to kill an immortal. A silica kinetic. Someone from Grants? Or a lone vigilante who had decided Jake Miller was a stain that needed to be scrubbed? He remembered the harbor—the invisible figure that had plucked the Grants employees out of the line of fire. It had to be the same person. He looked at the dashboard, then back at his friends. He couldn't go back to the house. He couldn't let the loop play out again. If he stayed on this path, he’d just keep dying, and worse, they would keep dying. The main quest—finding Chloe, his "Flawless Victory"—had to wait. He couldn't have his happy ending if a ghost was cutting his head off every time he turned his back. "Jake?" Julian asked, noticing his silence. "You okay? You look like you just saw your own ghost." Jake didn't answer. He shifted the car into gear, but he didn't head toward the studio gate. He began to turn the car around, his mind racing. He needed an edge. He needed to find out who this killer was before they found him again. And if the killer was working for Grants, there was only one way to get close enough to find out. Seraphina Stone had offered him a spot in the Grant League. It was a play for control, a way to keep him on a leash. But a leash worked both ways. "Change of plans," Jake said, his voice cold and focused. "What? We haven't even started the mission," Raven complained. "I'm taking Seraphina up on her offer," Jake said, flooring the accelerator. "We’re going to see the Queen." ════════════════════════════════════════