Zeke dropped to his knees, alone in the gray monotone diffusion of rain. His expression went blank—emptied out, evacuated of every readable thing. Tears ran down his face and vanished into the downpour, no longer his, just more water in the weather.

He looked to his right. Two men lay on the ground beside him, completely motionless—drained of color, pale and white as if life had already been rinsed away. The street made mirrors of their cheeks; the storm tried to close their eyes and couldn't.

"I did it again," Zeke whispered. "Ulmak," he paused. "Elaine," his hands started shaking as he held them out in front of his face. "I did…" he took a deep breath before continued. "It again…"

"Zeke," Fredric called out, dropping down from the building up above. "We need to go," he said, picking up pieces of Zeke's mask.

Zeke didn't move. He stared past the bodies into a gray that had no edge. Rain poured down his face, into his eyes, over his lips, but the discomfort didn't register; he was a silhouette that had forgotten the man it belonged to.

"Zeke! We need to go," Fredric grabbed Zeke by the shoulder.

Immediately, Zeke's body erupted into blue flames as his hair flickered white.

"Don't touch me!" he screamed out, his voice cracking under tension.

"Fine," Fredric leaped back with a frightened expression.

"I killed them," he whispered.

Fredric stepped to the fallen men. He pressed fingers to Viktor's neck, searching for a pulse, then looked back—Zeke still a statue in the rain. He moved to Dalas, and with a swift, clinical focus, channeled his magic, knitting the torn flesh at the knight's throat until the bleeding sealed and breath found its path again.

"This one's still alive," Fredric remarked.

A flicker returned to Zeke's eyes—first shock, then something softer that broke him open. Tears surged, indistinguishable from rain but heavier in the way they fell.

"Thank god," he gasped.

Fredric approached and leaned close, voice low enough to hide under the storm.

"Zeke, we need to get out of here. I jammed the knights' communications but by now they've surely figured out something's wrong," he said, handing Zeke a ripped rag.

Zeke took the rag and tied it across his mouth to conceal what was left of his face. He stood, unsteady but moving, and looked one last time toward the two knights.

"I'm sorry," he whispered.

In a flash, Zeke and Fredric scaled the walls, leaping back to the rooftops. They ran in the rain without saying a word—two shadows strung between lightning and guilt, vanishing into the city's wet, electric hush.

Rain stitched at the windows like gray thread, hemming the dark. By the time they reached Zeke's apartment, the room was swallowed by shadow, completely devoid of light; the weather pressed its weight against the glass and let a lonely, oppressive atmosphere seep in with the draft.

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"Go take a shower," Fredric remarked, heading toward the kitchen.

"What about you?" Zeke asked.

"I'll clean myself with magic," Fredric remarked.

Zeke slipped into the bathroom. Steam fogged the mirror; the tile was cold beneath his feet. He stepped under the spray—the first touch warm, insistent—and instinctively clamped a hand to his shoulder, nails digging deep. Blood ribboned out, spiraling through the water, then vanishing down the drain like a secret. He pulled his fingers free; the flesh knit shut in seconds, a neat, ruthless miracle. Impulsively he cranked the valve to cold, chasing discomfort—pain, sting, anything. The shock should have rattled his bones; months ago it would have made him shiver. Now it was only temperature moving from one number to another. No tremor. No complaint. Nothing.

He leaned his temple to the wet wall beside the showerhead. Memory sluiced in: a cheerful kid, two loving parents, days that were only sunshine and errands and the uncomplicated gravity of being held. The warmth of it lasted a heartbeat—and then his mother arrived, sickly and insistent, her emaciated frame ghost-pale, her eyes dulled to the color of weathered glass. He remembered not being able to meet that gaze; remembered the sorrow that bloomed there whenever she spoke of his father. And then the image he could not escape: his hands at her throat in the theater of rage, a defenseless woman and a son who had no place to put his anger, the animal heat of it flaring even now despite his iron will.

Blue fire gathered around him in answer—soft at first, then eager—coating his skin like the hands of a lover. A sickly love, a twisted tenderness grafted from his own need.

"What have I become," Zeke whispered.

He stepped out. In the mirror an unfamiliar stranger stared back: deep, tired furrows carved down the cheeks; eyes dull with exhaustion, the life behind them dimmed to coals. His hair and brows had turned winter-white, his skin gone pallid, almost ill. The irises burned an inhuman blue. Not his. His were gray—once bright with compassion, stubbornly human, not this vivid shade of catastrophe.

"Who am I?" Zeke questioned.

He dressed in his home clothes and moved to the dining table, sitting with the slow care of someone learning their weight again.

"Feeling better?" Fredric asked, bringing Zeke a bowl full of fragrance.

"What is this?" Zeke wondered.

"Mushroom ragu," Fredric replied, handing Zeke a spoon.

Zeke tasted it—one cautious spoonful—and then the bowl was empty, his hands slack over the rim as if the food had slipped through time rather than throat.

"I take it you liked that?" Fredric smiled.

"Yeah," Zeke replied with a sorrow expression.

"Zeke, you need to get over it," Fredric remarked.

"Get over what?" Zeke asked.

"Killing," Fredric, stared deep into his eyes.

"I can't do that," Zeke murmured.

"You have to," Fredric remarked. "It is imperative that you do, of all people, you must get over it."

"What do you mean?" Zeke asked.

"I didn't tell you this but, when the contractor king gave you a contract it became evident you were already in possession of one," Fredric explained.

"Normally, it's impossible to have two contracts as two demonic souls cannot reside within a single body. The contractor king used a great amount of power to suppress your initial contract, making it possible for you to bear two." He paused. "Zeke, the power you used today, it's the power of your initial contract."

"Initial contract," Zeke murmured. "since when did I?" he thought.

"Most likely since the moment you were born into this world," Fredric sighed.

"This contract, it will make you capable of everything you ever wished for. But for that to happen, you need to accept the consequences." Fredric said.

"I killed people!" Zeke shouted. "Do you want me to kill again?" he asked.

"You must choose," Fredric paused. "You will either become a hero, climbing the corpses of his enemies to build a world he always dreamed of. Or you will become a coward unable to do anything. Whichever option you choose, I'll support you," Fredric remarked.

"Hero this, hero that!" Zeke shouted. "Who have I ever saved?" Zeke asked.

"Hundreds," Fredric replied. "Both down in the undercity and here."

Zeke's eyes widened. The names arrived unbidden, assembling like lights switching on across a city map: Violet, Ian, Hanna, Haze, Ulmak, Elaine, Keith, Amanda—faces warm with relief, stubborn with gratitude, faces he'd moved out of the way of harm. The recollection steadied him, drew tight the scattered threads, brought a hard, quiet focus back into the room.

"Your choice?" Fredric asked, placing his fingertips in front of his face.

"I will do what needs to be done," Zeke growled with a crazed obsession.

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