Despite being emotionally eviscerated by a security guard, Ethan couldn’t help but smile as he saw the purple glow fading from his hands, his last jump propelling him high into the clear skies above Ascension. He had risked everything to gain powers, and now that he had them, he used them every chance he got, crisscrossing Ascension and the dense neighborhoods ringing the city at a breakneck pace that rivaled Alex’s flying speed, albeit with much less control.

Teleporting great distances, he had learned, was much like riding a rollercoaster, except one without any safety features or brakes, and no one to sue when things went horribly wrong.

When traveling across town or to the mountains like he was doing now, Ethan would start by aiming a portal up as far as he could see into the ordinary cloudless pale blue sky. Then, he’d open a portal in front of himself, connecting it to the one floating thousands of feet above him. He’d take a running start and launch himself through the portal in front of him, grinning wildly as the surety of the earth left his feet and and gravity immediately forced its will on him like a bird folding in its wings, diving through the air with nothing but his own ability to save him. Then, while falling, he had to aim another portal up, further away in the distance he was traveling, and another right underneath him, sending him screaming through the sky once more.

Recently, through agility training with Alex using aspen trees as makeshift slaloms, he had learned to open the portals more quickly than ever before, reducing the time he spent falling in between jumps. Now, he was better able to control his fall speed which not only allowed him to cover more distance laterally rather than vertically, but also gave him far more time to correct any sort of errors he might make before falling to his death.

It was an exhilarating, but also incredibly dangerous way to travel, one that would’ve been downright lethal to master had Alex not been around to catch him on the many occasions he had frozen after plummeting from great height and had been unable to open a new portal. Even under Alex’s watchful eye he had, in the early weeks of training, taken more than a few nasty falls. But, he had gotten back up every time, and now travel was largely second nature to him. Opening portals was becoming less of an involved process and more instinctual, trusting that he’d catch himself rather than worrying about how.

With barely a thought, Ethan opened one last portal and gently placed himself down on top of a green mesa overlooking a valley below.

It took two months until Apex had deemed the site safe, but the area surrounding the mine he and Rainey had collapsed was still cordoned off by yellow caution tape extending twenty feet out from the singged, scarred trees that ringed the blast radius from the Stillrock Mine explosion. Despite having a lot on his plate, Ethan returned here often, seemingly waiting for Rainey to pop back out and to tell him that she was kidding, that she wouldn’t harm Alex and the whole thing was just a bad dream. The thought of Rainey popping up in the city while Ethan was supposed to be on duty as a Protector was terrifying, fear acting as a steel band wrapping itself around his chest, uncomfortably tight around his ribs.

Ethan went to take a deep breath, but found himself suddenly struggling for air, gasping. Glancing down, he found he wasn’t just imagining it: there really was a pair of arms, cloaked in black long sleeves, wrapped around his chest, preventing him from expanding for anything other than short, wheezy breaths. Someone had snuck up on him without him hearing, and now he was already playing from behind.

Stupid, he thought, Alex is right, I need to pay more attention.

“Get off!” Ethan yelled. He tried to lean all his weight onto his toes and force him and his attacker to fall forward off the edge of the mesa, only to be held in place, anchored back as if the assailant was made of concrete. Whoever was behind him was powerful, strong enough not to budge as he futilely tried to fling himself forward, deadly silent despite his protests.

Grunting in exertion and quickly running out of air, Ethan thought of a new move: since he was being clutched, he pulled his feet up to his chest then used his free hands to open a portal underneath his feet.

“Gotcha,” he wheezed with a smile.

Now, when he threw himself downward, the shock of seeing the ground suddenly being replaced with sky allowed Ethan knock his attacker off balance and drag them with him a mile into the air, sending them tumbling through the clouds.

Ethan was briefly grateful for his jacket: it was freezing so high up, the water vapor of the clouds stung his eyes as they plummeted through them, leaving trails floating lazily behind the as they plummeted towards the mountains below. Of course, he may have created another issue if his attacker couldn’t fly, but he could worry about saving them after he saved himself, if he was feeling generous.

While their position shifted, Ethan’s predicament did not. He was now falling, but still couldn’t free his arms, and he knew he didn’t have much time before this idea turned out to be his last.

In fact, he had timed this exact situation before. Ethan always tried to pick a spot just above the clouds to teleport to when traveling long distances, which gave him slightly over eighteen seconds to formulate a plan to save themself. He wasted four of them struggling against the superior strength of his attacker, and he spent another two trying to get a good look at them over his shoulder. Despite being unable to see any identifying details, he could hear something flapping behind him, and he knew only a few Altered had a strength level this high. Even after throwing several elbows into their face, undoubtedly bruising himself in the process, they didn’t let go or even make so much as a grunt.

Brute force was never his strong suit, and it wasn’t going to save him here. With just four seconds left, he desperately formulated a new plan.

Opening a portal big enough for the two of them didn’t work, but opening one just large enough for himself to fit through might. He hadn’t tried something like this before, but having just a few more seconds until they both slammed into the ground, he had zero margin for error and only three seconds to either save himself or end up splattered on the rocks beneath them.

“Here goes nothing,” he whispered to himself. He opened a portal to the nearest patch of free sky he could see and another one underneath himself that was just wide enough for him to fit through, forcing his attackers arm’s up as his momentum carried him through the portal, leaving him unrestrained, several miles away, and around a mile in the air.

He gulped down several huge breaths as he fell, a white comet in the morning sky, free but not out of the woods yet. The frigid high-altitude air was making him cough, blurring his vision, but he managed to pick a clearing amongst the trees to land, hopefully providing him some cover and allowing him to catch his breath. He opened several ascending portals to stop his momentum, much like rolling a basketball up a hill and grabbing it just before gravity forced it back down.mmJust as he felt his momentum stalling out, he opened a portal just above the ground in between the trees, gently depositing himself gently onto a shaded, verdant patch. Before he had a chance to make another move to escape, a tree next to him exploded into splinters as someone crashed straight through it and bound him again tighter this time. Suddenly, there was a woman’s voice, oddly mirthful for someone in the middle of combat, whispering in his ear.

“Dead.”

Ethan recognized Alex’s voice instantly, groaning and shoving her aside as she let him go, laughing. She abandoned her usual white and bronze Titan suit for a more simple black sweater and green joggers, yet she kept the royal purple cape tied neatly through the hood.

“You could’ve killed me,” he spat, nearly tripping over a downed pine tree. He cursed, steadying himself. His heart was pounding and his eyes were blurry with irritation from the speed he traveled, but he was alive and out of danger, leaving him more angry and embarrassed than hurt. Alex had caught him unaware again, which did not bode well for his evaluation.

She rolled her eyes. “I had you the whole time. You weren’t going to get hurt unless you did something really dumb which, actually, you almost did. What kind of strategy is torpedoing yourself into the ground?”

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“It’s a game of chicken,” he explained, “only…I lost.”

“It shouldn’t have come to that,” she chastised him. “You’ve trained for three months to become a Protector and I know we’ve been over situational awareness. If you were paying attention like you should’ve been, you would’ve seen me coming. I even kept the cape on and this thing is super loud when I fly. You really should’ve heard it.”

Ethan shook his head in annoyance. He took a seat on a stump, stretching out his legs and trying to slow his breathing. The fight, though simulated by Alex, had been very real to him and he was still shaky. “How’d you find me?”

“I had Raz track your suit, which you’d know if you two were speaking.”

“I speak sometimes,” Ethan said, rubbing the back of his neck. “He just doesn’t always speak back.”

Alex rolled her eyes. She picked up the thirty foot tall tree she accidentally knocked down as if she was lifting a toothpick and gently tossed it off the trail it was blocking. It landed fifty yards away with a thunderous crash. She winced, then turned back to Ethan. “Well, you two need to patch things up. If everything goes well, you’ll be a Protector by the end of the day, and you need your PAL before Apex cuts you loose.”

“Right,” Ethan muttered, his face flush. He sighed, changing the subject. “Um, about me taking my evaluation…what exactly happens if I fail?”

“Um,” Alex dragged out the word, looking anywhere except at Ethan. “So, you’d be banned from using your powers in the city and labeled an Altered if you did, at which point I’d be forced to hunt you down if I saw you teleporting around town again.”

“I could take you if I had to,” Ethan muttered.

“All prior evidence to the contrary,” Alex laughed. “But, Apex does keep a few powerful people around for off-book missions or activities that a normal Protector wouldn’t be used for, including combat in evaluations. You could always do that.”

Ethan sighed, throwing a splinter of wood in front of him. “Combat isn’t really my strong suit.”

“Well, you don’t need to worry about any of that because I trained you and you won’t fail.”

Ethan had one more question, something that’d been weighing on him for a few months. His voice was soft, barely audible over the whisper of the wind through the otherwise silent forest around them.

“Is there a chance that Amory just says…no?”

“There’s been…discussions,” Alex gestured vaguely to the forest around them, not leaving Ethan with a ton of confidence. His gaze became transfixed on a tree in front of him.

“And…what exactly has been said in those discussions?”

Alex inhaled sharply, but before she could say more, her phone went off, buzzing urgently.

“If there’s anything I can do to make sure she allows me to become a Protector-”

“Hold that thought,” Alex said before answering. After a few moments that felt like an eternity, she walked back to Ethan, her face grim. Ethan stood, feeling his hands twitch at his side, ready to move if he had to.

“What’s wrong?”

“A Protector was attacked last night over in sector five. She was pretty badly hurt.”

Ethan remembered from the learning material Apex provided all potential Protectors that sector five was located at the north end of the city, also known as Stack Town due to all the smoke stacks. Prior to the routinization of air travel, Ascension, situated pretty much as far away from either coast as possible, had all their materials and food railed in. After the expansion of the airport, most of those industrial sites became mostly obsolete, but a few remained active. The sector wasn’t known for having anything obviously valuable that would be worth a fight, especially not one that would put a Protector in a hospital. That would naturally draw a ton of attention, which all but the most powerful Altered typically didn’t want.

“Are they okay?”

“She has a broken leg and a few broken ribs. She’s hospitalized and probably out for the next six weeks, more if they can’t find a way to help her heal correctly. She was hit with something we…haven’t really seen before.”

Ethan winced. If he wasn’t careful or paying attention while on patrol, that could easily be him. “Do we know who did it? Or why?”

Alex shook her head. “We don’t have any footage, but whoever it was that attacked Syphon robbed a jewelry store, so they’re after valuables. Weaver and Aegis are covering the Museum in Ascension for now, but I have to head over there and investigate, see if there’s anything I can do.”

Ethan took an eager step towards Alex. “Anything I can do?”

Meaning, anything I can do to help my status with Amory?

Alex shook her head and Ethan’s shoulders dropped slightly. “You need to go home and get some rest before the evaluation. I’ve tried to stay impartial, but I know Amory is going to throw someone tough at you and you need better rest than you can get on a hotel rooftop. Just do your best and make it so that she can’t say no. I’ll be out in Sector Five, but call me after, okay?”

Ethan bristled at the lack of commitment, but tried to shake it off. “Fine. I’ll call you after I pass my eval.”

With a hug for good luck, Alex gave Ethan a confident smile then started floating in the air above him. Despite being able to teleport himself, he always found that to be an incredible site.

He waved Alex off, then teleported himself back to the mesa overlooking all of Stillrock, sitting on the edge and dangling his legs off to give himself space to think. The morning sun had risen above the mountain, providing a welcome respite of warmth against the mountain winds. Despite the improving conditions, Ethan cursed.

“Damn it,” he said, banging his boot against the edge and knocking some dirt down. “Even Titan herself can’t get Amory to commit to letting me have a position and there’s no time for me to change that. I put myself in danger and ruined my friendship with Raz to get these powers for nothing. I’m going to have to start a business teleporting rich people for money, except I can’t operate anywhere in the state since Ascension would send a Protector to stop me. And I’ll probably get sued after someone throws up; I’m not the best at using these powers yet.”

He sighed heavly, hanging his head. He glanced out at the town of Stillrock beneath him, the few, spaced out buildings still empty before the town opened after breakfast.

“I’m going to end up right back here,” he muttered sadly, “right back where I started.”

He stood to leave, readying his first in a series of portals back to the city, but a flash of purple light on the north end of the town caught his eye. He whipped his head around, staring intently. To his knowledge, there were no active Protectors stationed outside of Ascension, as Apex’s main focus was protecting the city.

“Could’ve been nothing,” he muttered nervously, shutting his portal. He was proven wrong a moment later after another blinding flash, followed by the distinctive sound of a window being shattered echoed through the town. His heart leapt up to his throat.

“That…is definitely something,” he exhaled, pulling out his phone to call Alex. Before he dialed her number, he paused.

Staking out the entrance is one thing, but if I can show that I can take on whoever is in there, maybe Amory would have no choice but to let me become a Protector if I pass my evaluation. And if I get in over my head, I can always call Alex for backup, right? I can at least see who’s in there first, and then make a decision on calling Alex if they look too dangerous for me to handle.

Ignoring his pounding heart and better judgment, Ethan opened two portals and found himself crouched underneath the Stillrock Museum of Natural History. He narrowed his eyes, confused at what could possibly be worth stealing from inside there. As stealthily as he could be, he crouched beneath the window away from the street of the old brick museum building. He was trying to peeking through the jagged, broken glass to catch a glimpse of the action inside when something caught his eye: on the glass itself was a thick, purple material.

One of the first things Alex had Ethan do, before they ever started throwing punches, was memorize a list of all known Altered, compiled by Apex. This included everyone a Protector had fought in Ascension, as well as the few Protectors who turned their backs on the program. Instinctively, his mind began working down the list, trying to figure out who could be attacking him while also trying to listen for any signs of advancement by his foe. In the moment of silence, he took a glance at the thickening purple liquid sizzling as it slowly dripped down the wall.

Doesn’t look like pure energy considering it didn’t dissipate on contact like Oscil’s blasts, definitely not fire like Ember’s, but also not as solid as Weaver’s constructs. Did I just not pay enough attention, or am I missing someone?

Already on edge, the sound of a woman’s voice to his right nearly made him jump out of his skin.

“Hey,” she said quietly, gesturing to the museum. “Are you going to do something about that?”