There was another garage on the other side of the Bernal Palace that I didn’t know about. Upon pulling in, the driver dropped the PNP van onto a large metal slab on the floor. We stepped out—more like I was escorted out by the woman named Hannah and her thugs—and the platform depressed, lowering the van into a level underneath the garage. It closed.

“I need all hands on watch now,” said my mother, back in her mansion. “Post extra guards. Make sure the curtain doesn’t come down. Ever.”

By curtain, she must have meant whatever tech kept the capture drones away. There was so much here that I didn’t know and probably never would, especially after what happened earlier today.

She turned to me then, with the scorn of a disapproving mother toward a recalcitrant son. “You nearly crushed this whole operation, Jayson.”

I didn’t know what to say. How could I deny her? I had let my guard down. “I’m sorry.”

She didn’t say it was acceptable or invoke any punishment. She didn’t teach me any lessons, as I thought a mother should. Instead, she just shook her head and looked behind me.

The double doors to the hallway swung open, and the woman named Hannah emerged. I still couldn’t understand the sight of this foreigner. I thought my mother had kept the operation close to the family, but evidently, there seemed to be ties overseas. The United States? Where else?

Hannah was lithe but aging, much like my mother. The two stared at each other for a long time, too. I thought it was off. Maybe it was nothing.

“How is your crew?” asked my mother.

The men in the van came in next. They were brutes like Ernesto and Quin, security guard types with their sidearms holstered. They could have been plucked from any of the malls in Metro Manila. Yet, in their stolen PNP uniforms, they even looked at home during this operation.

More than me, at least.

I could see the outline of that dead cop beneath me, sprawled on the asphalt road. His blood sprinkled the dirt while tree leaves hung over us, sheltering us from the helicopter—for a time.

I remembered how it spun out of the sky and crashed into the countryside. And we made it out alive.

My mother’s only sympathetic part to my confusion showed itself when she touched my shoulder. She only reached as high as my neck, but at that moment, she seemed taller than us. “You met a nice girl, anyway.”

Shay sat on the hallway table, almost ignored, with her head in her hands. She had taken the cop’s death worse than I had. Perhaps the man was the first dead person she had ever seen.

Yet my mother could have been looking at a crying puppy for all she cared. “She won’t be a problem with the operation, will she?”

I told her about Shay and the others, reassuring her that they had already helped load The Crest and its Killers into Black Fire. “I trust them,” I added, careful not to mention anything between Shay and me. It didn’t matter; whatever bond I shared with Shay seemed far away now. Trauma sometimes drives people apart. After all, we had just watched someone die.

I should have felt it more, or I was just as cut out for this lifestyle as my mother was.

Uncle Nestor entered next, removing a hat I had never seen him wear before and throwing it on the table. “Out, you guys,” he said to the henchmen who had saved Hannah. He found Shay, then me. “Your girlfriend, too.”

She wasn’t my girlfriend—at least I didn’t think so. Shay didn’t argue, joining the others and widening our rift.

The doors closed.

Uncle Nestor scratched his forehead. “That was a ballsy move, “ he told my mother. “The dispensary was one thing, but this is a whole other. The Giants will force the military on us, and then we’ll have nowhere to hide.”

Mother stared up at a painting depicting the Illustrados—the suited Filipino caste of elite thinkers. I wish she could have reconciled with Papa and led this whole thing alongside him. They were more in the same mind than they realized.

The ceiling’s chandeliers looked almost like the helicopter falling from the sky, bending at the same angle. I had to ask them all. “How did you even take it down?”

Mother turned. “Jayson?”

“How did you get the helicopter down?”

“We didn’t.”

I frowned. “Huh?”

“Someone has our back,” she clarified, “I told you. Someone agrees with our mission. Someone with, evidently, more capabilities than us.”

How was that even possible? “You know who they are?”

“I wish we did,” said Uncle Nestor. “Maybe then we could tell them to clear us a path to Davao.”

“I’m not leaving,” said my mother.

My uncle scowled. “It’s the perfect time, Es.”

“According to what? Public perception? So what if the military comes down on us? You’ve seen it! We have a backup.”

“You don’t even know who that is.”

“I don’t need to!”

I thought about cursing inwardly again. What inspired my mother to be this confident? She was taking an immense risk with the family. Then again, she hadn’t hesitated to leave my father, Janice, or me alone.

“If anything,” she continued, “we need to solidify. There will be no more dispensary incidents. We will begin consolidating our Manila operations to our safest place.” She pointed to the floor. “Here.”

Uncle Nestor let loose a sharp exhalation. “While they close in on us, Es?”

Mother didn’t move. “Let them come.”

Ernesto and Quin entered next, interrupting the exchange and briefing my mother on the specifics of whatever plan she was forging. Uncle Nestor and I didn’t overhear; it seemed she didn’t want us to.

I followed him.

“Jayson?” he asked, sitting beneath me. “What is it?”

Ever since our phone conversation, it had been easier to talk to my uncle than my own mother. That didn’t seem right. “Why are you even here?” I asked him.

Uncle Nestor was Papa’s brother—he did not belong to my mother’s family by blood. I knew the Bernals had essentially exiled us at my father’s request, but why did the rest of the Vargases do the same?

I could have said this and more, but I didn’t.

“You’re young, Jayson,” he said. “You wouldn’t understand. When you’re-”

“I’m not that young.” I blurted it out so I wouldn’t be spoken over. “Jesus. I’m 23.”

“That’s still young, Jayson. If only-”

“You should be on Papa’s side.”

Uncle Nestor stared at me as if I had just dropped a grenade on the table and was running away with the pin.

“He’s your brother,” I continued. Then, something else occurred within me—something vile. “Is there something between you and my mother?”

“Jesus, Jayson. No. Not at all.” Uncle Nestor waved his hands, and the gesture seemed genuine. “You really don’t know a lot about her.”

My question caught him far off guard. Was it that strange to ask?

“If she wanted to take another man into this world,” he continued, “then she would.”

He emphasized the word “man,” and I didn’t think anything of it at the time. I was only relieved nothing was going on between the two… if he was telling the truth. “Then why?”

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

“If you’re thinking of some noble cause or a grand vision, forget it. It’s just money.” He showed the palace to me like my mother had many times before. “All this is her doing, and it’s our responsibility to uphold it, right?”

I wasn’t so sure. Could any person delve this deep into a criminal underground just for money? Was that all that there was? Sure, health was wealth… security, and opportunity, but was it everything? You could change the world with enough wealth, but wasn’t what you did just as important as how you got there?

Boots tapped on the floor next to us as Hannah approached. She folded her arms and looked at me. “You two have the subtlety of whales.” She looked between us, then focused on me. “Do you want out, Jayson?”

It felt strange hearing my name called by this even stranger woman. Regarding her question, I hadn’t even considered it.

She must have sensed my hesitation. “I used to ask myself why I was in this as well,” she told me. “Sometimes money is a fine motivator. People do a lot of shameful, awful things for money, but once they escape those shackles of poverty, they never go back if they don’t have to.” She looked down at my uncle as if speaking to him directly and then back to me. “But if you’re not in this one hundred percent—like my men, your uncle, and your mother—then you’re a burden. You get it?”

I did, and the fact that I couldn’t explain why I should get out only strengthened my resolve.

I wasn’t in this for money, I knew. I wasn’t in it for recognition. I was in it to tell Papa’s story and to show the Philippines what great fiction could be beyond the shroud of the Giants. I wanted to show our country we didn’t need them—because we never did.

“Good,” Hannah said, perhaps sensing my thoughts. “Now, where is she?”

I knew fully who she was referring to. I described the school and the typical places she would be. I watched as Hannah left the Bernal palace compound in yet another of my mother’s vehicles with her troupe of masqueraders. I was even there when she returned an hour later.

I could have been an avatar of my mother as I stood on the mansion’s steps, waiting for the SUV to pull in. The driver had cranked its auto-tint to maximum, and it was only now starting to wane.

Familiar hands pressed against the glass. An even more familiar face accompanied it—an excited one.

Quin opened the door, and Janice rushed out. She hugged me, her backpack swinging. “Jayson!” It felt like we hadn’t seen each other in years. “What is all this?”

My mother was busy now, but I didn’t need her to play the introductions. “This is going to be worth coming for,” I told my sister.

“I’ll say.” She looked at the Bernal mansion. “So, you have rich friends, then?”

She still didn’t know.

Just as I was about to explain, Mother came swooping down the steps. Janice stared at her in almost the same regard I must have, and when she took my sister’s hands, she murmured words I couldn’t hear.

After that, Janice looked to our mother as a paragon. Esmeralda Lane Bernal could have been the only light in a dark tunnel, a torch in a cave.

Janice became as enamored with the mansion’s decor as I was. The staff, the place’s cleanliness, and the myriad of rooms all described a way of life that was so foreign to us.

“Our own family’s wealth,” Mother said.

Janice regarded it all in wonder.

We found Papa’s urn on a pedestal in the hallway. Mother stepped up to it and looked down, and I could tell the same thoughts warred within her: that of a father keeping their children away from a lavish yet dangerous life. Well, poverty was inherently dangerous no matter where you went. This life? I could deal with it.

“Oh. My. God!” Janice threw her hands up as if she could embrace the hall and everything contained within. “This is so amazing! And it’s all ours!” She ran to hug Mother, thanking her.

Esmeralda Lane Bernal stood stern as her daughter hugged her, however. I thought she was surprised at seeing the girl she had been distanced from for so long. “You’re looking healthy,” our mother said. That’s wonderful.”

Janice pulled out of the grasp and searched Mother’s face. Something might have registered there that didn’t before, in the constricting pupils, in the furrowing of a brow. It was gone in a flash.

Janice was as excited as I had been to explore the mansion. Ever the journalism major, she started by taking notes and talking to herself. I caught murmurs of “tapestries…” and “gilded curtains…” and “wealth beyond anything I ever expected. So thankful I am to be here.”

“Are you writing a journal?” I asked her.

“Mmmm,” she said, nodding. “My God, Jayson, it’s like a dream come true.” She found her phone and snapped a picture. I saw her open her Instagram, intending to post. “Huh? No signal?”

I blinked, turning to my mother. Janice still didn’t know the truth of this place and what my mother was up to here. Should I have been the one to tell her?

“No pictures,” said Mother, watching Janice like some vulture on a branch. “Have a seat.”

Janice squinted but did as suggested, sitting at the hallway table across from me, right where I had. She was alone on the opposite side, while I was beside my mother and Uncle Nestor.

“Listen,” Mother told Janice, “you’re not going to be able to leave.”

I froze.

Janice looked across the table to everyone and then to me. “My exams begin soon.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

Janice searched among the staring eyes across from her. At that moment, I thought about leaving and sitting by her side. It would have been too awkward. I should have done it.

“Jayson?” Janice asked. “What is she talking about?”

“What I’m talking about,” my mother said, “is that you won’t be able to leave this house.” She folded her arms. “You’ll have to attend your classes remotely.”

“My… ‘classes remotely?’” Janice squinted at the table as if it were made of hot coals. “I have hands-on workshops and fieldwork. I can’t do those remotely.”

“We can hire a teacher.”

“I have interviews with President Atienza.”

Woah. “Congrats, sis,” I said. “How did you manage to get that?”

“Hard work,” she said, squinting at me. “Try it sometime.”

Jeez. I wasn’t prepared for that remark.

Our mother didn’t seem to care about the banter. “Wow,” she said, “all the more reason to keep you here.”

Janice scoffed. “Why?”

“Because you talk too much, daughter. Simple as that. I can’t even trust you with your friends.”

“What is wrong?” Janice looked to Mother, then to me. “What’s going on?”

“I know you talk to the capture drones,” Mother continued, ignoring my sister. “You’re a marites. I don’t want gossip in my house.”

She still wasn’t telling Janice about the operation. Why not? And how did my mother even know about what Janice was talking about to capture drones? Even still, it was a quirk and not something that defined her.

Mother must have been watching us all that time—watching our lives crumble while she made millions.

“Wow,” Janice said. Her gaze turned on me again.

I shook my head, feeling attacked. I didn’t tell her, but I didn’t say so, either.

“I wasn’t entirely unaware of your upbringing,” Mother said to Janice, echoing my earlier thoughts.

She may as well have been saying it to me, for my sister and I turned to each other, then to her. The obvious question hung between us.

I was the one to ask it. “Why didn’t you take us out of there?”

Mother didn’t have time to answer because Janice butted in. “I hate you already.”

“Excuse me?”

“Papa allowed me to talk about anything with anyone.”

“You can talk about anything you want with the house staff. Just don’t write down what they say. I want privacy. I believe I have earned it.”

Janice looked up just as one of the staff emerged from the second level and entered through another door. “These old men and women?” she asked.

Mother could have kicked up fumes from the way she exhaled. “Listen, if you’re not going to accept the rules here-”

“Then I’m leaving!” Janice got up. “I don’t care if this is a mansion or not! I don’t care if you’re my mother, either. I’d rather live poor on my own than live rich with you! God, I feel like a child!”

I thought she didn’t mean it. This wealth is what we had dreamt of. We had aspired to be successful and affluent and capable and, at the least, able to fend for ourselves. Above all else, we wanted to get there without anyone else’s help.

Or that was only me.

“I meant it when I said you’re not leaving,” Mother uttered.

Janice looked at me. “Jayson, are you coming?”

I didn’t want to upset Mother any more than she needed to be, and I was curious where this was going, so I shrugged.

“Jayson can leave whenever he wants,” said Mother. “He’s on important business, albeit he doesn’t have the same freedoms. No one has.”

“Before?” Janice asked. She found me. “You didn’t tell me anything about this.”

I hadn’t because I wasn’t sure she would tell anyone else. I didn’t voice any of this.

Janice shook her head and turned to go, but not before my mother pointed. “Ensure she doesn’t leave!”

Hannah’s entourage swooped down on Janice, grabbing her by the arms and legs and pulling her up. She thrashed like some junkie suffering withdrawal. She screamed. “Get off!” she cried. “Get the fuck off of me!” She turned back to me. “Jayson! Help me!”

They pulled her out of the room, Hannah following, while I only stared.

My mother approached me. “Anyone that is not on our side is an obstacle. Even family. I’ve always felt that, and you’ll see that even more now. Won’t you?”

I thought I would, but not in the same way. “Where is she going?” I asked.

“We’ll find a room for her, but don’t you worry about it. How is the next episode coming?”

Amidst everything that had transpired, I had forgotten to check my burner phone. I did so now, with Mother looking over my shoulder as I thumbed through texts. I found the latest one from Andrei.

Episode 2 just generated. Who should distribute?

My mother watched me, gauging my ability to make important decisions. I wouldn’t let her down.

I typed back: Reggie. Then: Least sus.

The PNP would notice a foreigner handing off drugs to a native Filipino. It was expected to blame outside influence for the resurgence of narcotics. It was probably true. Indeed, no god-fearing, patriotic Filipino would stoop that low. Except you, Jayson. Except you.

Then again, I didn’t fear God. I wasn’t sure I feared anything anymore. With the rest of the country closing in on us, I should have felt like a cornered animal. Yet, I was elated.

I got up to leave, and Mother didn’t stop me.