I didn't know how to respond to what Elias had said. "So your guild is as powerful as a god?"

"Yes. They might as well be one."

"And you think I can take them down? Your entire guild?"

Despite the edge of sarcasm to my voice, he looked full of confidence in what he said. "You don't need to take everyone down. There's a few people at the top. One person, especially."

He was serious. He'd brought me over from another world to kill the leaders of his own guild. "I'm already fighting a war. I don't have time for another one."

"I told you I can help you with yours."

"Then why can't you solve your own problems?"

"Because I don't have the help I need here. I told you I'm no fighter. Your war is different. You have warriors. They just need power. And I have something that could change everything for you."

He couldn't be saying what it sounded like he was saying. The skepticism on my face must have given away my thoughts.

A grin slid onto his face. "I can make more of us. I can give people neural implants."

The possibilities spun wildly through my mind. Lifting the binoculars, I searched the training field for Nash once more and watched him still levitating.

In my world, Nash was the best swordsman I'd ever met. Just thinking of pairing that with power made me giddy with excitement. He would be unstoppable. Together, we could fight so much more effectively than we did now when he had to rely upon someone else's power.

Leif and Wren would finally be able to fight with me again.

I ripped the binoculars back down and raised my voice excitedly. "We could bring peace to the valley with more power."

"I told you." Elias smiled as he watched me. "It's really uncanny. You're so much like her."

"Same for you. You are different though."

He had a faraway look for a moment. "Yeah. Just different enough to make it even more surreal."

"You really could give the neural implant to more people?"

"Easily. Everyone in my world has power. We can implant chips here. Since the experiment was to see what would happen if everyone had access to a chip, they ran it in the same way that they would in the real world. People receive the chip at age three when it is easier to help them learn to control it but not so late that they lose the benefits of rapid growth in early development."

I watched Piercey skeptically. "This most certainly gets abused. There must be kids who never get one or parents who are extorted."

He nodded. "We've had issues with this, but it actually is not very widespread because everyone joins a guild. You cannot survive in this world on your own unless you're legendary. No guild is going to allow any of the kids to not get an implant."

"Unless the guild wants to control their membership."

"Yes, only the competition with others is so fierce that you need all of your members to be incredibly powerful. The issue we've actually had is that children are given the implants too early, which can cause problems."

"Right." I thought back to stories I'd heard of babies losing control of their powers. "There's a subset of the population who really struggles to adjust to it as a baby."

"Truth is that everyone does. You're just used to it in your world. It's considered cruel here to give a baby an implant."

I chewed the inside of my cheek. "The Collective will figure out that we've given power to some in my world. They probably will figure out that you've brought me here."

"So talk to Dr. Drake."

"No. I cannot ask them for permission. They'll deny me. We have to do it first. Then, I'll convince her to forgive me."

"Sounds dangerous."

"The Collective and Dr. Henderson caused this chaos in my world. They need to let me fix it. We'll only give the implant to a few people. That won't skew the results of their experiment."

He nodded. "This is why I wanted your help. No one else has ever made it out of our simulation."

I lifted the binoculars to watch this version of Nash again. I absolutely had to have this power for him. Even though he never said it, I knew that it grated at him to not be able to battle on his own at my side. Nash was a warrior. He hated having to rely upon Piercey's power and to not be able to help me as he wanted. If there was anyone I could trust to use their power for good, it was him. He'd fought beside me tirelessly this past year to defend the valley.

It felt too good to be true and I feared that meant it must be.

"When can we do this?" I asked.

"Who are you planning to give implants to?"

"Nash, Leif, and Wren. They're the only ones I know for certain I can trust." I passed the binoculars to Elias. "They'll help your world as well. We repay our debts."

"I know you do, Max. I've seen enough to trust you. The power won't be easy for them to wield, though. It's hard to receive it as an adult and learn to use it. Dangerous even. You know what power can do when you lose control of it. My people are experts in controlling power. They need to train here."

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"You're sure about the time relativity thing you told me about? That we're not losing time in our world when we're here?"

"Yes." He crossed his arms. "From what I can tell, the mechanic was built into the system to allow supervisors to travel worlds without losing time."

"Why would they need to do that when they can observe us from outside of the experiment?"

He watched me for several seconds. "It's a good question. There's more going on than what the Collective told you. In fact, wouldn't you say they really didn't tell you anything?"

Dr. Drake had revealed far more information to me than the Collective did, but I suspected that she didn't know as much as they did either. "Right. I did always wonder why they created avatars in the first place. Dr. Henderson misused hers. What was their intended purpose?"

"Exactly," he said.

"You don't know either?"

"Not yet. I'm going to continue investigating though. This is still new for me. I only figured out how to travel worlds a few months ago and that's what opened the door for me to start finding this information."

When I began to ask my next question Elias turned suddenly toward the training ground. I focused on instinct, feeling power growing by the second. Then I noticed a form flying through the air straight for us.

"Listen." Elias raised a hand to me. "His name is Jaxon and we're not supposed to be here."

"Seriously? So why are we here then?"

Elias winced in apology. My Piercey would never have been so careless. I didn't buy that this had been an accident. So what was his agenda?

As he drew closer, I saw that it really was Nash–or better yet, Jaxon. And he could fucking fly. That was such an amazing power to master. I had to get this neural implant for Nash. Would he be gifted in this area in my world too?

Jaxon landed and stumbled to a stop, staring at me with his amber eyes wide and truly shocked. "Ash."

His stare brimmed with so much history and emotion that I could not guess at. Clearly, we were not together in this world, because he would not have been so surprised to see me if we were. I had no idea what to say but maybe that was for the best. The air felt so tense.

"I thought I felt you." Jaxon looked to Elias and then back to me. "You can't be seen here. Neither of you."

He could feel me even when I didn't use power? I felt the same as the other version of myself? "I'm sorry."

Jaxon's eyes suddenly looked suspicious. It felt horrible that he could even look at me that way. It was like my own Nash looking at me, with his full head of curls longer than he had worn them this past hair, and it sparked real pain in my chest to see this foreign look on him.

"You must have wanted me to come," Jaxon said. "You didn't mask yourself like he did."

What the hell? Elias hadn't told me to do that. I wasn't used to someone sensing me even when I wasn't using power. It wasn't me who had drawn Jaxon here but Elias, and I did not like being fooled. The distrust Jaxon seemed to feel for me now filled me for the man who looked like Piercey, but apparently was quite different.

When I didn't speak, Jaxon walked forward slowly and then stopped. His lips stiffened and pain shone in his eyes. It looked like he was holding himself back from something that tried to suck him closer to me. "We had an agreement."

I didn't know our history here or anything about what this version of Max did. It was clear from his expression that something had happened between us and it was significant enough for him to look like I'd just stabbed my sword through his gut.

"We're here because of our guild," Elias said. "This was the only way to discreetly reach out to you."

Anger gripped my gut as my stare shifted to the other man. He should have explained himself to me before throwing me into this situation. Why did he want me to be caught off guard? What if I had said the wrong thing?

Jaxon uttered a disgusted chuckle. "Your audacity astounds me. Using her, once again, to get to me." His hurt eyes turned back to me. "And you let him this time. What about our promise? Will you do it?"

I opened my mouth, but nothing escaped. I couldn't think of a single thing that seemed safe to say.

The way he looked at me hollowed out my gut. It was betrayal wasn't it? Or something close to it. He felt betrayed.

"I can't," he said. "I guess you knew I'd be too weak to do it. I'm still such a fool."

"Jaxon–" What was it we had promised to do?

"Whatever you two want, leave me out of it." Jaxon lifted into the air and turned to fly away when Elias's voice stopped him.

"You were right." Elias withdrew a long necklace from his pocket. When Jaxon turned around, he threw it through the air for the other man to catch. "That's what I came to say. I brought her because I knew you wouldn't talk to me otherwise. Just don't blame her because she didn't know."

Jaxon glanced down at me.

"I didn't want to believe what you told me back then," Elias said. "I know the darkness within your guild. I thought I knew my own too. It's worse than I could have imagined."

I wouldn't be played for a fool either. I turned on Elias and glowered at him, struggling to hold the heat within me back so I didn't draw too much attention to myself. "You had better start talking."

Elias lifted his hands. "I will. I promise."

When Jaxon spoke, I was surprised to find that he looked at me and not Elias. "There's no hope." His smile looked sad, but still appreciative. "Ashton will never turn on her people, even if that's what they deserve."

So, this was what had come between this world's version of Nash and myself? We served warring guilds? That wasn't so different from my own world. Only, it seemed that in this life, we hadn't found a way around that. Maybe Jaxon was loyal to his guild. It wasn't like Nash and the Prophet.

If this Ashton was truly like me, then I hurt even more for the two of them, because my singular focus on my people could make me blind at times. I needed more information, but with so little said, it still was easy to piece together some very important details. Jaxon and Ashton had hurt each other here. They didn't expect to see each other again. They were, by the way he acted, true enemies.

There was more than just pain in his eyes though when he looked at me. "I won't kill you, Ash. I don't think you can kill me either. You would have long ago if you could. The promise was always a lie. But that doesn't mean I'll trust you. I made that mistake once." He lifted the necklace as he looked at Elias. "I'm sorry you confirmed the truth about your mother. I'm sorry I was the one to break it to you. I still can't trust you either."

Ashton and Jaxon had promised to kill one another. I couldn't imagine this happening in any world.

"At least hear me out," Elias said.

Jaxon shook his head. "The time for deals is long past." He tossed the necklace back to him. "I wish you the best of luck."

"We could actually take them down. Don't be stubborn."

He only hesitated a moment before looking at me one last time. "Goodbye, Ash. Don't come back next time." The pain was so bright in his expression. What had I done to hurt him so badly? "You owe me that much."

When he flew away, it felt like he took my breath with him. Logically I knew this wasn't Nash and I'd done nothing to him, but damn it did he look like the man I loved. I couldn't stand to see him like that.

I stepped closer to Elias, full of vengeance. "Why did you do that?"

Though he looked nervous, he didn't back away. "If you knew what I did, you wouldn't have talked to me. You're too loyal."

"What did you do?"

Elias looked down in shame. "Ashton forgave me because it was for our guild. You won't feel the same."