Page 91 of Brawler
Flash frowned. “So, me and my brothers aren’t reincarnations of warriors across time?”
“That is correct.” The answer came sharply. “Those battles were not your lives. You were placed inside them to live through their weight and receive our messages. Your bond with your teammates heightened that signal, our last-ditch attempt at breaking through your resistance and making you hear.”
“Then what were the visions for? Are we some kind of chosen guardians?”
“Not chosen gods,” the figure said. “We do not bestow divinity.”
Flash tilted his head. “So, my dad was never Lincoln or Tex Washington?”
The hooded figure’s voice tilted, almost amused. “You sound disappointed.”
Flash snorted. “Hell, yeah. Who wouldn’t want Lincoln as a line on their résumé?”
“You have a way with wit. It will serve you well in the battle to come.”
The figure’s hands gripped the hood and drew it a little lower, shadow spilling back over its features. “No. Those were not lives you actually lived. We used the imagery of leaders, Washington,Lincoln, because they were men of leadership, and you follow and trust your mentors. Lieutenant Michael “Tex” Penn is a man of integrity, strategic, grounded. His care for you and your brothers is great. Then there is your father, a foundation in your life. Your love for him was the first doorway we tried to use to reach you.”
“So, you used Tex and my dad as messengers?”
“Exactly. As I said, the visions were connections, images molded to your experience so the message would land. Your resistance turned signal into static.”
“What’s the message?”
“Two parts. First, the power of mind. Second, the power of body. You read threats and move in ways civilians do not. That makes you the right receivers.”
“The warrior gene?”
“A working label. Aptitude. Pattern recognition under pressure.”
“Those ghostly tendrils?”
“A way to show you your connection. Threads of the brotherhood you already share.”
Flash let the words settle. His mouth curled, but his chest was tight. “So, you want me, us, to fight for you.”
“Yes…ifyouso choose. But you were singled out because of your bond. This is the true reason we broke our own law.” The cloaked figure stepped closer, its form wavering, edges blurred now. “We implore you to find Killa Saqra Rumi, callsign Lechuza, CIA Shadowguard. Chaos and his agents have broken free. They mean to ignite a war that will end in the annihilation of the Veil, and with it, Reality itself. Existence snuffed out in a single snap.” The chorus deepened, the timbre rolling through him like a low tide. “Only she can stop them, and only you can reach her.Allies will come to you. Some you already know, someyou have yet to meet, but all are bound to the same heart. She is the lock, and you are the key.”
Everything went to black, not coma black, just dark. Flash swore he felt a tightening, a warmth, a vow snapping into place inside his chest. Not unlike the moment they’d pinned on his trident, an oath hammered into bone, a creed written in blood. One purpose. One team. A mission he couldn’t fail, no matter the cost.
The voices swelled, then dropped to a resonance so low it echoed in his heart. “We will not stand by, either. You, Jae ‘Flash’ Shaw, will take up the call. We are certain, and we are grateful to partner with such men and women. When the scar tears, we will answer.”
The voice faded, but its echo burned in his chest, pulsing through his veins with every beat of his heart.Only she can stop them, and only you can reach her.The words beat like a battle cry, impossible to ignore.
Yet he was not one man against the void. He felt them, his brothers, threaded through him like steel cables, every bond forged in fire, sealed in blood. Tex’s steady command. Bondo’s immovable strength. Easy’s calm grin in the chaos. Shark’s watchful silence. Twister’s healing hands. Dagger’s unyielding edge. Brawler’s iron will. Beast’s loyalty, as fierce as any human’s.
The Keeper’s words pulsed through him, vast and terrible, too heavy for one heart to hold. He felt them burn along his veins, down into marrow, out into the wings of light he had claimed. Then…he let go. He poured it outward, a surge of fire and starlight, into every thread of brotherhood that bound him to the men he trusted with his life.
They saw. He knew they saw.
A pounding tore through him, raw and unfiltered, racing along the invisible conduits already forged. He sent themeverything, the connection that had lifted him, the desperation that had broken him, the horror that had stalked him through war after war. Visions crowded his mind with strife and sacrifice, courage and patriotism, words that turned the tide of battle. Flashes of himself rising star-spangled into the storm.
Deeper still, the battles inside his battles, seeinghis brotherswithin his visions, their faces, their voices, their strength, as if the Veil had written his team into its very fabric.
He pushed it all, every ounce, down the bond of oath and brotherhood, through the marrow-deep vow they had forged long before the Veil called his name. Their covenant carried it, absorbed it, a heart beating as one across time and blood and fire.
They felt the words as he had.Chaos is coming. Lechuza is the lock. I am the key.
The vision shattered.
