Sterling awoke bound to a essence president, head palpitating. Through a haze he saw Donovan observing him with a raptorial radiance. " Did you really suppose you could betray me and face no consequences?" Donovan paced sluggishly." After all I have given you." Rage swelled in Sterling's casket but he forced calm." The only bone
who betrayed anyone is you. What really happed to my family?" Donovan laughed, a concave sound echoing in the barren space." An unfortunate accident, as I'm sure the authorities reported. But no matter you were so easy to. influence in your grief." Memories swamped back- Donovan sweeping in to fill the hole, guiding Sterling's training into the association. All along playing on raw injuries for control. " Where are Emilia and Damian?" Sterling wrangle. Donovan beamed wider." Your family allowed
he could outsmart me in my own den. As for the girl." A bite seized Sterling. Had they been too late? Was this battle only prelude to further afflict? He strained against bonds, beyond reason. Donovan's boo twisted into a logjam. " You will watch them die for defying me, before joining them! " Donovan's trouble cut deep, fueling Sterling's rage. He threw his weight against the tapes, ignoring the bite of pain. A commotion erupted outdoors- whoops and gunfire echoed down the corridor. Donovan whirled, countenance fracturing into a logjam." Deal with them!" he barked into his radio. As he turned back, Sterling had worked one hand free. He launched from the president, diving Donovan in a barbarian attack. They crashed to the bottom in a distraction of flailing branches. Sterling landed punch after chastising blow until Donovan tossed him off with a spray of blood. He quailed against the wall, dazed. Donovan drew a dynamo shakily, taking end. The door burst open as Damian charged through, firing doubly. Donovan staggered, armament rattling down as his knees buckled. Emilia appeared behind Damian, bruises marring her skin but fire in her eyes. " It's over," Sterling told the pulsing crime lord, standing altitudinous as family girdled him at last- bonds of blood and choice reforged stronger than ever. Donovan wrangle vitriol through bloody teeth until the final rattle. As life drained from his body, Sterling only felt numb bleakness where rage formerly burned. The history was redressed, but what now lay ahead? In the fate of Donovan's death, an uneasy quiet settled over the emulsion. Sterling, Emilia and Damian stood amid the wreckage, query swimming in the air. " It's eventually over," Emilia said vocally, though her aspect
dallied on Damian warily. The masked man jounced." With Donovan gone, his association will chip. But adversaries remain who wish to see us fall." Sterling stepped near to Emilia in a gesture of consolation." We are together now. Nothing will harm you again, I promise." She leaned into his grasp, sick but trusting. Turning to Damian, Sterling asked the question burning within." What now, for you? Will you vanish back into the murk?" A flicker of emotion crossed his family's face. " For so long revenge drove me. But with Donovan dead and you at my side." Damian traced off, as if unaccustomed to expedients beyond the charge. Sterling grasped his arm." Stay. Help me rebuild what was lost- we can forge a new future, together as family." After a long moment, Damian sluggishly lifted his mask, revealing himself completely to those who knew his pain. A faint smile wormed his lips." Yes. It's time to lay ghosts to rest." A new chapter was opening, if they chose to write it together. In the months that followed, Sterling worked lifelessly to strike the remnants of Donovan's felonious conglomerate. With Damian at his side and Emilia his anchor, order was restored from the ashes of the history. Donovan's apprentices fell one by one until his association collapsed in on itself. Sterling assured means were seized, operatives detained, and ill- gotten wealth redistributed to help repair the communities formerly exploited. Soon the thoroughfares of their megacity felt safer, healed from poisonous influence that had poisoned the place of their nonage. Sterling's once sins were redeemed through honest work guiding the megacity to more days ahead. On a clear spring morning, Sterling and Emilia stood swapping promises girdled by musketeers new and old. Jack jounced his blessing from further, while Damian watched with a family's quiet joy. Their family was made whole at last. In the times followed, Sterling settled into reputed leadership while Damian continued noble work in murk, arising sometimes to educate Sterling's children tone defense with an uncle's care. Peace reigned where formerly destruction thrived. The scars of treason would remain, but love and purpose reconstructed purpose from tragedy. Together, the sisters assured light would always guide their path from that day forth. 10 Times latterly Sterling smiled as his youthful son Lily chased horselaugh through their home's auditoriums . Beside him, Emilia's hand rested gently on her swelling belly. How far they had come from ashes of the history. A vehicle pulled into the driveway, pulling Sterling from nostalgic studies. Damian surfaced, chatting Emilia with a warm grasp before clasping Sterling's hand. Though retired from active work, yearly visits were cherished. Over lunch, Damian reported tales of his peregrination helping worried souls, bringing grins. But a shadow flitted beneath his words, one Sterling knew of old. That night as the ménage slept, Sterling set up his family pacing restlessly." What troubles you, family?" Damian broke, tortured by recollections." Ghosts of the once garbage to stay buried, it seems. Rumors place Donovan's top enforcer Banes alive and rebuilding his shattered forces." Sterling strengthened. That monster had dissolved the night of Donovan's fall, presumed dead." Are you certain? After so long." seesawing grimly, Damian met his family's aspect
." I must hunt this beast to its lair. Join me, one last quest to comb our megacity clean." Sterling considered- his family, his life's work then. Yet some immoralities demand a final stage. He gripped Damian's shoulder intensively." For our family's long peace, this demon dies. Let's finish this family, formerly and for all." Sterling and Damian gathered their munitions, preparing for the quest ahead. Before leaving, Sterling embraced Emilia tightly. " I've to see this done," he rumored. She jounced in understanding, eyes glistering with solicitude." Come back to us." They followed Damian's leads deep into the night, suggestions making together the figure of Banes' rising felonious web. Days blurred into a race of close calls and dead ends, until at last they tracked him to an abandoned storehouse. Sterling scrutinized the structure through binoculars, counting a dozen fortified guards. Too numerous to take head- on." We need a distraction," he said. Damian smiled grimly." Leave that to me." He dissolved into the murk as Sterling set snares around the border. Moments latterly, near blasts drew the guards outdoors. Sterling eased outside, armament drawn. riots and gunfire filtered through the walls as Damian engaged the men outdoors. Deeper within, Banes paced furiously, seeing the mesh ending. He whirled at Sterling's approach, face wringing into a feral logjam." You," he wrangle. Without a word, they launched at each other in a vicious brawl, all finesse forgotten in savage retaliation. Through sheer will Sterling gained the upper hand, cascading Banes against a sword support. As the life drained from the man's eyes, Sterling felt only prostration. It was eventually over. Outside, Damian saluted him with a proud smile." Let's go home, family. Our megacity is free formerly more." Sterling and Damian began the trip home, relieved their long battle was eventually won. As they drove down the empty road under a pale dawn sky, Sterling felt only appetite to see his family again. Around a bend, a dark shape suddenly appeared- debris bestrew across the road. They swerved to avoid it and lost control, the truck tumbling violently into a notch. Sterling came to swinging upside down by his seatbelt, dazed and bleeding." Damian!" he called hoarsely. No response came from the passenger seat. frenetically he unbuckled and dropped, rushing to his family's side. Damian lay ominously still, twisted at an unnatural angle. Sterling pressed shaking fritters to his neck, at first feeling nothing. also, the faintest palpitation, weak but steady. Headlights appeared over, decelerating to a stop. bases sounded on clay as numbers approached, backlit by the rising sun. " Help!" Sterling croaked." Please.my family needs a croaker
." delineated against the dawn, the numbers studied the wreckage coolly. also one called out in a familiar, nipping voice " Your services are no longer needed, Sterling. Say farewell to your brother.and tell Emilia I am coming for her coming."