To Ashes And Blood

Two Truths And A Lie

Three Hours Earlier Before the Raid

“The crater is all wrong,” Director Shannon said with a heavy sigh as she inspected the crater.

The wind howled through the huge tear carved into the earth. Hundreds of meters wide, with a depth that still hadn't been ascertained.

The surrounding area looked as if something had snipped the threads holding reality and tied them back together carelessly.

The soldiers stationed around the area avoided looking directly into it. Not out of fear, but because every human instinct told them not to.

Shannon stared into the darkness below in silence.

A young officer approached cautiously.

“Director.”

“Report.”

The officer swallowed, focusing her gaze on the tablet in her hands.

“The readings are still fluctuating.”

“How much?”

“We don't know for now.”

Shannon's expression darkened at that answer.

The officer added, “The devices used to measure Echo residue had never failed before…”

Shannon interrupted her. “Yet every scanner pointed toward the crater has managed to produce different numbers, different energy signatures, and different frequencies?”

The officer hesitated.

“There is something else.”

Shannon didn't look away from the crater.

“Speak.”

“We found another body.”

For the first time since the officer arrived, Shannon turned to look at her.

“Show me.”

The officer immediately handed her the tablet.

Shannon zoomed in on the image. What she saw caused her stomach to tighten.

Not because of the corpse.

Because of what had been carved into the stone beside it.

An inscription she hadn't seen in years, and one she had hoped would remain buried.

The officer lowered her voice as she zoomed out, pointing to something in the image.

“That is the same mark from the Blackwater Incident.”

The area around Shannon suddenly became silent. The wind continued to howl.

For several seconds, Shannon simply stared at the image before finally managing to whisper,

“No.”

The officer blinked.

“Director?”

“No reports,” she said, louder this time.

The young woman froze.

“Excuse me?”

“I didn't stutter, Ashen. Make no reports of this incident.”

Shannon's voice became colder.

“There should be no records. No photographs. No other witnesses.”

The officer's eyes widened.

“Director, that's against….”

“Destroy it before I....”

The words came instantly, her hand hovering above her holster.

The officer stood frozen.

Shannon slowly looked back toward the crater.

A distant memory surfaced.

A ruined research facility.

A dying Hollow.

A Hollow that shouldn't have been capable of speech. One now classified as a Sabio.

The words it had spoken moments before its death.

The King remembers.

Shannon closed her eyes.

“No one finds out.”

Behind her, the officer quietly obeyed.

....................................

Present Time

The first thing Damien felt as he opened his eyes was pain.

His skull felt like it had been cracked open. His shoulder burned. Every muscle in his body ached.

Slowly, he opened his eyes and was greeted by a white ceiling.

“Medical wing.”

The scent of disinfectant immediately confirmed it.

“You're awake.”

Damien turned toward the voice.

Cole sat beside the window with a packet of chips in his hand and his boots resting on a nearby table.

For once, he wasn't smiling.

Director Shannon stood nearby with her arms crossed as she watched him.

The moment Damien tried to sit up, pain shot through his shoulder.

Cole immediately pushed him back down.

“Easy there, little pig.”

“Vera.”

The word escaped before he could stop it.

Cole blinked.

Then laughed softly.

“That's the first thing you ask?”

“Is she alive?”

“She's... alive,” Cole answered, lifting an eyebrow.

The tension in Damien's chest loosened slightly, and he took a deep breath.

“What happened after?”

Cole leaned back.

“The Sabio died.”

“I know that part.”

“Very dramatically.”

“I was there, Cinder.”

“Right.”

The Cinder scratched his head.

“We cleaned up the nest.”

“The wounded were evacuated.”

“The survivors got medical treatment.”

“And Shannon here has been glaring at everyone for the last six hours.”

Shannon didn't deny it.

Cole pointed at her.

“See?”

“That’s not helping.”

“Well, it's worth a shot.”

For a moment, the room became quiet.

Then Cole's expression changed subtly.

But Damien noticed.

The joking demeanor faded.

“There's something I want to ask you.”

Damien nodded.

Cole leaned forward, setting aside his bag of chips.

“When you fought those Crawlers.”

He paused for a second.

“How did you know what they were going to do?”

Damien froze.

The room suddenly felt smaller.

Cole continued.

“You moved before they attacked.”

“You avoided blind spots most Ashens don't even notice.”

“You knew exactly where the Sabio would strike.”

His eyes narrowed.

“It's almost like you've seen all of it before.”

The room became eerily silent.

Damien looked toward Shannon.

The Director's face remained unreadable.

“I've just been training, Cinder,” Damien replied, squeezing the bedsheets.

“Right. And I was born yesterday. You don't have to lie to me, little pig,” Cole replied immediately.

Shifting his gaze toward Shannon, he added,

“Anything I know, she knows. How did you do it?”

Damien stared at the ceiling.

For several seconds, he considered keeping up the lie.

Then he remembered the Sabio's face as it died.

Its final words echoed in his mind.

“The King remembers.”

He could feel some of his memories missing.

The growing feeling that he couldn't carry this alone and the realization that he was losing fragments of his memories, finally overwhelmed him.

So he told them everything.

From the final battle to humanity's extinction.

The Hollow King.

His death.

His impossible return.

Shannon flinched when Damien mentioned the Hollow King.

Save for the beeping medical equipment in the room, silence followed after he finished.

Cole stared at him.

Then at Shannon.

Then back at Damien.

“That's just ridiculous.”

Damien lowered his head.

“I promise you, it's the truth.”

Cole lifted Damien's chin.

“Alright, little pig. What was my first deployment as a Cinder?”

Damien locked eyes with him.

“The Eastern Perimeter. With Cinder Jennifer.”

Cole tried to hide the shock, but his face betrayed him.

“My first recon mission.”

“Outside the city. Singing Lake. It went sideways, and you were trapped alone for days with Director Shannon, who was still an Ashen medic at the time, and…..”

Cole broke eye contact.

“...Hmmm. That's fair.”

Damien blinked.

“That is your reaction?”

Cole shrugged.

“I've heard worse than this.”

“You have not,” Damien protested.

“Well, I once saw Corvin try cooking,” Cole added as he picked up his bag of chips.

“Cole,” Shannon said in a stern voice.

“Fair.”

The smile vanished completely from his face.

“For what it's worth, I believe you aren't lying.”

Damien's eyes widened slightly.

“How do you know?”

“Because Shannon looked terrified halfway through your story.”

The Director shot him a glare.

Cole ignored it.

Damien slowly turned toward her.

For the first time since meeting her...

He saw fear in her eyes.

Shannon looked away first.

“That isn't possible.”

Yet the conviction wasn't there.

“That's what I thought too, but your face said otherwise, witch,” Cole replied, licking his fingers.

Her jaw tightened.

“Enough.”

The word immediately killed the conversation.

Shannon stepped forward.

“What happened in that nest does not leave this room.”

Neither Damien nor Cole spoke.

Her gaze hardened.

“The Sabio.”

“The words it spoke.”

“The intelligence it displayed.”

“None of it leaves this room.”

Damien frowned.

“Why?”

Shannon didn't answer.

Struggling to sit upright, Damien called out to her.

“Director.”

She grabbed the front of his hospital gown and stared into his eyes like a viper sizing up its prey.

Cole moved immediately.

“Shannon!”

She waved him off and tightened her grip on Damien.

“Why? I'll tell you why! Because panic spreads faster than Hollows.”

“Director, that can't be the real reason.”

For a brief moment, Damien thought she might actually answer.

Cole reached out, placing his hands on her shoulders.

“Mi Gomita...”

She let go of Damien and turned away.

“Get some rest.”

Then she left.

The door slid shut behind her.

Cole stared after her.

“Don't think anything of it. She's been like that all day.”

Damien looked toward the door.

The conversation replayed itself in his mind.

She knows something. Far more than she's willing to admit.

And for some reason, she's terrified of intelligent Hollows.

His thoughts drifted as he took off his hospital gown and put on his uniform.

Oma Edwards.

The Girl of Broken Sound.

Damien's eyes widened.

In the original timeline, she wasn't supposed to appear for years.

Not until after the Fall of the East Sector.

Yet her file had been active earlier that morning.

His pulse quickened.

“No...”

If the timeline was accelerating...

Then Oma might already be moving.

Damien ignored the pain in his body and dressed hurriedly.

Cole raised an eyebrow.

“Where exactly do you think you're going?”

“I need to find someone.”

“Now?”

“Yes.”

Cole sighed.

“Why?”

Damien stared toward the window.

“Because last time...”

His voice grew quiet.

“...I was too late.”

And somewhere deep inside, a single question refused to leave him.

If Shannon was hiding the truth about intelligent Hollows...

What else was she hiding?