"But before we continue," David said, calm but firm. "Let's go into Daniel's room. He needs to hear this, too."
Zuri narrowed her eyes.
"Wait, wait, wait... You're here for whom?"
Her voice cut through the hall like a blade, sharp, protective, and trembling at the edges.
David paused, his eyes steady beneath a blank expression.
"Was I not loud enough?" he said flatly. "We're here for Daniel."
"Excuse me?" Zuri snapped, her tone rising, sharp with disbelief.
"Okay, okay," Jamal said quickly, placing a gentle hand on her arm.
"Zuri, let's just calm down," he urged, guiding her carefully toward the room. "We haven't heard the full story yet."
As they moved toward the door, Rachel stepped forward, her voice crisp and authoritative.
"You're dismissed, Doctor."
With a quiet nod, he stepped aside and left the hallway.
"David," Rachel said, stepping closer. "Let me do the talking from here on out."
David turned to her, his face unreadable. "Why?"
Rachel gave him a sharp look, her voice low but firm. "Because I said so."
David didn't respond right away. His blank expression lingered for a beat too long — then, with a subtle shrug, he stepped back.
inside Daniels room
"Mom, Dad."
Daniel, still lying in the hospital bed, turned his head as his parents entered the room. His voice was soft, a mix of relief and confusion.
"Oh, Daniel..."
Zuri rushed to his bedside, wrapping her arms around him in a trembling hug.
"I'm so happy you're okay. When you collapsed, I thought..."
Her voice trembled
"I thought we lost you."
She held him tighter like she never wanted to let go.
"What...."
Daniel blinked, still weak, but comforted.
"I'm glad you're ok, son."
Jamal stepped forward, resting a firm hand on Daniel's shoulder.
His eyes softened with pride in every line of his face.
"Eh-hem." Rachel clears her throat.
"I'm sorry to interrupt," Rachel said, her expression firm but respectful.
"But if you don't mind, I'd like to explain why Daniel walked away with his life today."
"Yes, please go ahead," Jamal said quickly, turning his head toward Rachel. His voice was calm, but his eyes held a quiet urgency — he wanted answers.
"Dad, who are these people?" Daniel asked, his gaze shifting toward Rachel and David as they approached.
Rachel stood at the end of Daniel's hospital bed, tablet in hand, while David dragged a chair beside her and sat down, arms folded.
"Okay, just one second... There we go."
Rachel tapped quickly across the screen, eyes scanning as data loaded.
"Found it."
She turned the tablet around, holding it out so everyone could see.
"Uh... what exactly are we looking at?"
Zuri furrowed her brow, eyes darting across the unfamiliar display.
"This," Rachel said, tapping the screen once, "is a chart showing the Primal Energy fluctuations detected near Greenwood Academy... around the time of the incident."
She pointed to one of the bars, bold red, near the top.
"This one here? That's the Nyxborn. It spiked at 500 VT. The standard for its Rank."
She swiped to the next graph.
"And this—"
Her tone shifted. Slightly lower. More deliberate.
"This is your son's reading."
Rachel's finger landed on a vertical line that shattered the chart's scale. The bar kept rising until it clipped off the screen completely, a flickering warning flashing in the corner:
[ERROR: DATA EXCEEDS MAXIMUM OUTPUT RANGE]
A beat of silence.
"What?"
Jamal's voice cracked. He stepped forward, staring at the impossible number.
"That's... not even readable."
"It broke the system," Rachel confirmed.
"Jamal."
Zuri said quietly, looking at her husband's face.
He had lost his cool.
His eyes were wide. His jaw clenched. The calm, collected veteran was gone, replaced by a father caught in the middle of something far beyond his control.
Rachel's voice cut through the tension.
"Now... It's hard to say for sure," she began, her tone calm, but with a weight behind every word. "But with this information..."
She turned the tablet slightly in her hand, her voice calm but heavy.
"We believe your son..."
A pause. Just long enough to let the silence thicken.
"...is the one we've been searching for."
"What? The one you've been looking for? What do you mean by that?"
Zuri's voice wavered, caught between confusion and rising dread.
She sat close beside Daniel, her hand wrapped around his.
Tight. Tighter.
Her grip trembled as her anxiety spiked—like her body was bracing for a truth she wasn't ready to hear.
"Inhale—exhale."
Rachel took a slow breath, grounding herself. Her fingers hovered over the edge of the tablet, hesitating, just for a moment.
"It began sixty-three years ago... when the Nyxborns first appeared."
Her voice was steady, reverent—like she was about to open a vault sealed by time itself.
She turned the tablet around.
Displayed on the screen was a weathered letter.
Its edges frayed, the ink faded, stamped with a crest none of them recognized.
"This letter..." Rachel paused, eyes scanning each face in the room.
"...was written by Aetherius. A message... from god."
Silence.
Even the heart monitor seemed to hold its breath.
Rachel's eyes dropped to the screen. She took a breath, then read aloud:
"I have fused the blood of a Nyxborn and an Angel. I will send this DNA forty-seven years into the future."
"Noah, when the time is right, assemble a team of extraordinary warriors. Find this weapon..."
"...and use it to end this futile war."
Her voice lingered on that final line.
The room went still.
Daniel's fingers twitched slightly in Zuri's grasp.
Jamal's eyes narrowed, jaw tight.
Zuri stared at the screen, then at Rachel.
"Umm... what does this have to do with my son?"
Zuri's voice broke the silence, her brows furrowed in confusion. Her grip on Daniel's hand tightened.
Her eyes darted between Rachel and David, searching for a straight answer.
"It has a lot to do with him," Rachel said, placing the tablet gently in her lap.
"Considering this is the highest Primal Energy output ever recorded."
Rachel straightened her posture, her eyes fixed straight ahead.
"But we can't know for sure, not unless we take him with us."
Her voice was steady. Her expression? Dead serious.
"No."
Zuri locked eyes with Rachel, her gaze unflinching, sharp, protective, burning with quiet fire.
"I don't believe it. And I don't care."
She spoke through clenched teeth.
"I almost lost my son today, and now you want to send him off to war—based on some old letter?"
The room temperature began to rise.
She let go of Daniel's hand and crossed her arms, her posture rigid, her glare burning.
"Absolutely not."
Rachel flinched slightly at the heat—literal and emotional—but kept her composure.
We're not sending him to war," she said carefully, raising both hands.
"We just want to run tests. That's it. We need to confirm if he's really the Hybrid."
"What? My son is not an object!"
Zuri shot to her feet.
The heat around her spiked like an engine running hot — sharp, suffocating.
Her aura pulsed off her skin in waves.
Rachel didn't move.
Daniel, still half-sitting up in bed, flinched at the surge.
"Mom... can I get a say in this?"
His voice was steady as he looked at his mom.
Zuri turned sharply.
"You don't need to worry about this, Daniel. I'm handling it."
Her hand came out — not harsh, but firm — as if to guide him back down.
But it didn't feel like guidance.
It felt like control.
And for the first time, Daniel looked at her not just as his mother, but as a wall between him and the truth.
"Zuri, you need to calm down. You're going to overheat."
Jamal stepped behind her, gently placing his hands on her shoulders. He turned her to face him, looking into her eyes, steady and calm, trying to ground her.
"Eh — No!"
Zuri slapped his hands away, her voice loud and sharp.
"DON'T TELL ME TO CALM DOWN!" Her chest rose and fell, the heat radiating off her skin like a furnace.
"Mom, just hear me out," Daniel called out to his mom, but his words never reached her, as her anger defined her surroundings.
She pointed a trembling hand toward Rachel and David.
"Did you not hear what these kids are planning to do to our son? And you're not even on my side?"
The words came out brittle, not just from rage, but from something else.
Something deeper.
Confusion.
She stared at Jamal, blinking, trying to make sense of him.
"I'm on your side. We're on the same side."
Jamal held his ground, voice low, trying not to escalate.
"But we can't keep going like this if you keep getting..."
His words trailed off, hesitant — not wanting to light another fuse.
Zuri's eyes narrowed.
"Getting what?" she snapped.
She stepped forward, both hands jabbing toward her chest.
"Because from where I'm standing, I'm the only one who cares about our son's safety!"
Her voice cracked — louder now, sharper.
"You realize Daniel could've died today? And you didn't even shed a tear!"
She mimicked his voice in a mocking baritone.
"Oh, I'm glad you're okay, son.' That's it?"
She scoffed.
"Do you even love him?"
"What?"
Jamal's face contorted — brows knit, lips tight.
He looked stunned. Wounded.
"Then show it," Zuri spat.
"Show your empat—"
"ZURI! THERE ARE NO TEARS!"
Jamal's voice exploded, shaking the room.
"THEY'RE GONE. I SHED THEM YEARS AGO—FOR EVERY LIFE I FAILED TO SAVE."
He stepped back, hands trembling.
"For the ones who died saving me."
He dragged his palm down his face, breath shallow.
"I came home with no friends."
His voice dropped.
And then—
He looked her dead in the eyes.
"You know why?"
His next words dropped like bricks.
"Because I dropped a three-thousand-pound bomb on them."
The silence afterward was deafening.
Zuri's hands flew up, covering her mouth. Her knees buckled.
Daniel sat up slightly in bed, eyes wide, frozen in place.
It was the first time they'd seen Jamal raise his voice.
His shoulders dropped. The fight drained from his eyes.
"I... I'm sorry."
Jamal turned and walked toward the door.
"Jamal. No—wait!"
Zuri called after him, reaching out — but he was already gone.
Rachel looked at Daniel — her face stunned but softened with empathy.
She hadn't expected the outburst.
David, meanwhile, shifted his gaze between Zuri and Jamal, his brows slightly furrowed.
He looked like a man standing in the middle of a building collapse, silently asking himself:
Am I witnessing a marriage fall apart in real-time?