Finian looked up; the row of cells seemed to stretch into infinity. With no other leads, he began the grim task of searching for Locki. He walked with his hands buried deep in his pockets, his boots clicking against the cold floor. Every cell he passed told a story of violence—splattered with fresh blood and littered with bleached bones.
The crowbar, the stairs, and now these cells, Finian mused, his mind racing. Something happened here while I was away. It's too convenient. It's as if they knew exactly when I'd arrive.
He began to connect the dots
The bike. The fall. The lab.
Finian stopped walking.
"…Nah."
A smirk tugged at his lips.
"That's too clean."
He exhaled.
"Someone wanted me here."
He retraced his steps, mentally recounting the journey from his house to the court and finally to this godforsaken place. Everything had gone too smoothly. There had been no resistance, no interference. He stepped back into the lift, his eyes scanning the control panel. He had checked every floor, and every button seemed ordinary.
Knowing these people, there's always a catch.
On a hunch, he jammed his palm against several buttons at once. For a heartbeat, nothing happened. Then, the floor fell out from under him.
The lift plummeted with such violent velocity that Finian was thrown against the ceiling. He scrambled for a handhold, his fingers straining as he clung to the light fixture while the car screeched downward. His eyes began to water from the sheer G-force. He blinked rapidly, trying to clear his vision, but a sudden jolt sent a loose shoe—discarded in the corner—flying upward, striking him squarely in the face.
The impact broke his grip. For a terrifying moment, gravity became his enemy as he tumbled through the air inside the falling shaft. He crashed through the emergency hatch, landing hard on the floor of the lift just as it hissed to a halt.
Dazed, Finian stood up. A harsh, overhead light blinded him for a second, revealing a new, sterile hallway. As he stepped out, the air seemed to shimmer. A holographic interface flickered into existence, overlaying his vision. Suddenly, the world was data: he could see the exact room temperature, the lingering heat signatures of bodies, and the structural integrity of the walls.
His gaze fell on a discarded watch on the floor. The HUD immediately pulled a file: manufacturer, sale date, and the name of the original purchaser.
"Damn," Finian whispered, rubbing his eyes. "Who designed these optics?"
A rhythmic, synthetic pulse echoed through the hall. "WARNING: PRIMAL BATTERIES UNSTABLE. ALL SECURITY PROTOCOLS DISABLED."
"So, the house is wide open," Finian noted, a grim smile tugging at his lips.
He moved deeper into the complex until he found a digital map. The prison was massive—spanning the area of five stadiums. His eyes scanned the directory until they landed on a high-security wing: ELITE CELLS.
"Gotcha."
He sprinted toward the wing, his boots thundering against the metal. He reached a massive sliding door and, rather than looking for a keycard, he put his weight into a single, devastating punch. The reinforced metal buckled and tore under his raw strength.
He stepped inside. The first door was labeled with a single name: LOCKI.
Finian burst into the room. It was empty save for a futuristic chair draped in heavy restraints. The shackles hung open, mocking him.
He was here. Finian sighed, the weight of the situation finally settling on him. Locki had all the information, but he still couldn't take Foster down. No one can. Everything is under Foster's thumb.
"It was one versus the world from the start, wasn't it, brother?"
He turned back to the map, searching for the nerve center of the facility. CONTROL ROOM.
Finian didn't wait. He kicked the control room doors off their tracks before they could even slide open. Inside, he found a terminal that had been dark for some time. He bypassed the encryption and searched the security logs. There was only one file left on the drive, titled: THIS IS WHAT YOU ARE LOOKING FOR.
He hit play. The grainy footage showed a dark figure escorting a restrained Locki toward a waiting jet. Seconds later, the craft roared into the sky. Finian slammed a USB drive into the port, transferred the file, and headed for the hangar.
He found the runway, but it was sealed tight. Noticing a heavy iron lever near the bay doors, he threw his entire weight into it. The mechanism groaned, the floor shook, and the massive shutters ground open.
Cold air rushed in. Outside, the sky had turned a bruised purple. Thunder cracked overhead, and a torrential rain began to lash the forest below.
"The sky is weeping," Finian said softly. "Just like that day."
"Finian! Father says our long-lost brother is home!"
Little Liora ran into the playroom, her face a mask of annoyance. Finian dropped his toys, looking up in confusion.
"We have another brother?"
Liora nodded vigorously. "Where has he been? Why show up now?"
"I don't know," she huffed, pulling back the heavy curtains of the window. "I wish he'd stayed gone. Look, there he is. Our 'big brother,' Locki."
Finian stood and joined her at the glass. His eyes widened. While he and Liora shared the family's shock of blonde hair, the boy standing in the courtyard had hair as black as a raven's wing. He was talking to a young girl, the two of them sharing a quiet laugh.
"He's definitely our brother," Finian noted, watching the way the boy moved. "And that girl... that must be his wife."
"How can you be sure?" Liora asked.
"Look at his eyes," Finian whispered. "When he laughs, he has that same look Father gets. But..." He paused, his young brow furrowing. "It's not a happy look. It's a look of pain."
In the years that followed, the resentment didn't fade easily. Their mother, who had initially been cold, eventually began to treat Locki as her own, which only fueled the siblings' jealousy.
Then came the day the world broke.
Their parents vanished without a trace. In the vacuum of their absence, Locki stepped in. When they cried, he told them their parents were simply working abroad—that one day they would reunite and talk about how close they had all become.
Locki became their cook, their teacher, and their protector. He raised them through the hardest years of their lives, shielding them from a truth they weren't ready to hear.
Until the day he took them to the graves.
Standing before the headstones of their mother and father, Finian and Liora collapsed. The lies were gone, replaced by the cold reality of stone and soil. As they sobbed, they felt a pair of strong arms wrap around them both.
"Don't cry," Locki whispered, hugging them tightly. "Your big brother is still here."
They clung to him like he was the only thing keeping them from falling off the edge of the earth.
"Stop now," Locki teased gently, though his own voice was thick with emotion. "Mother and Father will be cross with me if they see you sad. They'll think I've been beating you again."
Through their tears, Finian and Liora let out a small, broken giggle.
"There," Locki smiled, a warm, genuine expression that reached his tired eyes. "Those are the siblings I know."
Finian stood on the edge of the rain-slicked runway, the memory fading as the cold wind bit at his face. He gripped the USB drive in his pocket.
"I'm coming, Locki," he whispered into the storm.