The sharp smell of damp earth and crushed grass was the first thing that filtered through Alexander’s senses. He opened his eyes slowly, the blinding blue sky above forcing him to wince as a thumping beat against the inside of his skull. His body felt heavy drained of the erratic electric current that had been driving him just hours before.

He rolled his head to the side, his cheek pressing into the cool turf.

Marcus was sitting casually on the sleek hood of the Shelby, a lit cigarette dangling from his lips as he watched the kid stir. The engine of the muscle car was ticking softly as it cooled down in the middle of the isolated field.

"You finally woke up, prince" said Marcus, blowing a thick stream of smoke into the clean air. "Tell me, how does your head feel right now?"

Alexander didn’t answer immediately. He stared at the horizon, his thoughts muddy and disjointed like a man waking up from a devastating, multi-day alcohol bender.

"Look, kid... I went through the exact same shit you’re dealing with right now" said Marcus, his deep voice dropping into a rare, sober tone as he hopped down from the hood. "That terrifying wave of euphoria. Feeling like you’re invincible. Your blood runs so hot that the pure rush of adrenaline feels just as good as fucking a prime piece of ass. I understand exactly what’s happening inside your system."

Marcus walked over, standing right above him with his hands shoved into his pockets.

"But you need to pull yourself back to reality, old friend" said Marcus, his eyes dead serious. "Your mind is on the verge of a catastrophic collapse. I’ve seen way too many promising rookies lose their grip and fry their brains because they couldn’t handle the metabolic surge."

As the fog in Alexander’s mind began to clear, a sudden, violent wave of nausea seized his core. He rolled onto his hands and knees, his abdominal muscles contracting painfully as he began to vomit violently into the tall grass, his body rejecting the residual chemical toxins with a series of ragged, pathetic wheezes.

With the physical purging came the sudden, crushing weight of his memories.

The image of Lilly slammed into his mind—the raw terror etched into her pale face as she cowered against the shattered bathroom tile. The realization hit him like a physical blow. While the violence had been happening, he distinctly remembered feeling like a prisoner inside his own flesh. His limbs had moved with a terrifying autonomy, reducing his actual consciousness to a helpless, silent spectator trapped behind his own eyes, unable to stop the monster his body had become.

Alexander slowly forced his upper body up, wiping a string of bitter fluid from his lip as he sat back on his heels. Marcus reached out, offering him a fresh, cold bottle of water.

Alexander grabbed it with shaking fingers, rinsed his mouth out twice, and then poured the remaining freezing liquid straight over his head, letting it slick his dark hair back as it cooled his burning skin.

"I lost control... didn’t I?" asked Alexander, his deep voice carrying a raw, gravelly rasp as he looked up at the older agent.

"Way too much, kid" said Marcus, a grim, humorless expression settling over his face. "I just hope to God this doesn’t escalate into something worse by the time we get back. For now, you can forget about going back to the academy today. TMC does not tolerate volatile, high-conflict assets out in the open. The organization has a very specific, iron-clad public image to protect, and you just put a massive target on your back." 𝐟𝕣𝕖𝐞𝐰𝕖𝚋𝐧𝗼𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝗰𝐨𝐦

Alexander dragged his heavy frame up from the turf, leaning his back against the warm hood of the Shelby as his dark eyes locked onto the horizon.

"How do you control it?" asked Alexander, his voice a low, exhausting rasp.

Marcus took a slow drag from his cigarette, the orange cherry glowing brightly against the gray morning shadows.

"It’s complicated" said Marcus, his eyes tracking the smoke as it drifted into the wind. "It’s practically a hard drug in your system, kid, and it will never stop demanding more and more from you. You have to find a way to actively clear your mind... I fucking hate saying this, and I know I sound like a total piece of shit, but when I finally walked away from my mom and Ashley, it wasn’t for their safety. It was for my own. I’m just a goddamn selfish bastard."

He paused, taking a deep, heavy pull from the filter as if he were actively forcing himself to relive a dark, hidden past.

"When I first got recruited into this world, they invited me to Stephen’s private gym too" said Marcus, his voice dropping into a cold, gritty rumble. "I trained there for several months. It actually took me a bit longer than you to lose my grip on reality, though I don’t know if that’s a good or a bad thing. Either my body has a higher natural tolerance to that toxic garbage, or you’re just a terrifyingly perfect sponge for absorbing that shit."

Marcus flicked a trail of ash onto the grass, a grim smirk breaking across his face.

"But regardless... Ashley, my own sister, became my unhinged obsession" said Marcus, his eyes dead as he stared into the distance. "I couldn’t breathe without fucking her. It was the only thing my brain could process—constantly needing to fill myself with her, to possess her entire existence. My obsession reached such a psychotic level that I started doing exactly what you just did today. I tracked her every single move without her knowing. I brutally murdered guys who did nothing more than wave hello to her on the street. I turned into a bloodthirsty psychopath..."

Marcus turned his head, his cold gaze locking directly onto Alexander’s eyes with a chilling, vacant intensity.

"I got obsessed with something else too" said Marcus, his voice flat and detached as he dropped the cigarette butt and crushed it beneath his boot. "High-risk assassination missions. That’s exactly where I earned my nickname, Reaper. I reached a point where I only lived to hunt and kill. The second a target was dead, I would rush straight back to Ashley just to fuck her for hours. Massacring people and taking her body... those were the only two things on this earth that could successfully anesthetize my mind."