The lights in the room were incredibly, painfully bright. They flared before my eyes like supernovas, pulsing, beating, hammering into my brain…or maybe that was just the gash that snaked from my hairline to my eyebrow leaking blood.

I blinked once. Twice. The red light of the camera swam in my vision, doubling, tripling, then returning back to normal as a shadow moved behind it.

“Welcome back.” He purred, low and satisfied. I knew his voice—had known it for most of my life now from the first time I caught him before he slipped through the monkey bars in elementary school to the moment I made the choice to pull a family out of a sinking car after an accident, but failed to save his mother before her car sank into the depths of the Iris River to this moment, sitting here, strapped to this chair after he handed my ass to me atop the Stone Tower.

I moved my wrists, bound in ancient stone shackles that absorbed the only magic that I had, rendering it little more than a whiff of smoke. Both wrists felt sore—healing from breaks, and I blinked up at him. The mask over my eyes felt sharp, stuck to my face by sweat, blood, and grime, cutting into the soft skin around my lids.

“Seamus.” I wheezed, panting against the restraints, my ribs screaming in agony.

“Your healing is slower thanks to the manacles. You’ve lost control of the city. Your friends are all dead. All except one.” He smiled, and nodded toward my right. A stage light flared to life and there she sat. My heart dropped out of my body at the sight of her tied to that chair, but she sat up straight, her beautiful dark brown eyes bright with hatred and defiance directed at Seamus. She leaned forward with a growl, straining against the restraints, and my heart squeezed painfully in my chest.

“Why is she here?” I growled, and Seamus’ grin grew positively wicked.

“I thought you might want some company.” Seamus smiled cheerfully. “After all, there should be at least one person here to witness the downfall of the world’s most beloved superhero. Why not the love of his life?”

Alina bared her teeth at him, her auburn curls sticking to her forehead from the beads of sweat forming there.

“The Raven doesn’t even know who I am.” Alina sneered. “You have the wrong person, asshole.”

“I’m here to offer you a trade.” He opened his arms out wide, turning toward me to address me and gesturing to me and then to her, seemingly nonplussed by her words.

“I don’t negotiate with terrorists.” I mumbled, my head falling back against the chair.

“My terms are simple.” He went on, undeterred. “But if you aren’t interested, I’ll just kill her and be done with it.”

My head snapped toward him, eyes sharpening as I glared at him.

“You haven’t killed anyone in your entire life, Seamus. You wouldn’t start now.” I sneered, calling his bluff.

“I’m so glad you said that.” Seamus sighed, practically radiating with excitement. “See, your arrogance was exactly what I’d hoped for.”

He pointed to a screen that flared to life, showing a room full of hostages in the stone tower. Several armed, masked men patrolled the room.

“You have such a high opinion of me. You think I’m morally sound. That I would do the right thing just like I always did when we were kids. When I still had someone to teach me right and wrong. When I still had someone who gave a fuck about me and what happened to me.” He sneered.

“You know I—“

“I don’t want to hear your excuses. I’ve lived with them for fifteen years. Fifteen years of ‘there was nothing I could do.’ Fifteen years of ‘she was beyond saving.’ Fifteen years of replaying that moment in my head everyday where you decided someone else’s life was more important than hers. Fifteen years of planning what I could do to make you feel even a fraction of what I felt when you watched her drown.” He panted, clenching his fists.

“These people—they had nothing to do with the choices I made. They were my choices and mine alone.” I calmly told him.

“That’s the thing.” Seamus quietly said. “Everyone is affected by your choices whether you want them to be or not.”

I opened my mouth, and then closed it. He was right. I couldn’t deny it.

“When you donned the black mask and cloak, you swore an oath to The Ravens. You swore to protect at all costs, to never reveal your nature, your name, or your face. You swore to serve without question. It is the choices that you made that led us to this moment where you will watch every single one of these people die.” Seamus turned toward the screen.

“If you do this,” I tried to steady my voice, but the rising panic in my body threatened to make it quiver, “there is no going back. You cannot intake a life. Please. Reconsider.”

He turned over his shoulder and smiled sadly,

“I’ve reconsidered for a long time. But all reconsiderations have led to the same conclusion—you—destroyed in every sense of the word.”

Seamus picked up his phone, and dialed. The phone rang once.

“Seamus.” I wheezed, straining against the restraints.

It trilled again.

“Seamus, please.” I begged, my voice taking on a higher octave.

The line stopped ringing, whimpering in the background the only sound.

“Don’t.” I pleaded.

“Do it.” Seamus quietly commanded, hanging up the phone.

“Bastard.” Alina yelled, and the screaming began as the men raised their guns and opened fire on the crowd. I watched in horror at the onslaught or bullets and terror.

When the gunfire finally stopped, Seamus turned toward me and said,

“Are you ready to hear my terms of trade now?”

Tears slipped free of my eyes as I gaped in horror at the screen.

“What have you done?” I whispered.

“Here are my terms: I untie her and she goes free, but you must unmask yourself before god and everyone.” He explained.

My eyes darted to him. Unmasking myself was a death sentence, and he knew it. Revealing my identity triggered an automatic kill order for me, and every Raven in the world would hunt me down. I would become a traitor, a liability, and a dead man walking.

My gaze shifted to Alina, who sat in the chair, her eyes fixed on me. All I could see was that little girl I fell in love with all those years ago. The one who comforted me when my father died, who held my hand when the fireworks went off during the Fourth of July because the sound of them reminded me of Afghanistan, who kissed me in the back of her car before I deployed again back to that hellscape and told me she’d wait for me forever if she had to, who shed tears at my grave because joining the ravens meant that my civilian self had to die. The girl I loved so deeply and irrevocably that I almost broke in two watching her weep for my like her soul was broken in two. The girl I would love until I was ashes in the wind.

“Have you made your choice?” He asked. “Oh! And if you’re wondering about the cameras, I’ve cut into every broadcast in the area, so everyone at home watching can see who their hometown hero has been all these years too.”

My heart sank. Everything I had worked for all these years. Everything that I’d sacrificed for. I couldn’t lie my way out of a television broadcast. I couldn’t claim it never happened. This would be recorded, reposted, and analyzed for years if I made the choice to unmask myself.

And yet…

What would my life be worth if I didn’t? If I let her die for my pride? Because I was afraid and ashamed?

Seamus approached me, unhooking one of the manacles to allow me the freedom to make my choice. I sighed, leaning toward.

“Seamus.” I whispered. “I’m sorry. For everything. I’m sorry I didn’t save your mother. I’m sorry I wasn’t a better friend, a better man. I’m sorry for everything.”

“Alina.” I turned toward her. “You are the love of my life. You’re everything I’ve ever wanted and hoped for. I want you to be happy. I want you to know that none of this is your fault. I have loved you and will love you until the day I die.”

I reached up, unfastened the restraints on the mask and let it fall into my lap. Alina let out an audible gasp, tears falling down her face as Seamus released her and released me. Alina shook, shock evident on her face as she took a tentative step toward me, reaching out.

“Sam.” She whispered. A whiz and a crack were the only warning I got that a sniper had fired nearby. Alina’s eyes widened in horror at the recognition of the sound as her face whipped toward me. The bullet went cleanly through my neck and I fell to my knees.

Alina screamed, going to her knees before me, cradling me in her arms, and all I could think as the world went dark was how much I missed being in her arms. How much I would miss lying there in her arms. And yet how grateful I was that this was the way I got to go.

I know it was selfish.

But if I had to die, this is the way I wanted to go. In her arms. Free of doubt. Free of regret.

Just…Free.