Location the moon:
The Moon hung silent and barren, its craters bathed in cold starlight. Earth hovered in the black sky like a blue and green jewel. Tyler stood motionless on the dusty surface, golden hair cascading in waves behind him, cloak trailing like solar wind. His eyes, once alive with awe and possibility, now burned with quiet intensity. He had come here for solitude, for silence—a place to think. To breathe. To reflect.
He had done so much in so little time. In just a single day of arriving in this world, he had saved countless lives. Torn through collapsing buildings to rescue survivors. Halted hurricanes before they touched the coast. Crushed criminal operations before they even knew he was coming. All in America. Always in America. As if the rest of the world didn't burn too.
He sighed.
"So," he said aloud, the sound swallowed by the vacuum and preserved only in his internal field, "when are you going to reveal yourself?"
There was a pause. Then a low chuckle. Cold. Familiar.
"I was wondering when you'd finally call me out."
A voice. It didn't echo. It simply was. Carving its way through thought, through memory.
"Although, I'll admit, I wasn't sure you even knew. For a moment there, I almost believed you were blind to me."
Tyler narrowed his eyes but didn't flinch. "It would've been arrogant to think I'd arrive in this world without some form of a Void. Just because I'm not Bob Reynolds... doesn't mean I'm free. I felt something before. But I wasn't sure. This was a test."
The shadow took form—not physically, but mentally. A presence behind his thoughts, standing across from him like a reflection with its own life. Cloaked in darkness, humanoid, but flickering between states. Not quite real. Not quite illusion.
"I thought I absorbed you," Tyler said.
The voice shifted, darker, older.
"You absorbed part of me. Not all of you left the abyss we were in. You took fragments. You took enough to stabilize. To believe. But not enough to remember."
Tyler turned fully now, his brow furrowed. "How can you exist? How can we be separate at all?"
"Because of the trauma, Tyler," the Void answered.
It was the first time he had used that name. Tyler felt it in his chest like a needle.
"We survived the end of everything. The fall of our universe. The silence after the screams. And before we ended up in that quiet place, we endured horrors you can't comprehend. We were hunted. Ripped apart. Put back together. Again and again. Until we weren't whole anymore."
Tyler stepped forward, fists clenched.
"What horrors? What happened?"
"You're not ready for that," the Void said. "I'm not telling you because I don't want to see what happens when those memories come rushing back. Repressed memories aren't fiction. They're survival. You are the part of me that held onto hope. The piece that ran. The mask I wore."
He paused, letting it sink in.
"And I stayed. I became what we had to be. To survive. I killed those things in the dark. I consumed them. Their power. Their essence. And when the Entity found us, it tried to take what was left of our light. Couldn't do it. So it fractured us. Split us. And it gave you the catalyst—the Golden Serum."
Tyler's breathing deepened.
Flashes struck him suddenly—images. Teeth. Fire. Screams that bent space. A hand reaching out in the dark. A scream that became light. Then nothing.
He staggered.
"You're not real," he whispered.
The Void only smiled.
"I am more real than anything you've clung to. You've only been in this world a day. One day. You think you're grounded? You think you've found clarity? I've been in that abyss for what felt like eternity. While you were floating around playing god."
Sentry tried to steel himself. "I've helped people. I've healed. I've saved."
"Yes," the Void said with no mockery. "You stopped disasters. Pulled children from rubble. Saved the girl—Sarah. A mistake you still don't understand."
Tyler's jaw tightened. "Don't call her a mistake."
"Not her. You. You were reckless. You didn't understand your power. You didn't take time to learn. You pushed, and someone else paid the price."
"I'm not like you."
"You're right," the Void said, stepping closer.
"That's who I am. Who you forgot. What I had to become to survive the end of everything… and the horrors that followed."
He paused again. "You want to help? Good. I want that too. But what are you going to do about the Supes? What about Homelander?"
Sentry said nothing.
"You could end him. Right now. Quietly. A pulse of energy. Some exotic decay. They'd never even know it was you. But you're not going to do it, are you?"
Tyler shook his head slowly. "Not yet. Because if I do it now, without proof, without reason, all they'll see is a golden god killing an American icon. He becomes a martyr. The chaos doesn't end—it escalates."
The Void chuckled. "So young. So soft."
He paced behind Sentry like a shadow. "I've seen the outcome. I've lived it. This world will fight you. Vought will fight you. The government. The media. The Supes. You're trying to carry one million suns in your chest and pretend it doesn't burn."
Sentry said nothing for a long time.
Then finally: "So what's your role in all this? Are you my enemy?"
The Void turned his head. The stars reflected in his eyes like dying embers.
"No. I'm your past. I'm your truth. I'm the rest of you. And when the time comes, we'll become whole again. It won't be a fight. It'll be natural. Seamless. I'll be waiting."
And then he was gone.
Tyler stood alone.
Silence returned to the Moon. But it wasn't the same silence.
He exhaled, closing his eyes.
Was any of that true? Was it all real?
He didn't know. And that terrified him.
But what he did know was this: things had to change.
He opened his eyes, gaze locked on Earth's swirling clouds and seas.
"No more mistakes," he whispered. "No more fumbling around. Time to take this seriously."
The winds around him stirred. Energy hummed beneath his skin.
"No more acting like I can do whatever I want just because I have power. I need to think. To lead. To be better."
He lifted off the surface, cloak trailing behind him like fire.
"I will be the Golden Guardian. The hero this world needs."
He flew back toward Earth, burning like a second sun.