Frank Holloway and David Mercer had met in the army twenty-five years ago.
David was already a squad leader then — seasoned, steady, the kind of soldier who led from the front and never asked anyone to do something he wouldn't do himself. Frank was a green recruit, fresh off the bus, still fumbling with his bootlaces.
They were from the same part of Northvale Province. Same county, practically neighbors. In the military, that meant something. David took the kid under his wing without being asked — showed him the ropes, covered for his mistakes, turned a nervous teenager into a competent soldier.
Then, during a training exercise, everything changed.
A simulated charge went wrong. Live shrapnel — equipment failure, they said later, though nobody was ever held accountable — and David threw himself in front of Frank without a second's hesitation.
The fragment that should have killed Frank buried itself in David's shoulder instead. The injury was permanent. He never regained full range of motion in his right arm, and the discharge papers came six months later. Medical retirement. Twenty-eight years old with a busted shoulder and a pension that wouldn't cover rent.
From that day on, Frank Holloway considered David Mercer his brother. Not a friend. Not a comrade. Brother. The kind of debt that rewrites the code you live by.
During his remaining years of service, Frank didn't waste time. He studied — taught himself nights and weekends, grinding through correspondence courses and prep materials. When he was honorably discharged, he'd already passed the university entrance exams. Went straight to college, got his degree, and was assigned to the Education Bureau in his hometown.
Being a veteran and a college graduate in those days was a golden combination. Frank rose through the ranks quickly — principalship material within five years, everyone said. A man with a bright future.
Then the news came.
David and his wife. A car accident. Both gone.
One child — a boy, four years old — left behind.
After the grief subsided, Frank raised Ethan as his own. Never treated him differently. Never let him feel like a burden or a charity case. And when the kid tested into Ashford Prep with the highest score in the entire county, Frank was so proud he told everyone he met for a month. Happier than when he'd gotten into university himself.
Now this same kid had publicly humiliated a teacher, dropped out of the best school in the province, and was sitting across from him with an expression that could only be described as "strategically innocent."
Frank was not amused.
"You little punk." He released Ethan's ear but didn't sit back down. "Start talking. You skip the best school in the province, you turn down Helen Archer — do you have any idea what her name is worth? She's a legend in physics education across the entire country!"
"And you just threw it away like it was nothing!"
Ethan picked at his ear, wincing. "Uncle Frank, word travels way too fast in the education system. Also — and I mean this with love — your personality is too blunt. That's why you're stuck running the worst school in the city instead of a provincial position."
"SHUT UP!"
The roar was magnificent. It was the kind of sound that could be heard three houses down.
"My temper is what it is! You think you can lecture ME now? If you don't explain yourself today, I'm breaking your legs!"
Ethan sighed, dropped the smile, and told him everything.
Not the System — he could never tell anyone about the System. But everything else. The two years at Ashford Prep. The bullying. The stolen homework, the cockroaches, the slashed sneakers. Greer using him as a punching bag every time she was in a bad mood. Thornton looking the other way because Ethan didn't have the right parents or the right bank account.
It was the first time Frank had heard any of it.
The fury drained from his face, replaced by something worse. Something raw.
He sat down heavily, and for a long moment he didn't speak. When he did, his voice was different. Quieter.
"Why didn't you tell me?"
"What would you have done, Uncle Frank? Gone to the school and caused a scene? That would've made it worse." Ethan shrugged, but his jaw was tight. "I handled it."
Frank's hands were fists on his knees. He was angry — furious — but most of the anger was aimed at himself.
His temper. His bluntness. His inability to play the political game. If he'd been principal of a city-level school instead of the worst one in the district, Greer and Thornton wouldn't have dared touch his kid. Not with ten times the courage.
But he was who he was. And because of that, his boy had suffered in silence for two years.
After a long breath, Frank made his decision.
"Fine. If that's how it happened, I won't push you to go back. But your stunt is all over the education network now — no school in the city will take you. So here's what's going to happen: you give yourself a few days to cool down, and then you transfer to my school."
"Your school? Uncle Frank, more school?"
Frank's glare could have peeled paint. "What, you want to drop out at seventeen?"
Ethan shifted gears, his expression sliding into something sly and hopeful. "I'll go. I'll absolutely go. But... I have a small condition."
Frank narrowed his eyes. "A condition. For going to school."
"A tiny one. Microscopic, really."
"Out with it."
Ethan rubbed his hands together, fox-who-found-the-henhouse energy radiating from every pore.
"How's your financial situation these days, Uncle Frank? I need to borrow some money."
Frank's confusion was genuine. "Money? What for? Wait — is this about the house? The agent said you wanted to sell?" His voice softened a fraction. "Kid, that house is what your parents left you. If you need cash, tell me. Don't sell it."
He could see Ethan's expression wavering and pressed the advantage:
"Here, I'll give you extra this time. Use the next few days off to go to the mall — buy yourself some decent clothes. You're almost an adult. You should dress like one."
As he spoke, his hand was already reaching for his wallet.
"I need three million marks."
Frank's hand continued reaching for his wallet.
"Three million, sure. Listen, kid, money's just money. Don't feel bad about—"
His brain caught up to his ears.
"How... how much?"
Ethan watched his uncle's eyes go from normal-sized to dinner-plate-sized in approximately one-third of a second.
"Uncle Frank, please don't look at me like that. You're scaring me."
"You're scared? You just asked me for three MILLION marks in one breath! Tell me the truth — have you been scammed?"
Frank's mind had already constructed an elaborate scenario involving online fraud, a fake investment scheme, and possibly a kidnapping.
"Scammed? Uncle Frank, please. I'm the one who scams people. Nobody scams me."
Frank studied the kid's smug expression and barely restrained the urge to smack it off his face.
"Then what do you need three million marks for?"
Ethan leaned forward. "Well, you know about Dr. Archer wanting to take me as her student. And you know why she wanted me, right?"
"Something about you being decent at physics. Stop beating around the bush." Frank rapped his knuckles against Ethan's skull for emphasis.
Ethan rubbed his head with exaggerated hurt. "Uncle Frank, 'decent'? Decent? Fund your nephew today, and tomorrow the two of us can stand on the Nobel Prize stage."
Frank rolled his eyes so hard it was audible. He wasn't going to take that kind of nonsense seriously, but he was starting to understand the shape of what Ethan was actually asking.
"You want to use this money to go abroad? Study physics at a university overseas?"
Ethan almost laughed. Given what was currently loaded into his brain, there probably wasn't a physicist on the planet who could teach him anything.
"Close, but not quite. I want to set up my own lab. Build something."
Frank stared at him.
"Build something," he repeated flatly. "You. A seventeen-year-old high school dropout. Want to set up a laboratory and build something."
He opened his mouth for what was clearly about to be a spectacular lecture about fantasy versus reality, about children playing scientist, about the arrogance of youth—
And then he met Ethan's eyes.
The kid wasn't smiling anymore. There was no trace of the sly, ingratiating nephew act. What Frank saw instead was steady, unwavering certainty. The kind of look that left no room for doubt or jest.
"You're serious," Frank said.
"Uncle Frank." Ethan's voice was calm. "The reason my grades were bad in high school — it wasn't just the bullying. I've been spending the last two years working on something. Theoretical research. The theory is complete. All I need is the materials and equipment to build it."
He couldn't tell Frank about the System. So this was the cover story: two years of secret research. It was plausible enough — it explained why his grades had suffered, why he'd been distracted, why he'd stayed at Ashford Prep despite the misery.
Because the alternative — telling people that a high school student had derived nuclear reactor theory in a single morning — wasn't going to inspire confidence. It was going to inspire psychiatric evaluations.
Frank stared at him for a long time.
Then he stood up.
"Show me."
PLZ Throw Powerstones.