There was truly no way of knowing what to expect after hearing the gunshot. At first, Josh was frozen in place, but then the thought of Margot bleeding out in the alleyway made him jump to his feet. It had only taken him a moment to realize that if anything happened it would be his fault; and, consequently, it had taken him mere moments to raise his determination to the point where he was following the pointing of the hostess towards a back door out of the cafe.

Surprisingly, the door wasn’t locked. More surprising still was the scene that Josh found himself bursting in on.

Margot was about twenty feet down the alleyway to his right, with someone he couldn’t see very well on the ground, on their back, at her feet. There was a scattering of trash sprawled up the backstreet towards where he stood, with two toppled trash cans laying on the ground just a short distance away from Margot being the obvious source. The actual events that had led up to this moment were trickier to decode. The woman he considered a would be mentor was no where near as distressed as he expected she would be. He knew she was capable, but a gunshot could have meant anything and it wasn’t the sort of attack that could be handled with strength alone.

But Margot was not entirely reliant on her superhuman strength. And it was the moment that Josh thought that, that the scene before him made sense.

Someone had been sneaking up the alleyway and Margot had probably caught them by surprise. The trashcans had probably been knocked over as she had lunged from her hiding space, the would be attacker was pinned right next to the toppled cans. The gunshot probably hadn’t hit anyone; there wasn’t a sign of blood or serious injury on Margot that Josh could see at least, and there weren’t any sounds of distress or pain. Margot had tackled the person to the ground and the gun that had fired the shot that everyone on the block and probably heard, was knocked to the side of the attacker. Though, the more Josh thought about it, Margot was more the attacker than the person that had been creeping up the alleyway with a gun.

The scene hadn’t stopped just because Josh had stepped outside though. Margot wasn’t careless enough to pause at the sight of Josh. She had lunged down to grapple the now flailing gunman. And the struggle was growing messy. They were a blur of arms and legs as they struggled to maintain a grip on each other and escape the various strikes and holds being exchanged.

“She’s a very capable fighter, isn’t she.” Gul whispered from behind Josh.

Their appearance made sense, but Josh hadn’t heard them at all. Granted, he wasn’t paying attention to anything besides Margot and the gunman sprawled out on the back alley street in a contest of strength.

Gul placed a hand on Josh’s shoulder to move him to the side just enough for them to squeeze past. “But if we don’t step in, it will be a stalemate.”

“What?” Josh didn’t know what else to say.

Margot was incredibly strong and agile, there wasn’t really a scenario that made sense in his head where she lost the fight. But Gul was right, neither Margot or the man seemed to have an upper hand.

“Just the one?” Gul called out to Margot.

Their interruption stopped both of the figures struggling on the ground, at least for a moment. Margot paused just a moment longer than the gunman, who took the opportunity to throw Margot off of them and reach for their weapon.

Much to Josh’s surprise, Gul was the first to react. They pushed Josh back into the open back door of the cafe and leapt into the alleyway. Margot jumped back to attention as well and as soon as she was on her feet again, she was jumping at the gunman. Margot reached him first, stepping behind him and twisting the pistol to the side and trapping their finger in the trigger guard. The gun fired into the brick wall to their right and a shriek of pain confirmed to Josh that their finger was probably broken. The shriek was cut short as Gul made their way in front of the gunman and struck their hand down at them. Josh couldn’t see where the strike connected, but he witnessed the gunman go from being upright on his knees to slumped on the ground.

For a moment, Josh feared that Gul had just murdered the man with a single punch. But Margot quickly put the fear to rest.

“He’s unconscious but still breathing.”

“He’s still conscious.” Gul corrected plainly before leaning down and placing their hand on the man.

After several second of silence, Gul announced, “now he’s unconscious.”

Josh crept quietly and nervously up the back alley. Even though the man was unconscious, he didn’t feel like he should be there. It was still dangerous. There was a gun right there on the ground and it made him panic a little just seeing it.

“Joshua,” Gul had heard his approach and turned to Josh as he stood quietly several feet from the unconscious man. “I would like to test your eyes for a moment.”

“What do you mean?” Josh stammered, unable to meet Margot’s frustrated gaze.

“You are a very intelligent and focused young man. Tell me what your impression of this man is.”

The thought of doing what Gul was suggesting made Josh uncomfortable, but then again almost everything about Gul made Josh at least a little uncomfortable. But after hearing it, Josh couldn’t help but take a closer look at the man sprawled out face down on the ground.

He was light skinned, dark haired, probably six foot tall with a medium build, and dressed casually in nice but inexpensive clothes. All of his clothes were either tan, white, gray, or black. He was incredibly nondescript. So much so that it actively took Josh a moment to realize that that was the point.

“Can I see his face?”

Margot didn’t answer, but flipped the man over. She was careful not to jostle him too much, and kept herself positioned so that she could restrain him at a moment’s notice.

The man’s face was also incredibly average. Clean shaven, well maintained, and no visible scars or skin defects apart from light freckles. His nose was just pronounced enough to be clearly a nose and his jaw was set at such an angle that if there was anything remotely remarkable about the man he might have been incredibly attractive. But there was an oddly specific level of flatness and plainness that kept him from being anything close to remarkable. If Josh wasn’t looking directly at him, he wouldn’t have been able to remember his face at all.

There was only one thing that stood out to Josh. At the wrist, just below an incredibly plain looking digital wristwatch and above the bit of shirt cuff that was pushed up his right arm, there was a hint of a tattoo.

That was Josh’s first thought, but immediately after processing the thought of the word ‘tattoo’ the next logical conclusion shook Josh to his core.

“Roll up his right sleeve.”

Gul let a wide and mildly sinister smile stretch across their face at the order and nodded to Margot to do as Josh said. Josh didn’t see the smile or the nod. He only saw the mark on the man’s arm. It was a cuff tattoo, stretching from just above the wrist to halfway up the forearm. It didn’t look like an intentional design at first, comprising of varying thicknesses of vertical line that wrapped around the man’s whole arm. But it slowly dawned on Josh that it was a very intentional pattern.

“It’s a bar code.” Josh muttered to himself.

“What…” Margot started to ask a question, but Gul quickly interrupted.

“Excellent, Joshua.” Gul said with a slightly more measured smile. “Do me a favor and mark the top, bottom, and a vertical blank space connecting the two with this.”

Gul held uncapped and held out a white plastic marker. It looked like it had a tip like a permanent black marker, but it was a clear or white ink.

“Like a capital letter I with serif.” Gul carried on and shook the marker for Josh to take. “Go on. It’s not going to hurt him, its just a UV marker.”

With a nod from Margot, Josh took the marker and gently drew a line between two of the bar code lines on the man’s arm and then capped it on both ends with a horizontal line. The look that Margot had given him with the nod didn’t make him feel any better about what he was doing. When Josh looked up he noticed that the two identical men that had accompanied Gul to the cafe were now stationed at either end of the alleyway behind the cafe, and the woman that had been with them was standing in the back door to the cafe as well. He had the feeling, amid the confusion of the moment, that he and Margot had been surrounded.

“Steven, would you be so kind as to escort our friend back home?” Gul asked as they looked up to one of the men at the end of the alley.

Both of the men nodded and approached, picked the man up under the arms and began to carry him off back towards the street.

“Jacqueline,” Gul turned to the woman at the back door, “be a dear and flash a badge around so people don’t ask too many questions.”

The woman nodded and retreated back into the cafe.

Josh was left in the back alley, dazed and confused. Margot stood and lifted Josh off his knees with her as she did so. Amid his confusion, one thought surfaced and attempted to untangle what had just transpired.

“Gul, how does that answer my question?”

Gul’s smile subsided and the excitement faded into their normal neutral expression. “You didn’t forget. Good. But you’re right, it can be difficult to glean information from such an unprecedented event.”

“What question did you ask them?” Margot practically hissed the question.

She wasn’t angry, but she was clearly still stressed form her encounter. Her hands were scraped from being dragged across the concrete and she was still breathing heavy. The adrenaline in her system was lingering longer than she wanted it to and it was making it hard to stay calm and collected. Even after practicing sparring with Connor earlier that morning, Margot hadn’t looked this winded.

Josh couldn’t answer, he was still lost in everything that had happened. But Gul took the opportunity to intercede. “Why.”

Margot took a deep breath and centered her gaze on Josh. “That’s a big question. Are you sure you really want to know that?”

A lump formed in Josh’s throat. He wanted to say yes. He wanted to say that it was all that was standing between him and having her give him a mark there on the spot. But the words couldn’t bubble up past his hesitation. No matter how hard he focus, Josh couldn’t bring himself to admit that he wanted to feel safe again; because right then, he felt more afraid of the world than he ever had before.

So, instead, he nodded.

Gul’s smile returned, a slight sinister edge tinged with pity. “Because there will be people in your life that forget about you one day. They’ll move on to succeed and recline in succulent bliss as they reap the rewards for it without ever having to worry another day in their life. And the only way those people can continue to carry on in luxury is if they never remember you. To that end, the one that enjoys the pleasures of the victors will ensure that you are erased from this world.”

There was a pause as Gul took a breath of air in and savored the tension then had created, the fear that manifested across all of Josh’s body language. “Because, when you do not have the chance to succeed but you still contain the potential to grow—as all beings do when they are not crushed into the earth—you pose the greatest threat to the prosperity of the people that would exercise power over you. Because that’s what a mark is, the potential to grow and the draw to a world where you can.”

“I don’t…” Josh fumbled with the few words that did manage to come out of his mouth after Gul’s explanation.

“You won’t. No matter how well I explain it, you won’t be able to make sense of it until you are marked. But when you are, it will cascade down on you. Reality will make itself known.”

“You’re pushing him.” Margot whispered.

“Look at him. He needs it.” Gul whispered back in a gentle voice that did not sound like it belonged to the cold and calculating creature that Josh saw before him. “It will only take a small push. Just a little, and then he can be everything he is able to become. I can feel it.”

There was silence following Gul’s words. Josh didn’t dare respond or ask another question and Margot was struggling to try and find a mix of words that could comfort Josh while also reassuring him that Gul couldn’t be sure, at least a mix of those things that wasn’t a lie.

In that silence, Gul’s eyes grew gleeful. It was as if all their guesses were proving true in accelerated time. “Don’t worry, Joshua. You still have a choice… and time to make it. But you should leave now. Where one of these agents of erasure goes, more will follow.”

“They’re right.” Margot said with a low sigh. “We need to collect Connor and Sara quickly before they do anything foolish.