Season 1, Episode 6 - The Tree Plot VIII - "One More Time..."

Over the next year, Eos and Clayton's robbery of the Russet mansion was the first of several successful cases of…ahem, wealth redistribution. Words like that meant something to Clayton now. He couldn’t tell where it came from, but as Eos tossed him around during their Silk Road Jujitsu grappling sessions, as Eos took him to the new color cinemas in Kendall Bridge, as Eos took him on joy rides in her stolen car, a feeling rose within him - the feeling of caring.

Clayton felt like a lot of people took caring for granted. To be genuinely interested in something, to dedicate your life to something, was a feeling like no other. Long talks at night with Eos helped him steer his caring - he cared for her, he cared for the country he decided to stay in. Eos wanted to leave to somewhere better, Clayton wanted to stay here, so they compromised - they would make here better.

Hiding out in that cramped Waban apartment in the west side of Narragansett, as the dreams and ambitions of the two rose, so did the fortunes of Carmine’s small outfit. The neighboring apartments were soon occupied by tough-looking guys - former Eastern European military operatives, apparently - well-skilled with guns and the like. At one point, well-dressed Asian businessmen, flanked by their own mercenaries, showed up to the apartment as well.

The scale of their operations grew. No longer were they merely robbing mansions; Eos and Clayton exchanged their ratty thrift clothes for well-maintained trenchcoats as they collected protection money from Waban neighborhoods and took cuts from Waban gambling dens. Soon, Clayton and Eos were peddling drugs and grappling in the top floors of Waban apartment complexes overlooking the city.

While Eos met with Carmine to discuss their finances, Clayton read the books she left for him. Being semi-illiterate, they were simple picture books with even simpler words. But they carried with them powerful ideas - they depicted the Golden Age before the Unleashing, when anybody could do anything and not even the sky was the limit. Everybody was wealthy, children were well-fed and lived peaceful lives, and the flag had fifty stars on it and didn’t need soldiers patrolling the streets to ensure that the flag remained standing.

If they could remake New England into something like that, if he could live a simple life like that with Eos, then that was a far better reason to rob mansions and shake down shopkeepers than simply because it kept him fed.

Clayton had been handpicked by Eos for their outfit’s next act of daring - since it was Eos’s own idea. The outfit had grown so large and enough money flowed in that Eos could operate a bit more independently now, outside of Carmine’s watch.

As Clayton crouched down in a dilapidated building overlooking a rundown gas station in the declining milltown of Sebago, Maine, he reran the plan in his mind. It was relatively simple - through several shell corporations and partnerships, West Narragansett Technical Academy had a major stake in the casinos at Machigonne, the largest city in Maine. According to Eos’s man inside the Academy, Chairman Stockham skimmed the books from time to time. The skimmer, during his trips from the casino to Elizabeth Pond with the money, usually stopped at an Academy-owned gas station to refuel halfway down the coast.

The gas station looked like any other in the region - dilapidated, since it relied on passing tourists and outside funding since most of the local population didn’t own a car - as Clayton and other armed men remained in their overlook. The gas station was surrounded by similarly decaying buildings, with construction started when the money first started flowing in, only to remain unfinished when the stock markets crashed around the world. Clayton, along with the other gangsters, crouched near the top floor of the building, with a patchy roof over their heads, allowing in the sunlight. They dressed in all-black, waiting for Eos’s plan to kick off. A few other armed men were posted in other unfinished buildings, all of them keeping an eye on the gas station. Cars occasionally came and went, a few remaining parked as customers did their business inside.

Around midday, an inconspicuous Model Litoral turned into the gas station, pulling into the shadows underneath the metal roof that covered the pumps. On cue, the gas station attendant left the store. Clayton knew there would be a red Heartstring wrapped tightly around the attendant’s finger, but Eos, now Class 5, could conceal her presence so well that the Heartstring didn’t even appear in the Rddhi grid. When the attendant got close, the Heartstring would stretch even further, wrapping itself around the men in the van, bringing them all under Eos’s control. Eos had been waiting in the backroom of the gas station since early this morning, having easily taken over the attendant, biding her time until the skimmer arrived in the exact car as described by her source in the Academy.

The attendant loitered around the car, presumably as the Heartstring did its work. Once all the men were under her control, Eos would step out of the gas station and enter the car, since she needed to be relatively close to keep them under her control. That would be the toughest part. Eos and Clayton assumed the Academy might have men lying in wait around the gas station in case there was a robbery. Seeing Eos enter the car would give the robbery away, so that’s where Clayton and the other armed men would come in. Not only were they there in case anything went wrong, they would take out any of the Academy men who made a move on Eos.

Of course, that assumed that the Academy did have men lying in wait. Clayton heard that Stockham and his Academy were a wily bunch, home to oddballs and the like. Nonetheless, they upheld the current status quo that needed to be done away with, so, wily or not, the robbery would go ahead-

“Rat, Ox!”

A psychic force suddenly blasted through the wooden floor beneath Clayton and the armed men, the release of energy smacking them into - and sometimes through - the unfinished walls of the room. A falling brick smacked Clayton across the temple; in a daze, he just barely rolled out of the way of a falling beam. As red Rddhi flashed and sparked in front of him, he saw a Rddhi user with a red scarf and tired eyes standing in the room, moving calmly away from the giant whole he just made in the floor.

Several of the gangsters got their bearings and started to shoot, but the user produced a red, circular Rddhi shield that deflected the shots of their snub-nosed pistols. More gunshots joined in, creating a shrill cacophony, and Clayton saw slashes of red across the chests and arms of the gangsters who had been shot. He glanced over and saw Academy operatives entering the room, all heavily armed.

Did they know we would be here? Clayton questioned. Was the whole thing a set-up?

He knew he should’ve protected himself first, but something inside him - his own volition or something else, he couldn’t tell - made him look for Eos first. As men screamed and bullets smacked the walls and floor, Clayton rolled over to the edge of the room, arriving next to the fallen corpse of a gangster. Eos was more important, so he paid it no mind and peered through the opening where a window would’ve been installed. His eyes widened as he saw Eos in a firefight of her own, the gas station attendant dead next to her. He saw flickers of gunfire in all the surrounding buildings where the gangsters had been posted.

A powerful force approached him, but Clayton turned around and fired a fierce gust of wind at him. The Rddhi user deflected it with his Rddhi shield and continued to advance on Clayton, who had his back pressed against the wall.

If the shield only covers his front, then…

Clayton blew another gust of wind which struck uselessly against the shield, splitting his gust in several directions. He maintained his control of the gust that moved upward, striking dozens of loose bricks and beams that soon began to plummet downwards. Clayton arranged it so the falling debris would plunge toward the user in a circle, leaving him nowhere to go.

As expected, the user shifted his shield over his head. Clayton immediately picked up the pistol from the fallen gangster and shot the user in the stomach. Or, at least, he should’ve; instead, the man contorted himself, dodging Clayton's bullets while still using the shield to keep himself safe from the debris.

Still, the user had his hands full for a moment, giving Clayton an opportunity to take stock of the situation. Several bodies littered the ground, most of them belonging to the gangsters; the remaining gangsters were retreating out of the room, with gunfire echoing from other parts of the building.

Everything’s going wrong. We can’t let the Academy stop us. I need to rally them-

An errant explosion made the roof, already weakened, fully collapse on the other side of the room. Gangsters and agents dove out of the way, narrowly avoiding being crushed by the falling metal, brick, and wood. The debris covered all exits out of the room, leaving just a few gangsters.

We can still win-

The gangsters started surrendering.

They're content with just staying right here? When there's still so much more work to be done?

Clayton wasn’t. He had a dream. As the agents directed their attention towards him, as the Rddhi user knocked away the last of the falling debris, Clayton blew a massive gust of him that propelled him through the window opening.

He tumbled through the air for a moment, then saw the asphalt rushing up toward him. Academy agents down below pointed their guns at him; Clayton used one hand to send a breeze their way that swept all of them off of their feet. With his other hand, he swiped the air, creating a gust of wind that landed him on his feet. Before the agents could collect themselves, Clayton used the wind to hop in the air, toward Eos.

Eos had managed to maneuver herself behind a car parked at the front of the gas station, though a hail of gunfire and Rddhi fireballs kept her pinned down. As Clayton approached, both Eos and the agents noticed him; he used a gust of wind to knock all the projectiles away as he landed next to Eos and ducked his head.

“We were set up,” Eos realized, a rueful grin on her face, a pistol in her hand. “But, fortunately…” With her free hand, she held up a briefcase.

“The skimmed money,” Clayton realized, his heart beating fast. “You got it?”

Eos ignored a fireball slamming into the nearby asphalt and nodded. “They had a Rddhi user waiting in the van with enough power to ignore my Heartstrings. However, he wasn’t fast enough to save his friends.”

She gestured her head toward the fallen attendant by the pumps. “My human shield.”

And then she made another head nod toward a corpse lying halfway out of the opened door in the backseat of the van. “He courageously tossed me his briefcase and his own pistol before I shot him with it.”

“We should get out of here,” Clayton said. “We left a spare car deeper in the city. If we run we can make it.”

The gunfire picked up in intensity, bullets clanging off the side of the car. Clayton saw the Rddhi user from before exiting onto the street, agents and captured gangsters following behind him.

“Ready?” Eos asked with a grin.

“Always,” Clayton answered.

A moment later, Clayton sent a large gust of wind toward the fireball Rddhi user and the other agents firing on them out of the Model Litoral. With the projectiles momentarily halted, Eos stood, cocked her head, and fired the pistol straight at the gas pump.

The resulting explosion overturned the Litoral and even nearly knocked Clayton off his feet. Eos was already sprinting away, raising her hand, motioning forward, telling Clayton to follow. He picked himself off the asphalt; men screamed out from behind him and the heat from the explosion nipped at his back as he ran away, his ears ringing and his head pounding.

Sebago was a tiny town built around a rail line running through the middle of it. By this time, the explosions had attracted a few spectators and onlookers. Eos plowed right through them; they got the message and scurried away from the bloodsoaked face of Clayton as he followed her.

She always leads, he reflected. The civilians screamed as more gunfire rang out in their direction. I always follow. Why don’t we ever walk side by side?

Automatic rifle fire struck a nearby streetlamp, sending glass flying ahead of Clayton. He blew a gust of wind to clear it, but then realized the momentary delay had widened the gap between him and Eos.

We both want to improve the country. We both want to be together. So why am I following from behind? Why can’t I catch up? It is because I’m too slow-

As they headed down the main street of Sebago, passing by gray buildings and storefronts, a car suddenly pulled out of an alleyway. The driver leaned back, allowing the agent in the passenger seat to shoot through the window at Eos and Clayton. Eos nimbly ducked out of the way and slid over the hood of the car; Clayton knocked away the bullets and prepared to hop over the van when the grenade Eos left behind exploded, sending him falling to the ground. The asphalt stung him as cuts appeared on his hands and knees.

Or because she wants to keep her distance?

He picked himself up, his head swimming and the world spinning. Everything moved in a blur and he could barely see straight. He tried to use his wind, but no breezes or gusts appeared. Wiping the blood from his eyes, Clayton managed to orientate himself and sprinted around the flaming wreckage of the car.

She made me care. But about what? Caring about improving the country and caring about her are intertwined. Would I care if she wasn’t there? Do I only care because she cares? Am I able to care about something without her involvement?

Up ahead, the rail line cut perpendicularly through the main street. Lights on a warning sign flashed; the train was approaching. The crossing gate to close off the street were closing on either side of the intersection.

She made me care. But did she get me to care, or force me to care? Was it genuine or was she just manipulating me, to make me care about something she cared about?

Eos ducked her head under the closing gate closest to them; she then leapt over the closed gate on the other side. As he closed in on the intersection, Clayton heard the rumbling of the approaching train. He tried again to use his powers, but everything felt blurry and he failed once again to manipulate the Rddhi.

The train was too close now. In his wounded, weak state, Clayton couldn’t make it across the train tracks. Breathing heavily, he could only stop and stare as the image of Eos from across the tracks came into focus.

Time slowed down. Eos looked back at him for a moment. She hoisted the briefcase over her shoulder and gave him a sad smile.

Clayton raised a hand toward her, but then the freight train rolled by, chugging along for what felt like far too long. A long moment passed until the train finally made its way through the intersection. As the gates rose, Clayton saw that Eos had disappeared.

He offered little resistance when the Academy agents got to him.