As soon as Summer finished reading the message, she silently passed her phone over to Ashton. She watched his face darken, and his hand tense around her phone as he read the message. In an instant, he set her phone down and pulled out his own. As he did, Summer’s heart sank. It couldn’t be. Was there another part of the message that had been sent to him instead of her?

  Just as Summer had done, Ashton passed his phone to her and let her read the text. “Things have escalated,” he muttered, “I need to report this. We need to catch Jargon before things become even worse.”

  Summer carefully took the phone. She couldn’t help but notice the difference in weight between the two, or was it the situation that made it feel so heavy. As her eyes scanned the message, it was all she could do to hold back tears. The raging guilt reared its head again. This was all her fault. If she hadn’t insisted on playing hero, Aunt May and Mason would still be safe and sound. Maybe Ashton would have even played along with Ned’s plan to trick him if he weren’t so worried about her reaction.

  “Since you seemed reluctant to follow my plan, I have given you some incentive. I have the child, and Jargon has the mother. The only way to release the woman from Jargon’s control is to kill him or remove his powers. You should hurry. I’m not sure how much patience I have for babysitting.”

  “That disgusting rat,” Kayla growled, reading the message over Summer’s shoulder, “No matter what happens, we have your backs.”

  “That’s right,” Kai agreed enthusiastically, “Our first mission won’t be complete until we take Jargon down and rescue the hostage.”

  Ashton did not waste a moment, retrieving his phone from Summer’s grasp and contacting whoever needed to be contacted to get the situation under control. Unlike Ashton, Summer felt like she was frozen in place. Was she really going to be of any help in a situation like this?

  In all of the crime dramas she had watched, operatives with too much emotional investment were removed from sensitive cases like this. Actually, should a rookie team like theirs even be involved in something like this at all? Even if they were, it would only be because it was part of the demands for the release of the hostage. Granted, this was reality, not some show with a dramatic script to please the viewers.

  At the very least, Summer expected to be told to wait while the professionals sorted things out. Instead, the moment Ashton got off the phone, he told them to get ready.

  “Last night they were able to use some of the information MysteriousMaskz gave us to narrow down the potential locations of Jargon,” Ashton explained, “We will be assisting the task force in ambushing the most suspicious location. If you aren’t prepared to do so, I can go alone. Maskz only wants me to be involved, so you don’t have to go through with this.”

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  “Of course we are going!” Kai snapped, “Did you really think we would stand by and watch as you become a real villain’s puppet?”

  “True. There is no way this isn’t some kind of trap,” Levi agreed, “If you go we are all going.”

  “Let’s get ready,” Kayla said, lightly grabbing Summer’s wrist.

  That pulled Summer back into reality. For a moment she had forgotten that she would be considered to be part of ‘we’ too. None of them left her any space to voice her concerns about her adequacy to be part of this. There was no time since someone from the task force would be there to pick them up any minute.

  Summer’s hands were still trembling as she pulled her uniform on. She could already imagine the strangers in the task force judging her for being there. Not only was she too close to the hostage case, she was pretty much useless without Kayla. Right as she finished getting ready, another message popped up on her phone. This time it was from a different unknown number.

  “Delete this text as soon as you finish reading it. No one can know about what task I have given you if you want the child to make it back home safely. What I want you to do is simple. Use your powers to blind Jargon. No matter what, he cannot be allowed to see the true identity of Shadow Phoenix. I have even attached a picture to make your task even easier, but you can’t give away where you learned his appearance from. Good luck.”

  Below the text was the promised attached picture. Summer had expected Jargon to look more ordinary, but his appearance was more of a raging delinquent who had never grown out of his rebellious streak despite the wrinkles beginning to form on his face. Perhaps something like a mid-life crisis?

  There was a knock on her door. “Summer, are you almost ready?” Kayla called, “They are here.”

  Out of panic, Summer deleted the text as she had been told to do, and quickly hid her phone on her person. This situation had made it clear that MysteriousMaskz wasn’t playing around. This time she would do exactly what he told her to. Besides, there was nothing particularly wrong with making sure Jargon was blinded before he could see Ashton. All he was asking for this time was for her to cover someone’s eyes. Everything would be fine.

  Perhaps because he was a familiar face, Jared had shown up to pick them up again. He seemed a lot more tense than the last time they had seen him. Tired too. It reminded her that this situation didn’t just affect her and Ashton. Jargon had attacked everyone. It was Maskz who had made things personal yet again.

  “We need to get moving,” Jared told them, “We plan to strike all of the suspected hideouts at the same time to reduce any chances he has of getting away or using his victims as shields. We still don’t know how close his relationship is with Checkmate.”

  That rose another question to Summer’s mind. Was Checkmate allowed to see Ashton? Should she blind him too, just to be safe? She couldn’t ask because she had already deleted the conversation. Not only that, she couldn’t risk getting caught.