The first bullet shattered the window.
Glass exploded inward like frozen rain.
Maxruell threw Juvy down just as three masked men poured through the doorway, guns raised, boots stomping on blood-slick tiles.
"Targets confirmed," one of them barked into his mic. "Crimson and Prism both active."
Juvy clutched her head. "They're screaming…"
"Who?" Maxruell growled.
"The souls. The walls. The metal. Everything."
Another bullet punched the fridge. Sparks flew. Smoke curled like it was scared.
Maxruell stood.
Shadows peeled off the ceiling and wrapped around him like armor.
"Wrong house," he said.
The floor darkened.
Hands rose out of it.
Not human hands.
The first attacker fired again. The shadows caught the bullet and crushed it like chalk. The second attacker rushed with a blade glowing blue.
Maxruell's shadow moved faster than thought.
It grabbed the man's face and slammed him into the wall so hard the paint turned pink.
The third tried to retreat.
Juvy raised her trembling hand.
"Stop…"
The pipes burst.
Water surged up, wrapping around the man's legs, freezing mid-motion into clear crystal. Wind slammed him into the ceiling. Metal from the doorframe bent and locked his arms in place.
He screamed.
Juvy dropped her hand. "I didn't mean to"
Sirens were everywhere now. Helicopter blades chopped the sky.
From the stairwell came shouting. Boots. Lots of boots.
"They're not cops," Maxruell muttered. "Real cops don't move like that."
Juvy looked at their parents' bodies.
Her breath hitched.
Maxruell clenched his jaw. "We can't stay."
The hallway exploded inward.
Six more men rushed in. Different uniforms. No insignia. One carried a silver cage glowing with runes.
"Alive if possible," their leader said. "If not burn the girl first."
Juvy's eyes went wide. "Max…"
He stepped forward.
The crimson crystal throbbed like a war drum.
The room darkened until the only light came from the glowing rune cage and Juvy's prismatic aura.
Maxruell snapped his fingers.
The shadows lunged.
Two men were dragged into the floor like they'd stepped into wet cement. One fired wildly, bullets ricocheting, screaming as darkness crawled up his throat.
The leader slammed the cage on the ground.
A ghostly shape burst out of it twisted, shrieking, stitched with glowing symbols.
"Binding spirit!" the man shouted.
The thing flew straight at Juvy.
She screamed.
The air around her shattered into crystal.
The spirit slammed into it and broke apart into light.
Juvy collapsed to her knees. Blood ran from her nose.
Maxruell felt something tear inside his chest.
A memory slipped.
He forgot the smell of his mother's cooking.
He didn't know why that hurt.
The last attackers ran.
One made it to the stairs.
The building shook.
The shadows dragged him back screaming until his voice turned into nothing.
Silence.
Just broken walls, smoke, and the sound of Juvy crying.
Maxruell dropped beside her. "Hey… hey. Look at me."
"I killed them…" she whispered. "I didn't even touch them…"
"They were gonna kill us."
She looked at their parents.
"That didn't save them."
Outside, engines roared.
From the rooftops, figures in cloaks watched through scopes and glass lenses.
In a candlelit basement, a woman carved symbols into bone and smiled.
"Two," she whispered. "They broke the rule."
The twins fled through the back stairwell, feet slipping on blood and rain.
By the time they hit the street, the city had changed.
People were already filming.
Already whispering.
Already hunting.
Maxruell grabbed Juvy's hand.
"Run."
They vanished into the alleys.
Behind them, the building burned.
Above them, the sky cracked with thunder.
And across the city, every gang, cult, and hidden power learned the same thing:
The twins exist.
And they can be taken.