The SoulWatch: AfterMAGA (BL)

"I heard Pastor Goldrick's going live with the new feed filter next week—complete with customized, virtual halos and glowing hands for your service selfies!"

"Sweet, my score is gonna skyrocket!"

"Johnny Ashford makes your score skyrocket," the other girl fired back with a smirk.

David froze at the church entrance, the girls' laughter cutting through him like glass. He hadn't planned on coming. But after their last conversation—Johnny being forced to give up baseball after the season—he couldn't stay away.

The neon-blue signage above the door buzzed faintly: They Who Surrender Are Free.

He took a breath. Not for God. Not for the ministry. He was here for Johnny.

David had performed piano here the first year he and his father had arrived in Stricton. Back then it was the city's second performance space. Smaller than Symphony Hall, it was used for movies, community meetings, and youth ensembles. He and Johnny had watched a re-release of Star Wars here. David remembered Johnny feeding him buttered popcorn in the dark that night, a singular, silent gesture the two never talked about, only shared.

It was Sunday morning, and the sanctuary was nearly full - congregants filing in with programmed grace.

The once-beloved theater David remembered had been hollowed out and reconstructed as something unrecognizable: no velvet, no shadows, no soul.

David had always been enchanted by the Apollo frieze above the stage, adorned with a lyre and glowing rays of sunlight, which once graced the stage. It was a masterpiece that encapsulated the elegance of the god's sculpted figure and the cultural importance it held for him. The smooth marble captured light in a way that made Apollo seem almost alive—a symbol of beauty and artistic achievement.

"The Apollo had the most heavenly body," David thought secretly, "second only to Johnny."

But now, as David sunk in to a seat toward the rear, he felt a pang of loss. The church had removed the Apollo, dismissing it as pagan idolatry and nudity unfit for their sacred space. In its stead loomed an enormous LED cross, its harsh lights flickering rhythmically like a mechanical heartbeat—an austere replacement that lacked the warmth and grace of what had once been there.

No one greeted him. That was fine. He didn't want a welcome. He wanted to observe.

The stage was arranged like a talk show set—rows of chairs, a mounted flatscreen flashing Bible verses in rotating fonts, and a centerpiece stage washed in LED blue. People laughed too easily, voices pitched just a little too high.

It felt rehearsed.

David scanned the room once, twice—then he saw him.

Johnny had just walked in, posture rigid, shoulders square like he'd practiced it. He wore his impeccable cadet jacket again. The collar looked stiff. His eyes were sharp but searching, like someone waiting for instructions that hadn't yet come.

David's pulse picked up.

Johnny didn't notice him—not yet. Instead, Doug intercepted him with a wide, deliberate grin. He clapped Johnny on the back so firmly it almost seemed choreographed. His teeth gleamed under the blue stage lights; his voice rang bright and loud above the manufactured chaos. Doug was already pulling Johnny away, arm slung over his shoulder like he was a shepherd leading a prize lamb back to the flock.

And Johnny went, all awkward angles and soldier's resolve. He was nodding at Doug, nodding at the others, nodding in time to the beat of an invisible drum. Every movement took him further from where David sat. He made his way toward the front and took his seat among a group of boys from school dressed in crisp ROTC uniforms, half of them familiar faces from his baseball team.

David sat still, watching. His knee bounced. He should've left. This wasn't his space. But he couldn't tear his eyes away.

The lights dimmed slightly as the music began to swell. Something in the air shifted—an invisible gravity tugging on the senses, not just his own. A warmth settled in his chest, involuntary. That whisper of inclusion, of belonging—not offered, but implied. David's breath caught. For a fleeting second, he felt it: the urge to rise, to lift his hand like the others, to surrender.

He gripped the edge of the seat instead.

Johnny didn't notice him—not yet.

And he didn't know whether he was more afraid Johnny wouldn't see him… or that he would.

The service began with a spotlight above the stage, revealing the church choir loft. Noel Castillo stood in the second row, a slim figure swallowed by a robe that now hung too large for his frame.

David noticed the change Noel in a split second. His skin held the gray translucence of fatigue, and what once had been bright, intent eyes seemed harrowed—two dark eclipses beneath arched brows. David felt the change like a prick of ice. This was not the boy whose countertenor had shimmered through Tchaikovsky at the symphony; this was someone worn thin by forces that asked everything but gave nothing back.

The anthem began - a polished, pounding worship track stitched from electronic strings and militant snare hits. As the choir lifted their hands in practiced arcs, a constellation of wrist-lights flickered across the sanctuary: green pulses rippled down each row, the system's verdict that the congregation's surge of joy was "approved."

David watched a wave of emerald cadence sweep the pews like synchronized bioluminescence.

Except for Noel.

Half a verse in, Noel's SoulWatch gave a single red strobe, crimson and insistent, before snapping back to green. He tried to hide the watch under his robe, but he needed to hold the sheet music. Two measures later it flashed red once more, then twice in quick succession—an erratic heartbeat stuttering against the choir's perfect rhythm.

The boy did not miss a note, yet David caught the wince that tightened Noel's jaw each time the bracelet reprimanded him.

From her seat behind the pulpit, Jez Deb Hawkins watched the choir as though scanning for fractures in glass. Even after three years, David recognized her as the lady from City Hall. She leaned forward, elbows on knees, head tilted—eyes trained not on the worship leader but on Noel's wrist.

At the third red blink she tapped a manicured nail against her thigh, once, twice, like a metronome marking dissent. Eli Prophet noticed too. Stationed near the soundboard with a discreet tablet nestled in one hand, he glanced up each time the red flare breached the sea of green, his thumb flicking across the screen—logging, perhaps, or summoning a data stream David could only imagine.

The music swelled toward its bridge. Choir members swayed in lockstep, bodies bending on cue, but Noel's timing lagged by a breath—as though his muscles waited for permission his heart refused to grant. When the sopranos lifted their arms he was half a beat late; when the tenors pivoted left he lingered center, eyes darting to the exit before snapping back to the director. His mouth shaped every vowel flawlessly, yet David heard the hollowness behind the tone, the way resonance became restraint.

One more pulse of red flared, bright as brake-lights in fog.

In the throng of raised arms, Chastity Rose was a striking figure, like a bouquet of lilies glowing in the LED mist. Positioned just a few rows from the stage, her summer-blonde hair swayed as she stood with eyes closed in blissful reverence. When the choir surged into the chorus, she lifted one hand high, fingers quivering as if gathering unseen stars. With a voice that cut through the music, she cried out, "Praise be to the light that guides us!"

Chastity's SoulWatch answered in frenetic delight: a staccato of lime-green flashes—faster, brighter, more insistent than those around her. It strobed in perfect obedience, measuring every micro-surge of sanctioned joy, until her wrist looked aflame with verdant lightning. Nearby worshipers stole admiring glances; one girl mirrored Chastity's sway, eager to match the frequency of that approved, exuberant glow.

David took it all in with a single glance—the urgent green flash on Chastity's wrist, the practiced angle of her chin—just as Noel's bracelet glowed a solitary red. The contrast struck him like a discordant note: one loyal pulse celebrated, another silently chastised, both consumed by the same melody. A knot formed in his stomach, an uneasy mix of admiration and sadness that left him feeling hollow and unsettled.

Chastity never noticed Noel's crimson blink; lost in her private hallelujah, she was a living advertisement for the promise above the doors: They Who Surrender Are Free. Her SoulWatch pulsed agreement, green-green-green, an unbroken signal of blissful compliance—while, only yards away, Noel's desperate flashes went unanswered.

In David's memory, Noel's voice had soared above an orchestra, ringing with something startlingly human—fragility turned to diamonds. Now, as the choir hit its final chord, Noel's melody line fractured: for one aching bar his voice vanished into silence. The LED cross strobed white behind him, the band crashed through its resolution, and in that pocket of noise Noel fought for breath, SoulWatch pulsing an urgent double-red. Then—almost violently—he forced the note back into place, the light snapped green, and the machine of worship ground forward as though the glitch had never occurred.

Applause thundered across the hall. Ushers beamed, parents wiped proud tears, and rows upon rows of tiny green lights winked approval. Noel lowered his hands, head bowed, shoulders trembling in a way that looked like piety but felt, to David, like exhaustion. Eli tapped one last line on his tablet and locked the screen.

David's throat tightened. The room, awash in sanctioned joy, suddenly felt arctic. He knew what he'd just witnessed: the system extracting purity from a voice until only compliance remained.

As the final chord faded and the applause surged, Noel stepped down from the risers, trembling slightly under his robe. David watched him start toward the exit, sheet music clutched tight to his chest—but then two adults in black volunteer polos intercepted him near the side curtain.

They spoke too quietly for David to hear, but their body language was firm. One gestured toward the wing with an outstretched arm. Noel hesitated—just for a moment—then nodded. His SoulWatch flared red again as he turned and followed them, eyes down, shoulders rigid.

David craned his neck, trying to catch Noel's expression, but the boy was already disappearing through a side door marked Pathlight Counseling - Authorized Access Only. The door clicked shut behind him.

And then the lights shifted, the music faded, and the sanctuary turned its gaze toward the pulpit.

Goldrick waited until the room breathed in one vast, obedient breath.

David felt a slight shift beside him. An elderly woman he hadn't noticed before adjusted her posture, her gloved hand resting on the hymnal. When she caught him looking, her smile was delicate as pressed violets. Inside that mild expression flickered something unmistakeable—I see you.

Goldrick stepped forward, his voice starting as barely a whisper that somehow reached every corner of the sanctuary.

"I had a dream last night." His words trembled with what seemed like genuine pain. "I saw our children—your children—drowning. Not in water. In lies."

A mother in the front row gasped softly. Several SoulWatches flickered green in response. Beside David, the elderly woman's fingers moved almost imperceptibly—thumb to each fingertip in sequence. David recognized the gesture immediately: his mother counting mantras during difficult moments.

"They were reaching for us—for you—but their hands kept slipping through ours because they'd been told touching was wrong. Loving was wrong. That the very hands that should pull them to safety were actually pushing them under."

His voice cracked. Tears—real or performed—glinted in his eyes.

"This is what the world wants. To convince our babies that up is down. That chromosomes are choices. That the family is a prison instead of a fortress."

The woman shifted slightly, and David caught a glimpse of her wrist—not a SoulWatch, but a silver bracelet. No, not just a bracelet. A mala. Buddhist prayer beads worn as jewelry. His breath caught.

Goldrick gripped the podium, knuckles white. "I watched a boy last week—couldn't have been more than fourteen—standing on the Miller Street bridge. Standing there at 2 AM, looking down at the water. You know what he told the officer who found him?"

Silence so thick David could hear his own heartbeat.

"He said, 'My teacher told me I was born in the wrong body. But my parents say God doesn't make mistakes. So which is it—am I a mistake, or is God?"

A woman began weeping. Green lights pulsed like a heartbeat across the congregation.

"THAT BOY IS IN THIS ROOM RIGHT NOW!" Goldrick's voice exploded, making everyone jump. "He's sitting in these pews because we pulled him back from that bridge. Because we told him the truth—you are fearfully and wonderfully made. Every cell. Every chromosome. Every desire that aligns with His design."

Chastity Rose lifted both hands, tears streaming. Johnny's watch flickered between amber and green.

"But his friend jumped last month." Goldrick's voice dropped to a whisper again. "Sixteen years old. Had been sneaking to those clandestine meetings. Told his parents he was finally happy. Two weeks later—" He slapped the podium. The crack echoed like a gunshot.

"HAPPY! That's what the world calls it when our children march toward hell!"

Now people were standing, hands raised, some shaking with emotion. The fever pitch of the congregation rose like a tide.

"I held that mother while she screamed. Held that father while he asked me why God let the world steal his son. And you know what I told them?"

Goldrick's eyes swept the room like fire.

"I told them WE let it happen. Every time we stay silent. Every time we compromise. Every time we fail to remind them that rebellion is rebellion, no matter how it's decorated."

He stepped out from behind the podium, arms spread wide.

"So yes, picture that spider over the flame. But don't picture a stranger's child. Picture yours. Picture them dangling by a thread while the world whispers 'let go, be free.' Picture their faces when that thread snaps."

An elderly man was sobbing now. Teenagers gripped their armrests. The woman beside David's breathing had changed—deeper, more controlled, like she was anchoring herself against the emotional manipulation.

"We are the thread!" Goldrick roared. "We are the only thing between them and the flames. And if that makes us harsh, if that makes us rigid, if that makes us unloving in the world's eyes—SO BE IT!"

"I would rather be hated by a dying world than have to look one more parent in the eyes and say 'I'm sorry. I should have warned them louder.'"

He raised both fists to heaven. "Who will stand with me? Who will be the thread?"

The congregation exploded—screaming, crying, hands raised in religious ecstasy.

At the absolute height of the chaos, the woman beside David breathed out a single, clear "Om."

It should have been drowned in the noise. It wasn't. The sound carried beneath the hysteria like a bell struck underwater—felt more than heard, but undeniable. Her hand found David's and gripped it firmly, not in fear but in defiance.

Her fingers were warm, steady. Three gentle taps against his palm: tap tap tap. The same rhythm his mother used to wake him. "Time to rise, my light."

David's throat tightened. In the midst of this manufactured terror, she was reciting under her breath: "May all beings be free from suffering." His mother's favorite loving-kindness meditation, offered up in the belly of the beast.

When Goldrick finally raised his hands for silence, sweat glistened on his forehead like holy oil.

"The righteous," he whispered into the microphone, "are always tested. And we will not fail that test. Not on my watch. Not in this house. Not with your children's souls at stake."

"Amen," the congregation breathed as one.

Except David. Except the woman beside him, still holding his hand.

And somewhere in the front, Johnny's SoulWatch had gone solid amber—processing, calculating, caught between what he felt and what he was supposed to feel.

The service finally spilled out into the breezeway like pressurized air escaping a sealed cabin. Conversation fluttered in polite crescendos—"Wasn't that powerful?" "Praise the Lord!" David lingered just inside the glass doors, letting the crowd thin so he wouldn't be swept along in its current.

For a moment he just breathed—cool air, the scent of coffee, the faint echo of Goldrick's furnace-spider rhetoric still ringing in his skull—then started for the steps.

A gloved hand brushed his elbow. "Young man?"

The gray-haired woman from the pew—hat tucked primly under one arm—stood beside him. Up close her eyes were a clear, disarming hazel, nothing meek about the intelligence in them.

"I saw you listening," she said, voice pitched low enough to stay beneath the nearby ushers' chatter. "Listening the way one weighs a thing, not the way one drinks it in."

Before he could answer, she pressed a folded prayer card into his palm. Inside, in looping fountain-pen ink, was only three words: See, Feel, Act.

David tucked the card into the pocket over his heart.

The woman melted back into the crowd, but her presence lingered like incense in David's mind. He stood frozen at the threshold between worlds—behind him, the exit to sunshine and safety; ahead, the corridor to the youth hall where Johnny waited, unknowing.

See, Feel, Act.

He'd seen enough already. Noel's haunted face. Johnny's amber struggle. The congregation drunk on their own fear.

He felt too much. The prayer card against his chest seemed to pulse with his mother's heartbeat, her voice whispering the loving-kindness meditation: May you be free from suffering. May you be at peace.

But Johnny wasn't free. Wasn't at peace.

Act.

David's feet made the choice before his mind caught up. Not toward the exit. Not toward safety. Toward Johnny—always toward Johnny, even when it meant walking into the mouth of the beast.

David watched the elderly woman disappear into the departing crowd, her silver bracelet catching the light one last time. The prayer card felt warm against his chest, those three words—See, Feel, Act—pulsing like a second heartbeat.

The main sanctuary was emptying now, families filing out in practiced formations. Parents steered their children toward the exits with gentle hands on shoulders, while the youth peeled off in clusters, heading for the side corridors that led to the fellowship hall.

David knew he should leave. He'd seen enough. But his feet wouldn't move toward the exit. Instead, they carried him along the familiar path he'd walked years ago.

The hallway between the sanctuary and youth hall had been renovated too—gone were the vintage movie posters and community bulletin boards. Now, LED strips lined the walls, pulsing with soft blue light that made everyone look slightly underwater. Motivational posters dotted the walls: "Obedience is Strength," "Surrender to Soar," "Your Best Life Begins at the Altar."

He paused at the threshold, hand on the door handle. This was his last chance to turn back, to slip out into the morning sun and pretend he'd never come.

But then he remembered Johnny's amber SoulWatch during the sermon—not green like the others, not red like Noel's, but caught somewhere in between. Still evaluating. Still fighting, maybe.

David pulled open the door.

Chastity Rose stepped to the lectern with the poise of someone who'd performed this a hundred times. David's eyes locked onto her revealing outfit—a baby pink crop top that left her midriff bare, paired with a skirt that barely reached mid-thigh. The gold cross at her throat caught the light with each breath, nestled against skin that glowed with carefully applied shimmer. It was an audacious choice that screamed nightclub rather than the sanctified walls of a church youth gathering.

David's jaw tightened like a vice as she grabbed onto the mic stand, her manicured nails—painted virgin white—wrapping around it with practiced ease.

"Before I found Giant Faith," she began, voice sweet and tremulous, "I was a lamb lost in the wilderness of my own doubts."

She paused, letting her eyes sweep the room, catching the light just right. A few boys in the front row leaned forward.

"Or maybe," she gave a self-deprecating laugh that somehow made her more attractive, "like a lost girl in the perfume department of a store she couldn't afford. You know—wanting to smell like something expensive, something pure, but only finding cheap imitations that faded by noon."

"Mmm-hmm," several girls murmured, nodding. Her SoulWatch pulsed a satisfied green.

"I was so empty. I tried to fill it with..." she bit her lip, looked down as if ashamed, "attention. From boys who didn't see my soul. From likes on photos that showed everything but my heart."

Doug whistled low in appreciation. A few others chuckled knowingly.

"But then Pastor Goldrick found me. Cadet Ashford—" she gestured to Johnny with a graceful hand, "—showed me what real strength looked like. Not the kind that posts gym selfies, but the kind that kneels in prayer."

As Chastity continued lauding their rescue of her, David felt the sting of betrayal coil tighter. She was performing vulnerability, wearing it like her shimmer lotion—just enough to catch the light, never enough to show real skin.

"They didn't judge my past," she continued, tears threatening to spill but never quite falling—she'd learned to hold them right at the edge for maximum effect. "They saw the woman God intended me to be. Pure. Whole. A vessel for His glory, not... other things."

The innuendo hung in the air, somehow making her seem both repentant and available.

David watched Johnny's hands rise in applause—but mid-clap, one palm paused against the other, and for a blink his eyes flickered with something uneasy before he pressed forward. Then Johnny's SoulWatch flashed green.

The room exploded with jubilant cheers, a cacophony of excitement that filled every corner. Chastity basked in it, her smile widening as she placed one hand over her heart, the other raised in worship, her body arched just enough to be noticed.

As the applause for Chastity died down, Johnny stood slowly from his seat. Not volunteering—being pulled by something invisible. His shoulders were rigid, fighting it.

His uniform collar seemed too tight, the tendons in his neck straining against fabric and expectation.

David watched him walk toward the center like someone approaching a cliff edge.

Johnny stopped in the middle of the circle. For a moment, he just stood there, hands at his sides, throat working like he was trying to swallow something sharp. His SoulWatch flickered—amber, red, amber again.

He bowed his head.

The same gesture David had seen him make before taking the pitcher's mound—except now he wasn't centering himself. He was surrendering.

"I..." His voice cracked. He cleared his throat, started over. "I used to think I knew myself."

The room grew quiet. This wasn't the usual testimony opening.

"I thought I was strong. I thought I was..." His hands clenched, unclenched "Good."

Silence. Too much silence. Johnny's eyes darted around the circle, reading the room. Sweat beaded on his forehead.

Doug leaned forward. "It's okay, brother. Let it out."

Johnny's breath hitched. "But I was... I was blind. Too blind to see I needed help."

"That's right," someone murmured. A few hands raised in support. Johnny's SoulWatch flickered green—just once—then back to amber.

He noticed. They all noticed. His voice grew slightly stronger, chasing that green flash.

"The world told me to trust my instincts. That I should follow my heart." His laugh was shaky, uncertain. "But I was sick with it."

"Amen," Chastity called out, wiping tears. More voices joined. Johnny's watch flashed green again, longer this time.

Johnny's eyes widened slightly, like an addict seeing the drug take effect. "Sick with... with wanting things that weren't..." He swallowed hard. "Weren't from God."

The response was immediate. "Tell it!" "Yes, brother!" "Let Him work!"

Each affirmation seemed to pull something from Johnny. His hands unclenched, lifted slightly. The trembling started in his fingers.

"The world said those feelings were natural." His voice cracked again, but differently—raw now, desperate. "Said I should 'be myself.'"

Doug stood up. "But what if yourself is broken?"

Johnny's head snapped toward him, eyes wild with recognition. "Yes! What if... what if everything I wanted was just... poison?"

The crowd was on their feet now. Someone started clapping slowly, rhythmically. Others joined. Johnny's SoulWatch pulsed green in time with their applause.

"I see it now," Johnny said, voice rising to match their energy. Tears started flowing. "Every time I thought I was strong, I was actually dying inside."

"Preach it!" someone shouted.

Johnny raised his hands higher, the trembling spreading up his arms. The crowd's energy seemed to flow into him, filling the hollow spaces.

"Lord, I thank you," his voice broke completely now, "for showing me how sick I was. For the discipline. For the correction that felt like death—"

"But was LIFE!" the crowd finished with him.

Johnny gasped, shocked by their synchronicity. His SoulWatch blazed green. The validation hit him like a drug. His knees buckled slightly.

"More, Lord!" someone cried. "Pour it out!"

Johnny's control shattered. "Yes! Pour it out! Burn it away!" He was shouting now, feeding off their frenzy. "The confusion! The wants! The sick desires!"

"BURN IT!" they roared back.

He dropped to his knees, but even that felt choreographed by the crowd's expectation. Hands reached for him—not to lift him up, but to press him down further.

"Make me empty!" Johnny sobbed, but the words came out practiced, like he was reciting what they needed to hear. "Clean! Pure! Whatever you want!"

Chastity knelt beside him, hand on his back."Every person who led you astray," she coached, voice dripping honey over broken glass. "Renounce them."

Johnny's eyes flew open, unfocused. For a second, he hesitated.

Doug's hand landed on his other shoulder. "The enemy uses familiar faces, brother."

The pressure was physical now. Spiritual. Communal. Johnny's resistance crumbled.

"Every person who made me want to stray," he gasped, the words pulled from him, "they were sent by the enemy."

The crowd exploded. Johnny's SoulWatch went supernova green. He swayed under the weight of their approval, drunk on validation he'd been starved of for weeks.

When they finally pulled him to his feet, he looked emptied out. Not by God, but by them. Hollowed by their hunger, filled with their fervor.

He turned slowly, and his eyes—still wet, still wild—found David across the room.

For one second, David saw the truth: Johnny knew what he'd done. Knew what he'd traded for that green light. The terror in his eyes wasn't religious—it was the panic of someone who'd just sold something he couldn't buy back.

The crowd pressed closer, still praising, and Johnny's face reset into that empty smile. Someone whispered in his ear. He nodded, puppet-like.

"The doors are open," Johnny announced, arms raised, speaking to everyone and no one. "Anyone still carrying sickness, still fighting the cure—come. Tonight. Right now. Be free."

His eyes swept the room blindly, drunk on approval, no longer capable of focusing on any single face.

David couldn't watch anymore.

The room stilled.

Then the crowd surged toward the snack tables, and everything returned to smiles and chatter, like nothing sacred had just been torn open in front of them.

Someone had already turned the music back on—another bouncy worship remix that made David's skin crawl. Johnny stood near the punch bowl, hands still shaking as he tried to pour himself a cup, missing the rim twice before Doug steadied his wrist.

David edged around the snack table, heart hammering. Johnny was ladling punch with mechanical precision, every movement a brittle imitation of calm, as if muscle memory alone held him upright.

"I'm surprised to see you here," Johnny said without looking up. His voice was soft, carefully hollow. "Enjoying the fellowship?"

David didn't answer right away. He let the silence stretch until it stung.

"I caught the show," he said finally, voice tight with bitterness. "Didn't realize you were auditioning for martyr of the year."

Johnny flinched—just slightly—but enough. The ladle dipped too deep, spilling red punch across the tablecloth. He wiped it up quickly, hand shaking more than it should have.

"I didn't plan to speak," Johnny muttered, eyes fixed downward. "It just… happened."

David's jaw tightened. "Yeah. That's what they count on."

Johnny's fingers began tapping nervously against the punch bowl's rim, an irregular rhythm David knew too well: Johnny, spiraling silently, lost.

Then Micah appeared.

Not beside David—he stepped smoothly to Johnny's side, too close to be accidental. Micah's elbow lined up next to Johnny's on the table, their arms nearly touching. Johnny's rhythm stilled instantly.

Micah's hand rose casually, deliberately, holding something gold. A thin chain dangled from his fingers, a delicate cross catching the harsh LED light. Micah leaned closer, voice gentle, yet edged with possession. "Eli asked me to give you this," he murmured, words low and intimate—like a secret David wasn't supposed to overhear. "Said you earned it."

Johnny went visibly still. His eyes flicked to the cross, then quickly to David, startled and unsure. But before he could react, Micah reached out, smoothly looping the chain around Johnny's neck. The cross settled softly against Johnny's chest, a bright mark of ownership over his crisp white shirt.

David's eyes locked on the gold. It looked hot against Johnny's skin—like it had been seared there, glowing with heat he didn't want to want.

David felt his throat tighten. Micah's fingers lingered just a breath too long against Johnny's collar, straightening the cross with casual possessiveness—like he had the right.

"There," Micah said softly, his eyes lingering. "Perfect fit."

Johnny swallowed hard, eyes unreadable—but David saw a flash of raw panic beneath the careful blankness.

Micah glanced back toward David then, that slow smirk emerging, fully aware of what he'd done.

"Look at him," Micah said, softly enough to twist the knife. "Still your most devoted fanboy."

Johnny's hand jerked again, knocking the ladle into the punch bowl with a loud clatter. He stepped back slightly, breaking Micah's orbit—but the chain stayed, glittering like a leash.

He forced himself to look at David. "Glad you decided to come," Johnny said, voice brittle with regret.

"You shouldn't be," David answered, venom gone now—only grief remaining. "You looked like you were dying up there."

Micah watched them both, his eyes flickering knowingly between Johnny and David, the cross bright against Johnny's throat—a reward, a claim, a shackle.

David's pulse pounded. Johnny had already surrendered, the gold chain a physical reminder of the price he'd paid. And Micah—Micah had become the hand that fastened it around him.

David's chest still thrummed as he opened his mouth to speak—then Eli Prophet appeared at Johnny's side, stepping forward with predatory grace. He laid a firm hand on Johnny's shoulder, his touch smooth as silk and twice as cold.

Eli's smile was thin and knowing. "Interesting to see familiar faces," he said, gently squeezing Johnny's shoulder while offering a reassuring smile. "Just make sure your focus isn't wandering back into the past."

Johnny's head jerked toward Eli, his features crumpling into surprise, confusion rippling as he absorbed the full meaning of Eli's warning. David watched as Johnny forced himself to stand tall, spine rigid with sudden resolve.

Just then, Jez Deb Hawkins appeared, gliding forth from the shadows where she had observed everything with keen and careful eyes. Her presence was quiet yet unshakable, an unwavering force that had seemingly materialized out of nowhere. She slid her hand onto Johnny's other arm, her fingers light but commanding, and David stiffened in shock as he recognized her.

"The debrief is about to begin," she said, her whisper gentle yet insistent, a tension building beneath the soft tone. "They're waiting for you back in the Breakout Room." Her eyes darted toward Eli with a silent nod, as if confirming a careful strategy.

"Don't forget what's real," Jez instructed Johnny.

David stood rooted, heart straining against newfound doubt as he saw Johnny's loyalty bend toward them. Was this why his eyes had flickered, why his smile had wavered? Had Johnny already committed himself so fully that there wasn't any room left for David—not even in those brief, hopeful moments when he thought love might overpower it all?

"Go on," Eli urged, his voice smooth and silken but tinged with a hint of rebuke. "Everyone's counting on you." David felt each word like the sting of tiny betrayals, arrows that pierced through his ribs to the tender spot where he had once felt safe. Jez's grip did not loosen; it tightened, drawing Johnny away even as he hesitated.

David blinked against the sharp blur of hurt and watched Johnny turn.

He thought he saw Johnny look back one last time, thought he caught the glimmer of a split-second pause, but it was hard to tell from the distance—or maybe David didn't want to see clearly, because seeing clearly would mean knowing it was really over.

Eli turned back to David with a mocking half-smile, letting his gaze linger like a blade.

"I trust you found your morning sufficiently… enlightening, David," Eli said, his voiced laced with scorn. "Should you ever crave true fulfillment, the doors here are always open."

David slipped away from the crush of bodies and deftly maneuvered his way behind the DJ booth, melding into the shadows like a whisper amidst the pulsing lights and thumping bass. The distant chatter faded away, swallowed by a deafening loneliness that amplified the echoes of each thought - each scenario in his skull reverberating like a relentless drumbeat.

Each thought seemed like a tiger's roar in a bamboo forest, raw, untamed, reverberating.

He needed to leave now. The pulse in his temples quickened as he slipped around a corner, weaving through the complex maze of hallways that twisted through the old theater. His mind spun with uncertainty: why had Johnny left so willingly? Had the church already pulled him back with an unbreakable hold? His chest tightened at the betrayal, and he thought of himself as the lone defector of an army who'd lost the fight before the battle even began. Breathing hard, he rounded another corner and froze in place, startled. Micah stood half in shadow, arms crossed, leaning against the wall with calculated nonchalance.

David's pulse jolted. He glanced behind him, half-expecting another ambush. But Micah was alone. He straightened away from the wall with swift urgency, stepping toward David in a single, desperate stride.

Before David could speak—before he could ask if this was about trust or something deeper—Micah grabbed his wrist and pressed something cold into his palm.

David's real question wasn't about trust. It was whether Johnny and Micah were secretly seeing each other—not just seeing each other, but dating.

His mouth opened, searching for something safe to say, but the words didn't come.

He looked down. The object in his hand was small and unremarkable—just a USB drive. So ordinary it was almost disappointing.

"I'm doing this for someone who needs it—someone who's in trouble." Micah's voice was a hoarse whisper, and there was an edge of desperation that cut through even his attempt at carelessness.

The crimson pulse on Micah's wrist brightened, flickering like a warning signal that told them both there was no time to waste. David's fingers closed instinctively around the drive, knuckles whitening as the possibilities collided inside his mind. Who needed saving? Was Micah trapped, just like Johnny? Was this a trick, some cynical ploy to draw David further into the very heart of the church he despised?

A click echoed behind them like a gunshot—footsteps advancing down the corridor with military precision. David knew, even before he turned, whose arrival was imminent—it was Eli returning. Micah's eyes widened, and his hand on David's shoulder tightened for a split second. His gaze didn't meet David's. Like he couldn't afford it. Like looking at David too long might crack something - might cost him.

"Go," Micah said, a quick and forceful plea for trust before he vanished back into the shadows. David stood alone, one hand clamped around the drive, the other forming a fist against the panic rising in his throat.

He wanted to punch Micah.

Instead David ran. Past the exit. Past the parking lot. Past everything holy.

The USB burned in his fist like evidence of a crime he hadn't committed yet.

He didn't stop until the church was out of sight, until his chest was heaving, until the drive had left marks in his palm from gripping it so hard.

Johnny hadn't been performing back there. That was the worst part.

He'd been believing.