That evening, Ethan returned to the Holloway house with a backpack slung over one shoulder and seventeen days' worth of stubble on his jaw.
Frank and Linda were in the living room when he walked through the door, and the effect was immediate. Both of them went rigid — Frank mid-sentence, Linda mid-stitch on whatever she'd been mending — frozen in the specific posture of two people who desperately wanted to ask a question and were terrified of the answer.
Five million marks. Their life savings. Every penny they'd scraped together over decades of honest, underpaid work — riding on whatever this kid was about to say.
And layered on top of that: Frank's career, now hanging by a thread. The media firestorm. The relatives who'd come crawling out of the woodwork to gloat. The bureau meetings that had ground Frank down to a nub.
Whether they could hold their heads up ever again depended entirely on the next words out of Ethan's mouth.
He saw the tension on their faces — the hope fighting the dread — and decided to have a little fun with it.
"Man, I've been working out there for over two weeks, and I don't even get a hot meal when I walk in? This is how you treat your brilliant nephew? I'm heartbroken."
Linda's worry evaporated into familiar irritation. She crossed the room in three strides, grabbed him by the ear, and twisted.
"You little punk. You've been gone for half a month and the first thing you do is give me attitude?"
"Ow — ow — Aunt Linda, let go—"
"You dare keep me in suspense? Out with it. Now. How did it go?"
"If you let go of my ear, I'll tell you!"
She released him. Frank hadn't moved from the couch, but his hands were gripping the armrest hard enough to leave marks, and his expression said everything his mouth wouldn't.
Ethan dropped the act.
"Uncle Frank. Aunt Linda." He unslung the backpack and set it on the coffee table. "I won't drag this out. After seventeen days — your nephew has delivered."
He unzipped the bag and pulled out a device the size of his palm.
It was beautiful, in its way. A compact coil of layered components — metals, polymers, materials that shouldn't have been possible to miniaturize to this scale — emitting a soft, steady, pale blue glow. It looked like something from another world.
Which, in a sense, it was.
Frank lunged forward and scooped it out of Ethan's hands with the careful urgency of a man defusing a bomb.
"Are you insane? Just tossing it around in a backpack? What if there's a radiation leak?!"
Ethan shrugged. "The energy output is completely stable. You could run it over with a truck and it wouldn't leak. But sure, hold it gently if it makes you feel better."
Linda leaned over Frank's shoulder and peered at the glowing disc.
"This is what the fuss has been about? You spent five million marks and half a month locked in a factory... to make a nightlight?"
Ethan nearly choked.
Frank shot his wife a look. "This 'nightlight' could power every home in Millbrook County for a month."
Linda's eyebrows shot up. "This little thing?"
"It's a simplified prototype," Ethan added. "The full-scale version would produce significantly more. But even this one generates roughly five hundred million kilowatt-hours."
The number hung in the air.
Linda stared at the glowing disc. Then at Ethan. Then back at the disc. Her mouth opened, closed, and opened again.
She was a housewife. She didn't have a physics degree. But she understood power grids, electricity bills, and the concept of "enough energy to run an entire county." And the distance between that and the palm-sized object her husband was cradling like a newborn baby was so vast that her brain simply refused to close the gap.
"No wonder you had the nerve to make those promises," she said faintly. "You knew the whole time."
Ethan grinned. "Without the right tools, you don't take on the job. Those three million marks, Aunt Linda — wisest investment. Just like I said."
She gave him a look that was half-glare, half-something-else. "Don't get cocky. Frank, put that thing somewhere safe. I'm making dinner."
She disappeared into the kitchen. Ethan was fairly certain he heard her blow her nose on the way.
After Linda left, Ethan sat down across from Frank and laid out the next phase.
"The reactor works. That's step one. Step two is making sure the whole world knows it."
"I want to hold a press conference. Invite reporters from every major outlet in the region — TV stations, newspapers, online platforms. I unveil the reactor on camera, demonstrate it live, and let the footage speak for itself."
Frank's expression was troubled, but he nodded.
"I'll make calls. Start reaching out tomorrow." He paused. "But I'll be honest with you, kid — I'm not sure how many will show up."
"Between the media coverage and the... everything else, the name 'Ethan Mercer' is toxic in this city right now. Most reporters would rather cover a ribbon-cutting at a gas station than associate themselves with you."
"And your uncle—" He gestured at himself with a humorless smile. "—is no longer Principal Holloway. The Bureau made that official three days ago. My contacts aren't worth what they used to be."
Ethan felt a stab of guilt. "Uncle Frank, that's my fault. If I hadn't—"
Frank waved him off. "Save it. The Bureau was looking for an excuse, and Thornton handed them one. That's politics. Once this reactor goes public, they'll trip over each other trying to reinstate me."
He straightened up.
"You focus on the demonstration. I'll get you an audience. Even if it's just one camera — that's all we need."
Ryan Calloway had wanted to be a journalist since he was fourteen years old.
Not a blogger. Not a "content creator." A journalist. The kind who broke stories that mattered, who held power accountable, who made people sit up and pay attention. He'd grown up watching investigative documentaries and reading long-form exposés, and by the time he graduated from Hartwell University with honors in communications, he was certain — absolutely certain — that this was what he'd been built for.
Reality had other plans.
Born in a farming town two hours outside Ashford City, Ryan had no family connections, no media contacts, no uncle who golfed with the station manager. His parents had emptied their savings to put him through school, and there was nothing left over for the kind of strategic gift-giving and dinner-hosting that greased the wheels of career advancement in Valorian media.
So Ryan watched. For eight years, he watched.
He watched colleagues with half his talent and twice his connections leapfrog over him to anchor desks and senior correspondent positions. He watched kids fresh out of school land plum assignments because their fathers made phone calls. He watched the spark that had driven him through university — the fire, the hunger, the belief that good work would be rewarded — flicker and fade and finally go dark.
At twenty-nine, Ryan Calloway was a staff reporter at the Ashford City Television Station. He covered ribbon-cuttings. School fundraisers. Local business openings. The stories nobody else wanted, assigned by editors who'd forgotten his name.
He was, by his own assessment, a walking corpse in a press badge.
"Hey, Calloway. Have you heard?" Two colleagues were chatting by the coffee machine, voices just loud enough to carry. "That kid who made the news — the Ashford Prep dropout? Apparently he's holding a press conference. Sent an invitation to the station and everything."
"The 'black sheep' kid? You're joking. Does a high school student even know what a press conference is?"
"Dead serious. The deputy director's been going back and forth about it all morning. The kid's uncle — the principal who just got fired — apparently has some old connection to our station director."
"So just decline. Who wants to be associated with that mess?"
"Can't decline outright. The connection's too close. Someone has to go."
"Well, it's not going to be me."
A pause. Then both reporters turned, slowly, toward the corner desk where Ryan Calloway sat pretending to read his email.
Their smiles said everything.
Ten minutes later, Ryan walked out of the deputy director's office holding a printed assignment sheet and wearing an expression that could only be described as resigned.
The press conference of Ethan Mercer, problem youth.
He folded the paper, stuck it in his jacket pocket, and headed for the parking lot.
Twenty-nine years old. Hartwell degree. Eight years in the field. And this is what I'm covering.
He started the car and pulled into traffic.
At least it'll be over fast.
I am working hard Plz throw Powerstones.