Daniel laughs into his mouth guard as he ducks under a right thrown by Angle. Danny dances around the man, but the experienced wrestler keeps his center of gravity low and his moments concise. Danny tries to out-pace him, throwing a kick to his left before dancing to his right and throwing a hard left. Angle however just chuckles at the efforts, parrying the kick and shuffling with crab-like agility to block the left.

Just as he finishes his sentence, Kurt drops down low and takes Danny down with a quick lift tackle. Danny finds himself on his back, mounted by Kurt and blocking his face from a flurry of punches all in a matter of seconds. Kurt laughs out loud, pushing himself off Danny’s chest and offering the seventeen year old a hand. Danny accepts it gingerly, letting him be pulled onto his feet.

Kurt playfully knocks the back of Danny’s head, scruffing up his hair. The two of them exit the ring, and grab for their water bottles. Jackson stands against a nearby wall, arms crossed and switching his gaze between the book in his head and Danny. He looks to the right, seeing a younger girl perform flips in the ring, trying her best not to break her neck whilst still looking impressive. His face cracked into a smile and his cold eyes softened at the flash of movement. Two so different, yet so similar.

His phone began to vibrate, and he flicked open the phone and hit the flashing green button.

A muffled, yet clearly stern voice responds in a long paragraph. Jackson’s face warps into a frown, and then evolving into an angry glare.

He lowered the phone from the side of his face, flipped the screen shut and let out a hard breath. His hands rose to his temples, massaging the soft flesh. Just then, a voice called out to him.

Danny finished his sentence with a childlike chuckle, still drinking from the opening in his bottle.

Danny blinks back at Jackson, looking up at the wall-mounted clock. His eyebrow raises questioningly.

Jackson sighs, exasperated. He looks back at the young boy, shaking his head at him. Lord, why did this kid have to ask questions about everything, kids and soldiers are so vastly different.

Danny looks visibly concerned now, stepping toward Jackson.

Jackson sighs once more, advancing towards Danny himself. He puts a hand on the boy to reassure him.

Danny nods sharply, rushing to pack his stuff up and helping his sister with her stuff. Within minutes the three out of the door and on the way to the private air stripe.

The skyline of New York can be seen through the windows. A young girl, in her early teenage years, stares out wistfully. Her flame-red hair sticks still against her body, cascading down to just under her chest. She slumps forward, resting her chin on her hands. Across her is seated Danny, tapping his foot nervously into the floor, looking down at the mahogany table in front of him.

Jackson breaths out slowly through his mouth, massaging his temples with his thumbs, resting his index fingers right above each eyebrow.

Danny’s eyes widen for a split second, before he frowns.

Jackson forces a smile, you can almost see the thoughts swirling through his mind. He has to deal with this in his own way. He places a solid hand on the young Danny’s shoulder, giving it a light squeeze and trying his best not to shed a tear at the thought of what this kid is about to go through. Just then, the private jet’s intercom beeps, and the pilot announces that they’re about to bank into a landing. Jackson glances at his two wards’ seatbelts, making sure they’re firmly in place before he leans back into his own seat. His hands moved to both armrests, gripping them yet trying to do it as subtly as possible. He hated flying.

The beeps and boings familiar to the ears of many kids come over through the speakers. Bright neon lights flash about and somewhere nearby a kid screams in joy as their claw machine finally decides to humor them by delivering a toy. In another corner a kid wails as his parents try and explain to him that it’s time to go home because it was getting late. In yet another corner was an older man, probably in his seventies, huddled over a screen with brightly colored animals and some new form of tetris playing. It was like this last man that our dear hero found himself today, he stood before a booth arcade machine, a plastic revolver in his hand. He shot at the screen expertly ducking and swerving to mimic his character in the game.

Behind him stood the stoic figure of his butler, bodyguard and guardian, dressed in a perfectly maroon suit, contrasting the casual white t-shirt and jeans his ward wore. Jackson adjusted his cuffs, glancing at the time before returning to look at the screen, a little smile playing on his face as he watched Danny play soldier and the glee it brought upon the young man. His head moves the smallest fraction, acknowledging the presence of the XWF cameraman, he clears his throat to attract Danny’s attention.

Danny turns to face the camera man, his eyes have dark circles around them. The bloodlines within his pupils are engorged, giving his eyes a dark red tint. A tired smile dances across his face, cracking his dry lips.

He squeezes the trigger of the toy gun a few more times, emptying his virtual clip into a few more rogue villains.

Danny drops his hand, and the sound of his virtual gun reloading can be heard from the machine. He lifts it back towards the screen and clears the next room of pixel terrorists.

As he’s speaking, Danny continues to squeeze his trigger and dispose of more virtual threats to virtual freedom. He exclaims with every shot, hopping from side to side as if his body moving might affect the game.

Danny seems to have gotten shot in the game, losing and prompting a ten second countdown with the word:

Flashing on the screen.

Danny lifts up his trigger hand, with the plastic gun in it, kisses it’s tip, extend his arm out and squeezes the trigger one more time, mocking Main’s taunt and restarting the game.

Danny winks at the camera before turning back to his game. Jackson moves towards the camera to usher the man out.