Maya's POV
I screamed Kai's name as the white light swallowed everything.
The blast was like being inside a thunderstorm and an earthquake at the same time. The whole building shook, windows broke for blocks in every direction, and a wave of psychic energy hit me so hard I almost passed out.
But I held onto Ethan tight and forced myself to stay aware. My kid needed me.
When the light finally faded, I stumbled to the broken window and looked down at the parking lot.
There was a hole where Kai had landed. A big, smoking hole in the concrete and asphalt. But I couldn't see him anywhere.
"Daddy!" Ethan cried weakly. "Where's Daddy?"
"I don't know, baby," I whispered, tears running down my face.
Elder Marcus emerged beside me, his face grim. "The soul blade explosion should have killed him instantly. There's no way he could have survived that much concentrated dark magic."
"No," I said strongly. "He's not dead. I would feel it if he was dead. The mate bond would be broken."
But even as I said it, I could feel something wrong with our link. It was still there, but faint. Like Kai was very far away or...
"Mama," Ethan said, trying to sit up. "I can still smell Daddy. He's hurt really bad, but he's not gone."
I looked at my four-year-old son in wonder. "You can smell him? From here?"
Ethan nodded weakly. "He's down there somewhere. Under the ground."
"Under the ground?" Marcus repeated. "You mean he was buried by the explosion?"
"No," Ethan said, his little face scrunched up in focus. "Not buried. Hidden. Like he's in a different place that's right next to our place, but not the same."
"A pocket dimension," Marcus breathed. "The soul blade explosion must have torn a hole between worlds."
I didn't understand what he meant, but I didn't care. If there was even a tiny chance that Kai was living, I had to find him.
"How do we get to him?" I asked.
"We can't," Marcus said sadly. "Dimensional tears close themselves within minutes. Even if Kai is living in there, there's no way to reach him."
"There has to be a way," I maintained.
That's when Ethan shocked us all again.
"I can open it," he said quietly.
Marcus and I stared at him. "What?"
"I can feel the broken place where the explosion happened," Ethan explained. "It's like a crack in the air. I think I can make it bigger."
"Ethan, no," I said quickly. "You're already tired from fighting the rogues. Using more power could kill you."
"But Daddy will die if I don't try," Ethan said, and his silver eyes filled with tears. "I just found my real daddy. I can't lose him now."
My heart broke at the pain in my son's words. But Marcus was shaking his head.
"Even if you could open a dimensional tear," he told Ethan softly, "the energy required would be enormous. You're only four years old. Your body can't handle that kind of power."
"What if he wasn't doing it alone?" I asked suddenly.
Marcus looked at me sharply. "What do you mean?"
"I mean what if I helped him?" I said, the thought forming as I spoke. "I'm a Luna Prime. My healing power comes from the same source as his. What if we combined our abilities?"
"Maya, that's incredibly dangerous," Marcus warned. "If something goes wrong, you could both be killed."
"And if we do nothing, Kai dies for sure," I answered. "That's not a choice."
I looked down at Ethan, who was watching me with hope and fear mixed in his little face.
"Are you willing to try?" I asked him.
"Yes," he said instantly. "I want to save Daddy."
I picked him up and carried him to the window. Down in the parking lot, I could see the crater still smoking with leftover magic from the blast.
"Tell me what to do," I said.
Ethan closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "Put your hands on my shoulders. When I start using my power, send your silver light into me. But not to heal me - to make my power stronger."
I placed my hands on his small shoulders and felt the mate bond pulse slightly. Kai was still out there somewhere. Still living, but not for much longer.
"Ready?" Ethan asked.
"Ready."
Ethan's eyes blazed gold, and strength began flowing out of him like invisible fire. I could see the air above the hole starting to shimmer and bend.
I sent my silver healing light into my son, not to fix injuries but to amplify his incredible powers. The combination of our powers produced something I'd never felt before - raw creation energy that could reshape reality itself.
The air above the hole cracked like broken glass.
Through the crack, I could see another place. A dark, misty world where everything looked like shadows and echoes. And there, lying unconscious at the bottom of a similar hole, was Kai.
"I see him!" I cried. "Ethan, you did it!"
But the effort was too much for my son. Blood began dripping from his nose, and his hands started shaking.
"Can't... hold it... much longer," he gasped.
The dimensional crack was already starting to close. I had maybe thirty seconds to reach Kai before he was stuck forever in that shadow world.
I made a choice that would change everything.
I jumped through the crack.
The ghost world felt cold and empty, like all the warmth had been drained out of existence. I ran to Kai and found him barely breathing, his body covered in burns from the soul blade blast.
"Kai," I whispered, putting my hands on his chest. "Wake up."
I poured all of my healing power into him, and slowly his silver eyes opened.
"Maya?" he said softly. "How... how are you here?"
"Ethan opened a door between worlds," I explained quickly. "But it's closing. We have to go now."
I helped Kai to his feet, and we stumbled toward the crack in the air. But when we reached it, my heart sank.
The opening was barely two feet wide now, and getting smaller every second. And on the other side, I could see Ethan collapsing from tiredness.
"He can't hold it much longer," Kai said.
We squeezed through the closing crack just as it snapped shut behind us. The moment we landed in our own world, Ethan fell asleep in Elder Marcus's arms.
"Is he okay?" I asked anxiously, checking my son for injuries.
"He's alive," Marcus said. "But using that much power at his age... it's changed him somehow. I can feel it."
"Changed him how?"
Before Marcus could answer, Ethan's eyes opened. But instead of their normal silver color, they were now completely gold. Not the flickering gold of his Alpha powers, but solid, lasting gold that seemed to glow with inner fire.
"Mama?" he said, and his voice sounded different too. Older. More grown.
"I'm here, baby," I said, taking him into my arms.
"I don't feel like a little boy anymore," Ethan said quietly. "The power changed something inside me. I can see things now. Know things."
"What kind of things?" Kai asked, putting his arms around both of us.
Ethan looked up at him with those new golden eyes, and when he spoke, his words sent chills down my spine.
"I can see the future, Daddy," he said simply. "And something really bad is coming. Something worse than Victoria or Dominic or the soul blade."
"What do you mean?" I asked.
Ethan's sparkling eyes filled with sadness that no four-year-old should ever have to carry.
"The explosion didn't just open a door between worlds," he said. "It opened doors to all the worlds. And things are coming through. Things that want to eat our world and everything in it."
He pointed toward the window, and when I looked outside, I saw something that made my blood freeze.
The sky was going black, but not with regular darkness. This was something else. Something living.
And it was spreading toward us like a hungry shadow that swallowed everything it touched.
"The Void Feeders," Elder Marcus whispered in horror. "They're real."
"What are Void Feeders?" I asked, though I was afraid to know the answer.
"Ancient entities from the space between worlds," Marcus explained. "They consume entire realities, leaving nothing behind but emptiness."
I looked down at my son, who had somehow aged years in the span of minutes. "Can you stop them?"
Ethan's golden eyes met mine, and I saw an ancient knowledge that didn't belong in a child's face.
"Maybe," he said. "But not as I am now. I'll need to become something more. Something that's never existed before."
"What do you mean?"
My four-year-old son looked at me with eyes that had seen the end of worlds.
"I mean I'll have to stop being human," he said quietly. "To save everyone, I'll have to become something else entirely."
And as the living darkness crept closer to our building, I realized our greatest battle was just starting.