Dakota inhaled and exhaled deeply and spoke between breaths, "Blake, you know what I went through! What that bas**** of a hunter did to me! The guilt! The suffering!!" "I do know, Dakota! I do! But that wasn't Alan!! That was some random hunter from Venus! Alan was one of us!! And in your idiotic rage, you killed him!!" Blake kept between Colt and Dakota. From my state of limbo, I could watch the Guardians turn on each other. Colt tried to gather Light to revive me, but the Dreadnought was too dense with Darkness. That's why Blake was protecting us, Colt was vulnerable! Dakota placed his hand on Blake's chest and pushed him out of the way, "If only you knew the horrors..." Blake, in response, grabbed Dakota's arm and whipped around and held it behind Dakota's back. "Stand down, Blake!!" Dakota strained against Blake's strength. "Don't make me do this, Captain!" Blake yelled as he held Dakota tightly. "Just a little bit longer!..." Colt yelled. [i]"Guys! Stop fighting! It's the knight! It's him! He's messing with your head!"[/i] I tried to yell to my broken team, but they wouldn't answer me. They couldn't hear me. Dakota slipped out of Blake's grasp and force pushed the titan away. Dakota turned to Colt, "Screw you. Screw you. Screw you..." Colt tried to fly away but Dakota gripped him tightly. "STOP!!!" Blake tackled Dakota-- Colt flew away-- and drew his sidearm. "Don't move! Don't! Move!" Dakota stayed on the ground, refusing to look at the abyss of the weapon's barrel. Blake moved over to my body. I watched as his feet shuffled to me. Finally, after what felt like years, I returned to a stand from a bright burst of light. I glanced down to Dakota. He shifted, as if breaking free of the trance that held him. "Al... Alan?..." he uttered. "Alan?" Blake asked as he switched from Dakota to me. "I'm fine... Yeah, I'm fine," I coughed once. Twice. "Yeah, no thanks to you!!" Colt yelled to Dakota. The warlock stood up and stared at Blake. The titan, slowly and reluctantly, lowered his weapon. All of the sudden, the knight seemed to Blink at us, sword swinging! I jumped over the blade and rolled after hitting the ground. As subtly as it started, the world seemed to form back around us. Behind us, James and Kourtney were fighting the wizard, who had spawned a flaming sword. The two gods dualed the fireteam! Everyone ran around the court, trying to get an advantage. The wizard threw fireballs at the ground around us. One fireball exploded, and the shockwave sent James into a wall. The titan struggled to push himself back up, but just fell back to the ground, and didn't move again. I looked around for the knight. I spun around to see him behind me-- I couldn't keep up with his teleporting. The knight hit me with his sword, cracking my chest plate! I flew through the air, landing in the center of the court with everyone else. I was laying on my stomach, and I couldn't make myself get up. I raised my head up to see the wizard chant spells, causing the four of us to float in the air. With a shift motion of her arms, we were cast outside the atmospheric barrier around the Dreadnought. We were in space. No air. No gravity. The knight and wizard both began chanting, causing the Oversouls in the back to expand. The Darkness pouring from the orbs burned us as we strained! My body lurched as I felt myself lose Light; dying. There was no way our ships could save us in time. The Light in me was almost depleted! From the back of the court, where we first entered, I saw James leading a parade of Shattered Sun knights. (That's the problem with these twin god-princes. They used blunt force and blind rage rather than tactical prowess to gain dominance). Once the thirty plus knights were standing behind the twins, James raised Morin's old hammer as tribute and arc energy collided with him. In one motion, James swung the hammer into the ground, launching arc energy everywhere! That caused the chain reaction of the masses of knights to simultaneously explode... killing everyone on the bridge. The knights. The gods. James. My headset was broke, so I couldn't hear anyone talking, but I could almost hear the raging anger in Blake's voice, despite being in the vacuum of space. Blake tried to activate his jetpack and fly back to the Dreadnought, but he-- like the rest of us-- was transmatted to our respective ships. Phantom was killed. The Twins were dead. The Dreadnought was a burning scrap in space. Two Guardians down. I sat, frozen in shock, in the cockpit. The simple idea of reaching for the controls seemed impossible. We set course for Earth. The battle was over. No more Phantom. No more Shattered Suns. No more Morin. No more James. They sacrificed themselves for the survival of everyone else. The trip home was a silent one.