CISPA:Sons of Storm

It was a Saturday. The only day that gives him ultimate joy and silence. Teaching the kids wasn't as easy as it seems. They're kids, how hard could teaching them be? was what he thought when he wanted to take the job. After a few months, he realized children are actually the toughest lots to teach. And apart from that, the daily school noise nearly drives him crazy sometimes.

Liam Thompson had woken up some minutes before five in the morning. He had stared at the ceilings of his apartment for more of the time. At five thirty-eight, he was already tired of it.

He sprang up from his bed. What could he do? It was too early.

He dragged himself to the center of his room and started working out. One hundred squats. One hundred push-ups. It was a normal routine to keep him in shape, something he had continued since his military years. The habit had stuck, and now it was more of a mental reset than physical discipline.

As his palms pressed into the floor and his arms pushed his body up and down in a perfectly controlled flow, the silence around him slowly faded into the background. He reached out with one hand during a pause and turned on the TV. Nothing fancy, really. Just hoping to catch some early morning workout tracks—those upbeat, sometimes annoying pop beats that kept his pace steady.

For a moment, it worked. The music was light, the effect was good, no doubt. His body began to flow with the rhythm, each push-up timed with the beat, his breaths matching the bass. But, as always, the TV betrayed him. Without warning, the screen blinked and switched automatically to the news channel.

"Of course," he muttered.

It was frustrating. It always was. But he was used to it. The TV had some sort of software update glitch that refused to get fixed no matter how many settings he tried to change. It always returned to the news every morning before six. Who knows? It might actually be part of the TV function.

He kept going with his push-ups, ignoring the voice of the news anchor that was now spilling headlines about a fire in Brooklyn and a political scandal involving some city councilman. Liam had long stopped caring about morning news. Too much noise, too little solution. The world always had something going wrong.

At push-up sixty-four, he paused and sat back on his knees. Sweat had already begun to form on his chest and forehead. His breath was steady, though. He had done this too many times to feel breathless.

He grabbed his water bottle from beside the TV stand, took a quick sip, and stood up. Moving toward the window, he pulled the curtain slightly to peek outside. The sky was still dark, with only a hint of blue teasing the horizon. A few early morning joggers were jogging across the street. A dog barked in the distance. Somewhere below, a delivery truck rumbled down the block.

Saturdays were always like this. Quiet. Still. Peaceful.

He loved it.

He stretched his arms and rolled his shoulders, loosening his neck with a few gentle turns. Then, he walked over to his small kitchen space and put water on the stove. Tea. Always tea before anything else. Coffee made him edgy, especially on days like this when he didn't need to be anywhere until noon—and that is even if he was ever going anywhere.

As the kettle began to heat up, he returned to the living room and wiped his face with a towel.

The news was still going. Now something about a body found in an hotel room. He frowned. The world isn't changing. Not because it bothered him. But because it sounded... familiar.

The name Victor Vex floated somewhere in the background of the reporter's words. He immediately stared at the TV, completely focused.

Then he listened closely.

His eyes watched carefully.

He noticed the culprit on the TV. It looked like someone he knew.

The image was grainy, unclear. A capture from some street surveillance, probably, or maybe a security cam from the hotel exit. The face wasn't clear, just partially turned, head dipped, it was masked but the physique and hair was exposed. With that, something about the the picture struck him. Something didn't let his eyes move away.

He had never forgotten the features. He had created them in his mind for years and he was so sure it was accurate.

The way the jaw curved into the neck. The posture—tense, alert, confident. Even the way the figure stepped out of the building—it wasn't just movement; it was rhythm. Familiar rhythm. The kind that lives in your memory long after you've let someone go.

He sat down slowly, letting the weight of the moment press into his chest.

It couldn't be. But what if it was?

He reached for his phone without thinking. His hands moved out of habit. He opened his gallery, scrolled past old classroom photos, lesson plans, saved memes from colleagues, screenshots of recipes he never cooked... then, there it was.

The photo.

It was old. Slightly faded around the edges. The only image he had managed to keep through the years.

His brother.

He stared at it. At the brown skin. The jawline. The smirk that tried not to look too proud. The photo was from years ago—before things had gone south, before their family had fallen apart, before pain and anger swallowed them in different directions.

The TV kept talking. Something about the weapon used. Possible inside connections. Vex's past enemies. But Liam didn't hear much of it now. His thumb swiped over the photo gently. Then he opened a browser and typed what little information the reporter had said aloud. A link to a clearer image showed up almost immediately—a security still of the alleged killer leaving through an alley.

He tapped it.

It loaded slowly.

Then there it was.

Still blurry, but clearer than before.

The hair color was exactly the same. The body shape matched the one he had in his mind. It also matched the description his friend in the police force had once helped him put together years ago, back when he was still desperately searching—back when he still believed he'd find his brother behind a bus stop or walking past a coffee shop. That friend, Officer Malik, had told him, "Your brother wouldn't just disappear without reason, Ethan. Keep looking. But prepare for anything."

He didn't know what "anything" meant back then. Maybe he still didn't. But today… this image, this possibility—it felt like the "anything" had finally shown up.

He didn't move for a long time. The tea on the stove had over boiled, a faint hiss coming from the corner of the kitchen, but he didn't hear it until the smell of hot metal and steam forced his attention back.

He turned the stove off quickly, poured the water out, and leaned on the counter with both hands.

So, what now?

Was it really him?

Was his brother the one who killed Victor Vex?

The thought didn't disgust him. In some dark, quiet part of himself, he understood. Victor Vex wasn't just another big name in the city's criminal underbelly. He had ties to a lot of tragedies, a lot of broken lives—including theirs. If it was Ethan, it was personal. It wasn't just about the crime. It was about 'survival'. He could still remember Ethan telling him that he's only going to survive if he killed Victor Vex. Revenge. He didn't put much attention to it then because he felt it was only our of anger and grief but as it is now, he might actually have done it.

He took his tea without adding anything to it and walked back to the window. The early morning joggers were gone now. The city had woken up. Cars moved more frequently. Horns began to echo between the buildings. Yet inside him, the world had slowed down.

His Saturday was supposed to be silent. Peaceful. Free of worry.

But today, it wasn't.

Today, it was filled with thoughts of the past, of pain, of faces that might return.

He sat on the couch, tea cooling in his hand, eyes occasionally drifting back to the paused news image on the screen.

He didn't try to call Malik. Not yet. He didn't want confirmation. Not today.

For now, he wanted the ache of not knowing. He could only deal with that now.

He spent the morning in deadlock. Washing dishes with his mind elsewhere. Starting a book he couldn't get through five pages of. Picking up his guitar, only to set it back down after hitting two strings. His whole body was restless, but his thoughts were louder than anything he tried to distract himself with.

In the afternoon, he took a walk. Same route he always took—past the corner store, down the street with the three identical bakeries, into the park where children were already screaming joyfully across the field. He liked the noise here. It was distant enough not to disturb him but present enough to remind him that life still moved on.

He sat on his usual bench and watched the trees shift with the breeze.

The image returned to his mind again.

The man stepping out of the hotel's shadow. The tilt of his head. The controlled pace.

His brother—or someone who moved just like him.

He ran his fingers over the worn armrest of the bench, unsure if he wanted it to be true. Would it be a relief to find him again? Or a curse, now that blood was on his hands?

But deep in his gut, under the layers of reason and hesitation, something buzzed.

A hunch.

A pull.

He couldn't explain it, but he had always believed they would cross paths again. He didn't matter what he might have gotten himself into. He would try to find him, yet again.

And maybe this was how it would happen.

In silence that refused to stay silent.

Liam Thompson sat there, surrounded by children's laughter and chirping birds, staring into nothing, his tea long forgotten, his thoughts tangled in memory.

Saturday no longer felt like a day of peace.

It felt like a beginning to something bigger than him.