While the adults talked about science and war, Lucas had escaped the room again. He found Jax sitting on an overturned kayak near the waterline, smoking a cigarette that smelled like harsh, unfiltered tobacco.
"You're a long way from the buffet, kid," Jax said without looking back. The moonlight caught the jagged scar on his eyebrow.
"I don't like the food here," Lucas replied, sitting in the sand a few feet away, hugging his knees. "It feels like last meals."
Jax let out a short, dry chuckle. "Smart kid. Most people are busy Instagramming their appetizers while the house burns down. Your old man seems... intense."
"He's a Colonel," Lucas said, spitting the word like a pit. "Or he was. Now he's just a guy who yells."
"My dad was a drunk," Jax said, blowing a smoke ring. "Punched me in the face when I was twelve for breaking a glass. I spent the next twenty years in anger management classes and prison cells."
"Did you hate him?" Lucas asked.
"Sure," Jax said. "But I learned something. Men like that? They're scared. They're scared of the chaos. They think if they control everything—how you walk, how you talk, what you eat—then the chaos won't get them. But it always does."
Jax looked at the dark ocean. "The chaos is here, kid. Look at the water."
Lucas looked. The tide was going out, but the waves weren't crashing. They were hissing. Like the water was boiling.
"You're a swimmer, right?" Jax asked. "I saw you on the plane. You've got the shoulders. You hold yourself like you're waiting for a starting gun."
"I quit," Lucas said.
"Doesn't matter what you quit," Jax said, tossing the cigarette into the sand and crushing it out. "Once you're in the water, you swim or you drown. Your dad... he's trying to build a boat. But you? You know how to swim."
Jax reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, heavy object. He tossed it to Lucas. It was a tactical folding knife—black G10 scales, serrated edge, cold and heavy.
"Keep it hidden," Jax said. "Your old man will take it away because he wants to be the only 'protector.' But in five minutes, every man is going to be his own island. You're a swimmer, right? You know how to move fast."
Lucas gripped the knife. The cold steel felt more real than anything his father had ever given him.
"Why are you helping me?" Lucas asked.
"Because you have eyes," Jax said, standing up. "And because I don't plan on dying tonight."