* * *

“Stop hovering, it doesn’t make me go any faster,” Cypher complained.

Sarah moved to the side. She looked up at the cameras, pretending she wasn’t there only because she was waiting for him to finish whatever he was doing so he could give her a few minutes of his time.

A real distraction came soon enough, however, when a familiar face emerged from Zeus’ office. The smile came naturally as she hurried to catch him before he got to the elevator.

“Hey, Clay, what’re you doing here?”

He stopped, surprised to see her at first, but soon he managed an awkward smile.

“Don’t tell me they’re pulling you over.” He’d been assigned to Center after their graduation. It wasn’t uncommon for a change in assignments every once in a while, as had been Scorpion’s case.

He fidgeted. “No, I was finishing up something from before.”

“Don’t worry, you don’t have to tell me anything.”

Her words had an unexpected effect—he winced. Sarah wondered if she would have noticed these things so clearly before, in her old life.

“I should probably tell you something.” Nothing in his face matched his words. He looked like he’d rather take a stroll through the wrong side of a shooting range than keep talking to her.

“What is it?”

He lowered his voice. “I know you’re going to freak out and get mad at me for this, but please don’t.”

“That’s not a good start. What is it?”

He shifted uneasily.

“Clay, out with it.”

He hunched over, unwilling to meet her gaze. “Zeus asked me to keep an eye on you, as a favor.”

“Did you befriend me because he ordered you to? Were you even a recruit or were you a plant?”

“No! I really was a recruit.” He lowered his voice again with a surreptitious glance around. “But I’m a war orphan, so he knew he could ask me. He asked me to look after you, nothing more. He was worried about you.”

“Worried about me in what way?” She didn’t even try to hide her suspicion.

“Not worried you were a threat or anything,” he corrected quickly. “He said you’d gone through some stuff and that you might need someone to… well… be a friend.”

Sarah did her best not to show how upset she was by his words. By the look on his face, she didn’t succeed.

“Your friendship was an unexpected surprise. A good surprise.”

Sarah turned to leave. “Yeah, sure, whatever.”

He followed after her. “You’re really going to be like that?”

“I don’t want to be angry at you, but I can’t help it right now.”

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“Not really, no.” How many times had she shared her feelings with him? How much of herself had she exposed to him only to have it passed on to someone else?

“Well, you know where to find me if you change your mind.”

“Sure thing, Sparrow.” She used his codename on purpose, figuring that would distance herself from him a little further.

She walked away without a backwards glance. Her steps slowed when she saw Pegasus had been watching. He’d probably seen the entire thing.

A pang of guilt about how she’d pushed him away earlier brought her fully to a halt, almost made her walk his way.

Another insidious thought snuck its way to the forefront of her mind. Had Pegasus known about Clay? Had he known Clay was spying on her for Zeus?

Was that what Pegasus had done as well? Had that been the reason he was always seeking her out? He was another one of Zeus’ pets after all.

Her feet moved on their own, taking her away from him towards the elevator.

She didn’t think she could deal with those answers right now.

Pegasus intercepted her as she reached the elevator. “Are you alright?”

Sarah avoided his eyes, staring at the closed doors. The questions lingered on the tip of her tongue.

The elevator doors opened.

“Do you want to talk about whatever it is?”

His words, a perfect mirror to Clay’s, felt like a slap in the face. “I don’t need to talk about everything.”

He retreated, surprised.

Ah, hell. She shouldn’t have snapped at him.

“Sorry, I don’t wanna talk.” She put all her strength into pressing the door close button, determined to make her escape.

Thankfully, he didn’t follow her into the elevator. She didn’t think she could handle it right now.

She could pretend all she wanted, but what Clay said hurt more than it angered her. He’d been her friend, her only real friend, at the academy. No one was rude, but he was the only one who made an effort to spend time with her, to include her. To find out that he’d been asked—or maybe ordered would be a better word—to monitor her… Well, it was a blow.

It might’ve been out of concern for her, but she still felt betrayed.

All in all, she could probably do without talking to anyone for the time being. Unfortunately, that didn’t last nearly as long as she would’ve wished. It didn’t even last two whole days.

* * *

“Come on!” Jeremy tightened his grip on her hand as he ran down the sidewalk.

“Slow down. I haven’t done any real running since the last soccer game my final year.”

When they were almost at his house, he released her hand, coming to a stop in front of her. “Close your eyes.”

If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.

“Why?”

“Sarah, just do it.”

She reluctantly shut her eyes. His steps shifted behind her, and she could tell he was standing now between her and the scorching sun. His hands covered her eyes next as he leaned closer to her.

“I don’t trust you,” he whispered into her left ear.

Sarah stumbled forward in the odd reddish dark. It felt like they should be getting to his house soon. “Can I open my eyes now?”

“Hang on, don’t spoil the surprise.

“What are you talking about?” It wasn’t her birthday or their anniversary.

“I have a surprise.”

“I don’t like surprises,” she groaned.

“Since when?”

“I wanna know it’s hell before I smell the sulfur.”

He chuckled, hands shaking in front of her eyes. “Where did you get that from?”

“I heard it somewhere.” She shrugged. “Now what’s the surprise?”

He removed his hands all of a sudden. “Ta da!”

Sarah blinked her eyes open, adjusting to the brightness. They’d arrived at Jeremy’s house. There was an ugly olive-colored car in the driveway that looked mildly familiar.

Jeremy turned to her, beaming. “I got it off my brother. What do you think?”

She really wanted to say something unkind about the color, but it was a car. “Congrats!”

“Come on, test it out!” He brought her over to the passenger’s seat, opening the door for her, then ran around to the other side.

He turned on the car, turning knobs and pressing buttons. A kid with a new toy.

The radio came on automatically.

“Oh, I haven’t gotten anything set up yet,” he said.

The president was speaking. Sarah checked her watch. Was it time for his weekly public address?

His voice became louder, clearer, as he talked about the deaths. What deaths? Sarah went to turn the volume up, but her hand brushed the wrong knob and the station shifted to white noise. She quickly changed it back, but when the president’s voice once more returned, it was calm, as if nothing happened.

She turned to look at Jeremy, ready to ask him if he’d heard it too. But Jeremy was testing out the windshield wipers, the same excited smile on his face.

Despite the heat, a chill ran through her.

* * *

Sarah rubbed at her eyes, frowning down at the layout. She could have sworn there was another exit drawn there a moment ago.

She counted the exits again: one, two.

No, that wasn’t right. There should be three.

With a frustrated breath, she went through the layout again, tracing the outer lines with her finger like a child playing with a maze.

Three exits, she confirmed.

Pegasus was suddenly right next to her. “You’ve been avoiding me.”

Her mouth opened, but the reply changed at least a dozen times in her mind before it actually formed on her lips. “Yes.”

“Why?”

She wished with all her confused little heart that she had a proper answer.

“I’m sorry about the other night. I was supposed to be helping you deal with your difficulties, not add to them.”

“You weren’t thinking straight. And you already apologized for that. Sort of.” Right before he kissed her again in the repository. She felt again that odd mix of elation and misery.

This time he was the one who avoided her gaze. “I know my track record for apologies isn’t exactly stellar. I’m also very sorry for misreading the situation the second time… and misreading you.”

She couldn’t say he had, not entirely. Not at all maybe. But then again, she had no idea what was going on in her head. Just thinking about it tossed her emotions into turmoil. Cold sweat formed on her palms.

“Sarah?”

“I don’t think I can talk about that right now.” She could try blaming it on Clay’s confession and the paranoid thought that maybe Pegasus was there for the same reason—to keep an eye on her—but her feelings were too messed up. She needed more time to sort through it all before talking to him.

Unaware of her inner struggles, Pegasus nodded, offering her a smile. “Alright, no talking about it.” As if it were as simple as that to pretend that none of it happened.

Sarah wasn’t sure she could, but Pegasus had accepted it easily enough. Maybe it didn’t truly matter to him. She berated herself the next second for the accusation in her thoughts. It was what she’d asked of him. Still, it didn’t mean that she had to be happy about how easily he complied.

“If you still want to go to the park and don’t mind my coming along, we can go next week.”

Sarah nodded, trying to act normal, whatever that was for her.

He hesitated a while longer, but said nothing more before moving away to where Scorpion had caught his attention with hand signals.

Something had changed since that day she’d seen them arguing in the corridor. What or how, she didn’t know, but there was a camaraderie there that she hadn’t noticed before.

Sarah hated admitting to herself that she might be jealous. She had no right to be.

Analyzing their private exchange, she felt more than saw someone observing her. She turned out of reflex and met Griffon’s gaze. If he’d noticed anything, she couldn’t tell. But then she couldn’t tell what Griffon was thinking most of the time.

He directed her into the conference room. “Shall we?”

She took one of the first seats. Griffon followed her in, Unicorn, Pegasus, Mermaid, and Scorpion on his trail.

Mermaid took a seat up front left of Pegasus, Scorpion pulled a chair over to the corner to their right and Unicorn settled behind them. Sarah thought that completed the set, but then Cypher came in and closed the door.

“I’m uploading the new schematics,” he said, taking a seat next to where Griffon was standing.

Sarah stared down at her screen and blinked at the image, trying to get rid of the strange feeling of déjà vu. There were only two exits again.

“Hawk confirmed one of the exits was lost last week,” Griffon said. “We can probably blow through it if necessary, but there’s a ton of debris and flammables between the outside and the main area now.”

“Yay,” Mermaid grumbled.

“Their numbers haven’t changed since this morning, so we’ll be heading in to provide Hawk’s team some support.”

“What? They can’t handle twenty guys on their own?”

Griffon didn’t even crack a smile. “We want as many as we can alive, but I don’t want anyone on my team dead. Do you understand?”

Mermaid raised a hand. “Anyone dies, they’ll have to answer to me.”

Griffon fixed his gaze on her. “Is it going to be one of those days, Madeleine?”

She sunk back in her seat, looking appropriately subdued.

Griffon brought an image up on the screen. Sarah had no idea what she was looking at. By the looks on the others’ faces, she was not the only one.

Scorpion whistled low. “Whiskey…”

“Tango…” Pegasus joined in.

“Foxtrot,” Scorpion finished.

Mermaid laughed. “You know, Foxtrot really hates it when you do that.”

“So does Tango.”

“Whiskey doesn’t mind.”

Scorpion laughed. “No, but she always thinks we’re talking to her.”

“Foxtrot’s the one you should be worrying about pissing off,” Mermaid said. “Didn’t he finish combat training before deciding he’d rather work as an analyst?”

Pegasus nodded. “He switched over two hours before graduation, that’s how he got Foxtrot as a codename. Still does his weapons training regularly.”

“Even if you don’t give him a gun, have you seen him at the gym?” Scorpion grabbed Pegasus’ arm. “I don’t know what he uses those muscles for, but his arms are thicker than yours.”

Everyone had stopped what they were doing and were staring at Pegasus and Scorpion.

“Something’s changed, are you guys back together?”

“What? No,” Scorpion protested.

Sarah was looking at Pegasus, all but holding her breath as she waited for his response, but he was laughing.

Griffon leaned back against the table and glared at them. “You two, behave.”

“Sorry,” Pegasus said.

“And it’s not like you were saying anything important,” Mermaid said.

“Is it weird that I miss the fighting?” Griffon asked.

But even Sarah could tell he wasn’t serious. The feel of the room was different. It had been from the start and she hadn’t been able to put a finger on it until that moment.

“Can we go back to the mission planning?” Griffon asked, tearing her attention away.

Scorpion pressed her lips together, fighting back a smile. “Whenever you feel like it, boss.”

He glared at her and moved back to the center of the room. “Hawk will hopefully have something for us later today.”

“What about the secondary cell we’ve been monitoring?” Pegasus asked. “Did that lead us anywhere yet?”

Unicorn shook her head. “Hydra’s got the watch and Sphynx is taking over at 0200.”

Sarah blinked at the screen, the words suddenly getting away from her. She pressed her eyes tightly shut and took a deep breath. When she opened them again, everything was normal, but the words were slightly different, and Cypher was sitting beside her as if he’d been there all along. She wasn’t sure if she actually missed an entire chunk of time.

“Lore should be here shortly,” Cypher said.

Lore was coming over?

“And they still haven’t told you anything?” Griffon asked.

Cypher shook his head. “She’s supposed to take over November’s work, I’m not sure how that’ll help. I mean, November can do November’s work. Hell, the cook who likes baking pies could do November’s work.”

Mermaid laughed. Griffon complained.

“Now, you guys may not know this, and it hurts my pride a little to say it,” Cypher continued, “but she’s better than me.”

“Oh, sweetie, don’t worry yourself too much. We’ve always known,” Unicorn said, barely keeping a straight face.

A loud bang from the corner of the room alarmed Sarah. She drew in a sharp breath, choking on the warm air that invaded her lungs.

She struggled to suppress a cough, but her lungs and throat didn’t want to obey. The smell of something burning invaded her nostrils. She almost knocked over her chair when she pushed herself away from the table. It was burning her.

Sarah covered her mouth with a hand, but still it burned and choked her. She couldn’t breathe anymore, tucked in the corner, coughing.

“Phoenix, do you have anything you want to say?”

She blinked away the sting in her eyes, a couple more coughs lingering as she pushed her chair away—it hadn’t fallen after all.

“Sorry, I need some water.” She rushed to the door, glancing back to wave aside their concerned inquiries. Confused, she would’ve paused for a moment longer if the coughing had let her. When did Cypher move back to the other seat?