"Did you really fall asleep again?" Lucas asks as I sit up, covering my mouth as I yawn.

I removed the earplugs first because I knew he was going to ask something right away.

"Yeah," I answer. "You're cozy and it's warm in here, especially with my layers on. With the sound of the horrors and screams blocked, it's perfect for sleeping."

"Having you sleep against me is nice," he mutters. "Better than Zane."

"I did ask you out," I point out.

"Yeah, I know," he sighs as we rise from our seats, Lucas gathering up our trash to take care of as we leave. "But as I said, I need to… deal with things. You are far too into supporting the Patron for me, and I'm not sure how to deal with that. I don't mind doing vigilante work, even if most of the others are apparently supported by him, but there are still too many-"

Lucas cuts off there and doesn't say another word as we leave the theater. In fact, he doesn't say another word on our way to the restaurant for lunch, either. Him making that effort to not get into a fight with me over the Patron is nice.

Though I also know he's upset over the article that aired about him yesterday. Sorry, about Lumilxal. Lucas got into an altercation with another vigilante Monday night, and the news report called into question the budding vigilante's motives. He won't say what caused the altercation, and the article didn't say, either.

Once we're in the restaurant and seated, Lucas immerses himself in examining the menu, probably not wanting to talk further. It is the morning, after all, and I know he's running on less sleep than normal since he woke up early just to hang out with me.

"Am I ever going to meet your other two friends?" I ask. "The lovebirds?"

"Maybe one day," he shrugs. "You're busy on Saturdays right now, which is the only time I see them ever since they began dating, and I'm not an asshole. I won't crash their dates. Now hush, I'm too grumpy to talk."

At least he's being straightforward about it. I examine the menu, and when our waitress arrives, I place the orders for both of us because he does look irritated. If only he had been ready to date when I asked him out… his aunt did mention that he's really only like this in the mornings if he isn't getting some. Right now, he's holding off on just hookups because he does want to date me.

What would he do if I started dating Zane? Or someone else entirely? What would Zane do, for that matter? I did try pulling the "I met with the cute guy my childhood friend wants me to hook up with" thing with them on Monday, but I couldn't keep it up for long.

If another guy does show up, one I'm attracted to and who's attracted to me, I might go for it. Sure, I know Lucas and Zane better, but I've really only known them a couple of weeks. I won't wait around forever for these two to get their heads together, especially because I am ready for dating and sex.

Our food arrives as I wonder over these things, and Lucas and I begin eating in silence. When I'm halfway done with my food, I happen to glance over towards the counter and when I do, I jump in surprise.

"Whoa!" I exclaim.

"What?" Lucas asks as I pull out my phone.

My new one, that I bought on Monday after Chris dropped me off at the building full of stores. It's a smart phone this time, and I have four missed messages from Zane, all of which contain friend invites for a game he plays while bored at work.

"Damn turtles are everywhere," I pull up the camera app, the image on the screen far clearer than on my old phone.

"Turtles?" Lucas looks over as I take the picture of the turtle, which is just sitting on the counter, chilling like nothing's strange about it sitting there. I move the picture to my turtles album I made just for these pictures. "Uh… yeah, that's a turtle. What's it doing in here? And what did you mean, they're everywhere?"

"I've been seeing them everywhere since Monday afternoon," I tell him. "Starting with the restaurant I went to for lunch after meeting Chris. I've taken pictures of all of them."

I switch to the first picture, then show it to Lucas. He takes my phone and starts flipping through the pictures. The second one is in the changing rooms at the center, where I'd dressed after my shower after martial arts on Monday. The third is sitting on one of the trash cans at Lenny's Burgers and Fries, taken after my shift yesterday. The fourth is hanging out on the sidewalk in front of the Lusvaris Training Center. The fourth is sitting in the mail room at my apartment. The fifth was sitting on a bench I passed on my way to the center this morning. And now the sixth, here at the restaurant.

"It's gone, by the way," I say.

"What is?" Lucas looks at me.

"The turtle," I indicate where the turtle was, not even needing to look over to see that it's gone. "They show up, and after I stop focusing on them, they leave."

"That is more than weird," he mutters as he hands me my phone back. "Without the pictures, I'd have thought I'd imagined it."

The fact that this began after I talked to Sivalshi makes me wonder if it has to do with why Shade wanted to know if I'd talked to the great turtle or not. Why am I seeing turtles everywhere now? Why do they seem to just disappear after I look at them? Isaac said he has no clue what I'm talking about and was surprised when I sent him the picture.

According to him, the Patron's answer didn't really answer the question, but did make him think the turtles have always been here, just hidden through some sort of filter. Now, I'm starting to see through that filter because of my talk with Sivalshi. Or to Sivalshi, anyway.

I'm wondering if that's really what it is, because every single turtle is looking at me, as the pictures will attest.

"Which is why I'm taking them," I tell Lucas. "Because I wouldn't believe it without the proof, either."

"I'll keep an eye out for more," he says as my phone pings. "Zane again?"

"Yup," I check it. "Another invite, this time so that he can get free red turtle coins."

"I regret giving him my phone number," Lucas mutters. "I play that game, too, and he sends me two dozen of those invites a day. The only mercy was this past Thursday and Saturday, when he only sent me a handful. Probably because he was actually busy and not playing games."

The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

"Probably," I chuckle. "He does work though. The gaming is between jobs and he does take his duties seriously. When we're cleaning that conference room, he puts effort into it and doesn't goof off or anything, other than when we need to release some stress. According to his brother, he's a pretty decent manager, too."

"You talk with his brother?" Lucas asks. "I thought you'd only seen him a couple of times?"

"I saw him yesterday," I tell him. "I'd stopped by the building to ask a question and Zach was covering for Zane at the desk."

"What was he doing?"

"Zane?" I ask, and he nods. "He was up in the conference rooms, talking with the lady cleaning it, though I think he was also 'observing'. They're considering hiring the other people from the agency on full-time as actual employees, after they've worked there for a month."

"And not you?"

"My state's iffy due to the potential job," I say. "We don't know if I'll be available on Saturdays or not, and that's the only one I do at the moment. They'll probably ask three people to clean it in my place if I can't."

"Ah."

We return to eating, then Lucas pays and we make our way to the training center. Once we arrive, Lucas flashes to where he stored my duffel, then returns and hands it to me.

"I'm heading for my workout," he tells me. "See you later."

Lucas disappears as he flashes himself to get changed, and I make my way to the blocks room I train in. As usual, no one else is here. I change into clothes, slipping on my shorts just in time for Zane to arrive, his bag slung over one shoulder.

"Good afternoon, Kieran!" He cheerfully greets me. "How'd the hangout with Lucas go?"

"Same as usual," I shrug. "So you really are getting off earlier to come help with this?"

"Yeah," he answers. "Since I'm possibly getting another job anyway, they don't mind so much. Zach's covering for me again."

"Alright," I say, then start stretching.

Just like me, Zane undresses completely before changing into his workout clothes, and I don't think it's entirely in the hope that I'd ogle him. I think Zane plans on doing some power training after we help Todd out, so he wants to be ready to just strip and go.

The reason I suspect this is because I know he's frustrated by the limits of his power, and even if he might take awhile to figure out or learn others, he wants to speed up the shifting rate he has right now. That's at least something he can work on without a maximum improvement rate per month.

"Nice ass," Todd comments. "Do you always moon the door?"

I laugh at Zane's surprised expression, and Todd locks the door before bouncing the basketball once and catching it. He's already dressed in his training outfit, which consists of sneakers, shorts, and a sleeveless. Zane slips on his shorts, then I guess he decides to leave off the shirt as he starts stretching, too.

"Good afternoon, Todd," I say. "How're you?"

"Doing good," he answers. "How are you?"

"Not bad," I answer. "Have a good morning?"

"Yeah," he answers. "Mom, the gals, and I were talking, and we decided to make the move official. They're moving in with us tomorrow."

"That's good news," I say.

"Yeah," he says. "How did Danny's date go? Did he tell you?"

"Oh! Right!" Zane jumps to his feet. "How did that go? I didn't want to wait until tomorrow to ask him, but forgot to send him a text!"

"Erm," I snort. "You guys are assuming he told me how it went? It was after our shift at the diner, you know."

Both of them stare at me in a way that says they don't doubt for one moment that Danny texted me and told me how it went. I'm surprised he hadn't texted Zane, too, with how buddy-buddy they became after meeting for the first time on Thursday. Maybe he figured I'd tell Zane anyway, since I'd be seeing him today?

"It went well," I tell them. "Danny said that they spent some time just walking around, chatting, then they snuggled up in a restaurant and ate while watching the movie that the restaurant had playing on the TV. An older movie, but he said they both liked it. They're officially dating now."

"Is it a true lower-district relationship?" Zane asks.

In other words: since they're dating, are they having sex? That's pretty much the expectation here, with how easily someone's life might end and the desire to not waste time once actually in a relationship.

"Enough that he almost overslept his alarm this morning, which would have made him late for work," I confirm, causing both of them to laugh. "Let's get training, yeah?"

I take the basketball from Todd, then Zane and I move into the arena itself, heading to different sections. Once we're in position, I throw the basketball, and Todd releases his telekinetic mist. About a minute passes before he finds the ball and delivers it to Zane, who then throws the ball.

We repeat this for half an hour, with Todd delivering the ball to the one who didn't throw it each time, his control over the mist growing better as he does.

"Thanks for the help," Todd says once we return to him. "Want to go shoot some hoops over in the gold-and-up section?"

Todd helped me work on learning how to dribble and shoot yesterday. I think he likes basketball and wants some people to play with.

"Sure," I answer as I slip on my shoes. "Though I don't think Zane knows how to play."

"Hey!" Zane protests. "I know how to play basketball, thank you very much! I bet you'd be surprised to know, Shadow Boy, but I actually used to play on the weekends, back when I was still in school! There's this street court not far from my home, a group of us would hang out and shoot hoops! You can bet your shadows I'm better than you!"

"I'm not betting anything," I roll my eyes. "Get your shoes on, let's head to the court."

"Me and Todd against you!"

"Nah," I say. "Me and Todd against you, when I'm actually on the court. I'm still sore from yesterday's game."

"You played basketball yesterday?"

"I was teaching him the basics," Todd tells him. "Kieran kind of sucks at it."

Zane steps beside me and puts and arm across my shoulders, my heart beating hard at the feel of his bare skin against mine. It feels good, and as much as I wanted to kiss Lucas earlier, I want to kiss Zane now. But if I did that, he'd probably push himself away and distance himself for a bit because he doesn't feel comfortable dating me yet.

This is frustrating.

"Kieran," Zane says. "By the time you go to martial arts with Lucas today, we're going to have you shooting hoops like it's the only thing you've ever done in your life."

"You really want to see me red in the face, sweaty, and exhausted, don't you?" I ask, and he tenses up a little, his face a beautiful mix of shock and hesitation. "Don't worry, Zane, I'll put on shirt for the game."

It's then that he realizes we're skin-to-skin, and he quickly backs off, his face turning a little bit red. Zane's blushes really make his freckles stand out more, and it's cute.

"You don't need to do that," Zane says as I grab my bag and sling it over a shoulder. "I mean, we'll be bumping each other and stuff, but it's not that bad, and I promise I won't get touchy with you."

He continues to protest as he pulls on his shoes and grab his bag, even as we walk to the area saved for gold members and up and to the basketball court.

"Don't worry, Zane," Todd says once we're in the court. "I'll go shirtless for you. While I'm not into guys, I wouldn't mind letting you ogle me. It's nice to know someone appreciates my looks, and not just my girlfriends."

Zane's face reddens once more, and Todd actually does pull off his shirt, dropping it by our bags on the bench, then he bounces the ball a couple of times.

"Damn," Zane says. "I know I saw your body on Monday, after we got up and was doing breakfast and stuff, Todd, but I have to say, you really look nice. Nice and lean, which is amazing. You're put together well."

"Why, thank you," Todd smiles. "My girlfriends agree. Let's play one-on-one-on-one. No tracking points, for Kieran's sake."

"Sure," I say. "Everyone for themselves, half-court?"

"Yeah," he says. "Come on."

We move onto the court, and it's only as we're stepping over the line that Zane realizes I was screwing with him and haven't put a shirt on.

"Hey!" He exclaims. "That's mean!"

"You're not the only one allowed to tease people!" I laugh.

"I'm not letting you score a point!"

"Don't worry, Kieran! I'll make sure he can't do that!"

They're going to use their powers during this game, and it's probably going to result in them competing for points with that while I enjoy the show, forgotten on the side. That doesn't bother me much, as I find it fun to watch, too.