Another morning came to greet me. I liked to wake up even before the sun was out. The feeling of making my coffee with just me and Pringles while everybody else was still in their slumber brought me joy. There is no-

“I want coffee too. You can put half coffee and half sugar.” The young japanese monstrosity peaked over the door, screwing up my day. Sweeney didn’t look like she weighed more than a hundred and twenty pounds and yet she could empty my fridge on a daily basis. I prepared coffee for the two of us, my mood improving as soon as I grinded the coffee beans, the smell intoxicating.

For the first time, she chose to drink it with me on the balcony. Probably because we only realized that we even had a balcony yesterday. Sweeney “accidentally” pressed a button, and one of the living room walls opened smoothly, showing this beautiful sight. The whole city on display before our eyes.

“Do you ever sleep, Sweeney?”

“No.”

“Do you need to?”

“No.” She slurped the coffee, the heat didn’t bother her at all. I decided not to push it. Sweeney didn’t seem like a chatty person. Definitely not somebody I could forge a friendship with anyway.

To my surprise it was her that chose to ask me questions.

“I have gift for you.”

Her eastern block accent was thick as usual. The place that she crawled off was probably somewhere between Russia and whatever place nightmares went to die.

“A gift? That is sweet. What is it?”

She lifts the side of her blouse, her pale rib cage could be seen. The ribs opened up and a tendon shot out a purple arm with grey suckers. The limb crossed the hallway, going straight into the kitchen. The tentacle retracted, dragging a dead body, male probably in his forties. Sweeney opened her arms.

“Here. It is all yours. No need to thank me.” Her face showed no expression during the whole endeavor, a trail of blood could be seen all the way from the kitchen. Pringles barked at the body.

“Sweeney.”

“Yes.”

“Did you kill it?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“For you.”

“Why?”

She shrugged. “Nice gesture. Show I care.”

There is a certain calmness that only complete chaos can bestow upon you. It’s the sensation of being neck deep in shit and all I could do is paddle forward. “What am I supposed to do with it, Sweeney?”

“Consume, of course.”

“We don’t consume human bodies.”

“Of course you do, I see it all the time. You eat, you get money. You buy things. It’s natural.” She waved both hands at me, encouraging me to go forward.

“What would Frank say if he knew you killed somebody and you offered it to me afterwards?” Surprisingly, my tone was cold as ice.

“Frank know.”

Of course he knew. Sweeney must know that I’m always on tape. It said something about the environment I am living in when something this crazy happens, and all I can think is ‘great more things to fix’. Whatever this was, it wasn’t illegal, at least not in the eyes of The Company. I examined the body closely and the rules that kept circling in my head were only two. “War criminals must be killed on sight if an agent with the means to neutralize the threat is in the vicinity.” The second was, “The bodies of convicted criminals shall be returned to The Company in exchange of compensation.”

Once again I asked for help.

“Molly?”

“Kill order was deemed lawful. Sweeney acted as a proxy for our firm. The target in question was Jean Carlo Villanova, powered scientist developing chemical weapons made with prohibited technology and prohibited biological material. The Company has been notified and is waiting for transfer. You have twenty four hours to transfer the body, the order was issued by agent Nikki Pascal and sanctioned by agent Frank Orion Carruthers.”

Frank not Francis? “How do I transfer the body?”

“Put your index finger over the deceased and mark it with your current manipulation skill. Press the same finger into your horologium and channel your energy again.”

I did as instructed. The body was already cold, a whiff of the putrid smell lingering on the air. As I pressed my finger on the corpse, I saw that I had left a mark on it. A tiny tree inside a square was now printed on his arm. The rounded leaves already familiar. As I touched the horologium the body on the floor started to crumble, even the trail of blood that was left on the floor vanished.

“Body currently in transfer. F-C02 facility is requesting a grant to analyze the specimen. Request is granted, automatic approval was already set via Operator. Time until full examination is completed: thirteen hours.”

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

When the time was over, I would be compensated by the lab. Unfortunately, Sweeney acting as a proxy would cut my profits in half. Not bad for this much work, though. Imprinting had a way to make everything predictable. It felt like I’ve been doing this for some time. Every step of the way known to me.

Meanwhile, the female monstrosity just stood there, licking the bottom of the cup with an overstretched tongue. There was sugar all over her face. “Now you owe me.”

I raised my eyebrow. “I owe you because you obeyed orders from Frank?”

“I obeyed no one. You need it, I did it for you.” She smiled, the most egregious attempt that I ever saw of generating sympathy. It would’ve worked better as a scary tactic, but right now I had some much needed information, Sweeney was a crook. Not just because her record said so, but most importantly because of the way she tried to leverage things against me did. I must keep that in mind.

“So you violated your parole to help me out?”

For the first time I saw something resembling fear in her dark eyes. “No, never. Sweeney clean now.” She nodded, emphasizing her point.

“So what did you do? Fulfilled Frank’s orders or acted on your own and committed a crime?”

Her face looked like a kid who got caught stealing from the cookie jar. It would be adorable if I didn’t know better. “I did what Frank asked me to do,” she said pouting.

“So I don’t owe you anything do I?”

Sweeney walked away, mumbling. “You do something nice… try to be bestest Sweeney…”

Although I would never get myself obligated to her if I could help it, I made a mental note to do something for her in return. It would do me no good to antagonize my bodyguard.

----------------------------------------

Once again I headed out for bootcamp. I used my time in the car to knead some more. It felt like a good habit to have considering how many of my abilities seemed to be tied to mastering it. As I approached the gate, I went through the whole process of showing ID and finding my group again. It was considerably easier this time. When I arrived, the same soldiers from yesterday were already there, only Tilman was missing.

It was just as easy to spot Richard and Carl as it was yesterday, so I stood by them. Our clique was official now. Not that we had much of a choice, since everybody around us was either too nervous to strike up conversation or deliberately avoiding us.

Isolated on the left corner of the clearing, I saw Anand. His face is still swollen with a bloodshot eye. His injured leg seemed to have improved, since he wasn’t leaning on his other leg at all. His whole demeanor was a lot more somber, keeping his distance from the people he was getting along so well yesterday. His sister was the only one next to him, a hard look sculpted on her face. She looked menacing despite not even reaching her brothers’ shoulders. It was only when her taciturn look turned into concern that I looked over my shoulder. Sure enough, I saw Tilman striding in our direction.

“Good morning, ladies.” Sergeant Tilman seemed to be in a good mood, an effortless smile on his broad face. The group responded weakly with a good morning. “Sorry, I couldn’t hear it. Let’s try this again. Good morning, ladies.” The group gave a strong response this time, which only made his smile wider. “Yesterday, Anand and I had a little discussion about the nature of the military.” He nodded towards Anand and the indian teenager nervously nodded back. “Some of you called some pretty important people to complain about my methods and I thank you for it. Due to your concern I have about a hundred pages of letters and memos to wipe my ass with. If anyone has any more complaints to make you can address me directly. My door is always open to hear you whine.”

Sergeant Tilman put his hand out and a soldier handed him his clipboard. Perhaps, having cell phones or tablets would be too expensive for two of the biggest institutions in the history of the United States.

He began to name the teams that were formed based on yesterday's test. It was a long list, but I was doing my best to memorize every formation in it, until finally it was my turn. “The best Vanp on the second group is Billy the Grandpa.” At first nobody reacted, too afraid of the Sergeant, but when he started to laugh, his minions, and some other people joined the chorus, lessening some of the tension.

Tilman continued. “Not gonna lie, you do look like my grandpa, but I thought that you would know better than that. What made you choose this name when you could’ve picked….” He looked on both sides with his arms open. “Well… anything else.”

“Sir, my boss picked that name for me, sir!” I gave the most energetic reply I had in me. I didn’t think I could survive a single punch from the human colossus, so being extra-polite probably wouldn’t hurt. Hopefully.

“And who is your boss?”

“Sir, Connor O’Brien, sir!”

His smile vanished upon hearing the name. He looked me up and down as if he never had seen me until now, which he probably didn’t. “That guy is a fucking prick. Moving on, our Billy right here was the fittest of you lot.” He shook his head. Between the teens, several nasty looks were thrown at me. “That alone can tell you everything about how good you slobs are.” More laughter followed. Apparently as long as you’re laughing about somebody else, everything was fine. “Given the results your team will be formed by Dr. Friedman and Sun Welder. It was not an easy choice, but after careful deliberation we decided to have a more experienced trio. Good luck guys.”

If Tilman played poker, I wanted a seat at the table every time he was around. His tell was beyond obvious. The man was only nice to you when he was screwing you over. It made him the obnoxious squared-chined giant that he was, but also made him predictable.

The look on Richard and Carl's faces only confirmed my suspicions. I don’t know what made them choose these aliases but neither one of them seemed to be fight-oriented. I was in a tough spot here, but I decided to make my second bet. I prayed Julia was right about this one.

I raised my hand, Sergeant Tilman eyebrow rose, but he acknowledged me. “Say your piece, private.”

“Sir, I asked for our records to be double-proofed. Coordinator Julia Montoya Vargas asked that our personal files be sent directly to her, sir.”

Sergeant Tilman's relaxed demeanor turned serious. “Is that so?”

“Sir, yes sir!”

He stared straight into my eyeballs for a minute. The tension was so thick you could cut it with a knife. For a second I was afraid he would try to make hummus out of me too. But today was not the day.

“Ok, Gus send it to her as soon as possible.”

“I’m on it, sir.”

According to Julia, the main problem with the Legionnaires aside from the “macho bullshit and general incompetence” was bureaucracy. In her writings she went on and on about how the system is grossly flawed, and many of the procedures on it were redundant, exploitative, or nonsensical.

One of those rules was the one I just invoked. The Sergeant had the authority to form teams as he wished, but anyone could object to it and ask for somebody to review the files. The problem was that the person assigned to reevaluate any files must be the powered direct Coordinator. In my case, Julia. Since there was no time limit for her to review it, she could just sit on it and we would never be assigned on a mission together. She was right, understanding over the bureaucratic apparatus was that important. Maybe even life-saving.

The rest of the day we spent exercising and practicing. Everyone, regardless of the type of power, did the same things. Marching, group coordination, lectures about the military, and the core values of the Legionnaires. Sergeant Tilman was nowhere to be seen, everything being taught by his subordinates in a monotone voice. According to them, we had two weeks until we were eligible to be assigned to a mission. It wasn’t enough time even if we’re being productive. Thank God this wasn’t the only place where I could improve.