Over the past seven months, the Stealth Room had transformed from a plain rectangle room filled with obstacles into a full-scale replica of a Honrad suburb. The exact layout changed with every exercise, and today it was an approximately circular cul-de-sac about a hundred feet in diameter. The facades of six houses protruded from the room’s walls, evenly spaced around a central open space. Light filled the room, illuminating the gardens, fences, trees, and other details, everything made from the same white material as the rest of the ship.

A few dozen Honrad golems wandered around. According to Hauken, the Skonarian who ran the Stealth Room, the scenes used in the exercises were recordings of actual locations. The golems would follow their recorded paths, unless something Evie did caught their attention.

Evie perched in a shadow on a low hanging synthetic branch, her eyes fixed on their target. The Honrad, labeled “Noiye Jez” by her mask, relaxed on his or her lawn. Evie couldn’t tell. The repulsive creatures all looked the same to her. Everything about them, even these white replicas, made her skin crawl. Their large, wet eyes, gaping mouths, and greasy tufts of hair. Even the languid way they moved made her shudder with distaste.

Jez chatted with their neighbor, who was idly rooting around in a garden, extracting some kind of tuber.

I see an opening.

The text appeared at the top of Evie’s vision, sent by Amelia, floating silently next to her.

When the Honrad below us passes, we can move to the shed 13.87 feet to the left of the target.

Evie had been about to suggest the same move. The top of the shed was a strong tactical position, even though it was exposed. Any of the Honrad in the room would see her if they bothered to look, but the Honrad, like Humans, didn’t usually look up unless something specific caught their attention. Evie knew exactly how to avoid doing so.

Think you can manage to not fall off the roof this time?

Evie raised her eyes heavenward and took a resigned breath. It had been one time. Months ago. But Amelia and Hat weren’t ever going to let her live it down. She watched the Honrad directly below them amble by, waiting until it had moved far enough along that she was out of its peripheral vision. Then she grabbed onto Amelia’s handle and leapt.

Amelia opened silently, catching them in the air and propelling them higher and forward. Evie remained as still as possible. A moment later they dropped onto the roof of the shed. She absorbed the landing with her knees to avoid making any sound and crouched, bringing Amelia’s canopy down on top of her like a shell. Their target was only a dozen feet from them, still talking to its neighbor. Something beyond the neighbor caught Evie’s eye.

“Found the endpoint,” she whispered under her breath at a volume only Amelia could hear. Thirty feet behind the neighbor on the wall between two houses was a small, glowing blue circle. To end the exercise, they had to subdue their target and bring them to that circle without being overwhelmed by the rest of the Honrad in the room.

Great. Now, if the target’s neighbor would stop digging up potatoes and go away, we have a clear line.

Evie’s eyes flicked back to the neighbor. They were methodically digging up tubers, one at a time, at an excruciatingly slow pace. “It doesn’t look like it’s moving anytime soon,” Evie muttered.

Siiiiiiiiigh. I guess I can handle it. Will you be able to subdue the target without me?

“Don’t be melodramatic. Let me get into position.”

Evie quickly judged the distance between her and their target to see if she could risk a small amount of noise. She was a little close for comfort, but Jez had no reason to suspect anything and wouldn’t be paying attention. Evie slithered out from underneath Amelia and dropped off the roof, landing as silently as she could on the far side of the shed. She peeked around the corner, and flashed a thumbs up at Amelia.

Above her, Amelia sprung from the roof and began noisily flapping her way towards the center of the cul-du-sac. There was no other word for the motion the umbrella used. She opened and closed her canopy, moving like a strange, misshapen jellyfish. Evie had to suppress a snort of amusement as the surrounding room fell silent, every Honrad eye Evie could see fixed on the umbrella.

No matter how familiar Evie grew with the Honrad, their behavior still perplexed her. Most of the time they were docile, painfully boring creatures with equally dull lives. However, the second they perceived something as a threat, a switch flipped.

The Honrad nearest Amelia bared its teeth and lunged, leaping from the ground and soaring much higher than anyone not familiar with them would have expected. However, Amelia knew the Honrads’ physical limitations, and stayed just out of its reach.

Evie knew she had a microsecond before their target also took off after the Umbrella. If that happened, it would be impossible to subdue them without alerting the other Honrad. She needed to grab the target now.

“Jez! What’s going on!” she yelled out in perfectly accented Quall. Jez’s neighbor bolted after Amelia, knocking its basket of carefully harvested tubers over. Jez was about to follow, but hesitated and turned. Evie pounced.

The Honrad were wily and strong, but Evie had training and surprise on her side. As the creature turned, she leapt forward and sank a hand into the tuft of hair at the base of its skull, pushing it over and onto the ground. She twisted on top of the surprised golem, dug a knee between its shoulder blades at the base of its neck and, using both hands, yanked its head backwards. There was a second of resistance, followed by a sharp pop, and the Honrad stopped struggling.

Evie reached down and, with a grunt, pulled the golem up and into a fireman’s carry. She glanced around to see if anyone had noticed her, but they were all still trying to reach Amelia, so she made a beeline towards the end point. The second her hand hit the blue circle, all movement in the room stopped.

The white buildings and foliage around Evie started to melt into the ground. She turned and watched everything in the room, including the golems, dissolve into the floor, leaving behind a large empty space.

“Way to go out with a bang, Evie!” A nearby wall opened and Hauken stepped through. “That was a flawless final run. And a new record for this difficulty level! Haruto’s going to be pissed. There’s nothing he can do about you dethroning him at the last minute.”

Hauken’s words sent a bittersweet pang through Evie. The day after tomorrow, they would arrive at Honrad. Her time aboard the Skonarian ship was rapidly drawing to a close.

“I do all the work, and she gets the credit. Typical,” said Amelia, drifting down to them.

Evie pulled her thoughts back to the present and held out a hand to the Umbrella. “Don’t be salty, Amelia. Everyone knows that you’re the brains and I’m just dumb labor. Good job getting everyone’s attention! You were so… graceful.”

The umbrella didn’t have eyes, but Evie could tell she was glaring.

“You didn’t even fall off the roof!” said Hat, appearing out of nowhere and fluttering down to land on Evie’s shoulder.

Evie shot the pigeon a dirty look with no real malice in it and dropped the final golem unceremoniously onto the ground. “It was ONE goddamn time,” she said, wishing the memory could also sink away.

Hauken smiled at her. “It’s been a pleasure working with you, Evie. I’m looking forward to seeing how you do out there. Try not to get yourself killed!”

Another swell of emotion washed over Evie as she looked at Hauken, and she took a moment to analyze the feeling. It made sense. He was an excellent trainer, and if she survived the Sim, it would be largely because of what he had taught her. She decided the feeling was authentic, and held out a hand to the Skonarian. “Thank you for everything, Hauken. You’ve taught us so much these last few months. I can’t express how grateful we are.” Next to her, Amelia grunted in agreement. “Will we see you before we leave?”

Hauken nodded, taking her hand and shaking it. “The entire crew will be seeing you off. I wouldn’t miss it!”

Evie nodded and turned, pushing down the lump that had formed in her throat as she hurried to the doorway, followed by Amelia. For better or worse, the ship had become her home. If saying goodbye to Hauken was this difficult, she couldn’t imagine what it would be like to leave some of the others. And Lubanzi. She didn’t want to think about leaving Lubanzi.

“Evie!”

Speak of the devil. Lubanzi sat in the hallway next to the door, waiting for her. He jumped to his feet as soon as he saw her.

“You have to come see this! Celia just completed her assignment, and… you won’t believe me. Come see for yourself.”

The newest round of episodes had aired the day before, but Evie hadn’t found time to watch them yet. Curiosity piqued, she followed Lubanzi down the hallway. As they began walking, he eyed her with amusement. “I expected to be waiting longer. Did you break Haruto’s record?”

Evie fought to keep a grin off her face. “I may have.”

Lubanzi’s grin widened. “He’s going to be pissed.”

“Oh big fucking deal, we all know you’re the unofficial stealth room master,” said Hat from Evie’s shoulder. Lubanzi smiled modestly, but they all knew it was true. Lubanzi wasn’t fast enough to break any of the official records, but he could sneak his way unnoticed into places Haruto and Evie wouldn’t even dare try. “Plus, Amelia does all the heavy lifting,” Hat added.

“Finally, some overdue appreciation,” Amelia grumbled. Then softer, “even if it’s coming from someone who eats their own dried feces for fun.”

“Of course, this time she didn’t actually lift much,” Hat said loudly over the umbrella. “Mostly she just flapped around the ceiling like a jellyfish on a bad acid trip. Never seen anything like it!” Hat flapped his wings and sucked his tiny neck in and out in a ridiculous imitation of the way Amelia had moved to catch the Honrads’ attention.

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Amelia grumbled something in reply, but Evie couldn’t make it out over Lubanzi’s laughter. As they walked, she hung back and watched her friends, her found family, bicker with one another. She was going to miss this.

“Jesus Evie, can you move any slower?” Hat yelled back at her.

“It’s my fault,” said Amelia. “She’s not used to having to walk around on her own. It’s difficult for her.”

Evie smiled and hurried to catch up. They still had a little time left together, and she was going to savor every minute of it.

Sitting down on Lubanzi’s bed, Evie kicked her feet up and made herself comfortable. As Lubanzi fiddled with his tablet and Hat and Amelia settled in next to Evie, she mentally reviewed Celia’s assignment up to this point.

Celia was working alone, which meant she was after either a level one or level two target. She had been spending a lot of time infiltrating a high-end construction company, systematically stalking, cornering, and interrogating its top-level executives. Most recently, she had switched tactics and abducted a teacher from the Honrad equivalent of a college, keeping them in an undisclosed location for almost a week. In her last episode, Celia had deftly executed the teacher and dumped their body near the local resurrection center. It was okay for assassins to kill individuals who weren’t their targets, so long as they didn’t stay dead long enough to cause permanent injury. Celia had been making good progress on her assignment, but nothing had indicated that she would be completing it anytime soon.

Lubanzi sat next to Evie and propped the tablet on his knee where all five of them—Amiya had been waiting in his room—could see, and pressed play.

Celia crept through the night, a barely visible shadow in the darkness. Evie felt a shiver run down her spine, instinctually aware of the threat the woman posed. As she watched, a wall materialized in front of the assassin. It was too short to be a building, but too tall to climb easily. Or it would have been, had someone not carved almost invisible hand and foot holds into its side.

With unsettling speed and silence, Celia was on top of the wall and descending into what Evie thought might be a residential backyard. She snuck between murky outlines of plants and pieces of furniture before coming to rest beside a building, possibly a house. In the dim light, Evie could make out a vine twining its way up the wall next to Celia, adding a small element of beauty to the otherwise plain structure. Celia crouched and ran a finger along the base of the wall, stopping on a seemingly random spot. In a flash, her knife snapped out and began to glow, its orange light reflecting ominously off her masked face.

Celia waited for a moment for the blade to heat, then sank it into the wall next to where her finger rested. It penetrated, but slowly, as if meeting significant resistance. Evie had spent a little time studying Honrad architecture. Despite the outer wall’s resemblance to concrete, she knew it should only be an inch or two thick, with none of the layers of insulation and drywall found in human homes. However, it took almost the full length of Celia’s blade before the woman’s hand stopped pushing into the wall.

Evie stared in confusion for a moment, then her eyes went wide. “It’s a saferoom,” she breathed, and Lubanzi’s smile confirmed her suspicions.

Saferooms were expensive, reinforced rooms used as safe havens by the wealthy in emergencies. They had a single point of entry that only the owner could open or close. From within the room, the owner could contact the Honrad equivalent of the police and wait safely for their arrival. After securing the premises, the police would tell the owner all clear, and the owner would unseal the saferoom door from inside and be escorted to safety.

“The construction company she’s been harassing!” Evie said excitedly. Saferoom design and installation was one of the company's specialties.

“This confirms that she’s after a level two,” Hat added beside her, nodding. “Only politicians bother with those things.” Level two targets were low-level politicians. Despite the rules of The Understanding, politicians did occasionally receive threats, and many took steps to protect themselves.

Celia radiated contentment as her blade successfully made it through the saferoom wall. Evie expected her to cut a larger hole, but instead the woman abruptly sheathed her blade and disappeared into the darkness.

The camera blinked. It was daytime in a residential neighborhood. The houses were nothing special. Every Honrad home she had ever seen looked the same. They were all plain, one to three story cubes with frequent, evenly spaced windows. The houses in the video were slightly larger than average, but it was the size and quality of the surrounding gardens that made it clear to Evie that this was an affluent neighborhood. The Honrad displayed no artistic interest in their architecture or city planning, but their landscaping was impressive.

The camera focused on one home in particular, its entrance clearly visible at the center of the frame. It took Evie a moment to notice Celia crouched on a low branch in a nearby tree with a clear view of the home’s entrance. The shadows almost completely concealed her, making her invisible to anyone who wasn't actively searching.

A lone Honrad wandered into view, and Evie grimaced involuntarily at its exposed, fleshy body. Even though she was used to the collarless golems in the stealth room, seeing the actual Honrad was still unpleasant. Like the Skonarians, the Honrad didn’t wear clothing, except for a small group known as the Skoruum that Evie knew little about. This one was shamelessly on full display. The creature ambled to the house, blissfully oblivious of the lurking assassin, and held its eye to a scanner to unlock the front door. Aside from the eyeball scanner, the door looked shockingly normal. It was made of an unornamented rectangular slab of wood, smaller than a human door but with similar proportions and hardware. As the Honrad stepped over the threshold, Evie spotted two small watch-sized bracelets on the Honrad’s wrist.

“That fucker’s wearing two shields,” said Hat in surprise, noticing the bracelets at the same time as Evie.

When an individual became an eligible target in the Sim, the first thing they did if they had any sense was purchase a level-one shield. Level-one shields were cheap and energy efficient. They were up at all times, and would stop anything moving over a certain velocity, destroying the effectiveness of firearms and other projectile weapons. However, level-two shields—the kind that created an impenetrable barrier like the one Amelia was equipped with—were much less common. They were too expensive to be practical for lower-level targets. Usually.

“A level-two shield and a saferoom, assuming this is the same house,” Evie said. “That complicates the situation.” The combination of a saferoom and a level two shield was notoriously tricky, and it was very unusual for a target as low as level two to have both. The shield would only last about five minutes, but that could easily be enough time for the target to get to the saferoom. If that happened, the assassin chasing them would be put in a difficult, near impossible situation. They would be forced to retreat, and try again another day. Very few assassins completed an assignment once their target knew they were coming.

The second the doorway closed behind the Honrad, Celia stood. She jumped down, not bothering to conceal herself, and strode lithely up to the doorway. Slung over one of her broad shoulders was a large, sagging backpack, full of something heavy and irregularly shaped. She unsheathed her knife and, with no attempt at subtlety, stabbed it straight through the door’s lock.

Celia pulled her hand back, and the door swung open, revealing the dumbstruck Honrad frozen on the other side. She sprung forward, knife raised, but was too late. The Honrad's hand flew to its wrist, and a familiar blue shield sprung into place around, knocking Celia backwards. Her target turned and sprinted deeper into the house. There wasn’t a thing Celia could do to stop them.

“This is a dumb plan,” said Amelia from beside Evie. “She can get into the saferoom, but even those brain deficient skin bags will notice someone cutting a hole through the wall. What does she think it’ll do, sit there and politely wait for her to kill it?”

“Shut up and watch,” snapped Hat, though he too looked confused.

Celia was indeed sprinting around the house. She reached a familiar wall and, using the handholds carved into it, climbed over into the beautifully cultivated backyard. It took only moments for her to reach the vine-covered back wall of the house. Evie could just make out the small hole Celia’s blade had made the night before.

The Assassin crouched, swung her backpack from her shoulders, and pulled out something completely unexpected. It was a small metal canister topped with what looked like a regulator, attached to which was a thin clear tube. It reminded Evie of a medical oxygen cylinder. Celia delicately inserted the tube through the hole in the wall and twisted the valve. Nothing visible happened, but the soft hiss of compressed gas reached Evie’s ears.

“Where the ever-loving fuck did she find that?!” Hat squawked in surprise.

“Why don’t you shut up and watch,” grumbled Amelia.

“I’ve been trying to figure that out for the last hour, and I think I might have it,” Lubanzi said, wiggling his eyebrows at them as they watched Celia continue to fill the saferoom with gas. “Remember that Resurrection Center she raided during her last assignment?” Evie remembered well. That had been the first episode of the Sim they had ever watched. “I’ll bet you anything she stole it from there.”

Evie’s forehead creased thoughtfully as she watched. “We’re allowed to keep stuff like that between assignments?” she asked Hat.

The producer shrugged. “If it’s in your pod, it stays in your pod.”

Celia glanced at the meter on the regulator, nodded, and turned it off. She threw the whole contraption back into her backpack then sat back on her heels, bouncing impatiently as she waited another full minute.

Finally, Celia unsheathed her blade and stabbed it into the wall. She cut slowly but steadily, outlining a hole large enough for her to fit through. When the cut was complete, she pried the loose section of wall free. It dropped heavily to the ground, and she climbed through the hole.

Celia’s target lay on the floor, sprawled in an unmoving heap. She crouched down next to the limp figure and raised her blade. Loud pounding on the saferoom door made Evie jump, but Celia didn’t even twitch.

“Ma’am, it’s the police,” said a muffled voice through the door, speaking Quall. “We have checked your home and confirmed it’s safe for you to exit. We might still be able to catch the assassin if you can tell us what happened.”

Celia ignored the voice. She knew that only the owner of the saferoom could open the door, and the creature on the floor was in no position to do so. As her knife flashed towards the Honrad’s throat, the camera panned away, but the sound of steel cutting through flesh and bone still made Evie wince. Celia didn’t need the whole target. Just their head.

The camera blinked, and Celia was outside climbing back over the wall, using only one hand. A shadowed but distinctive, dripping shape hung from the other. As Celia dropped over the far side of the wall, the camera rose into the air until the entire house below was displayed on the screen. A crowd of shouting figures rushed into and out of the home’s entrance. A few were making their way around the sides to the back, but they were too late. Celia was already gone.

“Hot damn,” muttered Hat as they watched the screen fade to black. “That is how you complete an assignment. The ratings for this episode must be off the fucking charts.”

Evie turned to Lubanzi. “So you think she just stumbled upon some kind of lethal gas during her last assignment? Why would they have that at a Resurrection Center?” she asked skeptically.

Lubanzi shrugged. “I’m open to other ideas.”

“Krackor says most Honrad choose to end their lives after a few hundred years,” said a voice from the doorway. They turned to see Haruto leaning awkwardly against the doorframe, looking at them.

Evie and Lubanzi were far from close with Haruto, but their relationship had settled into a tentative stalemate. However, he never approached them without a reason.

“The teacher Celia kidnapped was a chemist. She could have identified the canister, and calculated an appropriate dose.”

“Why would the Honrad end their lives?” Evie asked. Members of the Understanding were effectively immortal.

“No idea,” said Haruto. “You’ll have to ask your informant when you get planet side.”

Informants were one of the resources provided to the assassins for each assignment. Anonymous volunteers, local to the area and willing to betray their own kind in exchange for healthy compensation. They were a required asset for each assignment. Everyone knew they existed, but the informants’ identities were carefully guarded.

“Claro sent me to come find you two,” continued Haruto. “In one hour, there will be a final competition in the Arena. Whoever wins will get their assignment, and their informants contact information, today.”

Evie and Lubanzi looked at each other. They weren’t supposed to get their assignments until they left the ship the day after tomorrow. An extra day of research, not to mention early contact with the informants, would be a huge advantage.

Evie rolled off the bed. “I might as well keep the ball rolling,” she said, stretching her back and cracking her neck. “Seeing as I’ve already beaten the Stealth Room record today.” She leaned Amelia casually against her shoulder and walked by Haruto, watching annoyance flash across his face. “Did Claro say which exercise we’re competing in?” she asked over her shoulder.

“Capture the flag. Full contact, so put your pads on,” he replied.