In two days. O-six hundred hours. Along with the mail delivery. That had been the instructions.

Once a week, a truck of mail would undertake the gruelling trek from oasis to outpost, delivering sack after sack of good wishes, harrowing heartbreaks, and penned tidings both good and bad. Another subsection of the truck carried cargo lesser in number, yet of greater volume. Goods, such as biscuits, sweaters, and photographs meant to ease the aching heart of a lonely service member.

Elliot often got no such package. His time of the week for connection with the outside world came in a more literal way. While mail got passed around, reaching its final destination, he would be lounging in the comfort of his own home. Shamelessly.

The fact that he had no use for such mail did not change, yet this week, he found himself in the lineup, like everybody else.

“Elliot Maxwell,” he said, reciting his name with the slightest glint of a smile. The expression looked more mischievous than whatever he had intended originally.

The Officer on the far side of the counter eyed him up and down. His vaguely anthropomorphic face only suggested understanding once his vision fell on Elliot’s shoulder crest. It was as if he was getting a joke far too late to be funny.

“That explains the package from Geverde,” he muttered, “where did I put that thing? Tyrkel! I gave that one inbound package to you, right?”

“…they’re all inbound, Sir,” Tyrkel said. He pulled another confused face that desperately sought a punchline. Elliot watched the two make one comical human expression after another. The anxiety yanking the corners of his mouth into a crooked smile began to feast on his patience.

“Yeah, the Geverde one. The more inbound one.”

Finally getting it, Tyrkel got himself off his stool. He stepped over each hastily strewn package with two slender peg-like legs. He bent over and lifted a package much smaller than the others, a size that most immediately suggested a book of some sort.

Private Tyrkel waded through the catastrophic mess once more, placing the package on the counter and noting the hollow sound.

“Didn’t know you were a reader, Sir,” he said.

“I’d be worried if you did know,” Elliot said. “Goodbye!”

Another horribly forced reaction.

Perilous situations which lacked a yoke and throttle unnerved him to no end. He sincerely believed that he had spent all his luck flying. Every journey he took into hostile territories felt like driving a sports car with no insurance, to give an utterly unsatisfactory metaphor.

He felt the knots of his stomach perform every flight maneuver he had ever recognized out of order and upside down as he traversed the hallways. His palm’s sweat seeped into the brown wrapping of the package finding the contraband concealed inside.

To pull such a stunt again, he’d have to be drunk or obscenely high on adrenaline. Such was becoming old, he thought. Such was doing the job a spy ought to do.

Upon reaching his quarters, he closed the woefully thin plywood door behind him. He checked more times than was ever necessary that he had locked the thing. He sat down on his bed, being mindful of the empty bunk above him. Once more, he traced his surroundings. The dehydrated timbre ceiling, thin plastered walls, creaking bed, hollow floor, and every dust-caked edge between.

He unwrapped the package, feeling the need to retrace the sender’s steps perfectly. After failing several times at preserving the paper, he removed the contents.

Your Final Journey: A Book that Grapples with Death.

He could imagine the Geverdian intelligence responsible getting an awful kick out of it. A handwritten note came along with it, obviously forged.

To Elliot Maxwell, it read along with the address, the sender listed as a fictional Rachel Maxwell. He was sure the contents of such a letter were crafted to feign authenticity. A Rachel Maxwell did not exist, nor did the sweet intentions behind her words. They only existed to persuade a package inspector of its authenticity should the need ever arise.

It made him a tinge lonely. Perhaps he would have to ask Evalyn or Iris for a letter one day.

He saved the letter, as any loving husband would, and turned his attention to the package. The hardcover was thick, and a tight leather skin encased it, just as had been described to him.

Uncaring for the preservation of such a distasteful joke, he bent the book to an obtuse degree, creasing the spine. The binding glue cracked and groaned. He kept going until the gap between the leather-skin spine and the page binding was prominent enough to force a finger through. Between that gap was a subtle bump.

Barely visible upon first inspection, most would boil it down to a mishap in the manufacturing; a faulty copy. Most were instead likely to flip through the book in search of a secret compartment cut into the pages.

Elliot got off his bed, careful to not trigger the intolerable groan of its springs, and found the razor he had purchased two days prior. Fumbling with one hand while the other held the book in place, he removed one from the box and began to cut into the paper tumour.

He made a rough incision from left to right, still insufficient to see what exactly was inside. He overturned the box and shook it, forcing the hidden contents out.

A small, flat rectangle of cheap metal, likely not too dissimilar to the material which made up his razor. Attached to it were several wires, each marked with stripes of differing colours. Next was an earpiece. A small hook of remarkably low profile. One could barely make out small grooves running down it from one end to the other.

Everything was as described, and the beginning of his task was a mere hour and a half away.

Elliot had stolen glances at the classroom clock all lesson, eyeing it before and after every topic and every question. He had watched the minute hand run almost full circle, and the hour was approaching its next stop. The seconds ticked by until there were only a handful left. A handful of time, what an intangible, yet palpable thing. It went by too quickly.

Elliot had pranced back to his quarters with all the grace of a hunted fawn. He could do this, he was just nervous.

As much as he could curse Special Operations for making a pilot do a spy’s job, there was truly no feasible way to plant one on the premises of an isolated air force base. Out of everyone officially stationed, he was the most experienced and by far the one with the highest clearance.

He found his quarters and slid in, locking the door shut behind him. Out of his pocket, he found the earpiece and slotted it into his ear. The hook was designed to be universal, but it still sat too precariously along the back of his ear for his liking. He tapped it twice before a soft buzz, not too dissimilar to radio static, began to tickle the hairs in his ear canal.

If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

The clock ticked away, and the final remnants of time slipped through his fingers; every hand had found its next stop. The next hour. The static buzz intensified unprompted before cutting, a clear stream of rushing air replacing it. A torrent of wind from some distant place, occasionally interrupted by the whistle of what sounded like wings through wind.

“Protag present. Requesting narrator,” Elliot whispered, fidgeting with the small, wired thing inside his pocket.

“Narrator to protagonist, confirm the inciting incident, begin rising conflict.”

A strange voice speaking the language with a noticeable prim accent. The speech was soft but still found a place amongst the wind. Elliot imagined it. Right now, a Spirit the size of his room drifting hundreds of kilometres above his head, circling the skies. it would scrutinise every detail of his surroundings with perfect accuracy.

Deity division was never wrong.

“Exit your current room and make a right turn,” the flying eye commanded. Elliot followed, the beginning of the mission finally dawning on him as his brain switched its thought patterns. Before leaving, he eyed a lump of resin on his desk, wrapped in paper. A gift from an Officer, supposedly a chewable that maintained a remarkable stickiness if spat out. He grabbed the malleable yellow lump and threw it in his mouth, the motion of his jaws soothing his senses.

A now steady hand grabbed his door handle, and unflinching fingers undid the lock. He opened the door.

“Sir!”

One of his students stood daftly on the other side of the thin doorway. His flipper-like hand was inches away from knocking on the door.

“L-Lawrek. Can I help you?” Elliot stumbled. The anxiety returned as he became painfully aware of the earpiece hidden underneath his hair. Visual concealment was one thing, but Special Operations could not procure any radio device small enough to go unnoticed. Only Aether models existed of such a size.

Aether meant that it could be sensed.

Lieutenant Lawrek saluted him, swinging his boots together as were customary. A fellow with interlocking patches of slimy skin running up and down his cylindrical body. Each patch was dyed a different shade of orange. His eyes were small and mouth large, but Elliot could feel the intense curiosity in his features.

“I have some questions about your last lecture, sir!” he said living up to Elliot’s image of him much too well. Elliot grew used to answering questions posed by his students, let alone by Lawrek himself. In the mere four days since his arrival, Lawrek had asked every single rookie question as if he were following a bingo card.

“Sorry Lawrek, another time,” Elliot said, forcing a smile and pushing the door closed behind him. He pushed past the Lieutenant and made the right turn.

“Back on track,” Elliot whispered, the chewing of his resin mellowing out.

“Rodger. Left turn, two bogies coming towards you.”

Elliot made the turn, dodging the two bickering crewmates as he walked past. Earpiece towards the wall. He gave it a second before letting himself feel relieved.

“Another left and you’ll be going up the stairs. Someone’s already there.”

Elliot did as he was told, spotting a superior officer coming down the steps. He saluted him, and the officer gave him a nod before continuing. Elliot held the salute for a moment too long, his eyes glued to the officer’s back.

Safe.

He began to descend the steps, taking them one at a time when he too often took two. The third floor was restricted to authorised access, yet it was not unusual for someone of his standing or situation to be called for a meeting. He hoped this assumption would work as often as he needed.

But he knew he was not that lucky.

“Protagonist, we have a problem.”

“What?” Elliot hissed.

“Your little buddy’s been following you. Making all the same moves you’ve been making.”

“Shit…” Elliot breathed as he came to the top of the staircase, making a left and travelling down a long, yet deserted hallway.

It was not long after. He could hear them. A set of footsteps following at a distance. They walked at almost an identical pace to his, not attempting to speed up and refusing to grow distant. The little bookworm had risked insubordination just to tail him.

The voice in his ear had ceased communication, refusing to take any risks unless absolutely necessary. The squelching of the resin competed with the thumping of his heart for space in his free ear.

He pulled his fingers out of his pocket for fear of crushing the device and descended the very next staircase.

“Help me out here,” Elliot said.

“First floor. Big crowd,” the voice said.

His student was perhaps following him in the hopes of having his questions answered; but, the possibility that Lieutenant Lawrek had gotten a read on his earpiece was just as likely. Hiding anywhere isolated was even riskier.

Elliot would have to take the risk. If worst came to worst, he would crush the earpiece under his boot the first chance he got.

That was only if he truly believed the consequences of failing the mission were outweighed by the risk of never seeing his family again.

Elliot rounded the stairwell and descended a second flight until he came to the first floor. A switch in classes was taking place as groups finished with practical lessons swapped for theory. A lot of twenty were filing through the hallway in a scattered set of two lines on their way to their next room.

The quickening onset of clacking boots rapidly descending the stairwell was plenty to spur him into a head-on collision. He shouldered through, quickening his pace with an impatient shove as he laundered himself of the blood trail emanating from his ear.

He caught a side glance or two from several of them, and he could only hope it was the scent of the gum. A glance here, a double take there, yet the cloud of natural magic was enough to overpower the earpiece, masking it.

He burst out the other end like a second birth and kept on walking. He refused to break the rhythm of his stride once lest he was singled out.

“You lost him, good work,” the eye said, “next is a left and you’re going up to the third floor again.”

Elliot found the staircase and ascended, never letting a feeling of security comfort him. He kept his peripherals wide and constantly moving.

Third floor. Back to square two.

“Walk forward. Two bogies walking up behind you and another three to your left.”

Elliot kept his stride powerful as he caught the glances of the officers to his left. Fleeting, but still existent. It tortured Elliot for all but a few seconds until the next threat would surely arrive.

“Almost there, the junction box is past the next left turn.”

He rounded the corner and came face to face with the junction. A small metal box at knee height. Streams of Aether-based communication signals coagulated at it before beaming towards the city. Elliot stood in front of the junction which managed communications from the third floor. The Air Marshall’s office was only a few steps down the hallway.

If things went accordingly, in six hours, the Air Marshall would receive a message from the Security Council, informing him of Evalyn’s absence from the city. The fruit that would come to bear from this was sure to be valuable.

Elliot found the small device in his pocket once more, removing it discreetly.

“Walk me through,” he said.

“The wires are magnetic, stick them to the bottom of the box.”

Elliot took the wires, lining the ends between his fingers. He took another glance left, then right, before crouching. Each wire clamped neatly to the metal, but the box itself still dangled. It was too obvious.

“You’ve got the group from the stairs closing in fast. There’s another bogie exiting a room down not too far from you.”

Elliot felt the air around him close in. The device was still all too visible. The junction could open for it to be placed inside, but the hatch was locked shut. It would go unnoticed for half a day at best left haphazardly swinging.

Elliot thought, but could not gather himself.

“Elliot! Get the fuck outta there!”

Unsure of what else to do, Elliot wiped the box down with his sleeves, removing any traces of his fingerprints as the chewing only became more and more audible.

The chewing.

Elliot spat out the resin, now abused into a soft material that lazily stuck to his skin. He stuck it under the box and, using a sleeved wrist, stuck the device to it.

“Just activate the device!” the voice said, but Elliot could not chance it being spotted after only a few hours. He let go of the device but watched it slowly part from the junction, the resin unable to hold the weight. He tried again, this time fanning it with his free hand.

The hollow footsteps invaded his other ear like a war drum, each one threatening the presence of its master. They played a dangerous game of pin-finger with the drumming of his heart. Each was out of sync with the other, doubling both sounds and exacerbating Elliot's fright.

“Elliot!” the voice pleaded, but he needed this to work. He let go of the device and felt it stick. It did not budge. He tapped on the device twice, waiting for the signal to be received.

“Fuck sake!” Elliot hissed, his voice almost cracking into a shout.

The beating hot silence was broken by a pair of droning sirens from outside.

Scramble sirens.

Elliot stayed paralysed, his boots glued to the floor as his eyeballs shook in their sockets, burning holes into the tip of a man’s boot just peaking from the corner. The boot stopped, then turned around. The walking footsteps from before turning into a run.

“Signal received and is transmitting successfully, but by the sounds of things I’ve been done,” the voice said.

“Will you be all right?” Elliot asked.

“I’ll ditch my comms in the desert and pretend I’m a wild Deity’s eye. That is if they find me. Good job today, you did well for a pilot. Always thought they were too eccentric for subtleties. Welp, farewell, either way.”

The brief and sparse relationship between the two cut out, and the sound of wind a world away was substituted with buzzing static. Elliot hid the earpiece, sneaking it back into his pocket.

He breathed. He breathed properly.

“Never again,” he swore.