by Chloe Gunter
Each word hit me like a blow, a very real reminder of the consequences I was facing.
“You wouldn’t remember me at all,” Gage said, his words no more than a whisper, effectively hammering the nail in my coffin and halting everyone in the room.
I rose out of my chair on unsteady legs and crossed the short distance between us, a choked sound escaping me. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed Reed taking Ramsey’s hand and pulling him out of sight, but my attention was focused on the man in front of me.
The man who had been in the trenches with me and had seen me through to the other side. The man whose passion and love consumed me and made me stronger. The man I couldn’t lose.
“I love you,” I said, immediately crawling into his outstretched arms. “I’m going to do whatever it takes, okay?”
“We’ll do whatever it takes,” he corrected, his fingers coming around to wrap in the nape of my neck. “You’re not alone anymore, Baby Bird.”
As I pressed my face into his neck, a soothing hand ran the length of my back, the touch lighter than Gage’s inescapable hold.
“No matter what, you’ll have us. We’ll always find a way, cara.”
Gavin’s words settled deep in my chest and hardened my resolve. Braced between the two of them, I made another oath that night. This time, to myself.
And just not for them and for our relationship, my friendship with Reed and Ramsey, nor solely because of the oaths I had taken, but for who I was fundamentally.
Despite the circumstances and the pressure I was facing, I knew that the men surrounding me were in my corner. It was the first time besides the meeting that we had all been together in one place, and somehow it felt right, the five of us working together.
I was going to work tirelessly until there wasn’t a question in my mind or anyone else's that I was dedicated beyond reproach. Not only for Ethos, but for my commitment to GRAVITAS as well.
And I knew that all of that started the following day, with the final game.
"Alright, agents, you five have made it to the final round in the GRAVITAS games for situational analytics. Your scores from the two previous rounds will be added with this round to form your final scores. Points are worth double in this round. I don't need to remind you that your rating in these games will help determine the priority level of the cases you are assigned," Ridley announced from the front of the conference room.
"I think you forgot eternal bragging rites, Boss," Katya called out beside me, making the crowd and the other agents laugh.
"Hey," Ridley said, throwing his hands up. "If you've got the skills to back up the talk, then by all means, be my guest. We'll just be watching here from the big screen and noting your every move."
"Make sure to get my good side!" Everett, mocked from my left, showcasing a playful and cocky side of himself I hadn’t seen of him during our Catania brief.
"So here are the ground rules," Ridley began again. "You'll all be sequestered in an adjacent holding room. One by one you will be led into a separate room where you will have one minute, and one minute only, to gather as many details about the room as you can. Directly after, we will lead you to a second room. There, you'll have half that time to observe the room and enumerate any changes you can discern from the first room. Think of this as a four dimensional version of one of those matching picture games. In the field, you need to be able to draw vast amounts of information from a glance, and sometimes, that can mean the difference between life or death. Godspeed."
Ridley led the five of us down the hall and into a small, empty conference room. Immediately, Everett and the two other agents separated from the pack and went their different ways, taking a moment to do whatever they needed to do to hone in before it was their turn in the next task, leaving Katya and I to ourselves.
"No holding back, Bird," Katya said under her breath, and I knew she was mirroring the conversation she had in the hall with me after the second interrogation style game. "You’re integrated now, so your senses should be sharper."
"Donahue," a voice called from the doorway, and I watched as Everett rose and left the room.
"Listen to yourself, Ptichka. I want to win fair and square," Katya said, using the Russian term for little bird while smirking at me, and damn it, I was always up for a little competition.
"Be careful what you ask for, babe. I'm not going to hold back," I said, mirroring her expression and letting the excitement fill me.
"Petrov," the voice from the door called, and Katya rose and walked towards the door.
"Loser buys drinks at Veritas tomorrow night," she called over her shoulder as she walked out the door, a surety to her stride.
I sank into my chair and emptied my mind of everything. The only thing that mattered was what I was about to observe in that room. I channeled the quiet calm I knew so well, hearing the echo of other names being called out in the background. Cold settled into my bones, but it was a welcome feeling, knowing that I was growing more comfortable with being in tune with myself and my new Spark.
"DeWitt!" My head snapped up to see Ridley standing in the doorway, his eyebrows furrowed. "We've called you twice, you're up."
Rising from the chair, I followed him out of the room, ignoring the looks he was throwing my way. We went down two hallways before stopping in front of a room, the window in the door completely blacked out.
"Once you turn the knob, it will activate the timer, one minute, DeWitt. Make it count."
Taking a deep breath, I relaxed my shoulders and gripped the knob, twisting it quickly and entering the room and then closing the door behind me. I had already decided to work clockwise before entering the room, but given the depth of the room, I knew that two vantage points would work to my advantage. Turning my attention to the left, I started cataloguing the scene, making mental pictures and frames of the objects as a whole. I blocked shapes and colors before focusing in on the detailed nuances.
They had emptied out a conference room, making the scene into a old-school office, the kind you would see in the basement of a poker den, with a big imposing desk and well-worn leather chairs in front of it. The wall on my left had a bookcase, and I quickly realized that they were all first sorted by color and then alphabetically. There were missing holes where books were supposed to have gone, and I made a mental note of how many.
I continued my scan of the room, notating what pictures hung where, the angles of the furniture, how many boxes were stacked in the corner, and the contents of the cabinet on my right. Soaking up the images one after another, I constructed my internal three-dimensional map before moving to the other end of the room behind the desk.
Quickly cycling the room once again from this vantage point, catching more details I had missed, I noted the back of the door. I could tell what Katya meant by being in tune with my Spark now. Individual fibers on the chairs were now discernible, the worn spots on the wood of the desk more apparent. The lacquer was almost non-existent in some areas. I ran my hands over the wood where it was most worn, feeling against the side of the desk until my fingers caught on something. As I ran my hand back over the path, a small latch on the underside of the lip caught the tips of my fingers.
Pressing my fingers against the groove, a small compartment sprung out from under the desk with a small note inside.
Be above it all.
Leave it to the administration of an elite government operation to put some National Treasure-esque shit in the middle of the games.
Grabbing the chair, I used it for leverage to quickly stand upon the desk. From this vantage point a noticeable pattern appeared in the layout of the room. It was essentially a map of the campus, complete with the elevations of the different buildings being comprised of the stacked objects and bookcases.
And right then, I was fucking standing right on top of the receiving hall.
The door opened, and I quickly jumped off the desk and ran out into the hall to join Ridley. He ushered me next door, pausing in the frame.
<
br /> "30 seconds, DeWitt, call them out as you notice them, and we'll keep track."
Twisting the knob, I charged into the room, directly going to check and see if the latch was still there. It wasn't.
"Missing latch, missing compartment," I called out before jumping on top of the desk.
And just like that, I saw everything completely as it was. The bookshelf was a different height, and different books were missing than before, representing the windows of the building it pertained to. The rug, which was the quad, and the chairs were slightly off on the angle.
One after another I called out the discrepancies, a constant stream of words flowing through my mouth, until the door opened and I found myself walking out into the hall to Ridley. He nudged me with his shoulder, grinning down at me.
"Remind me the next time we're on the track to play I spy with you while we race. That, Charlie, was impressive," he spoke low for only me to hear.
We filed back into the large conference room that we began in. I took an empty seat next to Everett, nodding to Katya in the other row. Ironically enough, it was the room where I first learned who Wyatt Ridley really was. But sitting in that back row again, I couldn't help but reflect on how much my life had changed in the last six months, how much I had grown since then.
"Alright, agents, it's time for the rankings," Ridley called out from the front of the room.
My eyes were glued to the projection in the front of the room, the split screen displaying each of us simultaneously. I could see that the only other person who had discovered the latch was Everett, while the others took more systematic loops around the room.
"In third, we have Agent Petrov with a stunning demonstration of observation. Even without discovering the hint to the room, she managed to only separate second place from two observations."
"Woohoo! Free drinks," I yelled, making the entire room laugh. She gave me a nod, and then there was a brush against my mind, soft at first, then more insistent. She raised an eyebrow at me, and then I imagined a small window appearing in my wall, letting that nudge in my mind inside.
I'm proud of you, Ptichka. That's exactly what I was talking about.
I knew I could shut her out anytime I wanted, bricking up my wall again, but it was oddly comforting to have her there. It wasn't much different than having a normal conversation, she wasn’t digging through my deepest thoughts, it was more like an internal walkie talkie.
It was slightly different than what I had experienced with the twins, the connection easier to form. It seemed like the more connections I made, the easier it was to sync.
"And then there were two, Donahue and DeWitt. Both of whom found the hidden latch in the desk, so good work with that, agents. Our situational analytics champion for this round of the GRAVITAS Games is..." Ridley paused, leaving us all in suspense.
Holding my breath, I bit the inside of my cheek to keep still. I really wanted to win, the competitive edge in me riding me hard. My Spark was simmering inside of me, feeding off my adrenaline, so I purposefully took a long slow breath.
"Can I get in on this drink deal, DeWitt?" Everett asked quickly, before the room started calling to Ridley to finish.
"Absolutely, when am I ever going to turn down a free drink?" I grinned with an easy smile, feeling confident in my performance.
"DeWitt!" Ridley yelled, as I watched Everett's head dramatically drop to the table before I reached over and patted his shoulder.
"You did a fantastic job, Donahue," I complimented, knowing that in order to beat Katya, he must have been a powerhouse in his own right. "I like my gin and tonics with double lime," I said with a chuckle before heading to the front of the room to Ridley.
After my win, I followed it up with my lunch date I had with Gavin. Nostalgia must have been in the air, and Gavin was, as always, thoughtful as we spent our time the same way we had spent our first lunch date. Sitting on a park bench eating lunch, just this time it happened to be in Paris with a lot more stolen kisses, touching, and another quick trip to his bedroom. Let it be said that Atlantean tech does have its advantages when it comes to dates.
Leaving lunch on high spirits, I made my way back to my apartment. Today marked my first official day of training with Reed to get up to speed with everything Ethos related. Opening the door to the apartment, I found him in the kitchen washing dishes.
"Hey, Char. Did you eat? I can make something real quick for you, if not?"
More like I got ate.
"I had lunch with Gavin, I'm good to go. Thanks, though," I said, moving to put my backpack on the dining room table. "So how is this going to work?"
"We'll be going back to the lair and using one of the test rooms. I'll give you the rundown once we get there," he said happily, the excitement and cautious optimism coming off him in droves.
"You did not just call it a lair. Really, Mountain Man? Bat-Cave was taken, and that was the best you could come up with at the time?" A smile stretched across my face as I settle back into our teasing rhythm.
"It's an underground chamber of doom that has secret high-tech stuff hidden in it. Of course I wanted to call it the Bat-Cave, but Ramsey shot that shit down fast. The rest of the collective calls it HQ, but thats too James Bond for me, you know? Lair is kind of all encompassing, while still keeping the mystery alive."
My lips twitched at his in depth observations, and I had to work hard to keep a smile from coming through. "Seems like you put a lot of thought into this," I offered as seriously as I could.
"Of course, Char. It's a big part of our lives, and it deserves to have a cool ass name. I mean, we have handles, why shouldn't our home base have one as well?"
His question was so earnest that I didn't have the heart to laugh at him. Strike that, I didn't have the heart to laugh at him until I saw the muscle in his cheek twitch near his eye, which indicated that he was doing it on purpose, and I was getting played. If he wanted to play, I'd show him how to play.
"Do you have handles for everything important in your life?" I asked, my tone light and curious while still wearing a serious expression so as to not give anything away.
"Yeah," he said slowly, looking a bit caught off guard.
"So you have a handle for your handle? Did Ramsey have a hand in naming it, or was the name already established before he came along?"
His face flushed scarlet as it often did when things of a sexual manner involving him were brought into light. It made me flashback to my first encounter with him, and how rosy his cheeks were at getting caught in a compromising situation.
"Um, well I guess—" he started, halfway mumbling as his hand found his beard.
"Because you know if you don't have a handle for it yet, I can help. Why don't you just go ahead and drop trou," I said seriously, motioning to his shorts. "I need to see what we're working with and make an informed decision before I give your handle a handle that's going to stick with it for the rest of your life. I'd hate to make it harder on you both."
Throughout my request I watched his eyes grow larger as his hands came in front of his shorts, acting as a semi-shield, as if I somehow developed x-ray vision and could already see his dick. The sight was too much for me and I broke my facade, a laugh spilling out of me.
Reed looked equal parts relieved and stunned as I watched the realization filter through his face that I had just been messing with him.
"You can't mess with my delicate sensibilities like that, Char. Did my previous threats of pranking you in your sleep mean nothing to you?" he asked inching closer.
Wiping the stray tears off my face, I put an arm out to keep him as far as possible, knowing that if he had his way, he'd be tickling the shit out of me and making me beg for mercy. Nuh-uh, not going to happen this time.
"Truce," I said, moving further from him.
"For now," he countered, straightening up and looking more relaxed then I had seen him in weeks. "Now, let's go teach you some new tricks. I can't wait to see what new things you're going to come up
with when we're done."
I could only imagine what he was referring to. A hologram of myself pranking the guys in between saving the world? Exploding his hair gel? Juvenile pranks in between serious missions sounded like a good balance to me.
But first, I needed to get up to speed and off of probation. There were too many moments like this that I couldn’t bear to lose. Moving closer to Reed, I gave him a smile and followed him through the gate he had made, knowing it was time we got to work.
The testing room was...sterile. White upon white upon white, from the floor to the walls to the ceiling, to the massive overhead lights. The effect was almost blinding.
"How exactly are we supposed to get anything accomplished in this room if I'm squinting even trying to look at you?"
"It's supposed to be a peaceful blank space to empty your mind, Char," Reed laughed, before saying a command to dim the lights to a low glow. "Better?"
"Much. So, the Keys?" I asked, using the word mentioned during the Conclave.
"Think of it like disciplines. There are three Keys you need to master before you'll have full control over your Spark. Each one takes it to another level, something more you'll be able to do before finally, you'll be a hardened Atlantean like the rest of this."
.
"Alright, hit me. You know I do well with lists and tasks." It was the way I had always been, goal-oriented and driven to accomplish any project to exact specifications.
"The Keys are broken down into Individual, Technological, and Metaphysical. Think of it in terms of yourself first, then the toys, then the world around you, each one building upon the last," he finished, sinking to the floor more gracefully than I expected, and motioned me to join him.
"So what will I be learning about myself today?" I asked, only somewhat sassy.
Reed reached down and pulled his khaki pant leg up briefly before reaching into his boot and pulling out a pocket knife. Flicking it open, he made sure he had my rapt attention before lowering the blade to the soft fleshy underside of his forearm.
