by ID Johnson
“I have your agenda,” he said picking up a sheet of paper from the console and handing it to her. “It’s really more like a list since we weren’t exactly sure what time you were going to arrive. Our agendas are programed into the IAC every morning, but since you don’t have that yet, Aaron wanted you to have a paper copy.”
“You have an agenda everyday?” she asked, a bit surprise.
“Oh yes, every day,” Eliza chimed in from the backseat.
“It makes sense,” Jamie said defending the notion. “There are so many of us, we have to have some sort of organization. We’re really just assigned to tasks as they pop up and the agenda helps keep track of who is involved in what. It’s not like we have scheduled bathroom breaks or anything,” he added.
Cadence looked it over, and it didn’t look so bad to her. She read it aloud so that Eliza could hear. “Visit apartment, tour facility, train, IAC implant with Christian,” she modified the phrase “train with Aaron” so as not to offend Eliza. It looked like a pretty good agenda to her. “Who is going to be showing me my apartment?” she asked.
“That would be me,” Jamie replied. “I am your host, unless otherwise specified.”
“Terrific!” Cadence exclaimed. “I’m so glad we get to spend the rest of the day together!”
“Wait, you’re training her?” Eliza asked, knowing that couldn’t be right. Jamie was great at what he did but training was not his area of expertise.
Jamie knew exactly why Cadence had not read that part aloud and he wished to avoid it as well. “Um, I’m not sure about that,” he lied. “Probably not. I guess I’m your host for most of those events, put it that way. We’ll figure it out.”
Eliza snorted in disgust but she didn’t ask any more questions. If she had drawn any conclusions, she didn’t say so and Cadence chose to change the topic, rather than face her wrath.
“Will you be there when I get my IAC?” she asked Jamie.
“Do you want me to be?” he inquired.
“Yes, please!” she responded without hesitation. She wasn’t sure if this was going to hurt or not, but she didn’t want to take any chances.
“Then, I will be there,” he replied. She grabbed his arm and gave it a squeeze, and Eliza didn’t miss the delightful expression on his face.
“Unless it’s not on your agenda,” Eliza blurted.
“Listen here, Eliza Doolittle, you have quite the attitude this afternoon. Didn’t shopping make you happy?” Jamie asked catching her eye in the rearview mirror.
“Yes,” Eliza admitted, “It did. I’m just crashing, I guess,” she muttered.
They turned a corner and the LIGHTS buildings came into view. They were out of the city now, and the campus seemed to take up several acres. They passed through a fence, which opened automatically as the vehicle approached. Cadence assumed there must be some sort of sensor. Then they wound their way up a little hill towards the main buildings.
“Those two taller buildings in the back are the apartments,” Jamie explained. “That building that looks like a gym is the gym,” he said smiling, “and you don’t have to worry about most of these other buildings because you won’t ever be in them. Unless of course you get called into Aaron’s office for doing something stupid, which happens more frequently for some people than for others,” he added, glancing in Eliza’s direction. She stuck her tongue out at him but said nothing. “His office is in that building right there,” he said pointing to one of the taller buildings. “And then this little building right here is where we meet to talk about hunts, both planning and debriefing. Over here is the parking garage where we house all of the vehicles, except for the planes and boats for obvious reasons. You’ll learn as you go, but basically, you can have a car delivered and picked up in front of you building so you don’t have to worry about bringing it over here unless you’re in a hurry and want to pick it up yourself.”
She was nodding along. “So how many people live here?”
“Well, it varies,” Jamie said thinking. “There are about sixty-five full-time Guardians on our team and twenty other full-time Hunters. We work with other Hunters and Guardians as well, but most of them don’t belong to our central team. There are other teams in other parts of the country and the world as well. The other ones around here that aren't part of our time work like independent contractors. Some Guardians and Hunters have long term working relationships. Other Hunters don’t use Guardians. Some Guardians are freelancers; it’s a whole convoluted mess when you really stop to think about it. And then every new Hunter and Guardian in the world is required to come and train here. They must stay on location until our trainers determine they are ready to move to observational hunts and then to be released, at which time they could possibly be asked to join our team, though that doesn’t happen very often, or another team in a different region. So, that’s where the majority of the individuals on campus come from and there could be up to two hundred or so of them at a time. It really just depends on who is Transforming.”
They had come to a stop in front of one of the two apartment buildings. “This is the building where team members live and that building over there is for the trainees.”
“What, you’re going to make her walk?” Eliza chimed in.
Cadence and Jamie exchanged glances before he responded. “No,” he replied, “not any further than you are. Cadence is on our team now, Eliza, didn’t you realize that?”
“What?” Eliza asked. “How is that possible? You haven’t even completed training yet. I mean, don’t get me wrong, it’s great to work with you and all, but what if you suck?”
Jamie just shook his head and Cadence didn’t know how to respond. She was beginning to understand why Aaron had warned her that Eliza didn’t get along well with other girls. “I’ll show you to your room,” he said, climbing out of the car. He tossed the keys to a valet who came out to move the car, which raised another question for Cadence.
“So, who are the other people that work here? They know about Clandestine Ternion, too, right? Are they humans?”
The doorman pulled open the heavy glass door and Cadence found herself in a fairly large lobby. The center of the building was open all the way to the top, where there was a skylight. It wasn’t a towering building, perhaps only twenty floors or so, but it was still impressive and Cadence was feeling more and more at home.
“Most of them are non-Transformees,” Jamie explained. Eliza was behind them but she was loafing, obviously still offended that she wasn’t consulted before Cadence was asked to join them. “A few of them are Transformees who either couldn’t cut it or decided it just wasn’t for them. It’s not easy doing battle with the powers of darkness every night,” he said attempting a bit of humor. Cadence chuckled, but she also saw the truth in what he said.
Jamie manually pushed the up button on the elevator, though he could have called it through his IAC, and they all stepped inside. “Are you going with us to see Cadence’s apartment?” Jamie asked Eliza, praying she would say no.
“Sure!” she said in the most chipper voice she could muster. “I have nothing else on my agenda. For now.”
Great, Jamie thought. “Okay,” he said nonchalantly. In his mind he activated the elevator and requested it go to level twenty-two. He knew he was grasping at straws, but he thought, maybe if he didn’t manually press the button, Eliza wouldn’t notice where they were going.
She was distracted by her phone at the moment. Though she rarely used it for actually communicating with anyone, she liked to have it around so she could play games with it. It was much more fun to play Candy Crush with her finger than her eye.
As the door opened, they stepped out into a short hallway. Cadence realized they had gone to the top of the building before Eliza did. The building narrowed up here and there were only two apartments. Jamie took her to the right and pulled a physical key out of his pocket to open the door.
“What the hell are we doing here?” Eliza asked, suddenly realizing whe
re they were. They were at the penthouse level. Aaron’s apartment was up here and the other one was reserved for the Hunter Leader, if he or she chose to work so closely with the Guardian Passel that they needed a place on sight.
“We are showing Cadence to her apartment,” Jamie replied, popping the door open. He waited for Cadence to go in first and then followed her in.
Cadence couldn’t believe how beautiful the place was. They entered into a stunningly decorated living room with an open-concept dining room and full kitchen behind it. To her left there was a space setup as a small office. She could see a couple of doors down a narrow walkway by the kitchen and she was eager to see what was back there, though she couldn’t pull her eye away from all of the beautiful décor in these rooms.
As she passed the kitchen, she noticed granite counter tops and stainless steal appliances. Upon opening the first door, she found a gorgeous bedroom, decorated in shades of purple and gray, two of her favorite colors. The bed was huge and it looked incredibly comfortable. She walked in to the en suite bathroom and was thrilled to see a Jacuzzi bathtub and a stand-alone shower. Returning to the hallway, she also located a half-bath for guests and a laundry room with a full sized washer and dryer.
Jamie was waiting for her in the kitchen while Eliza had dropped herself into a chair in the living room and was carefully studying her fingernails.
“This is incredible!” Cadence proclaimed. She threw her arms around his neck and Jamie couldn’t help but laugh at her enthusiasm.
“Isn’t it?” he agreed. “And did you see the view?”
Cadence had briefly glanced out the window, but she was happy to look again. She could see a great deal of the green space from here, one of the fountains that decorated the campus, and off in the distance, she could see some of the buildings from downtown Kansas City.
“This is just amazing,” she commented still staring out the window. “Ha! I feel like a grown up!” she laughed.
“I’m very glad you like it,” Jamie replied.
“Why wouldn’t she like it?” Eliza asked. “We’re in the freaking penthouse!”
Both of them chose to ignore her for now and Jamie continued. “This actually used to be your grandmother’s apartment, you know, several years ago, of course, but this was it.”
“Really?” Cadence asked. How exciting to think that her grandmother had once lived here, too.
“Yes, the building has undergone extensive remodeling since then and the interior was recently just redecorated with you in mind, but it’s still the same location, same address, as when your grandmother lived here.”
“I wonder if that’s why it was assigned to me,” she said absently, still spinning around, taking in all of the little details of the decorating.
“No, it was assigned to you because Aaron is thinking with the wrong head!” Eliza commented directly into Jamie’s IAC.
“I’m sure that had something to do with,” Jamie said in response to Cadence’s comment, not Eliza’s. “Now, you should have some clothes in your closet from your house and your dorm room. Aaron wanted me to ask you to get into your training clothes before I show you the other buildings so I can just take you straight to him. Do you think you have any thing that will work for that?”
“I’ll go check,” she said, bustling back to her new bedroom, planning to toss herself on to the bed before she started to look for workout clothes.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” Jamie demanded turning to Eliza.
“What?” she asked, as if she had no idea to what he was referring.
“Could you be any uglier or more selfish?” he asked, feeling like a father scolding his incessant daughter.
Eliza wanted to fire back with some smart remark, but in her heart, she knew he was right. Cadence needed this room because, there was a pretty good possibility she would, in fact, become the Hunter Leader if she were successful in the hunt at all. After all, her grandfather was one of the most popular Guardian Leaders ever and her grandmother had more success as the Hunter Leader than any two other leaders combined. It made sense to move her directly in to this apartment, establish her as the leader that she most likely would be, and expect the Hunters to follow. And even though Aaron had been doing a tremendous job running both Passels for almost twenty years, she knew he would be much happier with help from a Hunter Leader. She was just extremely jealous of Cadence and wished she were a lot less attractive. Even though it had been years since she and Aaron had dated and it had been a disaster, she still had feelings for him. She needed to find a way to deal with that herself instead of pushing it off onto other people and making it their problem.
“You’re right,” she said. “I’m sorry. It’s just hard, Jamie,” she said tossing herself back against the chair then and slumping her head against her hands.
He was not totally uncompassionate to her situation, but he knew her mouth was one of her biggest problems and it was beginning to get old for him as well. The chair she was sitting in was oversized and he wedged his way in next to her. “I know,” he said, massaging her neck roughly with one hand. “But you’re going to have to figure it out, sweetheart. Cause you know Aaron is never returning to that relationship, regardless of how much either one of you claims to have changed. I’m not fully blaming you but that was not pleasant for any of us, having him so pissed off at you all of the time and inadvertently taking it out on us. No thank you.”
“I know, I know,” she repeated. “I just need to move on. Find someone else.”
“Yes, you do,” Jamie agreed.
Cadence came bounding back out wearing yoga pants, a matching t-shirt, and a light hoody. “Will this work?” she asked.
Though she had actually been addressing Jamie, it was Eliza who answered. “That’s super cute!” she said, smiling. “That will definitely work!”
Cadence glanced inquisitively from Eliza to Jamie and then back again. He just smiled at her so she decided to pretend she hadn’t noticed a complete 180-degree shift in Eliza’s attitude.
“Are you ready for a little tour?” Jamie asked.
Eliza had decided not to join them on their jaunt around campus. She said she was worn out from shopping and needed to take a nap. Jamie showed Cadence that there were some food options in the basement of their building, including a smaller grocery store and a couple of restaurants. He also walked her over to the debrief building and let her see the meeting rooms there. She noted they had a lot of technology, which wasn’t surprising considering every single one of them had a computer in his or her eye. He didn’t take her to Aaron’s office because he probably wasn’t actually there, and as Jamie put it, he hoped she’d never have to go there. It was never a pleasant situation when you got called into the office. It was kind of like going to see the principal in school.
They finally ended up at the gym. Cadence was extremely impressed with all of the equipment that was available. Their version of a rock wall was incredibly extreme and Cadence was looking forward to giving it a try. Jamie also pointed out something they called The Hill which looked like a 75 or 80 degree incline. It was no wonder everyone hated it. There was also a lap pool, sauna, and whirlpool. There were several trainees using all of these services while they were on their tour and Cadence understood why that would be one of the more popular places to hang out.
After their tour of the back part of the building, Jamie returned her to the gym floor where Aaron was waiting. He was wearing a T-shirt and gray gym pants but he found a way to look incredibly attractive even in those, and it was difficult for her to keep from bounding at him and throwing her arms around him.
He smiled when he saw her. She had her hair pulled up in a high ponytail and it was swinging back and forth as she approached. She looked extremely happy and, while he was glad she seemed to like the facilities, he was a bit disheartened by the fact that he knew she would no longer be smiling once he started putting her through her paces.
“Hey,” he called to them as they app
roached. He had been observing a couple of other trainees who were working out with one of the trainers but he excused himself when he saw Cadence enter the room. “How are you?” he asked debating whether or not to offer a handshake. He finally decided it would be best if she just left her hands in the pockets of her hoodie where they were now.
“I’m great!” she exclaimed. “Never better!”
“You showed her the apartment then?” he asked of Jamie. Of course, he knew that because he had seen bits and pieces of the tour through Jamie’s IAC, but Cadence didn’t necessarily realize that.
“Showed her the apartment,” Jamie confirmed. “She loved it.”
“Good,” Aaron said. He had hired a pretty well-known interior designer to work on getting the apartment ready and had spent quite a bit of his own money simply because they were working on a crunched timeline. It was nice to know that Cadence appreciated all of their hard work. “Jamie, are you going to stick around and let me torture, you, too?”
“No!” Jamie said emphatically. “In fact, I think I will just leave the gym all together so I don’t get roped in to anything. Will you just let me know when she’s ready for me to take her to Christian?”
“Oh, are you going to go with her to get her implant, too?” Aaron asked
“I asked him to go. Just in case,” Cadence said quietly.
Aaron understood. “Okay, sure. That makes sense. I’ll let you know.”
“Thanks,” Jamie said. Then, turning to Cadence, he said, “Good luck. You’re going to need it.” She reached for him to hug him good-bye and he kissed her lightly on the cheek before making his way to the nearest exit.
While Cadence certainly didn’t mind, she was surprised and Aaron couldn’t help but read that expression from her. She caught his eye and attempted to figure out what he was thinking from the smirk on his face. “It’s not . . . .” Cadence began to explain.
“You don’t have to say anything to me,” Aaron said. “I already know.”
She realized he meant he could tell by her reaction that she did not have romantic feelings for Jamie. She shook her head tried to force the Healer completely out of her mind so she concentrate on the tasks at hand.
