After making sure no one else was within ear shot, Dario gestured for all of us to pull our seats closer. Then he turned to Deen and me. “I already told Johann on the way here what happened during our mini-mission yesterday, so I’ll also bring both of you up to speed. Because of the protests blocking the streets, we had to leave the car at 17th and continue on foot to Marshall. We did make it to the hospital, and although they were very strict of the identity of people they let inside, Myra was able to get in because she’s a Melchor student.”

“We occasionally have lectures and practical exams at the hospital,” Myra elaborated. “It wasn’t that suspicious I came there. Just an excuse I needed to get some forms for class.”

“The whole state of the place…” Deen said, confused. “I assumed they’d bar all visitors.”

Dario answered, “Pure luck we got there about fifteen minutes before the whole place went into lockdown because of the escalating violence. Before that happened, many people were there, mostly families of the transferred patients checking up on them.” He then gave us a brief story of how Myra distracted the staff at the front office so Sneak could go through the files on a computer.

“I had to stop myself vomiting because of the smell of the dumpster,” Reo whined. “You guys couldn’t find me a better place to summon?”

“I was there with you,” Everett said. “The smell wasn’t that bad. And it was the only secluded place within range of the hospital.”

“Picture this: me concentrating on typing on a keyboard using Sneak’s finger-sized arms as shitty smell frolicked up my nose.”

“Frolic?” Myra repeated with an exaggerated British accent. “Stop being a drama queen.”

“I was waiting for alarms to go off. Flashing red lights, blaring sirens, screaming people. ‘Help! A grey gremlin is on the keyboard!’ Something like that.”

“Hospitals don’t have that kind of alarm, you idiot,” she said, elbowing his arm. “Fire alarms maybe, but not those ones like you broke in a secret military base.”

“Hey, I’m just saying I was expecting the guys watching the security cams to spot Sneak on their screens. He wasn’t on invisible mode. Seems like we can’t expect people to be diligent on their jobs nowadays.”

“That’s rich coming from you.”

“Continuing on,” Dario said before the two of them could argue more. “Myra and Reo did find Julie’s room number, but they couldn’t get to her because the way to that building was guarded by cops. Perhaps if we had the time, they could’ve done more reconnaissance. But the the order came to lockdown the whole hospital and the surrounding streets.”

Myra folded her arms. “I still think I had a shot of finding Julie if we pushed on and took advantage of the commotion. It was total chaos when all the visitors were herded out of the hospital.”

“I told you to abort because it’s too risky,” he sternly replied. “This is the middle of the city. If you do get discovered, you’ll be fighting the police and the National Guard.”

Myra clicked her tongue, irritated at Dario shooting her down. “I can handle—"

“It’s not a question of whether you can win against them or not. You’ll be fighting against humans. Do you want stain your hands with the blood of innocent people?”

“Er…no, but—”

“BID agents will eventually come, don’t forget about them. And assuming you successfully snuck your way to Julie, what will you do? I’m the one with the ability to erase her memory.”

“I could…” She turned away from us, gazing at the small fountain in the middle of the garden. “You’re right…I also really don’t want to cause any more innocent casualties.”

Dario stared at her for a couple of seconds, his eyes narrowed. He then sighed and said, “After that, all of us scouted the surroundings and took notes, the walls of the hospital, the placements of the guards, the camps of the protesters. However, considering the rapidly evolving situation, the intel we got yesterday of the layout of area is no longer accurate. We’ll have to go back there later a couple of hours before our mission to see what’s what. Let’s move on to—oh, let’s order first.” He waved at the waiter who courteously hovered by the door several feet away, waiting for us to finish our discussion.

When he approached us, the waiter glanced at the plans on the table. Dario noticed and loudly chatted about our ‘project’ for our architecture course, throwing technical terms around like he knew what he was talking about. Maybe he did.

As everyone ordered food and drinks, I pondered my course of action.

I obviously wanted to have Julie’s memories erased, duh. Me above everyone else here. But I couldn’t contribute anything because I was supposedly a ‘normal human’, with only Myra and Johann knowing my secret. I still had no clue if they told Dario.

“Let’s discuss the obstacles while we wait for our food,” Dario said. “First, we have to get past the protesters—"

“Um…excuse me,” I began to say, ruining the cool start of a planning montage. “Should I stay here? I’m going to be useless in this whole breaking in the hospital thing.”

“You have to be here,” Deen empathically said. “We’re a group!”

“No…yeah, I mean we’re a group. But isn’t it better if I didn’t know about your plan just in case…I don’t know…the fewer people know about it the better, I guess? And it’s not like I’ll be of any help.”

“I’m sure you can contribute to our plans,” said Dario. “We are a group, yes. The more brains working together the better.”

“Not always,” said Reo.

Myra snorted. “Not with your brain.”

Dario again ignored his teammates. “And we’ll find a part for you, Erind. You can be a lookout, keep us updated of what’s happening with the protesters, the movements of the police—”

“From a distance!” cut in Deen. “From a distance, right? We don’t want Erind near any danger.” She put an emphasis on the ‘we’. “Those protesters could turn violent any second, they are violent now.”

“I can take care of myself,” I asserted. “And I want to have a part in this.”

“Erind has been through a lot,” Everett said to Deen. “I’m sure she knows how to deal with danger.”

Dario also assured her, “She’ll be far away from any riots.” Deen pursed her lips, but relented, nodding her consent like she was my mother or something. He said, “We’ll need all the help we can get; a lookout isn’t a small part. If anything happens, Erind can decide for herself if the situation is getting dangerous and leave.”

Does he know my secret?

I felt like his actions weren’t that of someone knowingly sitting at the same table with an Adumbrae.

Dario was the leader of a group fighting Adumbrae. It was a no-brainer he’d want me, an actual Adumbrae, a real one unlike those of the 2Ms, eliminated. Not that apparent, but I could tell he was a dangerous person. He didn’t seem affected by the deaths of a couple of people during the Sander’s fire, unlike Myra and Everett.

Maybe that was why Myra and Johann didn’t tell him about me.

Or maybe Dario was just really good at hiding things. I’m not so sure about him.

“I feel like a tree,” I said. They gave me quizzical looks. “You know? A kid playing a random tree in a school play? You guys are just giving me a role so I wouldn’t feel bad.” There was nervous chuckling at first, then everyone laughed after I told them I was joking—everyone except Myra.

The planning montage started. Queue in the tense music with subtle rising crescendo.

Even though I wasn’t going to have an important part, I still listened with half an ear, trying to teach myself practical skills like…doing illegal stuff.

Going past the ring of protesters was easy enough, the perimeter of the National Guard would be the hard one to crack. And once they were inside, they also had to move about undetected. If the hospital was operating normally—Dario could've just waltzed in and do his magic on Julie like he did with Ramello before.

“Babies get kidnapped from hospitals all the time,” Reo said, leaning back on his chair. Myra unexpectedly didn’t hit him, but just grunted her distaste. “What? I’m just saying this would’ve been a piece of cake if not for the protesters making the situation worse.”

The food arrived and the planning continued while we ate, discussing how to get past security we had no idea consisted of. There was even a debate on whether they should try to take over the security room to make their movements easier. But that’d also leave a trace that they were there in the first place, and would signal to the BID that there was something important with the patients at the hospital.

“One thing is clear,” Dario said. “We need Deen front and center.”

“I will be there,” she said.

“It’s really a different thing with you around,” Everett said. Reo snickered beside him, catching the double meaning.

Nearly twenty minutes later and they had a crude plan. My part, like Dario said earlier, was going to be a nearly useless lookout, far away from anything remotely dangerous…or helpful, which meant Deen was satisfied with it.

“The memorial starts at 9:00 p.m.,” Dario said. “The mayor scheduled it at that time so they could have a prayer vigil as well.” I mentally snickered, remembering Reginus and her tiny group. Dario went on, “I suspect he set it up like that in hopes the religious groups attending to pray—and there’s going to be many of them—will be the buffer against protests.”

“Smart stuff,” Reo said. “Pitting the masses against each other. I’m glad I voted for that guy.”

“You care about voting?” Myra asked incredulously. “And don’t forget that guy likely helps out the 2Ms.”

“Oh yeah. Then fuck that guy. I’m glad I didn’t vote.”

Dario said, “Let’s say 7:00 p.m. we start to move in position and update our plans accordingly.”

“By the way, Erind,” Myra said, surprising me. “You left your phone at your condo, right? Like, it’s gone?”

What’s up with her now? I nodded. “My phone, among other belongings...all of my belongings are gone, yeah. I’m just borrowing one of Deen’s phones until I get money from Mom and buy a replacement. Why do you ask?”

“What’s your new number now? If there’s something important, we can’t just keep calling Deen.”

“Er…yeah,” I said. I gave all of them my number.

After we were done eating and about to go our separate ways, Deen said to me, “Erind, I’m going to Cresthorne for my afternoon class. Want to come with me? You can study at the library. Or I can drop you off at my house.”

“Are we required to go to Cresthorne for class? I thought it’s only students who feel they can safely travel to the university during all this…nonsense…and the rest can just attend online.”

“That’s right, but I miss meeting other people.” Deen grinned. “Oh, you know? Extrovert people stuff. You won’t understand. Although I’m not sure who is going to be there.”

Perfect. “I think I’ll buy glasses this afternoon.”

“We can do that together late—”

“I’ll just buy on my own,” I insisted. She was getting weird these days. “I have nothing to do at Cresthorne or at your house anyway, might as well get this done.”

“But what if—?”

“Deen, you shouldn’t be so worried of Erind.” It was Myra who said that. Mild shock, I sarcastically thought. She subtly nodded at me. “She can take care of herself. Johann always scolds me when I get too protective of him just because he’s a normal human.” There was something weird with the way she said ‘normal human’.

“Fine,” Deen said. Her golden hair bounced as her shoulders dropped in surrender. “But keep me updated when you get home, okay?”

“Okay, Mom,” I said, sticking my tongue out at her.

Was this the right place?

Where was Myra?

The fountain she mentioned in her text was here, but I wasn’t sure how many were there in this mall. I approached the guy at the food stall selling cinnamon rolls beside it, and he confirmed it was the only one.

Deen dropped me off at this mall on her way to university. I fibbed there was an optical shop here where I could get an eye exam and order new glasses—well, not exactly a lie because there was really an optical shop here. I checked. But I was just going to buy cheap fake glasses from the department store.

Later, I’d have to think of some reason why it took me a long time to return to her house.

She was being very nosy nowadays, bordering on controlling.

I puzzled over what could’ve triggered the change. Was she intermingling her heroic purpose with my safety? She did volunteer to protect me at the start of all of this shit; technically, it was her first mission, a personally imposed mission at that. And the one night I left ‘her care’ was the night the 2Ms attacked.

It might’ve dealt a pretty huge blow on her self-image, although that was really on me for insisting to go back to my condo. So far, this was my best explanation of Deen’s abrupt change, but I might be wrong. I’ve been wrong about her before.

One thing was certain: even though Deen was my closest ally, I should start watching my back around her.

But enough of that, I should focus on my meeting with Myra.

Was this the right decision?

I replayed my thought process in deciding to come here, making sure I wasn’t doing this because the danger was fun. It was a creeping concern I was getting used to danger and could no longer approximate ‘flight’ instincts as time went by.

Myra hadn’t attacked me since our little encounter at Sander’s mall, so it seemed like it was really a mistake on her part—her reaction to my ‘revelation’ that she was the reason I became an Adumbrae confirmed this. And she also hadn’t attacked me even after she knew I was no longer human.

She was, from what I could tell, a relatively good person by her irritated reaction each time someone brought up the Sander’s fire—a reaction of a person bothered by her conscience.

Her personality was very consistent thus far, so I was certain I had a good read on her.

I stared at the pimple patch-covered crystals on my right palm. The main reason I wanted to meet her wasn’t to know the truth—that was also important, I suppose, so I could better plan for my survival—but to get help in practicing my powers.

Okay, that’s a lie. That wasn’t the main reason.

It was because I wanted to be close friends with her before making her suffer for all the wrongs she committed against me. This was my modus operandi since I was a kid. I stopped myself grinning like an idiot in public while thinking about what I’d do to Myra.

“Erind?” a voice behind me called.

I turned around. “Oh, Myra…Hi..."

“Um, so…” she looked around, fidgeting uncomfortably, her eyes landing on the food stall. “Have you eaten? I can buy you cinnamon—”

“We just ate, remember?”

“Oh yeah.” She exhaled. “I’m sorry.”

“What?”

“There I said it. Anyway, we should go some other place to continue talking.”

“A secluded restaurant? Hmm, I know a café—”

“We should go to our hideout…or we could choose any of the other abandoned buildings near it.”

“Huh? Why there?” She wanted to go an isolated place?

“If we’re going to show each other our…abilities…it’s best if we do it there.

I blinked, thinking rapidly. “Just the two of us?”

“Yeah. Johann has work. We haven’t told anyone else about you.”

“Uhhh…”

“I’m not going to do anything to you.” She grimaced, realizing what she said. “I know it’s hard for you to believe this…but…you can trust me. That’s all I can say…for what that’s worth.”

Do I go with her?

Obviously, duh.

I could foresee a lot of drama was going to happen here. I wouldn’t miss this for the world!