The healers looked at each other at a loss. After all, everyone that came through the circle was present and accounted for.

I let out a silent breath. “I’m sorry.” My voice drew everyone’s attention.

The healers looked at each other then tactfully walked a distance away. They grouped together, some of them looking away to give us privacy and others staring intently with curiosity.

Billy glared at me. “What do you mean?”

I stood up and met his glare with a steady gaze. “I tried, I really did. You all fell unconscious. While I was helping you, she …” My voice died out as I took in the way that his expression turned darker and darker.

Did I really want to tell them what happened? That she had turned into a monster and I killed her? Would they really believe me or write me off as a quack like the online forum did? I needed to complete my task and destroy that crystal and if my admission got me kicked off the team right now, I wouldn’t be able to do that.

My silence was met with shocked faces that slowly changed to grief and denial. I didn’t have to say anymore. If a Hunter didn’t make it out of somewhere in Gate Vale, it meant only one thing. Death.

Emma grabbed my hand and pulled herself up. “You …” Her voice cracked and she blinked at the tears in her eyes. “You did … your best. I’m sure of it.”

“Did your best?” Billy half-screamed. His face turned red, the thick veins on his forehead bulging. “Did you best? Like hell! This is why Es aren’t supposed to go on missions like this! They are nothing but bagage, weak, useless and unable to protect anyone! How do we know that you didn’t purposefully k-kill Reina so that you could take her spot!” His B-ranked aura spread out, heavy with anger, trying to smother me. He took a step towards me.

Mason stood up and pressed a shaking hand against Billy’s chest to stop him from getting any closer. His own presence flared out like a shield, forcing Billy’s back. “That’s inappropriate and you know it.” His voice lowered, threatening.

My teeth gritted together and I forced my leg to stay strong even though it felt like a giant, invisible hand was pressing down on me. I wasn’t as affected by their higher ranking pressure as I had been this morning. If my stats hadn’t been returned, I would have been on the ground right now, barely conscious, succumbing to the pressure of the two Hunter’s facing off. That’s not to say I wasn’t feeling it, I was. I just wouldn’t show it.

I did kill Reina. I did regret it. And I’d do it again if it meant that I could keep myself and Emma alive. But with Billy’s actions, any lingering guilt I had over it vanished. I lifted my chin and glared at Billy then swept my gaze across the rest of the team. A mix of emotions were displayed, from agreeing condemnation to the denial on Emma’s face.

I grabbed Emma’s arm and pulled at her sleeve, spreading the tear on the material so they all could clearly see the scab on her arm. “Do you see this?” I demanded. “This right here!” I pointed at it. “This is where a monster burrowed under her skin, digging its way up to her chest. Trying to get to her heart, I’m sure.” It was a guess, but it wouldn’t surprise me if the change was sparked when the caterpillar reached the human heart.

Emma’s face went pale as a sheet and she wobbled. I put a hand on her shoulder and gently set her on the ground before she fell over.

The rest of the team looked just as unsettled. Billy’s and Mason’s power struggle dissipated as they focused on me.

By now all of the healers were staring at us. Even random Hunters that were entering or exiting the Gate entrance a short ways away stopped to watch.

But I wasn’t done yet. I glared at Billy’s red face. “Take a look at your right hand. Do it. The same cut is on your hand, where I had to dig a monster out of you. That’s why your gauntlet is missing, if you haven’t noticed yet. There was only one on you, and you.” I pointed to Mason and Morgan. “And there were two on you.” I then pointed to Axe Guy and Kip. “I tried. But I could only go so fast trying to find the monsters. And it’s not like I’m a pro at taking off armor.” I waved my hand and their missing gear appeared on the ground at my feet. It clanged together, metal bumping against metal. “By the time I finished with all of you, it was too late for Reina.”

Their faces changed to horror as they checked the wounds on their bodies. I guess one thing I had going for me was that the healers hadn’t been that quick to take care of such small wounds yet.

“So don’t say that I didn’t try,” I gritted my teeth and glared at Billy’s wide eyes. “If I hadn’t, you wouldn't be here.”

Several emotions flashed over Billy’s face, too fast for me to catch, before he settled on a scowl. “Why didn’t you pass out? Did the monsters attack you too?” He flung the words at me. “How do we know that you didn’t make these cuts as a cover?”

“Billy!” Emma gasped at him.

“Hey,” Mason warned.

“How ungrateful can you be?” I demanded. “I don’t know why I wasn’t attacked. Maybe it’s because I was too weak and useless. The monsters just overlooked me entirely and went for the greater threats.” It had to be because I didn’t pass out. The monsters were probably drawn to unconscious people only. Honestly, it was a fluke that I even noticed them when I did. If I hadn’t, I would have been killed when everyone turned into monsters. “The reason why doesn’t matter. What matters is that I kept as many people as I could alive. I would rather have Reina here too.”

Billy opened his mouth but was cut off by Morgan. “Billy? I think you should drop it.” She bowed her head, tears streaming down her cheeks.

Axe Guy rested an arm around her trembling shoulders.

“Yeah,” Kip hugged herself tight, her fingers brushing her arm near her armpit. Where a scab was, so close to her torso.

Mason leveled Billy with a look. “Fighting about this isn’t going to change anything.”

Billy looked at everyone with incredulity. “Are you seriously going to just leave it like this?”

“I don’t think there’s anything else that can be said or done,” Mason said simply.

Billy growled low in frustration then glared at me. Without another word, he grabbed his gear from the pile on the ground and marched away. Moments later, he disappeared through the arch of the Gate.

The rest of the team took their stuff and walked away. Even the watching crowd lost interest and dissipated. That left me with just Mason and Emma.

Emma took a breath and stood up. “I’m sorry about Billy. He’s not a bad guy, really. He just wears his emotions on his sleeve, you know?” Tears pooled her pretty eyes.

Just like someone else who looked guilty as hell, I thought looking at Emma’s face.

Mason reached out and put an arm around Emma’s shoulder. “Billy and Reina.” He swallowed hard, his voice thick. “They’ve been best friends since childhood. They were both raised in the Hope Program and were both orphaned by ten. So you could say they were all each other had for most of their lives. They were each other’s most important person.” He looked down and Emma rubbed her arm as she swallowed a sob.

I huffed a breath and looked to the side, still angry but at least I understood now.

It was hard for Hunters to bear children. Even when they got pregnant, most female Hunters often miscarried before their second trimester. But humans and Hunters were separated for a reason. A Hunter’s strong presence was too much for a normal or unawakened human to handle for a long period of time. If a Hunter couple had a child, that child would go to the Hope building in Garden City. The mother had a four month maternity leave and the father had six weeks where they could stay with the baby as long as their Hunter aura didn’t affect the baby’s health. Then they would go back to Eden and the baby would be raised by the caregivers in the Hope Program.

The parents had visitation rights on the weekends, but for the most part, the children were raised in an orphanage environment. Because of the high casualty rate of Hunters, there were more orphans than not in the Hope Program. It was also just as likely to come across an abandoned child, whose parents were too busy to bother visiting. It was originally called the Hope Program because everyone thought that if two Hunters had a baby, it was guaranteed to be another Hunter — they were the hope of the future. But everyone had been wrong. The children from two Hunter parents had the same odds of becoming a Hunter as any other kid off the street who had either one or no Hunter parent.

“I get it,” I muttered. “But I still don’t appreciate him attacking me like that.”

Mason nodded. “I understand. I’ll talk to him.”

I looked up at the couple and took in the way Emma relied on him as she grieved. Then I remembered how his name was the first thing she’d said when she woke up. How devastated would she have been if Mason was the one that I killed. What if Emma was the one I couldn’t get in time? A chill went down my spine and I banished the thought. God, I was getting too attached, wasn’t I?

“See you tomorrow,” I muttered and turned to leave.

“Wait, are you coming tomorrow?” Emma asked hopefully.

I gave her a wan smile over my shoulder. “Yeah. I’m still under contract, right? There’s a couple things that I have to do, so I’m going to go for now.” My lashes lowered as I muttered, “I’m sure there’s a couple things you have to do too.” Handling grief was hard. “I’ll go to the Incident Office and fill out a report later.”

With that, I headed for Fogmire to cultivate for thirty minutes.

An hour later, I slowly closed the door to the Incident Office behind me. This was my second time closing that metal door behind me in less than a week. It didn’t feel good. This time I was at least able to make a full report. The receptionist wrote down every word I said about the events that led to Reina’s death. Of course, that’s because I lied. But it was easier to believe than the truth.

I didn’t say anything about her turning into a monster and me killing her. As far as the records would show, she disappeared while I dealt with the rest of the team. She was there one second, and gone the next. No one would question that because some monsters really are that fast and silent. Especially compared to the abilities of an E — they just didn’t have the stats to keep up.

I shouldn’t have lied, but I felt that it was only fair that something was recorded about Reina’s death. She — and the people who knew her — needed some sort of closure. Not to mention, I bet I’d get into trouble if I kept coming to make reports about the monster-humans I kept killing. The System wanted me to stay under the radar. I couldn’t have the Hunter police tailing me to see if I was a psycho killer.

A bitter smile quirked my lips. As if they had any reason to look at me. But if they wanted someone to check out, I would gladly point them in the right direction.

At the top of the stairs in front of the building, I paused with my foot hanging out over the next step. A familiar presence emanated from down below. I blinked out of my thoughts and focused on him, Kesstel.

He looked up at me, his hands in the pockets of his jeans and his white-blond hair brushed back from his forehead with casual flare. It was obvious he was waiting for me.

Why is it that I always see him here? “How did you know I was here?” I slowly started down the stairs.

“You’re actually pretty easy to trace, as soon as I knew what to look for. At least for me,” he commented casually. “Like a white dot in a sea of black. Although I’m sure you’re nearly invisible to other Hunters. But I get the impression that’s what you want, huh?”

He wasn’t wrong. I stopped with only a couple stairs to go so that we were the same height. I glanced at his red title over his head. Right now, I didn’t want to see his face. Everything that I’d learned and seen seemed to be piling up around me, hammering cracks into the calm shell that I forged around my mind. I didn’t have anything to hang the blame on, except for him, even if it was unfair.

I turned away. “I’ll see you later.”

“Oh, I thought you might want these, Jyn.”

I paused. He knew my name? When did I ever tell him? I looked over my shoulder.

In the one second that I glanced away, Kesstel had moved to the trash bin at the corner of the stairs, next to the wooded area where he crashed my world days ago. A pink pastry box hung in his hand, ready to drop down in the garbage. “I guess you didn’t like them after all.”

“Gah!” I ran over and grabbed the box out of his hand before he could commit a horrible sin. “Seriously, you can’t just throw stuff like this away!”

A sweet smell filled my nose. Intoxicated, I took a deep breath. It smelled so good and I’d only eaten a single pastry all day. Ah, that’s right, I still had that chocolate tres leche cake. I should eat that tonight. And everything inside this box. Tonight was a night where I could use some sweet therapy.

Kesstel breathed a small laugh. “Okay. I won’t anymore, I promise.” Then he sobered. “You look upset.”

The sides of the box bent as my fingers tightened on it’s edges. I stared down at the pink cardboard. My head and my heart screamed to run away. I didn’t want to learn more about him, and I didn’t want him to learn more about me. The best thing for me would be to keep a firm wall between us. But he was literally the only person I could talk to about what was going on.

I glanced up into his face then back down at the pastry box. “How can you stand seeing your teammates turn into monsters? And how do you handle killing them after they transform?” I held the box with one hand and smoothed out the wrinkles on the cardboard with my other.

“I don’t partner up.”

I blinked in surprise and looked fully into his face.

He shrugged. “What’s the use when they're all going to die anyway? In the end, it's going to be just me walking away when this world collapses. So what’s the use of getting attached in the first place?” He was so casual, so sure, as he spoke.

I looked at Kesstel’s vibrant blue eyes. They were so piercing, so polarizing. Yet every time I talked with him I could still feel a vacant sense, as if he wasn’t really here with me at all. He was looking at me, but he wasn’t seeing me. He seemed so perfect, but he didn’t really feel anything, did he? It was completely different than me, who felt more than I wanted to.

“How do you know you won’t get caught in the destruction if Earth collapses?” I asked.

He looked over my shoulder at the few Hunters that strolled by in the distance. When they were farther away, he spoke. “Because I’m not a human from Earth. When it collapses, I’ll appear in a portal and wait there until the parasite connects to the next world and I can go out again.”

He paused, the pleasant emotion sliding off his face, as if he was thinking about something. Then he looked down at me.

My eyes widened as our gazes collided. For the first time, he was looking at me, his attention completely focused one hundred percent on me.

His lips parted as if he was going to say something. Then he pressed them together in a thin line and his brows wrinkled in a semi-scowl.

“What?” I asked. It took everything I had to prevent myself from stepping back.

“Kesstel!” A soft voice rang out.

I blinked, recognizing that voice.

Bethany walked up, just as gorgeous as ever in the hot sun. When she saw me, she stopped and her eyes flared wide. “Y-You! What are you doing here?” Her eyes narrowed as she lifted her chin in the air. Multiple power-enhancing stones winked in the light from her necklace.

Kesstel looked at the furious woman and sighed. “Ah.”

I glared at him. Don’t you dare make me the mistress here! I thought. I forced a smile on my face, strained as it was. “I’ll pay you back later,” I muttered as I stored the pastries in my Items Bag. I’d give them back, but I really didn’t want to watch them get destroyed from that woman’s fury. “Bye.”

With that, I power walked past him, the opposite direction as Bethany Wilks. As soon as I rounded the corner, I fled with all my guts. Nope, never looking at him again. It’s just not worth it.

*****