The interrogation room is just as cold and impersonal as she expected. Out of curiosity, she switches her focus to escaping. There are a few clear paths. Amazing. Not that she intends to use them, only one life-shattering event with violence per day thank you very much.

The officers who led her here had been surprisingly nice. She suspects that the rest of the class spoke in her favor, they know about the abduction and nobody who ever sparred against Liam could ever doubt how much of an absolute asshole he is. One of the cops had even smiled and laughed while being told what happened, guess he was impressed, or maybe seeing a cocky fucker get his ass handed to him by a girl a full foot smaller than him is his personal fetish. Who knows?

Still, it has been more than an hour. This is getting weird.

The door opens and Seren jumps at the noise. The man who enters is a second surprise, if she had met him in the street she would have guessed marketing executive or cult leader. Designer suit, perfect brown curly hair, perfectly trimmed short beard, unmarred mahogany skin, sculpted body shape, and whitened teeth stuck in fake smile. The guy is a walking advertisement for a spa or something.

Seren forces her lifted eyebrow to descend back to its normal position, no need to give him hints about her reaction.

The impression is that she instantly dislikes him. It’s not the suit. She had loved a suit on Milo. He had been able to walk in them, a feat that actually requires some effort. No. It’s the eyes.

Seren has already seen eyes and smiles like those at her father’s place when she was a kid. It’s a pairing, like red wine and beef. The mouth smiles and spews kindness and compliments and it’s all bullshit. Seren used to put her hand in front of her to hide the whole bottom part of the face and just leave the eyes but she stopped really fast because it was too spooky. The eyes are cold, and calculating. They see you but they don’t see a person, they see a parameter, a weakness or a waste of time. She does not need to obscure the bottom part of this guy’s face to know he is bad news.

“Hello Seren, can I sit? “

Without waiting for a reply, he sits down. Of course. Seren forces her anger down, prevents herself from switching the paths to maiming him. Switching them too often will give her a terrible migraine and she needs all her attention now.

A second man enters the room. Silently, he takes the seat next to Mr toothpaste advertisement and studies her.

If the first man was silk this one is rock. Probably around seven feet, the suit he is wearing strains to contain his bulging muscles. His face looks like he failed the interview for evil genius henchman simply for being overqualified: Nordic and hard. A scar runs down from his cheek all the way down from his chin. He could probably breach a door with his jaw. He even has the obligatory buzzcut.

Seren’s gaze jumped from one to another in amused surprise. Those guys are larger than life, she feels that she has just been propelled on a movie set.

Silence reigns in the room while Seren and the duo study each other. Mr plastic surgery flier relents first.

“My name is agent Chauham, this is agent Eriksen. We work with the NSA.”

Seren perks up at that. The NSA? With? Not for? What the fuck is going on.

“I would like to first extend my heartfelt condolences to you. As if the kidnapping wasn’t bad enough, you lose a loved one. I know how this feels, I lost my wife. It seems like it can’t be real and the we can’t live without them, and yet we must go on, but every little thing around us reminds us of them. You even went to that class despite that, you must be very brave.”

Agent Chauham’s posture and expression show concern and fatherly care, the image reinforced by a touch of grey at his temples. His voice is smooth and cultured and he looks like the kind of person you could confide into, who would understand you and comfort you. Mature. Reliable. Tactful. Even his story about losing a lost one finds echo in Seren’s heart. It’s true that she sees Milo in everything she does, in everywhere she goes. She misses his voice, his snide comments and witty jokes, and the look he had when staring at her and only at her, like she was a long awaited birthday present he was unwrapping every day. If only she had been faster. If only she had said no to his invitation, and trained like she should have…

Seren blinks back a tear and steals a glance at Eriksen. For some reason he looks uncomfortable and frowns slightly. It almost looks comical on a man that large. Chauham knows he has pierced her defenses and plows on through with his pitch, Seren is indeed sad, and Chauham’s word have touched her but that doesn’t mean that she believes for a second that he genuinely cares.

“I understand your pain Seren, and that is why I believe we can do something about that accident at the gym. Truly regrettable, but we talked to your friends and they all agree that, well, he had it coming! “

He smiles at that and Seren feels her own traitorous lips twisting in answer. Damn, but this guy is good. She is even sure he noticed her slip up as he goes on.

“It’s just that we need your help with something. But first let me ask you how you did it. You know? Beat that Liam so hard. I know that he is pretty good. He even placed fourth at the state competition last Monday and you guys’ trainer thought that he was not fencing at his best. But you just didn’t give him a chance.”

Seren decides to answer, speaking for the first time since entering this room.

“I’m actually good at fencing.”

“Oh yes, we know about that. We know you always beat him and we watched a recording of your performance at this year’s national tournament. Truly impressive! We watched it and then, we watched this.”

Chauham hands her a tablet. Just as she takes it, there is a knock on the door. Eriksen stands up to answer.

On the tablet there is a video. The light is not good and the angle sucks but there is no mistaking the scene. The screen is frozen on a very clear image of her back, the bokken in her hand and Liam’s worried face. The video was clearly taken by someone with a very high end smartphone. The image is crystal clear. She can even see the knitted tear in her winter coat.

Eriksen comes back to whisper something in Chauham’s ear. She ignores it and press the play button.

She watches the duel start and notices with surprise that the video only lasts thirty seconds. It sure felt much longer.

At first she sees nothing wrong. She catches Liam in the chin with perfect form. Those two suited fuckers certainly did their homework on her but they don’t know that her weapon of choice is not the foil. It’s the sword. Forgetting that herself had cost her the first place at the cup they had watched.

After watching five more seconds she realizes what’s wrong.

Seren is good. She knows she is good. She has the skill, the will, and she trained for it, hard. She knows what a good fencer looks like and this isn’t it. No human being can fence like that.

Seren looks at the woman on the screen and finds it hard to believe it is actually her. Her face is not her usual focused persona, instead it looks feral and really, really cold. Cruel. That’s still believable. What isn’t is her movements.

Fencing takes a lot of mind games, anticipation and reading your opponent’s body, particularly because the average athlete can move faster than the eye can see. The Seren on the screen does not stop or do any of the “wasted” movements used to provoke a response. The fight looks like it has been set by a choreographer and repeated a hundred times. She parries every attack with total ease. Not once does she lose the initiative. The tablet’s sound system makes the ‘Holy shit!” And “get Salvador” clear enough, illustrating everyone’s surprise.

Seren watches the rest of the video numbed with shock. She did not even blink when Liam’s blade passed a breath away from her eyes, did not even hesitate before bashing his face with the wooden handle. Seren sees the shock on her face after seeing her opponent on the ground, then the horror, and finally the defiance in her voice

“Are you going to stop me?”

The boyish voice of the phone’s owner concludes the show with an amazed “ Oh shiiiiiit”

Seren finally lifts her eyes of the tablet.

They know.

They know that this was not natural. Not…. Normal. They know that she is not normal.

There will be no point lying to them. She can see it in the confidence of Chauham’s gaze and Eriksen’s slightly worried expression, as if she were one of the only people on the planet who he wasn’t sure he could take on.

Seren licks her lips. They know, but they want her to admit it. As if sensing her reluctance Chauham speaks. His voice is low, his posture forward.

“We found three types of wounds on the creature’s remains. Gunshots, explosives and a third set. Like stab wounds inflicted with something coated in acid.

It was you wasn’t it?”

Seren still doesn’t speak. Mistaking her surprise for hesitation, Chauham presses on.

“Help us and we will help you. We will have the charges dropped, we will make sure Cornell lets you stay, hell we could even get you a scholarship, but you have to let us help you.”

Why not. She hasn’t been abducted in a secret facility yet so they can’t be that bad right? If she goes with them they will use her and her skills, and probably control her but at least she’ll get some support, and more importantly some answers.

Just as Seren is about to break the door slams open. For the second time in just a few minutes, she jumps in surprise. The man who enters is not someone she knows but he smiles when he sees her. He is also wearing a dark suit as well as a pleasant smile on his jolly plump face. Were it not for the setting and his bag, he would have looked like someone’s nice uncle. Behind him, an officer in uniform looks at Chauham apologetically.

“ Hello Miss Nechayeva. I’m your lawyer. Your father hired me.”

Her father?

Disbelief must have shown on her face

“We are in the middle of a talk.

"My client is exhausted, she has suffered a traumatic event recently and needs to rest. I am sure we can all continue this discussion tomorrow? Unless you charge her of course?"

"Your client just beat a man almost to death, it would be in her best interest to…"

"Mr Austin will make a full recovery, and my client defended herself after the man who had been waiting for her after practice physically accosted her. We will also be looking into why he was never disciplined despite numerous complaints against him. I mean, it’s a clear case of harassment. Perhaps it has something to do with his family’s generosity towards the University? In any case, unless you perform an arrest right now we are leaving.”

The lawyer turns to her.

“Shall we?”

Seren mechanically stands up, realizes her mouth is hanging open and manages to close it.

Her father?

Later that night

“You got spicy chicken wings as well? Oh Yuki…”

“If you say thank you one more time I’m eating them.”

“That’s blackmail, pure and simple.”

Yuki mockingly glares and lifts a wing with delicate fingers.

“Talking about felony, how did it go?”

Seren waves the slice of pizza around and sticks her socked feet against Yuki’s portable heater.

“That Allen dude says he’s pretty sure he can get me to stay, and definitely sure he can settle this out of court with Liam’s parents. I’ll get disciplined though, and probably expelled from the team.”

“Old Salvador could be pressured into letting you stay, you know, on account of you being our best chance at winning the national?”

“I wouldn’t count on it, Cornell doesn’t depend on their athletic team for visibility. I’ll get no special treatment.”

"One can only hope."

"I’ll drink to that."

Seren gulps the coke. It’s too sweet against her tongue and the bubbles make her want to sneeze but she doesn’t care. It tastes like hope.

"Did your dad call you?"

"No."

Yuki adverts her eyes. Even when slumming her posture is impeccable., looking like she is one yukata short of conducting a tea ceremony. Seren can hardly blame her for ruining the mood. It is Yuki who managed to find her father’s contact using only information available on her profile, Yuki who related all the events to their freshly hired lawyer and Yuki who had knocked on her door with a meat pizza, coke and her favorite wings.

"It’s ok. I mean. You were here for me."

"Stop blushing! And stop thanking me!"

Yuki pats Seren shoulder and she appreciates the gesture for its true value. Yuki almost never willingly touches anyone.

“Oh! You had a delivery today. I picked it up on the way.”

“Wow Yuki can I hire you as my personal assistant?”

“Bitch please you can’t even afford your own personal training gear. “

“Then when I’m triple Olympic gold medal and a famous actress.”

“My poor Seren you should get your head checked for a concussion, because you’re raving mad. “

“Hey!”

Seren stops chuckling long enough to look at the small box. It doesn’t feel heavy but it does contain something. Opening it she finds a burner phone, a charger and a message in an envelope.

“Wow this is some James Bond bullshit. What’s going on?”

Seren can’t help but smile. Yuki swears like she is speaking a foreign language, as if she had to force herself to be suitably rude. Seren opens the envelope to find a letter written in a clean hand.

“It’s from that guy who saved us last Friday, Nathan something. He wants to talk.”

Yuki doesn’t say anything. Seren has never told her the details of the abduction, only that it was bad and that Milo was dead, and Yuki had not asked. She is here now and Seren realizes two things. She needs to share what happened and she needs to tell someone what she can do. Her trust in Yuki is absolute.

“Tell me… Do you believe in monsters? I mean, that they exist?”

Yuki’s eyes are clouded and sorrowful.

“After seeing you fight, I do.”