“Mr. Alpha, we presume?” Agent Alpha felt as though he was staring down the barrel of a loaded gun as he looked into the eyes of the two Vanessa clones.

“We’ve come to check the log of your doorway.” The leftmost clone said. She was dressed in a green uniform, and had a golden badge depicting an eagle on it. The badge was placed firmly over her left chest. “Your use of the portal stabilizer was of a much shorter duration than you projected in your statement of purpose.”

“Quite.” Added the second clone. She wore the same military uniform as the first, but it was a deep shade of scarlet, and her chest had two more emblems on it than the green one. “Did you happen to complete your objective and find L- the traitor?”

The clone twitched at the end of her sentence, and her fist clenched. Alpha swallowed saliva he hadn’t realized had been building up, and nodded at the two of them.

“Please, come in and inspect to your heart’s content. We have nothing to hide. Unfortunately, our agent left her emergency rations and photon destabilizer at the base before she left, so she had to come back and procure them. As you know, the portal stabilizer costs a lot of money to run, so we were going to wait until our next allocated date to run it again.”

Alpha rapidly belted out excuse after excuse while the clones walked towards the basement entrance. “Please, Mr. Alpha. We are aware of your diligent nature. However, we will need to record the footage and data from the gate if we are to clear you of any and all suspicions.” The green Vanessa said.

“Yes, and due to a recent string of… thefts, the supreme commander is cracking down on any and all suspicious behavior in the organization. I’m sure you’re aware of this, and have nothing to hide. Right, agent Alpha?” The red Vanessa chimed in as they walked down the stairs.

When they reached the bottom, they were greeted by a pair of faces that they hadn’t seen at the research center before. “Hello. I am doctor James Johnson. I don’t believe we’ve had the pleasure of meeting.”

Alpha’s heart clenched as he watched the two Vanessa clones stare Leo dead in the eyes. They had done some work, such as gelling up his hair, and even using dye to mask the silver into an emerald green color.

In fact, per Vanessa’s suggestion, they had flirted with the idea of giving him a piercing in his left ear. She said that it suited him perfectly, and she always wanted to see him wearing one.

Of course, the boy was powerless to go against his lover, and soon a diamond stud in his left ear was all that remained as a reminder of the conversation.

“No, we haven’t.” The green Vanessa said, her lips twitching. “Alpha, may I know who this is, and why he has been excluded from your employee roster?”

Gone was the respectful prefix before Alpha’s name, and in its place was a hard-toned warden looking to get to the bottom of things.

“Well,” Alpha cleared his throat, and took a seat to hide his shaking legs, “We only just hired him recently. Despite his young age, he has a natural affinity for deciphering photon readings, and will prove a valuable asset to us in the future.”

Leo nodded his head and sent a smile to the clones. “It truly is a pleasure to meet the two of you. Are you twins? It’s a rarity nowadays to see twins working the same job.”

The red Vanessa flicked her head to Alpha, who was sheepishly looking away. “Alpha, how much does L- your new assistant know?” Vanessa twitched on the verge of saying Leo’s name once more, the brainwashing pulling through where her will would not.

Alpha’s eyes narrowed as he realized that subconsciously, they had been found out. Of course the woman closest to Leo would recognize him, even in a showy getup like this. However, they weren’t out of commission yet.

“He knows almost nothing. He was only brought to the lab yesterday, so he’ll establish a connection with the void and an introduction to the key players and terms later tonight.”

The green Vanessa nodded, and started speaking to Leo. The two seemed to be fighting the compulsion, or at the very least not completely subservient to it. Even though they instinctively recognized Leo, they didn’t seem eager to report him.

‘Could we have completely misread how much control Christian has over them?’ Alpha could only think to himself as Leo continued to dodge the Vanessas, who had been trying to touch his piercing for the better part of twenty seconds.

“Enough fooling around.” Alpha said, straightening up. “I can’t have you bothering my assistant for too long. Take a look at the feed, and then leave, so we can start doing some real work.”

Only the green one bothered to glance back at Alpha, while red continued to stare into Leo’s eyes. Green opened her mouth to say something, but Red held up her hand and pointed to the gate that Leo and his friends had used only days prior.

Green sighed, but acquiesced to her superior’s orders, and walked over towards the machine. Meanwhile, Red continued to try and touch Leo, much to the dismay of the real Vanessa, who was in disguise behind him as his assistant.

Her gaze had been avoided for the most part, as Red and Green’s complete fascination with Leo had taken up their attention spans.

‘I can’t tell if that’s because of the brainwashing, or if that’s a default of Vanessa… for her sake, we’ll say it’s the brainwashing.’ Alpha let out a sigh as Green came back and gave a thumbs up to Red, who had finally given up on trying to touch Leo.

Red sighed, and pointed up the stairs, ordering Green to go back to their waiting vehicle. “Well, Alpha, it appears that there is nothing wrong. I shall report this back to the Supreme Commander. The next time the portal goes on, please send a request to headquarters.”

Alpha nodded, and only when he saw Red leave the basement did he let out a long sigh. Leo smiled at him and asked, “Long day?”

Alpha merely snorted and stormed off to his office.