Eniola slowly opened her eyes into the vast darkness. The only thing that lit up the room was the small blue light of the holo-clock in a subtle glow. As far as she knew, everyone was asleep, especially Jay, whose snores echoed out into the room. That was something it would take a while to get used to.

Eniola lifted herself from her bed and tip-toed across the concrete floors so that no one would wake. She pressed the dial on the wall and the doors slid open with a loud whoosh. Eniola flinched and turned back. No one was awake.

Eniola peeked into the hallways for any night patrol who wanted to sneak up on her and jump on her. No one was there, so she walked out into the night.

The nipping feeling at her gut only became bigger. There was something they weren't being told, and Eniola became certain about it. The PSEUDO had Zaira flagged in their records, and she knew something about them. Eniola had the inkling suspicion that this wasn't the first time they'd heard about Enigma.

Eniola charted her course past the training room and opened the random door on the side Kain wanted people to think was random. Instead, it opened into the secret hallway. Of course, it did that. The hallway wouldn't just rearrange itself in a day.

No one was inside of her and Eniola sighed in relief as she came up to the familiar door. She punched in the code from a hasty memory of snooping over Kain on the keypad. After a second, the keypad glowed green, and the door slid away to another analysis room. The PSEUDO seemed to have a lot of those. Eniola wondered where they fit in this house.

But now there was no time for wondering. Now it was time to find out why Zaira and the PSEUDO were connected. Eniola stepped up to the holo-screen she switched off and tapped it on. It sat right in her search for Zaira. The flagged profile.

Eniola scrolled through the basic facts and instead went to where all the interesting secrets would be. There were a bunch of sections about her life, but the one that caught her eyes was tucked at the end.

Enigma.

Eniola's eyes widened. So they weren't hearing about it for the first time. She clicked on it, and a long list of files appeared beneath it. She clicked on the very first one and a detailed blueprint of the computer in its huge egg shape took up the screen. Eniola squinted at it. So if they knew about it, how come they hadn't built it?

Suddenly a loud, yet somehow low-pitched scream wrang out from someone. Eniola turned back swiftly and screamed in response. Only it wasn't an enormous member of the PSEUDO here to press a gun barrel to her head. It was only Zaira with wide eyes standing defensively at the door. A cool sigh released from Eniola.

"Please never do that again," Eniola stammered. Zaira scowled.

"What are you doing here?" Zaira whispered.

"What are you doing here?" Eniola asked back.

"Trying to figure out why we're in danger," Zaira said. "What about you?"

"Finding out the reason we're in danger," Eniola replied. She stepped away from the computer. "The PSEUDO has you on file."

"They have everyone on worth something on file," Zaira mumbled.

"Exactly," Eniola replied. "But you're flagged as extra notice or something. You're extra important and you're going to wanna see this."

Zaira cut in front of Eniola and stared at the screen. "That's fake."

"What?"

"That blueprint is fake," Zaira said. "I created it to throw people off just in case they found it."

"So, what does this blueprint make?" Eniola asked.

"It makes a piece of metal that looks like a computer," Zaira sighed. She cut in front of Eniola and toggled with the screens like it was her second, or fourth, language. She raised an eyebrow as she looked through her profile.

"Look at the other files," Eniola reminded.

Zaira clicked on the first one and a blurry and grainy image of what looked like the place Eniola almost got murdered at. Huang's Dimsum or Zaira's underground lab. Eniola could see Zaira's clear figure. She closed in and clicked on more, and they were all the same. Grainy photos of Zaira or other people entering the lab. Some even included a caption underneath them describing the photos. They seemed boring, but Eniola knew it was more than that.

"They know me," Zaira whispered. "They know me."

"Yeah," Eniola replied.

A memory made itself known again after being buried. That day they all went to the lab. Fatima told them that there were people who weren't Keone who wanted Enigma.

People like the PSEUDO.

"What has the PSEUDO done to you?" Eniola asked.

"I remember a couple of years ago, the lab got these digital attacks, and we got hacked," Zaira said. "It was pretty minor, but then soon after that we got threats telling us to hand over Enigma."

Zaira says it so calmly as she does when talking about danger. It's almost like it didn't happen to her. Eniola asked. "So then, what happened?"

"We hacked them back," Zaira sent. "We created a digital bomb and tracked down their servers. It went through."

"What happened?" Eniola asked.

"We think it shut down thousands of servers connected to this person, but we never knew who it was," Zaira said. "At least something happened, then we stopped getting threats, so it was finished."

There was an attack on our servers on the west coast in the US. It shut down all of our servers, and that sector of the PSEUDO took years to recover from the severe damage. We had to retreat.

Kain's words echoed in Eniola's head again. What did Zaira do to scare Kain away from an entire country?

"Kain told me about something like that," Eniola said. "It shut down the west coast sector of the PSEUDO."

"Good," Zaira said. "That confirms that I was their target."

Eniola was about to say something, but faint footsteps filled the air. Eniola froze for a moment until it dawned on her. Someone else was coming. Zaira groaned before she quickly clicked off the computer, then gripped Eniola's frantically.

"Huh?" Eniola whispered, but then Zaira and she ran towards the back before she pulled Eniola down below a table.

Just at that moment, the footsteps entered the room and three faint silhouettes cast a shadowy glow over the room. Eniola slightly peered out behind the table. It was Kain, Josanne, and Sasha. Eniola's heart sped up.

This was not the plan.

"Don't let them see you," Zaira hissed.

The text ran under Eniola's vision once Josanne signed to Kain. "What are we here for?"

"We need to create a plan," Kain said while signing. "Zaira knows about us."

"She has known about us," Sasha replied. "So, what's the difference now?"

"We have to keep them here," Kain said. "They cannot leave now. At least not Zaira, mostly. They know too much."

Eniola froze more than she already had. It wasn't like they'd found all this out by themselves. They tracked Eniola down! They willingly let them all be part of their organization. Eniola knew too much because the PSEUDO gave themselves up.

Kain sighed and looked around. "When we take the computer and take the other one, we'll have no use for them anymore. But monitor Zaira. She's skilled, and she's not completely trustworthy like the rest of them. She needs to be kept in check. Follow her, Sasha."

"Of course," he replied.

"When we finally take the computers, we can finally prevail onto the next phase," Kain seemed to remind. What phase? "The world will change as we know it."

"We'll take the power and remove it," Josanne said after. "We'll start with Zaira."

Eniola turned over to Zaira, whose face had gone pale despite being black. Zaira squeezed her hand onto Eniola's tightly and let out a slight whimper. Eniola quickly pressed her finger to her lips.

"What was that?" Sasha asked.

Eniola shuddered. She hadn't been to church for a good while, but she mumbled a quick prayer. Something had to happen now.

More footsteps followed soon after they filled the room. Eniola pressed herself further against the back. The looming shadows flickered in and out of her vision. Kain was so close to unleashing his wrath on them. She didn't even want to think of what would happen when they found her.

"We have to leave," Eniola mouthed.

Eniola looked over towards the door. The three of them were still there and looked as deadly as ever. She gulped. Josanne was walking right to them. Eniola quickly turned back. Josanne would likely shoot them all with ease and make sure not to get blood on her shoes.

"Wait," Zaira said before she slipped out her phone onto her lap. Eniola turned over to her, as Zaira typed with one hand, while the other still cut off Eniola's circulation with ease. "I've found my way in systems."

"Find it now!" Eniola hissed.

"That's what I'm doing," Zaira replied. She toggled with something else before she pressed something on her screen long and hard.

Then an alarm blared off in the distance, loud and defeating.

"There's been a breach!" Sasha yelled, and the footsteps inside all ran out of the room.

Eniola slumped back in relief and, at the same moment, Zaira yanked her back up again. Oh yeah. There was an alarm and both of them still couldn't be here if they enjoyed living.

"We should head back to our room before they find us," Zaira stressed.

They both ran out of the room and out of the secret hallway hand in hand, and this time, the flashing red lights illuminated their path in a hazardous glow. Eniola and Zaira finally emerged in the main hallway before Zaira pulled her back again into the divot. There were people there. They soon cleared out, and now there was an open path back to their room.

"Let's go!" Zaira stressed again, and they both took off running across the hallway before they stopped on the other side. Eniola and Zaira pressed themselves against the wall.

Just at that moment, more guards came from nowhere. Wuying, the burly fighter who body-checked her before for no reason, led their path. Eniola knew that there were a lot more secret hallways in this house.

"Hello?" Wuying yelled. "Show yourself!"

Eniola did not show herself. This was because she valued her life.

The illumination of flashlights poked through the form in an accusing blur. The lights ran next to Eniola and Zaira a little too close to her liking. Eniola squinted her eyes shut.

"Hallway clear!" Wuying yelled and Eniola once against released the tension in her body with a shuddery sigh. She slumped down the wall yet again. The more she encountered near death, the more tiring it became.

"Don't get tired, Eniola," Zaira said like she was listening to her thoughts. "You can be tired again when we get into the room and pretend like this never happened."