Then Axel left.

And my senses basically exploded. My heart started to rise to my throat and my hands quiver at my sides again. I could feel pulsing in the pressure points in my feet, blood start to rise on my cheeks, the hair at the back of my neck zing out with fear, my hairline prick with sweat, and the edges of my eyes dry as they enlarged to try and take everything in.

So that was great.

Sam stood up. He swiped at the blood under his nose with his sleeve and then licked the rest off his lips. Asshole. He sighed angrily and stomped back to his bunk.

The younger boy, Flynn, slowly climbed down from his top bunk. He pointed at the bed just in front of him, to the left of me in the corner by the door.

"That bed is free," he said.

"Thank you," I replied quickly.

"So," Ricki said from his bed, pushing himself off his elbows. My eyes flicked to him. "What's your deal?" He asked in Mexican-accented English.

"What do you mean?" I asked back.

He rolled his coffee-brown eyes. "You know, why you're here." He got out of his bed and started to pull the covers neatly over it. "We all have a story, we all have a past that got us here."

"It's complicated."

"Then un-complicate it," Sam spat at me. He held his hands tight at his sides. "Just 'cause you can pin me to a wall and bash my jewels, ain't mean shit to the thugs twice my size who'll skin you alive." His light green eyes looked like the inside of an avocado. I much preferred Axel's hazel-green ones. They kept me calm when our discussions in the prison cells got personal.

"For once he's actually right," Dùo said. "You're a girl."

"Oh shit, have I been going my whole life not knowing that?"

"Oh no, but Strider will protect you," came a soft purr from behind me. Hunter rose from his bed too, shirtless like Sam but with much more pronounced muscle tone.

"I thought Flagg had forgotten about him," Dùo said.

"Dios knows he doesn't stop him from getting beat up everyday of his life though," Ricki added.

I tilted my head. "Beat up?"

"Lawrence didn't tell you?" Hunter said with surprise.

"Tell me what?"

"Pity," the Australian shrugged. "You'll have to ask one of us later about it. I'd be happy to share."

There was something very off and very striking about the way he spoke to me. Not just the almost teasing tone of his voice, but the way he dipped his head and his dark eyes didn't move from my face.

Creep.

Sam turned his focus back to me. "The point is that there are agents here who are gonna try and fuck you up." He flashed yellow teeth at me. "Literally."

"Try it," I smiled at him.

"He's being serious," Flynn said shyly. "Agents have been talkin.' They know you're here and they're gonna wanna be friends with you."

"Friends," Dúo chuckled, "right."

I narrowed my eyes at Sam. "Well, if every agent here is as shit of a fighter as you are, then making friends is going to be a pleasure." I turned on my heel and threw the door open to stalk back to James. I shut it behind me and the redhead looked up.

"How'd it go?" He asked cautiously.

"Axel really wasn't kidding about Sam being a total asshat."

"Yeah I'm sorry you gotta deal with him. He's... incomparable."

"That's not the word I would use."

James crossed his arms over his chest and looked away. His bright red hair had a single stray strand that stuck out by his left ear. "I'm guessing he mentioned me too?"

I hesitated, remembering Sam's foul words, and Hunter's reaction to the mention of his name. "Yeah."

He sighed and looked back to me. He had brown eyes for the most part, but faded to almost an amber as they got closer to his pupil. "The rest of the guys will be up in a bit after they get dressed. I take it you want to get out of here before that happens?"

"Yes please."

He chuckled and nodded his head in the direction we had come up from the training rooms and we started off that way.

"What exactly did Lawrence tell you about this place?" He asked as we went down the stairs.

"He said everyone has come from bad backgrounds and that usually provoked various aggressive outbursts."

James suddenly stopped when we came to the landing between the first and second floors. "Did he say anything about the Director?" His eyes turned serious as he crossed his arms nervously over his black t-shirt.

I curled a hair behind my ear. Something about the tone of his voice had changed. It was more demanding than the softness it had been when he and Owen had been teasing Axel not even 20 minutes ago. "Not much besides his name was Flagg and he's a madman," I said. "Why? Is that true?"

"That and more," James said. "No matter what he says, don't trust a word of it. He's probably going to try and bring you over to his side."

I cracked up. "His side?"

James lowered his voice. "I've seen the footage Bowman. You're dangerous. You may not have done a lot of spying, but I'm betting you're a fast learner and he doesn't let just anybody out on missions. He'll try to use you to get to us. In case you haven't noticed, you're the only girl here, and your gender is gonna be used as a chess piece whether you're into someone or not. He'll tell you things that aren't true, he'll make you feel small and inconspicuous and indebted to him."

"That seems like a lot of detail," I said.

James didn't miss a beat. "He has a plan for everyone."

"Axel didn't say you were such a fantastic welcome committee."

He uncrossed his arms. "Just promise me," his eyes pleaded attention.

I stared at this stranger and tilted my head. James didn't look intimidating at all. He was taller than me by a little, but I bet I was stronger. Axel said he wasn't a combat agent and I could definitely tell. He wasn't scrawny, but he didn't have as much muscle as the boys in the dorm I was just in. Why were Hunter and Sam so pissed at him? If it was because he was gay... fuck, I'm going to have to go back in that dorm and break some bones. I saw no reason to hate James, he seemed nice. I'd happily break Sam's nose so he left the redhead alone.

"Okay," I said finally.

James breathed a sigh of relief. "I know that didn't make a lot of sense, but thanks. Sorry, breakfast is this way." He gestured down the last set of stairs.

I followed him down and through another hallway that opened up into a large dining hall. The double doors were open and the smell of disinfectant spray on plastic and watery scrambled eggs hit my scent glands like a truck. I stopped sharp right before we went in.

James turned around. "What?"

"You didn't tell me it was a cafeteria," I widened my eyes.

"Should I have?" He asked.

"Yes," I said nervously.

"Why?"

"Because they are set up specifically to highlight anybody who walks through, them and all their faults in front of everyone. It's built like a goddamn catwalk!"

"Breathe," James said, taking a step back towards me. "It's not that bad. If I can do it, you can do it."

I crossed my arms defiantly. "I'm sorry, are you in the same position I am? The only girl in an all-boys spy agency burdened with heightened social anxiety, depression, a trashed self identity and this?" I swiped the hair completely off the left side of my forehead and air hit the fresh delicate stitches that carved their way around my zygomatic bone. James took a step back. "No!" I answered for him.

"Bowman—"

"Can you at least call me Adira?" Calling people by their last names never made much sense to me, like how James kept saying Lawrence instead of Axel. It just didn't sound right, especially after Axel made reiterating puns about various car parts over the past four days.

"Adira," James started again, "I know what it's like to stand out. You've noticed how I limp?" He gestured to his right knee. I nodded slightly. I wasn't going to bring it up because it seemed permanent and serious and probably embarrassing for him. "It's a complicated story... but basically I did something I shouldn't have. All the agents think I'm weird now because of what I did, and everyone still stares at me and teases me even though it was almost four years ago," he said. The boys in my dorm mentioned him getting beat up too. I get why he didn't want to tell me that part. "I know what it's like. But right now, you have to prioritize. Own your shit. There are boys in there who prey on any sort of weakness that you have. So you have to hold your head up and not let anything drag you down."

"Why didn't you just write me a song about it?" I rolled my eyes at his cliché choice of words.

"Jesus, Axel really wasn't kidding about the sarcasm thing," he said matter-of-factly. "Look, do you want to come in or not?" He gestured a hand to the open double doors where boys had started to congregate in. "Either is fine."

I blew out a breath and squeezed my eyes shut. My heartbeat drummed in my ears as I tried to block out the noise around me and focus on the happy memories I had. Ignoring the red hot scars of ripped morality that scratched my more recent memories I dug deeper, to the life I lived before I was kidnapped. I saw high school, the two years that I finished. Listening to music and feeling the beat pulse through my veins. Studying seagulls outside the classroom window. The undeniable grin that brushed across my face when I saw things as simple as a dog wag its tail when it trotted off on a walk, or fireworks reflected in my neighbors eyes when we gathered together for the Fourth of July.

And then red.

My vision screamed red. I screamed red. Flashes of black and white, blue-hot fire and heated-orange scalpels. The man next to me, flesh dripping from his face like his last words. More screams. But they weren't mine.

My eyes flew open and I gasped for breath. James was still standing in front of me and gesturing to the doors.

I bolted back the way we came.

James didn't even have time to shout after me before I had run down three different hallways, leapt down a flight of stairs, and gotten completely lost. I ran blindly around corners, panting not from the running but from hyperventilation. I couldn't make out anything as it flew past my vision, all I saw were tunnels wherever I focused on the most.

I rounded another corner and suddenly slammed directly into someone. With my momentum I fell forwards and him backwards, me landing on his chest and his head hitting the floor with a concerning thud when we both crashed to the floor.

I sat up, still panting. The boy groaned under me, rubbing his forehead with a sluggish arm.

"Fucking hell, ain't it a bit early for that darling?" He opened sky blue eyes and ran them down my face and body. I slid off of him. "What the hell are you running for?" He sat up on his elbows but then moaned feverishly and slid back down.

"I'm sorry," I whispered to him. He had a southern English accent, and sort of a disheveled mohawk type look, blond hair shaved shorter on the sides of his head and then left in slightly longer tufts on the top.

"You didn't answer my question," he murmured, sustaining himself on his elbows successfully this time. He looked like he'd just woken up.

I stammered. Um—"

"Adira!" James shout cut me off. My senses spiked again.

"I'm here," I called breathlessly down the hallway.

"You're running from Strider?" The agent's darker blond eyebrows furrowed. "Why?"

James rounded the corner behind me at a limped half-run. He started to rant but then he spotted the boy I'd landed on.

"Blitz what the actual—"

"I didn't do anything!" The boy, Blitz I guess, scrambled to his feet quicker than I thought his apparent head injury and sleepless state would have allowed him too, and put his hands in the air.

"I didn't say you did anything," James said, limping towards us. Both boys looked down to where I was still on the floor.

"I ran into him," I said to James, then looked at the floor. "Sorry."

"Nah 'salright," Blitz shrugged a shoulder. "Woke me up, that's for sure." He extended a hand down to me and helped me to my feet. "Blitzen Ackley," he introduced himself. "I train the level 5's and have trouble with mornings. People call me Blitz."

"Why are you down in the training rooms anyway?" James asked him. I blinked and looked around. I hadn't even noticed that's where we were back to. The elevator to the basement prison was just a couple yards in front of me, and dozens of doors were fitted into both sides of the hallway leading to separate rooms for training.

"Couldn't sleep," Blitzen said. "Thought I may as well make the most of nightmare adrenaline and nail a perfect mid-air elbow strike. Pulled an all-nighter to get it done."

"How did you get a key? Or get past Owen last night? Or avoid the cameras?" James demanded.

Blitzen laughed and then coughed and bit his lip when he saw how serious James was. "Yeah I sorta had some help from an expert..."

At that moment another boy came out of the same room Blitzen had, in a similar state of exhaustion and tiredness.

James sighed. "Seriously?" His tone stressed sheer annoyance and he ran a hand through his flaming hair. "Harrison?" He rubbed his forehead.

Oh. So this was Harrison Andrews, Axel's friend. Or more like twin, really. They looked remarkably similar, except Harrison's hair was dyed a shade darker than Axel's, and his eyes were dark chocolate brown to Axel's hazel and green ones. They had the exact same build, not extremely muscular, but definitely athletic. They were about the same height, about three inches taller than me. Same size of head, same articulation of eyebrows.

Harrison yawned and then froze when he saw all of us. He had a chain around his neck, but whatever hung off of it disappeared under the neckline of his black t-shirt. He snapped his mouth shut and scratched the back of his neck.

"Hey guys," he stammered. "Morning?"

James tisked. "You know, if I hadn't literally yanked you off girls before I would presume—"

"Shut up!" Harrison interrupted James' sentence with hard eyes. He then turned to me. "Don't you worry girl, he's kidding, he's totally kidding —I'm, I'm not gay. Not at all. Nada. Straight as a ruler." He made a straight cut through the air with his hand.

"I wasn't worried," I said dully.

He cracked a smirk at my tone, the same one Axel had always done. Their similarities were disconcerting that I almost smiled back.

"What are you guys doing down here?" Blitzen asked James and I. "Why were you running?

I glanced nervously at James, hoping he would explain. Talking in front of strangers... also something I would have loved to run away from, but considering there was the potential consequence of falling on a guy and giving him a concussion...I'll just stick here. James started the story.

"Wait wait wait hold up, she fell on top of you?" Harrison said.

I licked my lips. "Does it stop you picturing it if I said it was an accident and I was running because I had a panic attack because people generally freak me out and then I slammed into him?"

"Nope. Still picturing it," Harrison grinned.

"Slammed in is right," Blitzen said, rubbing the back of his head. "Next time we do this, I'll top."

I tilted my head and hummed. "Bottom 'ain't my type."

"So I take it that's my cue?" Harrison butted in. "I'm down for anything. Top, bottom, hell, I'll even middle—"

"Enough, Andrews," James sighed like he'd said that everyday of his life. He turned his freckle-sprinkled face to me. "Would you like breakfast?" He asked me. The thought of food made me nauseous, never mind the taste. I shook my head slightly.

"That's okay," he said gently. "We'll just go to training then. I'll show you what's what, the routines and stuff before all the agents come in. Sound good?" I wondered briefly if Axel picked James because he knew how much his voice would soothe my nerves. His cadence had a slight southern tone, not like Sam who sounded like an evil cowboy, more like he pronounced double vowels in a different tone than the rest of his sentences.

"It was nice crashing into you Adira," Blitzen said, extending a hand and grinning.

"Let's do it again sometime." I shook his hand. He raised his eyebrows and Harrison pouted. I smiled at the difference in the feeling of their eyes. "It's a joke."

"If you're wondering, Andrews and Lawrence aren't twins," James said as Blitzen and Harrison trotted up the stairs behind us to go eat breakfast. He licked his lips and the corner of his mouth twitched into a smile. "We had it tested."

-

James taught one of the level 3 training groups at the agency, which usually consisted of 13-14 year-olds. Axel had said that there were 10 levels in total, level 10 being Director Flagg, and level 9 being a level trainer or international recon agent.

The redhead nobly, like Axel said, didn't let his knee hold him back from showing the younger agents how to perfectly execute moves that I'm sure he could still do in his sleep if he had his real knee. Apparently they only show agents stun moves at this level, and once they've built up strength, endurance, and ideas of where the most important organs of the body are, then they're taught knockout moves at the higher levels by trainers like Blitzen.

James also ecstatically went over some of the special spy gadgets to the agents and me, barely containing his clear inner geek as he did. I'd used some of the basic ones like grappling hooks for quick getaways, but these were so much more sophisticated. James showed us electronic lock pickers, which looked like a slightly thicker unbent paper clip that you slide into the keyhole of a lock, press the button on the end, and then it mechanically grows to the appropriate size of the key. He also showed us the more discrete gadgets that agents actually wore on their person when they went out on a mission, like a ring that folded out into brass knuckles, or a small stud earring that was really a recorder. Razor-sharp hair clips, your average coin that can open up to store something like a computer chip in, practically 2D butterfly knives, half a dozen different tasers and explosives that can fold away into your shoe, and special slots made into clothing to hide telescoping batons.