《Shadow Thief》9 - Seriously?

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"Good!" I replied. I was proud. My team managed to figure something like that out, so fast too. "That's right. Everything from my left shoulder down to my fingers move slower than the rest of me. Now, since I'm a teacher, I suppose I should ask a question. How do I hide my weakness?"

I was being a bit bitchy, after all two trainees just found out my secret. I went and gave them a hard question.

Mila raised her hand. "You distract your opponent with different parts of your body and relentless attacks. When we got close to you, you got too close to us, and forced us to move back. That kept you from any tiring close combat with your left arm."

I had to take a minute to take in what my shy little hamster girl just said. I took a breath, debating on how to react to this now seemingly smart conversation.

Luckily, Theo interrupted me.

"So?" He asked. "What's our reward?"

"I never said anything about a reward."

"Oh, come on, you can't have a competition without a reward," Mercy complained.

"Just did."

"Come on, Shadow," Theo whined.

"Fine!" I yelled. "But only cause you two annoy me. Tell you what, I'll answer one of your questions as long as their not personal. There. Good enough for you?"

While Mercy seemed a bit disappointed, Theo was thrilled. Smiling, I decided that that was enough for today and walked back to the team room. Actually, it was a bit of a limp. I had a baseball sized bruise on my calf that I'm sure would sting for a few days.

I grabbed some grapes from a bowl before falling back into a chair besides the table. I barely noticed Theo come in until he was sitting across from me.

"What?" I asked.

He was staring at me with a giddy smile. He dropped an oval-shaped container in front of me.

"For the bruise."

I nodded my thanks before pocketing the container. Still, that didn't seem to be enough. He kept staring at me, waiting for something.

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"Do you need something?" I asked.

"Uh, well, you said you'd answer a question. So, can I ask?"

"I guess, but nothing personal."

"Okay. Um, what's your name?"

"Too personal."

"Where did you live?"

"Too personal."

"Did you have a family?"

"Too personal."

"Oh, come on, I can't ask anything!"

"You could, if you'd stop trying to pry into my personal life."

"Fine, then why's your left arm slow? Is that to personal too?"

"It's an old injury," I replied, my hand instinctively grabbing my shoulder.

He stopped, suddenly growing serious. "From what?"

I tugged at the collar of my shirt, revealing a pink indent below my collar bone. His eyes widened as he looked at the scar, a blush slightly covering his cheeks.

"Is that..."

"A bullet, yep."

"But they're illegal."

"Just because something's illegal doesn't mean people don't do it. I'm living proof of that."

"Didn't you get a doctor to try to fix you up?"

"That's enough for today," I replied, pulling the collar of my shirt back up. "I've already answered two of your questions. That's more than I promised."

I popped a grape in my mouth, carrying the bowl as I marched out of the team room.

Stupid idea, really. I had no idea where anything other than the training center and the team room was. So, I wandered. Without my ID, no one knew who I was so I didn't really have many problems. Weird, the security here really sucked. I passed a few guards, even guard Two from the day I was taken in. He gave me a wave and went on with his business.

"Hey!" A voice yelled. I turned to see a girl with golden blonde hair walking towards me. She was tall, about six feet, and had soft chocolate eyes. She wore a black jacket and Jean pants. "Are you knew here?"

"Yeah, why?"

"Well, my name's Kindle, and I was wondering if you wanted a tour?"

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I thoughts about it. A tour sounded nice. They hadn't really given me one, only the training center and team room.

I nodded, dropping the bowl of grapes on a counter before following the girl.

Apparently, we had a cafeteria. Free food all day and night. It was the first place Kindle took me on the tour.

"So," she said as we walked down the halls of the building, "how long have you been here?"

"About a week."

"And you still haven't gotten a tour?"

"My teams not big into welcomes, I guess. We spend most of our time in the training room."

"What team are you part of?"

"Five."

She stopped, looking at me with wide disgusted eyes.

"You mean the test squadron? The one with the murder?"

I nodded. I wonder where this is going.

"Ugh, I don't get how you could do it. No matter how much they paid me, I still wouldn't want to work with that criminal. I hear she had a big ransom on her head. What was her name? Shade...Night?"

"Shadow," I offered, a small smile growing on my lips.

"Yeah, that's it. Shadow. Oh, here were are. The information room."

I turned to face a steel door, more of a safe actually.

"It's mostly history. We keep all the history from way back. Even when they used computers. Well, the history of our city, at least. The world history's kept in a different area."

I eyed the door. It seemed pretty strong, but who knew.

Kindle brought me back to the cafeteria where we decided to talk.

"What squadron are you in?" I asked.

"Three."

"I've never seen you in the training room."

"Well that's cause we specialize in data and recon. We don't do much fighting, and even if we do its hand to hand until we can escape."

Hand to hand combat huh? I still had to teach the others much more of that.

"I'm sorry," Kindle suddenly said, "I don't think I got your name."

"Shadow!" My name was being called in the background. Kindle's head shot up. I turned around, looking at Mila while she ran to me. "Shadow, Theo wants to talk to you in the squadron."

"Shadow?" Kindle asked, a stutter in her words. "The Shadow?"

I smiled wildly. "The one and only."

And, with that, I left a shocked and slightly horrified Kindle in the cafeteria, as well as a few other eavesdroppers. I walked besides Mila to the squad room.

"What does he want?" I asked.

She simply shrugged. Now that I thought about it, this was the first time I've been alone with Mila.

"So, how's the new bow working?"

This seemed to excite her.

"I love it! It's lighter than before but it shoots better. And the blades on the end make it easier to fight close up."

I smiled gently.

"I'm glad. Just remember that you aren't ready for real close combat. Only use it if you absolutely need to. And even then try to escape."

We walked into the squad room to find the others already there. Levi and Mercy were talking about something in the corner of the room, Bryce was occupied with something in his hands, and Theo was happily sitting at the table in the center. I pulled up a chair across from him and Mila stood besides me.

"You needed me?" I asked.

He wore a smile, but I wasn't sure if that meant good news or bad news.

He lifted his hands to reveal a small folder. It was pushed to me. It slid with grace into my waiting hands. I opened it, reading the title of a paper which was written in smooth handwriting.

"'Rosey Carnez,'" I read aloud. I pulled the page a bit higher to see an artists rendering of a woman who looked to be in her early thirties. "What's all this?"

Theo couldn't contain his smile any longer. His pearly white teeth shined. "Our first mission as an active squadron."

My jaw dropped.

"Seriously?"

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