Cadence had received a text message that morning from Aaron, checking to see how she was doing and asking if she felt up to meeting him at 10:00 for training. Thoughts of how her night had ended had her feeling just fine, and she was out the door by 9:30. This morning was a little different than the day before, however. They were joined by another Hunter, Meagan, and her trainer, Shane, the guy Aaron had been talking to in the gym the day before. Meagan, a shorter brunette with wavy hair and an infectious smile, had been at LIGHTS for almost six weeks, and she was preparing for her first observation hunt the next night. Aaron explained that, if Meagan could successfully spar with Cadence, there was a possibility that she might be ready to go on an observation. This in spite of the fact that Cadence had never sparred with anyone before, and Meagan had been doing so almost daily for the last several weeks.
The type of sparring these ladies would be performing did not involve boxing gloves, however. It involved full-on hand-to-hand combat. Aaron reminded Cadence that he had already seen her in action and was aware that she knew how to trust her instincts. With Meagan, they weren’t quite sure. The opponents she had practiced against previously were all either newbies or Guardians sent back for remediation. Now, with Cadence, they would be able to tell if she was anywhere near ready for combat with an actual Vampire.
Aaron gave Cadence fairly general directions. “Pretend she’s a Vampire. Act as if you are trying kill her, but don’t really hurt her. Understand?”
She had understood. Meagan and Shane did have one small advantage, however. They were able to communicate via IAC whereas Cadence had not attempted to turn hers back on yet. Nevertheless, Aaron seemed confident in her ability to defeat Meagan with minimal coaching from him.
The first round was not even close. Meagan was nowhere near as fast as Cadence. The newbie had her opponent pinned in less than ten seconds. The second round, it took her a bit longer but only because Cadence decided to let Meagan move first. After that, the trainers tried various tactics to make it more even and to hinder Cadence, such as only allowing her to use one arm or blindfolding her. Despite all of these obstructions, Cadence was still successful every single time. She was shocked at her own abilities but remembered what Aaron had told her about her gene pool. These victories were likely due to her amazing grandparents.
Even though she was losing time and again, Aaron and Shane were also very impressed with what Meagan showed them in the ring. For an average Hunter, she was doing great against a formidable opponent. She consistently made moves that would have most like been effective if Cadence hadn’t been quite so fast or quite so agile.
After a few hours in the ring, Aaron left Cadence to work on the drills they had covered the day before. He let her know that he would be coming by that evening to work on her IAC. As always, he had an insurmountable amount of work to do, but he trusted her to do the exercises she was told to complete and do them to the best of her ability. She had had only one question. “When do I get to learn how to use the guns?”
“Tomorrow,” Aaron had replied, amused at her enthusiasm.
Cadence stayed at the gym most of the afternoon. She was able to get in several reps of the exercises Aaron had taught her, and since her endurance seemed to last a lot longer than it used to, she continued to work out. At one point, Jamie came in while she was on the treadmill and checked on her. He was relieved to see she had fully recovered from the incident with the IAC, and he gave her a few pointers for improving her endurance. Cadence was glad things were not as awkward as they had been the night before. She really cared about Jamie, even if she wasn’t interested in dating him, and hated to think he might have his feelings hurt because of something she did.
Overall, Cadence felt like it was an extremely productive day. By the time Aaron knocked on her door at 8:30, she had showered, eaten dinner, and taken a few minutes to relax with her copy of Cosmo.
“Hey there,” she said as she opened the door. He was dressed in his hunting attire, all black, so she knew he was on his way out.
“Hi, how was the rest of your day?” he asked as he entered the apartment.
“Great! How was yours?” She offered him a seat on the couch and sat down next to him.
“Busy,” he replied, honestly. “And not over yet. I’m about to catch a flight to Denver in just a bit, so I can’t stay too long,” he explained.
“What’s going on there?” she asked out of curiosity.
“It’s a long story,” he began, “but basically it’s a Rogue attempting to track down a specific Hunter and destroy him. Sort of like your situation, only this Rogue is angry because the Hunter killed his Vampirling, and he believes it was without cause.”
“Sounds interesting,” Cadence replied tucking one leg beneath her.
“Yeah, we think we have a location on him, but they called me in to help track him because he keeps slipping away. They think it’s poor coordination on the part of the Hunters. Anyway, we have got to get your IAC up and running so you know what the hell is going on.”
“Okay,” Cadence said hesitantly. As much as she wanted to be on the same wavelength as everyone else, she was frightened to try the implant again.
“Are you ready?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said though she wasn’t sure if that was truly the case.
“Good. All right, so the first thing we are going to do is activate just my feed through your IAC. Okay, so just like you did last night when you went to turn it off, you’re going to concentrate on giving the command that I tell you, and then that will activate the chip. Okay?” She closed her eyes, thinking that might help, and nodded her head. She was ready. “All right, so the first command is ‘IAC Aaron On.’”
Cadence took a deep breath and mentally repeated those words. “IAC Aaron On.”
There was a crackling noise and static at first, like when an older model television set has to warm up, but then suddenly, there he was--in her brain. When her eyes were closed, she could simply see a star in the corner of her right eye with a small “A” next to it.
“You did it!”
“Did you get that message I just sent you?” he asked.
“Yes,” she replied. Next to the A, his message popped up, but it wasn’t as if she had to read it. The words were being read to her in his voice. It was like he had implanted his voice directly into her brain.
“Good. Now I’ll teach you the commands to respond. Any time you want to talk to anyone else, whether it’s me, Eliza, Meagan, whoever, you think their name first, the message, and then send. Any time you think the word send, you can be sure a message is going to that person unless you’re in Full Off or Full Pause mode, which we’ll talk about in a minute. All right? So, think of something you might want to tell me, and see if you can send it.”
“Will I get some sort of opportunity to check it before I hit send? Like, can I see it?”
“Yes, you can. We don’t usually have time to check every message we send since we send so many messages a day. It becomes second nature. But you can actually read it first if you want. The box where your messages appear is right above my line. Regardless of who else you have open, I’ll always be in the same place. My messages will always be louder and faster than anyone else’s because mine have top priority.”
“All right, here goes.” She wanted to think of something clever to say, but since she was also limited on time, she simply said:
“I beat your Hill record by 11 seconds.”
“I’m aware. Congratulations.”
“How does it feel to know you got beat by a girl?
“All right,” he said, “moving right along….”
She laughed aloud and concluded that this might be a great way to mess with people.
“There are a few other things that you need to be aware of. You’re going to need to know how to do a Full Pause, which is the same as a Full Off, only you’re going to think Pause instead of Off. However, that’s going to be problematic for you because I can’t push you out of Pause the way that I can everyone else. I can’t push you out of Off either.”
“Why not?” Cadence asked.
“I have no idea, but I think it has something to do with whatever activated in your brain last night. So, any time you’re on Full Pause you can see who is trying to contact you, but they can’t actually access you until you allow them in by ending the Pause or by activating them one at a time. So, let’s try putting it on Full Pause first.
“IAC Full Pause”
“Good,” he said aloud, seeing her flip from On to Pause on his IAC. Then she saw his name light up in her eye and she knew he was trying to contact her. “See that? Just give it the same command as you did before to turn my feed on, okay?
“IAC Aaron On”
“Nice work! You’re a fast learner.”
“You’re too kind.”
“Ah, extra credit,” he laughed. “You can also use the Resume command there instead of On to come out of a Pause, but it really makes no difference. So, Pause is good if you’re going to sleep, or the bathroom, or something where you don’t want others accessing your visuals.”
“Got it.”
“So, if you want to see what someone else is seeing, you have to turn them on first, and then just say their name and Add Visuals. That’s it. And you get full audio with that, too, like a video camera. So, you’ve got me on, and there you go.”
Suddenly, Cadence’s field of vision was fragmented. Her left eye stayed completely as it was before, but now on the top half of her right eye, she was seeing what Aaron was looking at, which was even odder since it was herself. “Whoa!” she said, “That’s crazy!”
“It does take some getting used to. But you’ve got time to practice, and you’ll catch on. So, to turn it off, it’s just the reverse.”
“If I don’t turn it off, can you force me off?”
“Yes, and in fact I had to allow you in. Now, with everyone else, I can override his or her decision to keep someone out. So, if we’re out on a hunt and you need to access Elliott, but he’s being an ass and won’t let you on, I can see that denial pop up and turn it on for you.”
Even as he was speaking, he was sending her a request to access her visuals so she could see what it looked like. “Do you see that?” he asked.
“Yes, what’s the command?”
“You can speak while we’re sitting right next to each other, you know.”
“But this is more fun.”
“Visuals Aaron Allow”
The request had been illuminated and once the access was allowed, it faded into the background so she could see who had access, but it wasn’t drawing her attention away from the visuals themselves.
“Cadence, you haven’t turned my visuals off yet.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Don’t make me do it for you. You get a nasty error signal.”
“Fine, but how am I going to practice this visual thingy if I can’t see what anyone else is doing?”
“I just want to see that you can give the command. I’ll let you have access again if you want it,” he said. She turned it off. “Thank you. One of the easiest ways to make sure you’re covered on a hunt is to turn on everyone’s and then just turn off the ones you don’t need. So, if you went out with ten members of the team, you could just turn the entire team on and then start turning the people who aren’t present off. It’s the best bet for making sure you don’t miss anyone.”
“What’s the command for that?
“Make sure you’re ready for it because it’s going to be a lot of chatter, just like last night.”
“Okay, I’m ready.”
IAC Full On
Cadence wasn’t sure but she may have sent him a few expletives. When the full team came on, it was unbelievably noisy. Her right eye was flooded with teeny tiny pictures as the other members of the team allowed her access to their visuals. “Good Lord!” she said as she soon had over thirty open screens on her right eye.
“I know it’s a lot. There are a couple of things you can do to make it easier, if you need to have everyone open. You won’t need to very often. Unfortunately, that’s what I’m looking at most of the time.”
“Really? How do you even function?”
“It took a lot of practice. First of all, if you put on these glasses, it will automatically split the field into your left eye as well, leaving you a window at the top to see what is in front of you. However, you get used to looking through everyone else’s visuals as your own, and your brain really is wired to be able to do so after a bit of practice.”
Cadence slid the glasses on. It took her left eye a moment to adjust. “Unbelievable. I’m not sure that’s any better,” she admitted. “What else can I do?”
“You can prioritize your visuals. So, say you know you want to leave everyone open, just in case you need to access them quickly, and you don’t want to have to wait for them to allow access again. You can stack everyone that you don’t need immediately by giving the command IAC their name and the Stack Visual. You can also move them around by saying IAC Priority 1, then their name, and then Priority 2, etc.”
“Okay, that makes sense. How do I fight Vampires with all of this clutter in my field of vision?” she asked.
“You can use the command IAC Pause Visual and that will take everything out of your field of view. And then, to turn it back on, it’s Resume.”
“Got it,” Cadence said. She knew she was definitely going to need more practice, but it wasn’t nearly as scary as she had thought it was going to be after her experience the night before.
“I’ve got to go, but there’s one more thing I want to mention before I do. You can turn on the Newsfeed by saying IAC Newsfeed On and that will give you access to all of the chatter on the IAC, including any broadcasts from our network of Vampire watchers.”
“We have Vampire watchers?”
“Yes, they’re mostly Hunters and Guardians who no longer want to hunt, but they want to be involved, or non-Transformers. So, check that out tonight, too, all right?” He stood and walked over to the door. Cadence had to mentally flip a lot of switches to get back to where she was comfortable talking to him and leaving the IAC on. In fact, he was the only one she left on.
“Be careful,” she said.
“Always am,” he replied. “You can watch if you want to. Just request access, and I’ll grant it for you. You’d probably learn quite a bit that way, actually.”
“Okay,” she agreed. It would be nice to see others in action before she went out herself.
“Just remember if you put yourself on Full Pause I won’t be able to re-access you so keep that in mind.”
“Right.” She noticed they were lingering at the door, even though he was supposed to be going right now or else he was going to hold up the plane and make them all late. He was standing only a foot or so away from him, that intoxicating smell filling her lungs. Aaron bit his bottom lip, and little waves of electricity pulsated throughout Cadence’s body.
“Aaron, just kiss me already.”
He must have been surprised to receive that message; she was equally as surprised that she had sent it. Cadence was shocked by her own boldness, and she wondered if she should try to turn it into a joke. But when he took a step forward, she knew there was nothing to be embarrassed about. He gently moved a lock of hair away from her face, meeting her eyes. He slipped his hands around her waist and she placed her hands on his chest. Aaron leaned in slowly until his lips were just an inch or so away from hers and then paused for a second, just long enough to make her catch her breath. And then, his soft lips were on hers, gently at first but then with more pressure. She slid her hands up to the back of his head and opened her mouth. He continued to kiss her for a few seconds longer before pulling back.
“I have to go,” he said, his forehead resting against hers.
“Okay,” she said, her eyes still closed, her fingers still entwined in his hair.
“They’re asking where I am at.”
“I understand.”
“I’ll see you tomorrow,” he reminded her, kissing her softly on the forehead.
Finally, Cadence found a way to pull herself away. “Right… okay,” she said, snapping back to reality.
Aaron pulled open the door but gave her one last longing glance before his eyes crinkled at the edges and that crooked grin spread across his face. He slipped away so quickly, she could hardly see him go.
Cadence closed the door and slumped against it. Sometimes, too much anticipation led to disappoint. However, in this particular circumstance that was not the case at all. She ran her fingers across her swollen lips, smiling at the memory, and hoping this was just the first of many kisses to come.
Watching the hunt had been extremely valuable to Cadence. She was able to observe how the other Hunters and Guardians talked to each other, how they accessed each other’s visuals to determine where they needed to go and to coordinate their plan of attack. Aaron had allowed her full access to his communication screen, and she was actually able to see him firing off directives to his team members like a rapid-fire machine gun. He was sending out orders faster than she could read them. Of course, no one was actually reading most of the messages; they were sent directly into the receivers’ brains, including her own, but it was still incredibly impressive to see how fast they came.
Even though Aaron was working with a team he was not as familiar with, he was still able to pinpoint their strengths quickly, and they worked together to hem in the Rogue Vampire. Out of fear, the rebel charged one of the Hunters who grabbed him by the throat and squeezed, sending his head flying several feet into the air. What Cadence certainly would have found quite disgusting not too long ago actually had her cheering, and she couldn’t wait to have the opportunity to prove herself on the battlefield.
The next morning, she met Shane and Meagan at the gun range. Cadence had been disappointed when Aaron had let her know he was going to be a little bit late. Most of her night was spent thinking about him, and she couldn’t wait to see him. However, she understood that he had work to do, and Shane went ahead and got started as soon as both ladies were ready.
“All right, girls,” he said in his booming voice. Shane had the appearance of a bodybuilder, though he had the peppy attitude of a personal trainer. Cadence didn’t know him very well, and she wasn’t sure what to think of him. He had a fun personality, but there was just something she couldn’t put her finger on that made her not quite count him as a friend--not yet anyway. “Meagan, this is not your first time at the shooting range. I’m going to go ahead and let you get started on the targets over there while I run through weaponry with Cadence.”
Meagan found her way to the target practice station and Shane continued. “I’m going to introduce you to the two primary weapons you will be using to kill Vampires.” He reached over to the table next to him and picked up the first weapon, the larger of the two. “This,” he said, “is a modified Beretta 93R. It packs the same punch as the regular Beretta but we’re not shooting bullets here. That would be too dangerous to humans and wouldn’t do nearly as much good. We are shooting liquefied silver ions, or LSI. Now, this is a compound created right here at LIGHTS, and it will essentially take out any Vampire with just one accurate shot to the heart. Since it is a continuous stream weapon, we have to be very careful to make sure the stream ends before we swivel the weapon to engage our next target. Usually this isn’t a problem. Basically, the stream ends as soon as we take our finger off of the trigger but it is something to be aware of. LIS is not deadly to humans, or to Hunters, unless a Vampire is shooting it. It does sting when one of these two entities is hit by it. Please keep in mind, however, that since you are a Hunter, you can kill Guardians if you shoot them with LIS. You will be required to spend an extensive amount of time in our training modules learning the difference between Vampires and Guardians before we even consider allowing you to take the Beretta outside of this learning environment. Understood?”
“I have a quick question,” Cadence said, hoping for some clarity. “Why do most of the movies and books out there on monsters say that silver bullets kill werewolves but not Vampires, if silver really is lethal to Vampires?
“I have some theories on that,” Shane admitted, “But basically, the answer is they just don’t get it. Confusion, maybe. I tend to think it’s a conspiracy on the part of the Vampires. You ask Aaron that and mention a conspiracy; he’ll laugh right in your face. Bottom line is this, best way to kill a Vampire, rip his MFin’ head off. Second best way, silver to the heart? Got it?”
Cadence nodded, so he moved on to the next weapon. “Now this is a modified Glock. Because of the size of the Glock, it does not shoot LIS. We load these suckers with the real deal, silver bullets. Naturally, you can imagine these weapons are highly dangerous because they carry actual bullets, which can also kill humans. So, with this weapon, you can basically kill any entity. Which means, if a Vampire gets his grimy hands on one of these and fires it at a Hunter, they will most certainly drop dead just as quickly as any other being. I'm sure you know by now that Vampires cannot kill Guardians, but they can kill Hunters with any weapon at their disposal. Though they usually prefer not to use guns, they can, and sometimes they do. You may or may not be aware that the original Glock does not come with a safety feature. However, ours are thoroughly modified with a top-of-the-line safety mechanism, which you engage and disengage here,” he said, demonstrating the safety to her.
After Shane took her through the steps of making sure the safety was on, how to take it off, and how to tell the difference, he showed her how to load the weapons and the best way to use the viewfinder for both of the weapons, especially since she was right eye dominant because the IAC could potentially interfere with the right eye’s ability to focus correctly. It took a little while for Cadence to become accustomed to holding her eyes the way he instructed her to, and she found it much easier to aim if she had all of her visuals off, so she practiced turning them on and off quickly as she shot at the targets in the gun range.
Once she had gotten used to the weapons and done some target practice, the next step was to use the practice module LIGHTS had available. This was a simulated walk through, utilizing holograms to represent all three Passels of the Ternion. So, as she listened to Shane’s instructions, Cadence realized, she would have to determine quickly who was and who was not a Vampire. If she accidentally shot a Hunter in the simulation, she would receive a two-point deduction. If she accidentally shot a Guardian, she would be put on probation, sent back through the initial training, and mandated to spend at least one week solely on target practice with no module practice. They took shooting Guardians very seriously around here, and she understood why.
The goal was to score at least thirty points on three consecutive turns through the simulation. Each Vampire kill was worth five points, and there were twenty Vampires within the five minutes of the module. The module changed each time, so it was not possible to rely on one’s memory to pinpoint where to find the bad guys without risking taking out one of the good guys.
Once they reached their goal of three consecutive scores of thirty points, they would be allowed to participate in an observation. This was Meagan’s fourth attempt at completing the modules. She had actually scored above thirty points twice before but not consecutively. She had shot a few Hunters but never a Guardian. Shane said he thought, perhaps, she was so worried about shooting a Guardian she wasn’t firing fast enough and hitting the Vampires. Cadence listened to everything he had to say to her because she wanted to make sure she did the best she could.
Meagan entered the simulator first. Cadence was able to access her visuals to observe how she preceded. From the very beginning, Cadence could see some things that she was clearly doing wrong. She stood next to Shane, and they both reacted similarly each time Meagan missed a Vampire or almost took out a Hunter or Guardian. At the end of the simulator, she had scored twenty-five points. Good, not great, and not good enough to count for one of her three runs.
Then, it was Cadence’s turn. She had her choice of weapons, and she chose the Glock. She felt it was small enough that she could raise and aim it with one hand if she needed to, which would make it easier if she ever decided to carry two. For this simulator purpose, however, she was only allowed one, and she couldn’t wait to get started.
Just before she was about to start, she got a request for visuals from Aaron. She contemplated ignoring him since it was sure to make her more nervous, but she decided to go ahead and turn it on knowing that, if she wasn’t successful this round, his feedback would be invaluable.
She entered through a black door and was given instructions to stand on the X. There was a clock counting down above her and a gentle female voice stating the time remaining. As the woman approached zero, Cadence’s nervous sensation became excitement. She waited for the woman to say, “You may begin,” and she rounded the corner, entering the simulator.
The first individual that appeared in front of her was dressed all in black, and she could tell immediately that this was a Guardian, so she did not shoot. However, in the corner of her eye she saw a Vampire appear to leap out from behind a piece of furniture. She shot it, hearing the soft ping from the scoreboard above her. To her right, another Vampire appeared, and she took it out as well.
As Cadence continued to wind her way through the maze of hallways and small chambers, she began to wonder why this was so difficult. She had reached thirty points within the first 10 seconds of the simulator. Though part of her thought it would be less risky to play it safe and put her gun away, lest she shoot a Guardian or Hunter, she was having too much fun to quit now. There was one small Vampire hiding beneath a dumpster that she missed, and she was extremely pissed off about it. At the end of her first round, Cadence's score was a near perfect ninety-five.
She exited the simulator to find Shane, Meagan, and Aaron all applauding her performance. “Well done!” Shane said as she placed her weapon on the table and approached them.
“That was amazing!” Meagan concurred. “I really wish I could get this like you can!”
“Thank you,” Cadence said squeezing her arm. “You’ll get it. You really will.”
Aaron stepped over and put his arms around her, “Unbelievable,” he whispered as he gave her a quick hug. She couldn’t help but beam at him. Though she was still upset that she had missed that one Vampire, she was proud that she was able to get all of the rest of them.
Meagan did better on her second turn and was actually able to score thirty-five points, enough to count as a round toward earning her observation. Between turns, the girls talked about which strategies were working and which were not, and Meagan said that it was really helping her to watch Cadence’s attempts. Even though Cadence was able to get her three consecutive scores of thirty in her first three attempts, and two of her scores were perfect, something a rookie Hunter had never accomplished before, she continued to take her turns because she wanted the practice, and it did seem to be helping Meagan to watch her and then discuss. By the end of the session, Meagan was scoring in the high fifties, low sixties, and she was able to get her three consecutive hunts as well.
Cadence’s prowess had drawn so much attention that many of the veteran Guardians and Hunters had come to watch her in person. Rather than just following her visually, they showed up at the gun range to collectively cheer her on. At one point, Christian logged into the system and ratcheted the level of difficulty up. It made no difference; she was still easily able to score in the nineties. And she never had a kill that wasn’t a Vampire, despite the higher numbers of Hunters and Guardians he threw her direction.
Once their session was over and most of the spectators had left, Cadence set her Glock back on the table. She wanted to rush over to Aaron, but he was having a discussion with Shane, and by the looks of it, it was important. Cadence hoped they were agreeing that Meagan was ready to go on the hunt the next night. The brunette had worked hard and earned it, in Cadence’s opinion. Hopefully, it wouldn’t be much longer before she was also allowed to go. Although, technically, she had met the requirements, she knew it wouldn’t be this hunt for her. She still needed time.
Meagan came up behind her, and Cadence put her arm around her shoulders as Shane walked over toward them. He smiled at Meagan for a long moment before his eyes flickered at Cadence and then back to the other girl. “All right,” he said in his booming voice. “We’ll see both of you at the meeting room tonight at 9:00.” He offered both women a high-five.
“What? I get to go, too?” Cadence asked, making sure she had understood correctly.
“That’s what I said,” Shane confirmed. “Be there ready to go watch our forces in action. All right?”
Cadence was elated. She threw her arms around Meagan, and they both jumped up and down shrieking for a few moments before they gave Shane his high-fives. Actually, Meagan flung herself into his arms, and Cadence thought it was nice she was so close to her trainer.
Glancing around the room, Cadence saw Aaron over toward the exit, deep in the middle of a conversation with Elliott, whom she hadn’t seen since she’d arrived. Despite this, she couldn’t help but run over and give Aaron a hug. He wasn’t looking, and when she bumped into him so hard, she almost knocked him over, but she didn’t care. She was too ecstatic. “Thank you!” she said, and once he’d had a chance to recover from the collision, she planted a kiss on his cheek and bounded away hoping she’d get a chance to talk to him again later. For now, she wanted to get back to her apartment so she could watch some more footage of recent hunts and go over her own recorded simulator footage, all of which she could watch from the IAC.
Cadence flew out the door on her way back to her apartment on cloud nine. Everything was going so well! She was making great progress as a hunter, she’d finally figured out her IAC, and, oh yeah, Aaron had kissed her! Finally, things were looking up! She felt unstoppable.
“What was that?” Elliott asked as Cadence flew away and exited the building.
Aaron felt the color rising up his neck. “Nothing. She’s just really happy she gets to go with us tonight, that’s all.”
“Aaron, I’ve known you a really long time, my friend. Do you think I can’t smell your bullshit from ten miles away? Now tell me the truth; what’s going on?”
He stammered at first, not sure exactly what to say. There were a lot of people on this team he could easily lie to. Elliott was not one of them. “It’s, uh, it’s really nothing. I mean nothing’s going on. Nothing’s happened. Not much of anything really at all.”
“Did you sleep with her?” Elliott demanded loudly enough that several other individuals within earshot turned to look in their general direction.
“NO!” Aaron said sternly. “Please be a little more discrete!” he demanded of his longtime friend.
“Sorry. That was way too loud. I apologize. I just know something must have happened because two days ago that girl couldn’t look you in the eye without turning pink, and now she’s kissing you in public like it’s just the most natural thing anyone would do. Just go up to your boss and plant a big one right on him.”
“All right, all right, that’s enough. I told you it was nothing really. I kissed her last night. She asked me to, and I did. And maybe I shouldn’t have, but I wanted to, and it happened.”
“You kissed her?”
“Yes.”
“You KISSED her?”
“It was nothing really.”
Elliott huffed aloud before he sent back, “Well, I think other things might be happening soon by the looks of it.”
“Listen, I don’t have any idea where this relationship is going, but it’s really not anyone else’s business.”
“I beg to differ!” Elliott countered. “What happened to no relationship?”
Aaron had no response to the second part, so he concentrated on the first. “How’s that? What do you mean you beg to differ?”
“Think back to what happened last time with Ms. Whiney-Britches, ignoring your orders, doing whatever she wanted, almost got herself caught in the crossfire between two Hunters. We cannot have those types of situations, and you know it.”
“That won’t happen with Cadence,” Aaron assured his friend.
“How do you know that?”
“She always does exactly what I say. Always.”
“Yeah, well that was when you were her boss. Now you’re her boyfriend. And if she doesn’t want to do what you say, or she thinks you’re being mean, or you looked at her cross-eyed, she’s going to go do her own thing and put us all in danger. I just don’t like it Aaron. I don’t like it at all.”
“Elliott, I’m not her boyfriend. It’s really not to that point. She’ll listen. You’ll see tonight. Trust me. I’ve never seen anything like her. You watched her in the simulator. She’s incredible. And if she’s ready to go out into the field then so be it.”
“All right, you’re the boss. Just please don’t hate me when I start saying I told you so.
“I won’t because you won’t have to.”