“Don’t joke about something like that,” Reo snapped.

“You said it first,” I retorted. “Now, your joke is becoming real.”

From his voice, I could tell he was anxious. A freaking baby for panicking so fast. I should either be supportive or start to freeze into a frightened statue. But first, I want to get back at him for trying to back out from being my pawn.

“You kept pressing zero,” I said, forcing my voice to crack to match his panic. A blame game was perfect to stoke anxious flames. “You shouldn’t have done that. It’s so obvious there’s something wrong with it—we’re on a ship with Adumbrae! Like, there shouldn’t be a number zero on that panel, and you pressed it.”

“Shut up, Erind,” he murmured through gritted teeth. “I’m trying to think here.”

Rude much? I could make Reo’s wish of swimming in the ocean come true. Too bad I couldn’t off him because that’d make Dario suspicious. Plus, I needed Reo to find the ships to Red Island. He was my lucky charm now, I decided.  

Reo’s face reflected on the elevator door looked like he had heartburn and constipation at the same time. That made me realize he could see my reflection too. I put on a scared-powerless-human-girl face, complete with a hand covering my mouth. Nibbling my fingernails with chattering teeth might be too much.

Why was he freaking out? Given the circumstances, he’d be right to think we were headed to danger. But it wasn’t like he was helpless. He had powers.

I guess Reo couldn’t use his actual powers in a face-to-face fight. But he still had super strength and regeneration for generic brawling.

Reo’s opened palms on the door clenched into fists. For a second, I thought he was going to punch his way out. That’d put an end to our mission and draw attention to us. Thankfully, he didn’t do anything stupid to stop the elevator.  

Turning around, Reo breathed deeply. “Oookay… Let’s chill the fuck out so we can think clearly. No panicking, alright, Erind?”

“No panicking,” I repeated in a squeak.

“We’re still going down. This isn’t alright, dammit! We’re going somewhere we shouldn’t be.”

Duh, our mission is to find suspicious shit, I quipped in my head. We needed to go places we shouldn’t be. So… like… we should be going there.

I couldn’t tell him that, of course. So, I just retreated a few steps, looking up at the ceiling as if we were falling to hell. It might’ve been better if I had gone with Everett. At the least, I had some inkling about what went on inside his head.

“This is an elevator!” Reo said, his eyes sparkling as if he had a major epiphany.

“Okay…?”

“What comes down must come up.”

“I think that’s the reverse of the saying,” I said, wondering if Reo had gone cuckoo. “It should be—”

Reo flapped his hand at me. “Yeah, yeah. What I’m saying is that we’ll just stay inside here. We can’t stop the elevator from going down. But after that, we’ll just ride it back up. Get it? People use this thing, so it should have a way of going up. The buttons will probably work again.”

“I-I hope they will. We’ll stay put and wait,” I said, though I was thinking of how to get Reo out without actually pushing him. I didn’t want us to stay inside; we should explore whichever floor the elevator opened to.

After a few seconds of silence and staring at each other, we felt the elevator slowing down.

“Stay behind me.” Reo held out his hand.

“A-are you going to fight?” I asked. Surprising how he was still protective of me. And such a whiplash of reactions from him. “Can’t we just pretend we-we’re like lost or something?”

“That’s not going to work, Erind.”

“Why not? Let me talk to—”  

“If we’re lucky, we’ll meet no one,” said Reo, not listening to me. “But if we’re not—”

The elevator dinged open. Reo tensed, hiding a fist behind his back. I craned my neck to see where we were. A tall man with a perplexed look stood outside. He wore overalls with the logo of the cruise ship on his chest.

“Who are you two?” said Overalls Man. He reached for something in his pocket.

“We pressed the wrong—” I started to say. But Overalls Man didn’t get to hear my excuse because Reo punched him in the chin.

Reo stepped out of the elevator, catching Overalls Man as he slumped.

The fuck? Should I scream? It’d be too late now, so I just gasped and hoped that was an adequate reaction.

“We’re as unlucky as my mother giving birth to me,” Reo grumbled.

“Why did you do that?” I demanded. Reo wanted to stay out of trouble, yet he pulled some dumb shit like this?  

Reo looked left and right. Presumably, everything was clear outside. He waved at me. “Get out of there! Follow me.” And he dragged the unconscious man away.

I wanted to go exploring, so I supposed this was fine. I quickly glanced at the security camera of the elevator—it was pointed inward so it didn’t capture Overalls Man getting whomped—before stepping out.

We hurried down a corridor, its metal walls painted gray. The way was well-lit and clean, with pipes and valves here and there. There were also signs—numbers, and arrows, and technical-sounding words. I didn’t know what they meant. I failed to match my surroundings with the pictures Big Marcy sent me, but I’d surely come upon somewhere familiar eventually.   

“Why did you do that?” I repeated my question to Reo in hushed tones. “Why did you attack him?”

“Look for doors, cabinets, anywhere we can hide this guy.”

“I-is he dead?” I stammered. Just going to keep up being timid and nice Erind until I make sense of this crazy bastard. “Your super strength—”

“I didn’t kill him,” said Reo, finally answering me. He scanned the ceiling, probably checking for security cameras. “He’s breathing. There’s some humanity left in me.”

“Humanity? What’re you talking about?”

“Didn’t use much force behind my punch.” Reo briefly replied. “I should’ve.” He stopped by the corner, Overalls Man draped over his shoulder. I crouched beside them. “My first strike should’ve been full-forced,” Reo continued. “If this guy was an Adumbrae, we’d be toasty toast. Dead toast.” Then he leaned forward to check around the bend.

“But he’s a normal human,” I said, stating the obvious. Fascinating how Reo thinks. I was trying to delve into who he really was, to get some consistency with his thinking. Presenting a moral question was a good poke. “If you used your superstrength, he’d be—”

“Dead,” Reo finished as he looked back at me. “Tch. A risk I shouldn’t have taken—no space to care for others when my life—when our lives are on the line.” He cocked his head left. “I see a door.”

“What’s inside?”

He shrugged before standing up. “Beats me. Another risk, heh. We’re on a roll. But we can’t stand here waiting to be found, can we?”

I closed my eyes, as if steeling my resolve, and nodded. “Let’s go.”

Reo continued to be a lucky charm. The room we entered was empty. It was a locker room twice as long as my cabin room, with narrow metal cabinets lining either side.  

Memories of the time Myra hunted me at Sanders Mall returned. I was a weakling, normal human back then, and I stumbled into a locker room too. It was in there I turned into an Adumbrae and first transformed into Blanchette.

Wasn’t that long ago, but insanely plenty of things had changed since. Not really that long… yet, the sensation of my stomach getting speared seemed a distant memory. Like I couldn’t remember how to properly feel pain. If I suffered that kind of injury now, it’d be painful, duh, but nothing worth noting. I remembered what Reo said that he missed getting drunk because of his regeneration.

Was that wistfulness I sensed inside me? Did I miss being a normal human? I missed the peace, I guess.

Reo set Overalls Man on a bench in the center of the room. Reo threw his head back as he stood, flinging his ponytail. “Safe for now,” he mumbled as he tried opening the lockers. “What do I do next?”

“Reo, you still haven’t answered my other question,” I said, injecting an edge into my voice. “Why did you hit this man? I was about to tell him that we were lost. That’s a believable excuse.”

“It’s not,” he replied. He found an open cabinet and rummaged inside.

“Are you going to tell me why? Just because I’m just a normal human and useless in this situation—”

Reo pulled out a uniform, the same as Overalls Man wore, from the locker. “Come on, Erind. You’re not useless.”

“I am.” I sighed, slumping my shoulders. Time to be a drama queen. “I know I’m useless. And I shouldn’t have been on this trip—you were right about that. But I wanted to help. That’s all.”

Reo’s eyes darted to the left. “You’re, uh, helpful…”

“I hope you won’t treat me like extra baggage you cart around,” I said. “Tell me about your plans so I can help too. Don’t forget that I’m a law student at Eloyce University. There’s not much law stuff going on here, but I’m intelligent, like, generally, for what that’s worth. I hope I am.”

“More intelligent than me, for sure,” said Reo. “I couldn’t even finish film school. I lied to Myra about why I was kicked out—it was my grades. Though, I did sell—”

“Why did you punch this man?”

“I punched him because he knew we were intruders. Or he suspected, at the least. He was going to call security either way.” Reo pulled out a small handheld radio thingy from the pocket Overalls Guy was reaching for earlier.

I raised a brow. How did Reo know? This fucker had x-ray vision or something? I glanced down at myself—nothing to see here.

Reo continued, “That elevator… the zero button wasn’t supposed to be there if it was a normal ride. That elevator was placed in the same row as the others to give passengers who are the 2Ms’ customers easy access here. It’s such a public place. It should be secure enough that other passengers, the ordinary people, you know, wouldn’t accidentally reach this level. Pressing zero isn’t enough to get it to move down here.”

Shit, is he onto me? Or was he making excuses for himself? If I continued to blame him, he might find that suspicious. I went the other way.

“I-I’m sorry for blaming you,” I said. “I might’ve pressed some wrong buttons too. I mean, they’re the correct buttons for the secret code whatever, but they’re wrong because we, uh, got here.”

“I’m not blaming you, Erind. And, uh, sorry for telling you to shut up.” Before I could respond, he hurriedly continued, “Anyway, I’m saying the code isn’t something people would accidentally press.”

“But we pressed it somehow.”

Reo hoarsely laughed. “The most unluckiest coincidence fucking ever. In this guy’s mind—” Reo pointed at Overalls Man “—no one else but 2Ms’ clients or employees should be here. That’s why I had to punch him. Everyone we meet around here will assume we’re the enemy. Making up stories wouldn’t work.”

I slowly nodded. What Reo said made sense. He really was a fast thinker. If given time to think, I would’ve reached the same conclusion. But in the moment, my reaction was to hide behind a face since we were supposed to be sneaking around. 

“He asked who we are,” I said, nodding down at Overalls Man. “He didn’t ask if we were lost or something. You’re right, he already assumed we were intruders.”

“That’s right, Erind-o, my friend-o,” Reo said, pointing a finger gun at me. “And after knocking him out, we could no longer go back up because—”

“Because we can’t leave this man behind. If someone came upon him, they’d immediately raise the alarm. Like, they’d check the security footage and see us.”

“Right again.” Reo held the overalls from the cabinet to his shoulders, checking if it’d fit him. “No evil henchmen are flooding this place. We’re good so far. They’re not actively monitoring the elevators—laxity, because they’ve been doing this operation for so long without hitches, is my guess. But if something bad happens, they’ll come looking.”

I nodded. Reo was wrong on this point.

Big Marcy’s men should be monitoring the secret elevator—or elevators if there were others. Such an important location wouldn’t be with no eyes. But Big Marcy knew I was coming here; he would’ve ordered them not to bother with me. By them, I was thinking of only a few of his most trusted men. No way Big Marcy would’ve told all of his men that he was helping me, the big, bad, Red Hood. His brother, Mark, likely had spies embedded here and there.

The security cameras, I was confident were no problem. What I should be careful about were the people on this level. Most probably they’d be under Mark’s payroll. Reo was right to punch Overalls Man.

Looking at the floor, I shifted my feet. “Again, I’m sorry, Reo.”

“We’re moving way past that,” he said.

“And thank you for protecting me.”

He blinked. The curve of his ears poking out the sea of his black hair turned red. “Uh, yeah. I wasn’t doing any protecting. It was my own skin—uh, it’s just a random, human dude. No effort at all. Thank me if I actually beat off an Adumbrae.”

“Beat off an Adumbrae?” I giggled. That was a genuine reaction. My humor was degenerating. I should try this joke with Deen.

“Okay, that came out wrong.” Reo shook his head, chuckling. “Beat an Adumbrae. That.”

“I hope we don’t meet any Adumbrae,” I said. “But what do we do with this guy?” I pointed at Overalls Man.

“I have an idea.”

---

 

After leaving Overalls Man inside the locker room, Reo and I went deeper into the bowels of the ship.

“Will that work?” I asked.

We set up Overalls Man to look like he bumped his head into the door of a locker somehow and got knocked out. Reo reasoned that Overalls Man barely saw us, only for a split-second, before getting knocked out—Overalls Man wouldn’t remember us. If he awoke splayed on the floor, right in front of an opened locker door, he’d assume the most logical thing.

It wasn’t exactly the most plausible scenario for him. Like why the hell would he run into the door? But he didn’t have any alternative explanation for his state unless he remembered us.

A simple plan that had a chance of working. Me, I was thinking of throwing him overboard. Damn that bitch Domino—I had a fixation on going overboard now. But then I remembered we were likely below the waterline, so no opening to chuck Overalls Man out of the ship. Killing him and stuffing his body into a locker wasn’t going to work either, for obvious reasons. Kinda hard to hide a dead body here.

I didn’t tell Reo about any of my plans, duh. I was surprised that he didn’t suggest killing Overalls Man. I thought that’d be on the top of his list after that ‘humanity’ and risk-taking talk.    

“We’ll have to hope it works,” Reo said. “We’re not Dario, so we can’t just erase his memory. Slightly crumpling the locker door is a nice touch. Awesome suggestion, Erind.”

“Thanks. We make a good team.”

“If it doesn’t work and we need to escape, you can ride on a lifeboat and I’ll pull it.”

“Wow, that’s a nice gesture.” I chuckled, all cutesy. “I know one thing that’s not working—these overalls on me.” I gestured at the way oversized uniform I wore. It was the smallest size we could find in that locker room, and it looked like I was a kid lost in a circus tent. “No one’s going to believe I’m an employee here.”

“Same goes for me,” said Reo. “Not many Japanese among the crew. Haven’t seen one, to be honest. They’d recall if a Japanese guy is working with them.”

“So… why are we continuing?” I asked. “I thought you wanted to go back up?” I didn’t manipulate him into doing this. He was the one who suggested we disguise ourselves and sneak around. Why the sudden change? Such a weird guy.

“We’re already here. Might as well. And this is our job, remember?”

“I thought you wanted to avoid doing this mission.”

“Well, you thought wrong of me, Ms. Erind Hartwell.” He looked over his shoulder and winked. “And you’d continue to do this even if I left. It’d be forever on my conscience if anything bad happened to you.”

That sounded like a sleazy line, and it was, but I sensed some genuineness in it. I couldn’t understand why. What was up with this guy?

I checked the photos on my phone to see if I could figure out where to go.

“Are you calling for backup?” Reo asked. “We probably should tell the others where we are.”

“That’s what I was thinking of doing,” I replied, angling my phone away from his sight. “But there’s no signal here. Can’t even connect to the ship’s wifi.”

“Just you and me then, Erind-o, my friend-o.” Reo stopped walking. I stopped behind him. We came upon a fork. On the wall in front of us were arrows and labels. “Left or right? Or should I toss a coin?”

I recognized the markings on the wall. “Let’s go right,” I said, walking first before Reo could stop me. “Right’s the right way, right?”