He was guiltily grateful that no one at the table blamed him, even if it was his actions that led to their failure. It had been their mistakes that put him in the position to have to make that decision, but no one wanted a classmate to die.
“Six months,” Karen groaned, pulling the bowl back to herself. “Our lease is up in two weeks. Silas, can we crash with you and Summer?”
“No.” Silas’s eyes went to Summer as she laughed, the tone telling him she was trying to diffuse a situation at the bar. Seeing someone standing a smidgen too close to her, he put on his leave-my-girl-alone face, hunching his shoulders to look more massive when she cheerfully pointed him out, the ribbon that had been around the chocolates now in her hair. Beside him, Allen chuckled as the student’s face twitched and he turned away.
“I’m not waiting another six months to graduate,” Allen repeated, pushing his glasses back up his long nose.
Ethan set his beer down hard. “You have another choice? It’s not as if we can long-draft back and try again.”
No, not yet, anyway. Frowning, Silas dropped his gaze to the data he’d gotten from Summer’s double-draft. There had been an unexpected sink of gravity paralleling the secondary Doppler shift. He wasn’t sure if it validated his theory that drafters were creating a temporary, parallel universe when they drafted, then yanking that created pocket of parallel existence into the current one, in effect allowing a reboot of time. If that was true, drafting back further in time was possible—apart from the massive damage it would do to the drafter performing it.
Silas hit the PROCEED key to start the data-compiling, and the screen went clear to conserve power. Under it, the table was scratched with initials in a heart, and Silas’s lips twitched. “I wouldn’t do anything different if I could long-draft,” he said.
“I would.” Ethan’s jaw was tight as he looked at Allen in accusation. From across the table, Karen and Heidi clinked glasses and downed their drinks.
Allen raised a hand in placation. “We all would, but they’d still fail us. Professor Milo is right. We treated it like a game, not reality.”
A smile crossed Silas’s face, his psychology training coming to the forefront. It never failed to amaze him how tooth-and-nail they could be with each other until one of their own was threatened, and then there was no doubt of their loyalty to each other. But then again, Opti took steps to foster that kind of behavior.
“It was a game.” Silas slid down the bench as Summer approached with a plate of fried vegetables. “They dress you up in training suits and give you guns that don’t hurt anyone, then set you all against each other to fetch a box of chocolate. They aren’t treating it seriously, either.”
“They are now,” Ethan said as he held up his hand to show the silver band around his wrist. Silas was the only one at the table without one. It had a tracking chip in it, a product of their probation. The only reason Silas was exempt was because they knew he’d find a way to get it off, and then everyone would know, when he shared the information.
“I’m going to lodge a formal protest,” Allen said as he glumly twisted the band around his wrist before hiding it behind his sleeve. “Who do I go to for that?”
Ethan snorted as Heidi looked into the bottom of her wineglass. “Milo,” she said softly.
An odd sensation of protection and pride pinged against Silas’s thoughts as Summer’s tall, willowy frame eased past Allen and easily shoved him down so she could sit beside Silas. Allen went without complaint, happy to be at her other side, if not the focus of her immediate attentions. The plate of fried vegetables steamed, and she wiggled closer to Silas, touching almost his entire body’s length. The scent of her hair was everywhere, and he put an arm around and behind her simply to maintain their balance.
“Anyone want some?” she asked as she handed Silas the second pair of chopsticks, and a mild negative response rose up.
She smiled as their eyes met, but a faint look of panic in her eyes made him feel as if it was ending. She was there, warm beside him, but they both knew time would pull them apart. She needed him as much as he needed her.
“Maybe we can get extra credit,” Allen said, eyes on a breaded pepper.
Karen sat back from the table in disgust. “Dude. He got shot. He’s not going to give us extra credit. Besides, this isn’t high school. We pay the price and move on.”
“No!” Allen protested, angry now. “I won’t do nothing. There’s got to be a way to fix this.”
Heidi shot Karen a tired look, and the taller woman sat up. “Okay, I can see where this is going,” Karen said. “You can count me and Heidi out of whatever cack-brained idea you have in that head of yours.”
Allen pushed his glasses back up his narrow nose and glared. “Hey! I don’t even have the idea yet. Let me come up with one before you diss it.”
Summer laughed as she angled a fried broccoli between her teeth. “Does it involve a thermonuclear device like your last idea?” she asked around her full mouth.
“That was a good idea!” Allen protested, ears red.
“I can’t afford another screwup,” Ethan said.
“Me, either,” Beth agreed, and Allen’s expression darkened.
Summer leaned toward Allen as she chewed, and Silas felt the coolness slip between them. “Lots of people fail the final,” she said as she used her chopsticks to put a hot pepper on his crumb-strewn plate.
Silas hunched lower in his chair. “Not because of me, they don’t,” he said, but he didn’t know what they could do to make it right, either. He’d already talked to Professor Woo, and there was no extra work, no teaching of classes, nothing.
His head came up as Ethan and Beth stood. “Okay, we’re out of here,” Ethan said, and Beth came around the table to give the women a hug good-bye. “See you guys later.”
But Heidi and Karen had stood as well, making Silas feel as if they were being abandoned. “Us, too,” Karen said. “There’s too many people here. We’re going to another bar where we can sulk in peace. You want to come, Summer? I seriously need to blow off some steam.”
But Summer only settled more firmly against him. “No. Thanks. I’m good here.”
Allen grumbled something unheard, but Silas ignored him, feeling at the same time protective, loving, and depressed. Summer loved him back, and that’s what hurt. This extra semester they now had might seem like a boon, but it would only make the inevitable parting harder. They would graduate. She would move forward in the Opti drafter/anchor program, and he would continue on in academia, developing tools and techniques to keep her safe. From a distance.
No longer hungry, he stuck his chopsticks straight up in a piece of fried onion.
With a final wave, the four left together, probably going somewhere to burn Silas in effigy. Allen was silent, shifting to take advantage of the increased space.
“Are you sure there’s no extra credit we can do?” Allen mused as he pulled the plate of vegetables directly in front of him.
Silas eyed him, then decided Allen could have his dinner if he left his girlfriend alone. “Classes are over,” he said. “It’s done.”
“Not until I say it is,” Allen grumbled, and Silas watched Summer and Allen finish off the plate, vying over the choice bits, their working relationship easy to mistake for attraction. There wasn’t a flicker of jealousy in Silas. He’d figured out long ago that Summer didn’t love Allen. She loved Silas and had chosen to work with Allen because Allen would never risk Silas’s anger by trying to move their working relationship to a new level. She’d been using Allen to keep serious anchors at a distance. But someday she would move on. And Silas had been holding her back.
Silas’s hands clenched. “Summer. I’m sorry.”
Knowing he wasn’t talking about last night, she leaned in to give him a kiss. “I wouldn’t change a thing,” she said, making it worse.
Allen’s
expression went sour, fully aware of his part in the trio. “I’m tired of getting shot. How come I’m always the one who gets shot?”
Silas chuckled, his good mood hesitating as a slim, petite woman passed between him and the bar. She was limping, and he stood in a rush, recognizing her voice when she politely refused an unwelcome advance. Summer and Allen stared up at him in surprise. “Excuse me,” he said as he angled his bulk out.
“Who is it?” Summer asked, seeing his gaze on the woman, who was now standing with her back to them as she looked over the music selection at the jukebox.
“I’m not sure,” he hedged, pulse fast as he got free of the table and made his way across the room.
People got out of his way, and he still had no idea what he was going to say when he reached her. In a quandary, he froze. He couldn’t just walk up and say, “Hey, you owe me for screwing up my test grade.”
She stiffened, feeling him behind her. “I’m not a bitch for saying no. I came here to get away from everyone, okay?” she said as she turned. But her peeved expression shifted to one of recognition, and then she flushed the most comely shade of red.
“Hi,” he said flatly.
She recovered fast, running her gaze up and down his more casual clothes once, before leaning in to be heard over the noise. “Thanks for the migraine last night, Dr. Banner.”
His lip twitched at the thinly veiled reference to the Hulk. “It’s Dr. Denier, actually. I have to retake my exam, thanks to you.” The music changed, and his shoulders relaxed as the electronic country shifted to something a little more sophisticated, with brass and complicated rhythm.
“Yeah?” she said tartly. “I spent last night in the dark with a washcloth over my eyes.”
His shoulders regained their belligerent hunch. “There were three drafters on site amplifying it, but if it makes you feel better, I’ll let my best friend die next time.”
Her eyes flicked behind him to the table. He could feel Summer watching, sense Allen’s amusement. “Sorry,” she said, and he could tell she didn’t say it often, but when she did, she meant it. “It wasn’t you who double-drafted anyway. It was her.”
Silas turned at her caustic tone, wincing at Summer’s pointed, inquiring look.
The small woman leaned casually against the jukebox, effectively preventing anyone from changing the music. “But no one gets mad at tall, blond, and beautiful,” she finished dryly.
Silas’s attention came back to her, the way she looked against the jukebox with the light accenting her curves. “And you’re tiny and deadly,” he said. “What’s your beef?”
The woman’s eyes flicked to his, her surprise that he thought her competent obvious. Slowly she pushed herself up. “None of them deserve to pass,” she said frankly. “I heard what happened. No one blocked the 911 calls, and local authority was on the scene in eleven minutes. Everyone was focused on get in, get the tag, get out. Everyone had a cell phone, and no one did a search on who might have a gun, who carried a concealed, how many times the bar had been hit by armed thieves, and the chances they had an SOP for gunplay. No one even bothered to see if the back door was open.”
Silas abruptly lost his need to protest.
“There were six of them there,” the woman said, eyes tracking someone behind him, “and they caused a panic that made local and state news. My God, you got the proctor shot.”
“He’s not a proctor, he’s a prophylactic,” Allen said as he came up to them. “What would you have done?”
“Not what you did,” the woman said, sticking her hand out. “Peri Reed.”
“Allen Swift,” he said, taking it as Summer eased up beside Silas and Silas curved a hand around her waist. “You’re in the freshman class?” he asked quizzically.
“No, incoming senior,” she said brightly, and Silas exhaled, glad she wasn’t looking at him anymore. At his side, Summer gave him an askance look. “I did my military on the East Coast, but I can’t get the upper drafter classes there, so here I am.”
Silas’s brow rose. “I didn’t know Opti did that.”
She leaned back against the jukebox, giving the approaching man a look to turn around and wait to put in his music request. “They don’t, but Opti found me at like ten, so they just let me hang with my retired agent/child psychologist for the drafter studies, and I got the military stuff through the Marines.”
She’d gone through Marine training? Gutsy.
“It’s nice to meet you,” Allen said, making Silas wonder at the light in his eye.
“Ah, this is Summer, my girlfriend,” Silas said, and the two women shook hands, looking so different they complemented each other.
“Peri Reed. Pleasure,” the woman said again, her confidence telling Silas she was used to meeting people with a lot of personal clout and could hold her own.
“I think you met Silas yesterday?” Summer guessed.
“Met? She hit me with a stolen drone and got my exam thrown out,” he said, and Summer grinned.
“Sorry about the migraine last night,” Summer said brightly.
Peri shrugged. “Don’t worry about it. You do what you need to do to save your anchor, the hell with the rest. If nothing else, I’ve got a big list of what not to do next year.”
Allen cleared his throat, clearly not sure if she was being sarcastic or not. Silas was betting she wasn’t.
“And what would you have done?” Allen asked as he took his glasses off and dropped them in his shirt pocket. “There were six agents on site and one goal.”
Peri beamed. “There was one retired agent on site,” she said, and Allen froze when she reached out and tightened his tie. “Watching six students and one lab rat trying to play pin the tail on the box of chocolates.”
Lab rat?
“If it had been me,” Peri said as she dropped back from Allen, his ears now a flustered red, “I would have gone into Professor Milo’s office the night before and replaced the chocolates in the box with fuzzy troll babies.”
Silas chuckled, smile fading when three couples took their table, pushing their used glasses to the front, where a waitress whisked them away.
“Yeah?” Allen said antagonistically as Summer began casting around for another table, but the place was full.
“Yeah.” Peri cocked her head coyly. “It’s a win-win either way. If I got the box on task, I win. If I didn’t get the box on task, it’s still a win because I already have the chocolate.”
It made sense in a warped and twisted way. Just the thing a retired, bored Opti-agent-turned-schoolteacher would find amusing. “And if you got caught in Milo’s office?” he asked.
Peri smiled as she turned to him. “I’d still call that a win. I’d probably be put on suspension, but I’d have the kudos for trying.”
There was that, and Silas’s hand tightened around Summer’s waist.
“I hear you all have to wait six months to retake,” Peri said. “If someone tried that with me, I’d trash the grading computer so everyone had to retake. They won’t make everyone wait to graduate, and if they run them again . . .” Peri smirked, turning to the jukebox to make another selection.
“That’s not a bad idea,” Allen said softly.
Suddenly wary, Silas stopped looking for another table. “What,” he said flatly.
“We could do that!” Allen said with wide-eyed enthusiasm. “We could break into the registrar’s office and wipe out everyone’s grades for the semester.”
Summer began to laugh. “Allen, love. They back those up,” she said, and Silas frowned, wishing Allen would let it go.
“So we put the system in a death spiral instead,” Allen said, waving his arms and inching into Peri’s personal space. “It will have the same effect. If they can’t reboot, they can’t post grades. Silas knows how to do that.”
“And everyone on campus knows it,” Silas s
aid as Peri pushed Allen right back with a stiff finger. Silas hid a smile, enjoying how the woman was reading everyone quickly and correctly. His smile faded. Something had hurt her in the past, something that made her good at assessing people fast. But most drafters were like that.
“Which means nothing if they can’t prove it was you,” Allen persisted. “It will take months to rebuild. Win-win,” he said brightly. “Either we do it and they let us graduate with everyone else due to the general disarray, or we fail and deserve being held back.”
Summer gave Silas a weary look. Silas agreed. Allen’s expression darkened upon seeing it. “What are they going to do?” Allen said. “Kick us out of the program? We’re too valuable.”
Well, Silas was valuable, and Summer, being a drafter, was valuable. Allen . . . not so much, and with that, Silas realized Allen was fighting for something he knew he was at risk of losing. With no drafter invested in him, Allen had to prove himself, or he’d be shoved into the slush pool, where he’d do research and file papers until catching the eye of a high-profile drafter. It was sort of Silas’s fault, not for having screwed up his final, but for using Allen as a buffer so he could maintain a relationship with Summer, a relationship that was destined to fall apart unless he proved he could be an effective anchor.
“We’ll do it,” he said suddenly, and Summer gasped, almost as shocked as Allen.
“Silas, are you kidding?” Summer said, eyes wide.
“Opti rewards bold, decisive behavior,” he said nervously, and Peri’s eyebrows rose in question. “It couldn’t make things worse. And it might be my only chance to prove that I could make a good anchor and get out of the labs,” he finished, hating that his neck had gone red.