Waters of Lethe, Book 2

54. Adverse Reaction

"You've got to be thinking about something," Alex said to me, nudging my shoulder as we waited for the elevator. 

I cocked my head to the side to glance at him. It was almost ten in the morning, and Scott didn't mention anything about training today. Most everyone seemed pretty shaken up by the recent tests, so it'd make sense if he let our duties slide for today.

Alex raised his eyebrows, waiting for me to speak. I took a breath, not knowing how I felt exactly. I felt out of it, like my brain had been plucked from my skull and thrown against a brick wall a few dozen times. The elevator doors opened and we stepped forward into it. "I feel weird, I guess. Like everyone else."

He pursed his lips, bringing out a couple of dimples. "I know it."

We looked at each other as the doors closed, and I realized the elevator was stalling because we hadn't pressed a button. "Where are we going, anyways? Where would this guy be?"

The side of his mouth pulled up in a tight grin. "No clue." He closed his eyes and randomly picked a button belonging to a floor I'd never been to.

"Central supplies," Alex identified the floor as he stepped off the elevator with me behind him. We immediately were in a huge room, a room winding around the elevator shafts with stacks and stacks of supplies: training equipment, infirmary equipment, even more weapons.

Way more weapons.

I left Alex and walked to a far wall, one that housed hundreds upon hundreds of wicked looking rifles, shotguns, bullets. A few bullet proof vests were laid on a shelf by the guns, and I couldn't help but run my fingers along the tough black fabric.

"Whoa," Alex whispered.

"I take it you've never seen this neck of the woods, huh?"

He smiled at my hillbilly lingo. Part of me wanted him to smile, and I knew how to get it out of him.

"No," he confirmed. "Never had much of a reason to come down here."

I picked up a vest and shrugged it on. It was lighter than it felt. My loose, curly hair tugged under the vest, but I had to stop and look at him in bewilderment. "You never wondered what was on the floors you weren't shown when you first arrived here?"

He tore his gaze away from the guns and planted it on me, on the vest I tried on. Then he walked to me, standing over me a few inches so I had to tilt my head back to look up at him. He put his hands on my shoulders, then ran a hand along the back of my neck and pulled my hair out from where it was trapped between the vest and my back. I watched as his hands traveled from my shoulders to the front of the vest, grabbing a handful of the material and pulling his hands together so it was snug across my chest. "No," he said, my vest still bunched in his hands. "You know my story. You know why I don't—"

"You're right," I told him, bringing a hand to my face so I could pinch the bridge of my nose. My headache wasn't going away. I hoped Enzo hadn't taken all of the pills Scott had so graciously given us. "I should have thought before asking. Sorry." I knew Alex, knew why he followed orders like a soldier that never second guessed his commanding officer. He was provided safety here, his family was provided safety back in Detroit. Some things were worth losing your freedom over. Some things were worth losing your life over, even if you weren't physically dying.

"Well," Alex sighed, "he isn't here." He let go of my vest and smoothed it out where he had it bunched up in his big hands, then turned from me. I took it off and put it back on the shelf, leaving it exactly how I had found it.

"Where would you go if you just got here, scared out of your mind?" I asked him as we walked back to the elevator.

He chuckled. "Why do you think this guy is scared out of his mind?"

I pursed my lips. "Because he's in a brand new place with probably zero memories, jackass," I told him.

"There's that charm," he grinned. "What if he were like me?"

"Like you?" I jokingly scoffed. "He'd probably be signed up for the next mission Scott's planning. Oh!" I gasped, remembering one of mine and Alex's first unfortunate encounters. "He's probably in the nursery, terrorizing some poor girl."

"Terrorizing? Or blessing her with his body? Assuming he really is like me."

I felt blood rush to my cheeks, though I didn't know why. It felt nice to have someone to joke with, to bring the edge off of things. "So which is it? Training floor or nursery?"

We got into the elevator again and he pressed the button to the training floor. "I'm not in the mood for babies."

I only nodded, not having the strength or will to go back and forth with him about why he was a jerk, or back and forth with myself about why I wanted him to stay with me. I just focused on the pounding in my head and the fact that I wasn't alone, no matter how alone I felt.

The door opened and we stepped out, listening first. Quiet. Still. My arm brushed against his, sending me on high alert.

"I don't think—" Alex began.

"No, no. Let's look. Just because we don't hear anything..."

I walked ahead to the weapon room, looked back and saw him nod and reluctantly follow me. 

"I feel like I need to shoot at something anyway," he mumbled.

"Why's that?" I asked, looking in supply room after office along the way.

"It's a guaranteed way to get things off my mind. To open it, you know?"

I did know. The sound of the bullets exploding in your ears invaded like an army, leaving nothing in your head except for the ringing, dull, pleasant ache. I would rather hear Alex talk, however.

We peeked in the weapon room, peeked in the gun range. Peeked, peeked, peeked, until we came to the gyms.

"Hear that?" I asked him. We were walking in the hallway when all of a sudden I heard a hard melodic thump, thump, thump. Every now and then the thumps would skip a beat. 

Like someone beating the shit out of a punching bag.

I didn't realize I had a hand on Alex's chest to stop him so I could hear better until he shifted his weight, making me drop my hand. "Sounds like someone's in the last room," I said, my voice unsteady.

We advanced down the hall until we came to the last room on the right, a large room, not a gym, that housed weights and treadmills and the punching bag that Jai was currently, like I guessed, beating the shit out of.

"Good ear, my dear," Alex smiled as we stood in the doorway.

I barely heard him, though, because the melodic thump, thump, thumps of Jai's fists flying into the bag poured into my brain, kicking my headache to a whole other level. My breath caught as I stared at him, the way his muscular arms flexed to pound the bag, the way his face was dry of sweat, the way his breathing was even, the way the pulse in his throat was visible to me, the way I saw and heard that his heart was pumping at a steady rate of seventy beats per minute. I saw the way his jaw was clenched, saw the way his eyes were focused on the bag and away from us. He was so wrapped up in where his fists landed that he didn't even notice us.

Something wasn't right. Jai wasn't Alex. I wanted to tell Alex that Jai was madder than a mule chewing on bumble bees, because at that moment, Alex's lighthearted laugh would have made the tight feeling in my chest disappear in an instant.

This wasn't right.

"Alex," I said, my voice tight, as I grabbed one of his arms with both of my hands in an attempt to push him back down the hallway and out of the vicinity of this angry person. If I hadn't said anything, we might would have made it. But we didn't. As soon as he heard my voice, Jai whipped his head around to take us in, staring at us, his breathing suddenly increased. It was only until two seconds passed that I realized he was looking at me, jaw clenched tighter, black eyes as cold as the Arctic Ocean and as hard as diamonds.

"You.. bitch," Jai growled at me. "You incompetent—"

The next thing I knew, Jai was coming for me. 

He wasn't Alex at all.