KILLJOY

Chapter 5: A Treat

One day has passed since he had started training. He was still a bit sore from blocking Mayeda yesterday. Max seemed to be in a shitty mood when he came back to the dorm later that day, so he didn't talk much that evening till he went to sleep. Next morning came, and he decided to wake up a bit early to try and talk a bit more with Liv and Eli. After getting changed, he walked out of his room, seeing Eli and Liv sitting on one of the benches in the lounge. They moved their attention to him for a moment as he came over to sit down next to them.

"So... how long have you two been here?"
Eli sighed as he heard his inquiry, however he had no reason to deny him.
"Me and Liv have both been here for Four days, this is our fifth. Pretty soon, we'll hit that damn deadline and we'll just have to try and apply with someone else."
He listened intently as he heard them speak their thoughts.
"You think you're making any progress?"
Eli was, again, the first to reply.
"I feel... something. It's faint, but I feel... more alive than I used to, if that makes sense. More energetic."
Liv was the second to respond to his question.
"Sometimes I feel a bit tingly whenever I'm under pressure, but that's about it..."

He was trying to figure something out— how do you tell if you're making progress towards a TICK? He wasn't fully sure still, but he had these as reference now, so it was helpful. Liv seemed to be stuck in thought for a minute before her face brightened up a bit, as if she'd just had a really good idea.

"Ooh— I know a really nice smoothie place not too far from here! We should sneak off after training and get some, just the three of us together! C'mon, it would be fun! It'd be a nice treat for all our hard work, I can pay if you don't have cash on you!"
Eli merely nodded, subscribing to the idea. While he was slightly more hesitant, there certainly wasn't anything wrong with it, and it's not like anyone else knew they were part of a gang.
"Alright, alright. I'm in. And no worries, I ain't broke. Not sure about him though."
He pointed at Eli, smirking a bit from his own comment as Eli just sneered.
"Oh, shut up," Eli said as Mayeda rounded the corner."

Another pretty uneventful day had passed, getting smacked around by Mayeda as their deadlines slowly approached, although for the others, they were coming up fast. He felt like there was... something happening, but he wasn't really sure what. He just didn't feel as bad after training as he did last time. As they were walking out of the training room, Liv motioned to meet her, leaning on a wall. Eli went in front as he leaned next to her, as he walked over to stand in front of her.
"So, how do we get out of here? You know where the entrance is?"

Eli looked over at him as a small smirk grew on his face, as he pulled a key ring out of his pocket.
"I maaaay have 'borrowed' Mayeda's key to the basement entrance."
Liv looked a bit surprised at his bold move, saying, "Are you crazy, he'll kill you if you get caught!"
Eli smirked as he responded to her concern.
"What, you worried about me? Trust me, I doubt he'll notice. He almost never heads down there unless he's on recruit duty, and four are plenty enough for him already."
He just sighed in annoyance at the situation he was probably about to get roped into, but he did agree to their offer, and he wasn't gonna chicken out.
"We leaving now, or?"

Eli pushed himself off the wall, pocketing his 'borrowed' key as he started walking. He and Liv quickly followed behind him as they went down a few hallways, being careful not to get spotted as they eventually made it to a locked, metal door. Eli quickly took out his key as he turned the lock, opening the door as he led the others through before locking it behind him again. He stowed the key again as they walked through a grey-tiled tunnel for what felt like ages. Eventually, they wound up behind a small secret entrance hidden behind a large poster, covered in graffiti.

Eli looked over at his two doubting friends, smirking a bit at their previous worries.
"See? Nothing happened, we'll just treat ourselves, come back, and we'll be just fine."
Liv piped up after he finished talking.
"Should we get Max something?"
Eli replied, now with a slightly less joyful mood as he was reminded of him, "Nah, he's a dick. Besides, if we bring anything in then it'll be suspicious as hell."
"Okay, okay," Liv said. They felt pretty confident as they left, as nothing seemed to be wrong as they left the base.

The pair of eyes watching them through the streets atop the flats would soon prove otherwise, however.