I was about to plop my butt on the hood of Deen’s car when I remembered this new light blue Genvoi was the replacement she bought for her other car that was torched in the Sanders fire. I didn’t think I was heavy enough to dent it, but I was still a bit excited from my fight about a couple of hours ago that I might not be able to control my strength. I ended up half-leaning and half-sitting on it that left me worse than if I’d just remained standing; I hoped I’d just rapidly heal whatever muscle cramps I’d get from this awkward position.

Up to now, Deen still didn’t know the fire was Everett’s work; I wondered what her reaction was going to be when that day would inevitably come. For now, we were still one united group, planning our next course of action regarding the discovery they made over at the hospital.

“I’m so sorry we can’t go in the house,” Deen said. We were gathered on the driveway outside her garage, her car partially covering us from the view of her house. “I didn’t know Sis is going to come home tonight. We could’ve held our meeting at the park instead.”

“I want to meet your sister,” Reo said with a mischievous grin. “I’m curious to see what she looks like. An older you?”

“Um, I guess a bit? I can introduce you to her if you really—”

“Don’t mind him, Deen,” Myra said, shooting him a warning glare. “He knows what your sister looks like. I saw him searching for pics of your sister on his phone—”

“Shuddup,” he hissed. “Don’t make it sound weird and creepy."

“Anyway,” Deen said, not minding them, perhaps already too used to guys being creepy with her sister, and also her. “We can go in the house. After all, sis knows you’re my friends. Nothing weird about that. But we can’t talk about important matters inside; she might walk in on us discussing…incriminating stuff.”

Everett stood up even straighter. “We’re fine here outside. The night breeze feels nice.” He folded his arms across his chest. I could’ve sworn he intentionally bounced his pecs when he did that. And he also flexed his forearm muscles.

“So, Julie’s memory is already wiped?” I asked. “She doesn’t remember the attack on the condo? And also about me being there?” The group turned to Dario.

“Yes…should be.” Dario scratched his chin. We seemed to have disturbed him while he was in deep thought. He was mostly silent on our drive here to Deen’s place. He said, “It’s hard to say because that was a few days ago, and I don’t actually read minds to snip out specific memories. Can view it as getting a feel of what the brain has processed for the appropriate time frame and scrambling that. But don’t worry, I estimate I did a sufficient job that any residual memories she had of you that night can be explained with being stressed and confusing it with meeting you some other time. You also have Deen as your witness that you weren’t at your condo during the attack.”

“One less thing to worry about then,” I said. “So, what was that…that thing you guys were talking about in the car? I didn’t quite catch it. Something about the 2Ms connected to the hospital?”

“About the 2Ms…we’re still not certain.” His brows furrowed, he said, “But there’s a large possibility it is them. I suppose we haven’t fully explained it to you, but we should since you’re part of the group too.”

Aw, I’m so touched, I thought sarcastically.

He explained that Johann—the real lookout, in contrast to me, just a tree lookout—noticed a convoy of police cars and a couple of suspicious cargo vans went past the National Guard barricade on Marshall Avenue and proceeded to the hospital. I might be wrong, but could that convoy be the police sirens I heard when I was at the warehouse compound? They were actually on their way to the hospital for sketchy things instead of heading to me. I wondered if the police eventually did respond to the calls from the PCM members that they were massacred by an Adumbrae—namely, me.

“We were already there.” Everett shrugged. “Thought we might as well check it out.” He narrated how they sneaked around to find where the convoy went off to, aided by Reo’s fairy.

“Another day by the dumpsters,” Reo said with intentionally fake gusto.

Myra leaned near him and sniffed. “You do stink.” She acted like she was about to gag. “Yeah, it’s better we’re out here. We don’t want Deen’s sister to think we’re friends with someone who doesn’t maintain personal hygiene.”

“Wha—! You’re the ones who told me to summon there—”

“Moving on.” Dario swept his hand between them like a referee stopping a match. “Tell them what you guys saw.”

“Let me.” Myra was suddenly enraged. “Those bastards were wheeling patients into their vans! We saw four patients, maybe there were more. They were bound with those straitjackets and also tied to their beds with straps across their bodies. And they were also gagged and blindfolded.”

Everett chimed in, “At first, we thought they were dead.”

“Yeah! They looked like mummies with those tons of restraints. But then I realized that if those were dead bodies, then they should’ve been in body bags. And why were the police doing the moving?"

"It really isn't their job," Johann agreed. "You were right to be suspicious."

"Then one of the bodies moved! The guy probably woke up. He got an arm free, and threw a cop across the parking area, a good ten feet away.”

“With one arm.”

Deen nodded. “Definitely suspicious.”

"The lighting wasn't good, but I might've seen some abnormal growths on that arm," Everett said.

“Those criminal assholes are doing something to the patients!” Myra said. “And then they’re taking them away for more experimentation. It’s got to be the 2Ms. This should be connected to whatever shit they were cooking up at Erind’s condo. Maybe version two-point-oh of their turning humans into monsters plot.”

“You’re probably right on that one,” Dario conceded. “Although we don't have any more information.”

Or do you mean to say your secret organization hasn’t told you about it yet? It was always Dario who brought this or that intel, supposedly from the Professor, to start a mission. He was essentially a handler for the group like this was a spy thriller movie. But now, he seemed genuinely surprised by whatever was going on at the hospital.

Myra caught my gaze. We seemed to be thinking the same thing. The people behind Dario didn’t get a whiff of this beforehand? A pretty fucking big issue to miss.

The group started discussing our next moves. It was obvious that, as self-proclaimed heroes and vigilantes fighting a criminal Adumbrae organization, we should do something to stop it. But what?

“How about we leak this to the police?” said Deen. “Johann can do it. Then the police will come in and investigate—”

“We’re not sure which police officers can be trusted,” replied Johann.

“Hmmm, the BID then? How do we leak something to the BID?”

Reo snapped his fingers. “How about we leak this to the media instead? Newspapers, TV, the internet. Just fucking everywhere! There’s no need to worry about who’s a good guy or a bad guy. Also no problem with covering our tracks compared to if we try to contact the BID.”

“What exactly are we going to leak?” Myra said.

Reo stared at her for a couple of seconds. “Oh, I thought you were going to follow it up with an insult or something like—never mind. We do some recordings of the horrors at EFU Medical Center.”

“Go back in and video what they’re doing there? We don’t even know what exactly they’re doing there."

The discussion went on and on for several minutes. They were a lot of problems with trying to get evidence of criminal activities inside the hospital. For one, they only lucked out being present when the cops came to take some patients. They couldn’t just break into the hospital and stay there until something suspicious happened; they also weren’t sure if it happened every night.

I drummed my fingers on the hood of Deen’s car thinking how to get out of this because I wanted to go to sleep. I should’ve made some excuse early on that I was just a nominal part of the group. Now, they were even asking me for suggestions.

“What do you think, Erind?” Dario said. I sensed he was just doing it to make me feel included. But why? To appease Deen? Was he trying to get Deen on his side? She was the one with the most useful power among them all.

“Ummm…” I looked at my fingers, then at Deen’s car. New car, old car. Sanders fire. An idea popped into my head. “What if we set fire to the hospital?”

“What?” Deen exclaimed. “We’re not going to do that!”

“Very straightforward,” Reo snorted.

“Wait, I think Erind is onto something here,” said Dario.

“I mean not burn it and kill people.” I was really tempted to glance over at Everett, but that was too suspicious. “Just make a scare so that authorities would come and check it. Protesters would also take advantage of that somehow to clamor for patients to be moved away…stuff like that. Like set fire to an empty wing?”

“If we’re going that route, it might be better for it to be a bomb scare.”

“I didn’t know we're terrorists now,” Johann said. “Isn’t that too much?”

“We’ll blame this on the protesters,” Dario said. “We can call ahead to warn the hospital, then rig a bomb to explode in an empty part of the building just to show the threat is real.”

The discussion went on again, and I regretted giving that suggestion. Everyone hated the kid who asked a question just when the class was about to be dismissed, and I kinda did it to myself here. Fuck.

We didn’t reach a consensus on what to do with my arson idea, which now turned into a terrorist bombing attack. It wasn’t going to exactly lead to the arrest of the 2Ms or their underlings, but it would surely lead to having the hospital evacuated.

“Okay, that’s it for tonight guys,” Dario said. “Good job on our mission. However, we have a new problem on our hands. Let’s sleep on this first; maybe we’ll have more ideas tomorrow. I also have to check my stash if we need to make bombs.”

“Oooh, cheesecake tarts from Lyon Patisserie,” I said as we came to the kitchen counter to check what Deen’s sister left for us. Lyon was probably the most expensive gourmet pastry shop in the city. I always wanted to try their food, but I found it too expensive to buy for binge eating while watching movies.

“She says it’s from an office party,” Deen said, reading off a sticky note her sister left on the fridge. “I remember her mentioning that their big boss was having his birthday. This must be it.”

“We should thank her.”

“Better not disturb her if she’s already in her room. She must be tired.”

“Ah, you’re right. Is it okay if I have some?”

“Go ahead.” Deen grinned.

I bit off the crust of the tart, nibbling around the custard filling. "This is so flaky and buttery." Then I threw the creamy center whole into my mouth. “Yum! Very good.” I liked to eat or drink sweet things after doing something stressful or tiring. Like after I had my little exploration of the city and ran into Clive and Trepanner, I bought a bottle of milk tea from the vending machine at my condo. Rest in peace, vending machine.

“If you want to eat other…things,” Deen mumbled, “I can help you with…um…looking for them?”

“Huh? What do you mean?”

“Just if you want something else to eat.”

“Like now? I’m good with these. These tarts are awesome. It’s also kind of late to order more food, and I'm not hungry.”

Deen blinked rapidly, struggling to put her thoughts into words. “Not now. But if you want something to eat another time…don’t hesitate to ask me for help.”

“You already cook breakfast for me,” I said. “Speaking of breakfast, let’s save the rest of these for tomorrow. These should be great with tea…or coffee in your case. I’m a traitor to the Founding Fathers who dumped tea to the sea.”

“Oh, I didn’t specifically mean breakfast.” She chewed her lips while looking at the floor.

What’s up with her? Did she suspect I was getting tired of her being clingy? “That reminds me,” I said. “I’m really, really sorry for losing the hoodie we just bought.” I gave her the story that I took it off when I was at the bar because their aircon was broken. Then a fight broke out among the drunk guys and I had to run, leaving it behind in my hurry. It was kind of close to the truth, minus the part that I actually threw it in a random trash can because it was crusted with dried blood.

“We should go get it,” she emphatically said. “I’ll go back there tomo—"

“No, just let it be,” I interjected. I knew she’d think of getting it back. It was good that I headed her off now before she went there on her own and traced my trail of death and destruction. “If we go there to retrieve it, then that’s as good as admitting I was there tonight. Good thing I chose a generic-looking design; they’ll just chuck it to a lost and found bin and forget about it. If it was something that looked expensive, they might go to the police, right?”

“I…okay then,” she said. “I won’t go there.”

“Hooray for bland design!”

Knock, knock, knock.

I groaned as I turned over. I still want to sleep.

Knock, knock, knock.

Why did this feel familiar? I opened my eyes. I could make out the features of the room in the darkness; I was still at Deen’s house. I wasn’t sure what time it was. I usually woke up around 5 a.m., so it was probably earlier than that.

Who the fuck was knocking? Deen? She didn’t wake up this early.

Knock, knock, knock.

I swear if it's those fucking zombies again—

“Erind? Are you already awake?” It was Deen. Must be something important.

“Coming!” I said, my voice still raspy from just having woken up. I rubbed my eyes and rushed to the door. “What is it, Deen?”

“Let me in,” she said. She was clutching her phone and had a worried expression on her face. “Sis might overhear us if she’s awake.”

I stepped aside.

“I just saw on the news that the mayor was arrested by the BID last night as he was coming home from the memorial event. It was all hush-hush, but some aide of the mayor leaked it, and the BID confirmed that it happened.”

“Woah,” I said, “The BID sure does move fast. Hmmm, so what will happen to the hospital now?”

“I’m not sure. Maybe the 2Ms will stop their operations there because the mayor can’t protect them? Never mind that for now, there’s another thing that happened.” She showed me her phone. It was a public advisory by the BID with pictures of persons-of-interests they were looking for.

“What is this?”

“There was another Adumbrae attack last night. About two dozen people were either killed or injured. The BID says it was an Adumbrae attack, but it could be one of the experiments of the 2Ms that escaped. This could be connected to what they're doing at the hospital. The thing is, the BID is looking for people around the scene of last night's incident.” She scrolled down her phone and stopped at a familiar picture. “And one of them is Ramello.”