Chapter 239: Secrets in the Hallway.
The room fell into a respectful hush as Mute spoke, his voice carrying effortlessly across the space—smooth, measured, laced with quiet authority.
"What we’re building here requires genuine collaboration," he said. "My role is to ensure the director’s vision translates into field operations that actually deliver. You’ll find I have high expectations. That’s not a threat. It’s a standard."
I stepped fully through the doorway.
The Mute I remembered from Hogsby had been a level-three teleporter grieving a stolen girlfriend—small, readable, painfully ordinary in the way of students who still hadn’t stared into the abyss long enough to know what they were. That version had no right standing at the front of a government field department like he owned the air itself. Yet here he was, radiating the calm confidence of someone who had always known this exact moment was waiting for him.
Our eyes locked the instant I crossed the threshold. Surprise flashed across his face—there and gone in a heartbeat—quickly buried beneath that unreadable mask. Then a small, cryptic smile curved his lips, one that explained nothing and hinted at everything. His gaze tracked me like a predator as I moved through the room and dropped into the empty seat beside Sherry.
Becky. Max. Danny. Sherry. A handful of new, sharp-eyed faces filled the remaining chairs. Only Ernesto was missing from the old crew. I filed the absence away without letting it show on my face.
"That’s it," Mute said, his eyes still fixed on mine, expression smoothing back into perfect neutrality. "Let’s hear from our director."
He stepped aside with fluid grace. The woman at the front moved forward.
[Melissa Veyron. Primordial woman. Unmarked.]
The system notification slid through my mind like cold glass, nearly costing me the first few words of her speech. I wrenched my focus back to her. Short white hair glowing under the lights. A face of preserved, almost sculpted beauty—the kind maintained through decades, maybe centuries, of disciplined will. Monica Veyron’s sister, the family legacy etched into every angle.
"Hey." Sherry’s warm breath brushed my ear. "You’re somewhere else."
"I’m here," I murmured, forcing myself to mean it as I reached for her hand under the table.
"I don’t have much to say this evening," Melissa began. Her voice was velvet and steel—measured, warm in precisely calibrated doses. "You’ll learn more about me as we work together." She paused, glancing at her notes with practiced elegance. "Mr..." She let the name linger a fraction too long before claiming it. "Mute has covered the essentials. We begin tomorrow. Thank you."
She turned and walked out with predatory poise. Mute followed right behind her, a silent shadow at her shoulder.
The room exhaled, bursting back into low murmurs of conversation and shifting chairs.
[Enhanced hearing active.]
The system triggered it without warning. Their footsteps in the corridor outside suddenly sharpened into crisp, audible detail.
"One of the agents in there," Mute said, voice low and thoughtful as they moved away. "I know him. But the way he looked at me when he walked in..." A brief pause. "Like he’s seen me before."
Wait!
"And?" Melissa’s heels clicked steadily onward, never slowing.
"Of all the bodies available inside these walls," Mute continued, "why this one?"
"Be grateful," Melissa replied, her tone edged with ice. "You should be grateful you’re even—"
"Bram."
The enhanced hearing cut off abruptly.
Becky was standing directly in front of me, close enough that I could smell the faint trace of her perfume. Sherry remained seated beside me, watching with quiet curiosity.
"Quick word?" Becky said, then caught herself and offered Sherry a polite smile. "Sorry—can I borrow him for a sec?"
"Go ahead," Sherry replied, easy and trusting, though her fingers lingered on mine a moment longer before letting go.
I stood and fell into step with Becky, walking to a quiet corner of the mission room. Her hand rested lightly on my shoulder, steady but not quite weightless. Her limp was still there—noticeable in the slight hitch of her gait—but lighter than the last time I’d seen her moving on her own. Progress. Not whole, but healing.
"How are you?" I asked as she leaned back against the cool wall, carefully shifting her weight off the bad leg.
"Good," she said, offering a small nod. "Getting there."
From the corner of my eye, I caught a flash of blonde hair and an unwavering stare. Max was watching us from across the room like a hawk, not even pretending to look away. His gaze burned with something sharp and unreadable.
"What do you need?" I asked, keeping my voice low.
"Your help, Bram." She looked me dead in the eyes, intensity radiating off her. "Will you help me?"
I held back the automatic yes. I’d learned the hard way not to commit before I understood the full shape of the blade.
"Help you with what?"
Her eyes flicked toward Max for a split second. Something flickered across her face—brief, almost invisible, like a shadow passing behind glass—then vanished. She looked back at me.
"Nesto’s missing," she said.
I studied her closely. That wasn’t what she had started to say. I could feel the weight of the unsaid words hanging between us, heavy and deliberate.
"He’s a portal creator," I replied carefully. "He could be anywhere. Outside the walls, even. Maybe he just needed air after everything that’s happened."
"That’s not Nesto," Becky shot back, steel threading through her voice. "He doesn’t just disappear. Something happened to him."
"Okay," I said, nodding slowly. "I’ll look into it."
"Thank you." She pushed herself off the wall with a quiet exhale of relief.
"Is that everything?" I pressed, watching her face for cracks.
"Yeah." She gave me a smile that almost reached her eyes, but not quite. "That’s all."
I offered her my hand. She took it, and we walked back toward the group together, her grip tighter than it needed to be.
Max hadn’t moved an inch. His eyes tracked us the entire way—cold, calculating, giving nothing away.
She didn’t tell me what she actually came to say, I thought, glancing at him again. Whether Max had anything to do with that loaded silence, I couldn’t tell yet. But I was going to find out.