Enhanced

XIV

As time continued from the moment, each of them disconnected themselves from one another to engage in the warmth of silence as Aiden and Cassidy worked through the security systems to keep watch of the halls and corridors of their camps compound. Unfortunately, it seemed that the mercenaries nor their remaining troops were forsaking their presence anytime soon. From what they could interpret, they were possibly luring a blind squadron to peek out from their concealed refuge to capture and incapacitate them similarly, and as brutally they did the Ninth.

If they knew that there were hidden rooms. It was only a matter of hours before the Sixth themselves were liable to death.

Hours emanated into the night as they waited and waited, the pair at the screen studying their routines and patterns. Hours passed on and the Sixth rested themselves, waiting for an opportunity to be given. One solution they thought of was to wait till daybreak. This could allow the satellite to regain feed control and observe the attack on the camp, but it wasn't going to be long before Vendetta figures out that they're hidden in the concealed concrete walls. If they had been able to take notice of Aiden's intrusion using a computer based program in the library's software, they were fully capable of revealing their location.

Clea had her eyes bound on the door of Miles' secluded room, aside her own. She sat at the same tabletop that she'd stayed on since the early stages of the invasion. After having witnessed the decimation of the Ninth, she denied the arising truth of their eventual deaths. Her parents wouldn't even know till days, maybe even weeks after she had passed. She thought to herself that she had to live up to her name. She had to stay strong, like the rest of them did; Like the rest of them tried. It was just hard to stay steady when two of the strongest people she knew were battered and bruised.

Tapping her boots to the beat of the music that played in her head, she couldn't remove the picture of the atrocity that befell Lily and her comrades. What happened to her revealed a black realism to her life. With her luxurious stay in Never, she'd forgotten on several occasions that she herself was a soldier. A soldier that had to be ready to experience such disturbing moments. People were going to die. Hatred and violence was going to spread in them.

Her elbows laid bent on the curve of her knees, her hands sheathing her face once again. She felt her broken exhales on her palms, droplets of water glistening in the crevices of her prints. Cody exited his room, finding her at one of her lowest points. A moment of empathy struck him. He took a few steps toward her elevated posture, placing a hand on her shoulder. "You doing okay?" He asked with a bright, elevating tone.

"Seriously?" Clea questioned weakly, lowering her hands as she wiped her tears of her cheeks.

"I would've said something else, but that's what my head suggested I say." Cody replied with a big smile, sitting down on the seat aside her boot. It was clear to her that he wasn't the joy-filled and jumpy teenager he made himself to be. A factor that made him likable to her. "As duty of a Strider, it's my job to ensure that our team isn't gloomy and hopeless in a time of chaos." He emphasized a bit too much.

"Too late." Clea responded, circling her vision to all her friends. Cody did alike her, sighing soundlessly. Another moment passed, a silence that allowed him to survey their dire situation from the inside instead of the things that happened outside. "We're coming out of this alive, right?" She asked doubtfully, turning her eyes to him.

Her words stayed to him for a moment longer. Were they? It wasn't like it mattered to him if they did. What happens then? He returns home to his family? The same parents that made loose of him earlier than they were supposed to? The same parents that when they saw the opportunity to remove him from their lives for years, they made sure to extend the period? It wasn't like he mattered to them when they sent him to the welcome carpet of Never and left without a final assurance that it was all fine.