The Day Before We Met

Safe With Me

"Please let me do patrol today. Please Ajax. I don't want to be alone with her anymore." I begged Ajax to no avail.

"No, you are the best at hand to hand combat as well as close combat. You are guarding her while we patrol." Ajax shut down my request and I groaned loudly before closing our coms.

"Let's go. You have to do your sound thing." I tried to hide the fact that I wanted nothing more than to trade places with literally anyone else.

"It's called sound check, and it isn't for another ten minutes." Hannah giggled at my lack of knowledge on the subject.

"I'd rather leave now so we can get there early." I countered.

"I wanted to ask you a question first." Hannah showed the real reason she was stalling.

"I can't promise I'll be able to answer, but okay." I internally screamed. This is not what I wanted to do today. Why can't she just do as asked?

"Why do you want the shot? I don't want you to be angry all the time." She frowned up at me.

"I don't like emotions. They aren't my thing." I answered bluntly.

"What emotions?" She pushed the matter.

"All of them." I rolled my eyes despite her not being able to see me.

"Why is that?"

"They're annoying and ruin my day."

Hannah surprised me with what she did next. She wrapped her arms around my armored body and held me tightly. "When you have bad emotions, you talk about them so you can be happy again. Hugs also work, and I'm good at giving those."

I didn't quite know what to do. I've never been hugged before in my life. Not once.

"Have you ever been hugged?" Hannah mumbled against my chest plate with her cheek pressed against it from how tightly she was squeezing.

"Um, no. I don't know what to do." I gently patted her head twice before putting my arms back down at my sides.

My actions made Hannah giggle. "Wrap your arms around me like I am you, and gently squeeze so you don't crush my internal organs."

I had to lean down some, but I managed to carefully wrap my arms around her and a weird feeling came through me. Safety? Peace? Neither of those exist.

"You give good hugs. I can't wait till I can hug you without your armor." Hannah pulled away after another second passed.

"I hate to burst your bubble, but you won't ever catch a glimpse of me." I got ready to take her to sound check regardless of her rapid fire questions and comments.

"I bet I will." Hannah smiled up at me brightly.

"Oh really?" I cocked my head to the side some.

"I'll see you one day." She nodded her head. "Let's go Sentinel Alex. Time to go sing!" She took my hand and went to pull me out of the room.

"First we ask for clearance, and then we go." I sighed when she tried to pull on me again, but I didn't budge. Not even a bit.

"Coms from Sentinel Ajax." My alert system went off.

"Put him through." I gently pried Hannah away from the door and put a my index finger up to tell her to wait.

"You are green. We don't see anyone so far. Keep your eyes open for disguised Marians." Ajax gave me the go before cutting the coms.

"Alright, hotshot. Let's roll." I put my hand on the middle of her back and lead her down the hallway and to the stage.

"Multiple readings ahead. Stay alert, Sentinel." My alarm systems went off and I stopped dead in my tracks and stopped Hannah as well by gripping the back of her shirt into a ball in my hand.