𝐑𝐞𝐚𝐝 𝐦𝐲 𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐝 | 𝐁𝐨𝐨𝐤 𝐎𝐧𝐞 | 𝐅𝐢𝐯𝐞 𝐇𝐚𝐫𝐠𝐫𝐞𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐬 𝐱 𝐑𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫

𝙲𝚑𝚊𝚙𝚝𝚎𝚛 𝚃𝚠𝚎𝚗𝚝𝚢 | 𝚈𝚘𝚞 𝚠𝚎𝚛𝚎 𝚊𝚕𝚠𝚊𝚢𝚜 𝚊 𝚔𝚒𝚕𝚕𝚎𝚛

^^^

'Protect: Harold Jenkins.'

"Who the hell is Harold Jenkins?"

Five stared at the piece of paper printed in black ink with the same confused expression as me. I stood behind him, looking over his shoulder, many questions swirling in my head. We were in a room with large pipes that were used to transmit information to agents in the field.

Gloria, the office owner whom Five had knocked out with a stapler, was lying unconscious on the floor at her desk.

Without a word, Five crumpled the piece of paper, threw it into a nearby trash can, and selected one of the blank sheets.

We had to hurry. Dot could come back at any time.

"What do you wanna do?" I asked.

Instead of answering, Five began pressing individual letters on the typewriter. After several seconds, the first message was ready.

'To Cha-Cha: Terminate Hazel for immediate extraction.'

I shifted impatiently from one foot to the other as Five tried to pick another piece of paper from the pile with shaking hands.

Half an hour has passed since the situation in the storage. All this time I was trying to force myself to focus on the task at hand. But somehow I just couldn't.

My entire mind space was occupied by thoughts about this situation. The way he kissed... Was he experienced? Who knows what he actually did during his time in the Commission? On the other hand, I had no comparison. It's possible that I felt like I was in heaven while someone else might have found Five's technique rather average. Also possible--

"This name," the boy's whisper interrupted my thoughts. "This guy has something to do with the apocalypse."

"Cha-Cha and Hazel are there to protect him," I muttered, looking over his shoulder. "Does that mean his death will stop the apocalypse?"

"I'd like to believe that. For now, we can't let them find out about the need to protect him."

I nodded. After a while, the first piece of paper was joined by a second one.

'To: Hazel.  Terminate Cha-Cha for immediate extraction.'

"Quick, give me those tubes," Five hissed, folding both sheets in half.

I looked in the direction he was pointing. There were a dozen plastic tubes in a large copper box at the end of the room. I raised both hands and after a few seconds there were two containers on the desk next to us. I took one and opened it. Five handed me one of the sheets, packing another message into the other tube himself.

"I see. You want to confuse them," I muttered, pressing the lid down.

Five nodded almost unnoticeably. His hair fell over his forehead, and I saw a few beads of sweat on his temple.

"I want to keep them busy. More specifically, I want them to eliminate each other."

The corners of my mouth lifted into a slight smile. Smart. At least one problem will be solved.

The second problem was returning home. Third - finding and killing this Harold Jenkins guy.

And it will only get easier from there.

The thought that we were just two steps away from ending all this madness made me want to jump. It seemed so simple, so trivial. We've dealt with worse on more than one occasion.