Steel: The Transformation

Chapter 31

                 

Chapter 31

Alec POV

Rose's eyes looked back at me from the small hologram version of her face, which was suspended in air above the small metal cube that we Basati referred to as a phone.

"So how is everything's going?" Rose pinned me down with her eyes yet again.

My fingers were playing with a knife, but I kept me gaze focus on her, "It's going well, Cleo keeps progressing every day. As you said, the bonding ceremony changed everything." One look at Rose even through a hologram phone made me want to reclaim those words, she had a dark expression on her face.

"I just meant that it really helps in terms of building that trust, without it she might not even trust me a this stage."

Rose's reply was measured and any emotions across her face was now gone, "Yes, that's the underlying purpose of the bonding ceremony."

I felt as if there was other words hanging in the air between us, things she didn't want to discuss. What could I do? She was in Central and I had my mission as a mentor here to think of.

"So any more news about the Hunters?" Rose's voice almost sounded impatient.

"Not at the moment," I shook my head, "but we are planning on scanning the woods during Easter break to see if we can find their camp."

"Please make sure that you take care of Cleo. Central doesn't want one of their very rare Steel Basati to get injured."

I noticed the absence of any words for me to be careful. I looked at her face, she looked completely neutral. How could she just shut off like that? Like we had never been anything more than just Basati co-workers. I shook my head lightly, when she was in this mood there was no talking to her about it.

I might as well just try to get out of this call, "So was there anything else that you wanted to talk about?"

"Yes, actually there is."

Her dark eyes pierced me even through the veil of 3D holograms.

"Cleo found her parents knife stash in her house."

I rose an eye brow at this. This was news to me, so Cleo must be speaking to Rose more than what I knew.

"She has been asking about her parents. She wants me to find someone that knew them."

"Thank you for telling me," I looked at Rose. She nodded quickly and then terminated the phone call without even saying good-bye. I stared into the void that only a second ago had held her face. What could I do about this? I guess I'll have to wait for her to get out of this mood and then I'll try to talk to her. It was stupid of me to talk about the bond between Cleo and I, I knew that it was already something she was insecure about.

I walked over to the desk and dug through the bottom drawer until I found what I was looking for. My fingers closed around the folder and I pulled it out. I opened it up and started reading trough the pages of information, the incident report and the photos. The report had been handed to me on the day I left Central, they had told me that I was not to share the information with anyone. That it was all there to help me understand my mentee better. I looked at their faces, the two people that had brought Cleo in to this world. I was starting to think that the right moment had come for me to ignore Central and tell Cleo about her parents.

~*~

I was pushing the last of the camping gear in rugsack as Cleo was pushing food down in hers. She had pre-made pasta salad and a number of other dishes and was now trying to fit them all in the small space she had left in hers.