Saraphina

Ch.6 The Deal

Saraphina;
I was sore and I felt sick, but I still had things I had to do. Fish had gotten into another fight with someone from DI, so I had to break it up. Pepper has been handling some new kid, so I had to do her work, which is a lot of work. I had to train the newbies for the next mission, all while not ripping my stitches. It hurt like hell.

I was pounding as hard as I could on a punching bag to let out some steam. "Saraphina stop!" Rocky yelled suddenly. "Why?" I asked. He raised my tank top, slightly to check my bandage. "I'm fine," I said. "You shouldn't be putting your body through that kind of strain!" he scolded. "Your skin is already tighter with normal! If you're not careful it could rip," he said.

I laughed silently. After all these years, he still worried about me. "I'm fine Rocky," I said. He opened his mouth, as if to protest, but I stopped him. "Is Pepper back?" I asked. "Yeah, I think she's in her study, but-" I cut him off. "Thanks Rocky! I'll talk to you later! Bye!" "But-"

The door shut behind me, I had to talk to Pepper. I felt a little bad for leaving him like that, but I promised to make it up to him. After all, he's the only friend I have here. Even if I didn't understand why he wanted me around.

I walked into her office. She wasn't there, only a redheaded boy. He turned to me and my heart stopped. We locked eyes. I looked at him and noticed the dome thing on his head. I was too embarrassed to laugh because I was wearing the jacket he gave me.

Say something! Like what? Anything! I yelled back and forth with myself. I cleared my throat to say something, but he did first.

"I didn't know you wore glasses," he said. I smiled. "Nice to see your still alive, but your a Martian now?" I said. "It's something that a guy named Rocky made to help with my enhanced senses." Xander said, then looking a little self-conscious. "You look better in that jacket than when you were half dead," he said. I laughed because of the sheer awkwardness of the room.

I looked around to find anything to talk about. I finally noticed his wrist. My rubber wristband was still wearing it. "You still have my bracelet on?" I said. "Oh," he said trying to take it off. "No, no, no, no, no, no, no," I said before he took it off. "You keep that on," I explained. "It has your name on it," he said. "I know, it's my promise, my swear," I explained. "You give it back when the promise is fulfilled."

"Oh," he said. The room was dead quiet. "What did you promise me?" he asked, confused. I sighed. I hadn't thought about my promise until now. "It doesn't matter," I said quietly.

I hadn't expected to ever see him again. I wondered what made Leam, aka Lionel Richey, change his mind about bringing him here. I might not ever know. "So," he said. "Your kind of a big deal here?" he said. "Yeah, you could say that."

Pepper walked in. "Saraphina!" she cried in delighted surprise. "This is Xander. He's a level L, and needs to start his training today. Here's his file, now get to it please. Once your in good enough shape, you'll be on another mission," she said ushering us out.

I wanted to talk about getting better weapons and older soldiers, but apparently that's not going to happen. I groned, half from irritation, half from pain.

"Uhh what did she mean by I'm a level L?" Xander asked. I had just now realized how impressive that was. Only Joseph had started out like that. I started at level K. He might be my help around here if we live long enough.

"It means your pretty good, now, let's get you to dinner. Afterwords, we'll get started. Okay?" I said as if he had a real choise. "Okay?" he said.

Once there, I was instantly surrounded. Suck ups and younger people with a million questions, and others who are desperate to see me mess up or fail. It was pretty easy to see the difference.