espionage [h.s.]

THIRTY FOUR

A.N. I thought a new chapter would be a good way to end 2019 🥂 hope you enjoy it, remember to vote & comment!

HARRY

Rochelle and I sit side by side on the platform of the water tower with our backs against the metal structure, my legs stretched out while hers are crossed. A comfortable silence settles between us for a while, the only sound coming from the faint creaks of the old water tower and the sound of the soft, cool wind drifting through the air, which strangely doesn't chill me to the bone as much as the words I'm about to say do.

"What exactly do you know about what happened last year already?" I begin by asking, my voice quiet as it drifts away with the breeze.

"Not much," she admits. "I just heard that you were in our criminology class and you didn't finish it last year, because something big happened and the institute shut down for a bit." She pauses, her lips pursing as she thinks of more. "And that the trainees from your class kind of just....disappeared from the institute and never came back. And I also remember you shouting at me like a dick when I mentioned it the first time."

I chuckle lightly at that last bit, always amused by her boldness. "Yeah, I was a bit of a dick then," I agree and she nods in response. "But only because it's kind of a sensitive topic, and I don't like talking about it."

"Then why do you want to tell me about it now?"

I hesitate again, because I haven't completely decided the reason for that. "I don't know," I admit honestly. "It just feels like the right time. We're kind of.......friends now, I guess? And if I learned anything in school, it's that friends don't keep secrets."

"Yeah," she says, shooting me a small smile. "They don't." When she notices me opening my mouth a few times and then closing it again, struggling to get the words out, she gives me an encouraging nudge. "Another thing you should've learned in school," she murmurs softly, "is that sometimes it's better to just rip the bandaid off."

I sigh deeply, biting down on my lip and running my hands down my face in slight frustration before I begin. "Well, as you know already, I was a trainee last year....."

"Kind of hard to believe," Rochelle interjects humorously. "Especially because you're already such a hard-ass."

I just smile at her words, finding myself quite grateful and touched by her attempts to lighten the mood. "It was nearing the end of the year, and my class of trainees were heading out to a bar to celebrate us almost graduating. They were all taking a bus there, but I didn't go because I didn't drink back then. I was quite serious about training and I thought it'd inhibit it." I shake my head at myself, almost laughing at the person I was back then. "At that time, we were tracking a terror cell, and while I was left back at the institute, I got a call from one of the trainees on that bus telling me that the bus had just been hijacked by that terror cell."