And in those eyes, so like mine, I saw it all.
Joy.
Longing.
Regret.
And sorrow.
My heart felt like a fist had closed around it and squeezed until I couldn't breathe.
I ran. Fled hundreds of yards back into the ruins.
My hands wouldn't stop shaking as I placed a video call to my brother inside the Bastion.
This time, it rang for over a minute before someone picked up.
A handsome face filled the screen. I spoke immediately:
"Do you know about the bait operation at the front gate?"
"Wait, are you outside the Bastion?"
I didn't answer. I pressed on:
"Where are you right now?"
"I'm at a tailor's, trying on suits. You're acting strange. Are you outside the Bastion?"
He asked the question a second time.
This time, I hung up.
I raised my head, eyes sharp as a hawk's, tracking every movement on the wall.
Up on the rampart, the squad leader beside Muriel pocketed a phone and leaned in close to whisper something in her ear. Far too close.
Closer than any professional distance would allow. I filed that away.
The next second, Muriel wrenched the dagger from his abdomen in one clean motion.
Then drove it in again. Hard.
She didn't stop there.
The blade twisted. The wet, grinding crack of something breaking made every hair on every neck stand on end.
Where the blade carved, flesh split open in a burst.
The bait's body lurched downward.
The stench of blood flooded the air again, so thick it was nearly enough to make a person retch.
His lips were bitten through, his mouth full of blood. He looked at me with raw, broken grief and shook his head—barely, almost imperceptibly.
He didn't want me to go out there.
"Give him an adrenaline shot. Don't let him die."
Darkness crept in.
The slaughter hadn't produced the results she'd wanted. Muriel's face was tight with fury.
I pressed my hand over my nose and mouth, fighting the urge to vomit.
I went back to the video call from earlier.
I'd screen-recorded it.
I studied every frame.
The fingers visible on the other end were thicker, longer than my brother's.
The hair length didn't match the photos that had been sent to me either.
They looked more like they belonged to the squad leader standing beside Muriel.
My brain detonated.
I had to confront that man myself.
I had to find out who he really was.
But at that moment, up on the wall, a blade flew with surgical precision.
The cloth strips shredded apart.
Their only connection—severed in a single cut.