08:11 PM | Safe House Approach
The road narrowed from asphalt to gravel, city lights fading behind dense tree coverage that swallowed them whole. Isolation pressed in protective, yes, but also vulnerably finite. Cut off from help if things went sideways.
Yuki sat up slightly, peering out at darkness broken only by their headlights cutting through tree shadows like searchlights through smoke. "We're really in the middle of nowhere."
"That's the point," Aveline said, her tone warm and reassuring despite the clinical assessment that followed. "Nearest neighbor is 2.3 miles away. Emergency services response time: eighteen minutes. But that isolation gives us tactical advantage multiple sight lines, limited approach vectors. We see them coming long before they see us."
She's doing it again. Making the terrifying sound strategic. Making vulnerability sound like strength. Watch Yuki's shoulders relax.
"Or makes us sitting ducks," Yuki muttered.
Aveline turned in her seat, meeting Yuki's eyes with what looked like genuine understanding. "I know it feels exposed. But we have contingencies. Three escape routes mapped and memorized. Emergency vehicle stashed 200 meters north keys in a magnetic box under the rear bumper, tank full, always. And this—" She held up a small device. "—panic trigger. Direct line to C.R.I.M.E. rapid response. Eight minutes, and we have a full tactical team on site."
"You've really thought of everything."
Aveline smiled, and it looked almost self-deprecating, almost humble. "That's the job. Thinking of everything so you don't have to."
Perfect deflection. Making her obsessive calculation sound like consideration. Like care.
Adrian pulled into the driveway, motion sensors flooding the area with light that pushed back the darkness like stage curtains revealing a set. The safe house stood there modern, clean-lined, deceptively residential. You wouldn't know the windows were bulletproof unless you tried to break them. Wouldn't know the walls were reinforced unless you tried to breach them.
Aesthetic married to function. Beautiful and deadly, like everything else in Adrian's orbit lately.
He pressed his thumb to the dashboard scanner. A quiet beep of biometric clearance, and the garage door rolled open with mechanical precision.
"Home sweet heavily fortified home," Adrian said, trying for lightness he didn't quite feel.
Inside
The interior matched the exterior minimalist functionality that somehow still felt lived-in rather than sterile. Security monitors lined one wall of the living room, showing multiple camera angles of the perimeter in neat quadrants. The kitchen gleamed with stainless steel appliances and granite countertops. Quality without excess.
The living room held sparse but comfortable furniture: a deep couch that looked like you could actually sleep on it, a coffee table with clean lines, everything deliberate and purposeful. Two guest bedrooms branched off the main hallway, doors standing open invitingly.
Yuki set her bag down carefully, taking it all in—this strange sanctuary that felt both protective and isolating, like a very expensive cage designed by someone who actually cared about the bird inside.
Aveline moved immediately into professional mode, checking windows, testing locks, examining sight lines with the kind of precision that would have looked obsessive if she weren't so graceful about it. "Structural integrity: excellent. Entry points: all secured. Egress routes: adequate for emergency extraction."
"It's a house, not a fortress," Adrian said, maybe trying to make it feel less clinical, less like witness protection and more like hospitality.
Aveline glanced back at him, and her smile was warm, teasing. "Why can't it be both? I contain multitudes." She gestured around. "See? Cozy and defensible. The best of both worlds."
The literary reference. Whitman. Unexpected, humanizing. Watch Adrian's surprise. She's full of those little touches just enough culture, just enough humor, just enough warmth to seem complete.
"Fair point," Adrian conceded.
Aveline checked her watch a smooth, natural gesture. "I should head out. Let you two get settled."
"You're not staying?" Adrian asked, surprised.
"Not necessary." She said it gently, like she was sparing him something rather than abandoning him. "You're more than capable of handling protection detail solo for twelve hours. Besides, Yuki doesn't need two intense operatives hovering over her. One's plenty." A warm smile. "I'll be back at six AM for shift rotation. You'll barely have time to miss me."
"What if something happens?"
Aveline pulled a small device from her jacket pocket matte black, single red button, deceptively simple. "Panic trigger. One press, and I get an alert. Direct encrypted line to my mobile. Response time: eight minutes under optimal conditions, twelve under worst-case." She pressed it into his hand, fingers lingering just a moment reassuring, grounding. "Keep it within arm's reach. I mean it, Adrian. Any concern, any worry, even if it's probably nothing you press that button."
"I will."
"Promise?"
"Promise."
The extracted promise. Making him feel responsible to her. Creating obligation. Building emotional debt.
Aveline turned to Yuki then, and something softened in her expression the efficiency mellowing into something that looked genuinely caring. "You've been incredibly brave today. I know this is overwhelming. But you're in the best possible hands." She gestured at Adrian. "He's annoyingly protective. You'll be sick of safety protocols by morning."
Yuki laughed, surprised. "Thanks. For everything. You've been... really kind."
Aveline paused, and for just a microsecond something flickered across her face surprise? Pleasure? Calculation? Then it was gone, replaced by warmth.
"You're welcome, Yuki. Really." She reached out, squeezed Yuki's shoulder gently—sisterly, protective. "Stay away from windows after dark. Follow Adrian's instructions. Try to get some sleep if you can. And tomorrow we'll figure out the next steps together. Okay?"
"Okay."
Aveline collected her things with efficient grace, then paused at the door. She looked back at them both, and her smile was genuine-looking, warm, almost affectionate.
"Ciao, you two. Try not to burn the place down."
She left, the door closing with a soft click behind her.
The absence of her presence was somehow louder than her presence had been like a vacuum where energy used to be, the air pressure changing when a weather system moved through.
Adrian and Yuki stood in sudden quiet.
"She's..." Yuki began, searching for the right word in the silence.
"Yeah," Adrian agreed, even though he had no idea what adjective she was reaching for. Intense? Competent? Terrifyingly good at seeming human? "She really is."
Dinner
Adrian moved to the kitchen, pulling out ingredients with practiced ease nothing fancy, just pasta, jarred marinara that he'd doctor up with fresh garlic and herbs, garlic bread that would fill the house with the smell of comfort. Real food. Not takeout, not rations, not the kind of fuel you consumed without tasting. Something with care in it.
"You cook?" Yuki asked, surprised, moving to help without being asked instinctive domesticity, the need to be useful.
"Learned from my foster father can only make disappointmens tho," Adrian said, handing her a cutting board and vegetables. "One of the few good things he taught me before..." He trailed off, the sentence dying somewhere between memory and present.
"You don't have to talk about it if—"
"It's okay." Adrian's voice was gentle. "He was a good man. Just... didn't get enough time with him. Car accident." He paused, stirring sauce that didn't need stirring. "
"God, Adrian. I'm so sorry."
"Me too." He added basil, oregano, tasted, adjusted. "But he taught me to cook. Taught me that taking care of people starts with feeding them properly. So I guess he's still here, in a way. Every time I make pasta. It's his favourite."
They worked in companionable silence after that, the ordinary rhythm of meal preparation strangely comforting after chaos. Yuki chopped vegetables with careful precision, lost in the meditation of repetitive motion. Adrian stirred sauce, added seasonings, tasted, adjusted. Simple domestic choreography that felt almost normal.
The kitchen filled with warmth and garlic-scented steam. The pasta water bubbled. The garlic bread crisped in the oven.
For a moment just a moment everything felt suspended. Normal. Almost peaceful.
They ate at the small kitchen table, plates steaming, garlic bread crispy on the edges and soft in the middle. For those few minutes, they were just two people sharing dinner, not witness and protector in a corporate nightmare counting down to mass casualties.
"This is really good," Yuki said, genuine pleasure warming her voice. "Like, restaurant-quality good."
"Thanks. Cooking helps me think. Keeps my hands busy when my brain won't shut up." Adrian smiled slightly. "Which is basically always."
"I get that. That's what yoga does for me. Or reading. Just... something to focus on that isn't the disaster happening around me."
They ate, and talked about small things favorite foods, catastrophic cooking disasters, the particular terror of accidentally setting off smoke alarms at 2 AM and having to explain to neighbors that no, everything's fine, just experimenting with kitchen fire. Normal conversation, blessedly normal, like pressure valves releasing steam before everything exploded.
After dinner, after dishes were washed and put away, after the kitchen was restored to order, they migrated to the living room. The TV played low some mindless sitcom neither of them really watched, just comforting background noise, proof that the world still contained laughter tracks and predictable plots.
Yuki curled on the couch with one of her books, legs tucked under her, looking small and vulnerable in the soft lamplight. The kind of image that reminded Adrian exactly what he was protecting not just a witness, but a person. Someone who read romance novels and did yoga and probably had strong opinions about coffee.
"Have you read this?" she asked suddenly, turning the book to show him the cover a romance novel, couple embracing under moonlight, the kind of book people dismissed but that sold millions for very good reasons.
"Can't say I have," Adrian admitted from his armchair.
"It's SO good." Enthusiasm broke through exhaustion like sunlight through storm clouds. "The author's writing style is just... ugh, perfect. The way she builds tension? The YEARNING? I've been dying to talk about it but no one I know reads romance. They all judge, you know? Like it's not 'real literature' or whatever. As if emotional complexity doesn't count if there's kissing."
"Tell me about it," Adrian said, settling deeper into his chair.
She did. For twenty minutes, she talked about character development and narrative tension and the particular genius of slow-burn romance and why mutual pining was the superior trope and how this author understood the way desire built in the space between touches rather than in the touches themselves.
Adrian caught maybe one plot point in three, understood perhaps half of what she was saying, but he let her talk. Let her be excited about something that wasn't fear or danger or corporate-sponsored murder. Let her be young and enthusiastic and normal.
He watched her eyes light up, watched animation return to her face, watched her hands gesture as she explained why a particular scene was devastating in its restraint.
And maybe, he thought, this was what they were really fighting for. Not just justice or stopping Nexo or exposing corruption. But this the ability for people to curl up with romance novels and get genuinely excited about fictional characters. The ordinary magic of normal life. The right to care about things that didn't matter in the grand scheme but mattered enormously in the small one.
"There's this new restaurant downtown," Yuki said after a while, something wistful entering her voice. "Japanese fusion place. Been wanting to try it for weeks. My coworker kept raving about their ramen said it was like, life-changing good. The kind of broth that makes you reevaluate your priorities."
She gestured vaguely at everything the safe house, the situation, her life on indefinite hold. "But obviously that's not happening anytime soon."
"After this is over, I'll take you," Adrian said. The promise came out firm, certain. "My treat. We'll get that life-changing ramen. You can tell me if it lives up to the hype."
Yuki looked at him, surprised. "Really?"
"Really. Consider it payment for putting up with all this. For being brave when you had every reason not to be."
She was quiet for a moment, studying him in the lamplight. "You know... this actually feels safer than witness protection probably would."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah. It's... personal. You actually care. The Feds would just process me another name on paperwork, another witness to shuffle through systems and forget about until testimony day. You see me." Her voice dropped. "That matters more than I can explain."
The words hung there, heavier than she probably intended, weighted with everything unsaid.
"Could I just stay here?" she asked quietly. "Instead of witness protection? I mean, if that's allowed? If it wouldn't be too much trouble?"
Adrian felt warmth spread through his chest unexpected, pleasant, dangerous. "Honestly? I'd prefer that. You're good company. Especially after being around Elias and Aveline all day."
Yuki laughed. "They're that intense?"
"They're so pragmatic," Adrian said with feeling. "Everything's tactical analysis and probability matrices and optimal resource allocation. Elias treats emotions like operational liabilities, and Aveline—" He paused, searching for words. "Aveline is clinically efficient doesn't even scratch the surface. She makes calculating machines look warm and fuzzy."
Yuki smiled. "But she was nice to me. In her way. Like she was trying."
"I have no idea why," Adrian admitted, genuinely baffled by the afternoon's display. "Aveline doesn't do nice. She does effective. Sometimes those overlap, but it's always strategy, never warmth."
"Maybe she just likes me."
"Aveline doesn't 'like' people. She assesses them. Categorizes them. Determines their utility and threat level."
Yuki smirked. "Maybe I'm special."
"Maybe," Adrian laughed, shaking his head. "God help us all if you've somehow cracked her code. Maybe you'll be the first person she actually connects with instead of just... performs for."
"She performs?"
Adrian hesitated, wondering how much to say. "She's very good at being what people need her to be. Sometimes I wonder if there's anything underneath all that, or if she's just layers of performance all the way down."
Yuki considered this. "That sounds lonely."
"Yeah," Adrian said quietly. "It really does."
Goodnight
Eventually, exhaustion won. Adrian showed Yuki to the guest room, handing her spare blankets and pillows, the domestic ritual of hospitality.
"Guest room's yours for as long as you need it. Bathroom's down the hall, towels in the cabinet. There's extra toiletries under the sink. If you need anything—"
"I'll yell," Yuki finished, smiling. "Thanks, Adrian. For everything. For believing me. For protecting me. For making me feel human instead of just... evidence. Like I matter beyond what I know."
"You do matter. Get some sleep. Tomorrow we figure out next steps."
"Goodnight."
"Goodnight, Yuki."
She closed the door softly. Adrian stood in the hallway for a moment, listening to the quiet sounds of her settling in—rustling fabric, water running, the creak of bedsprings.
He headed to his own room, suddenly exhausted bone-deep weariness that came from adrenaline crash and emotional labor, from being strong for someone else when he barely had strength for himself.
He lay down fully clothed, staring at the ceiling in darkness, listening to the safe house settle around him with its small nocturnal sounds the hum of the refrigerator, the tick of cooling pipes, the whisper of wind through trees outside.
He thought about Dursley's terrified face in those final moments. About Marcus's journal, every page soaked in desperate courage. About Aveline's flawless performance today so warm, so human, so convincing that even knowing what she was, Adrian had found himself almost believing it. About Elias's warnings that attachment was a liability, that witnesses disappeared sometimes even under the best protection.
About Yuki's smile over dinner, how normal it had felt cooking together, talking about books and restaurants and life beyond this nightmare.
For a moment tonight just a moment he'd almost forgotten. Almost forgotten about the serum with its 99.7% fatality rate, about the distribution timeline counting down like a bomb timer, about tens of thousands of potential casualties whose deaths would be called "complications" in some corporate report.
For a moment, they'd just been two people sharing dinner. Making pasta. Talking about romance novels.
And maybe, he thought as sleep finally pulled him under like a tide, maybe that was what made all of this worth it. Not just stopping the villains or bringing down Nexo or exposing corruption to sunlight.
But protecting those small moments of normalcy. The ability to get excited about fictional characters. To want to try new restaurants. To feel safe enough to be fully, messily, wonderfully human.
Outside, Metro City hummed its nocturnal song sirens and traffic and the endless pulse of survival, of people living and dying and loving and fighting in the spaces between streetlights.
Tomorrow would bring new problems, new threats, new battles.
Tomorrow, Aveline would return, and he'd have to watch her perform humanity again, never quite sure what was real and what was calculation.
Tomorrow, Nexo would move closer to distribution, and they'd have to move faster, smarter, better.
But tonight..tonight, one person was safe.
One person was sleeping peacefully in his guest room, maybe dreaming about life-changing ramen and romance novel endings where everyone got what they deserved.
That had to count for something.
That had to be enough.
Adrian closed his eyes, hand resting on the panic trigger on his nightstand, ready to wake at the first wrong sound.
And somewhere in the darkness, the city kept spinning, kept breathing, kept surviving another night.
One moment at a time.
One protected life at a time.
It was all they could do.
So they did it.