Bright Eyes

35. Operation Anon

Today 8:23 PM

Hi is this Christopher Alexander's
number

Yes. This is Christopher Alexander.
Who is this if I may ask?

My identity's not important now.
You and your friends should meet
me on Saturday 7 pm at old man
grump.. Ive got something
important to tell you

Wait. Hold on there. How do you
expect me and my friends to meet
up with you if we don't know who
you are? How are we supposed to
trust you?

You've probably heard about what
happened to my friends Lyn and
Max. Seems like the whole school's
heard about it. We can't risk falling
into another cruel prank

But thats the thing I want to talk
to you and your friends about

Today 8:47 PM

I know who did it..I know whos
behind all this

If you can give me a chance please

Today 9:06 PM

I'm not an enemy I swear

All I ask is a chance that's all

If you'll just let me.. PLEASE

Damien gave the messages another glance, reading them over one last time, before he handed the phone back to Sander. "So," Damien said, looking up at Sander from where he sat on the edge of his bed, "any idea who they are?"

    Sander shook his head, took his seat next to Damien. "No clue," he said. "Except whoever they are, they're probably someone from school. There's no way they could've known what happened to Max and Lyn if they weren't."

    Damien nodded, and said nothing more.

    "So," said Sander, after a moment's silence, "you think we should?"

"It's sketchy, I'll tell you that," Damien said, his leg bouncing up and down in thought. "But there's this fifty-fifty to it. What if it's another attack? What if we agree to meet up, then we end up cornered, and they get a good shot at us? But then what if it isn't? What if they're telling the truth?"

    Sander let out a sigh, taking off his glasses and dropping his phone onto the bed. He ran a hand down his face, and allowed his body to plummet down onto the mattress, next to Damien. Shaking his head, then lifting one hand to rub at his eyes, he said, "I want a break from all this. From whoever's out to get us in school, even from Crystalline and training with Mister Bato. Just a pause, just for a while—that would be healthy, I think . . . "

    Damien chuckled. "Don't we all?" Yet his chuckle was devoid of any real humor, Sander noticed, dying out as quickly as it left Damien's lips.

    For a beat too long, all was quiet. Too quiet, in Sander's opinion. He removed his forearm from where he rested it on his forehead, opened his eyes to look up at Damien who still sat on the edge of the bed, the look on his face serious, gazing absently at Sander's bed across the room, or perhaps staring straight at nothing at all. Damien's leg still moved up and down, the rhythm strangely noiseless that Sander could hear nothing, yet he could still feel the pattern of slight dips and rises of the mattress beneath his torso, and that's how he knew—

"You're thinking of something, aren't you?" Sander said, despite not needing to ask. Having befriended and lived with Damien these past months, he knew his roommate's habits by now.

"Mmhmm," Damien hummed in response. "Yeah . . . Lots of things." He glanced down at his leg, the heel of his foot tapping against the wooden floor, and said, "It's not just this mess we're in I'm thinking about—whoever's behind what happened to Max and Lyn, this thing with Mister Brighteyes and Crystalline. I mean, it isn't just those I'd want a break from."