Secrets Upon Secrets

12 - Steven Onyx

"Would you hurry up?" she criticized. Her voice carried all the way to me at full volume, but the people around us seemed unbothered. Just like that time she said my real name out in public but no one heard it besides me.

How does she even do that? I wondered, Does she really have two abilities like people say? I wondered.

"Don't see how that's any of your business," she said in that weird way again.

Crap, I didn't realize I was projecting, I thought, trying to make sure it was in my own head.

"You know, for a telepath, you're not very perceptive," she told me.

I groaned, and she shushed me.

Can't you keep that mental? She thought loudly.

She glared at me, as I mentally cursed her out. (In her head. Intentionally.)

So where's your little friend? I asked her, quite a while later. She pissed at you for leaving her out?

She frowned.

"Something like that," she said. Something about her tone was off. She didn't sound quite like she usually did, or at least how I'd become accustomed to hearing her. Usually she sounded overconfident, borderline cocky, and always straight up malicious. But right in that moment she almost sounded like a normal person. (Not anything positive of course, that's too far of a stretch, but she was approaching neutral at least.)

The two of us returned focus to our mission.

We were currently on route to the coordinates where we suspected this Robin guy to be.

I don't really trust Grey, but so far she hasn't crossed me.

Besides, she has a lot more dirt on me than I do on her. The entire time she's been in my range I've been in her head, listening to her whispers. But for all of that snooping the closest thing to a real slip up she's done is just now, where she was vaguely upset about her friend being mad at her.

(Yes, I could tell that she'd been making fake slips. As good as she may be, I'm no noob at this game of secrets.)

And either she's actually as conceited and surface-y as she's been portraying herself, (which is entirely possible, and probably probable, seeing as who she is,) or she's just using it as a cover and is actually considering every angle, and not just the most obvious ones.

If she is doing what I suspect, then I have exactly zero chance of coming out on top of our encounter. She is going to use me how she sees fit and I'll only get out of this deal what she wants me to get out of it.

Let's hope I'm just paranoid, I thought (hopefully to myself).

She didn't seem to react to that at all so I suppose I didn't accidentally transmit it.

I've been doing that a lot lately.

Over the course of practically my whole life, I've been training to be a Hero. Even before I unlocked my ability at age ten. (A year younger than most.)

Once I'd triggered my ability I worked day and night to stretch its limits.

And while I succeeded, and can effortlessly listen in undetected and transmit fluidly, the drawback is I often overhear thoughts that I'd rather not, or transmit when I'm not trying to.

I'd managed to hide this fact from most people but that doesn't always work, and I'm incredibly afraid- correction- I'm terrified of Grey finding out.

Neither the Midnight Sea nor my greatest personal enemy, neither of them can ever know that my powers are messing me up.