Up In Arms

Chapter 9

"What do you know about Silvershot?" I asked when the conversation came to a lull.

After successfully finding a provider for his crossbow bolts, Tenpin and I were hanging around my car and exchanging small-talk as he checked every bolt for flaws. Silvershot was out of the base – off to kill some poor asshole – and so were Thunderclap and Lockheed – they had a 'meeting' to attend. Winterfall was still out on her mission, so it was just the two of us left to hold down the fort.

"Not much, I'll tell you that. We all know a few basic things about her, but everything else is either speculation or observation." Tenpin snorted, a ghost of a smile appearing. "She must have driven her old partner crazy."

I narrowed my eyes. She had a partner? Past tense, they weren't around anymore? How did Tenpin know about this partner?

"Who?" I realized that I growled the word out and tried to calm myself down.

Wow, me. Possessive much?

Tenpin either didn't notice, or he was a really good actor. "Yeah, never met the guy though. I wonder if they're even still in touch."

Now he seemed to realize that I was struggling against my confusion, suspicion, and a stubborn remainder of unjustified possessive anger. I didn't even know Silvershot that well yet! Yes, she's my soulmate, but that doesn't mean that I can get possessive over her.

Stupid soul-tie.

"We don't naturally pop out like this." Twirling a bolt in one hand, he sat on the edge of the trunk as he explained. "And we certainly wouldn't have grouped and resigned ourselves to work together like this. Our group is one of many, and we all link back to yet another group of assassins, the group that trained and named each and every one of us."

"They train assassins in pairs, one boy one girl, and the pairs usually grow really close by the end of the training but only a rare few have grown romantic relationships. The whole point of having a boy training with a girl – and vice versa – is to help them become both familiar with the other sex and to be able to further resist their 'charms' and whatever."

"And these pairs, they usually keep in touch?" I asked, my confusion gone for the most part.

"If they aren't assigned to the same group, yeah. My partner, Jadelock, and I try to call each other at least once a month, but mostly we just troll each other with memes." He admitted. "Winterfall doesn't talk about her partner, but Thunderclap and Lockheed were partners and I'd say they 'keep in touch'."

I nodded and leant against a post in the underground parking facility to think. Training partners rarely became romantically attached, and knowing Silvershot's personality, I find it hard to believe that she would grow close to anyone. She definitely acted like she only tolerated this group and would leave if she had the chance. As I asked around and learnt more about her, it became easier and easier to see how she treats me differently than the rest of the group.

Other than shooting me three times, but that's a given.

The sound of a motor was accompanied by the ringing of a bicycle bell, and we both looked around my car to see Silvershot go deeper into the hidden parking garage on a sleek silver motorcycle, followed by a much slower-traveling Winterfall on a regular, cliché basket bike. Seeing us, she adjusted her course and came to a panting stop and rested a forearm on the side of my car.

Her ponytail had partially come undone and she had a few smudges of dirt here and there, but she had a triumphant – if tired – smile as she caught her breath.

"What's up?" Tenpin asked.

"Mission went better than expected." She replied, taking her hair out of the ponytail before running her fingers through it. "But damn that school has high security. I might have been able to get in on my own, but the uniform helped redirect some questions."

And the fact that she looked flawlessly eighteen. Or because she was 5'4" at the tallest.

"What's up with you guys?"

Tenpin shrugged. "Nothing much, checking crossbow bolts and talking about partners."

"Oh," she smiled, "how is Jadelock?"

"Very 'Doge' and 'Success Kid', so she finished a mission and is riding that high of a job flawlessly completed." He replied.

I snorted back a laugh. "You can tell her emotions from the memes she sends you?"

Tenpin smiled, a lighthearted and wistful look in his eyes. "Yeah, for the most perceptive person since Sherlock Holmes, she's surprisingly easy to read."

Winterfall and I shared a look at that, hiding smiles at his blindness. Looks like we both ship it.

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