A/N: New update! It was supposed to be up on Sunday, but I hit writer's block… Anyways, I hope everyone enjoys it, and as a suggestion…If you want to really get into this chapter, I advise listening to Broken by Lifehouse while reading. Again, please review!
"We're supposed to learn something with Bluetooth devices today," said Robbie.
Imogen barely looked up from her cereal when she said, "I'm not going."
"They won't like that you know, you cannot just skip your classes," replied Robbie.
"I don't care," she muttered. "I'm not going to go."
"Why not? It's not like you Imogen, you always want to go," he said reaching his hand out to touch hers.
She jerked her hand away and stood up.
"I just don't want to go, alright?" she said, and then quickly left the dining hall.
Imogen walked silently down the halls towards her room, arms folded as she went. She didn't get much sleep last night; just the thought of the clothes she had worn on the mission kept her up. She had to get them out of her room, but she knew that she couldn't just give them back to Amanda. That would raise too many questions…so what could she do with them?
"Are you okay?" a voice asked her as she leaned against the wall.
"Fine," she replied, not even looking up.
"I don't believe that," the voice said. "My class is in a few minutes and you are walking in the opposite direction. You love causing trouble in my classes; you are not fine if you're walking away from that."
Imogen looked defiantly into Birkhoff's eyes.
"I just don't feel like going today!" she said.
"I kind of figured that," he replied. "But the thing is, as much as you may want to not come and just lie in bed; it's an important lesson today."
"Already know how to do it," she said.
"Is that so?" he said, raising an eyebrow.
"Yep," she said, popping the 'p' sound.
"Then you don't have to pay attention, but you still have to come," he said.
"What's the point?" she asked.
"Your oh-so-witty attitude will be missed if you don't show up," he answered.
"Who would miss my wit?" she asked.
"It's time to go, and you are going to walk with me so I can make sure that you turn up," Birkhoff said.
Imogen narrowed her eyes once he turned away; she had a feeling that he was avoiding answering. Once they arrived in the class, Imogen sat down near Thom and Jaden; the only seat left free.
"Bluetooth devices! Use 128-bit-link keys to encrypt communication. Crack the key and holy Watergate, Batman!" said Birkhoff, holding up a little gadget.
Imogen couldn't but snort in laughter. Only Birkhoff would bring a superhero into a class about technology. Birkhoff looked sharply at her, but then his lips twitched into a slight smile.
"Any cell phone within range becomes an instant bug," he finished.
Imogen looked down at her allotted equipment and began to work when she heard Thom and Jaden talking.
"Call me," said Jaden, waving a phone suggestively.
"I don't have your number," Thom replied.
"I think you do," said Jaden smugly.
Imogen couldn't help but roll her eyes. They were being so obvious and they would get in trouble with Division if they kept at it.
"Wow, snappy banter. You should write for reality TV," said Birkhoff, leaning towards Thom and Jaden. "Has it really been that long since you've had sex?"
Imogen flinched a little at the last comment, and didn't see Birkhoff's eyes flicker over to her for a brief second. Birkhoff started to walk away when Jaden made another comment about how at some of them have at least had sex, but Imogen just tuned her out. She didn't realize how much her mission was affecting her until those little comments.
Imogen took a deep breath and continued on with her work; if she could just get through the rest of this class, she would be fine. She just needed a little bit of time to recuperate on her own. Imogen knew full well that she couldn't go to anyone in Division about this; not only would they not understand…but it would get her into deep trouble. They would think that she couldn't handle it and then she would be canceled.
A little while later Imogen was walking down the hall around Percy's office when she heard voices coming from inside.
That's strange, she thought. Percy isn't here…
Curiosity getting the better of her, Imogen walked up to the door and pressed her ear against it; trying to hear what the voices were saying.
"Ok cool, but what are we really doing here?" asked the first voice.
"Birkhoff," she muttered.
"Well let's put it this way Birkhoff. You can either help me, or I can tell Percy what you've been doing after hours in the video conference room," said a voice that Imogen recognized as Michael's. "…with the girls of Amsterdam?"
Imogen flinched away from the door and then continued walking down the hallway. Whatever they were talking about in there obviously wasn't that important. She shook her head and went down to the training room, not noticing Thom standing in the shadows as she went.
When she reached the training room, Imogen began to take out her frustrations on one of the dummies.
"Well I was going to ask if you'd spar with me…but judging from the way that you are beating on that, it's not such a good idea is it?" said Robbie, walking towards her.
"No, it's not," she replied, giving the dummy a good hit in the head.
"If that was a person, they'd probably have a concussion by now," Robbie remarked. "What's gotten into you?"
"Nothing," she answered. "I'm fine."
"You're obviously not," he said, grabbing one of her arms. "Seriously, what's wrong?"
"Just leave it Robbie," she said darkly, jerking her arm away.
At that point, Robbie just gave up trying to figure out what was wrong and walked away. Imogen decided to take a break from beating on the dummy. It wouldn't do anyone any good if she burned herself out. She moved to run on one of the treadmills after taking a drink from her water bottle. Just then, someone from Operations stepped out and started to talk to Michael.
"Percy?" asked Michael.
"Nikita," the man from operations said.
With that, each and every single recruit stopped and looked at what was going on. As Michael followed the guy into Operations, leaving Birkhoff behind, people slowly went back to training.
Even though Imogen was now running on the treadmill, she noticed that Alex walked up to Birkhoff-and she couldn't help but eavesdrop.
"Thanks again for helping me with that phone hack," said Alex.
"What? Whatever," Birkhoff said, sounding uninterested.
"The workaround you figured out was genius," Alex continued.
Something about Alex's tone of voice and how she moved slightly towards Birkhoff nearly made Imogen flinch. But Imogen just shook it off and kept running, pretending that she wasn't listening.
"Yeah. Yeah, I'm very brilliant. Now move," he said impatiently, moving her out of the way.
Imogen started to run a little bit faster, ramping up the speed on the treadmill. She had finally decided; she was going to work really hard and just keep herself busy.
Covering up the cracks, she thought. That's what I'm going to do.
"Earlier today, we had a security breach," said Birkhoff, walking down the stairs to the training area while holding a stack of papers.
Imogen was standing in the back row, behind Thom. She didn't want to be noticed; she just wanted to get out of there and go somewhere else.
"Someone entered Percy's office without permission…" Birkhoff continued. "We're going to find that person."
"Psst," a voice whispered to Imogen.
"What do you want Robbie?" she whispered back.
"You ok now?" he asked.
"I'm fine, now be quiet!" she hissed.
"You step forward now, take responsibility, and I will personally put in a word for you," Birkhoff said, pausing for a moment, allowing time for someone to speak up. "Ok…"
Birkhoff proceeded to walk in front of the first row of recruits, looking at them then down to his papers. Imogen could see that if the recruit checked out, that where they were was logged, Birkhoff just moved on silently, not saying a word. When he got to Jaden however, he moved past her while looking down at his sheets, then moved back to stand directly in front of her.
"Where were you at 15:00?" he asked suspiciously.
"In my room," Jaden responded.
"Funny, there's no log of that…" he said, and paused for a moment. "In fact, you were completely off the grid at that point."
"Not my fault," she said, sounding on edge.
"Anyone here that can vouch for her?" he said, raising his voice a little.
There was a moment of silence, during which Imogen noticed Thom turning his head and looking somewhere that was not directly in front of him. But before she could see where he was looking, Birkhoff started talking again.
"I didn't think so," he said, sounding completely satisfied.
"Oh, this is bull. I didn't do anything! You're trying to set me up; you think I don't know that?" Jaden said, voice growing louder towards the end.
She was advancing on Birkhoff before she had even finished speaking, and a few of the male recruits had to step forward to hold her back.
"HEY! What the hell is going on here?" Michael yelled, coming from Operations.
Imogen's lips twitched for a moment. Birkhoff's in trouble! She thought to herself. Imogen couldn't help but snicker, and was dangerously close to laughing out loud when she heard Michael yelling again.
"Everybody get out!" he yelled. "Go!"
Before Imogen made her way out the area and followed the other recruits, she heard Michael say something curious to Birkhoff.
"Look this has nothing to do with the recruits," he said. "I was in Percy's office. If there's any blowback it'll be on me and me alone. You got that?"
Imogen sat in one of the spinning chairs in the computer lab, just spinning around and around and around. She was silent, no humming or anything, and her eyes were closed. The computer was on the home screen…she had only started it up before she had to stop. She just couldn't go any further…or doing anything really, until she dealt with what had happened on the mission.
While spinning around, Imogen heard footsteps; someone came into the computer lab.
"What are you doing?" they asked. It was Birkhoff…
"Spinning around," she replied, not even opening her eyes.
"Why though? Aren't you dizzy?"
"No I'm not…I'm fine."
"Somehow I doubt that," he said, and he held out a hand to stop the chair from spinning.
It came to an abrupt stop, making her face him directly, even though she refused to open her eyes.
"Stop asking me these things ok? I don't want to talk about it," she said, trying to get out of the chair and leave. "I'm dealing with it on my own."
"You don't seem to be doing a very good job at it then. If I can notice, I bet you that Amanda can as well," he replied.
"I said stop," she said, pushing him back a bit so that she could stand.
"You need to talk to someone," he said, moving to grab her arm.
Imogen turned around and swiftly slapped him in the face.
"How can I talk to someone about this, when no one even cares about me? If I tell anyone, I'll get cancelled. Try thinking about that next time!" she said, small tears forming in her eyes.
Imogen turned and quickly made her way out of the computer lab, not even waiting for Birkhoff's response.
"But I care…" he whispered. "Maybe no one else does…but I do."