Chapter 10

The Bet

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4pm - 56 hours to deadline expires…

Angie pushed the heavy port of the warehouse open, just enough for her to get through with all her stuff. The creaking sound of the metal sliding across the coquet floor, echoed through the old building that was poorly restored with different kinds of three and metal, along with furniture that seemed to be found on a scrap yard. Angie had to use her feed to push the door open, pressing her back against the wall as she did. "I'm back! And I got all the stuff!" She yelled out, making her voice resound through the partly empty building as well.

"Hey guys! Fireball is back!" Anthony called out from his relaxed place on the sofa, practically filling out the entire furniture.

"There you are, shorty. What took you so long?" Clara asked as she walked up to her to help her in with all the stuff she had collected.

"Oh, there was just something I had to do before I headed home. It was no big deal," Angie said with a sly smirk across her lips, and closed the heavy port behind her, after she had rolled in the filled wheelbarrow. Luckily, Jim had allowed her to take the old power generator with her, when he had installed the new one, so at least she had crossed that point of her list as well.

"Woh! Look at that loot! Have you emptied a scrap yard or something?" Xavier asked as him and his brother got up to her to rummage through the wheelbarrow.

"What the heck is this for? Are you planning on rubbing Atlantis?" Wyatt asked scornfully when he found one of the oxygen cylinders in the pile, coursing Xavier to chuckle as well.

"Hey! Keep your absurd amount of hands off this stuff. It's not for children," Angie said sharply, but with a slight teasing undertone. "Now shoo, go play with the power outlet or something," she said and shooed them a few steps back from the wheelbarrow.

"Ooh, someone is cranky~" Xavier said scornfully, but both boys did as they were told and kept their hands off her stuff.

"So this is what Dustin told you to get? It's certainly not easy to figure out what's going on inside that guy's mind," Clara said and crossed her arms while she looked over the pile of stuff, Angie had collected throughout the day.

"Wait. Did Dustin ask you to do this?" Wyatt asked questioning.

Angie nodded her head with a proud smirk and placed her hands on her hips. "Mhm. He specifically asked me to fulfil this mission for him," she said.

"Well that makes it official then. The boss has lost his mind," Xavier said scornfully. However, he immediately shut his eyes and cringed when Angie frowned at him and got ready to punch him with her fist. Luckily, for him, Angie froze when she heard that one voice raise above the others.

"Now, look who decided to show up before the sun goes down," Dustin said and laid his arms on the railing of the warehouse' upper level, where his personal room was located. "And you actually managed to find a good amount of stuff already. Good job shorty~," He teased and pushed himself off the railing to walk down the stairs. "You didn't get as much as I had hoped, but it's acceptable," He added as he walked up to look through all the stuff in the wheelbarrow. Opposite to Xavier and Wyatt, Dustin was fully allowed to look through the pile of things.

Angie groaned and crossed her arms. "Well sorry that the junk you've written on that list is impossible to find," she muttered a little annoyed. It would be nice just being praised without getting a criticism thrown in the face as well, for a change. But that wasn't Dustin's way to do it.

"The things I need is not hard to gather. You just have to know where to look," he simply said. Despite the fact that he obviously knew where the things where, himself, he didn't seem to have any plans about sharing it with her. "You don't look closely enough, Angie. Sometimes you'll have to dig deeper to see what you're dealing with. That's why you're still on the newbie's team~," Dustin said and gave her another of his 'I know best' smirks. "But if you keep up the good work, you definitely got the potential to be a master thief," he added and laid his hands on his back as he passed her, still smirking.

Hearing him say that, Angie's expression changed. "A prof? You mean like you? Ha!" She said scornfully as she let a smug smirk spread across her lips. "I could beat your ass any time, Dustin, and you know it," she then said and placed her hands on her hips. This comment made all the others in the room laugh and jump along with the teasing.

"Oooh, she can so beat your ass!" Wyatt teased, making both him and his brother chuckle sneeringly. However, when Dustin firmly hocked his forefinger in the young man's nose ring, they immediately stopped laughing.

"I wonder how long it will take you to break free if I tie your hands on your back and hang you up in your nose ring~" Dustin said with a sly smirk, having Wyatt standing on his tiptoes by pulling up in his nose ring a little.

Wyatt just smiled sheepishly, now chasing his words extremely cautiously. "Heh. I-if I tell you now w-we won't be needing to test it, would we?" He asked a little strained, but Dustin just kept smirking.

"Time will show~" the dark-haired boy said with a low voice before he let go of the nose ring, allowing Wyatt to go free. "But I would like to see you try to compete against me, though I doubt the success is laying ahead of you," Dustin then said with that confident tone in his voice as he headed for the stairs once again.

Angie just smirked when he began to walk away, completely avoiding confronting her. "Aww, what's the matter Dusty?~ Too scare to fight a girl like me?~" she teased as she made a cute, innocent face coursing the other girls in the near to 'Awe' at her.

Dustin stopped where he was and raised a brow, his confident smirk never fading. "Yes…" He then answered and tilted his head a little, still having his back facing the others. "I am scared..." he said before he glanced back at Angie with a teasingly and overacting sad face. "Scared of hurting a little girl and make her cry like a baby~" he said scornfully and pouted out his lip, making the others around them chuckle and 'Ooh' once again.

Angie just rolled her eyes and crossed her arms over her chest. "Like I'm gonna cry, jackass," she said harshly with a smirk, just looking back at him with a certain expression.

Dustin just requited her comment with a chuckle while he shook his head a little. "I have to admit that I like your attitude, shorty~" He said with a slight playful tone as he turned to walk back up to her.

"Ooh, romance~" Wiatt teased and bumped his elbow into Xavier, but both Dustin and Angie just ignored the comment. Instead, they just kept their gaze staring at each other as Dustin stepped up close to the point, where they could see each other's reflections in the other's eyes.

With the confident smirk glued to his face, Dustin looked down at the redhead as if he was looking down at a bug, ready to crush it under his boot. "But there's no point playing games you've already won~" he then said with a low voice, only loud enough for Angie to hear.

This made Angie's firm expression turn into a furious frown against him. Her expression only made the young man smirk more, knowing that he had hit what he aimed at. With that, he turned his back against her once again, but Angie wasn't done with him yet. He only reached to take a few steps before she again raised her voice.

"How about a little bet you and me, between?" Angie suggested with a serious tone in her voice. "If you can proof that I can't beat you, I will never bring up anything like this again," she promised, having the others' eyes move from her to Dustin constantly.

"Oh yeah? And what if you win?" Dustin asked and glanced back at her as he crossed his arms. That question alone let her know that he wasn't going to refuse her challenge. Dustin never ran from a bet if the price was fair. At least in his own opinion.

With her hands held in fists by her sides, Angie raised her chin a little, never once breaking eye contact with him. "You shall admit that you were wrong about me," she said sternly, coursing the others around them to let out quite gasps.

Dustin let his gaze travel through the group of youngsters that now had gathered around the two, watching them from a mindful distance. When his green eyes again fell on Angie, a smirk had made it's way back across his lips. "Alright. If that can shut you up," he said. "We have a bet~"

. . .