Hello, Hello! Chapter 3 is up 🌊 🌊 🌊

Nine POV

Six is sleeping restlessly in the spare room of our current safe house – my penthouse in the John Hancock centre. My foot taps the tiled kitchen floor in an irregular pattern, waiting for Marina to return from the spare room with a report on Six's wellbeing.

John is currently sitting on the balcony with Sarah, and they are enjoying the sunrise. I'm far too nervous for that, normally at this time of day I would be out training, but I can't bring myself to do it. I haven't seen her in years. Years.

After Six fainted I quickly evacuated her from the Mog hive, and headed straight here. John and the others, bar Sarah, blew up a few things and met me at the penthouse. I'm not sure what is happening at the Mogadorian base right now, but it can't be pretty. Man.

John/Four POV

I look through the thick glass door at Nine, who is tapping his foot and muttering to himself; he looks really stressed. Six wasn't in very good condition when we got back, but we can only hope that she can still function properly, and by that I mean still fight and survive. I'm not sure what we'll do if she can't. I mean, she's a great friend, but we can't keep her if she's a liability. We took a huge risk in rescuing her from the Mog base, but we can't take the risk of keeping her here if she can't function or if they.. changed her.

I squeeze Sarah's hand, silently telling her to come inside with me. We situate ourselves on the white leather couch and wait for Marina. Eight walks in casually, grabs a green apple from the table and sits near us. He looks at ease but you can tell he is turning something through his mind.

Marina enters the kitchen area and everyone looks up. "Where is Ella?" she asks.

"Sleeping, she had a long night." Eight replies.

That seems fair enough, she is only ten and could do with some rest, especially after all she did to help with Six's evacuation.

"She deserves it after last night. Okay," says Marina, "Status report, Six has a concussion, sprained ankle and multiple burns and cuts on her, I fixed most of them but I can't do concussions. My legacy isn't strong enough, at least not at the moment. So now she's physically fine, but..."

We all know what the Mogadorian base can be like, having spent time there ourselves, and the fact that Six is still alive is a miracle, even with the Loric charm broken, but we can't assess her mental condition until she wakes up. But the question niggles at the back of my mind, why keep her alive? Why her and not Five?

Six POV

I wake up in an unfamiliar room, and freeze, sweat gathering at the nape of my neck. Silently, I assess the situation, everything seems to be in order, and I feel better than I have for a long time, despite the throbbing at the crown of my head. I slowly drag the covers from my body and pad across the fluffy carpet to the door. No shoes, I wonder who took them off. I wonder where I am. I wonder.

I can hear soft voices coming from the hallway, not the rough, sleazy voices of Mogadorians. Voices I haven't heard in forever. Loric voices. I wrench open the door with new-found strength and move slightly faster down the hallway. They came for me. I'm not alone. Turning one final corner I am met with five familiar faces, thank god. The room goes quiet. Wonderful.

Nine POV

All of a sudden the door knocks open and Six stand in its frame. All talking stops. She stays there, hesitant, does she trust us? Does she know us?

"How are you feeling, Six?" asks Marina in her kind voice, trying to ease the tension in the room.

She just nods, and mimes a pen and paper. Why isn't she talking to us? What happened in the Mog base?

I can't speak , she writes.

Oh. The silence suffocates me. I process this information. Nobody really knows how to respond. I mean, I'm glad to have Six back, but is she still Six? I could never imagine the snarky, annoying Six as a mute.

"Ever?" Sarah queries; way to make her feel better (note extreme sarcasm).

Temporarily.

There is a collective sigh of relief throughout the room as everyone releases the breath they had been holding. John checks his watch, 1:04 pm, and announces that it is time for training. Six gets up to follow but I gently push her back down with one hand, no way has she recovered that quickly.

I'm fine, leave me alone

I give her a hard stare and she coldly returns it. There's nothing I can do to change her mind now. Reluctantly I release her and we tread down the hallway to the training room. Sandor fitted it out with a vast variety of high tech equipment when we lived here, and I must say it's pretty amazing. You can program fake Mogadorians to practice with, but we prefer to train one on one. John states that we will be playing capture the flag, and we divide in to teams of three: Sarah, Eight and Six vs John, Marina and I.

Ella has woken up but decides to opt out of this session. She is going to referee and announces the beginning of the game.

Our team agrees to watch out for Six and go easy on her, so that she isn't too stressed. We decide to attack Eight so as to keep him busy whilst Marina sneaks through and obtains the flag. John is distracting eight by luring him over to the side of the gymnasium and I am about to throw a punch at his back when I am swept off my feet.

Stunned, I look up and see Six smirking at me. I quickly return to my feet and soon we are brawling each other on the left side of the gym. She seems the same as before her capture and for a moment I forget everything that has happened. I punch, she blocks. She kicks, i turn. I kick her to the ground and she freezes on the spot, eyes welling with tears. What happened? This isn't the Six I know.

Eight has noticed the interaction and picks her up, carrying her to the side of the training room before re-joining the game. Our team does win in the end, possibly because Eight's only had two fighters. But who knows?

Tonight Marina is going to try to heal Six's voice, and although it might be necessary, Eight and I decide not to tell the others about her small breakdown during capture the flag. She doesn't need any more unwanted attention than she already has.

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