Aiden and I arrived back at the foxhole not thirty minutes later. Aiden didn't stay for long though, just summed up the last few hours of our lives in about two sentences then ran off somewhere. Probably to do some soul searching or something- He's a bit of a prick.

I, however, couldn't even stay for a second. I walked in through the door and slumped straight to the room that Ray had kindly provided and sagged into a bed. I curled myself up into a tight ball on the creaky mattress just laid on the floor and tried to force myself to sleep.

It was about 8pm when we returned and it was nearing to 11pm when I finally found myself wanting to go to sleep. Considering I'd been up all night yesterday and had a fairly knackering day today I was surprised I wasn't out like a light but there was just too much on mind.

I'd done my job for Ray now. There was nothing else I had to do. Tomorrow, I could go home and return my life to at least a bit of its original normality. Mel will come with me, she wouldn't stay with these criminals around here for longer than she has to even if she did actually know the vigilante before today.

Just after 11 o'clock rolled around, Melina strolled into the room. At first I didn't know where she was heading to but then she perched on the floor by the side of my mattress and laid down so her head was resting on my stomach. For a minute, she didn't move or talk just inhaled and exhaled fairly louder.

I moved my arm instinctively to rest over her front and she brought up her hand to make circular patterns on the back of my arm. I shivered a little at the ticklish feeling which caused her to laugh and finally roll over and tap me.

'Clark, are you asleep?'

'No.' I mumbled. 'Why?'

'... I want to take you somewhere.'

'Now?' I closed my eyes and frowned. 'Will it take long?'

'It'll take as long as it takes.' Melina smiled giddily jumping to her feet. She reached down and grabbed my arms, pulling me up with all her strength till I reached my feet.

'I am tired, Mel.' I whimpered, leaning my head down onto her shoulder since we were basically the same height. '-and I am trying to sound like a whiny bitch here, are you sure it can't wait?'

'It can't. I know you've had a busy day but we're going to be even busier tomorrow since Ray and Tobias are cracking into the system now and tomorrow we get to work on releasing that list through to the public. We have a very big problem though.'

'What?' I leaned up, opening my eyes as wide as I could as she led me out of the room and away from my not-comfortable-but-good-enough-to-sleep-in bed.

'Well, WKZ are being paid by Blume to only show information and footage that they want out so the station is biased. Our problem is that Blume had this arrangement with the big bosses of WKZ who basically control everything. We have no idea if we reveal the information to a broadcaster if they'll be trustworthy enough to report on it.'

'Let me guess, you and we have to find a solution to this problem. Why can't Ray do it?' I growled. 'Why are we being made to do everything?'

'We've barely done anything, Clark.' Melina rolled her eyes. 'Besides, I'd rather go back to our lives once I'm certain that Blume are gone for good rather than leaving it to a bunch of old timers.'

'Old timers that you've known a long time.' I mumbled, being tired I was.

'Oh?' Melina stepped away from me. 'Oh! So, I'm going to get sass from you and bitterness because I didn't tell you one thing. One tiny thing that doesn't even matter- Yes, Aiden told me that you know that two of us have been working today and no, I won't be giving you examples of that type of work.'

'Keep your secrets, Mel!' I rolled my eyes, holding my hands up in surrender. 'If you didn't trust me enough with it or if you just didn't want me in that life of yours then that's fine. But don't you dare roll your eyes at me because I don't want to stick around for the finale. I've done my job, I don't need to be here.'

'Yes you do.' Mel's entire aura around her changed and she grabbed my hand from my side. 'I need you here to keep me sane. Being around these men makes me forget where the line is. These people can go as far as killing with no mercy, I will never become that, I will never need to be but only if you stay with me.'

'... I can't, Mel.' I whimpered, trying to keep up a strong demina. 'I don't do the field. I'm so scared. I almost died today, you expect me to just suck that up and go for it again. No, I want to have a normal life, Mel- or rather, as normal a life as a person like me can get.'

Mel sighed and took me by the hand, leading me through the empty computer room and up into the corridor that led outside. She marched me out to the car that Aiden had said was for us and guided me to the passengers seat.

'Where are we going, Mel? It's eleven o'clock at night. No one's going to be out.' I mumbled.

'Stop moaning.' She muttered back, jumping into the drivers seat and sticking her key into the ignition. 'I'm taking you somewhere you need to go. Especially if you'd like to survive the next few weeks.'

'What do you mean?'

'Aiden has us to help him out in a more… delicate task.' Mel pulled the car away from the warehouse and headed towards the highway. 'I'm well aware that you're going to say no but you have to hear me out.'

I shrugged my shoulder as I turned on the air conditioning for the car. Chicago was getting hotter around this time of year, even the night times were too warm for me which might be down to the fact that I was so used to terrible british rain for 18 years of my life.

'What is it?' I prompted her after a few minutes.

'I- … Umm... I'll tell you when we get where we're going.' Mel stared straight ahead and didn't look my way again until we reached our destination thirty minutes later.

I jumped out of the car awkwardly and followed after Melina who was already heading towards and inside a large lit up building.

'It's this way.' She mumbled, taking my hand and leading me through a pair of double doors. 'It's very late, there shouldn't be many people here. They only stay open this night every so often, I had Aiden call in to ask them to stay open later for the two of us.'

'Why?' I mumbled but Mel ignored me as she marched me up to a receptionist and smiled sweetly at him.

The receptionist was young, his hair was like a fuzzy mop on top of his head and he still had acne spots from puberty layering over his face. He smiled right back at Mel and then waved at me beside her.

'Hi, we made an appointment. The name's... Shazland.' Mel grinned.

'Oh yes, you must be Ann! Yes, I was told to keep an extra look-out for you. Boss' orders. There's a bag made up for you right here.' The young boy beamed like a light, he reached beside him and pulled forward a large, cramped full duffel bag and headed to Mel through the window.

'Thank you very much.' Mel laughed.

'No, no, thank you.' The boy laughed right back. 'And welcome to Point Blank, Chicago's biggest and best shooting range this side of the river.'

'... Shooting range...' I whispered.

Mel turned to me, her face pale as sheets as she led me away from the boy quickly saying her thank you's and goodbyes.

'You took me to a freaking shooting range?' I angrily whispered. 'Why would you think that's okay? I'm out of here, I have more important things to do- like sleep.'

I went to leave but Mel grabbed my arm hard and forced me closer to her. 'You have to stay because we have important matters to think about. Plus, how the hell do you live in America and not know how to shoot a gun? That's like blasphemy.'

'Number one, quite easily actually and number two, I'm British. The fact that I'm not drowning in Boston is probably blasphemy enough.' I mumbled back. 'I don't want to know how to shoot.'

'Please, come on. We came all this way, you should at least try it.' Mel batted her little eyelids. 'I'd do it for you.'

'Don't!' I warned.

'Okay fine, you don't have to shoot, just watch me. Would that be okay?'

No it wasn't, but what choice did I have. Mel would probably cut me up and serve me to the poor for lunch if I disobeyed her again. I groaned a quiet yes and she laughed, knowing she'd got her way and smiling about it.

'Take these.' Melina handed me a pair of earmuffs, which I quickly slipped over my head, before leading me into a fairly loud yet almost empty room. The shooting room was ten lanes, each one with a stall like structure to separate them out. At the bottom of the range were ten dummy pictures in a row each with circles marking how much points they were worth if you hit a certain point.

There were only two other people in the room so Mel and I quickly walked down to the end and set up the gear she'd been given by the receptionist. While Mel got to work putting bullets into clips and then clips into guns, I shed out of my scarf and hat which I'd been wearing all night since the room was piping hot.

'Take this too.' Mel turned to me when I was down, a gun in her hands, pointing the handle my way while she held the barrel.

'What happened to "I don't have to shoot, just watch me" like two minutes ago?' I growled.

'I know you're a hardcore pacifist who can't fire a gun at anyone innocent and blah, blah, blah but it's not like you're actually shooting a person is it? It's just a little bit of practice, like when we used to shoot nerf guns as kids. It didn't hurt anyone did it?'

Mel kind of took the words right out of my mouth so I just took the gun quietly from her and dropped my hands to my side without a sound.

'So... what's the problem already?' I mumbled after a few seconds of silence between the two of us as the rest of the room was alive with the sound of gunshots.

Melina grabbed a gun of her own and fired two shots down the alley without even blinking, both her shots hit the target around the thigh which caused Mel to growl but she then turned her attention entirely to me and sighed.

'Ray and Tobias are having difficulty reading the information that the bug has given us. They seem to have some sort of code blocking it- which I've never even heard of before, by the way. Ray is pretty sure that if we find the code slash password then we should be able to get to the list and whatever other secrets that blume is hiding.'

'Where are we supposed to fit into Aiden's little plan then?' I mumbled in confusion, I held the gun to my side gently. I didn't want to lift it up, I didn't even want to look at it while Mel fired another two shots, this time one hit the stomach and the other hit the wrist beside it.

'Well, in order to find out the password we need to ask around a bit. Aiden has asked the two of us to accompany him on some little pick-up tasks so we can get the information we need.'

'No.' I replied back instantly, taking a step back from her and away from the gun she was firing. 'Count me out. I know where you're going with this, Mel, that's why you're taking so long to get to the point. I will not involve myself in any threatening or brutal interrogation of any sort.'

'You don't have to do anything!' Mel growled to me. 'Aiden will get the information, we just have to have his back and protect him when he gets these people we need.'

'What people?' I practically snarled at her.

'The fixers. The people that Blume are hiring to kill people.' Mel snarled back at me except she was a lot more threatening. 'I'll stop you before we get into an argument about this now. You don't need to decide right away. It is your choice whether you help or not. I just need you to know that I will be helping Aiden and I might make a name for myself in the hacker community. People might start coming for me and- well, it won't be that much of a stretch to find you so I want you to be prepared for that.'

…

'How dare you!' I whispered before erupting behind her. I felt eyes from around the room look to me but I didn't care, all gun shots stopped. I stomped forward so that my face was right at her and screamed right into Mel's face.

'How absolutely dare you, Melina! No, we are having an argument about this right now. How dare you say that to me, "won't be that much of a stretch to find you" after everything I have fucking done over the last few years to protect you, to protect your family, to protect everyone. This is how you fucking treat me, how you talk to me about this kind of thing.'

Mel flinched but placed her gun down on the table beside her and stared.

With one arm, I slammed my fist down onto the counter in front of me hard and felt the pain throb up my arm. I then used it to point at her then jab her hard in the shoulder. 'I deleted everything. My life. My family. My name. All because you slipped up. You! Not me! And now you're going to do it again and say that if I get found out then that's basically my fault for not trying enough.'

'That's not what I meant, Clark, I just meant-'

'I know exactly what you fucking meant!' I snapped. 'It's the same as why you didn't tell me about Aiden. You know I hate this life, you know that I hate what I've had to become and that this was all a mistake but now that I'm in it, there's no way out. Yet you will risk everything that I worked so hard to protect because you want to be the fucking hero.'

'Clark, I-'

'That's not my god-damn name!' I squeezed my finger down on the trigger and seven consecutive bullets ricocheted down the barrel of the gun and onto the target down the alley but I didn't look as the anger consumed me all over.

'... I'm so sorry...' Mel whispered. 'I'm so sorry, Percilla.'