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* Italics means thoughts.

Chapter 16; Who do you trust?

Oliver had never been one to distrust people. It might even be a considered flaw of his. He just trusted people easily and a lot of times, just saw the good in them, not any of the bad. Though there were still some people who he disliked, that was a rare occurrence for him. It just wasn't in his nature to distrust someone. Part of the reason could be that his close friends have been extremely loyal. Unfortunately, his trusting nature had taken a beating after being in the Enhancement Program, making him a little more wary. And his trusting nature sometimes got him into a trouble.

So it was no surprise when he had voted to stay with the crew at the dam base. Oliver was still a trusting person.

While that's true for Oliver, Onier was a little more hesitant with trust. In actuality, that's not exactly true. Onier was just more reserved than Oliver. He just rarely put all of his chips in the pot, per se. So while he still was in agreement with his friends about staying, he was just on edge about it, to the point of almost paranoia. Oliver was convinced the only person he trusted completely was Amyna.

And then there was Amyna. The female of the group was more trusting than Oliver but not quite as paranoid as Onier. Not that anyone was as paranoid as him. Amyna trust someone but not until they've earned it. Though, if she did trust you, she was one who would always, always have your back.

So when they decided that they would stay, nobody in the trio was really surprised. Although Onier agreed only grudgingly. "What d'you guys think?" Olive inquired. "We're all agreed?"

"Yup," Amyna agreed. "They seem nice enough and they didn't kick us out after what happened with Nightwrath last night. I'm all for giving them a chance. Onier?"

"I'd still prefer to be on our own-"

"Shocker," Amyna said sarcastically, "We all know you would Mr. Anti-social."

"Oh, stow it, Myna." Onier snorted. "But yeah, I'm willing to give it a shot also."

Rex peeked his head into the room and chipped in. "Oh, good, it get really boring her when I'm the only teen. And Noah had school, soooo yeah."

The three other teens stared for a second. After they had finished answering, or sometimes in Oliver's case, dodging the questions, Oliver claimed to he tired but in reality, they were just having a meeting. And apparently Rex had been listening in. Maybe into the entire conversation.

"Really, Rex? Wow, real mature." Amyna asked at the same time Onier said, "Snooping is not becoming for you."

Rex shrugged cockily. "What can I say? I'm awesome. So you guys really are staying?"

"Yeah, at least for a while. No promises on whether its permanent." Oliver said. "Depends on how we settle in and how much we bug you guys."

Amyna started to add something to that but it was lost in a yawn as she stood up before trying again. "I said, I don't know you guys but I'm heading to bed. Y'know, beauty sleep, early training and all that."

Onier shrugged and followed, also heading to bed but not before escaping some of Oliver's quips about his beauty sleep. Onier just shrugged in response, probably rolling his eyes too but resisted the bait.

Oliver stared at Rex, seeing as he was the last one there and had had plopped down onto Amyna's now vacant chair. A few seconds of awkward silence passed before Rex decided to break it.

"Soooooooo, what was life like in your forest base thing?"

"It was pretty good, if not dull on occasion." The white haired teen replied. "Amyna would normally be working on whatever her tech project of the week was while Onier and I would rotate the monitoring duties, though a lot of times we would doze off or play the radio or scout a nearby town and whatnot. Also on occasion, we'd have a 'mission,'" Oliver made air quotes around the last word. "To try and recruit a new EVO but we never were successful. We'd also do activities together, like a board game or just goof off. It was actually pretty fun."

Another short awkward pause. "How 'bout you, Rex?"

"Just average life at Providence" Oliver nodded. "Well, it was pretty retinue days, training, meetings, in free time I would play video game, basketball or chill with Noah. Or we'd have a mission."

"Who's Noah?" Oliver asked in confusion, not having met the other blonde teen.

"Noah's my best friend. We play basketball and other stuff a lot whenever I have some time I'm not being looked over by White or Six." Rex explained.

Oliver nodded and was silent for a moment preparing to ask another question but before he did, a wave of fatigue washed over him. And Oliver wasn't one who was fun to be around when he was tired. So Oliver excused himself and headed to bed.

As the teen slipped into the room he had been given, he felt an icy chill run down his spine. He shuddered but wrote it off as just his paranoia. Man, he was turning into Onier.

Finally pushing away his sense of foreboding he managed dozed off.

Author's Note; Hey, once again guys, it's good to be back and I am sorry for the massive delay on an update. I've got lots of stories going and then ral life stuff so this kept getting pushed back. . .and back. . .but it's finely here and I hope it wasn't a disappointment. Oh, and thanks to my Betas. Anyway, Project X is still going (It'll still be going for. . .well, a very, very long time but I'll stop advertising for it, since I am sure you're all fed up with it.) Until next update, Baldore out!