“No, because you’ve decided to come in here, destroy your life, give it over to this place, and for what?” I asked, raising my arms. “You wanted closure? You wanted to see me again? I’m here, Art. You got closure. Go back to business school, go do normal shit with your life.”
He turned his back and pushed the door with his foot. I placed mind in the doorjamb, keeping it open. “No,” he let out, the echo of his voice softly bounced around his dark room. And on the bed, a teddy.
“Not like Mercy would even let you,” I whispered. “You basically signed your life away. But, that’s fine, because I’m here. And—” My tongue swelled in my mouth as it released I’d been doing a whole lot of yapping.
Artemis looked at me with a slight turn of his head. “And you’re going to protect me?” he asked. “Like you promised? Like you told me, all those nights when you got in from a job too dangerous for me, and I was just glad you made it back—and with fried chicken to sweeten the deal.”
“Yeah, well, you made a deal here, I made a deal there,” I said. “Anyway, I’m training you, so if I can’t protect you, at least you’ll be able to protect yourself.” Looking him up and down. “You’ve put on more muscle.”
“I also learned how to throw a proper punch,” he said. “I got a gym membership, and even put myself in a boxing ring a couple times there. I promised myself I’d hurt you when I saw you again.”
He actually hadn’t changed at all. Artemis was the same as ever, once he’d decided on something, he put his mind to it. It was a little salt in the wound that he’d put his focus on me, to hurt me—but I deserved it. “You did,” I said, turning to show him the light pink-red stains on the back of my shirt.
“I want a new trainer then,” he said, standing straight on at me, his shoulders broad, positioned himself in front of the teddy, as if it was a secret he’d shared with me—and now I wasn’t allowed to know.
“No, you’ll get eaten alive by half these guys, even the women would have you snapped,” I told him. “I think it has to be me. And, you’ve still got to pass a psych eval, so maybe if youact a little insane, Mercy will let you go out and forget this ever happened.”
“Did that all of that yesterday,” he said. “I passed. I’m sane, and I know what I’m doing, and I know what I want.”
I stared, expecting the answer to what he wanted. My stare lingered, I was used to Art being combative and pushing my buttons, but he was more than that now. He was angry, more-so than I’d ever seen him.
“I want to stop bad people from doing bad things,” he said. “I don’t want anyone else to go through what I’ve seen people go through. The governments aren’t doing anything, the billionaires aren’t doing anything, I have a real chance and opportunity to change all of that.” There were tears in his eyes. I stepped closer. “And obviously, you wouldn’t understand that, because you just took any job that came your way, you didn’t even care where it came from.” He sucked back a sob.
“That’s not completely true, Art,” I said. “I’ve tried to do what’s best, I’ve tried to put bad guys in the ground. And sure, I’ve helped a couple of them get away with shit, but I don’t want to see people trafficked and forced into slavery.” I pulled him into an embrace. He fought it weakly before giving in, his sobs caught on my t-shirt as his arms wrapped around my back and softly patted at where he’d been scratching last night.
***
Training was going to be brutal. One of the reasons I enjoyed Sanctum was for the training services. Mercy’s team put together comprehensive training regimes as rehabilitation for heragentswho were injured during jobs.
It was going to be different for Artemis, she’d seen something in him, and I’d seen it in him as well, it was the good—and I didn’t want it tainted like I knew it could be. He’d alreadytaken a life—or several, my mind was still processing the change that happened from the guy I knew who would whimper when we fucked, to a guy who was jumping my body and telling me I wasn’t man enough to fuck him.
A buzzer sounded, pulling me back to the training room where Artemis was harnessed into a climbing wall—he’d reached the top of it and knocked the buzzer. The people around training stopped to give him his deserved applause. I clapped for him, as it seemed mine was the only one he was waiting on.
“Good job up there,” I said.
“You weren’t even watching,” he said, repelling down the wall.
“Let me see your hands.” I took them regardless, inspecting his fingertips and palms. “Ok, some callouses there. They’re gonna become rough with all the climbing.”
“Then they can be calloused, what’s it to you?”
Biting my lip, it really wasn’t anything to me—other than a memory of how soft his hands were. “I’m just saying, you’ve got to expect that to happen.”
He shrugged. “I could do this again and again, and again.”
“If you’re feeling cocky about, take the harness off,” I told him.
“It’s my first week of training, shouldn’t I keep it on?”
“I think you’re ready, but you climb up, you’ve got to climb your ass back down. No repelling, and nobody coming up to save you,” I said. It was a bad call, but I couldn’t stop. “And no powder. If we were out in the world, you wouldn’t have all that.”
Mercy’s heels clopped on the floor, silencing everyone in the training facility. She wore red today, deep red. She walked by the punching bags and the agents practicing with long wooden swords. Everyone watched. “I told you to train him, Donovan, not kill him,” she said.
“I’m pushing him,” I said. “Isn’t that what we all want here? For Art to be ready to work of his debt.”
Artemis’s eye twitched, he didn’t seem phased by the conditions—except that eye twitch. “I wanna try,” he said. “I could probably get halfway up there.”
“No, no,” Mercy said. “Donovan, I think you should have a go.”
