With things squared away and Taylor still sleeping, she started to go about her morning duties. As normal as she could do, anyway, given that her entire status quo had shifted since the previous morning. Magnolia smiled as she shifted all of the unread emails from Ryan into their own little folder to deal with in a moment. Aside from those, very little had come in overnight that she had to deal with immediately. Most incoming requests had sorted themselves according to her filters and workflows. Leave forms, education requests and schedule changes all sat in their own sections, ready for when she had some time to deal with them.…

‘I love you.’ Words that she had expected to remain unsaid. Something kept close to her chest, unspoken unto the ending of the world. An emotional reality that would interfere with how everything operated. A change that couldn’t be taken back. And he had accepted it. And let her kiss him. Had accepted touch and intimacy and a thousand small sensations that had barely been part of her imaginings whenever he’d been in her mind as she masturbated. Magnolia tried not to move, tried to keep her breathing even, her movements as subtle as when she’d been sleeping. Still, with how large his back muscles were in her field of…

Taylor shifted slightly, the dried blood on his knee making his pants stick as he adjusted his position against the wall. It was quiet. Always quiet. He hated the quiet. Hated how still the dead man was. Hated that no matter how many times he came here, history never changed. He settled, back straight, knees up, the head of the dead man near his left foot. He couldn’t stop looking at the dead man, at the strip of white cloth he’d used to cover the man’s eyes, and the blood was wicking up from the cold floor, staining the shroud. It was silent. The same stillness that hung in the…

Whoever had said you couldn’t play with toys as an adult had been an arsehole. ‘Okay,’ Milla said, placing the Solstice figure on the city-map-playmat. ‘What about here?’ Stef tossed the little agent doll back and forth between her hands, then placed it halfway between where they’d designated the blackout zone and the little round cracker that represented the closest set of fairy stairs in this scenario. There was a ping in her HUD – Ryan, requesting video. ‘Gimme a minute,’ she said. She clicked the video accept button, smiled, and tried not to look at her own little picture-in-picture webcam face. [Hey.]  [They’re estimating that this will take at…

Magnolia stared into the bathroom mirror and wrinkled her nose. She’d gotten about an hour more of sleep than average but felt worse for it. More rest was good, but it had been some less-than-optimal arrangement of REM cycles. Nothing she couldn’t handle. She tapped her phone, swiped into the apps and opened the little custom app Screen had built, where her bestie-with-benefits built her a new playlist each week. Some kind of alt-rock with a female vocalist started, moody and uplifting in that perfect early-2000s kind of way. She discarded her shorts and cami and then began a body check. There’d been a few wounds not worth going to…

‘One-point-seven,’ Magnolia said. Taylor adjusted his aim. Exact. The Scholar would accept no less. The suspended shift cycle began, and he fired. The shot hit Mimosa’s chest and- Fear tasted like blood. ‘What-’ Magnolia’s voice. He reacted before he understood. Require: Macro: Shields Reflexively, his arms were across his body. Right arm protecting his lower half, left arm across his chest and face. He swept left and right. Magnolia was fine. Grigori was fine. Both protected by shields designed to withstand most physical, and some magical, forms of attack. Not guaranteed safety. All he could provide with a requirement and no notice. Important to protect- He looked at Magnolia. He…

‘Jonesy?’ ‘Hmm?’ Stef looked down at where her arm was strapped to the chair that wouldn’t have looked out of place in a sci-fi torture scene. ‘Are you a Bond villain?’ Jones looked at her, took a moment to pull his goggles up on his forehead and put down the wrench that glowed blue at the end. ‘Whatever do you mean?’ he asked, an absolute shit-eating grin on his face. She looked at the machine that had appeared in the lab and had taken over almost all of the free space. Easily six feet tall, something that looked weirdly…mechanical compared to the usual, space-age, Star-Trekky minimalist design of Agency tech.…

There was a knock at the door. ‘You know you don’t have to knock,’ Stef called as she tidied the circular table. The door opened, and Ryan walked in, two plastic takeaway bags in his hand. ‘It’s weird,’ she said as she set the last of the folders and tablets on the sideboard. ‘It’s dinnertime, and I want to say “I’m starving”, but I’m not because I’m, y’know, a robot now-’ She smiled, as he didn’t even react to the “robot” comment anymore. ‘But it still feels right to say. Am I ever gonna be hungry again?’ He set one of the bags near the folders on the sideboard and…

There was a chime on the door. Stef sighed and sat up, simulated nebula gasses swirling around her head. Go away. Another chime. She looked down at her phone and dialled down the space sim – restricting the particle effects mostly to the room’s walls, roof and floor. Conversation couldn’t really happen with galaxies passing in front of your face. Her HUD let her know it was Mags on the other side of the door – surprising, but probably better than one of the other options. Mags, at least, probably just wanted to let her know what weird violence would happen to her body next. Especially since that morning’s session…

It was important to know the areas under his protection. The general outlay of an Agency floor didn’t change without notice, but the smaller changes that recruits made could be just as vital to know in case of an emergency. Taylor paused briefly in front of a noticeboard. Anything official was handled by Magnolia. Anything unofficial was also usually handled by Magnolia. Anything social that affected working relationships were factors she had to consider when making schedules. Designating teams. Allowing downtime. Almost nothing made it back to him, and it didn’t need to. His Duty was to protect his recruits, not to be their friend. In an area of the…