59. Chapter Fifty-Nine
Chapter Fifty-Nine
Halley
I’m in Knox’s office after dinner, barefoot on the rug Viper dragged in to cover the worst of the stone. The fire burns low in the hearth, steady and warm, while the sconces cast a soft glow across the office.
We’re all here, not working on the same things so much as existing in the same space.
Shade sits in the leather armchair closest to the fire with a datapad, scrolling through lines of code for the surveillance system. The glow reflects faintly in the glasses he’s started wearing when he works, catching along the clean angles of his face and making him look unfairly handsome.
I’m still getting used to them, mostly because every time he looks up over the frames, I forget what I was supposed to be doing and start thinking about kissing him instead. I indulge that impulse every time, much to Shade’s bemused appreciation.
Viper has claimed the chair by the wall, long legs stretched out, a knife turning idly between his fingers as he goes over the manifest for his next escort over the mountain.
Blaze is on the floor near the fire, back against the stone, in the process of taking his favorite pistol apart, cleaning it, and putting it back together again. There is a suspicious amount of blood crusted on the weapon.
Knox stands behind me where I'm sitting in his seat at the desk, looking over my shoulder as I run him through the kitchen stores report for this week.
It won't be long before we run low on fresh produce like vegetables now that there are no farms operating in Fathim, and we've been working hard on finding a sustainable solution that will keep this fortress stocked for the many years to come.
I try not to let it stress me out, because at the end of the day, I know we will work it out as a Pack.
I smooth my hands over the skirt of the dress Knox made me.
It isn’t the first time he’s put his hands to work making clothes for me.
Once, he cut up his own uniform and sewed me a new uniform because mine didn’t fit. Back then, we both pretended it was merely practical, nothing more than a Prime Alpha solving a problem for his subordinate.
I know better now.
It was always an Alpha providing for his Omega.
This dress carries the same quiet devotion, although Knox made it from softer, brighter, prettier fabric.
The fabric is pale and floral, scavenged by Blaze from some ruined corner of the world and brought home like treasure.
I don't know when he had time to sew it, but I suspect he forfeited sleep for it.
I wear it often just to see his eyes track me across the room with a strange, soft yearning.
When I asked Knox why he made me such a whimsical dress, he looked almost embarrassed.
Then he told me he thought I might like looking like a normal civilian for once, an Omega with a life instead of a soldier with a mission.
After all the war and blood and death, he said, seeing me in something beautiful gave him peace.
Like proof that we'd created a reality where his Omega could wear a flowery dress and be safe.
He says he's not a romantic, but then does things like this.
The bond rests warm and easy between all five of us, and before long, a bloom of contented Omega perfume settles into the room. Knox makes a pleased rumble at the base of his throat and strokes my hair.
This room smells like our Pack. It's familiar, grounding, safe, and one breath of it is enough to ease the tightest parts of my mind.
Shade shifts in his seat.
It’s subtle, just a pause in the movement of his hands, but I feel a change in him through the bond.
He lifts his head slowly, pretty brown eyes looking at me over the edge of the datapad.
There’s something careful in his expression, the same one he gets when he's weighing a decision that he's not entirely sure of.
"Halley," he says, and my name is said softer than usual, like he's trying to cushion what he's about to say. "I think it’s time."
The room shifts without anyone moving. Viper’s knife stops turning, Blaze’s hands still, and Knox’s presence at my back steadies, his attention narrowing to Shade.
I meet Shade’s gaze and cock my head. "Time for what?"
He hesitates, which is not like him. Then he gets up from his chair, walks across the room, sets the datapad down, and turns it toward me.
"To finish what you started."
My fingers curl in the fabric of my dress.
"You didn’t leave the Omega Division and start training because you volunteered. You left because General Stone threatened your friends if you didn't."
The words instantly burrow deep and dig into an old wound, something I’ve been avoiding thinking about. There has been too much to do here, and it's easier to stay busy than to think about what I've lost.
"You were always trying to get back to them," Shade continues, his voice coaxing and soft. "Even when you left us, it was for them, so you could protect them and bring them to safety."
My eyes glaze over as I'm transported back to Barkrood Base, to our home in the Omega Division.
I remember the way we watched out for each other and tried to stay true to ourselves inside a place built to strip that away.
They never gave up on me, and they were more of a family to me than my biological one.
Shade’s voice stays even. "I know you had to set that mission aside because the world was on fire and you had to be the one to put it out. Then Blackreach was cut off, and you had no way to reach them."
Across the room, Viper’s attention settles on me, watchful and steady. Even without the bond, I would feel his support in the way he holds himself, ready to back whatever choice I make.
Shade nudges the datapad closer.
"Well," he says quietly, "the world’s no longer on fire, and Viper created you a way into Blackreach."
I look down at the screen, then back at him. He holds my gaze with calm certainty.
"You were their protector first," he says. "Before you were ours and before you were the savior of our species."
His voice softens.
"It’s time to finish what you started, Halley."
I stare at the datapad.
For a while, I don’t touch it.
The screen has gone dim, the glass reflecting the firelight and the shape of my own face back at me.
I look softer than I have in years, or maybe ever.
My cheeks are slightly flushed from the heat of the room, and my hair is loose around my face.
I wiggle my bare feet and stroke the soft floral fabric of my dress.
He's right.
There is nothing holding me back from picking up my mission again. I'm not the same Omega who was desperate, with blind hope, but ultimately powerless to save them.
Now, I've grown into someone who has the emotional strength to carry this out, and the authority to make it happen. I could actually save them.
"What is it?" I ask, gesturing to the datapad.
Shade’s mouth tightens. "The files recovered from Stone about the Omega Division."
We rarely speak the General’s name now, and the effect is immediate. Blaze’s pistol clicks as his grip shifts around it, Viper’s scent turns bitter with protectiveness, and Knox stills behind me.
I reach for the datapad, and my thumb brushes the screen awake.
General Stone’s personnel records open beneath my hand with folders, labels, clean little categories for all the lives he thought he owned.
My file is at the top.
SPARKS, HALLEY. (OMEGA)
I open it and read the first few lines out loud.
"Defective Omega." I swallow thickly, my voice shaking at those familiar words, but I keep going. "Poorly educated. Controllable with incentives. Emotional instability requires monitoring. Advanced age lowers expectations of success with Omega Command. Disposable if compromised."
My voice peters out as a low, pained sound leaves Blaze.
The bond lights up with indignation and rage, violence pulsing through the Alphas, but Shade doesn't react, and I know it's because he's read it before. He prepared himself so he could remain calm and stop us from losing our minds over a dead man's words.
Defective.
Disposable if compromised.
There it is.
The truth of what I was to General Stone.
I always knew what I was to him, but seeing it written in his own words makes it harder to dismiss. To Stone, I was an experiment he could send onto a battlefield and replace if I broke.
I wait for the words to tear me apart, but they don’t.
My restored fertility comes to mind, followed by the old fear that the negative pregnancy result proves him right. That I’m still defective. The word stings, but the shame doesn’t consume me the way it once did.
I’ve thought about the my fertility often and what it means for the future of our Pack. I want to talk to my mates about children, but the last traces of that shame have kept me silent. I’m getting closer to facing it, though.
The report still hurts. No one wants proof that another person considered them disposable. My resurrection healed my body and restored my connection to my Omega, but it didn’t erase the years I spent believing I was defective or the damage done by everyone who treated me that way.
I swipe at the rogue tear tracking down my cheek, ignoring the symphony of my Alphas growling in protest of my distress.
When Stone wrote this, he thought I was small, easy to control, and powerless.
I am not powerless anymore.
I’m surrounded by my Pack, whose love and support have started streaming down the bond with Shade’s encouragement.
I let the file sit open and I scroll lazily through it, barely skimming the rest. It's a summary of my time training with Scorch Squad and the development of my Omega Command. It's littered with Stone's personal opinions of me: lazy, old, stubborn, useless.
Finally, I've had enough and scroll back to the top.
SPARKS, HALLEY. (OMEGA)
I stare at my name.
The report is thinner than I expected.
Stone spent years convincing me he knew everything that happened between Scorch Squad and me at the training camp. He wanted me to believe Knox and Shade reported every moment of our time together.