Nicolai was waiting in their quad hall, if it could be called waiting. He was handcuffed hand and foot, gagged, and wearing only his boxers and a fiercely angry glare in his eyes. Donovan looked at him a moment longer and then burst into laughter. Dominic, still inside the barracks, looked up questioningly.

Nicolai. Handcuffed, gagged, in his boxers. Staring at him angrily. And with little hearts, spirals, and Roxy's name signed with a flourish just right below his navel. But it was the message, written in large letters, that made him start to laugh despite himself. Poor poor Nicolai. And what an amazing little bitch Roxy was.

The flashboy had "I love Dommy!" scrawled on his chest.

Dominic couldn't even move; it was too hilarious. He barely managed to breathe, laughing almost uncontrollably as he grabbed onto Donovan's shoulder with one hand for support, arm wrapped around his stomach as he gasped. God. Rox was obviously very repentent for her dalliance. All Dom's anger bled away as he stared at Nicolai, the other man's rage and sweet little message too much for him to ignore.

How could anyone stay angry at a girl like that?

On the floor in front of her Cell door was a boy, and older student. He was wearing only his boxers, and his wrists and ankles were handcuffed and tied together. He was gagged with his undershirt, and there were designs and swirls drawn on the pale skin of his muscular chest and stomach with the words "I Love Dommy!" inscribed in flowery letters. The signature, just below his navel, was "Roxy".

The twins were in the hall as well, practically dying of laughter, and they both turned to look at her with a grin, looked back at each other and burst into more laughter. Donovan finally got enough control to nod greeting at her and then reached out and ruffled the boy's hair. "Aww, thanks, flash!" He looked at his brother. "Shall we let him up?" he asked, eyes twinkling in reflected malice. Dom returned the look. "Yeah. Right after lunch, maybe." Don looked back at Nico with mock remorse. "Poor guy. Hope you don't have any simwork to do this morning. You know, practice and all." The fury in the boy's eyes made Don grin. "Well, we'd love to stay and chat, but we've got two beautiful girls waiting for us for breakfast, eh Dom?" Dom grinned agreement, and Don leaned in just a little closer. "Dante hates it when I'm late."

That brought fresh laughter on, and with a few final synchronized wicked grins, the twins left the hallway, brushing past Sol on the way out.

Sol hurried to the boy on the floor and looked him over while he glared at her. He didn't appear to be wounded, just restrained, and she tried hard not to smile, but it was difficult. The other students were starting to stir, and Sol bit her lip. The boy had obviously been brought here for Dominic's benefit. He didn't need to be humiliated any further.

Handcuffs. She needed the key, but first she needed to get him out of the hallway.

She palmed open the door and dragged him into her own cell with some degree of difficulty, the door sliding shut just as others began to open.

"Don't do that." His own midnight eyes widened and he let her go, and she clenched her jaw tightly, fingers balled into tight fists as her shoulders shook and she stood her ground, staring.

With her mind perturbed, she couldn't figure out why he seemed to angry at her.

"How...how can you ask me that?" The moment the words were out of his mouth his eyes narrowed and his face became even darker. It was a popular phrase in argument, but he'd never thought to hear himself utter it. What had happened to his easy ability to shrug things off? Love had canceled that out with the rest of his training, and now he was paying the price, if only the down payment. The full settlement wouldn't be called for until he failed Review.

It hit him again, how much he had put at risk to love this girl who was standing in the hallway and throwing his affection in his face. His hands clenched into fists at his side, and when he spoke, his voice was cold and even and precise as only a Creche-trained voice can be.

"Waste?! Was that... what we did... that's a waste to you?! Maybe Nicolai was right, maybe you can just spend your last days here with all those others! Maybe I'll just go back to Nathan and he can finish what he tried to do before, and I won't have to try to keep him from killing you ever again!"

Her voice was low, very quiet and almost impossible to hear, but Donovan and Dominic both had excellent hearing. As quiet as it was, he wasn't certain it had been meant for him to hear, but he didn't care. The next moment she was in his arms, and he pulled her to him and kissed her gently, confusion and relief and frustration battling for supremacy in his gaze.

"Jelice, please... let me help you. If you don't think I can, at least tell me what's going on. Please. I need to know."

What was going on? He couldn't help. There was nothing to help. And what could she possibly say? I saw Nathan again, Donovan, and he was Angel. He was Angel and he still loves me, and when I told him to leave, he wore that same pain in his eyes as he had when I watched him be taken away from me by those MPs at Battleschool. I actually smiled as he was beaten and dragged away, I smiled and his glance nearly broke me. He had that same look today, and the buried part of me that still loves him hurts. It hurts so badly and I can't tell you because you want to kill him. And he wants to kill you, and that frightens me most of all...

"I... I saw Nathan again in the commons. He was acting... different. Like, almost like he used to when we... back in BattleSchool. And... and he called me Anjel." Dante held Donovan tighter and closed her eyes, painful remembrance stabbing at her. "He only calls me that when he's Angel..."

So what? the ice mocked. So he's somehow your Angel again. But he isn't. He isn't your mon ange, he hasn't been since he struck you in your quarters and left you for dead. He almost killed you, almost killed Aria. No matter that he didn't write that letter, no matter that you struck him first. You never would have been able to truly mortally wound him, even if you tried. He did it so easily. He can do it again...

Donovan cared for Jelice deeply, but it was becoming apparent to him that her affection for him held no sway on her old affection for Terrence. A twinge of jealousy cropped up and he beat it back down. She wasn't in love with him. She was scared of him, and she was scared for Donovan's sake.

This was beginning to get blurry.

On one hand, Jelice cared for him deeply, but it appeared she also still retained some feeling toward Terrence, mixed as it was with fear. He didn't know how to respond to that. He really wanted to talk to Dominic, even if his twin couldn't shed any light on this situation. It would make him feel better to know that he wasn't alone in his confusion.

"Anjel," he said softly, testing the sound. Pretty, and a clever twist, to match his name to hers in that fashion. They'd known each other for only two days. How could this depth of attachment have formed? He reminded himself sternly that he had known Jelice...Anjel...for only a little longer, and lapsed into mental silence.

She never expected to hear those words again, especially not from Donovan, his easy tone doing nothing to conceal the difficulty of his question. But he made no move to let her go, did not push her away, just kept those strong arms around her, stroking her curls, and Dante sighed bitterly to herself.

For all the world, she didn't know.

Yes, she had loved Nathan. Loved him with all her heart, first real love bright and precious. Those few days they'd had together were burned in her memory; painful, private, priceless. But that was two long years ago. She'd loved Angel, but that was precisely the source of her overwhelming confusion. It had been Angel she'd surrendered to with such ease. Not this slate-eyed, cold-blooded Mode who now stood in his place.

The weak part of her that still loved him didn't want to admit that he'd changed. It didn't want to accept the reality of those years; his strikes against her, her recovery alone from those wounds, the stains of his blood and hers that nothing could erase. It refused to believe that her Angel was gone.

But he was.

"I am new to this, Jelice. Please forgive me if I am clumsy." His nervousness made him regress, taking on the old speech patterns he and Dom had abandoned a week into their stay at Command School. "I do not know what to do. He hurt you, and I want to hurt him for it, but not if that will hurt you." He spoke the simplest way he knew how, giving air to thoughts far too complex for him to try to do justice to them. "What do you want me to do? I love you." His gaze hardened. "I won't let him hurt you. Do you think he will leave you alone if we do nothing?" His tone became more urgent, conveying his obvious opinion that Mode would do nothing of the kind.

Dante did not appreciate feeling like some sort of hunted fugitive.

"I don't know." What could they do? Ever since Nathan had reappeared in her life, everything had fallen apart. All her carefully constructed barriers, the glacier shield, the cold demeanor; all were useless, a waste of control now that she found herself barely hanging on. He'd broken her body once... and now, she felt as if her life was breaking before her eyes.

All she wanted was to be left alone. Free. Safe. Without the need to glance over her shoulder, avoid the shadows, constantly be on the alert. It had taken her long, hard months to gain that sort of tentative peace after he'd been taken to Charybdis, and she hadn't realized how much freedom she'd had then, until now, until he was back. Nathan would never just leave her alone, she knew. He would always be there, the angel in her dreams, the nightmare that haunted her waking hours.

Dante sighed again, bitter ice in her eyes as she clenched her jaw and glanced away. "I don't know," she repeated, knowing not what else to say. "He... I know he won't just leave me alone, not now. But..." But perhaps he would leave Donovan out of this. He was innocent; he'd only sought to protect her. Nothing more. That's all he wanted-- to protect her from Mode forever-- and Dante grieved, knowing that if he were involved, it would lead to so much more. She felt no pain in realizing that Nathan might hurt her; it was accepted, as mundane and understood as the fact that there were stars in the space that surrounded them. But she would no more let Nathan hurt her love than she would allow Donovan to kill her broken angel.

"I think... his grievance is with me, but... oh, Donovan, don't get involved in this, please! He's already hurt me, it doesn't matter, but maybe he'll leave you alive if you stay away! Don't you see? He won't kill me, but he'll kill you if you try to interfere!" Her eyes blazed quicksilver with rage at being set into this situation, but she knew that if given the chance, her reaction those years ago in her quarters would have been the same. She'd paid her debt for the mistakes of the past. Nathan just refused to let them go.

Donovan shook his head and watched her pacing come to a halt as she looked at him in angry surprise. Wick was right. Terrence was probably schizophrenic. He wondered briefly how he'd gotten past admissions, and then shrugged it off. After all, he and Dominic had been cleared, and their reversible ability could be classified as mental imbalance.

Wick.

She was the one to blame for all this. They'd all been innocent until Wick and Jor's plan had gone into effect, tearing apart her life, Aria's life... Nathan's life. Nothing had been the same since. And all because that manipulative chienne had decided to take it upon herself to scheme for Jor. Dante closed her eyes and quietly accepted Donovan's words. Perhaps he was right. Perhaps he wasn't. But either way, she would never let him know what she wished to do.

It would be such poetic justice for her and Nathan to kill Wick together.

But it would never happen. Damned if she wouldn't try, however, to give Wick just what she deserved for her years of pain. Dante had smiled happily, freely, for the first time in years when she'd seen Wick alone in the infirmary, paying the price for her ill-thought vengeance. There was very little Dante wouldn't hesitate to do to the other girl. The French have such fiery tempers...

The play of emotions that had crossed her face had confused him, but her final reaction was crystal clear, and he pulled away and smiled at her, a hint of playfulness in his eyes in response to her little smile. "Yes, Jelice," he said in quiet mock-subservience before he slipped an arm around her waist and turned, walking with her to the door of the Quad and out of it.

The quiet conversation they usually held after Gabe had finished eating was uncomfortably absent. By the time they returned to the barracks, Sol was feeling more than a little guilty, but she couldn't really put her finger on why. It wasn't as if he'd been struggling to get away. His complete lack of reaction didn't mean he didn't care. It was just the way he was. He kissed her, not the other way around.

At least, not at first.

Besides, he was sixteen, and he was male. From the very little she knew about how such things came about, she shouldn't feel guilty in the slightest...but Gabe wasn't at all like that, and she did feel guilty. She was just frustrated that she couldn't figure out why.

They returned to the barracks, and she paused before actually re-entering the cell. One or both of the twins might be in there, and the hallway was empty. He stopped to look at her questioningly, and she leaned forward and kissed his cheek, opened her mouth to say she was sorry, and then closed it and kissed him again.

Are you really sorry? she asked herself dimly as they separated.

Well, perhaps not completely identical. Donovan was more resigned to this meeting than anything else, and Dominic couldn't blame his brother. He'd been in search of Rox when notice of the newly scheduled parade review reached him, and his twin's search for Dante had been just as fruitless. Bereft of their girls and not too entirely pleased with the prospect of enduring one of Arcen's speeches, both wore slight frowns and the selfsame irritation at having been disrupted from other tasks.

The hallway was beginning to become crowded, soldiers filing in from the outside corridor, others emerging from their rooms with mumbled complaints and half-hearted bitching. Dominic leaned against the wall nearest the exit, arms folded across his chest, and Donovan followed suit. Together they waited patiently, dark indigo eyes tracing their quadmates, and Dom sighed and rolled his eyes. "Ridiculous, this. Hope Arcen keeps this quick."

He stopped suddenly and counted. Fifteen. Who was he missing? Hadley, his mind offered. No, Hadley was transferred. Not Hadley, Geneva. Geneva Brooke, her first day in his Quad and late for a seriously important meeting.

Not a good sign.

He sighed and gave a mental shrug. So she'd miss the meeting. Someone else could fill her in, and if she was anything less than perfect on review, he'd have a damn good reason to yell at her. Not that he didn't already.

"HEY!" he yelled above the noise, and immediately everyone stopped and looked up at him in surprise. Arcen was a tough driller, and he pushed his troops hard in the battleroom, but here in the Quad he was generally more laidback. He saw them look at each other nervously in little glances and then back to him, saw them falling into their training phase. If that would keep them quiet and attentive then he didn't care.

"We've got a new headmaster, and the new headmaster wants a parade review tomorrow afternoon. That means three things for all of you. One, no meals and no classes tomorrow morning until I've approved your kit." Angry murmurs rose at this, and he silenced them with a look. "Two, all dress uniforms cleaned and prepared for tomorrow before lights out tonight." The rumbles were getting louder now, and he narrowed his eyes at them. "I'm not finished." Sullen silence.

Her first damn day and she already looks like an incompetent idiot who can’t tell time. She cursed herself silently. This is not the impression she wanted to leave on those around her. No matter how much she tried, she was always making small, yet vital errors. She was not the politician that her mother was. She never had mastered the flair for showing something different on the exterior than was present internally.

She was a bit annoyed at being pulled away from Sol. She was just beginning to strike up a conversation with her. She was never going to get to know the others in her Quad.

First she was transferred in with no warning whatsoever. That wasn't unusual by itself, and certainly no fault of hers, and he was doing his best not to hold that against her, but it made the larger picture that much bleaker. This parade review was equally unexpected and a good deal more unwelcome, and she was off interrupting the other students with conversation when she should have been getting her kit ready.

This review could mean a lot. It could mean the demerits for ill-organized students, or demotions for undisciplined commanders, and Arcen didn't intend to allow himself or any of Diamondback to fall into either category. He didn't appreciate her not taking this seriously.