"𝐓𝐇𝐀𝐓 𝐆𝐈𝐑𝐋 𝐇𝐀𝐒 𝐀𝐋𝐖𝐀𝐘𝐒 𝐁𝐄𝐄𝐍 𝐇𝐀𝐋𝐅 𝐆𝐎𝐃𝐃𝐄𝐒𝐒, 𝐇𝐀𝐋𝐅 𝐇𝐄𝐋𝐋"
❝ Delphinium Tesla is anything but the innocent citizen she pretends to be, especially not with the power of telekinesis behind her fingertips. Laying low wi...
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At the compound, the team lingered in a sitting area, too energized from the night's earlier events to sleep. The soldiers took the opportunity to question them incessantly about why they returned two teammates short. After what he did, no one cared where Jake had disappeared off to, but the soldiers were already formulating a plan to retrieve Finn.
A stout soldier began saying, "Are you positive-"
"Yes, yes I think it is..." Arlo muttered to himself. Conversation halted.
"Are you positive he was completely unconscious?" the soldiers finished, throwing Arlo an odd look.
"Yes." Gigi folded her hands. "I could feel him slip away."
A troubled expression passing over his face, the soldier turned to his comrades to discuss the situation in hushed tones. Delphinium wondered if they would be punished for leaving Finn behind, even if there wasn't much to be done about it. She didn't need punishment to feel guilty-it seemed the regret after leaving people to die was a habit of hers.
"Someone's at the gate," Arlo announced loudly.
Demanding the team remain where they were, the soldiers left. As the steel doors opened in the distance, sounds of shock were unmistakable. Delphinium's fists balled, sure the Needles had found them.
But as they escorted a single figure into view, Delphinium was filled with more questions than ever. Finn stood there, looking weary and sporting a bruised face where Jake had nearly crushed his skull in, but otherwise intact. The smell of smoke radiated off of him.
"I knew it." Arlo was the only one wearing a grin.
"Sit here," a female soldier told Finn, "and relay to us exactly what happened to you, soldier."
Finn sat with a straight spine, staring at the ground as he tried to summon every last detail. "I don't know how I got into that cell. But I was in one of the holding cells, the same place we were all kept sedated for days. The Needles weren't there to sedate me. With some aid from the Crimsons, my hands were freed. I knew I couldn't just leave them there, so I did what I was too weak to do the first time-I burned the place to the ground. We all got away."
"Was Corinthian inside?"
"No," Finn said. "Unfortunately, something prompted him to leave."
"You're back."
Everyone was startled. The soldier's guns were raised to Jake, but even they were wary to approach him. "Why didn't you tell us he'd arrived?" one of the soldiers accused Arlo.
"Snitches get stitches." He was overwhelmingly proud of having kept the secret.
"Why would you knock me out?" Finn asked Jake, his rational tone surely not going to be returned. "Corinthian would have sold me for my power-my power that we could use to defeat him."
