The transition from the suffocating, erotically charged darkness of the tunnels to the fluorescent sterility of the Slipgate Diner was jarring. It felt less like walking into a room and more like waking up from a 'new movie' dream. The air conditioning hummed with a mundane consistency that clashed violently with the roaring blood still pounding in Raina's ears.
Raina sat in the second booth from the door. She had commandeered the table, pushing aside napkin dispensers and salt shakers to make room for her laptop, a tangle of USB cables, and the heavy, blocky ultra-spectrum camera.
Across from her sat Marcus. He looked weary, the adrenaline of the descent fading into the heavy fatigue of a man who just wanted a normal life. Beside him sat Eira. The pale woman was alert, her emerald eyes scanning the windows as if expecting the shadows from the basement to stage a flanking maneuver through the parking lot.
Liri and Pearl occupied the booth behind them, leaning over the back of the seat to peer at the laptop screen. Liri smelled of lavender and ozone. Pearl smelled of the ocean, a scent that made Raina's stomach do a strange, nervous flip.
"The resolution is processing," Raina said. Her voice sounded too loud in the quiet room. She tapped a key with a finger that was trembling slightly. "The sensor picked up interference. Radiation. Or something like it."
She was babbling. She knew she was babbling. She was trying to fill the silence with technical jargon because if she stopped talking, she might start thinking about what had almost happened in the dark. She might start thinking about the way Nix's skin felt against hers, or the impossible, perfect match of him in her hands.
A progress bar on the screen filled with agonizing slowness.
"Here," Raina said, pointing at the monitor as the first image resolved. "Look at the masonry."
The photo showed the wall of the antechamber. Under the harsh scrutiny of the flash and the spectrum enhancement, the rock didn't look like a natural formation. It looked like a puzzle.
"That is not random erosion," Raina explained, tracing the lines on the screen. "See the interlocking angles? No mortar. This is polygonal masonry. It's similar to what you see in Cusco or Delphi, but the scale is wrong. And the geological age... this rock has been cut for ten thousand years. Maybe more."
"Pre-flood," Liri whispered, her chin resting on her folded arms atop the booth seat. "The old builders. They sang the stones into place."
Raina ignored the magical commentary and clicked to the next photo.
This one was of the fissure where Nix had entered. The thermal overlay showed veins of bright orange heat pulsing through the cold blue rock. It looked like the nervous system of a giant, sleeping god.
"The heat signature is rhythmic," Raina said, her breath hitching. She felt flushed. Her skin felt too tight for her body. "It creates a piezoelectric effect in the quartz content of the granite. That is the vibration you feel. It is literally an electric heartbeat."
"Can we kill it?" Eira asked. It was a serious question.
"You can't kill a geological phenomenon, Eira," Raina snapped, a little too sharply. She rubbed her temples. "It's physics. Just... very loud physics."
She clicked the arrow key again. The next image was a mistake.
It wasn't a structural analysis or a thermal map. It was a picture she must have snapped blindly during the chaotic retreat, or perhaps in the moments before Marcus had called out. The frame was dominated by Nix.
He wasn't hiding. Unfortunately not a blur of motion. He was clearly hanging from a support beam, looking directly into the lens. The flash had caught him perfectly. He was shirtless, his loincloth low on his hips, his muscular definition thrown into sharp relief by the shadows. His face, that impossibly handsome, movie-star visage, was split in a wide, charming grin.
Worse yet, he was winking and one of his hands was raised in a little, cheeky wave.
It was absurd. It was terrifying. And it was undeniably, overwhelmingly hot.
A sound escaped Raina's throat. It was supposed to be a cough, or a scoff of professional disdain. Instead, it came out as a high-pitched, girlish giggle. It was a sophomoric sound, the kind of noise a teenager makes when the captain of the football team looks her way.
"What is it?" Marcus asked, leaning forward to squint at the screen.
Panic flared in Raina's chest. She slammed her finger onto the Next key. "Glitch!" she blurted out. "Sensor artifact. Just pixel noise. Nothing to see."
The image vanished, replaced by a blurry shot of the floor.
Raina let out a breath she didn't know she was holding. She bit her lip, fighting back another wave of hysterical laughter. She felt giddy, intoxicated by the secret she was keeping. It was unprofessional. It was dangerous. And she wanted to see the picture again.
She risked a glance to her left.
Pearl was watching her. She was not looking at the screen. She was looking directly at Raina. Her large, oceanic eyes were unblinking, shimmering with a depth of understanding that made Raina feel naked. Pearl's lips quirked up at the corner. It wasn't a malicious smile. It was a look of recognition. Game recognizes game.
Pearl had seen the photo. Or perhaps she just smelled the pheromones rolling off Raina in waves.
Raina froze, waiting for the outing. Waiting for Pearl to say, Why was the thief winking at you? or Why do you smell like his musk?
But Pearl said nothing. She simply blinked, slow and deliberate, and turned her attention back to Liri's hair, which she began to braid absentmindedly.
Raina turned back to the computer, her heart hammering against her ribs. She felt a bead of sweat trickle down her spine. Why was she protecting him? Why was Pearl protecting her?
She looked at Pearl again, really looked at her this time. In the harsh fluorescent light of the diner, Pearl was breathtaking. Her skin had a luminous quality, a pearlescent sheen that made her look like she was lit from within. Her features were delicate but strong, possessed of an exotic symmetry that was almost painful to look at.
Raina realized with a start that Pearl and Nix shared more than just a habitat. They shared a quality. A class. They were both undeniably people from a similar family background, beautiful and lethal in equal measure.
Are they together? The thought struck Raina with the force of a physical blow. A spike of jealousy, sharp and irrational, pierced her chest.
Raina looked at Pearl's hands... delicate between the fingers, yet elegant. Then she remembered Nix's hands. Soft. Strong. Perfect.
No, Raina thought, shaking her head slightly. They are different. But they are of the same heritage. A heritage I don't know at all.
"Raina?" Marcus's voice broke through her reverie. He was looking at her with concern. "You zoned out. You've been staring at the wall for a full minute. Are you sure you're okay? The air down there can mess with your head."
"I'm fine," Raina said quickly. She closed the laptop with a snap. "Just... processing. The data. It's a lot of data. Complex geometry. Very taxing."
She stood up abruptly. "I need water. Cold water."
She marched toward the kitchen before anyone could stop her.
Eira watched her go with narrowed eyes. She turned to Marcus, lowering her voice to a conspiratorial whisper. "She is behaving strangely. She giggles. She flushes. She moves with a chaotic energy. This is not the behavior of a warrior. This is the behavior of someone who has been... enchanted."
"She's tired, Eira," Marcus said, rubbing his face. "She just drove halfway across the continent and then climbed down a mine shaft. Cut her some slack."
"I have seen this look before," Eira insisted, crossing her arms. "In the great halls of the North. It is the look a maiden wears when she has tasted the mead of desire. Or when she is hiding a wound."
"Well, she's not wounded," Marcus said, standing up. "She's an engineer. She's probably just excited about the rocks. Now, come on. We have a guest. We need to feed her."
Marcus walked into the kitchen, leaving Eira alone in the booth. She looked at the closed laptop, then at Pearl.
"You know something," Eira said to Pearl.
Pearl finished the braid in Liri's hair and tied it off with a bit of seaweed she had produced from nowhere. "I know many things," Pearl hummed. "I know the song of the whale. I know the taste of the tide. And I know that tonight, we are having a chicken special."
The kitchen of the Slipgate Diner was a place of organized chaos. It was Marcus's domain, but lately, it had become a communal workspace. Marcus stood at the grill, searing chicken. The smell of rendering fat and spices filled the air, grounding the group in something real and substantial.
Liri was chopping vegetables at the prep station. She wasn't using a knife. She was flicking her fingers, and a small, spectral blade of wind was slicing through carrots and peppers with surgical precision. Pearl was at the sink, washing potatoes. She didn't use a sponge. She simply held the potatoes under the faucet and sang a low note, causing the water to agitate and scrub the skins clean in seconds.
Raina leaned against the counter near the pass-through window, clutching a glass of ice water like a lifeline. She watched them but could not see their hands. It was domestic. It was insane. And it was strangely beautiful. She was trying to compose herself. She smoothed her hair. She checked her reflection in the stainless steel refrigerator door. Her cheeks were still pink. Her pupils were dilated.
Pull it together, soldier, she told herself. You are a professional. You are here to fix a building, not to fall in lust with a mysterious gentleman thief with strange wardrobe choices.
"Meat is resting," Marcus announced. "Liri, how are those peppers coming?"
"They are submitted to my will," Liri replied, sliding the chopped vegetables into a bowl.
"Pearl, plates," Marcus ordered.
Pearl grabbed a stack of heavy ceramic plates and spun them onto the counter like frisbees. They landed perfectly in a stack.
The bell above the diner door chimed.
Raina stiffened. She knew who it was. She didn't need to look. She could feel the shift in the air pressure. She could smell the scent of rain and musk that drifted in from the dining room.
"Ah," Marcus said, wiping his hands on his apron. "Right on time."
He walked out of the kitchen. Raina followed, her heart doing a traitorous double-time rhythm against her ribs.
Nix stood in the center of the diner. He had cleaned up. The slime and the muck of the tunnel were gone. He was wearing clothes—actual human clothes that must have been tailored for his smaller stature. He wore a pair of charcoal grey trousers, a crisp white dress shirt with the sleeves rolled up to the elbows, and a fitted vest.
He looked like a gentleman thief from a Victorian novel. He looked like a leading man who had been shrunk in the wash. His hair was slicked back, revealing the strong, noble lines of his face. His skin glowed with health and vitality. He held a bottle of wine in one hand.
Marcus walked up to him. "Nix. You found a suit."
"I found many things," Nix said. His voice was smooth, cultured, devoid of the croak he sometimes used for effect. He looked past Marcus. His golden eyes locked onto Raina.
The air in the room seemed to vanish.
Raina felt her knees weaken. He looked so... normal. And yet, so utterly perfect. The memory of his hands on her body in the red light of the tunnel crashed over her, making her breath catch.
"Raina," Marcus said, gesturing to the small man. "I don't think you've been formally introduced. This is Nix. He's... well, he's our acquisition specialist."
Nix stepped forward. He didn't bow. He didn't scamper. He walked with a fluid, confident stride. He stopped in front of Raina. He was barely chest-high to her, but he held himself with such presence that the height difference felt irrelevant.
He extended a hand. "A pleasure, Miss Raina."
Raina stared at the hand. It was the same hand that had unbuttoned her pants. It was the same hand that had brought her to the edge of oblivion. She reached out. She took his hand. It was warm. His grip was firm, dry, and polite. But as their skin touched, a spark of static electricity snapped between them, loud enough to be heard.
Raina jumped slightly. Nix didn't flinch. He just smiled, that same slow, devastating smile from the photograph.
"The pleasure is mine," Raina managed to say. Her voice was an octave higher than usual.
"I trust you found the... tour of the facilities illuminating?" Nix asked. His eyes danced with mischief. He was teasing her. He was playing with fire right in front of Marcus and the others.
"Very," Raina said, pulling her hand back. She clasped her hands behind her back to hide their trembling. "The... structural integrity is fascinating."
"Indeed," Nix purred. "I find the hidden depths are often the most rewarding."
Pearl, standing in the kitchen doorway with a stack of plates, let out a short, sharp cough that sounded suspiciously like a laugh.
Eira narrowed her eyes, looking between Raina and Nix. "You smell of the same soap," she accused, sniffing the air.
Raina panicked. "It's the diner soap! In the bathroom! Is there other soap?"
"Yes," Nix agreed smoothly, smoothing his vest. "Hygiene is paramount when one travels via the crawlspace. Shall we eat? I believe I was promised meatloaf, though the scent of chicken special is far more enticing."
"The special it is," Marcus said, oblivious to the subtext that was practically vibrating the floorboards. "Grab a seat, Nix. Don't put your feet on the table."
Nix pulled out a chair for himself. He climbed up with a grace that made the action look dignified rather than childish. He sat down, placed the wine bottle on the table, and looked at Raina. He patted the empty seat beside him.
"Sit, engineer," Nix said softly. "Tell me more about your rocks."
Raina looked at the empty seat. She looked at Marcus, who was busy plating food. She looked at Eira, who was watching her like a hawk. And she looked at Pearl, who gave her a tiny, almost imperceptible nod. Raina walked over. She sat down next to the thief.
Under the table, in the privacy of the tablecloth's shadow, she felt a knee press gently against hers. It was warm. It was solid.
Raina picked up her fork. She didn't move her leg.
"So," Raina said, her voice finally steadying as she embraced the madness. "Let's talk about the piezoelectric effect."
"I am listening," Nix said, pouring the wine. "Intently."
The air inside the diner hummed with a quiet and comfortable energy, though the atmosphere around the corner booth where Nix and Raina sat was charged with something far more volatile. To the casual observer, they were merely two professionals discussing the geological peculiarities of the tunnel excavation. Raina had a stack of papers spread out on the Formica table, her finger tracing the jagged lines of a topographical map, while Nix leaned forward with his elbows propped up, nodding sagely at her explanations.
But beneath the surface level of their conversation, a completely different game was being played.
About an hour or so later, Raina headed back to the hotel to clean up and rest. The heavy glass door of the diner clicked shut, sealing out the humid Texas night and the receding sound of Raina's footsteps. Marcus summoned the crew over for a quick meeting. Nix was looking out for Rains's safety while she was on her way.
Nix stood by the window for a long moment, watching until her silhouette disappeared toward the hotel down the street. The moment she was gone, his posture shifted. The "Gentleman Thief" persona relaxed into something looser, more feral. He let out a long, ragged exhale and rolled his neck, cracking the tension out of his spine.
"She is gone," Nix announced, turning back to the room.
The atmosphere in the diner instantly changed. The performance was over.
Eira immediately reached up and yanked the thick, knitted beanie off her head. She shook out her hair, revealing the sharp, elegant points of her ears that had been painfully pinned back for the last two hours.
"By the frosty breath of the ancestors," Eira groaned, rubbing the tops of her ears. "I thought I was going to lose circulation. How do humans tolerate these wool helmets?"
"They call it 'fashion,' or 'hygiene,'" Marcus said, grabbing a rag to wipe down the counter. "And keep it down. She's an engineer, not a blind woman. If she had seen those ears, she would have bolted."
Liri adjusted her own cap but didn't take it off, preferring to keep her ears tucked safely away. She leaned against the prep table, her emerald eyes thoughtful. "She stared at us," Liri noted. "She looked right at me when I brought the water. I thought she saw the glamour fading."
"She saw what she expected to see," Nix said, walking over to grab a leftover piece of the chicken. He hopped up onto the counter, disregarding Marcus's glare. "Raina is a creature of logic. Of science. If she sees a beautiful woman in a kitchen cap, she assumes it is a chef. She does not assume it is an Elf from the High Vale because Elves do not exist in her textbooks."
"And me?" Pearl asked. She was wiping her hands on a towel, her small, perfectly proportioned frame moving with a grace that belied her size. "She watched me like a hawk."
"She thinks you are simply... compact," Marcus said gently. "There are humans your size, Pearl. Rare, but they exist. She probably thinks you have a condition, or you're just genetically petite. She's too polite to ask."
"Politeness is a useful shield," Pearl mused. "But she is sharp. She sensed the power in the food. She sensed the connection between Nix and the deep earth."
"She sensed a lot of things," Eira muttered, scratching her ear again. "She almost hyperventilated when she saw the photo of the thief winking."
Nix smirked, tearing into a chicken wing. "She handled it well."
"We cannot keep this from her forever," Liri warned. "If she is to work in the tunnels, if she is to help us stabilize the Slipgate, she will need to know what we are. She will need to know that we are not just eccentric cooks."
"Not yet," Marcus said firmly. He looked at the group—a thief, two elves, and a miniture siren, all trying to pass as a short-order crew in rural Texas. "She just accepted that there is a heartbeat in the granite. She accepted that the food tastes like magic. If we tell her you guys are elves and Pearl is a siren right now, her brain will snap. We have to drip-feed the truth."
"The slow reveal," Nix agreed, licking grease from his fingers. "Let her fall in love with the mystery first. Then... we show her the magic."
Eira sighed, looking at her beanie with disdain before tossing it onto the counter. "Fine. But tomorrow, we get better hats. This one itches."
Marcus killed the main lights, leaving the diner illuminated only by the neon glow of the pie case. "Deal. Now, let's clean up. We open at six, and I have a feeling our engineer is going to be back early for coffee."