They didn't manage to waive their remedial drill. Nearly a third of the group, including Farah, only managed thirty-eight hits as the sun set on their second day of Salamander training.

Sergeant Varnell didn't seem displeased, as she dismissed them for dinner, earlier in the evening. "Colonel Tammerlane isn't willing to spare us more ammunition. So we'll be going back to conditioning training anyway. Running the walls isn't any different from what I was going to put you through tomorrow. Go get some sleep."

They had taken her instructions to heart; no one was up long past sunset. Except for Gerald, who was still awake with a small lamp and a quill, writing something. Adrian was somewhat curious about, but not enough to stay awake.

The last thing Adrian had been expecting, when he shut his eyes, was opening them in the dead of night.

His quiet, dreamless sleep was interrupted by a sharp rap on the side of his head, and a gentle hand was resting over his mouth. He stifled his panic when he saw Sergeant Varnell standing beside his cot, holding up her other hand.

"Eyes up, soldier. Say nothing, move quietly. Get dressed." Sergeant Varnell whispered.

Her presence and the urgency of her tone, was shock enough to make him sit up out of reflex. A dozen questions swept through his thoughts, but he didn't voice them. "Aye, ma'am," was all he said as he slid out of bed, and pulled out his clothes.

Sergeant Varnell was waiting for him at the door. She had a dark, angry scowl on her face, and her sword was in her hand. "With me."

She lead him out into the fields, walking silently for nearly half a mile before stopping in sight of a small equipment shed near the tram line.

"Everyone who takes the tram lines is noticed, this far from the districts," Varnell began to explain. "The couple we captured had been monitored for nearly four hours. Colonel Tammerlane's people took them without incident. I'm bringing you to see them on a hunch, but I am rarely wrong about these sorts of things."

She opened the door and led them inside, and despite being bound and gagged, Adrian instantly recognised the two.

Carver and Tiffany Mormew. Enforcers, for Stenman Xavier.

"I brought you because they both have Undercity accents, and were carrying poorly maintained short swords."

Even for a gang like the Porters, professionally made weapons were difficult to acquire. Xavier, to the best of his knowledge, had only one person armed with well-forged knives; a shadow who had come underground with the reject she was sleeping with at the time.

Even the Mormews, respected enforcers, used old army swords stolen from a metal recycling warehouse. The antiquated weapons lay on the table beside them.

It was strange, seeing them like this. Adrian used to fear them, respect them. Now, looking at the pair, he knew that if he had met them both in the open field, he could have handled them both.

"Their names are Tiffany and Carver Mormew. They work for my former gang boss, Stenman Xavier," Adrian said. "Enforcers, and 'problem solvers'."

"Problem solvers?"

"People entrusted to make field decisions on behalf of Xavier. He didn't let just anyone decide how a situation needs to be handled," Adrian said.

"So they make problems go away?" Varnell asked, the disapproving note in her voice so pronounced that even Tiffany and Carver flinched.

"Not necessarily," Adrian explained. "Xavier's first instruction is to avoid attracting attention. If the smart move is to hit someone over the head and push them into an incinerator, then they would do it. If the smart move is a bribe, threat, or employment, they do it."

"Stenman Xavier. I recognize the name. We get reports occasionally about the condition of the Undercity," Varnell said, as she stepped forward and un-gagged the pair.

Tiffany huffed in derision, and looked at Adrian. "The boss was a little broken up about your desertion, kid. He liked you."

"What were you here to do?" Varnell asked them.

Neither of them responded.

"You're not going to torture them, are you?" Adrian asked.

Varnell sputtered and shook her head. "Torture? You torture people if you want them to agree with you. In four hours, I could get these two to confess, in the Agora, that they're rabbits. But finding out useful information? Torture is unreliable for that."

Not inhumane. Not cruel, or intolerable. Adrian was careful to mark that distinction.

"Besides. I don't need your former compatriots to talk. You know them well enough to answer for them. If they were here on orders from their boss and knew their target had entered military service, how do you think Xavier would approach this."

"Sideways, first. Xavier would look for a way to remove or isolate me," Adrian admitted.

"He would probably know that a pair of affidavits about a serious offence would be enough to have your provisional pardon suspended while we investigate. Confirmation from a third party would be enough to have you dishonourably discharged, or even sent to a tribunal," Varnell explained. "I doubt he would risk exposure like this when seven pieces of paper and a single bribed witness would suffice."

Adrian's eyes widened, and he gulped hard. He hadn't realised it might have been that easy for his former life to upend his current one.

"Which tells me these two are 'problem-solving' right now, on his behalf. But without his direct support," Varnell said. "Good for your boss, since it exonerates him. Good for you, because it further confirms you don't have an unpardonable offence in your past. Bad for these two, since it suggests they're here to kill you."

"Bertram," Varnell asked one of the soldiers nearby. "What is the legal protocol for the attempted murder of a soldier? Do we hand them over to the orderlies, or do we conduct a military tribunal?"

"They're civilians, and the sixth hasn't started yet, ma'am," the tall soldier, Bertram, replied. "They remain outside of  military jurisdiction unless we're being invaded."

"I see. Adrian, would it smooth things over with your former life if I returned these two largely undamaged?" Sergeant Varnell asked him.

Adrian nodded. "I believe it would, ma'am. I can't hate them for trying this. My departure could make Xavier look weak in the eyes of his enemies or his underlings. These two will probably be punished for their motivation, rather than their actions."

"I see. Either these two were trying to help, and are reprimanded, or they're trying to upstage him. Are you comfortable with this leniency, mister Keates?" Varnell asked.

"I am," Adrian was surprised at his answer.

"Then I'll send these two back to mister Xavier with a message," Varnell said, as she finally turned back to the two prisoners.

"Adrian Keates currently enjoys the provisional pardon granted to him with enlisting. Inform your boss that because the two of you appear to be acting alone, the Army is not considering a reprisal," Varnell said to the pair. "However, we will ignore any future attempt to convince us that he has committed an unpardonable offence, because of this attempt on his life. Any further irritation may invite the wrath of the Army."

Varnell paused, before adding, "which is polite for 'I will bring a battalion down on your heads if you irritate me again'. Do you understand what I said?"

They both nodded, sullenly, and Adrian could feel Varnell resisting the urge to cuff them both over the head.

Apparently, he wasn't alone. "Sergeant Varnell asked you a question! Do you understand the message you have been given?" The tall soldier, Bartholomew, shouted at them.

"Yes, yes, there's no need to shout," Tiffany said.

"I will stop shouting when the two of you demonstrate that you're not hard of hearing! Now repeat your message back to Sergeant Varnell!" Bartholomew barked.

Surprisingly, Carver relayed it back with the exact wording he was given. Varnell gestured for their release, and the pair of enforcers were escorted out.

Once the two of them were alone, Varnell turned to him, and said, "I now know you don't have an unpardonable offence in your past. Even those two would have known how to use it to their advantage. But you're currently in the uncomfortable position of having your past interrupt my present."

Adrian swallowed hard and tried to say something in his defence, but Varnell raised a hand and stopped him. "Relax. You're not the first kid to run to the army to escape his past. We picked those two out over a week ago. The only odd situation left to sort out is why you're running."

"I left, ma'am. I didn't want to live that life anymore," Adrian admitted.

"Yet you were willing to before. Why?"

"Xavier put my sister into hospice care. In Riverward, in Central. The cost to keep her bed there was substantial. She died two months ago."

"I see. Your service, in whatever capacity your boss required, for family," Varnell speculated.

"Not any capacity, ma'am. I was willing to risk my life or even other people he employed. I wasn't willing to kill. I'd have rather gone into forward-tunnel inspection."

"Those are kids that stress new tunnels with small explosives to test their stability, ma'am," Bartholomew explained. "Common practice in the Undercity."

"I see. Good. I'll accept those answers," Varnell said. "It also clears up the second most irritating mystery in your cadre of recruits."

"Second?" Adrian asked. "Who could have a secret stranger than hired hit-men coming after me?"

"You'd be surprised. Go back to sleep, soldier. Tomorrow won't wait for us," Varnell said. Adrian saluted, before even considering the need. Bartholomew returned it, and a moment later, so did Sergeant Varnell.