Left. Left. Left, right, left.

  "Are you stup—"

  The deafening alarm drowned out Gabe's voice. Beyond the gargantuan crimson base behind him was the vastness of uncountable metal platforms forming a sky-filling collage of skyscrapers. The panorama captured Joaquim's gaze after he turned away from the cloud waves beneath him until another human stepped outside.

  "I don't see a fire here," she said. After talking into an earthplexus hologram icon of a speaker following her, the fire alarm ceased blaring.

  Her tear-shaped eyes met Joaquim's, probably noticing his mask first. "Did you two just get here?"

  "They're with me Corporal Woo," Camilo shapeshifted as Dalia answered as he stepped outside. He did shapeshift back to his original form back in No Man's Land before going to sleep, but Joaquim was sure that something was slightly different about his face back then. Now his Dalia form looked slightly different than the first time he demonstrated his flux powers too.

  Is it her nose? Joaquim thought to himself.

  "Hey... did you do your bun differently or something?" Corporal Woo asked Camilo. "It's been years since you last called me by my rank."

  They both had their dark hair up in a bun as required to adhere to Ember's military dress code.

  "The fire alarm brought out the more serious side of me," Camilo said, suddenly shifting his serious tone to a more casual one.

  Did he just realize she knows the person he shapeshifted into?

  "You never cared for being serious... the army is just a bunch of glorified mercenary bands," Corporal Woo said. "If anything, all the officers give you so much leniency since you are so good at combat and bringing in revenue. We've had kids go the wrong way all the time since we are extremely understaffed... are you doing alright Dalia?"

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  Camilo took a few moments to respond to the question. "I.. I've had a rough day."

  "If you need someone to talk to I'll be at the mess hall," Corporal Woo reassured him. "Hey, how come you didn't ask me to jaunt these new recruits? You got a shitty jaunter didn't you?"

  Corporal Woo crossed her arms and smiled while asking that, and Camilo nodded in response.

  "Okay, you three need to come in. My offer still stands if you need it Dalia."

  Past the diorama Joaquim ran by earlier was a twenty-first century carbine weapon on a glass display. When he came back with Gabe and Camilo, there was only one cleaner robot that remained in the area. It resembled a two-headed giraffe with its two heads acting like impromptu limbs. Attached were cameras sold in No Man's Land acting as its eyes. However, it was more likely it was being remote-controlled rather than being autonomous.

  The area with the displays, the fire exit, and the two-headed giraffe robot trifurcated into three hallways, and Camilo while still shapeshifted led the brothers to the one opposite of the fire exit. Their marble floors had a beige and white checker pattern, a pattern that could belong to a school beneath the clouds. However, all the paintings and photos against the wall made it clear where the boys were.

  It did not take long after their walk to arrive to their destination; an appreciable entrance that led to a convex under the military base. A shameless display of child recruitment awaited them below the stairs after Camilo pushed the entrance open with his trimmed hands. Visible past the floor-to-ceiling windows were clouds the convex was submerged in. The grayness they casted over the rows of seated seats gave this ominous overcast mood rather than the whimsical mood they had under the blue sky. It did not take long for a self-replicating police robot to approach the trio from the shadows.

  "Please remove your mask and identify yourself," it asked Joaquim.

  The unexpected request seemingly knocked out the air out of Joaquim's breath. Gabe's presence behind him felt overwhelmingly looming, he knew what was coming. He never told him his real name until this moment.

  "Joaquim Wami."

  With trepidation, Joaquim turned his head.

  Gabe's face became unfamiliar in disgust.