They came through the front door like they had already decided where everything was going.

Like my house was already theirs and I was nothing more than an uninvited rat that they couldn’t get rid of.

Their bags swung off their shoulders even as their voices overlapped as they talked excitably about something that they had no idea about.

Hell, one of them was already looking at the wall like he was about to start writing on it at any moment so he could remember whatever was in his head. Nobody paused long enough to look around properly, which told me everything I needed to know about how this was going to go.

It was the survivors all over again. And I wasn’t going to put up with that.

The first time was a lesson, this time it would be nothing but a punishment. And I wasn’t enough of a masochist to want to go through it a second time.

Chenghai didn’t move from beside me, his arm still resting where it had been on the back of the couch, his coffee in his hand like he was just waiting to watch a show.

The rest of the guys were just as casual. Yuche sat on my other side. He had stayed inside when the rest of us had gone out to confront the military in order to watch our backs from the window, but now he was sitting there with a smirk on his face like he wanted to see just how sideways this shitshow was going to become.

Zhenlan sat in his wingback chair, the same newspaper in his had from before the fall. I found it hilarious. If anyone actually thought about it, they would realize that there was no way he could actually be reading it, let alone every day for months. But the people who came into my house never seemed to look at things that closely.

If they did, they would quickly turn around and never come back.

Lingyun was sitting on the other side of the sectional, his fingers dancing over the controller like he didn’t have a care in the world. But it was clear that he wasn’t paying attention to anything on screen. Otherwise he wouldn’t have missed that jump for the past twenty three times.

The moment the door opened without so much as a knock, I could feel the tension coming off the guys.

But they didn’t say anything. They didn’t counter me when Wei and I were coming to an agreement. I wondered if that was because they already had an idea of what I was going to do or they were just trusting the process.

One of the scientists dragged a chair across the floor of the dining room. Another set something down on the table like it belonged there. A third stepped closer to the wall and reached into his pocket.

That was more than enough.

I shook my head once and looked up at Wei Guang who was standing between us and the scientists. "Oh," I purred, a smirk playing on my face. "You thought you were moving in here? My bad."

Everyone stopped moving and turned to look at me. I could feel Chenghai vibrating beside me as he tried to contain his laughter. I could feel Yuche’s tight muscles relaxing.

Yeah, they were trusting the process.

"We had an agreement," said Wei, coming closer to where I was on the sectional. "You agreed."

"I did," I agreed with a nod of my head. "You wanted my place, but this is only a part of my place."

One of the other soldiers that had come in after frowned. "We were told this was the location."

"It is," I answered, already turning away. "You just misunderstood which part."

I didn’t wait for them to argue. I headed toward the back of the house, and after a second, they followed. Their voices picked up again behind me, lower this time like they were hissing at each other trying to figure out what was going on.

I even heard Wei demanding answers from Chenghai, but he didn’t have any to give. I had kept this hand close to the chest.

We stepped out the back door and onto the path. My backyard looked like a normal one. Not overly large given the size of the house. But there was a rock pathway between flowers and emerald green grass. It wasn’t until you actually got out here that you began to appreciate the backyard as it was meant to be.

The house faded behind us as we continued to walk, and I could hear the voices behind me getting louder and louder as they tried to figure out what I was doing...where I was going.

Finally, after about twenty plus minutes of walking, a hedge came into view. It was tall enough to make everyone think that this was where the property ended, but that wasn’t the case at all.

Finding the wooden half gate, I pushed it open and stepped into the second half of my backyard.

"Consider it your own place," I said, moving aside so they could see it properly.

The pool house sat just beyond the hedge. Zhenlan called it a pool house, but to me, it was just a house. It looked like it had come out of a magazine. Three stories high with clean lines, white siding, black shutters, and a pool out front that hadn’t been touched in months.

Zhenlan had mentioned it when the survivors first came. Something about a graduation gift where I could still live with him but have my own place now that I was grown. I didn’t know anything about it, but I guess the old Rouxi had decorated everything.

I wasn’t going to move, so I might as well make use of it in a different way.

The scientists moved past me, their attention already shifting to the structure instead of the walk it took to get here. They stepped inside without waiting, and the reaction was immediate.

"It’s dirty," one of them said with a sneer.

Of course it was dirty. It hadn’t been touched since the beginning of the apocalypse. But a little dust, a few spiderwebs, and maybe a couple of mice did not make a house unlivable.

"You have a cleaning crew," I said with a shrug. "Might as well get them to do what you are paying them for."

"This isn’t what we agreed to," another one said, turning back toward me.

"You needed space," I answered. "You have space. How isn’t this what we agreed upon?"

Wei stepped forward then, his patience finally thinning. "We needed access to the main structure."

"You have access," I said. "You just walked it."

"That’s not the same thing."

"You’re welcome to leave," I replied, my eyes turning cold as I met his. "If you don’t like it, then feel free to take your people and find something better."

That stopped him.

Everything outside had already been set. Equipment had been unloaded, positions taken, systems running. Moving the thirty some odd scientists now meant having to undo all of it, and he knew it.

He looked around once, taking in the distance, the space, the fact that this was still better than what was waiting for them anywhere else.

Then he exhaled. "I’ll assign a security team," he said at last. "The scientists need to be protected around the clock." 𝚏𝕣𝕖𝚎𝚠𝚎𝚋𝚗𝐨𝐯𝕖𝕝.𝕔𝐨𝕞

"You do that," I replied.

The scientists had already started moving again, complaints shifting into adjustments, their attention snapping back to the work now that it was clear they weren’t getting anything closer.

That was fine.

They would stay busy.

I turned and walked back the way we came, leaving them to it.

By the time I reached the house and sat back down, the noise had settled where it belonged. Distant. Manageable. And definitely not my problem.

Chenghai glanced at me after we had come back before going back to his coffee. He didn’t ask anything.

He didn’t need to. I could see the smile on his face.

I picked up my phone and went to sit down on the couch, letting the guys fall where they wanted to.

Now it was time to take my pound of flesh.

I took in a deep, controlled breath and let it out, stretching my space as far as it could go outside.

The military dropped so much stuff right outside my doors, thinking that it would be safe.

They really should have known better.

One small intention, and a solar panel that was at the end of an entire row of them disappeared, along with all the cables it was attached to. A back up storage batter went with it.

I hummed as I selected the drama I wanted to watch and put my head on Yuche’s shoulder even as my mind was already on something else.

A satellite dish from one of the communication units came next, along with everything that it needed to work.

It was a lot like I had done when I went shopping before the world ended. You don’t take enough to really notice. Just enough that if someone did, they would assume it had been misplaced, or moved.

I moved away from the technology until I got to where they were storing their food for the scientists. A crate near the back of a stack disappeared and landed quietly into my space. And an entire case of wine and spirits quickly followed it.

I wanted to take more, I would fully admit it. But I was playing the long game here.

For every day that they sat outside my front door, for every day that the scientists were living rent freed in my pool house, I would take something else.

I shifted on the couch and turned the volume up slightly, letting the noise outside fade again.

I made a deal for internet, streaming services, and dinner. It wasn’t my fault that they thought I could be persuaded by things like that.