Chapter 20: 20. I Was Going to Report This Tomorrow. Then a Loose Tile Said Otherwise.

William started to set up a situation that would test each woman’s weaknesses while also forcing them to work together as they spread out. It was going to be tiring, maybe annoying, and probably end with at least one person wanting to kill him.

Additionally, he felt a great deal of excitement about the upcoming challenges. They did many drills, with William calling out situations and making them respond right away.

Catherine had trouble making decisions quickly, Lia thought too much about where she was, Kaela rushed in without thinking about it, Ellie held back too much, and Clara got too stressed out trying to keep track of too many things at once.

Everyone was worn out and sweaty by the end of the hour, but William could already see small changes in how they moved and reacted. Not big wins, but wins all the same.

William said, "Good work," when they stopped for a drink.

"Same time tomorrow... We’ll go into more detail about each person’s problems."

William realized he needed a few minutes alone to relax as the women started to leave, talking about the training with varying levels of excitement and anger. He told Catherine he’d meet her in thirty minutes to talk about business matters.

Then he went to one of the quieter parts of the academy to take a break and not think about complicated training situations for a while.

At this time of night, the administrative wing was mostly empty because most of the staff had gone home or to their rooms. William walked down the familiar hallways to a small courtyard he had found that had a lovely view of the sunset and was usually empty.

He was almost there when he heard something that made him stop. A voice was coming from one of the storage rooms that was supposed to be empty off the main hallway.

It was speaking quietly but with a lot of feeling, and William’s combat instincts immediately told him it was suspicious. The room wasn’t supposed to be used, and the way the person was talking made it sound like they would rather not be heard.

William moved closer carefully, using his old training to keep quiet and stay in the shadows. As he got closer, the voice became clearer, and what he heard made his blood run cold.

"Target secured."

"Wade is precisely where we need him..."

"Several high-value students are now attached and have administrative access through Blackwood."

"The plan is moving forward as planned. Await further orders."

There was a pause, probably so that someone could hear the answer, and then the voice went on. "Got it. I’ll keep my cover."

"The academy won’t know what hit them until it’s too late."

William was frozen, and his mind was racing. They were definitely talking about someone in the academy who was working against them by name.

This wasn’t just paranoia or the headmaster’s vague suspicions. This was real, happening right now, and aimed at him and his students.

The voice in the room stopped, which made it seem like the conversation was over. William had about thirty seconds before whoever was in there came out and might have seen him eavesdropping.

He had to make a choice right away. Should he confront them, run and tell the headmaster, or keep listening for more information?

His hand moved toward where a weapon would have been in his old life, but he was unarmed and wearing an instructor’s uniform that was meant for teaching, not fighting. In the meantime, anyone in that room could be a student or a high-ranking teacher, and facing them alone could be deadly.

The handle on the door began to turn. William made up his mind and acted.

William’s first thought was to confront whoever was in that room, but his instincts from his previous life kicked in quickly and strongly. Going after possibly dangerous conspirators while unarmed and worn out from training was the kind of dumb thing that got people killed in action movies right before the credits rolled.

William thought to himself, "Nope," as he quietly backed away from the door.

"Not my kind of shit I have to deal with right now."

"The headmaster said there were enemies in the academy, and I just confirmed it..."

"And it turns out the mission is already accomplished, so I can tell him about it tomorrow when I’m not running on three hours of sleep and a protein bar."

He walked quickly but carefully down the hall, putting some space between himself and the storage room before whoever was inside came out to see if anyone had been listening. He was already thinking about what he’d heard, making a list of details, and trying to remember if he knew the voice.

The problem was that he had only heard it for about thirty seconds, and it was muffled through a door and spoken softly. Anyone from a student to a senior instructor could have done it.

He only knew for sure that they knew about him and his students and that Catherine was going to be his assistant. That made it seem like someone who had access to academy records or had been keeping an eye on him.

William muttered, "Great, so I’m being stalked by conspiracy theorists with real organizational support," as he turned a corner into another empty hallway.

"This just keeps getting fucking better in my second life."

"Extreme difficulty at the start... that sounds alright."

He was about halfway to the courtyard he had been going to when he saw something strange. There was someone else in this part of the administrative wing that was supposed to be empty.

They were partly hidden behind a support pillar about twenty feet ahead. William’s combat instincts quickly told him that the behavior was strange because normal people don’t hide behind things in empty hallways unless they are up to something.

The person moved a little, and William saw long black hair pulled back in a messy bun, an instructor’s uniform that looked like it had been thrown on quickly, and a stance that made it clear that the person was trying very hard to be inconspicuous but had no idea how to do it.

William thought, "Oh, for fuck’s sake," when he saw the signs of another eavesdropper.

"Someone else was listening? How many people want to hear that storage room talk?"

The woman was leaning around the pillar to get a better look at something that William had passed by. From this angle, he could tell exactly that it was a woman.

She was so focused on what she was watching that she didn’t see William coming from the other side.

William was about ten feet away when he realized she was probably watching the same storage room he had just left. This meant that she had either followed him there or had been investigating on her own and coincidentally arrived at the same time.

Either way, the situation rapidly became complex. He was trying to decide whether to tell her he was there or just let her do whatever research she was doing when everything went wrong.

The woman shifted her weight to get a better viewing angle, and her foot came down directly on a loose piece of decorative tile that someone had probably been meaning to fix for weeks. The tile made a sharp cracking sound that echoed down the empty hallway like a gunshot in the silence.

William saw her entire body go rigid with the universal expression of someone who’d just screwed up catastrophically. Back toward the storage room, he heard raised voices and the sound of a door being thrown open.

"Someone’s out there!"

"Check the corridors now!"

"If it’s a student, grab them. If it’s staff, we’ll need to adjust the timeline."