Chapter 18: Trust

 

Jessica walked out of the workshop building and moved to the side of the entrance, positioning herself so she wouldn’t block anyone who wanted to enter or exit. She prepared to simply stand there, lost in thought, when her eyes caught sight of a bench a few inches past the building’s corner.

Without consciously deciding to, she began walking toward it.

She reached the bench and sat, leaning her back against the wooden slats, letting her full weight settle. For a long moment, she sat motionless, her face betraying no emotion whatsoever. But behind those molten gold eyes, a single thought rang through her mind like a mantra:

‘Nothing is ever free. Nothing is ever free. They want something in return. I know it.’

Her mind grew firmer with each repetition, building walls against hope. But then confusion crept in, making her sit up straight. She leaned forward, her jaw resting on clasped hands as she replayed the scene from the office.

Jack’s expression when he’d made his request. Violet’s nod of verification.

In her previous life, as she’d grown older and more experienced, Jessica had learned to read people. Hidden motives, buried intentions, the things left unsaid, she’d trained herself to notice them all. It had kept her safe. It had kept her from being caught by surprise when reality inevitably showed its teeth.

But for the first time since she’d learned that hard truth, something had caught her completely off guard.

Unconditional care.

The concept was foreign and she wasn’t ready to believe such a thing could exist. That’s why she’d excused herself, to think clearly, to analyze, to figure out what they really wanted and what scheme they were running.

‘…But what do they really want?’

She stood abruptly and began pacing back and forth around the bench area, her footsteps quick and agitated. Minutes passed. No answers came.

She sat down hard, both hands rising to ruffle her blood-red hair in frustration.

“Why does this seem so difficult?”

The question hung unanswered in the air. Her emotionless facade crumbled into a deep frown as her thoughts drifted to her exit from the office, the way she’d stormed out without proper courtesy.

She imagined Violet’s reaction. The spanking. The death by spanking.

She ruffled her hair harder.

“Damnit! I shouldn’t have reacted like that when that vile being was there!”

Despite her frustration, a slight smile tugged at her lips as she thought about the day’s events. Violet, for all her fury and violence, had never once projected malice or negative intent. Even during the spanking, the almost dying spanking, Jessica hadn’t felt any real darkness from her.

‘But it still hurts like hell.’ She winced, the memory still fresh, still stinging.

While she was lost in her thoughts, the workshop door opened.

A figure stepped out, a young woman with dull silver hair and glasses that sat slightly loose on her blue eyes. It was the same woman Jessica had nearly run into when she’d stormed out of the office.

‘She’s looking for me.’ Jessica thought as the woman’s gaze swept the area until it landed on her, still seated on the bench in the distance. The woman adjusted her glasses and walked over with calm, measured steps.

“Good afternoon.” Her voice was polite, professional.

“Good afternoon.” Jessica replied with a slight smile.

The woman, blue eyes, silver hair, gestured toward the empty space beside Jessica. “Is this place taken?”

Jessica shook her head. “It’s totally empty.”

Without another word, the woman sat.

Silence descended. One minute passed. Then two. Jessica’s eye began twitching almost imperceptibly as the quiet stretched into awkward territory.

Finally, the woman spoke.

“I’m Wendy, by the way.” Her tone was matter-of-fact, leaving no room for argument. “I’ll be your escort if you want to go anywhere.”

Jessica nodded. “I’m Jessica.”

Wendy nodded back and adjusted her glasses.

Something screamed in Jessica’s mind, a realization born from countless binge-watched dramas. This woman beside her was the spitting image of those serious, dedicated assistants who placed their jobs above everything else. Even themselves.

‘Sigh… That’s certainly a crazy way to live.’ Jessica tried to imagine herself in that role and immediately experienced a full-body cringe.

“This place is certainly one of the best spots to get fresh air,” Wendy said, interrupting her thoughts.

Jessica’s brows rose slightly, her lips curving in amusement. “You think so?”

Wendy nodded, adjusting her glasses yet again. “Yes… I do.” She paused, then added with a mischievous curl to her lips, “Though I think it might just be my personal preference.”

Jessica laughed, a small, genuine sound. The image of the serious, rigid assistant crumbled entirely in her mind.

****

 

After the laughter receded, Wendy raised her head, staring slightly upward at the distant clouds.

“Look,” she said, nudging her chin toward the horizon. “And tell me that isn’t beautiful.”

Jessica followed her line of sight, and her breath caught in her throat.

‘Beautiful…’

The word echoed in her mind, utterly insufficient for what she saw. The clouds drifted lazily across the sky, bathed in the warm afternoon glow of the sun. But one cloud in particular demanded attention, a massive, puffy formation that had taken the shape of a hand. It looked as if it were trying to descend from the heavens, reaching down toward the world below, but the angle made it appear as though its fingers were gently touching the sun itself.

“It’s beautiful,” Jessica finally managed.

Wendy nodded, her expression soft. “It is…”

Then her face darkened almost imperceptibly.

“…And at the same time, it’s horrifying and heart-wrenching to see. For someone like me who knows what actually happened.”

Jessica turned sharply, her expression shifting from appreciation to serious intrigue.

“What happened?”

Wendy sighed, the sound carrying years of memory.

“A few years ago, my cohorts and I decided to relocate to this settlement for long-term residence.. Unknown to us, a bad omen was about to descend just outside this settlement area.”

She paused, eyes fixed on the cloud-shaped hand.

“That cloud you see there… it wasn’t just a cloud shaped like a hand. It was a real giant hand. Countless of them, actually. And they were all descending. My cohorts and I were caught right in the middle.”

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

Jessica stared back at the cloud-hand, now impossibly distant from the safety of the settlement walls. In her mind, she began to imagine the scene, countless horrifying hands raining from the sky, falling toward her with nowhere to run, no destination close enough to reach.

‘I’d be completely squashed into a mashed paste,’ she confirmed inwardly. ‘No hope of survival.’

She turned back to Wendy. “It’s definitely impossible to survive something like that if you’re weak.”

Wendy nodded, confirming her words.

“It is. My cohort’s levels ranged from [Level 13] to [Level 24].” She met Jessica’s gaze. “Each of those hands was [Level 38].”

Jessica’s eyes widened.

‘Level 38?! That’s more than ten levels above the strongest member of their team.’

She voiced the obvious question. “Then how did you survive?”

Wendy stared at the distance in silence for a long moment, taking in the scene quietly. When she finally spoke, her voice was soft.

“Someone I didn’t trust saved us.”

Jessica’s brows rose. “Someone you didn’t trust?”

Wendy turned to meet her gaze.

“Before the journey, we needed a guide. Someone who knew the safest path to this settlement. Someone we could trust.” She looked back at the sky. “We found someone like that. He was well-known as a map expert, trustworthy in a general sense. So we hired him.”

Jessica’s frown deepened. “Then why didn’t you trust him? He was literally known by others who could verify his trustworthiness. Why wasn’t he trustworthy to you?”

Wendy glanced at her and smiled, a knowing, sad smile.

“Because I’m not the type of person to trust someone who offers to do his job for free, with the excuse that he was planning to go there anyway.”

Realization dawned on Jessica.

‘For free?’

She replayed the words in her mind before looking back at the sky.

“Was that why you didn’t trust him?”

Wendy nodded.

“Yes. Through everything I’ve experienced, I’ve come to believe that nothing ever comes for free. So I didn’t trust him, even though I knew he benefited from safety by coming with us, he was [Level 19] after all.” She paused. “But something about the way he agreed so instantly after seeing us… it just felt wrong. I concluded he had an ulterior motive of some sort.”

Silence settled between them as they both stared at the sky.

Jessica broke it.

“So… how did he save you from something clearly stronger than all of you?”

Wendy’s lips curled slightly.

“He told us earlier before then that he had an ability which allows him teleport a maximum of five people to a limited distance. The flaw was that he couldn’t teleport himself, and the aftereffects left him paralyzed for a period of time.” She turned to Jessica. “And you know the funniest thing about it all?”

Jessica waited.

“His limited distance at that moment was strangely close to the settlement walls. And my cohorts and I were exactly five people if we excluded him.”

Jessica thought for a long moment, turning the information over in her mind.

‘It feels strangely orchestrated,’ she mused. ‘Almost like it was designed for his total demise.’

Wendy’s voice cut through her thoughts.

“I didn’t calculate everything properly back then. I believed that not everyone was good enough to save others when they themselves were still in danger. Who would want to act the hero and die alone?” She stared down at her slender hands, which bore slightly faded scars. “I held that belief… until it happened. My cohorts and I all disappeared and landed right at the gate of this settlement.”

Jessica frowned, processing the weight of the revelation. Despite the seriousness, a stray thought surfaced.

‘He didn’t even say anything before saving them. Not a goodbye. Not a hero’s last words.’

She understood, logically, that time was critical, that even a single word could mean death in that instant. But still, the absence of a word bothered her.