Gabe finally smiles and motions for me to get out of the truck. I follow him to the back and he reaches for a bag in the bed that I hadn’t previously noticed. “I’m not about to send you on your way without some protection.”

He starts handing me all sorts of items. He gives me a thick coat, a backpack full of food, a first aid kit, and a water bottle. He then pulls out my rifle, a pistol, and several extra magazines of ammunition, along with a sheathed machete. Apart from living within Crestwood, I’ve never felt so safe.

“I tried to make sure that you have enough supplies to at least make it a few days,” he says.

“Thank you,” I tell him. “It’s more than I could have hoped for.”

He zips the empty bag back up and rests his arms on the side of the truck. I stand next to him feeling like a walking surplus store, but that’s a good thing.

“Gabe, I feel like I ought to tell you something,” I say. Even as the words come out, my stomach churns. I’m about to tell the man that is carrying out my banishment the truth about my abilities - a betrayal of myself, but I feel like he needs to know.

He looks at me without saying a word, his eyebrows raised.

“I overheard something, a meeting. There was a group of raiders that came to Crestwood yesterday, right?”

“Yeah, Paxton gave them the boot.”

“Not before he met with them. They want something. They are looking for something.”

“How do you know about this?”

“I said I overheard it.”

“You couldn’t have,” he says, cocking his head to the side. “You were in the cell.”

“I know,” I say. I look away from him, biting my lower lip. “Do you remember when I first came here, Paxton asked me if I had any special abilities?”

“He asks everyone that for some reason,” Gabe says.

“Yeah, well, I lied to him when I told him no. I can actually hear things better than anyone.”

“What do you mean?” He turns his whole body toward me and stares deep into my eyes.

“I mean that if I know a place very well, I can listen to just about anything. If I’m up in my apartment, I can listen at the front gate and hear the conversations of the guards. If I want, I can listen to any of the elders’ meetings. I can hear conversations that Paxton has at Headquarters.”

As he looks at me, I can’t tell if he believes what I’m saying.

“Well, yesterday I overheard his conversation with the raider. He’s after the group of people that came into Crestwood.”

“What do you mean after them?”

“I mean, they have something he wants…but it’s not really just something he wants. It’s something Shadowface wants.”