"I had what you might call a friend? Friends, even, but I'm not sure if they saw me that way, or just as another teammate. Or even as an asshole."
"Okayyyyyyyyy." Rhett leaned in, sensing the shift in Henrik's voice—something raw beneath the usual cynicism.
"Ugh." Henrik sighed, turning back to sit on the dirty floor, his back against the railing wall. His fingers drummed against his thigh, a nervous tic Rhett hadn't seen before. "There was my squad, team B. There was this guy, Mateo. He was kind of like me, you know? Usually kept to himself, but he was pretty nice when you got to know him? He had this weird quirk that let him create slime, which I honestly thought was useless and he failed to even pass the entrance exam, but he managed to turn it into something powerful."
