Adam's smile stayed in place as if it belonged there... as if it had been practiced in mirrors until it looked reassuring instead of sharp.
Sera held his gaze without flinching. She had watched that same expression form in a different room, in a different life, while her wrists bled against metal and her lungs tried to remember how to work.
It was the smile he wore when he believed the numbers were on his side. It was the smile he wore when he thought survival meant loyalty.
"You're special," he repeated when he re-entered the room she was in, and the word came out warm, almost indulgent. "You just don't know how yet."
Sera let her shoulders remain loose. She kept her hands relaxed at her sides. She forced her breathing to stay even, not because she needed to, but because the equipment liked consistency and humans believed consistency meant control.
