The voices drifted to him again. "I'll be fine. Please. Just leave it?" an unfamiliar female voice said. His brows drew together. Although the kitchen light was on and spilling into the still dark living room, he would have to round the corner from the living room into the kitchen to see who these people were. Who the hell was in his house? He doesn't remember arresting any female perpetrators this week. He looked around for a weapon, but dropped that thought when he heard: "Just sit still and let me do this!".

His heart sank into his stomach. Oh no. He recognized his sister's voice. What the hell was she into now again? He was not crazy about the biker gang she was hanging out with, but then again, they had actually been good to her. Ironically they had kept her out of trouble. She had always been the wild child of the family. Owen was the quiet one, the one who had followed his dad's footsteps into the Army, and was currently employed by the local SWAT team as a sniper.

He clenched his jaw and rounded the corner. Neither woman saw him at first, and he took the time to evaluate the scene. The glass he had heard was the small pane above his door's handle. The obvious point of entry. And there was Olivia dabbing blood from a wound just above the left eye of a woman with pitch black hair. The woman was hugging herself and staring down, letting Olivia do her thing. "What the hell Olivia?" Owen thundered. They both looked up and he locked eyes with the unknown female, and he knew, his whole world was about to change.

The obvious answer to that age-old question: "How are you?"

And yet... that word is drenched in so many hidden feelings. A deadly term really...

Broken. Useless. Alone. Clueless. Betrayed. Fragile. On the edge. Depressed. Anxious. Abandoned. Crushed. Falling apart. Tired. Defeated. Burden. Bitter. Vulnerable. Sad. Frustrated. Hopeless. Confused. Hurt. Unsure. Damaged. Regret. Drowning.

That inch that I allowed to slip every day has become a hundred thousand miles of pure uphill. And now it's too hard. Too hard to try. Too hard to do. Too hard to even feel.

And I literally have nobody to talk to. Nobody that will just listen. Because either everyone wants to fix it, or they judge me. And I don't have the energy for either. So I keep it all inside. I suppose that actually means I'm strong. But I don't feel that.

"How are you?" someone asks as they walk up to me with a smile on their face.

I answer without hesitation.

"Fine".

Nearly 4 god-damned months of deep undercover work, all to infiltrate this god-damned weapon dealer's circle. My Black Ops team was briefed and weapons on low-ready we stormed. After the gang was successfully detained, I got called to my Commander's office. I assumed it was to debrief, but when he pushed the folder over the table I knew it meant another mission. "Seth", he said. Fuck, he never called me by my first name. "I don't want to give this one to anyone else."

I opened the folder and a photo of a black haired girl with the deepest blue eyes I've ever seen stared back at me. "All the information on the target is in there. You'll also find a bus ticket to a town called Courtship". This can only mean trouble. The Commander's insistence, and a blue-eyed girl in a town called Courtship. What the actual fuck...