“Oh... mm... Mes...” The boy began to stammer something that vaguely sounded like his name, but he trailed off as Messiah straightened away from him. There was something strange in the boy’s voice – he didn’t know what it was, but given the circumstances and his own appearance, Messiah calculated that there was roughly a seventy-percent chance it was fear. As he got up and removed his body weight from the boy, he saw a pained grimace flicker over Lamb’s face – but before he could process what that meant, he heard a voice shout.

“Oh! Kitty!” Cinder’s voice seemed to be directed away, at the gymnasium door. Messiah glanced over and saw a man with dyed russet hair approaching them from the entrance.

“Puma!” Atlas cried in delight at almost the same time. “Good timing! Are you done with your check-up?”

“… Huh? Yeah.” Puma’s dark eyes swivelled through the crowd before landing on Messiah, standing in front of Lamb, who was still flat on his back in the mats. “Whoah, what’s going on?”

“We’re playing ice-breaker games,” Atlas explained innocently. At that, the others chuckled forlornly.

“More like ‘breaker’ games.” One of them sighed. “Lamb threw me real hard, you know!”

Atlas joined in the laughter with a boisterous chortle. “Aye, but you guys feel real close now, don’tcha?”

As they replied with a mixture of chuckles and indignant complaints, Messiah remembered the grimace he had just seen. He hesitated for a moment, wondering if it was worth the effort to look into – but decided it wasn’t worth trying to calculate a decision. Simply going along with his momentary whim, he turned back to Lamb and knelt down next to the boy.

“… You alright?” His voice sounded hoarse and raspy as it slid through his mask.

Lamb’s round eyes turned to him and stared for a few long seconds of silent astonishment before he finally nodded. “… Mm.”

It didn’t really seem like the boy had understood anything that had just been said, but Messiah’s whim was starting to be replaced by the desire to remove himself from the center of attention. Getting up, he pulled his hair tie out and let the rest of his hair fall freely as he turned to Atlas. "I'm done.”

“Well done, well done!” Atlas clapped his hands enthusiastically. “As expected of the almighty Messiah, you beat our champion!”

“Champion? My little Lamb?” A chortle made Messiah glance over his shoulder. Puma had walked over to the mats and was aggressively shrugging off his jacket. “Is that so? Let me challenge him, too.”

“Huh…?” Lamb blinked upwards for a moment, then sat up abruptly and turned to Atlas in protest. “Wait, I’m–!”

“Scared?” Puma stepped onto the mat and leaned over boy with a dark chuckle. “Don’t worry, I’ll be as gentle as I always am.”

Teeth gritting, Lamb turned back to Puma with a fierce glare. “I’m not scared!”

“Great! Get up then, c’mon.” Puma laughed brightly and offered a hand. “The last time we sparred was months ago. Let’s see if you’re any closer to beating me now!”

Lamb scowled and seemed to hesitate, then pointedly ignored the man’s hand and struggled to his feet on his own.

Codename Lamb… Intending to reflect more deeply on the results of his investigation, Messiah turned away. Walking over to a far wall and closing his eyes, he began to replay their session. Obviously, the most striking aspect of the fight was the fact that Lamb hadn’t been able to see – but that wasn’t the only thing that had impressed him. The boy’s agility and confidence had allowed him to make choices that most Sentinels would not have taken based on simple calculations. In fact, Lamb had consistently made many choices that Messiah believed were non-ideal. It was impossible for Ypsilon to create a Sentinel that could surpass his own abilities, but there were other ways to optimize the process. Had Lamb been equipped with specific abilities that allowed him to make those choices so confidently? Had Ypsilon tweaked their last Generation One to be more specialized in combat? Or...

A sudden pained yelp broke into his churning processes and Messiah jerked his head up. Turning his focus, he saw Puma’s dark silhouette hunched over slightly, clinging to a thin pale limb that Messiah belatedly realized was Lamb’s arm. After a moment, Puma release the boy’s arm and let him collapse properly into the mats.

“Uh, that was faster than I expected. You okay?” Puma chuckled and knelt down beside the boy, then turned his head to Atlas. “Sir, wasn’t Lamb training with you in Singapore all summer? What were you teaching him, how to cook or something?”

Atlas tossed his head back in a hoarse laugh, unperturbed by the young man’s haughty taunt. “Oh, no, teaching Lamb how to cook would take much longer than a mere summer!”

“... Hey!” Lamb sat up, his messy hair completely covering his eyes and his voice disgruntled. The boy began to mutter some kind of retort, but Messiah heard his name from the other Sentinels, and turned his attention to their whispering instead.

“Wow, that Puma, he’s just as scary as they say. To think he can beat Lamb so easily...”

“Maybe Cinders was just weak?” There was some faint, nervous laughter, as though they didn’t believe anything they were saying.

“Lamb did good against that big guy too. Messiah, right...? They seemed pretty evenly matched.”

I disagree. I was simply assessing him. Messiah glanced over, meeting the peeking gaze of the person who had spoken and watching as she stiffened and instantly looked away. But the Sentinel beside her didn’t notice, and continued with another offhanded chuckle.

“He’s Generation Zero though, isn’t he? The first Sentinel? Maybe he’s a little defective –” Someone yanked hard on their sleeve and they broke off abruptly, glancing over their shoulder and noticing Messiah with a visible gulp of shock.

“Damn!” Cinders, at the other end of the spectators, walked over to the mats and thumped Puma on the back. “You read his every move! As expected of his boyfriend.” He looked down at Lamb with a wide smirk. “You know him inside out, don’t you?”

Lamb, shaking his hair vigorously out of his eyes, glared at Cinders and growled, “Call me his boyfriend one more time and the next time I flatten you, I’ll dislocate your arm, too.”

“Eek, scary.” Cinders lifted his hands in surrender and made a show of cringing away. Beside him, Puma chuckled proudly.

“He’s badass, ain’t he? Isn’t that hot? Doesn’t that make you wanna push him down even more?” Purring, Puma stepped forward and knelt down in front of Lamb. As he reached a hand out to the boy’s face, Lamb jerked away, then flinched suddenly and reached instinctively for his chest. Noticing, Messiah straightened off the wall – but before he had to worry about whether he should approach them or not, Puma’s hand flashed forward and grabbed the boy by the shirt.

“Hey!” Lamb yelped in shock as Puma yanked his shirt up, and he grabbed the man’s hand in protest. But as he looked up with a scowl, his expression faltered, and he trailed off as he noticed the dark look on the Puma’s face.

“You’re bleeding,” Puma said nonchalantly.

“What?” Atlas came over too, his eyes widening in surprise as he looked down at the boy. “You were wounded? You should have told me! Gah, this boy...” He sighed and shook his head in exasperation.

“You have your check-up next, right?” Puma stood and dragged Lamb up by the shirt as well. It was strange – it seemed like he was concerned, but in stark contrast to his light-hearted demeanor earlier, Puma’s voice and actions were suddenly much colder. “I’ll take you there. You should get it checked.”

“I-I’m fine!” Lamb’s voice was shrill in embarrassment and he glanced at the other Sentinels, who were openly staring. Flushing, he yanked himself free from Puma’s grasp and stumbled backwards at his own force, but managed to stay on his feet. “I can go by myself!”

Puma’s dark eyes glinted as he eyed the boy, but he stood where he was and remained silent. Cinders cast him a rather dubious look, but also didn’t comment.

Red-faced, staring down, and clutching at his shirt, Lamb stomped past everyone’s stares. He passed Messiah on his way to the door, and his shoulders seemed to tense a little further in self-consciousness as he rushed away. The breeze that followed his hasty exit was warm and smelled pleasantly of milky shampoo.

Once Lamb had left, Atlas clapped his hands together again and the loud noise caused everyone to jump. Puma blinked, turned his head away from the doorway, and walked off the mats, where he shoved Cinders back towards the others.

“So who’s next?” Atlas asked, glancing pointedly at Puma.

“Not me,” Puma declared, a grin worming back onto his face as he stared challengingly back at the man. “I’m not wasting my time with these guys.”

“Don’t worry.” Someone called out amongst a mixture of sarcastic ‘wows’ and laughs. “Nobody wants to get beat up by you, either.”

Puma’s grin widened and playfulness returned to his eyes as he chuckled. “What do you mean, I wouldn’t beat anyone up! Didn’t you see how gentle I was to Lamb?”

“You call that gentle?!” As their laughter became louder, Messiah turned away and retreated back into his own thought processes.

Lamb hadn’t worn his blindfold against Puma... and yet he had been grounded so easily. Codename Puma was the second Sentinel to join the Dispatch team, after Nam. He must be quite experienced, but other than that, Messiah didn’t know much.

It might seem strange, that after over ten years of being used by Ypsilon, he barely knew anything about the other Sentinels – but that was the same for all of them. Secrecy was Ypsilon’s ultimate rule – ‘only know what you need to know.’ So again, Messiah found himself wondering... what was with this sudden casual get-together? What schemes were they playing around with, now...?

Puma... Glancing over, Messiah saw the red-haired man laughing comfortably with the others, who despite their earlier whispers looked eager to speak with him. He recalled the scene from earlier – the sight of the dark-haired Sentinel standing over Lamb’s fallen body, and then the glint that had appeared in his eyes when Lamb had refused his help. All of the evidence he had gathered suggested that Puma was simply strong, much stronger than Lamb. But there was a strange sensation in his head, a small uncomfortable squirming that made him doubt the numbers. Although it was backed by nothing more than a gut feeling, Messiah couldn’t help but think, no... there’s more to it than that.

Warily, Messiah lifted his gaze and made a mental note to ask Maggie about Codename Puma, too.

Lamb’s ‘boyfriend,’ huh...?