A narrow gaze pierces the butter blonde man, turning the same piece of his Venn puzzle for the third time, his fingers working with the kind of frustrated precision of someone trying to force a solution that should come naturally.

A barista behind the counter caught his eye and he lifted two fingers in casual acknowledgement, the kind of regular's greeting that didn't require words.

Confused by Elise's gaze, he returns the look to the lady dressed in shades of blue, "Why are you giving me that look?"

Elise made no remark to the man from her vision now clear as day before her. Her hand instinctively tightened around her phone, the same protective gesture she'd made in every nightmare since that night. She sat opposite him, and a double-shot espresso sat before him on the coffee table.

He tries to make small talk. "The difference between a cafe and a coffee shop is quite a fine line, don't you think?" Seeing she wasn't biting, he sips his espresso, savouring it, before offering courtesy, "If you find something you like, it's on me." He moves his hand out, offering the menu on the table.

She picks up the menu. 'What I need is for you to—' The numbers made her stomach drop. ₣6 for coffee? I've eaten for three days on less, and they definitely don't offer refills. She shifted in her seat, the plush cushioning suddenly feeling too soft, too expensive, like she might leave an impression she couldn't afford to replace.

"I know, right? But it is worth every last drop," he takes a final gulp from his cup.

"I have things to do after this," she lies. "Let's stay on topic. Explain what that was last night."

"To be honest, I have no clue," he shrugs. "But that totally demolished me! Haven't felt anything like it since—" he pauses, catching himself speaking as if it were a weekend bender, making Elise's jaw tighten. "Well, in short, my powers have stopped working since. And boy, are the Gardeners ecstatic about it. And the vindicated looks on them, calling me a glorified Gardener. Honestly, I'm not as angry as I thought I would be." He chuckles, recalling the office banter.

A server glided past with a tray of pastries that presumably cost more than Elise's weekly groceries, and she pulled her jacket tighter around herself.

"I think seeing them finally get something out of their hours in the office is what's doing it."

"Am I expected to care?" She set the menu down with deliberate care, the kind of controlled movement that suggested she wanted to slam it.

"You wanted to know what that was last night, and I even told you, the aftermath." The butter blonde raises his arms in surrender, believing he has nothing else to offer.

"Your powers, your Omega, you speak like they had nothing to do with it?" Elise employs a stern, impatient tone.

Another staff member walked past their table, and Lyle's automatic wave seemed to irritate Elise further.

"How about yours? My 'Omega'—" he air-quoted with the kind of casual disdain that came from having grown up around the term, "—if you will, has never behaved like that. I thought my cognitive manipulation—" he pauses, feeling close to an epiphany with the puzzle but no dice, "—was being usurped or something. Could you blame me for how I acted?"

"You assume I understand half of what you just said."

He groans in annoyance, his fingers finally abandoning the puzzle pieces to drum against the table, "I'm not speaking in tongues! It was your 'Omega'! Was it not?!"

"Like fuck I'd be accursed by that." The word left a bitter taste, like she'd licked a game cartridge.

His fingers stilled on the puzzle pieces, and when he looked up, his casual mask had slipped, his merry eyes narrowed just enough to show something sharp underneath.

"Maybe if you understood your bullshit, you would know what's going on."

A miasma of silence fills the space between them for a minute. His fingers returned to the puzzle pieces, moving them without purpose, while Elise studied his face as if trying to solve a puzzle of her own.

A waiter comes to the table, her mood cheery. Despite the hostile atmosphere, she offers the cafe's free samples today: bite-sized cakes with the cafe's logo on mini toothpick flags.

Elise and the man take a sample and thank the waiter. After taking a bite, his face softens, and he returns the toothpick while Elise opts to use the mint tip.

"I don't need to continue this to get an answer out of you. All I need to do is understand my 'bullshit' to know what's going on, isn't that right, Elise?"

A wry smirk grows on his face while a disturbed expression grows on Elise's face. Elise wonders, How does he know my name?

Though he'd lost any reason to stay, he remained when Elise said nothing.

Her face softened.

"Why don't you leave then?" She questions his intention more than his presence.

His face betrayed no emotion, "I have a bill to pay, plus my offer on getting you something still stands. It's the least I can do for taking time out of your day."

Elise catches the bluff masked in his hospitality. Remembering the menu containing an 'order and pay by QR code' written in bold. He already paid for his order; nothing is stopping him from leaving unless he wants something from her.

"No, that will be fine. I have a feeling I'll be hearing from you soon."

"Maybe," he shrugs. "Some groundskeeping would have to be made before that would come into consideration."

"If that's the case, then a name to put to your mug would be nice, glorified Gardener."

"For you, you call me Lyle."

"Lyle, Lyle, Crocodile," the name reminding Elise of a movie from her childhood.

"You'd be surprised by the overlap," Lyle finishes with a humoured smile as Elise makes her leave.

Wind bellows through the human-sized windows down concrete castle-esque halls. A pristine white trench coat flows as the rhythmic footsteps echo through the nearly vacant halls, toward the Horticultural office.

Opening the heavy wooden door, the room is filled with half a dozen people inspecting and moving around forensic pieces. The entire room turns its attention to him.

All action halts. A beat of uncertainty—then cheers fill the room, louder and more mocking than usual. Dilrosun from evidence processing gave him a theatrical salute, while Payet didn't even look up from her files. The usual mix of colleagues who'd either always liked him or never had.

"If it isn't our glorified Gardener," a voice from the screen calls out, the thick German accent unable to mask genuine amusement.

Lyle sits at the empty desk in the corner, a call underway. "You seem to be enjoying this far too much, Traffy." Lyle gasps for dramatic effect, "Unless you've already replaced me!"

The room resumes with their work, now filled with casual chatter.

"Yes, and it could not have happened at a better time, Gardener." Their tone is dry of emotion, a joke some might assume. "And also this ability to turn off an enhancement, a cognitive manipulation no less, is most intriguing. Certainly, you can regain your usefulness by procuring insight that will help our research, findings that not even you could begin to fathom."

"But that's the weird part, she says she's got no such thing and seeing her in person, I could sense my mark on her, but I've never met such a 'woman'." He pauses, trying to pinpoint if he'd ever met her before. "Not since Leafy joined."

"Did the mark seem off in some kind of way?" Traffy comments.

"Yeah." An uneasiness dims his expression. "It was heavy. When I activated it, it was like trying to work with lead."

"Another manipulator at work? Somehow able to copy your mark?"

"Be for real!" his humour returns to him. "That would make me a Gardener for real."

"For real?"

"For real, for real! Plus, that would ruin my specialness; no more will I be the one and only second-gen Stepper."

Possibilities stir in his mind, causing him to think aloud.

"It shouldn't be possible for there to be another; I'm an only child." Lyle pauses. "Unless..." he discards the thought before he gets too curious. "Wait, how could they copy me in the first place? How—" Lyle stops himself before spitting out every question popping into his head as the chain of thought continues.

In that silence, a voice in the call's background gives their input, "Maybe you forgot you activated it on someone a while ago?" The caller immediately mutes.

Lyle's eyes narrow as if to glare through the screen.

The call cuts.

I guess it isn't as intriguing a prospect as you said it was, Traffy, Lyle thought.

Lyle gets up from the chair, removes his coat with the practised motion, and hangs it on the backrest as he faces the office staff.

"Everyone," he commands, and heads turn. "What did we end up gleaning from them?"

"We don't have a suitable DNA sample for further forensic analysis," the Gardener speaks matter-of-factly. "However, take this with a grain of salt, but Elise's fingerprints seem to have taken on a different pattern, which could be from the quality of the sample."

"Anything about her family tree raising concerns?" Lyle requests.

"No. She was orphaned at the end of her first year of university and is supported by the government. She has no Omega mutations in her genome or lineage."

Lyle cringed at 'Omega', the word had never bothered him before, but something about the venom in Elise's voice when she said it had infected his hearing.

The Gardener continues, "But if a mutation did occur, we would need either a saliva or blood sample to find that out."

That is not what I wanted to hear. His fingers drummed against the desk edge—the same restless energy from the puzzle, but faster now as his anxiety about his absent power grows. "Has the Gardener from the cafe returned yet?" Lyle asks, referring to the waitress who had served them the cake.

"No, she has delegated the task to someone else."

"That's fine, just keep a watch on her, it's only a matter of time." Lyle takes a moment to think about any other factors that may be involved. "How about the boy?"

"His lineage is of interest. Not only is he from the Strider family, but he also has Omega lineage; however, he has not awakened, and it is suspected that the lineage's ability has faded out with none of the siblings awakening and the ability remains uncatalogued, never seen any form of expression since its inception."

"A total blank slate." Lyle thinks aloud, taken by surprise.

"To put it simply? Yes, he is a blank slate with financial power in the stead of Omega enhancement."

Lyle cringes at the use of 'Omega', unable to hear the word the same way.

"I'll think I'll give this Gardening thing a try." The irony wasn't lost on him. "I will be tending to him."