Saber settled into the chair and gripped his sweatpants where they stretched over his knees. 

“Where’s the hallway outside of Saber’s dressing room?” Hawks’ voice broke the stilted silence laying over the room. 

Every eye in the room turned towards the wall of monitors. Hawks was right. Not one of them showed the dressing rooms. During the briefing at the venue staff took care to point out not one, but three cameras watching over Saber’s dressing room. They’d bragged about their security team and name-dropped various celebrities who’d supposedly endorsed them. 

A guard with a buzz cut cleared her throat, “There are too many cameras to watch all at once. Everything’s divided between us and the other station. Each screen alternates every fifteen minutes. The method ensures that even in the case of guards being away from one of the stations someone will still have eyes on you.” 

“And how far away is the other station?” Hawks glared at buzzcut. Buzzcut withered under Hawks’ gaze. 

She scratched her chin anxiously as she responded, “It’s on the other side of the stage…” 

“And how often do you two check in with each other?” 

“Every fifteen minutes…” 

Saber was beginning to see the gaping hole in their methodology. 

Hawks turned back towards Saber. Saber could feel his eyes stinging but he refused to blink, too terrified he’d see that disgusting version of Hawks again. 

“Are you…?” Hawks trailed off, referencing Saber’s bloodshot eyes and strained expression. 

“As good as I can be given the circumstances.” Saber smiled again. 

It must not have been convincing given the way Hawks nodded slowly as she pulled out a notepad. 

“I’m sure you know what comes next,” Saber twitched at the acknowledgement and Hawks continued, “Feel free to go as slowly as you’d like. Spare no detail, just like last time.” 

Saber flinched again. He looked down at his lap and took a deep breath before closing his eyes for the smallest fraction of a second. If he saw the world behind his eyelids it flashed by too quickly for him to process. Saber breathed a sigh of relief. He heard a disembodied chuckle. 

[You can still blink, just don’t close your eyes for extended periods of time.] 

Saber’s jaw went tight. With his teeth gritted together he hissed, “Shut it! I’ll deal with you later.” 

“What was that?” Hawks’ pen sat poised on her notepad. Saber looked between it and her face. 

“Sorry, officer. I was…just trying to collect my thoughts.” 

Hawks smiled in a manner she must have thought reassuring. Saber felt more condescended to than reassured. 

The conversation with Hawks went faster than it had last time. Saber hoped it was due to how minor his involvement with this case was and not an indicator that he was growing used to giving statements to police. Saber was able to easily skip past the voice’s part in dodging the madman’s first shot. 

He attributed it to blind luck. Hawks added that the gunman was injured in the tussle with the other man. She offered the excuse that it must have impaired his aim. Saber smiled tightly and shrugged nonchalantly. 

Saber’s mad rush towards the security door was harder to claim luck on. Not only had he skipped the first door on the right, but he’d also completely ignored both doors on the lefthand side. The side that was out of view of the gunman and as such the more obvious choice for a man driven by fear. 

“Did one of the staff tell you where the security room was? The members of security we’ve talked to told us that it’s against protocol to inform the guests of their location. Though I’m sure an exception can be made seeing as that little mistake ended up saving your life.” 

Saber bit the inside of his lip to stop himself from instantly agreeing with Hawks' guess. On the surface it seemed like an easy lie. Claim some staff member happened to let it slip during the dress rehearsal and be done with the thing. But Saber knew how things like this went down. 

If Saber agreed there would be a manhunt for the supposed loose lipped staffer. They’d use whatever vague descriptors Saber threw out to create a line up of would-be heroes. Saber would be forced to check every face until he was able to identify ‘the one.’ When he failed to identify a staff member there would be a panic. They might assume there was a second intruder or that the man wasn’t working alone. 

The whole thing felt like a headache, even if only in Saber’s imagination. 

“Uh.. I…” Saber trailed off awkwardly while trying to find the perfect excuse to get the interview over with so he could go home and deal with his newfound psychosis. 

[Say you saw it on a green sticky note] 

“I saw it on a green sticky note!” Saber spoke without thinking. He flinched and mentally cursed out the voice in his head. Could it hear what he was thinking?

“A green sticky note?” Hawks said, raising one perfectly manicured, blonde brow skeptically. 

[It’s a little map stuck to the inside of the fire doors to the west. It’s been there since before ticket sales. Say you saw it when you went to get your raspberry lemonade from the quik-eats delivery person.]

“It’s on the west fire doors. I saw it when…” Saber cursed internally again. He must be insane. The voice knew something he hadn’t even told Julie about, “When I went out to get a drink from a delivery service.” 

Julie gasped next to Saber and smacked him over the head, lightly, “You promised you’d stop doing that! Or at least have someone pick it up for you! You know how dan-” 

Julie trailed off as Hawks glared at her. Saber sighed. Julie was right, it was reckless to duck outside the venue. But stage days were long and exhausting. 

Set up started in the early morning and stretched through the whole day. It wasn’t even about the drink. It was about the fresh air, the sense of freedom, the tiny rebellion that fueled Saber. 

“We’ll check on that,” Hawks said as she made a note in her journal. Last time Saber asked why she didn’t just use a phone and/or tablet like all the other officers. She said she wanted to avoid giving the impression that she was disinterested. 

At the time Saber was too frazzled to stop himself from telling her that her resting bitch face was already doing that. Hawks found that response funny. Something in her expression now told Saber to keep this memory to himself. 

Though it could’ve been the lingering afterimage of the tumors in Hawks’ shoulder that stilled Saber’s tongue. Either way, Saber kept silent.