Six

"I'm not working for you bastards," Henry hissed, recoiling from them as if they held some deadly plague. " I might as well leave now, I'll go tell Sandara—or better yet, Chaerin, she'd know what to do—"

Jin interrupted with a wry grin, shaking his head like it was all some big joke. It appeared that he was restraining a few laughs. "You'll do nothing of the sort."

"Who's going to stop me from walking right out the door?" he challenged right back.

"There's seven of us and one of you," Rap Monster reminded him loudly. "Plus you wouldn't know how to get out even if you tried. I don't mind using a bit of force to get what I want."

At that, Henry got rather quiet and crossed his legs together. He didn't know what to think—Jin's betrayal so early on had seemed to throw him off by a lot. When he didn't say anything for the next three minutes, Jin cleared his throat loudly and began speaking.

"Well Henry, didn't you think it was suspicious that I offered five of my agents to be on loan in exchange for you?" he asked seriously, his brow crinkling in concentration. "And didn't you find it odd that Chaerin of all people knew your name?"

"I guess it was unusual," Henry muttered in reply, balancing his face on his hands. "But you guys don't get new recruits often, from what I heard."

"You don't get recruits straight from the Academy often," Jimin corrected with a small smile, causing Rap Monster to shush him quietly. "Always read the fine print."

Jin shot the younger boy a look before continuing. "I'll tell you this—Chaerin's got her own little secret gang thing going on as far as we know. She figured a new recruit would be a good asset to her side, and heck, so did I."

Again, he was shocked into silence. Henry's eyes were about as wide as saucers, staring intently into Jin's eyes to decipher if there was a lie in there. He cocked his head to the side, Jin meeting his stare with an equal creepiness. It took a minute to realize that Jin was not in fact, lying. There wasn't a hint of a lie in his eyes, not even a flicker—or perhaps he was just that good at lying.

"You're telling the truth."

"Why wouldn't I?"

His voice seemed to falter as he struggled to reply with something that was actually coherent and literate. "Well, you could always be lying to get me on your side, stuff like that."