From her seat near the center of the group, Alex listened.

More accurately, Alex listened, fiddled with one of the leather cords on her bracelet, and thought, [i]I am never going to hear the end of this.[/i] Between her mother, her brother, and her best friend, the guilt trips would be legion. Only her father would spare her.

[i]Maybe I’ll die,[/i] she thought, [i]and then no one will be able to yell at me about my life choices[/i]—and then felt immediately guilty, no filial help necessary. Death was not a joke, and neither was their situation. Things were about to get a lot more dangerous than the search-and-rescue, disaster-relief type jobs she’d been doing as she finished up her training. She skimmed her eyes over the other Guardians gathered here, but couldn’t tell at a glance if they were any more or less prepared than she was.

As the director wrapped up her speech and opened the floor for questions, Alex reached into the backpack sitting at her feet and plucked out the cup that was poking from the top. She let the taste of chocolate and raspberry ground her for a moment, listening to the redheaded woman ask her question. It was a probably a fair one, if not something Alex herself would have dared to ask.

[i]Everyone has a right to be afraid.[/i] She took another sip of her mocha, starting to wish she’d opted for the larger size—because the more people talked, the more this was starting to feel like a sixteen-ounce sort of problem—and listened to the silence as they all waited to be reassured.