The woman cut her eyes to Bo. "Khan, who is this?" Her words were ice cold.

Bo answered before Khan could. "Bo. And I'd like it if you answered my question."

"I don't have to answer any questions coming out of your mouth," the woman said.

Khan stepped between them both, raising his hands and giving a forced laugh. "Okay, okay, let's not fight. We're all friends here."

Bo and the woman responded at the same time. 

"I don't know her," Bo said.

"Friends?" the woman scoffed. 

Khan rolled his eyes. "All right, whatever. We barely know each other. But still, let's not make even more of a mess in the base. I'll do introductions and then we can agree to be at least civil acquaintances, all right?"

The woman sighed and crossed her arms, but nodded. Bo didn't say anything, but Khan took her silence as agreement.

"Bo, this is Helga. She is third in charge underneath me," Khan said.

"Adam makes it a habit to leave his second and third hands behind on missions to scrub the toilets?" Bo asked, cocking an eyebrow.

Helga snarled. "It was to fix equipment."

"Adam wants to build trust between the leaders and the rest of the gang, so he makes us do the same jobs as everyone else. Adam may treat us nearly the same as everyone else, but the others have to listen to our orders," Khan explained.

Helga moved so that she stood right by Bo's side. She was a tall woman and towered like a pillar over Bo. Bo didn't let this bother her, however. She was used to the generals back home trying to intimidate her into doing what they wanted. Because she was small, everyone thought that physical differences could cower her. They never knew what she'd battled in her past, the massive and insurmountable odds that made their height or brawn seem puny in comparison. They'd have to be twenty feet tall for her to be scared by something as inconsequential as height.

Helga stared at Bo. "Do you know Adam? You seem to be casually throwing his name around as if you're best friends."

"Khan said I might be a good fit for the group," Bo said. "I just thought talking to your leader would be the best way of going about that."

Helga clicked her tongue, but somehow this simple answer seemed to cool the anger that she'd had since setting foot in the room. She let out a breath that lifted the bangs on her forehead, and walked over to flop onto a chair and drape her arms over the sides. "I'm so bored," she said, abruptly changing the subject. "I wanted to go on the mission. I hate fixing things."

"So do I," Khan said.

"I know. You left it all to me, remember?"

Khan pretended to be absorbed in some invisible thing happening in the corner of the room.

Bo leaned forward in her chair. "So can you tell us where Adam went?"

Helga shrugged, waving her hand in the air above her face in a lazy circle. "Secret mission out in the desert."

"Doing what?" Khan asked.

"Emergency rescue. He took the twins and Jasper and Horace," Helga replied.

"Must be big if he wanted so many to come with him."

"Not big enough to want his two best fighters with him," Helga sighed.

"Pfft, the twins could kick your butt any time," Khan retorted.

"There's two of them, idiot."

"Still."

Bo growled in frustration. "But can you tell us where he went?"

Helga sniffed. "Why do you want to know so bad?"

"I want to go find him."

"You're that desperate to join the Forlorn?" Khan asked.

They had no idea of the feeling of restlessness that surged through her body. She had thought she was going to see Adam. She'd entered this building thinking that he would step through a door and everything would be all right again. That it would be as if all the years apart had never happened, and they could start again. But now she found that it was just as it always was. He was one step away from her, always just out of reach. To have her one wish snatched away from her felt like a punch in the stomach. And she didn't have the patience to put up with two idiots that were constantly arguing with each other and not giving her the information she needed.

"Just tell me where he went. I need to talk to him urgently," she said.

Helga's expression changed from her bored and antagonizing expression, to one that was entirely too shrewd for Bo's comfort. Bo avoided her gaze and looked instead to Khan. He just shrugged. "You know as much as I do," he said.

Helga uncrossed her arms and leaned forward in her chair. "You do know Adam."

Bo glared at her, but shook her head. Helga just smirked.

"I can tell you know him. You've got the look of someone who's been abandoned. You've the look of someone who's searching."

Bo clamped her mouth shut, not wanting to yell at Helga or do anything else that might confirm her suspicions even more. So she just glared at a spot on the floor and breathed through the growing rage that made her heart pound faster.

"Look," Helga said. "I don't know where Adam went. Honestly. He just said it was out in the desert, and that he'd be back in a few days. You're welcome to go out in the dust and try and find him, but I don't think that will be a very constructive use of your time." Little did Helga know that was exactly what Bo had been doing for far too long now.

Khan waved his arms to try and dispel the tension between the two women once again. "All right, let's stop with the displays of supremacy for now. We're going to call a truce for dinner, okay? We don't want to ruin our appetites over arguing."

He got up and walked over to pat Bo's shoulder. She glared at him and he retracted his hand with a nervous laugh. "Who wants to help grill the meat?" he asked, his voice slightly higher than before as he backed up from both of the withering glares coming from the women.

"How about you do it yourself, tiger?" Helga said, the words coming out from behind her clenched teeth.

"You want to promote peace, don't you?" Bo said.

Khan grumbled, shuffling toward the area where the stove was shoved against a wall. "Whatever."

As he clashed around with the pots and pans, trying to figure out how to make them dinner, Bo tried to stifle her smile-- but one glance at Helga's twisted mouth trying to hold back her own laughter, and suddenly both of them burst into giggles that sent them rolling around on their chairs.

Khan spun around and pointed a pan at them. "Hey! Don't bond over teasing me!"

"Too late!" Helga shouted back.

---

A/N: So I have some exciting news about Bo And The Beast! I submitted the manuscript to Swoonreads, which is a website like Wattpad, that is owned by Macmillan publishing company. The exciting part is, that if it does well enough on Swoonreads to be noticed by their people, IT COULD BE PUBLISHED! As in LEGIT published, as in you could go to a store and buy it and hug it and have an official cover and everything! SO! If you loved Bo And The Beast, and wouldn't mind popping over there to give it a comment and star rating, then I would like give you a trillion virtual hugs!

P.S. It has the same title over there as it does here, but my username is Cassie Rose. Also, that version only has the happier ending! :D