Dissonance - Book One

thirty-one

"Well?"

"Well, we have them. All of them."

"All I care about is the girl. Do you have Ever?"

"Yes, sir."

"Does she know about Wyler?"

"I don't think so. At least, not yet."

"Good. We can use that to our advantage. Where is she?"

"Bunker 37."

"How quickly can we get her here?"

"Hard to say. Shouldn't be too long. We've sent a team to pick her up. Cavanaugh and Jacobs are holding her in a cell until the team reaches them."

"Get everything ready so that we're prepared the moment she arrives. We don't have a minute to waste. I'm leaving the briefing up to you, which goes against my better judgement, but frankly, I think you're the only chance we have at convincing her to do what we want. Can you handle that?"

"Of course sir."

"What I mean is: will you be able to put your personal feelings aside and focus on the task at hand?"

"Don't make me repeat myself."

"Then I'll head upstairs to update the General on your progress."

"Sir, just one more thing."

"Yes?"

"Don't ever question my loyalty again. Don't confuse your rank with your level of importance. I know the General would be very disappointed to hear of your mistreatment of me, and we both know what he does when he's disappointed. Understood?"

"Aye aye ma'am."

***

"Well, I don't say this a lot, but you're right," Lex says, after they shove her back into our room and lock the door behind them. The commotion finally settles down now that Lex isn't cussing and yelling at Jacobs to keep his hands off of her as he pushed her through the corridor.

"Where did they take you?" I ask.

"I don't know, some sort of command center. There was a guy in a uniform on a screen asking me a bunch of questions about us and how we got here, but I could tell that was just a front. He was actually interested in...you." Lex points to me.

Her words don't come as a surprise, but I'm curious if she knows why they are so interested in me.

"Me? Why?"

"I don't know. I was hoping you could tell us that."

Wyler and Lex stare at me, waiting for my response, but I don't know what to say.

"Look, I'm just as confused as you two. What did the guy in the uniform ask you, the one on the screen?"

"Stuff about where you were living, if your parents were with us, something about a code and some sort of medicine."

"My parents? Why would he want to know about my parents?" I say more to myself then to Lex. "Medicine? A code?" I continue rambling aloud.

"Yes, a code. It was all very cryptic Ever, kind of like a code," Lex says, laying on the sarcasm.

"So now what?" Wyler asks, trying to diffuse the tension.

"Now, we get out of here," I state.

"Right, and just how do we go about doing that? This place is locked down better than most prisons."