“Starting to look like you again,” he says lightheartedly.
I must have really been a mess. I am glad I never got a chance to catch a glimpse of my reflection. We begin to make our way back to the District, and he escorts me all the way back to the door of my shack. Before I enter, he reminds me to be careful, and of my false promise to behave. I reassure him I will, but no matter what, I still have not forgotten I have accomplished nothing. Yes, I know why Hadley was sold early, but I still need to know where she went. I have to know where to find her, or I may lose her forever. Zeke even admitted that only one person knows this information on our entire Island. The Ambassador. Regardless of what I said, whether I bring my own death sentence down on me or not, I will find a way to speak to him.
*
My memories have not faltered me in the least bit, not about that day, that week. It will forever be singed into my brain. I remember every detail about what Yency said, the chamber, what Zeke told me, and the promise I made to myself to find a way to talk to the Ambassador. A promise I am about to enact. I still have about three months before I go up for auction. Three months to finalize my plans to accomplish my goal, but I will not wait that long. I can’t take any chances. It was necessary for me to remain calm and go about my daily duties as if nothing was wrong these past few weeks. I didn’t want to worry my friends anymore or give the Grods and Holds more reason to monitor me closely. They have finally started to accept maybe I am okay, after all. The time is right. I will find a way to break into the Ambassador’s mansion. I have decided, tomorrow night. I pick myself up off the dirt from the path and dust off my knees. I begin to head back towards my shack in the District. I may have been able to fool everyone else on the Island that I am stable, but my shack mates know better. They have been extremely worried and are not buying my happy act. Staying out this late after shift has probably gotten them wondering if I have finally just decided to go off the deep end and get myself killed.
When I finally make it back, I push open the creaky bamboo door to our shack expecting a scolding from Benja, Nayze, and Yency for my foolishness, but they are not there. Sitting on my bed of cotton is a man I have never seen before in my life. He looks rather peculiar. He is neither a Grod nor Hold. He is definitely not one of the Island trainees. He stands up, and I notice he is in a black suit with a gray trench coat. Kind of odd attire for our climate. He must be burning up. He interrupts my train of thought when he coldly barks, “Trainee 15892, Ambassador Tarik has requested to see you immediately.”
Chapter 3
Weapons are trained on me from every direction as I cross the threshold of the daunting gate entrance. There were four men positioned at the gate, and I can easily spot four more guarding the front entrance of the mansion. I am not sure, but I think I catch a glare from a couple of weapons on the roof. Snipers, I think. Much more protection than the original two Grods who were fortifying the defense the last time I was here. I still would not have backed down then, though. Not in the state of mind I was in. I would have gotten myself killed. My wrists begin to itch. My hands are cuffed behind my back with tight rawhide constraints. Two of the gray trench-coated men are escorting me on both sides with their hands firmly gripped around my elbows constantly nudging me forward. I am befuddled over the intense precautions they have deemed necessary to employ for my presence. I am guessing they have discovered my plans for breaking into the mansion. But even if they have, I was never planning to harm anyone. I just wanted to talk to the Ambassador. Surely, they cannot think I am so much of a threat that I should warrant this much attention.
We begin to ascend the steps to the entrance of the mansion and, wow! The mansion is even more imposing as I approach closer. I look up and the dome on the roof of the building seems to be scraping the bottom of the highest clouds in the sky. Every shack on our Island could fit into this place at least ten times over. All of this for one man. What a waste of useful space. As I step through the front entrance, I am even more astounded over the splendor of the inside than the colossal dimensions outside. The floors and walls appear to be clear as if they are all made of mirrors, but no reflections rebound from them. There is an oval fountain in the front room with water spouting from three different sources creating a double arch. Like a sideways 3, I wonder if it is intentional. Behind the fountain are two sets of staircases that spiral around each other leading to different floor levels. The steps of the staircases are clear and can barely be seen. The inner workings of the building are much more intricate than I originally expected from the outside.
One of the men next to me calls a Grod over and commands, “Tell the Ambassador 15892 has arrived.”
The man nods and scurries off around a corner I had failed to notice earlier. The non-reflective mirrored walls are throwing me for a loop. I can’t get a sense of where I am. My head is starting to spin. This is either some weird Federation décor trend, or a way to confuse any of the Ambassador’s enemies if they were to ever break in. Ah. Of course, it makes sense. If I had managed to break in, I would have had no idea what to do once I got in here. I probably would have wandered around in circles for hours like I was in a maze. Hadley told me about mazes before. One of her childhood memories I got to abstractly participate in once was of her parents taking her to a cornfield maze to play in. Stop, I tell myself. I have to focus, for Hadley. This was the meeting I was willing to die for, to sacrifice everything, and it looks as if I will be getting the meeting with the Ambassador shortly. I didn’t even have to do anything. I should feel fortunate, but something does not feel right about this whole situation. I had not told anyone about my plans to break in here. I had put on an acceptable enough act by most standards the past few weeks to convince the outsiders. My shack mates may have been suspicious, but even they had no proof. Just then, the Grod who scampered off earlier returns. He has a look of relief, but fear in his face at the same time. I never see Grods fearful of anything, but then again, I guess an Ambassador for the Federation holds more rank and power capable of intimidation than us trainees on the Island.
“The Ambassador is ready to see him now.”
The gray trench-coated men push me forward, and we head around the same corner. When we get to the middle of the aisle, we unexpectedly stop as if they are preparing to walk through a door. I am just as confused as one of the men reaches his hand up in the air and appears to place it on something I can’t see. His hand remains there for a few seconds seemingly frozen in place. Red lights begin to emit from thin air tracing key points along his palm and fingers. Almost instantaneously, the image of the empty hallway disappears, and we are standing in front of a set of metallic doors that begin to slide open in front of us. I step into the small polished chamber and when the doors close again, I feel an energy that abruptly shoves me against the back wall. In only a few seconds, the doors are opening once again. We step into a room with black marbled floors and walls. A stark contrast to the clear front room. The furniture appears to be molded straight out of the marble, and there is an absence of sunlight with no windows. Hadley would hate this room. Concentrate, I mutter quietly to myself.
I meet eyes with the man sitting behind the desk in a throne like chair. He is a dark-skinned man whose wrinkles indicate he is well aged. His black and gray sprinkled hair surrounds his shiny bald scalp. He rises as I enter the room, and I see he is dressed in all white and must easily outweigh me by 200 pounds. I start to think about the amount of food he must have had to consume to become so big and think my weekly intake must be equivalent to one meal for this man.
The gray trench-coated men sit me down in a chair in front of the desk, and they walk around to whisper something in the ear of the man I am now assuming to be Ambassador Tarik. He nods his head in apparent agreement and waves them away out of the room leaving me alone with him. He inquisitively eyes me up and down as if I am a mystery to him. He gingerly moseys around to take a seat directly in front of me at the edge of the black marble desk. I am waiting for him
to speak first, but he seems as if he is waiting for me to say something. Well, if they knew I was planning on breaking in here to speak to him, I may as well be the one who initiates our meeting.
I start, “Sir, I wanted to speak to you abou…”
I cannot finish my opening statement before he violently wallops me with the back of his hand across the right side of my face. I am knocked out of the chair with no way to brace my fall as my hands are still firmly cuffed. My left shoulder crashes to the hard marble floor, and I feel an abrupt shooting pain. I must have separated my shoulder. He reaches down with one hand and picks me up to throw me back in my chair. What I mistook earlier for glutton I know now has hidden his tremendous brute power.
“Do not speak to me unless you are told to do so, boy!” he bellows.
“I am sorry, sir,” I say. He smacks me again in the same spot, but with less force this time. Apparently apologies are also included in his no talking policy.
“Stand up,” he commands.
I stand up quickly battling the urge to try and rub the stinging pain away from my cheek. He begins to circle me eyeing every part of my body.
“I don’t get it,” he says. “What is so special about you? You aren’t the strongest, the fastest, the biggest. I have seen the footage from your training sessions, your work sessions. You are nothing particularly special to look at it either. So what is it?”
There is an awkward silence as he continues to eye me peculiarly. “Speak,” he orders.
“I don’t understand what you are talking about, sir,” I rapidly reply.
“First, it was Trainee 53029.” I am beginning to tell that the Ambassador and his goons don’t particularly care for the names we were given at Island 2 and will always refer to us by our 5-digit identifiers. He continues, “In my 30 years as Ambassador of this Island, I have never had one of my subjects be sold before they were eligible for auction. It’s just not feasible for these people to pay so much for someone when they could easily get them for cheaper at auction. But someone made quite a substantial offer. I am a businessman; I know when to take a good deal when I hear one. So I sold her. It was only… logical.”
He stops to wipe the sweat dripping gently from his brow.
“One of my guards has informed me you two were quite close,” he says with an added emphasis. “And now, I have received two separate offers to purchase you at amounts that are way more than you are worth.”
I see he pulls out a list that contains several numbers scribbled down next to a random list of identifiers. He intensely gazes at the list with a look of bewilderment. He looks up and calmly asks, “And I want to know why?” Without giving me any time to respond, he says, “I believe you have met my friends from the Hub. Do you know who they are, what it is they do?”
Again, without any time for a response, he continues, “They are the ones who were working at Hawk Station 39. They are the Hawkers who paid your parents a measly amount of money in exchange for your pitiful life.”
My parents. I try not to give them much thought, but every now and then, when they inevitably sneak back into my mind, I feel an overwhelming sense of anger and resentment towards them. The Ambassador is trying to get a reaction out of me, but I am just barely able to constrain my emotions. Not normally one of my strong suits, but I manage just fine this time. I just stare back at him with a stone-like face.
His dark eyes continue to glare at me while he appears to be waiting for a rise out of me. His large round face cannot hide his disappointment when I thwart his plans.
“I have invited them here to give me a second opinion. I thought, maybe they could see something in you I didn’t. Something that might explain this sudden heightened interest in you, in your girlfriend.”
He leers at me and smugly says, “And they have confirmed my evaluations. They see nothing in you to make you this valuable. To make you worth the money they are offering. I, however, am nothing if not diligent. I also told them to take a look into the history on the day you were Hawked. They have graciously informed me something quite interesting happened shortly after they took you. It appears that on the same day you were shipped to our beloved Islands, three Grodarian troops were murdered right outside their station.”
He pauses to take out his old handkerchief to wipe more sweat off of his wrinkled forehead.
“Normally, this would have warranted no such attention as many of our troops were being killed by civilians in the city at the time in order to strip them of supplies and food. After all, many were very desperate during the war. But these three men, they were not killed by civilians. It was far too clean. Their murder was done by a person of skill, experience. A professional.”
He pulls out a sheet of paper and begins to read verbatim, “Soldier Bote, Cause of Death, knife puncture to the right aorta of the heart.” I realize he is going to read me all of their autopsy reports. “Soldier Bordelon, Cause of Death, laceration to jugular artery, and Soldier Todd, Cause of Death, broken neck.”
He looks up at me as if I am supposed to know what he is talking about.
“That is unfortunate,” I say feebly. I forget about the not talking part, but he apparently did also because I am still sitting in my chair in one piece.
“Indeed,” he says. “All three deaths took place in a matter of seconds. They were done in complete silence, the security tapes were destroyed and what is even more puzzling is none of these soldiers’ comrades saw their deaths, and they were only standing two blocks away.”
He coolly continues to say, “I am not a man who believes in coincidences. The girl, now you, what happened at the station the day you were Hawked. Something does not add up, and I want to know what. I think you know more than you are letting on.”
His demeanor quickly changes from inquisitive warden to menacing maniac. He sharply slams his hand into my injured shoulder’s collarbone and begins to squeeze with an immense force. I hear a loud crack. I am writhing in severe pain. My body crumples, and I curl to the left side nurturing my injury. He grabs me by the neck and squeezes his vice grip of a hand tightly.
“Now, tell me the truth, or I will make sure you will never see that girl again. All it takes is one call, and I will end her miserable existence. Your friends, here on the Island, I will make sure their deaths are even more painfully slow. Believe me when I say that they will suffer. Now, you think long and hard before you answer me. I am not someone you want to play with, son,” he gravely threatens.
He is waiting for me to answer, but he has apparently forgotten his hand is still tightly wrapped around my throat. He lets go, and I can see his impatience is quickly growing. Out of fear for not wanting to get hit again for speaking out of turn, I wait for some sort of cue to indicate when I should begin. He waves his left hand in a circular motion letting me know it is all right to respond.
I try to talk, but nothing comes out of my throat but empty air. It feels as if my larynx has been completely crushed. I begin to slowly regain my ability to push out words, but only at a substantially diminished volume.
“Sir,” I barely force out, “I don’t have any idea. I don’t know what is going on. It’s easy for me to understand why someone would want Hadley as a Token so badly.” I begin to cough harshly. “If you knew her, you could easily see why. If I had anything, I would give it all away if it meant I could just see her again, spend one more day with her. But I honestly don’t know why anyone would want me at all.”
I feel as if my answer will not be good enough to meet his expectations. I drop to the ground using the right side of my body to brace all of my weight.
“Ambassador, I am asking, begging you to believe me. I do not know anything. If you are to punish anyone, just punish me alone for any alleged crimes. Please leave Hadley, Benja, Nayze, and Yency out of it.”
I didn’t even bother to think about what their identifiers were. I probably should not have used their given names, but I am not thinking clearly. I am trying to save their lives. I just hop
e I have not made things worse.
I peek up to see the Ambassador’s face is filled with disgust, pity, and most disturbingly, pure exasperation. I know my plea was not enough. I know I have failed. The last thing I see is his large tree trunk of a leg rearing back before it connects directly with my nose. My body flies backwards, and I lay on the ground in a pool of my own blood from my broken nose, and I am limboing between a state of consciousness and unconsciousness.
Ambassador Tarik directs two Grods to come into the room. “Take him away and throw him in confinement until I figure out what to do with him.”
As one of the Grods is dragging me out, I manage enough strength to raise my head. Right before my awareness fades into oblivion, I hear the Ambassador’s words clearly. I will never be able to forget them. He says to the other Grod, “He is lying. Bring in his friends. One of them will talk.”
“And if they don’t?” the Grod replies.
The Ambassador makes sure he looks at me before he emotionlessly says it. “Kill them all.”
Chapter 4
My eyes gradually open to discover I have been locked in a small square chamber. The walls are all so brightly and perfectly painted white my eyes reflexively squint. I begin to sit up, but at first movement, I am reminded of the injuries I sustained. My shoulder is screaming at me to lie back down, and luckily, my face has become numb from the overwhelming pain. I stubbornly ignore my body as I set up to take in my surroundings. I lean against the white wall, and my back hits a metal-chromed ring attached behind me. I look down at the bed I am sitting on. The white sheets are tucked in neatly with a plush gray blanket sharply tucked in on the sides with neatly folded hospital corners. Even the pillow is soft. I notice there is a white porcelain odd shaped object in the corner of the room with a chrome handle. A weird looking contraption. The room is neat and clean in every aspect. The tile floors are almost so shiny I can see my reflection. Then, I actually do begin to see my reflection. I can see my now crooked nose is covered in dried blood and the parts of it that are visible are now a dark purple color.
Token (Token Chronicles) Page 5