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“Your choices remain your choices even if their result is not your preference. To deny them is to deny the you that made them.” Connor Ridley, Shadows Fall
Karen had been biting her tongue far too often lately if the stream of words that were flowing out of her mouth at the teenager in front of her were any indication. She wasn’t even sure what all it was that she was saying. It was just so nice to let the words go without second guessing their reception or trying to censor her thoughts that she was a little caught up in the moment. She didn’t figure she could get herself into any more trouble than she was already in, and it wasn’t as though she cared what the girl in front of her thought of what she was saying. She may have never actually met the teen before, but she had plenty of words that had been building up to hurl at her.
“I need you to stop talking.” The words were harsh and unexpected (the girl hadn’t said anything to her in the time since she had walked in the door). Karen drew up short in her forward progress across the room. Whether she had been heading in that direction to slam her hands down on the desk or to go straight for wringing the neck of the girl sitting behind it was something she would never know (she had been waiting until she got there to decide) because the words effectively froze her.
“Excuse me?” The equal mix of disdain and outrage would have caused most people to at least pause, but the girl seated at the desk continued to type frantically at the computer in front of her without sparing a glance for the other occupant of the room. That didn’t exactly do anything to calm Karen’s temper. It was bad enough to be interrupted mid rant, but this was a rant that was the culmination of her displeasure with a whole slew of people and their choices, and she was sick to death of biting the words back down.
“You heard me,” she stated calmly still focused on the screen. Her fingers halted their typing and began tapping impatiently as if she had been typing so quickly that the machine had fallen behind and needed time (time that she wasn’t inclined to give) to catch up with her. “You need to actually listen to me, and that requires that you stop running your mouth for two seconds together.”
“You listen here you little traitor,” a new, more personal tirade was beginning to form, but it never got beyond its initial few words.
“I said stop talking,” the red head reiterated making eye contact for the first time since she had entered the room and started doing whatever it was that she had been doing at the desk. There was something in that look that silenced the older woman. Karen wasn’t easily silenced against her own personal inclination, but there was something about that look that made all of the words that wanted to pour out of her simmer somewhere in the background instead of bubbling to the surface. It might have been the intensity or the anger in the gaze, but it was (most likely) the hurt that was lurking in the background of it. Karen felt the irrateness drain out of her leaving her feeling (and looking) puzzled instead. She didn’t much care for it. She had come here to start settling things -- not to add more knots to the tangle.
“Good,” the girl nodded when no more words were forthcoming. She rose from behind the desk and pulled what appeared to be a jump drive from her pocket. “They’re coming for you, Karen.” She said in a tone that could only be construed as reassuring. She moved towards Karen and pressed the drive into her hand. “We’re going to get you out of here. They’re going to pick you up. When they do, you have to get this to Anna. It has to be Anna.” She stressed. “She’s the only one that will know what to do with it.”
“Why would I . . .,” Karen began before something in the girl seemed to snap.
“Just do it, Karen!” She ordered before taking a deep breath. Her voice turned calm again for just an instant before drifting off into a place that could only accurately be termed pleading. “If you want this all to end, if you want there to be any chance of fixing this mess, then you have to make sure Anna gets this.”
“There wouldn’t be a mess if it weren’t for you,” Karen retorted. It wasn’t completely true, but it was true enough for Karen’s purposes (she needed some sort of a response; the silence that she had been earlier shocked into just wasn’t her style). “If you think I’m going to help you play them again, you’ve got another thing coming.”
“Give it to Anna,” she repeated as if saying it enough times to Karen would cause her to forget why she was objecting. “It’s not like Anna won’t be able to tell what it is and whether she can use it or not. Just give her the chance to see it.”
“Are you asking me to trust you?” Karen scoffed.
“No, I’m asking you to trust that Anna knows what she’s doing.” The girl countered.
Karen didn’t have an immediate response to that. This meeting with Lia Lawson was anything but what she had expected (although she wouldn’t be able to tell you exactly what it was that she had expected either). The jump drive was still in her hand; the thought occurred to Karen that (petty and childish as it might be) it would also be satisfying on some deep level to chuck it at Lia’s head. She refrained (for the time being, she wasn’t going to take the option completely off the table).
“You want me to believe that I’m just going to walk out of here with no interference, drop off a completely harmless gift from you to Anna, and everything is going to end up hunky dorey fine?” It wasn’t her best use of sarcasm, but it served its purpose well enough.
“You don’t have to believe anything,” Lia countered again. “You just have to do what I’m telling you.”
“I don’t take orders from anybody -- let alone people who sell out their friends,” Karen was quite pleased with that one. It sounded very heroinish at the climax of a story. Maybe Will’s reading list wasn’t entirely without its uses.
“You’re sounding very indignant about that for someone who never much cared about what Connor was doing in the first place.” Lia challenged with a quirk of her eyebrow that made Karen want to smack it off her face. She wasn’t the one that was supposed to be doing the challenging here. That was Karen’s department.
“You’ve never met me,” she parried. “Why would you know anything about what I care about?” Karen wasn’t entirely comfortable with the way the conversation was going and that wasn’t only because it felt like it kept slipping out of her control. There had been something in Lia’s voice that implied that she knew things about Karen. Karen knew things about Lia, but there wasn’t supposed to be any reciprocation. Anything Lia claimed to know would have to have come from Kyle or Anna or Connor telling it to her, and the thought that she had been some sort of topic of casual conversation between them and the person who had for all intents and purposes been spying on them gave her a feeling of being touched by something invasive that made her cringe in response.
“I know people who’ve met you. I know people who’ve spent a lot of time with you. They’ve talked. Vented really,” the words weren’t making Karen’s sense of invaded privacy any less. “I’m very sure I know more about you than you’ve ever known about me.”
“Yeah, well, I know everything about you that I’ll ever need to know,” Karen couldn’t believe that she kept letting herself get thrown by the wisp of a girl in front of her. She was so sick of defense. It was time to start throwing around some offense instead. “I know you sold out people that trusted you. I know that you shouldn’t be stupid enough to think that whatever trick you’re trying to pull off will work, but maybe you aren’t quite as bright as Anna’s stuff gives you credit for.”
“Anna’s stuff?” Lia’s voice was an odd combination of amused and concerned that Karen wasn’t even going to try to bother to sort out. “You read Anna’s files? Been sneaking around behind their backs? How very trustworthy of you.”
“I got what I needed.” If Lia thought that that trustworthy shot was going to make any sort of an impression on her, then she really didn’t know anything about the person with whom she was dealing. “I’ll
live with the consequences. It’s not like they aren’t upset already. A little more after what you did to them won’t hurt them any.”
“I don’t know what you think you know,” Lia began.
“I don’t think,” Karen insisted. “I know. I had good sources.” She offered a smug smirk that actually made Lia pause before she responded.
“Are you implying that you ran me through Glimpse?” She blinked at her as if she was rearranging her thoughts to accommodate the idea.
Karen shrugged. She didn’t really find it necessary to offer any sort of vocal confirmation. She would just let that sink in; Lia could realize that she wasn’t going to be pulling any wool over her eyes, and she could go away (and Karen could set about figuring how in the world she was going to get out of this house without those security goons nabbing her again).
“And here they all thought that you were just an annoyance who didn’t pay much attention.” Did Lia actually sound impressed? No way. She must have misheard, and the girl had popped out with that response much too quickly for Karen’s taste as well. She was supposed to require processing time and concede defeat -- not stand there looking like she was ready to continue this pointless round and round excuse for a conversation.
“So, I think we’re having a standoff,” Karen commented hoping to goad the other woman into playing whatever card she still thought she had in her hand and getting on her way.
“Maybe, maybe not,” she sounded speculative. “What did Glimpse tell you about me?”
“That you turned on them.” Karen responded before thinking whether she actually wanted to answer that question or not. She decided that it didn’t matter. It wasn’t like Lia didn’t already know what Lia had done.
“No, it didn’t,” the redhead insisted. “I know Anna’s program. I know how it phrases results. That’s not what it told you.”
“Close enough.” Karen argued.
“How about we elaborate on the specifics?” Lia pushed. Karen didn’t see the harm. What did it matter at this point?
“It said that you would put your family first,” she told her crossing her arms and waiting to see how the girl would try to wiggle her way out of that one.
She laughed. It wasn’t a very pleasant sound. It sounded eerily like a patient she had once heard in rounds through a psych ward when she had still been a student. It had that hysterical quality to it, but this was actually more disturbing to listen to because it was abundantly clear that the person doing the laughing knew that she sounded nearly hysterical but couldn’t make it stop. Karen actually found herself taking a step forward (ingrained nursing habit to intercede), but she reminded herself of where she was and what she was dealing with and she kept herself still. The laughter faded away (although not, in Karen’s opinion, anywhere near quickly enough). Karen found herself on the receiving end of a focused, questioning look that felt completely out of place to be coming from a person who had just been laughing in that almost out of control manner.
“And I suppose that it never occurred to you that my family would ever be something that wasn’t defined by blood?” The words didn’t sound angry. It would have been easier to dismiss them if they had been. They were just offered calmly, collectedly, and as if she had been politely asking some sort of question about the state of the weather. It made it difficult for Karen to form a response.
“What are you trying to get me to believe?” She settled on eventually.
“I told you,” Lia said, and Karen caught a hint of exhaustion in her voice. “I’m not trying to get you to believe anything. I’m just asking you to do. Do follow directions. Do get out of here. Do go home. Do drop that with Anna on your way. You’ve spent months with them, and if you managed to use Glimpse, then you have obviously been paying attention. Don’t tell me for one minute that you believe that Anna wouldn’t be able to tell if there was something wrong with what I’m having you pass on to her.” Karen didn’t have anything to say to that, and she rather got the impression that Lia wasn’t expecting her to say anything.
She stared at Karen for a long moment as if she was looking for some sort of answer in her expression. Karen merely stared back as she tried to make all these new impressions and bits of information that kept flooding her fit together like they were puzzle pieces that didn’t match the outline of edges she had already made.
“Okay.” She seemed to find what she was looking for on Karen’s face. “Okay,” she repeated. Lia turned and started to head for the door.
“Wait,” the movement seemed to jar Karen out of the mental processes she had gotten lost inside. “Where are you going?” She demanded.
“I said they’re coming for you.” Lia answered without turning back around. A defensive shift in her shoulders could barely be seen if you were paying close attention – which Karen was. “I didn’t say anyone was free and clear yet. Somebody has to cover your exit.”
“But that means that you aren’t coming with me,” Karen pointed out as if she was talking to a particularly recalcitrant child who wasn’t listening to sense. It was a rather pointless thing to say. Why would Lia have given her the jump drive in the first place if she was planning on coming with her? Those had been, however, the only words that had come to Karen’s mind, and she was desperate to keep the conversation going a little longer (ironic since she had been so desperate for it to end just minutes before). She still didn’t know what was going on here, and she didn’t like that. She had come here to try to bring things around to some sort of an end game, and she hadn’t given up on that.
Lia Lawson had just cropped up to be some sort of unplanned for complication (although she was willing to admit that planning hadn’t really had a lot to do with this whole day). All she knew was that she suddenly had a very bad feeling about this whole situation. That was new. She had spent most of her time feeling angry and irritated and a bit self-righteously indignant; there hadn’t been enough cool down time for her to get to the “bad” part of the emotional spectrum.
“Someone has to . . .,” she began, but it was Karen’s turn to go back to interrupting.
“You can’t just stay here after helping us,” Karen insisted knowing full well that she wasn’t telling her anything that she didn’t surely already know.
“Just sit here and try to be patient.” Lia told her with her hand on the door. “Don’t antagonize Wyatt if he comes back.” Her voice twinged with just the lightest touch of humor. “I know how hard that is for you. Can you manage for a few minutes?”
Karen wasn’t in a mood to appreciate the humor. She wasn’t even bothered by the fact that more than one person had made a habit of talking about her behind her back. Everything was getting drowned out by the fact that she was suddenly really unsure of her bearings, and Lia walking out that door wasn’t going to do anything to help her with that.
“It’ll be soon,” Lia added reassuringly as if Karen’s interruption had something to do with not wanting to be left alone. Karen followed her path across the room and rested her hand on Lia’s shoulder. Lia shrugged her off and turned to face her.
“Don’t make this any harder than it has to be,” she told her with a small smile. “I know how much you hate being wrong.”
Karen made a small choking sound in her throat, and she wasn’t even sure why. The word sort of bounced around in her head. Wrong. She didn’t know what she thought now. She didn’t know if she believed that Lia was still helping. She didn’t know if she believed that Lia was setting Anna up and using her to do it. She just knew that she would be taking that jump drive to Anna if and when she got out of here with it. She would do what Lia asked her to do. She would just do, but she found herself thinking that it would be really, really nice to believe. She couldn’t decide what to say, and whatever she would have settled on saying was lost in a sudden rush of words from Lia. For the first time, she sounded sad and as if she was trying to get the rush of words out
before something happened to stop them – that something probably being an onset of the tears that she was rapidly blinking out of her eyes.
“If you would,” Her hands rose to the back of her neck and worked the clasp of the necklace that hung there. “Getting that to Anna,” she nodded at Karen who understood her to mean the jump drive she was currently clutching in her fist. “That is the most important thing. But if you would,” she held the necklace out, “this is for Kyle.”
“I think you should give it to him yourself,” Karen protested taking a step back. She still didn’t know what exactly was happening or what she believed, but that smacked of a goodbye gesture (and she really, really didn’t want to be a party to that no matter how things turned out).
Lia just looked at her with eyes that were shiny from the still welling tears, and Karen couldn’t find words to voice a further refusal.
“I don’t like this,” Karen said pushing the drive down in her pocket and letting the proffered piece of jewelry take its place in her hand.
“I don’t like it much either,” the other girl agreed, “but I’m doing what has to be done.” Her voice became firm again. “Don’t let them forget that. Ending this comes first. They can’t get bogged down in the details.”
That was even more indicative of a goodbye (and of other things that Karen wasn’t prepared to dwell on). She focused instead on the pendant that lay against her palm. Karen ran her thumb over the tiny, curling script of the engraved letters on the crossbar that read “Love endures all things.”
“What should I say to Kyle?” She wanted to regret the words; she still wanted to be anywhere but in the middle of this kind of message passing. She let them stand anyway. She had wanted to bring things to an end one way or another. The least she could do was see it through the repercussions.
A dark red braid fell over Lia’s shoulder as she spun and rested her hand on the door. She didn’t seem prepared for the question, and there was a tension in her shoulders that told Karen she was participating in some sort of an internal struggle as she tried to determine how to respond. It just brought the goodbye quality of it all even more to the forefront of Karen’s mind.
“Tell him that he’s always been worth it. He’s been worth all of it.”
With a sound that could only be called a swallowed back sob, she was gone.
Glimpse: The Complete Trilogy Page 44