Words of Fate

Chapter 9

Vivian's POV

"Are you girls awake?" Luca yells from behind the door, it's late in the afternoon and Ari and I have spent the last hour or so reading because we decided to skip out on going to a dining hall.

"Yeah!" Ari yells back and in response, Luca opens the door and walks in.

"Are you girls up for a walk because I know where they hide all the ice cream in the tunnels." A smirk rises.

"Sure, why not?" I close my book and set it on the table beside me. "Are you up to going?" I face Ari who is clearly getting frustrated trying to open her magnetic bookmark.

"Yeah, I guess. Just give me a minute"

"I'll go get Dylan and we'll meet you outside" Luca leaves as quickly as he came in. I hear a small snap as Ari closes her book. Silently we both slip on our shoes and exit our room. I open the door and nearly run into Dylan, he stumbles backwards muttering under his breath.

"Sorry," I tell him but he just grunts lightly.

"So, how did you come across this secret room?" Ari asks while closing the door.

A warm blush rises on Luca's cheeks, "Dylan and I were uh fooling around a few months ago and we opened a random door and found the stash." Dylan uncomfortably coughs beside him.

"Oh" Ari doesn't seem to have any words so I take the chance to talk and let her recover.

"Is it not wrong to be stealing from the people who have just accepted us into their community?" I ask my voice hushed.

"What are they gonna do? Throw us in ice cream jail? The worst Cecilia would do is give us a stern talking to and inform us we have our cards for a reason" Luca seems confident in his words so my thoughts of worry escape me.

"Hurry up before we do get caught. I don't need you two dragging us behind." Dylan is clearly unimpressed at the pace of our walk and he quickens his own pace in order to convince us to move faster.

"Are you always this stuck up?" Normally I wouldn't ask such a bold question but I get a negative vibe from him and I want to kick him down a couple notches.

"Excuse me?" Dylan snaps back.

"You heard me" I'm defending Ari now more than myself.

"How about we all just go back to the topic of ice cream." Luca cuts in.

"Fine" Dylan responds.

"Good, there's no need to argue" Luca continues to talk but I find myself tuning him out only catching a few words here and there. I start counting the wood planks beneath my feet as we continue to walk over bridges and platforms. By the time I make it to eighty-seven we turn into the entrance room where the elevator goes down to the tunnels.

"So this time we don't have to ride anywhere and we just have to walk down the main corridor for a minute or two."

We all walk into the elevator and it descends, this time the elevator doesn't bug me nearly as much. It bings loudly when we reach the bottom and the doors allow us to walk out. As Luca promised we don't get into the machine that resembles a roller coaster and instead he turns to the right and he and Dylan walk hand in hand. Ari and I keep pace an arm's length apart closely behind them.

"So how was this place built?" It clearly would've taken a lot of time and money.

"This was an abandoned government base from the war before The Heart took over, we renovated it to fit our needs and as far as we know The Heart has no clue this place even exists." I nod accepting the answer. Just as I'm about to open my mouth to speak again I hear a scream, on instinct I run towards where the scream came from. 

"Vivian!" Luca harshly whispers my name behind me. 

"Please! I already told you I don't know anything! I won't tell anyone anything! I don't even know who you people are!" A man voice pleads as I stop the door the noise is escaping from. Ari catches up to me and through the small window in the door, we see a man in hunting gear and an unfamiliar man circling him. 

"If you would just tell me the truth I could end it for you and the beatings would be over." I flinch as the man brings his fist down on the hunter's face.

Luca and Dylan pull us away from the door and bring us down the hall by our wrists, I'm too stunned to fight back. I was just starting to trust that this place was safe. 

"What the f**k was going on in there?" I yank my wrist from Dylan's grasp when I'm positive we're out of earshot to whoever is in that room. 

"We know how this must look but they must have found out that the man in the woods was not who he said he was. They wouldn't do something like this unless that man has information we need." Luca explains. 

"Is that the best lie you've got?" I challenge. 

"Come on Vivian, Luca has no reason to lie to us, the man shot a gun off. It's safer for them to make him prove his actions with the gun, he could've been aiming at us for all we know." I bite down on my tongue hard, there's no point in trying to argue with them. I'll just find a way to sneak off later and come down here tonight. 

"Okay, let's just go back up and call it a night," I suggest. 

"Agreed" Luca leads us back to the elevator and soon enough we're back up and in our room. I'm surprised that we didn't get caught, if they’re torturing someone you’d think they would have someone to patrol outside the door too.

"Listen, Viv, I know that you're still skeptical of this place but they're doing what they need to to keep everyone safe. They have all the children here who wouldn't be able to fight back against any threat and so many other people that wouldn't know what to do." She pleads for me to believe her but I just stiffly nod, she has no reason to vouch for this place and yet she’s making excuses for them.  

"Let's just go to bed" I climb in and she follows after turning the light off. No matter how long it takes her to get to sleep I have to stay up and leave as soon as I get the chance, that man's life is on the line. 

I awake when I hear a loud creak, I don't even remember falling asleep. I shake my head to clear my foggy thoughts and stand up to investigate where the noise came from. I see a silhouette and know that it's Ari, I turn the light on and she jumps. I look at her and she's dressed from head to toe in black clothes. 

"What are you doing?" I ask. 

"I couldn't sleep so I was going to go for a walk." Her voice hitches and I know she's not telling the truth. 

"The truth?" I make my voice stern. 

"Fine, I was going to see what's going on with that man and to see what I could find out about this place" So what the Hell was the point in standing up for them? Was it all just some lie to make me let her sneak off and get herself hurt?

"No, you're not. I won't allow you to go do that, you don't have experience and training and you'll just end up in a chair like that man." I tell her and with that she becomes defensive. 

"I can take care of myself."

"Fine, but I'm coming with you" A plan forms in my head and I know exactly what I need to do.

"Fine" She sighs and with that, I'm up and we're both headed to the entrance room. It takes us a short time to get near and I realize that now is the time to make my move. I break into a sprint while trying to keep my footsteps as soundless as possible and I make it to the main door swinging it open and locking it behind me leaving Ari locked out on the other side with no way down. 

"Vivian!" Ari scolds from the other side of the door, her voice hushed so no one wakes up. 

"You're just going to get me caught if you stay there and I'll be the one who ends up in a chair. Go back to our room, I can take care of myself and I'm experienced in stuff like this." I walk away not allowing her to answer. I need to make it down and into the room as quickly as possible especially now because if anyone tries to come down they'll find out the door is locked. 

The elevator descends quickly and I rush out when it reaches the bottom, I lightly jog to the room where the man was being held and I cringe at the sound of my footsteps against the concrete. When I make it to the door I look through the window and I see the hunter but I don't see anyone else in the room and the hunter is asleep so it's probably safe to say the man who was beating and questioning him isn't in there. 

Once I know this I don't hesitate to grab the doorknob and open the door. When I swing the door open and step in I see the bloodied and bruised man strapped to a chair. I move to walk over to him and try to help him but I jump as I hear the door slam and my shoulder is grabbed from behind. I swing my elbow up and feel it collide with whoever grabbed me. I twist around and meet eyes with Sawyer who is cradling his cheek in pain. 

"You can't be down here" Sawyer glares. With all the commotion the hunter wakes up and stirs behind me. 

"What the f**k is going on?" I ask. 

"That's not for you to know, you're not involved with this" Sawer snaps aggressively.

"I was one of the four people that heard the gunshot, I am involved in this. You lied to us and told us you were just going to gas him and let him go!" 

"Leave girl before they hurt you too, pretty boy hasn't hit me yet but he looks close to hitting you" The hunter speaks but I'm so focused on Sawyer I barely hear. 

"This" Sawyer gestures to the man, "this is not my fault, I do as I'm told and you should too now get back up there and stop digging around." Sawyer seems different when he's angry. 

"No, you're going to tell me right now what the Hell is going on. I was lied to along with everyone else and I deserve an explanation!" He takes a deep breath and sighs. 

"Let's go for a walk" He opens the door and grabs my arm escorting me out. 

"You understand we have a lot of people to protect right?" He continues to pull me along beside him. 

"Well, yeah,"

"Good, and we have many children here that we need to make sure are safe. With every person, we bring in the carts scan faces and can bring up anyone in The Heart's system. When we scanned that man it revealed his true identity." Sawyer opens a door and takes me into a room with him. 

I look around and it's very high tech with symbols and sets of numbers I have no idea what the meaning behind could be. Sawyer types on a keyboard to my right and when he stands straight again a picture of the hunter pops up on one of the walls along with what looks like a keycard. 

"He's very high up in the Heart's protection forces and there's no way around letting him go, he could have some sort of bug planted on him as it is. Cecilia lied because she doesn't want to panic the people. By simply bringing him here we put everyone in danger after we fell for his stupid hunter act. Yet, we don't know if there even is a bug planted and until we know more or he tells us more we can't allow our people to go into a panic." 

"I understand that, but I don't know if this is even close to the way you should handle it. You'll have to beat that man to death before he says a word you want. My father's friend worked for one of the lower protection units and he had to go through weeks of training to ensure if he were ever captured by a rival force that they would die before releasing information." 

"Then how do you suggest we handle it?"

"Cecilia said you had sedatives, I suggest you sedate him to the point where consciousness is almost gone and question him while he's in the confused state. There's a high chance he won't have a filter and he'll willingly give information. Almost as though he’s drunk but using sedatives would most likely make him willing to talk." Sawyer pauses taking a look at me. 

"How do you know this stuff?"Sawyer questions and I shrug. 

"I took a ton of extra classes and actually paid attention to what was being taught. My dad was a teacher in The Heart, he knew a lot and made sure I did too, taking any chance he had to teach me something new." 

"I'll talk to Cecilia and if she approves I'll request permission to speak to the doctors about the proper dosages and medicines." I nod. 

"If I try to convince Cecilia to go through with your idea then I'm going to need you to keep your mouth shut about all of this until we publicly release the information. I'm also going to ask that you allow me to escort you back to your room"

"Yeah, I'll stay quiet but you need to keep me updated and you need to tell me the truth about what's going on" I pitch. 

"Fine, I have a feeling that if this works Cecilia will keep you very high up with her. You also have to start your guard training soon if Cecilia still sees it fit." Sawyer leads me out of the room and down the corridor back to the elevator once again. 

It seems to take a long time to go up though I'm sure it's only because of the awkward silence that surrounds the air around us. After what seems like minutes, the elevator bings and we finally reach the top. When we walk out Sawyer walks over to the door and pulls it before looking up to me. 

"Really? You locked it" He twists the lock and it clicks open.

"I didn't want anybody following me" I shrug and he just shakes his head. 

We continue walking towards my room and I never noticed how silent the air is, out here there are no loud man-made city sounds. The air is calm and smooth with a very gentle rustling of the leaves. We reach my door and I open it quietly trying not to wake Ari, I notice that Sawyer watches me to make sure I actually go inside. 

I close the door behind me, now realizing just how exhausted I am, I walk over to the bed and climb in before falling into a quick dreamless sleep.