▌│█║▌║▌║Chapter 41║▌║▌║█│▌

Via finally became quiet after the red-haired girl’s tirade. The red-haired girl walked behind the large man carrying us, and she moved directly in front of me. She grabbed my hair, and she forced my face to look up at her. She stared at me intently with her emerald-green eyes. “Do you remember my name Khan?” She asked. “You’re an interesting guy. I didn’t even expect you to remember my voice or appearance.”

Annoyed and troubled at the current situation I was in, I told her in such an aggravated voice, I almost spat out the words, “I just remember things easily, but no, I don’t remember your name. I didn’t care enough to remember yourname.”

Which is true, I only remembered the names of the people I thought were important from the event. She seemed like a relatively small piece on the chess board the terrorists have. She giggled a bit and said, “Well, it’s Scarlett. You can remember it because of my scarletthair. You’re probably wondering why we are taking you away huh? In short, you will be our sort of lab rat, but it will help people like you in the end. Our goal is to bring down the tyrannical government that is in place now, and put in place a government where low levels and sagarus aren’t constantly discriminated against. It will be wonderful won’t it?”

I stared back at her with dead eyes. “How naïve she must be.” I thought.

I answered her saying, “That’s not going to happen. You will never overthrow the government because of the protectors, and even if you did, it won’t change much socially. People don’t change easily. There will still be discrimination no matter what you do. People have grown up their whole lives being taught that sagarus and low-level people are the scum of the earth. People aren’t just going to forget what they have been taught their whole life. Especially since you are using violent measures to achieve your goals, the people will not want to support it even more because of that. Your logic is flawed.”

She swung my limp head back down against the body of the man that was carrying us, and she scolded me in an angry tone, “You just think thatnow. Once you see what we are doing, you will come around. I guarantee it. You too loud mouth, even though you are high level.”

I could hear Via mumble under her breath, “Yeah right.”

It went back into silence for a little bit, and I got sucked into the steady rhythm of the man’s walking pace. My mind started to wander about the purpose Scarlett said they had for kidnapping me. What does she mean by a lab rat? Does this have something to do with the DNA that the terrorist group has been stealing over various locations? How are people not seeing us walk down the street either? I asked out loud, wanting either of them to answer, “How do people not see us walking down the street? It’s now like we aren’t noticeable.”

I could hear Scarlett giggle playfully as she said, “You would be wondering why, wouldn’t you? I guess we can tell you since you are coming with us anyway. One of our members has the power to make people seem non-existent to the outside world. She can endow certain objects with that power, and all the people who have the objects can become invisible to the outside world. The only people able to see them are the people with the other objects she has endowed with her power. We slipped a coin that she gave her power to in both of your pockets when we grabbed you. The process takes a while to do and wears off in about thirty minutes, so it isn’t that effective in a fight though. For the purposes we are using it for though, it is just about perfect.”

Another member of the terrorist organization?! How many members do these guys have?

“Well what about our paralysis?” I asked. “Why can’t we move?”

“That would be Ford’s doing. He can paralyze anybody for about forty-five minutes depending on the person with his power. He can paralyze people by shooting darts generated on his fingertips.”

We turned a corner then, and we headed into a dark alleyway. I could hear some dogs barking from what seemed like the end of the alley, and the humidity rise in the dark place. Suddenly, we seemed to have stopped at a door, and I heard Scarlett knock on it three times. A response to the knocking could be heard on the other side of the door saying, “The time is eleven fifty-eight…”

Scarlett responded to him by saying, “And we are preparing for high noon.”

A door could be heard creaking open, as we walked forward into a shaded room. A sleezy man’s voice rung out through the darkness asking, “Why do you have those two kids with you? Don’t tell me you did what Claudius specifically told you to not do.”

“Well… I just couldn’t help it. He seemed like such and interesting guy, and we needed more sagarus anyway. This is the perfect guy for the job, I know it!”

“Mhmm, sure, Ford can you set them over there against the pillar until Claudius comes back? Thanks.”

Ford turned to his right, and he carried us towards a pillar and sat Via and I down. When he did, he let out a relieved sigh and said, “Finally, they were starting to get really heavy.”

Trying to take this opportunity to lighten the mood, I retorted to him, “You really shouldn’t judge a girl’s weight like that.”

Via let out a, “Hey!” in protest, but the jest did a good job in lightening the solemn atmosphere in the air. The place we were in erupted in laughter and giggles. I looked around with my eyes at my surroundings, since I’m still not able to move my head or neck, and the place seemed like a large warehouse. There were structures, boxes, and cat walks all around the warehouse. I let out a sigh in disappointment. This really is just a generic villain’s hideout from comic books huh?

▌│█║▌║▌║To be Continued║▌║▌║█│▌