“We can’t run,” Gem muttered quietly and I turned to look at her.

Her puffy eyes were fixed on the red words above the door and her hands were curled into fists.

“We can’t go without talking to Plend. We need to find out what happened to Peggy. We need to… I don’t know, report her missing! We need to do something! We can’t leave her behind!” Desperation tinged her voice as she turned and grabbed my arm.

I found myself nodding.

“Okay. Let’s go talk to Plend. See what she has to say.”

Gem clutched my hand tightly and I squeezed back. I knew she was blaming herself for what happened. She was the primary gunner, it was her job to protect us. She was wrong though, this was my fault.

“Do you think Plend will be in her office? It’s early still,” Cas asked.

I glanced at my wrist monitor. Somehow, it was gone six-thirty, closer to seven.

“Let’s check her office, if not we’ll just have to try and work out which room is hers. I don’t even have her ping, I can’t call her.” I realised.

We left Ursa’s room without looking back and headed towards Andy’s office. It felt weird to call it her office, it had been his for as long as I had been at the base. We’d been there so many times and the thought of someone else being in there made me uncomfortable.

I knocked on the door softly, reluctant to talk to her again but this time, it opened quickly. Plend was in her dress uniform again but somehow the medal designating her as Director was even more shiny. Not a single hair was out of place and she looked well rested.

“Yes?” She demanded as she raised her left eyebrow at us.

“Umm… May we come in? We have something we’d like to discuss.” I tried to be as polite and proper as possible.

She slowly looked us up and down, taking in our crumpled clothes, bare feet and blotchy faces.

“Fine.”

She stepped away from the door and marched towards her desk, perching carefully on the chair behind it.

We walked into the room and sat down. It was so glaringly different to when Andy had been there. It was all clean, ordered and organised. Whereas Andy had screens strewn around the place, Earthen books and artefacts overflowed on the bookshelves and pictures were everywhere, Plend had a different style. The bookcases were neatly organised and displayed pictures of her in neat suits shaking hands with each of the Council members. She was wearing different suits in each of them. It chilled me to see how close she must have been with them. I knew we couldn’t trust her. In the photo of her and Harvey, they were both captured mid laugh. My hatred for this woman we barely knew was growing. I wrenched my eyes away from the photo and they fell on the small collection of books she had. I almost laughed, they were so predictable; The Full and Complete History of the Council, The Rise and Fall of the Earthen Empires and the Space Corps Manual. There was absolutely nothing of character or interest in the room.

“Well?” She demanded.

I finally brought my gaze back to her and tried to carefully construct what I wanted to say.

“Um… One of our crewmates, Pegasus, she’s gone missing. We woke up and she wasn’t there.”

Plend’s face did not move at all. If a kid went missing on Andy’s watch, he would have been so worried but she didn’t seem concerned at all.

“Is that all?”

I felt Gem bristle behind me.

“What do you mean is that all? Peggy’s gone. We need to call the Guardians or something!” She insisted.

Plend pursed her lips.

“I see no need for that. People run away all the time, I’m sure she will return.”

“No. It isn’t like that. She wouldn’t leave and not tell us!”

“Are you sure?” Her eyebrow raised again.

“Yes!” I said emphatically.

“Well, I guess you can call the Guardians’ non-emergency line but they won’t do much without there being any real concerns. Is that all?”

“Um no, actually. I was wondering what’s happened to all the tutors. I noticed not many of them were at dinner last night and I tried to organise a meeting with a couple of them to discuss my teaching and I couldn’t get through.”

Careful, Aries, Cas warned. We can’t tell her what we saw in Taury’s room.

I know.

Plend smirked again.

“Ah yes. Unfortunately, you won’t be able to speak to many of the previous tutors here. There has been some restructuring.”

“Restructuring?” I asked, my eyebrows drew together.

“Yes. For too long things have been lax here. There has not been enough oversight from the Council and the previous Director allowed it to be run into the ground. He allowed for treasonous terrorists to be cultivated and celebrated instead of imprisoned for life.”

I swallowed. She was obviously talking about us.

“Unfortunately,” she continued, “not all of his decisions can be overturned so you will be allowed to continue teaching for now.”

I had nothing to say to that. The rest of my crew were silent too as she looked at us in disgust.

“Well? Is there anything else you need?” She demanded.

“No,” I said, unsure of what else I could say to her.

“Good. Go get cleaned up and changed into your uniform before breakfast. The Council allowed for you to be Tutors, you should set a better example. It looks like you slept in those.”

She turned away from us and began reading on her screen, clearly dismissing us.

What do we do? Gem asked.

I turned, gesturing for my crew to do the same.

I guess we do what she said. Go get changed, call the Guardians and try to call Chal again.

We slipped out of the office and started down the corridor to our rooms.

It’s too late for us to go unnoticed now. We need to do what she said. Go for breakfast then after when it’s busier we’ll go. There will be too many kids around for them to want to make a scene.

I looked around at my crew and saw them all nod, determination etched onto their faces.

I don’t want any of us to be alone until we go. We’ll grab everyone’s bags from their rooms now and get changed into our flight suits in our room. If anyone asks why we aren’t wearing the dress uniform we can say that we’re teaching a class on flying later so want to be prepared.