Chapter 10

Hello dear sweet forsaken NaNo novel. I've missed you.
Ok, so it hasn't been completely forsaken. But I'm not just rippin' through it like I was in November. Oh well. Regardless, here's the next part. Sorry it's been forever.
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“Sit down, Miss Conrad,” the gruff voice behind the lights said. It took a moment for her eyes to adjust for her to even find a chair. As the blinding white slowly funneled out of her eyes, she found the man in front of her incredibly intimidating. He wore the same uniform as Patrick, but filled it with much more bulk and muscle. That being said, he wasn’t an extremely young man; she estimated him to be about fifty, if no older than fifty-five. The lines of his face, especially his jaw, were sharp and jagged, as though he’d been carved out of a rock by a particularly poor sculptor. Cold gray eyes, holding none of the warmth of Patrick’s or even Trey’s, peered out at her from beneath the brim of his hat. He was everything she had expected a Memorist sergeant to be, and he terrified her beyond even her own expectations.
She sat down immediately, more out of fear than compliance. The man was sitting at a primitive looking desk made of wood. On the desktop was a name plate that read: “Sergeant Bernard Collins” in official capitol letters. Next to it sat a cup full of pencils, and even pens. A piece of paper lay on the desk directly in front of the Sergeant, and there was no Dictator machine in sight. Of course, she herself had even wanted to write a letter to Branson, but why would anyone in a setting such as this prefer to record a conversation by hand? Dictators had the capacity to print an entire sentence within a millisecond of its oral completion through laser printers. She supposed the Sergeant preferred to make the same statement as Patrick and his Memorists: live in the past, and reject progress.
Her train of thought was broken by the calm, controlled voice of the commanding officer.
“You put me in a predicament, Miss Collins,” he said again. His voice wasn’t loud or boisterous; in fact, it was the only part of her drill sergeant description that this man didn’t match perfectly. However, the quiet, accusatory tone of his speech almost frightened her more than if he had been yelling at the top of his lungs. “I cannot keep you here, but now that you’ve seen this place I can’t afford to let you leave.”
“I didn’t see the passcode, I wouldn’t know how to get in anyway,” she protested.
“Ah, but therein lies the problem, Miss Conrad. The only thing I have to prove that is your word. Private Blue has told me your story. I don’t appreciate the affect you’ve had on him.”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“Are you not aware, Miss Conrad, that he ran away from his commission in an effort to keep you safe?”
Her eyes widened as she shook her head in shock.
“A loyal move, no doubt, but loyalty to the enemy is worth nothing to me. A complete waste of my time and manpower.”
Suddenly it all clicked in her head: his not knowing where they were going, his reluctance to leave behind his walkie-talkie. He hadn’t been planning to desert. He deserted for her. She found herself more confused than ever. He hadn’t even know her then. What welled up inside Patrick, what ridiculous amounts of compassion, that he would be willing to risk his position and even his life for an enemy stranger? The things that boy did for her…
“I also have a serious concern as to your motives, Miss Conrad. You are looking for your National brother and father, your father being Nigel Conrad, am I correct?”
She nodded. She had never told Patrick her father’s name, as far as she could recall. As though reading her mind, the Sergeant continued, “We make it our business to know every aspect of the enemy’s army. Your father is a prominent general in the National forces. I myself am shocked at Private Blue’s total stupidity in harboring the child of one of our greatest nemeses.”
She had expected execution. Insult was almost as bad.
“Yet, I find another predicament, Miss Conrad, in the case of your grandmother.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said earnestly. What did Nana have to do with any of this?
“You are probably unaware that your grandmother, Sadie Conrad, has acted as a Safeguard for the Memorist army for the last eight years of her life.”
Most of the sentence flew over Piper’s head, but she understood three words with inescapable clarity: “Sadie Conrad” and “Memorist.”
“A Safeguard, Miss Conrad, is the term we use for one who looks over top secret government documents; in this case, an Apocalypse Journal.”
Piper’s hand flew to her heart in an effort to keep it from escaping her chest. Nana couldn’t have had an Apocalypse Journal, even in her attic… Nana wasn’t a traitor…
“She expressed a wish to pass the Journal on to you at some point before her passing, so you can see my problem. She obviously trusted you, but I have no way to know for sure if I can.”
“Her passing?” She bypassed the rest of the sentence completely, shoving the chair back as she stood up in outrage. “You killed her! Your bombs attacked my city, you KILLED my mother!” She was shocked at the strength of her own voice. She felt bigger and stronger looking down at the Sergeant, who was still sitting calmly in his chair. “My brother was five. Five years old with blue eyes and a little heart that only knew that his mother was inside the house burning to death.”
“Miss Conrad, I sympathize with your loss. I truly do.”
“How can you? You have no heart, none of you! You don’t understand that there are people in our cities, civilians! Five year olds! You may have wiped out an important city but you also snuffed out thousands of people who lived ordinary lives. How do you live with yourselves?” By this time hot tears were rolling down her face, not just from sadness, but also from anger and indignation.
“If you would listen to the entire story—“
“I don’t have to listen, you’re all the same. All over a stupid book! And you’d even kill your own spy to accomplish your ends. If I know anything about my grandmother, I know she was loyal, loyal to me, and probably loyal to you if you’re telling me the truth. And that’s how you repay her loyalty? With death and destruction?”
“If you would let me finish, Miss Conrad,” he tried to say. She cut him off before he could continue.
“I hope you die. I hope you all go up in a ball of fire, just like my family, all in the name of your delusions. I hope you die a miserable death and you think of my little brother running back into a burning building, you think of my mother screaming and crying, you think of—“
“MISS CONRAD!”
She sat down hurriedly just as the Sergeant stood up, towering over her like a capitol building. His raised voice terrified her even more than his calm.
“There is one crucial fact you have to understand, Miss Conrad,” he said, lowering his voice once again. Maybe it was the light, but she thought she saw tears welling in his eyes as well. The illusion almost gave them a sort of warmth and vulnerability.
“Memorists did not bomb your city. Nationals did.”