We follow Zoe down winding concrete passages. It was like they were carved into the mountain haphazardly and then just concreted over and given a paint job. Whoever did this didn't exactly try to make it easy for any other inhabitants. Or navigable.
After going through of the long hallways, Zoe pointing at a door in each and telling us who worked there or what that room was, all of which I promptly forgot, we came to a large black door. It was at the end of a long, white concrete hallway, identical to every single other hallway in this cavern. By this time my feet were hurting and the adrenaline rush of flying through the sky in a giant floating arrowhead had worn off. I was crashing. Hard.
It hits me then, what we've been through in the last couple of days. Leaving the city, walking miles and storming a watch tower… It all seems so huge, my entire world has been expanded. Even just seeing a portion of it from the Dropship I can't seem to grasp the absolute magnitude of it. It is just so much bigger than me.
And I was about to find out just how big it really was.
Zoe led us through the black door and into the Control Room. A large room, at least big enough to fit three-hundred people, and it was filled with desks, and screens and people looking at them or talking into microphones. It was busy and felt like it had a direct sense of purpose. The entire back wall was covered in screens, each holding a different picture. I strain my eyes to see them. And what I see is horrific. It is a city. A run-down city like ours, but unlike ours, it is on fire. An entire skyscraper is on fire. I look away to the other screens and some have images of familiar buildings. I spot the Hub and Merciless mart entrance. But the screens also hold images which are clearly from another city. Another city.
I just try and focus on one fact: They have been watching us. What for, I really hope they explain to us soon.
We're silent as we cross the room and through a door on the right. I can see the exhaustion in all our stances. The others are noticing the screens too, Caleb and Christina frown, Tobias looks troubled. Peter looks serious but wary, he always seems wary when there is a new power coming into play. As if he measures himself up against it to see which course of action would be the best for his own gain.
We file into a small room with a large metal table inside and a huge black screen on the wall. A thin man sits on the opposite side of the table behind a laptop. He looks up, his eyes regarding us from behind a furrowed brow, his features dusky and narrow. But it wasn't him that commanded our attention.
A tall, dark woman leans against the wall watching us as Zoe points to chairs and we take our cue to sit down.
She has beautiful, smooth brown skin covered by a tightfitting jacket and dark pants, clothes for a purpose. She wears a belt with a gun in a holster. She's young, about twenty, and her face is the kind of face that would look radiant if she was smiling. She wasn't smiling. Her eyes regard us with a hardness and a hint of contempt. I stare right back at her and notice her irises are so dark they are almost black. In that moment as we stare at each other, her eyes are flint, if someone were to strike her the wrong way sparks would fly and something would go up in flames.
I don't know what it was that gave her that hardness, I can see it is a kind of fury just held in check, but I have a feeling it was something far more horrific than what I have seen. And I don't even know whether that is possible.
What would someone have to have been through to have eyes like that?
Zoe, unaware of the tension that the woman brought the room, ploughed on ahead with introductions.
"This is Rafi, he's our computer expert and encoder. He built the entire system in the Control Room from scratch. If it weren't for him there wouldn't be much of a Resistance above the Scar."
Zoe beams at Rafi and he gives us all a nod and a half-smile, just a brief turning of the lips.
"And this is Nita," indicating the woman against the wall, "She's in charge of all the operations above the Scar."
Nita steps forward off the wall and stares at us with that same expression. She doesn't look impressed to see us.
"Well…" her voice was as hard as her eyes, confident and knowing and indifferent. I instantly felt a kind of animosity towards her. She can't treat us like this, we know practically nothing of the world and she is going to regard us with contempt already? Well, two can play at that game. I sit back in my chair and look at her with the pettiest expression I can manage.
"The prodigal Four comes to us, how very fortunate." She stares straight at him and he stares back undaunted but with that same wariness and a judgement, as if he was sizing her up and he liked what he saw. "Tris the invincible as well, what a wonderful day for the rebels," the contempt and sarcasm in her voice is overwhelming. What is her problem?
"Christina and Uriah, we are always in need of soldiers. I hope you join us in our ongoing endeavours of peace for all." I couldn't detect much sarcasm for them, which I felt was rather unfair.
"You," she points at Caleb and regards him with an intensity that he wilts under, "I saw what you did in that city and if I catch a hint of betrayal or action counter to what we are trying to achieve here I will throw you back inside that city where they will no doubt tear you apart."
"I–
"And if you speak to me I will cut out your tongue." She wasn't joking. Caleb shrinks back in his chair as far as he will go as we all look at him.
Jesus, this woman has issues. I mean, I kind of wholeheartedly agree with her, but Caleb is my problem. Because even though I still haven't asked Caleb why he did it nor spoken more than a few words to him since we left the city, he is still my brother and my responsibility. I would deal with him.
But Nita wasn't done yet, she turns on Peter.
"And you… Peter," she almost spits his name as though it is acid on her tongue, "if I catch you holding a weapon inside this base, I will skin you with your own butter knife. And then I will take out both your eyes before throwing you to the Programmers because it is no less than what you deserve, you two-faced bastard." All of this Nita says in a dangerously low voice that I don't doubt for a second is nothing but truth. She would do it.
"Cross me and I will find you. And I will kill you. I can't afford insubordination here." She stares at each of us in turn again, lingering on me last.
"How do you know all of this? Why are you watching us?" asks Tobias.
Nita swings her stare back onto him and I feel my hackles rising. "Good question, but not the one you need to ask."
"What's the one I need to ask then?" Tobias challenges.
"Who were the ones controlling you?"
That sends chills through all of us. Controlling? How could there be someone controlling the City?
"Well," Zoe's happy tones cut through the tension like butter, "now that introductions are over, why don't we tell them what we're actually fighting for."
Nita releases us all from her unblinking stare and leans against the wall again. "I'll let you take it Zoe. I'll watch."
Zoe smiles and asks Rafi to bring up the map.
AN: I liked Nita in the book and felt that she could have been so much more. So this is me attempting to bring out the real Nita. Cold, hard, intelligent, and a bit of a bitch. Don't worry though, I promise to make her better. And I won't make her plans as stupid as the ones in the book.