What do you think so far?
"Holy shite!"
"Holy shit"
Sarah and Shay let out in unison.
Cosima is too astonished to say anything; she continues to gawk at the woman before her.
Taking in their reactions, Elise proceeds to explain "I know this may come as a shock to all of you, and I apologize; but Mrs. Bowles saw fit to introduce you into the operation at this very moment. I am aware it is sudden and probably inconvenient under these circumstances but we had no choice. The enemy is moving fast and we have to stop them soon before they take their inhuman ideology further. Now, we need all the information you can provide us. That along with the one we already have and the training we have been enduring for years, we are fairly certain we are prepared to confront and defeat the neolutionism once and for all"
Sarah and Cosima didn't really understand what Elise just said, focusing instead on other details. Like her accent for example; there's no hint of French whatsoever. Her body, even in the uniform, looked built-if the broad shoulders were an indication. But perhaps the most disturbing aspect was the expression on her face. She looked rather cold and detached; her eyes lacked the warm sincerity of Delphine's. They are very confused and torn about what to feel.
Elise, still not getting any response, focuses her attention on the soldiers guarding Shay.
"Release Miss Davydov" She commands.
Shay lets out a nervous sigh avoiding the sister's eyes.
Immediately the soldiers remove the cuffs.
"What!"
"Hey!"
Again, Cosima and Sarah's attempt to move was stopped by the soldiers.
Before they could lash out, the entrance door opened.
"Marion!" Shay exclaims upon seeing the woman.
Cosima and Sarah look at each other; their minds trying to find some sense in the situation.
"Shay, long time no see" The woman regards her with a smile. The smile morphs into an expression of concern though when she notices the bandages on Shay's arm "what happened to you?"
"Uh" Shay gets agitated, but doesn't respond.
Marion turns to Cosima and seems to get it "oh" she takes a few steps forward "hello Cosima, I don't think we had the pleasure of meeting before, I'm Marion Bowles" She doesn't bother to extend her hand; she clearly could see Cosima was not up to any pleasantries.
As expected Cosima acknowledges her with a dead glare, not liking one bit how well she is treating Shay.
"Marion, what the hell?" Sarah couldn't help but to demand an explanation for this madness.
With this, Marion throws a glance to Elise.
The blonde gets the message. She stands at attention and instructs in a loud and firm voice "you are dismissed"
The ten soldiers present leave the room in an instant.
When they are alone, Marion faces Sarah "there are a lot of things we need to discuss Sarah but first…" she moves toward Shay. "Are you Ok?"
Shay manages a mixture of shaking her head and nodding at the same time.
"You don't have to worry about anything anymore; you're not going back to them" Marion assures Shay putting a hand on her shoulder "now I just want you to refresh yourself and relax, because later we need to talk about everything you learned Ok?" She then turns back to Elise "please make sure Miss Davydov gets a room nearby".
Elise nods and extends her arm "follow me please"
With some fear evident in her eyes, Shay follows the other blonde.
When they are out of sight, Marion comments "you couldn't just wait a few hours before checking on the flash drive, I see" she chuckles glancing at Sarah.
Sarah crosses her arms defensively and it is about to retort when Cosima beats her to it.
"So, she was supposed to hide it from us? From me?" Cosima challenges with renewed anger.
"No, I was actually hoping that Sarah's lack of patience would result in you seeing that specific video at some point. I was also counting on your short temper, knowing you would go after Miss Davydov. It was the only way we could retrieve her safely without neolution suspecting anything…"
"Shite" Sarah mutters under her breath.
"… although safe is not the word I should be using" Marion glances at Cosima before continuing "As far as they are concerned Shay is my prisoner now; and that's how it's supposed to remain"
"What are you saying?"
After making sure Shay was escorted to her room, Elise reentered the area.
"What I'm saying Cosima is that Miss Davydov is an important tool in this matter. She's got valuable information and everything she did was under my orders. To get results there were sacrifices, from many of us, but she did nothing wrong; she had to do what she had to do"
Upon hearing those words Cosima loses it "how dare you!" she dashes toward Marion.
She didn't even get three steps forward when a strong arm grabbed her around the midsection, causing her to expel air from her lungs in a loud oof.
"Stay right there!" Elise orders with her free arm stretched, pointing at Sarah, who was about to move. When she makes sure that they were not going to put up a fight, she lets go of Cosima and adds "You two seriously need to calm down. We are wasting valuable time with all this bickering. We all have questions, we all want answers and we're going to get them but we need to focus."
Sarah wants to argue, but the veracity of the statement makes her decide against it.
Cosima just remains bewildered in front of this woman whose voice and face she recognizes, but not the attitude or stand.
Marion shakes her head with a sigh "I'm afraid Miss Cote is right, we need to act immediately, the sooner we exchange information, the better." She steps toward Sarah "Since we wasted so much time in useless arguments how about if we go to a quiet place to catch up and let Elise and Cosima deal with the science"
At this, Sarah tenses, glancing at Cosima "I don't think that's a good idea Marion"
Elise intervenes "there are things we need to discuss about the original genome and some neolution technology I'm sure she'll be interested in hearing" She turns to Cosima "right Miss Niehaus?"
The brunette remains unresponsive.
"I'm sorry, I know this must be too much for you and I wish I could give you some time to adjust but I'm afraid we can't afford that luxury"
Elise is met only with silence.
"Cos?" Sarah asks her sister with worry, not knowing if she's ready to face this Delphine look-alike by herself.
Finally Cosima reacts "what? No; yeah, yeah I can… I can do that yeah sure" She swallows as she tries to convince Sarah that she would be fine.
"Good" a sly smile-that doesn't quite reach her eyes- graces Elise's face "I have the files in my office, if we just…" She signals for Cosima to follow her.
Cosima does, nervously; throwing one last look to her sister before disappearing with Elise.
"Shall we?"
Marion's voice startles a distracted Sarah. "yeah"
As they walk Marion allows Sarah to organize her thoughts and lead the conversation.
"Why didn't you find me sooner? What happened?" Sarah starts.
"I was hiding here, neolution was after me. I couldn't risk making any contact with you while they were on high alert. I'm still a target, but right now they're distracted with other things."
"Oh" Sarah nods. Then she remembers someone. "Where is Charlotte?"
At the sound of her daughter's name being mentioned Marion's steps faltered. She closes her eyes letting a shaky breath escape her lips.