Born of starlight and shadows

~Part twenty five: Carter~

"So," the masked figure said. "This is her."

"Yes," he nodded. "This is her."

The masked figure studied her face intently. "Doesn't look like much."

A swarm of memories seemed to buzz throughout his mind, but he pushed them down. Now was not the time in reminiscing in what once was.

He soon was confronted with another problem, however.

For a few of his precious moments he was unaware of how to reply. The words simply would not come. A rush of panic flooded through him.

But to his relief, he managed to say something.

"While that may be true, she was still able to do-" he paused for a moment, adding, "Bear with me for a moment, please-"

With fumbling fingers, he was able to retrieve the sleek phone from his pocket, and, though it was true, he was now far from graceful, he was able to find the data he was looking for without too much effort. Or time-that was the main thing he was afraid of wasting. With present company, that was always a concern.

He slanted the phone screen towards the masked figure.

"Yes, yes, indeed," the figure nodded slightly, the silver light glinting off of the mask which they wore. "Taken from the security cameras?"

"Indeed," he said.

"Were you present when the drug was administered?" the figure asked, tilting their head slightly.

"No," he said hastily. "No, I was not."

Another nod. "But you acted as the escort."

"Yes," he confirmed.

That's a rather nice way of putting what I did, but yes, I suppose I did...

He felt another chill run up his spine as he thought of the encounter. He hadn't been able to contain his emotions. He was afraid, no, terrified, really, of how the girl may now be suffering as a result.

But surely not even he would be able to make her do what he had seen her do...no, surely not. Or so he hoped. Mainly he didn't want to be responsible for another catastrophic event.

He was jolted out of his thoughts when he realized the masked figure had spoken once again.

"I'm sorry," he said, in what he sincerely hoped was an apologetic tone of voice, "What was that?"

If he could see those eyes, he knew they would be narrowed at him.

"You know how I hate repeating myself," the masked figure said. "Johnson."

"It won't happen again," he promised.

"No," the masked figure agreed. "It won't...one way or another."

He swallowed.

"Now, I would like to see the prison records database," the masked figure said.

"Right away," he said.

He accessed the files the same way he had accessed the footage-by imputing his long, complicated password and tapping on one screen, then another, then another. It seemed that something of this had come in handy-his fingers knew exactly where to go without him even needing to think about it.

"Ah, yes," the masked figure said, leaning close to him-close enough that he was more than a little uncomfortable, though he tried not to show it.

"Yes, she was brought here only a short while ago," the figure said. "Very well."

Her eyes moved away from the screen. "Can you bring me any observations of her behavior so far?"

"This may take a few moments-" he cautioned.

"Yes, yes," the figure waved their hand impatiently.

He managed to access the record of the goings-on in a certain cell, cell B-218.

"Three of the prisoners had a conversation, it appears," he said.

He imagined the figure raising a condescending eyebrow. "It appears? Were you or were you not monitoring the footage of the cell block or not?"

"I'm sorry," he apologized quickly, "I didn't mean it like that. I was monitoring it, yes."

"Fine, then," the figure said. "Carry on."

He detected even more impatience, so he was eager to do so.

"Yes, well, the girl was among them," he said. "They talked for..."

He glanced down at the tiny screen he held in his hand. "Roughly an hour, before I was instructed to remove her from the cell."

"And before that? Did she display any signs of rebellion at first?" he asked.

He had to shut his eyes for a moment, shut his eyes and try to think back, remember, something that seemed to be growing increasingly had.

"She did fight, at the beginning, but most of them did," he said, barely restraining himself from adding a "didn't they?" at the end. He needed to sound confident. He had to.

The figure gave a slight nod. "Very well. That will be all."

He didn't need to be told twice. He left without a second glance. He didn't even feel a twinge of pity for the girl lying, unconscious or otherwise. No, not after what she had done.

He didn't even wonder why she had done it, what had motivated her. No, his thoughts somewhere else. On someone else.

His breathing seemed to grow heavier, more panicked, as he recalled her face. That was because she reminded of him of another. Only one other.

He had managed to go near her before, yes, but only by ignoring everything from his past, hadn't he? He wanted to tell himself that, he wanted it to be the case, but was it really true?

He stopped in his tracks. Even if he had wanted to continue, which, undoubtedly, part of him did, he didn't think he would be able to.

Something in a particularly dark, forgotten corner of his memory, pulled at him. But the past was to be left alone. For a long while, he hoped.

He would need all the strength he could get if he was to do anything remotely helpful.

The way things were looking, he doubted that would be the case.