Project Gemini (WATTYS 2016 WINNER!)

Chapter Two - The Prime Minister's Presence.

"Pariahs have the tendency within the first seventy-two hours to metamorphose between...powers."

"If you're going to exile me then do it already."

"Not until we talk."

She ignored him as she stood, the chain on the handcuffs giving her some leverage. Lying Litchfield, everyone on the streets liked to call him, only her father had forbidden her from calling him that in the house. Rumour had it he was the worst Prime Minister since the Wall had been built. She was surprised there wasn't a government lapdog or Reaper shadowing him.

He nodded at her, "You look like your father," he said.

"You're—."

"Mr. Litchfield, Prime Minister, yes, and—."

"Where am I?" she asked, cutting to the chase.

He smiled. There was some strain behind it. "Sit," he said.

It was a command, not a request. She sat back down gingerly, trying not to rattle the chain on the handcuffs too much. She snuck a look at her wrist, noticing the large black V still there. She tried to summon some of her energy but she couldn't feel its presence.

"I'm in a crisis situation, Miss Saunders. My hand is being forced by a power I don't like to get my hands dirty with," he said, exposing the large black H tattooed onto his wrist. "Two weeks ago, a research facility here in London was broken into, nothing went missing, but then last night the man running that research was murdered."

"Doctor Hillary?"

"The very same."

"So what has this got to do with me?"

"Out of a building of three hundred or so people, you were the only one left alive. Care to explain?" he asked, he leant back and squinted at her. She hesitated, the rule of the streets she'd grown up with was always say nothing and stay alive.

"I don't know what you're talking about,"

He sighed. "Let's not play games, Miss Saunders. Your father wouldn't appreciate it."

"He's not here right now," she said. "He doesn't even know about this."

His eyes narrowed, "Not yet, but he could be facing prison time for harbouring a Pariah."

Eva lunged up. A part of her wanted to throttle him. Like a savage.

"He didn't even know," she whispered, her knuckles white, "nor did my mum."

"Perhaps that's better for both of us, and their careers, of course."

"You're threatening them?"

"Not necessarily."

He cut her off as she tried to argue and instead clapped his hands together and motioned towards the camera. The door unlocked a second time. The aura of the room shifted and rushed towards the open door where a man stepped in, carrying a chair with him. A thin, almost invisible purple haze evaporated from the man's body and connected with the purple glow of her fingertips. Except this aura, despite its weakness, reeked of power that crushed hers instantly.

Instinctively she shrunk back into the chair. She'd never felt power like this in this great a volume, even at the Reforms held once a month. Not one of the Pariahs put on trial and display had ever been as strong as this aura right here, right now.

The man turned and smirked at her, a cigarette packet stuffed into his jacket pocket making a bulge on his shirt. It was the police officer who tasered her last night. "Morning, kid," he said, dropping the chair at the end of the table.