The Espionage and The Enigma

Chapter 7- NOT VALID

          I felt Michael look up at me and roll his eyes. "You're needed for revisions." He grumbled. "They also told me to tell you that. Cabin 7."

          With annoyance from him and last night with Dylan, I stood up from my seat and didn't bother to ask him why I was needed. It's not like I wanted to, anyways.

       I walked across the cabin towards the back of the aircraft, a medical room. Every aircraft was equipped with one after Collingsworth, the sector responsible for our medical research, requested it. I opened the door and a thin woman with blonde hair and brown eyes came up to me, a smile on her face. Her nametag said Nurse Amelia.

          "Diana Belasco, am I correct?" I nodded and tried to smile back, but I was too exhausted. "Follow me," She said, leading me over to a metal operation table where 4 doctors dressed in brown plainclothes waited for me and began to set up machines. I stared at them.

          "You're here for Revisions," began Nurse Amelia, gesturing for me to sit on the examining table. I pulled myself up onto the metal surface and looked around the room, they weren't preparing to operate on me though, since their Plainclothes were brown. The color meant that cosmetic enhancements were going to be made. So these doctors were from the Collingsworth sector.

          "Would someone pull up a picture of Mrs. Virtanen?" called one of the doctors in the corner. Almost instantly, a picture appeared on the screen of Daenaryis, her pale blue eyes boring into mine. Her image smiled back at us.

          "She's lovely really. Since both of you look alike, the procedures will be minimal, I promise you. Just injections for hair color, iris color contacts, pigmentation bleaching, also with injections, and enhancement of your cheek bones and collarbones."

          I gulped.

          "Lay down, the procedure is painless, I promise." She said, smiling and nodding to the doctor who turned on the operating light above me. I adjusted myself and the cool metal touched my skin. I sighed and closed my eyes. The light burned into my eyes. I felt another one of the doctors stand by my side and inject my arm with anesthesia.

          "Don’t be afraid." Nurse Amelia murmured. I could already feel the world slipping away from me.

• • • • • • • • • • • •

          I woke up. My head was throbbing and my vision blurry. I was the operating room. I blinked once, twice, three times until the haze went away and I was starring up at my companions. Lorenne, Council Member Macklevoy, Xavier. They all wore puzzled expressions on their faces, but seemed to be relieved. All except....

           Michael? Was it really him? I focused on him, confused. He had blonde, almost white hair and extremely fair skin. Pale blue eyes. He looked exactly like Jakob. I didn't remember him looking like that the last time I saw him. He raised his eyebrow smiled at my puzzled expression. He must have gone in during my procedure, I thought.

          "We were waiting for you to wake up." said Council member Macklevoy with a condescending tone. "The injections seemed to be, ah, too much to your system." He said, pacing the room and looking to his fellow Council members. He was the leader here.

          I furrowed my eyebrows and raised myself up to a sitting position, my legs dangling off the table. They were as pale as Michael's face. I raised up my hand and found it to be the same shade. "I'm terribly sorry for that, Council member Macklevoy." I said, looking to him and nodding. I looked across the room to the mirror that was positioned on the door. The reflection staring back at me was completely foreign.

           I had waves of platinum blonde, longer than usual. It came past my hips. Pale blue eyes that could pierce through anything. My cheekbones protruded from my face. My waist looked smaller, so did my hips. Had they done more to me than I realized? I looked at Lorenne for confirmation on the matter, but she just stared at my reflection with a somber face and smiled ruefully. Xavier, who was behind her, smiled the same way back at me as well. Lorenne was hardly the one to show affection for me, so it caught me off guard. It was as if she knew what was going to happen to me.

          The thought made me even more terrified.

          She nodded at me and mouthed "Be careful" before looking away. It was as if she never said it. It was her final goodbye. The thought that she said that was enough to make me emotional, and I felt small pinpricks of tears form in my eyes. Was this it- The Draft? Was the beginning really only the end for me? 

          "We've discussed your mission details with Mr. Alessio while you were out. It proves to be, to all of us, that both of you have an extremely well carried out plan. Especially the one for the assassination of Daenaryis and Jakob. Mr. Alessio had told me you made up most of the details. Well done Ms. Belasco." Xavier said, smiling at me in his usual big brother fashion. I tried to keep my expression calm, but I looked up at Michael. He coughed and slightly nodded, looking over to the Council members. I didn't do this plan, I had gone into operation just before calculating it. So he did? I narrowed my eyes. If he was so smart, why didn't he tell them?

          "Thank you for your complements Council members. It is most extraordinary that you did so." I raised my chin up at them and gave them the best smile I could manage. It was better for me, but that still left the question as to why Michael did all of that.

            I thought back of his moves since the time we met. All the details he knew about the Draft before me. How the society functioned. How he was horrible at military tasks in front of his superiors, but in the privacy of running in the morning, he treaded the tracks so fast, he ran faster than I. Was Michael not what he seemed to be? Was he hiding something.

          I looked at his face in the reflection, Michael always looked annoyed, so unlike Lorenne it wasn't a surprise to find the expression worn on his face. How was he feeling about all this? Was he sad? Did he have anyone to tell him that they would miss him, that it was okay, that they loved him?

          Did he even have anyone to tell him goodbye?

        His eyes met mine in the mirror, and he scowled and looked away. Even though Michael was going to bring me down during the Draft, I wasn't going to die without trying.

         Daenaryis Virtanen. Married to Jakob Virtanen. 23 years of age. A Soviet States Republic heir to the throne of the Scandinavian Peninsula. No longer Diana the assassin, or Diana, the brave.

           I supposed that now, I was to become more than either.