Reforming Society •• OneRepublic {2}

A Lesson of Secrecy

Secretary of State's P.O.V.

She arrived home at about sunset, getting out of the black car that had taken her home from the White House. Her black heels clattered on the concrete of her driveway as she walked up to the front door, swinging her briefcase back and forth a bit. As she approached the front porch, she looked up at the flag at the top corner of the garage door, waving in the breeze - the all-seeing eye reminding them that the government was always watching.

As she got her keys out for the locked front door, the sleeve of her suit jacket came up to reveal the crown on her left wrist. She stared at it only a moment before turning the key and entering the house. She heard the TV in the living room and saw the light from the kitchen down the hall.

"Honey! Are you there?" She called.

"Yeah! Hey!" Her husband returned. She kicked off her heels and put her briefcase and jacket on the recliner in the entrance room. As she went in the kitchen and hung the keys on the key-holder, she also moved to get a wine glass from the cupboard to pour herself some.

"How was your day?" Her husband asked from the couch, only the back of his head visible in front of the news.

"Shitty."

She then sipped the wine, watching her husband reach for the remote to turn the television off. He got up and turned to her, "How come?"

She scoffed, "Oh, if only I could explain it."

He leaned against the island's counter, resting his elbows on it and looking at her.

"You could try to." He shrugged. She sighed loudly and put her wine down. At first, she tried to vaguely explain it so she wouldn't get in trouble.

"Well, I'm already pissed off that there's no longer any real foreign policy so they've given me new jobs. Like, I have no idea how to do these and I'm already busy as hell as it is! I've got to help Carter with his personal affairs - and I smell something fishy going on with him but I won't say anything because I can't!"

"No foreign policy?"

"No! And the secretary of state does all of that concerning other nations, but we've shut off our borders to pretty much everyone! The only countries we deal with are Russia and a few others! There's even talk of opening up to North Korea! Those are the allies we have right now! Apparently history means nothing! That or we've turned to the bad side..."

"You're against all of this?"

"Of course I am! Anyone would be! But I can't say anything to anyone."

She put her face in her palms just then, frustrated. She had a feeling she shouldn't have said anything even to her husband, but shrugged off the lingering feeling. They're just making her feel as if she has no one. They want people scared, paranoid. But she has to go along with their plans. It's the only job she can hope to have in this new world.

Her husband put a warm hand on her shoulder and said, "I'm here for you. To talk."

She looked up, nodding, "Thank you. We should go to bed."

Her husband nodded back, gray eyes sad.

As she and her husband also got ready to go to bed, brushing their teeth and getting pajamas on, she also spoke of them changing the Great Seal of the United States.

"They're changing it?"

"Of course. They already got rid of the stripes and stars, why wouldn't they get rid of our eagle too?"

"It's the national insignia."

"I know."

"Well, they're changing it to what? What's our new emblem gonna be?"

"Everything's probably going to be that damned eye."

Her husband gave a small groan as he jumped in the bed, "That thing freaks me out."

She sighed, getting in bed with him and turning off the bedside lamp beside her as he turned off his.

"I know." She replied again.

Then they both went to sleep, the poor Secretary of State forgetting about the wire the government placed inside them, just beside their vocal cords. She'd forgotten that they monitor everyone who works with them, to see who rats them out, tapping in to every word they give, as well as others they are around. They not only have a black eye everywhere - but ears.

The secretary and her husband were woken up early in the morning. Her husband was the first to be forced out of the bed, and the secretary woke up at the struggle. She turned from sleeping on her side just to see a man in all black, including a mask to cover his face, pulling him off the bed by his arms. Her husband yelled out her name, "Erin!"

She yelled back for him.

"Lloyd!"

Then her own arms were taken in by strong, uncaring hands and she was forced out of the bed as well, her body falling to the floor before the man behind her stood her up. As soon as she was on her feet and being pressed tightly against him, she saw her husband in the same position as her, except he had a knife to his throat.

"Maybe this'll teach you to keep your mouth shut." The man behind her gruffly said in her ear in an accent she couldn't identify. She stared across the room at her husband. She panicked and felt the man holding her nod to the other.

"No, no, Lloyd---"

But a slice rippled through the air as the knife slit her husband's throat, blood spewing all over his gray t-shirt and the carpet in front of him. She screamed and clawed at the man holding her.

"Not so fast." He said. Then a cold blade was on her and she could not stop the pain searing through her own neck as the other man let her husband, dying as he choked on his own blood, to the floor. As her own blood went everywhere, soaking her chest, she couldn't even cry. The man holding her let her fall to the floor and she tried hard to stop the flow of blood from her neck, but every time she laid a hand on her neck, blood gushed in between her fingers as she writhed on the ground.

She soon heard her husband stop choking on the other end of the bed and felt herself begin to cry for him, but the only tears that spilled out were from her body's struggle to breath. She watched through blurred vision as the killers, both with their bloody knives in hand, left the room. However, she caught one thing in their last moments of being in the room.

A square-shaped emblem was attached to their shoulders, as red as her blood and the eye on it as black as her next, and last, moments.

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I'm sorry you all had to wait a week for this chapter, I'm sure you were hyped for more of the guys just to get this lady. Much like how in the first book (I changed that cover earlier by the way, if you've seen it tell me how you like it!) I gave you glimpses of the outside circle aside from Ramona/Ryan/Shawn, I now give you glimpses of other people who are affected by the government in a more direct way than the guys are. Violence is often involved for a number of reasons, some of those being a) I want you to hate this government and b) I want you to know what they do exactly. Much love to you guys!

The next chapter comes on June 4th and is one of the girls' P.O.V.s. Important: I also do a bit of a time jump in that chapter, so be prepared for a bit more change in both the gov. and its effects as well as changes in the characters. :)