“Evie!” A desperate tone erupted from a woman whose emotions swirled in a tumultuous torrent of turmoil as she entered the side office that she visited daily in the employ of the California Territory’s government.
“Oh my god, Sonia,” Evie said as she jumped from being seated behind her desk to her feet, her arms becoming immediately outstretched. “I was so afraid you were there.” As she took her co-worker into her arms, moisture began to form within her eyes.
“Did we stop the train, Evie?” Sonia said in a raspy voice. “The M line. Did we stop it?”
Though Evie heard the words and knew without hesitation the answer, through the haziness of her moist eyes she spied a large approaching figure over the shoulder of her friend stepping through the main entry to the office to begin a walk inwards to where they stood. “Sonia,” she said as she pushed away from her friend.
“Did we shut it down?” Sonia muttered a final desperate plea for answers before noticing a strange look within Evie’s eyes.
“Governor Logan.” Evie greeted the approaching official in a polite tone that was somewhat of a warning to her friend.
Sonia turned quickly upon the balls of her feet, the small purse that was still hung upon her shoulders swinging into a tray of papers on the edge of Evie’s desk, knocking it to the ground leaving a fluffy bed of white at her feet. “Governor Logan,” she said, her face wrinkled with distraught as tears again began to fall in a mixture of fear and despair.
Logan glanced from the woman called Evie to Sonia, the intimidating look that was his trademark expressed out of habit upon his face. Though he believed he had never been through the doorway of this particular office upon the overlook, a simple glance around told him that this was his transportation bureau, answering to the curiosity birthed within upon overhearing the question Sonia had desperately asked. “You were with my assistant tonight,” he said, choosing to ignore that which he had overheard for the moment. “Where is he now?”
Sonia backed further away, the moisture within her eyes spilling out and down her cheeks. “Governor Logan,” she said with a voice that displayed fear in a raspy sampling of nervousness.
“Where is Mark?”
As the Governor closed further in towards her, Sonia’s heart raced as memories of her boyfriend’s paranoid assumptions swirled in a tempest of fearful speculation. “I don’t know,” she responded, wondering within if it were truly possible that this man had orchestrated an assassination on another Governor this evening. “He left when the train was still stopped.”
The normally boisterous and intimidating demeanor of Victor Logan generally saturated the atmosphere as a man who could overpower with a simple entrance. The Governor was accustomed to those who were easily unsettled by such a man as he was; the fear of a strict and rigid government represented like an aura that surrounded him. As he gazed upon the reddened face of this woman whom he had spoken of on occasion in light conversation with a young man who had somehow touched upon a parental sense that he long believed was non-existent, who somehow ignited a youthful spirit within a man who had allowed youth to pass in obsession with a rising political career, Logan suddenly felt a mild sense of bewilderment of when he had become lost within his own image. He reached a hand forward, feeling a flinch within the muscles of the small and young Sonia, placing his hand upon her shoulder. He towered above her, and his large hand covered her shoulder completely, yet he patted the hand softly upon her in an attempt to ease her. “I’m sorry. You’ve obviously had a difficult night. I just want to know if he’s alright.” With a glance to his side at the woman named Evie who also displayed tremendous intimidation within her widened eyes, Logan again felt a wonderment of how he had become such a frightening presence. “I’m concerned,” he continued, his voice growing softer with the effect of emotions that had been ignored for so many years.
Sonia’s heart continued to race, yet she felt her eyes lock upon the Governor’s, his gaze commanding and unsettling like a hypnotic truth serum. “He told me they killed his father before he opened the doorway and jumped into the tunnel.”
Sonia’s winded voice, near a whisper, circled with a disturbing echo within the Governor’s mind. “Who killed his father?”
Sonia shook her head, tears forming once more in a mixture of despair, discomfort and fear.
Though the Governor was discovering a softer side of himself, softness could not cover a lifetime’s worth of harsh reactions that had become the norm for a powerful man. Without thought, the hand upon Sonia’s shoulder reacted with a push that jolted her backwards. “Who!” He commanded, anxiety rising from within.
Tears fell from Sonia’s eyes continuing a salty track down her cheeks, the strength within the Governor’s hand intimidating further. “I think he thinks you did,” she said lightly beneath a choppy and emotional voice.
The words hit like a flash from a weapon’s tip, though he had spent the evening fearful that blame would lie upon him within the mind of his assistant. Logan dropped his hand back to his side, stepping backwards and away from Sonia, feeling a hint of embarrassment, another newly discovered sensation. After another glance at the woman beside them, watching closely the conversation occurring, Logan backed further away again. He took a final glance at Sonia who appeared to shiver with emotions spilling easily from within. There was nothing more to say. The Governor’s chest grew tight with his reaction to the words spoken resulting in the sudden need for a hasty exit. He turned, his steps quickening towards the doorway that led from the office of the transportation bureau, the overlook blazing brightly through the clear glass of the exit door.
#
The world around can change so rapidly. With the perpetual rolling of time from day to day, the unyielding promise that though at times life could blind with complacency, change is inevitable. For Sonia Lochman, the latest change in life was cruel, leaving her a confused and unsure woman that was beginning to succumb to the pains of paranoia.
“Sonia, don’t be ridiculous. Where will you go?”
In the haziness of a world that had turned surreal, Sonia tossed the last of her belongings that blindly were grabbed with a disorganized sweep of the hand into the bag she held with the other hand. “I don’t know,” she said with a voice powered by desperation. “I know too much. I have to get out of here.”
“You’re acting crazy,” Evie said as her attention was drawn by a new command received upon her computer’s monitor. With a glance at the monitor’s display, she read quickly the words received, releasing a short but breathy gasp. She glanced again at Sonia as her brow dropped further with worry. “Sonia.”
“Evie,” she said with the intention of speaking a final goodbye when the change in her friend’s expression was noticed. “What?”
“A command just came through from Identikey Enforcement with an identity number for notification of any scans. My security is high enough to see the identity of the card’s owner.”
“Me?” Sonia asked in paranoia driven desperation.
Evie shook her head slowly, her brow still dropped low. “Mark Simms.”
“I have to go.” Sonia rose to make a quick exit, but paused as she swung her bag of belongings over her shoulder. With a quick decision made, one made with little thought of possible repercussion, she enabled her computer with a tap of a desktop button and then reached out with one hand to the small keyboard. With a quick dance of her fingers, she typed a final message to a man who was not answering his incoming calls, yet would have no choice in the receipt of a text message. Sonia knew it was a goodbye message, and a silent tear followed the tracks of many of it’s predecessors down her cheek in the acceptance of it being her last communication with a young man who had sparked her hopeful side. Once finished, she discontinued the power to the monitor she once worked at day after day, and shifted the weight of her bag again. “Goodbye, Evie,” she said as she began the walk towards the office’s exit.
Evie stood. “This is crazy, Sonia. Where will you go?”
Sonia turned towards Evie a final time. “I don’t know, but maybe you should remember that you were here for the conversation with Governor Logan. You know too much too.”
Sonia did not wait for a response, for swimming within the paranoia in her head was the fear that the Governor may be issuing a command for her retrieval at that very moment, festering anticipation of walking past the Enforcer that guarded the exit from the Government offices. Sonia walked quickly towards the doorway that led out from the transportation bureau, astounded at how much her life had changed from that of the hopeful girl who not long ago was nervous about meeting the father of her boyfriend.
#
‘They’re looking for you. Be Careful. Love, Sonni.’
The constant production of moisture within Mark Simms’ eyes left a crusty stickiness within them that rendered the message on his communication device blurry, yet still readable. He had sat within the suite in the guest quarters for too long now, he knew, his back rigidly resting within the desk chair that his father had occupied when he had spoken with him that morning. As he gazed upon the message left by the woman he had accompanied and deserted earlier in the evening, the highly placed government employee that he was spoke to him of what methods would be used to discover the location of a man listed as wanted. Though he had been taken aback when he realized that entrance had been granted to this place with the swipe of his key card, proving to him that after so many years of bad blood between him and his father that his father had never removed his authorization to be granted entry to personal quarters whether at home or abroad, he now realized, however, that use of the card had delivered danger upon him. As he took one last glance across the room at the luggage that sat at the foot of the bed, he prepared for an exit, the run of a grieving man with no place to turn, unsure of why it was he was wanted yet driven only by the tumultuous swirling of grief and anger within him.
As the events of the evening that had left him somewhat dazed melted into realization of what was occurring at the moment, he pulled open a drawer in search of something to wipe the haze from his eyes. When nothing was found, a second drawer was opened and then a third to where he found a box of tissues alongside his father’s journal. Mark grabbed a tissue from the box and wiped his eyes with it as the fingertips of his free hand massaged the cover of the journal. As he discarded the tissue, he grasped the journal in his hand, recognizing the archaic tool that his father obsessively logged the details of his life within. With no pause, he rose from the chair, hastily approaching the exit door, awash with despair and unsure of where he was to turn, no longer trusting of his superior who he assumed not only took the life of his father, but now issued the command for his arrest. With the furious beat of an anxious heart, Mark burst through the main door, quickly turning towards the lobby of the elaborate guest quarters to where he could exit and begin a journey towards the mammoth territory-long Corridor Eighteen, where he knew he could easily wander without use of his identikey. Within his thoughts, the swirl of anger and despair continued, yet the only wanting within him at the moment was to find a quiet and unassuming spot to read his father’s final words..