The Glade and Its Glitch: Book 4 Escape

Chapter 2

Soar reached Glitch's base after a few hours. He passed by Chen's noodle house and snarled as he saw inside. He recognized a few of the people inside. Elemental masters. Soar picked up the pace, he didn't want to be seen by any of them.

He let out a small smile after he walked by. He remembered the story Glitch had told him about the event that had happened near the noodle shop. Glitch had helped Commander's troops attack the ninja.

Well, Misako. But it still counted.

Soar chuckled, Glitch had said she didn't know what hit her. Although that meant that the ninja might know about Glitch. But of course, there was always the chance that they thought it was the Glade. After all, two boys with dark hair and a shaved part are easily mistaken for each other or even believed to be the same person. Especially in the heat of battle.

When Soar reached the secret entrance to the base Commander led, he looked around. No one was watching. He lifted the lid on a dumpster and climbed inside.

"This is humiliating." Soar pulled back a sliding door and jumped down onto a set of stairs. He walked down into Commander's base. As he reached the bottom of the stairs, Commander met him.

"You're back earlier than we expected."

"Who's we?" Soar fell into step next to her. "Devin and Cassandra aren't exactly hospitable."

"Aww, they didn't welcome you with a gift basket and flowers?"

"Shut up Commander." Soar took a right and opened a door.

Glitch was inside hunched over a table staring at a map. He turned as Soar and Commander walked in.

"Well? How is the experiment going?"

"Meh. They haven't figured it out yet. But they're close. And also... there's some bad news."

"We can't have bad news. We need to Get. Things. Done." Glitch clapped, emphasizing his words.

Commander raised an eyebrow and stood next to Glitch. She stared Soar down. "What happened?"

"Quake's dead."

"W-what?" Glitch had no words. He didn't know what to say. Quake dead? He felt bad. He barely knew her, but still. She had seemed to like him. And she had talked sense into him when he needed it. But now she was dead.

"How did she die?"

"And?"

Glitch and Commander spoke at the same time. Glitch looked up at her in shock. She didn't seem to have any remorse. Her face was stony and her posture straight. One of their warriors was dead. Did she not care?

"That's the bad news?"

"Why would you ask that? Quake is dead! How can that not be the bad news?"

Commander shot him a stern look. "I thought you were willing to sacrifice anything for this cause?"

"I-"

"This is a sacrifice. Are you going to back down and show weakness?"

Soar just watched. Sure Commander was stern, but this was a whole new level. It was almost like she was controlling Glitch.

"Devin gave her vengestone gas, it killed her. I don't-"

Commander held up a hand to silence Soar. "Well? Are you weak?" Her words were thick with hostility as she spoke to Glitch. "Or are you strong?"

"How dare you question me!" Glitch shot back. "I am strong. We may have deaths along the way but our side will prevail! The Glade will fall! And the ninja with them! I will sacrifice anything."

"Including your own life?"

This time, Glitch didn't hesitate. "Yes."

"And that is what makes someone a leader." Commander straightened and stalked out of the room.

"Devin killed her, Glitch." Soar continued once Commander left the room. "You can't let him do that. He and Cassandra have gone insane. Please... Quake-"

"I don't want to hear about it anymore." Glitch turned and walked away from Soar.

Soar's shoulders sagged. He didn't know how to feel either. But Glitch was a teenager. He needed to deal with the loss of Quake. But now, and mainly because of Commander's instructions, Glitch was shutting off his emotions and acting like everything was fine. He was worrying about life-or-death situations.

"Glitch... maybe we should stop." Soar was now realizing that Glitch's plan had some real problems and things could get bad fast.

"We can't stop!" Glitch whirled around and yelled at Soar. "We're in too deep. We can't back out now. If you want to back out, fine. But I'm sticking with what I know is right."

"Fine!" Soar turned. "I'm not backing out. But I think Devin went too far."

"Fine! Think that! Quake knew what she was getting into."

"Did she? Or was she just following her crush blindly?"

"Get out!" Glitch screamed and banged his hands on the table.

Soar backed out of the room. But he held eye contact with Glitch the whole time. Soon, Commander, Soar, and Glitch were all alone. And they were left to think about their ideas and recent events.

Commander was ready. She wasn't concerned with Quake's death. All that mattered was destroying elemental masters. She wouldn't hesitate. She would cut her losses.

Soar was ready. Sure he was nervous, who wouldn't be with the knowledge of Devin's acts? But he was still loyal to Glitch and their cause.

Glitch... He didn't know if he was ready or not. Now he was doubting himself. How far was too far? But Glitch didn't care. He needed the vengestone experiment to work. He needed elemental masters to be destroyed. And he was going to get it done. No matter what it took.

~~~

Devin buried his face in his hands. "We need to do something, Cassandra."

"We can interrogate them."

"How would that help?"

"We could get information. Think of how much we could help Glitch in more ways than one."

"How would we interrogate them?"

"We ask questions." Cassandra wrapped her arms around her husband. "And we persuade them to tell us the answer."

"Hmm, sounds interesting. What would we ask?"

"Anything and everything. Where is the Glade? How do we get into the Glade? What is the ninja's weakness? There are so many possibilities."

Devin sat up and thought for a second. "That might be a good idea. In fact, it's a great idea. Who should we start with?"

"I don't know." Cassandra tilted her head and smiled down at her husband. "Who do you want to do first?"

"Lloyd. Once we break him, breaking Huntress will be easy. Plus he'll do anything to keep us from hurting her."

"You are a genius. We'll start soon."