The Yankee Captain

Are You Crazy?

Ana led me back down the hallway and past the elevators. We went through a door that said Lab that had stairs behind it. Down we went until we ran out of stairs, another door led us to another hallway that had lights so bright it hurt my eyes. 

The only door in the hallway was all the way at the end and when we reached it Ana turned to me, "Here." Without another word she walked back down the hallway. 

"Okay." I whispered to myself. The door didn't have a handle but a red button on the right hand side with an intercom above it. A small camera was in the corner so I assumed I had to push the button to be let in. 

I pushed the button and nothing happened. I looked around and wondered if it had actually worked. I went back to push it again when the door opened suddenly. 

"Go through the door, Ms. Nelson." The intercom said. 

I went through the door and walked into a huge lab full of scientist. They were all running around checking things on various computer screens. 

Dr. Taylor was there and when he saw me he immediately rushed to my side. 

"Ms. Nelson, yes, please come and meet everyone else." He brought me over to three others that were dressed like me. 

"This is Nico and Alex." He nodded to two men who looked very similar. I could tell right away they were military and not historians. 

"And this is Thea." He nodded to a pretty blonde girl in a ridiculous pink outfit. Yes the period of the outfit was right but for scouting it just wouldn't do. What were they thinking?

"Ummm...Dr. Taylor, what is going on?" I asked. 

Everyone looked at me and then walked away, leaving Dr. Taylor and I alone. 

"What do you mean?" He asked. He looked slightly nervous. 

"Those people are not historians." I blankly stated. 

Dr. Taylor scratched the back of his neck and forced a smile on his face. "No, they aren't but Mr. Stafford requested they go."

"Who are they exactly?"

"Alex and Nico are Marines, sent for protection. Thea is, well that is Thea Stafford, Mr. Stafford's daughter."

"No way." I was shaking my head as I started walking back towards the door. 

"Ms. Nelson, wait!" I could hear his loud footsteps running after me.

I stopped and turned around to let him know exactly what I thought. "This is insane. You can't send them into the Civil War and expect them to live out the day. The Marines have a good chance of living, sure, but Thea is a liability. None of them know the customs of that time, they would stick out and get themselves shot-point blank. Us walking around and scouting things out for you isn't going to go over well if we have the Rebs and the Yanks on our asses!"

"Ms. Nelson, please. We asked you of all the historians because we believed you could help the rest of your party through this. Do you doubt your own abilities of knowing the customs? Can you not keep everyone alive?"

I just stared at him. He had no idea what he was asking, two Marines were quite capable of surviving but not against a whole platoon. This was going to be extremely difficult to pull off, almost impossible. 

"Fine. But what I say goes. End of story."