Puppet {ManxMan}

CHAPTER 24

Kailas was the head of Phoniks Vidroh, the leader, the boss. Under him were six military based under-bosses, the people in charge of the soldiers, weapons, fighting and protection. There were two elected settlement caretakers, and two heads of medicine. I met them all when we entered the official conference room.

The conference room was bigger and brighter, with more windows and more accessories on the walls. The chair at the head of the table was a little bigger than the stool Kailas had taken in the map room, but it wasn't nearly as over-exaggerated as Blu's "throne". It was just a black padded chair with a back high enough for me to lean against comfortably.

I didn't really want to be there, I figured there were better things to do with my time, and the prospect of meeting new people made my stomach churn in unease, but I relented when Kailas asked me to join and showed up anyway. Only because he asked me to and I didn't want to leave him alone. I needed to meet these people so I knew who I could trust.

Most of what was discussed went right over my head, as I didn't particularly care about crops and livestock and how many textbooks the children had at the school they'd built. I was busy looking around the room and watching the faces there, trying to decipher who was good and who was a douche bag.

The only one not present was Ian, since he was still recovering. I assumed the empty chair beside Cass was where he would sit, since he was one of the six military under-bosses. Arthur and Cass sat on either side of Kailas, one on the left and one on the right, understandable since they founded the rebellion together and were childhood friends. Malachi sat on Arthur's left, and beside him was a small looking man I assumed was the medical assistant Arthur spoke about.

He was wearing a white lab coat, so that was a dead giveaway. He looked sweet, with strawberry blond hair, freckles, and bright blue eyes, but strangely enough Malachi kept shifting uncomfortably in his seat, looking almost afraid of the tiny man who was definitely shorter than Arthur was. I wondered why, but quickly lost interest.

Sitting beside the cute guy I learned was named Gale was a bigger man with gold hair and brown eyes. Kailas mentioned he was one of the men who trained the soldiers and recruits and prepared them for fire fights. He was Jayden, formerly from the United States Air Force, and at the opposite head of the table was the eldest, a man in his mid-thirties called Roman. I didn't like him much.

His hair was cut into a military buzz, and his eyes were dark. I didn't like dark eyes, they were gateways into an equally dark soul, so when he plopped himself down on the opposite side of the table from Kailas, like he figured he was just as important, and folded his arms with self-entitlement, my fingers started playing with the knife I'd originally planned to use on Kailas, my eyes locked on him suspiciously.

On the right side of the table, a chair away from Cass, was a woman, and beside her was a man. Both her eyes and hair were light brown, while he was brunet with blue eyes, and there was a baby cradled in the woman's arms. They were a married couple, Devin and Lucia, in charge of the settlement, all the people, the crops and animals, and the buildings. While Kailas focused on military, politics, and protection, those two focused on getting the settlement into a somewhat normalized state.

There was one more man at the table, sitting between Devin and Roman. I didn't like him much either. His hair was black and his eyes were a mix of brown and green like swamp water. His name was Rhett, but I doubted that was his real name. Who would willingly name their child something that sounded like a cough?

His smile looked completely false, like he was hiding something devious behind a mask of kindness, and what's worse is that the way he was leaning on the table, head propped into his hand and body turned, he was in the perfect position to stare blatantly at Dakota, who was standing leaning against the wall behind Cass.