S.H.A.D.E. [{ Completed }]✔ (#Wattys2018)

Relocation

13.

Glasses swerves through traffic, chattering away about my mission.

"We're going to Los Angeles. Some of the N.P.'s biggest Psychic players reside there. We're going to work to capture them and get as much info from them as possible on the N.P.'s plans and how things are progressing with the Demons."

"I'm going to kidnap them?"

"Precisely."

"Great."

Promptly, he changes the subject.  "You remember the industrial plant you woke up in?"

"How could I not?"

"Yeah, dumb question. Well, S.H.A.D.E inserted you after your surgery into their load of meat."

"..... What?"

He takes his eyes off the road, giving me an apologetic look. "Sorry, I think I've been desensitized or something. I mean, those people in the room with you, the ones who were asleep? Well, they are delivered to the N.P. so that their souls can be extracted from their bodies and fed to the Underworld. You see, the Psychics work to meet a certain quota of souls, because if they don't, the Demons choose from them who they will devour. For a Psychic, you either work for Demons or you die by Demons."

I wring my hands, feeling uneasy. "So then they really don't have a choice?"

Glasses throws me another look. "I don't know about you, but I would rather die than work for those monsters who harvest innocent people."

His face is a lot more serious than I have ever seen it. I nod in agreement, realizing I feel the same way.

"And you do, too?"

"Yes."

I nod to myself.

" We often place our potential agents within their food supply, see which ones wake up, who can manage their way out off the bat, who has the quickest reflexes, who is good at taking orders from their Sync."

"Every Shade has a Sync, then? Not just me?"

"You got it. The only colors without a Sync are the Primaries; The Founders and members of their spectrum. Copper, for instance, is a Red. Reds condition and train Blacks for battle. He has no Sync, you see."

"And the other Primaries are...?"

"Red, Green, Blue. They are the ones who operate S.H.A.D.E., pull the strings."

"Make us dance," I intone. Glasses laughs, and it finally occurs to me that this man is surely not called "Glasses".
I clear my throat. "So, uh, I never did get your name last night."

He perks up a little, like he's just realized as well. "Ah, how rude of me! They call me Indigo, I'm a Blue."

Indigo? I like "Glasses" better. "So, you  are a member of the Primaries? What is it that the Blues do, if the Reds prepare the Blacks for death?"

"Good god, that sounded rather harsh," His brows furrow. "As a Blue, I am a surgeon for S.H.A.D.E. I actually was the one who performed your implantation." He beams at me, as if this is a happy revelation for me.

"So," I say, hearing my own anger, "you're the one who thought it was okay to go digging around in my head?"

The smile he wore slowly slips off his face, and his eyes flicker off the road my way. "I don't pick who is my patient, Ebony. I wasn't the one who scouted you out. That would be a Green's vocation, not mine."

Yeah, pass along the blame. Just like Copper. But they were are all a part of the multitude of dots that made up this fucked up picture.

We drove a while, passing flat land, the air stagnant in the car despite having the windows down. I licked the sweat off my upper lip, feeling the black shirt Scarlet gave me sticking to the small of my back.

"Hot for the evening," I say, trying to dispel the awkward atmosphere that settled into the car after his defence of his actions. I am too tired and uncomfortable to keep up my anger.

"Indeed. You get used to it. There'll be air conditioning in your apartment anyway. It's quite a nice set up, I'm sure you'll be content there."

"Indigo... is there even the slightest chance that I'll be able to return to my old life? That once I do enough for S.H.A.D.E, I can have my memory restored?"

He is silent for a few beats, opening his mouth to speak and then immediately closing it again. "It's -- well, I've never seen it happen. Perhaps if you make enough of a mark, Gold would consider it, but..."

"Gold?"

"Yes, Gold. He's the one. He's above us all. He calls the shots, we scramble to operate the way he pleases." Indigo sounds almost dreamy speaking about this guy.

"So, this Gold is who I would have to speak to? Who I'd have to convince?"

"Speaking isn't going to get you anywhere with Gold. You start off strong with action, then when he invites you, you speak to him"

"So in other words, I need to go kill some Demons."

"And kidnap some Psychics. Luckily, you're heading to the right place."

"Great."