The P. P. A. Project

Chapter Twenty - Meet And Greet

Chapter Twenty – Meet And Greet

Playing dress up was not the highlight of my following months. It wasn’t good enough for me to dye my precious… dark hair… blonde temporarily but if the other guys were going to go along with it they wanted us to actually be the parts we were playing.

Casey and I had started growing agitated but we did as told. The party had been postponed due to some recent “complications” on base (jee I wonder what those were) and so they decided to make it a spring gathering instead. This allowed  Casey and me time to learn the accents, find out more about their personal lives and truly become the parts we were to be playing.

In the mix up of everything I got to discover how talented the twins were with not only facial prosthetics but makeup and costume design as well. It was a little scary at first but eventually the awkwardness faded and we were able to really adapt to our parts.

It was finally the day before hand and we had to show off everything we’d worked so hard to achieve. I emerged from the dressing room first. The twins were on either side of our dressing room doors. At first, there was no reaction.  But the guys slowly realized who it was they were looking at and well… freaked out.

“Is that her?! I thought that was a hologram of the real wife!” Ethan shouted as he stood and did a single circle around me. I felt extremely awkward in the military wife attire and heels, which had never been my friends to begin with, but this was game time and I had to be ready.

“It seems the two of you have managed to pull it off.” Chief said as he stood and watched as Casey left the room as well. He’d been working out extensively to get the bulkiness of the officer Hans.

Liam didn’t speak. I watched him look at us once and leave the room. I would have chased after him but a barricade had now formed around us. I didn’t really know why but it made me feel ridiculously terrible that he was still not on board.

“Absolutely brilliant!” Connor exclaimed. He had adapted himself to the 21st century very well in the recent months. I think it may have just been the male genes but his addiction to gaming had become something of a problem but his ability to learn and adapt to technology and weapons of the future had impressed the team so much that they wanted him to remain a permanent member of the team.

I looked at the unfamiliar face in the mirror and realized it was in fact me under all those layers of makeup and clothing… and blonde hair… ugh!

There was something about the situation which was all together getting to me. My enthusiasm to save my family… and me… had not decreased but I kept getting this feeling that things were spiraling down in a direction I had feared all along.

But as long as my parents were safe, that was all that mattered.

“Pandora!” Casey shouted, a glow on his face as he was thrilled by the final results, “Let’s change so that we can go get some grub.”

I nodded my head as the guys dispersed. Once changed Casey raced his way down to the dining hall as I took my ever-so sweet time. Even though the base was hundreds of feet below the surface, somehow I could tell that there was a fresh storm coming up and that transport was going to be exhausting. It was like the clouds were angry and they were taking out their fury on the world below.

Chills traveled up my spine at the thought. I then thought back on all the parents and doctors I had gone through before all of this had started. How many of them had lived with their fortunes like they told me with a good life? How many of them were… killed?

These were the thoughts which had been racing through my mind recently. I was saddened by the idea that the once enthusiastic girl I’d been in the beginning of this journey had transformed into this cynical old woman I really was. When I looked at my real face in the mirror all I could see were age lines and liver spots. Not the youth the government wanted.