Never As It Seems

The Rebellion

"You've been having this going on all this time?" said Flames. 

"No, no," said Ms. Hillman. "Only since the trouble with you started. This area was pretty much empty before all this started, actually, in case you were wondering if there was anything top secret going on before, because there wasn't. But there were enough people willing to start a cause for you and against the Fuzzy Guy that we decided to set this all up. We had to do it in secret, though, obviously; if you haven't noticed, there are quite a lot of guards around here." 

"You mean those aren't yours?" said Rick. 

"No, absolutely not. I really have no need for guards - we had the surveillance cameras, and those worked fine enough before all this started. But apparently someone thought they were less than adequate, and he paid people to stand in front of the building and look menacing, really." 

Flames laughed.  

"Excuse me, Ms. Hillman," said a man who had just walked up to them; he was holding a clipboard and pen. "I need authorization for this." He handed the tablet to her and she took it. 

"Hmm," she said as she glanced over whatever was on the paper attached to the clipboard. "Yes, I think that will be fine." She quickly signed her name with the pen and handed it and the clipboard back to him. 

"Thank you very much," said the man, and he hurried away.

"What was that?" said Flames. 

"No idea." 

"Shouldn't you know what something has on it before you sign it?" said Adam. 

"Hmm," she said vaguely. "Well, moving on from that - I have a bit of a plan for you, and it involves you revealing yourself to everyone. You can do that, can't you?"

"Sure," said Flames.

"Good. I don't think any of the people in this room will be particularly offended or outraged to see you here. They've kind of been expecting you, you see. They knew you had to turn up eventually, so they've been kept in a sort of 'whatever goes' state of mind." 

"So they're not going to freak out when I come out and say hi to them?" said Flames. 

"Most likely no. I can't assure you that they won't be completely calm about it, though." 

He shrugged. "Better than nothing, I guess."  

"Wait, how are you going to tell everyone you're here?" said Annmarie. "They all look pretty busy. Wouldn't you need to get everyone's attention at once? Kind of impossible, isn't it?" 

"I've had a plan ready for a while in case this happened, don't worry," said Ms. Hillman. "Come on, Mr. Pond. Up here." She indicated the back of the room, and they made their way over to a camera that was set up. Next to it was a man slouching down in a chair, leaning his head against the wall behind him and clearly fast asleep. 

"I get the feeling I know where this is going," said Flames. 

"I imagine you do," said Ms. Hillman. She walked over to the man and poked him on the head. "Gregson. Wake up." 

He jerked awake and looked around violently before his eyes settled on Ms. Hillman and Flames. "Aaah!" 

"I have a job for you," she said. 

He stared at Flames as if he weren't entirely sure if he were there or not. "Is that -" 

"It is. So far nobody has recognized him except for you. And I have decided you will be the first to display that he's back to everyone in this room, because I've noticed you have a discarded camera in front of you, and I think it should be put to good use."