The Five Fold Symbol

Chapter 9: Riot

        Renny awoke early the next morning. This was quite a bad habit she seemed to be getting herself into. She has never really been much of a morning person. At least this time, it wasn’t voluntary. Her phone was ringing softly and emitting an awful buzzing. By the sound of it, the device was clearly smothered by something or other.

    With an irritated huff, she picked herself up off of the cave floor. She scuttled over to where Merlin was sleeping and plopped herself down, picking through his knapsack as quietly as she could.

    “What--...?” Merlin grumbled sleepily. He looked at her with bleary blue eyes, some half-formed question on his lips.

    “Sh...” Renny said as she extracted her phone. She answered it quickly, getting up and going to the mouth of the cave.

    Merlin remained where he was, staring after her, his mind still clouded by sleep. The events of the day before slowly began to come back to him. H smiled slightly to himself as he watched her talk curtly into the phone. She sure had done a good job in gaining Arthurs trust.

    “Brody, why are you calling me?” She asked, sounding thoroughly irritated with this Brody character. “You could have woken my bunkmates! You know as well as I do hat civilians aren’t allowed to have cell phones! Are you trying to get me arrested?”

    Merlin frowned slightly. Who was Brody anyways? She did mention having a brother... The way she spoke to him didn’t seem like they had a sibling sort of relationship. Then again, the main example he had of brotherly-sisterly affection was between Arthur and Morgana. For some reason, he didn’t think that was quite a normal example.

    She paused a moment and tore her fingers through her hair in exasperation. “No Brody, I was being facetious. I realize you just wanted to make sure I was okay. Just chill, though. It’s only been a couple of hours since you last saw me. I’m bloody fine and dandy.”

    “I don’t know when I’ll be back...” she was mumbling. “I promise I’ll be careful, Brody... I’m not pushing the envelope... Kenneth will just need to chill out then... Look, I really think I’ve found a good lead here...”

    Again she paused, “Yes, I am quite miffed right now. You don’t need to check up on me! Yesterday you were saying that Wade needed to calm down because I am perfectly capable of taking care of myself. I’m a big girl, remember?”

    There was a loud mumbling coming through the phone and Renny jumped slightly, pulling the phone a couple of centimeters farther away from her ear.

    “Brody, Brody, please, calm down,” she said. “You need to trust me one this. I haven’t revealed myself. Not fully, not yet. These guys have been completely out of touch with society for decades. I think that they’ll sympathize with us here. Look, I wouldn’t trust them as much as I’ve had to if I didn’t think that they could help us so fully. You know me. I don’t mix well with people.”

    She paused a moment and then incredulously said, “Are there men here? Are you seriously asking me that? ...No I suppose it’s a fair question, but still. Why does that matter? I mean, yeah, they’re both men. There’s no problem for me. I trust them. That should be enough for you to feel comfortable with.”

    This time she paused for a long while. Throughout the conversation she had been pacing back and forth. Suddenly, she froze. She lowered her voice, sounding angry and completely done with the situation. “No,” she snapped. “No Brody. We are not talking about this. Not now, not ever. I can handle my own life well enough; I don’t need you poking around unnecessarily.”

    “You’re asking me why not?” She asked after another long pause, sounding as if she were deep in disbelief. “First of all, I am in a public facility. Not the proper place. Second, we are talking on the phone. Not the proper means. Third we are on the edge of complete anarchy. A war isn’t the best time to make hasty decisions like this... Whatever... Just hold off on all that. I’ll talk to you whenever...”