The Hunted

Valuable Asset

"No," Dillon said. "There's no way that is a good idea."

"It's not a good idea, I agree," I said, "but it might be just what we need to persuade everyone that we can do this. Maybe my speech works, maybe it doesn't. This is something you and I both know will work."

We were standing in the hallway outside of the room that was being used as sleeping quarters. I had caught Dillon as he was heading to take a quick nap. Maybe that wasn't the best time to ask him to help me break out the Leader from a high security prison, but we needed all the time we could get to plan it.

"We don't even know if she's alive," he replied.

"If who's alive?" Derek asked as he walked up, drying his hair with a towel. One benefit to staying at the Place of Worship was having running water.

"Your girlfriend thinks we should break out the Leader from whatever prison she's being held in," Dillon told him.

Derek glanced at me before back at Dillon. "She's not my girlfriend." Dillon rolled his eyes and snorted. "The Leader would be a valuable asset if we could find where she is."

"My father knows where she is," I interjected. "He found her about an hour ago. We just need to figure out how to get her out."

Dillon shook his head. "It could be a cover up."

"That's a risk I'd be willing to take."

"I'm not going to risk people's lives for what could be a fool's errand!" he exclaimed.

Wasn't that what he was doing with the revolution? We had no idea if we had enough people to overtake the Elders and their officials. I was certain that we didn't. There was only about three hundred rebels spread throughout the city. That's going up against close to three thousand Guardians, Agents, and Officers. Not to mention the current soldiers in the military.

"It wouldn't take a lot of people," Derek said slowly. "The fewer people the better and it would only be people who would know what they were doing, not civilians."

"So you want us to risk the few government officials that we have on our side?"

"Former government officials," I muttered.

"Whatever. I'm not doing it. We cannot risk losing those people. They're the only chance that we have at actually winning."

"No, they're not," I insisted. "Look, Dillon, we're greatly outnumbered right now. We need to have the country on our side. If we're going to dethrone the Elders here in the capital, we need to have rebellions in every major city in the country. It won't be enough to just do it here. There are people who can rise and take the Elders positions once we over take them."

Dillon turned away from us, walking a few feet down the hallway. "Dillon, you know I'm right! We need every body, every mind that we can get."

"We need an army, Dill," Derek said softly. "This is how we get our army."

"The speech, though," Dillon muttered.

"The speech will only do so much, Dillon. There were a lot of people who didn't care for me before. I'm not going to be able to persuade the entire country to revolt. Leader Maluhia has that ability. She fought against the Elders until the day she was imprisoned. She's the missing piece to the puzzle."

He put a hand against the wall, bowing his head in thought. I was certain that I was right. The revolution wouldn't survive if it was only in this city. There were government officials throughout the country. It wasn't going to be enough and he needed to acknowledge that. Deep down he most likely knew that to be the case. He needed to allow himself to accept it.