Redeemers

Chapter 2: the Interrogation

Annora sits in her chair frozen looking into the dark eyes of the man that just said her name. Her name. How had he known? She has done everything to try and keep her identity secret including dying her hair a variety of different colors. This time her hair color is black, a black so dark it seemes to make her face seem more angular and makes her blue eyes more distinct than when her hair was its normal chestnut brown. She never went by her real name when she was out in the world doing her normal dealings. She knew that they had deemed fingerprinting technology obsolete, and therefore never fingerprinted her, even in her youth. They now depend only on DNA test which, contrary to their beliefs, are easy to get around. They never actually take a person's blood these days, only a small scan on the wrist that can provide all the DNA and blood type information they need on a normal basis. After all, it was invented for medical uses during and after the Synthetic Plague. Unless their captive had created her own little device to combat theirs.

They had caught her doing one of her weekly runs to the juvenile center to bring food and other supplies for the malnourished. Illegal in these people's brutal society that they invented seven years ago. That always annoyed her. Suddenly it is illegal to help any of those that are to young or old to get things for themselves.

Annora knows that she has paused to long for this response to be credible, but she tries anyway, "My name is Anabella Leion."

The man only smiles, "The games end here, I know who you are. You may not remember me, but I remember you. I know you in a way no one else can, I can identify you not by your looks, not by your name, but by how you walk, talk, and act because deep down you are just like me." He sits in the chair and cryptically watches her as if he is wondering how she will respond.

"How am I to know you are telling the truth? You obviously know my name, yet I don't know yours," she cocks her head looking at him strait in the eye, "How can you honestly say you know me when I have no recollection of you? Shouldn't I be the one to judge if I am just like you?" Annora fires each question with poison in her voice. The fact that this man could believe that he knows everything about her sickens her.

Out of her several questions, the man decides to answer with one of his own, "Tell me, Annora, are you a sheep or a wolf?"

Annora is startled by the question and angered by the fact that he declined to answer any of her questions before asking his own. She knows that he has all the power in the room, but that didn't mean she couldn't win some of it back with her own words. She grudgingly answers with a question of her own, "Why do I need to answer that?"

The man smiles as if he had waited for that question to come up, "Because, there are two kinds of people in this world, the weak and the strong. The wolf represents the strong and the sheep represents the weak..."

Annora cuts him off before he can continue, "And the strong coral the weak, yada, yada, yada."

The man smiles once more, "Exactly! So, now that you fully understand answer the question, are you a sheep or a wolf?"

The room falls deadly silent and Annora does not let her eyes fall from that of the man's. His eyes are dark, a shade that may seem to be brown in the sun, but looks black in the dimly lit room.

His smile is really beginning to annoy Annora, and words finally escape her mouth, but she knows that they may not be the ones that the man wanted to hear, "The question is pointless anyway. The weak would say that they are the wolf because they are fearful of the alternative and they see themselves as strong which is exactly the idea that makes them weak. Some cocky man or woman might say that they or the wolf because they bully those around them, but does that make them strong? Only the truly strong would say that they are the sheep because only the strong would understand that the only way to be strong is to understand your faults."