Uncovered

6...Plans?!

I slipped on my leather jacket, shaking out my hair. Today was going to be a long day.

Michael...or my dad now, was going to show me through the systems today and introduce me to the new plans of the center. Mike kept rambling on and on about the amazing miracle of me coming home again and how we could finally go through with them. I don't think he realized that every time he said that, I peed my pants a little.

I slapped my face a few times in the small desk side mirror, jumping on the balls of my feet. All I had to do was lead a revolution. Simple, right?

While I was walking to the door, it slammed open, Liv on the other side.

"You know what I was thinking?" She said, stepping into my room. She didn't even look at me.

"Good morning to you too," I sighed.

"You should move in with me." She twirled around, looking at me expectedly.

"What? Why?" I raised my eyebrows. This was way out of the blue.

"Duh. Isn't it obvious? You've been gone for so long and we need to catch up on girl time."

"That's it?"

"Well...," she trailed off, tilting her head.

"I knew it. What's up Liv?" I rolled my eyes, smiling.

"Just a minor plus, you do get to live beside Jackson..." she trailed off.

My smile dropped. I didn't want anything to do with that lowlife jerk who mocked me last night. In fact, I would function perfectly fine if I never had to see him again.

"You mean a major inconvenience," I scowled at the thought of living beside that dirtbag.

"Oh come on, he didn't mean it. Just give him a chance."

"What, so he can call me a prissy pink princess and insult me? I'll pass. In fact, he can go die for all I care."

"Whoa hey. He might suck, but he's still my brother, you know." She held her hands up, stern.

I ran my hands through my hair, sighing. I crossed over to her, putting my arms around her. She put her head on my shoulder, patting my back.

"He's actually a nice guy, you know." She looked up at me.

I rolled my eyes, letting go of her. As if I would believe that.

"I'm sure you can tell me all about him later. Right now, we have a meeting to go to," I walked out the door, gesturing for her to follow me.

"Oh yeah...," she said. We left my room, Liv leading me through the long black hallways for a few minutes until we landed in front of a tall steel door with a passcode on it.

"Not a lot of people know the password to this door so don't trust anyone with it." She said, entering the code. I heard a click and the door opened slightly. There were multiple voices talking together from the room and I quietly tried to step in. Of course, Liv strolled right in and announced her presence loudly. Typical.

"Hey, we're here. Let's get this show on a road," she said to everyone.

Everyone looked up, quickly noticing it was me, the lost princess waiting awkwardly at the door. They all just stared at me with their mouths slightly open. Well,  almost all of them. Jackson was looking down with his eyebrows furrowed, typing ferociously on a computer. I entered the room firmly, keeping my head held high with my arms crossed. My face turned confident. I had to be brave, act like I knew what I was doing. Jackson looked up.

"You can stop looking like you have a stick up your butt Lea. No one's going to attack you here," Jackson said, rolling his eyes.

I uncrossed my arms, letting my hands ball into fists. He was really getting on my nerves. My blood boiled, but someone's hand stopped me, landing on my shoulder.

"Don't let him get to you, Lea."

I spun around, facing a guy a bit taller than me with dirty blonde hair and a warm smile. After a second, I registered that he was talking about Jackson.

"Is he always this annoyed?" 

"...recently yeah. Give him a break though, he's going through stuff with his girlfriend," he told me, looking over at Jackson. I snorted.

"Why would anyone want to be his girlfriend?" I crossed my arms, glaring at Jackson from across the room.

The dirty-blonde haired guy smiled slightly, shrugging his shoulders.

"I'm glad you're back though," he told me. Were we friends before I...left?

"I-uh my memory," I struggled to explain that I had no idea who he was, but he stopped me.

"Relax. I know. I'm Alex," he said.

I nodded my head, smiling slightly.

"Lea. You probably knew that already though."

"Hey, we have a mission to plan if you didn't already notice," Jackson yelled across the room to us, glaring at me as if I was the worst thing that could ever happen to him.

Alex and I walked over to the table everyone was huddled around, quickly glancing around the room at the different people gathered here, all staring at me. They all seemed to notice their wide eyes and quickly looked down to finish whatever they had been typing up or writing down.

"Lea, how was your sleep?" Micheal walked towards me, a smile on his face. I focused on him, not the surprised eyes, shrugging my shoulders. I don't think I'd get a good night's sleep for the next few years. My mind was always spinning.

"So, what are you guys organizing?" I asked the group.

Liv got up from the chair she was slumped across and walked over to the holographic diagram hovering in the center of the table.

"In order to end this rebellion, we've got to end this terrible reign Lena's put on everyone. This is her palace."

With a small swoop of her fingers, the hologram tilted to show a grand palace, a sparkling chandelier at the front gates. 

"So we have to get Lena, imprison her and take over Fera again." I looked up. 

All of the members of the group around the table looked at each other with hesitant eyes, avoiding my stare. Liv turned to me and shook her head. 

"We can't exactly contain Lena..." My blood ran cold. 

"We have to kill her?" My voice sounded hoarse in my ears. 

Liv shook her head again, staring at the floor. If we didn't have to kill her, why wouldn't she look at me? Liv finally looked up. 

"You have to kill her."