Retrograde

Chapter 9 • The Mnemosyne

• Chapter Nine •
The Mnemosyne

My reflection yells at me
Reprimanding turbulent demands

Cael woke with a jolt. He instinctively rubbed his eyes as they felt too heavy to open. He groaned and shifted himself on the stiff bed under him. When he got back to the underground—which Oscar told Cael was called the Drey—he was directed to one of the many bunker rooms for sleep. 

Based off pure instinct
That I may just not know who I am

He recognized the loudly playing song as one of his old—very old—favourites.

"Finally, man. I've been blasting songs for 20 minutes now. You were dead to the world." Garver. When Cael opened his eyes, he saw Garver sitting in a chair in front of him with a tablet on his lap. There had to be a speaker in the room, because it was louder than what the tablet looked capable of. 

"Well," Cael started huskily, sleep in his voice, "when you get dragged around places at all hours of the night and don't get sleep until an ungodly hour, then that's what happens." He placed a hand under his head and looked over at Garver. "I think you can turn that off now."

Garver tapped the pause button on the tablet, giving Cael a smirk. "Rise and shine, Sleeping Ugly."

"First of all...fuck you. Second, do you even know how old that song is?" Cael sat up and planted his feet to the floor, minding his head as he was on the bottom bunk. 

"No, but it seems like you have an idea. Got it from your playlist."

"How did you--nevermind." Cael shook his head, running his fingers through his hair. 

"Well, your clothes are in that duffel bag on the desk, and..." Garver pulled something out of his pocket. "This is your new phone. There's software on it that me and some of my guys made to make it untraceable. But to be more safe, the Cipher never communicates using the regular means." The phone Garver spoke of looked like a silver bracelet. There were several small holes on the topside that Cael assumed was for sound and there was a button on the side, along with what looked like a small camera feature. Cael considered his old phone fancy, but this wasn't something he had yet seen before. "Put it on and press the button."

When Cael did so, he noticed that a holograph was projected from a slit that looked like a black line on the rim of the bracelet. He opened his palm and turned the palm up. It showed him that it was 3:25 in the afternoon. The set-up seemed like a much more updated version of an iPhone. "I guess a regular smartphone is too obsolete for you."

Garver laughed and then smirked. "I know a guy. Oh, let me show you what we use to communicate with each other." Garver pushed toward Cael in the rolling chair and set the tablet on the bed. Garver scrolled over and tapped on an app called The Drey. The icon was a silhouette of a squirrel on a blue, circular background. 

The app opened up to a sign-up and login screen. Cael went about signing up to the app as he spoke. "So...are squirrels and their homes our mascot or something?"

Garver looked almost too happy that he asked. "In a way. I came up with it, based on what Sabin told me. He was interested in the animals on earth and how they communicate. Especially squirrels. He had read that squirrels were a symbol of socialization, harmony, and resourcefulness. We are the squirrels. Our home is the Drey."