Frobisher

Part 4

"I miss socks the most."

"Socks!" exclaimed Toby.

"Socks are sorely underrated. My feet have been constantly cold for seven years. I want some socks. Forget about food or fresh air. What I wish for most is a pair of fluffy socks."

"You are so weird," Eddie told Cat as she ranted about her socks.  

"I want some good food. I nice fat steak. With grilled mushrooms." Toby announced. Eddie made a face. "Mushrooms?! Ew, that's disgusting. All I want to do is play PacMan. Like PacMan is life. What about you Alex?"

"I'm sorry but I agree with Cat, my toes have been borderline hypothermic for six months and it's not fun."

Before Eddie could reply to her though, the door opened and two of the red-clad men carried in another of the red-coloured beds, they placed it in between Alex's and Cat's, then without a word they left. "Ooh, a newbie," said Eddie. "I wonder what they'll be like," added Cat.

They continued their speculations of the new person for about ten more minutes before the door opened and one of the red-clad men led in a youngish boy about Alex's age with scruffy brown hair and a hint of mischief in his eyes. Alex's eyes widened but before she could say anything in awe, the boy winked at her, and Alex realised she should keep her mouth shut. The men simply left the boy standing there and shut the door. Alex breathed a sigh of relief and ran at the boy. "Arlo!" she squealed, wrapping her arms around the scrawny boy. "Alex," he breathed in a sigh of relief. "Woah, You're not high," said Alex a little taken aback. "Why did you think it took so long, Happy made me sober up."

Alex hugged her friend again before finally letting go and turning toward the rest of the group. "Everyone, this is Arlo. Arlo, this is Eddie, Cat, Toby and Anna," she explained, gesturing to each of them one at a time. Arlo nodded to them and then turned to Alex. "I have a plan," he told her. "You better," she replied. She turned back toward the others and sat on Eddie's bed next to him. Arlo quickly sat beside her as Cat sat on the bed opposite with Toby. "Why is it freezing in here?" he asked, unused to the cold in the red t-shirt and bottoms. Cat threw him a cardigan and he quickly pulled it on before explaining. "Happy made me sober up as soon as she found out that the chip had placed you here, knowing it to be the base of the cult, and apparently she needed me at "full capacity" or something to try and get you back.

"It took me two months to sober up while the others tried to figure out a plan but we still had nothing better than rally the troops and march on Rome, so to speak. We were eventually trying to plan that, simply spreading the word that Lilith was taken would rally half the Mornesse, and probably a hell of a lot of the regular citizens too, with the hate against Frobisher and all, but the problem was, we didn't know the resources these people had at their disposal, for all we knew, we could show up and the army could be waiting for us there, the news of a raid travels fast to waiting ears. Many of Frobishers people came looking, few found us, none got anywhere near. They stopped sending them after Happy killed one in self-defence. Finally, one day, I had an idea. What if we took down the building from the inside, get in quietly, get Alex out, burn it down or something, you know, destroy the building. Byron actually agreed with me when I said that, which was the highlight of my day as Byron never agrees with me. Happy decided that I was to be the infiltrator, as Happy was known after killing that guy, and Byron had a family of his own that we could put in danger if Frobisher found out who he was. That leaves me, though we still had to find a way to get me in.

"I immediately just suggested volunteering to Frobishers experiments, like rocking up and knocking on the front door but Happy said it was too dangerous. Then after exhausting all our other options over a few months, they finally caved. I got into contact with them by hacking their system and sending messages through the corrupted code, it was really fun actually. I demanded money in return for coming to them and volunteering. They sent over 2 million, which was nothing to them but was enough to buy food for the people of the Mornesse for a year, then I rocked up here this morning and smashed your dad's car. I presumed that you would be separated with other people Frobisher disliked and not lumped in with the cult, I knew he had more here after I did my research and found out about Eddie and Toby here. A young boy goes missing. A year later, a PI goes looking and gets close to Frobisher, then disappears. I assumed that you would be kept separate from the cult and probably together so I just had to get Frobisher pissed at me, so I took a golf club to the car. Then I went up and knocked on the door, and was brought here."

"Hey, Arlo? Please tell me you brought something to communicate with Happy. I might slap you if you came empty-handed."

He tapped the side of his head, just below his ear and then picked something up from his skin. He handed Alex the small electronic chip. "Happy helped me design them. Miniscule communicators that connect directly to your eardrums. Undetectable on any x-ray or scanner. Put it on," he told her and she placed the communicator in behind her ear and she felt it melt into her skin. "Woah that's weird." She immediately heard a loud voice blaring through her ear. "Arlo! Are you OK? Where are you! Have you seen Al?!" she heard Happy shout from the other end of the communicator. "How do I reply?" Alex asked Arlo. "Tap the side and speak then tap again to turn it off. "

Alex tapped the side. "Happy, I can hear you, are you alright?" Happy almost screamed back.

"Oh my God Alex! It's so good to hear your voice. Never mind about me! What about you? Are you hurt?"

"I'm fine, I'm fine but we shouldn't talk too much, there are cameras in here."

"Ok, Ok but it's so great to hear your voice."

"Yours too."

With that, Happy stopped speaking and Alex turned off the chip, then handed it back to Arlo. "It's safer with you," she said to him and Arlo nodded, taking the chip and replacing it behind his ear. Alex was right in giving Arlo the chip as that evening when the lights went off, the woman returned and brought Eddie and Alex back to room D24.