The whole training grounds area has a lot of connected underground stuff, and we were going thru a lot of tunnels before Utah finally got the 3 of us into an elevator. He had to type in a security code before it would move, but when it did it went up to the top of the only decent-sized building in the Centre.
We got off in a fancy hallway with glass walls and doors, security panels everywhere—obviously the HQ of the whole place. Utah swiped us all thru a few doors, and then we were in this giant office with floor-to-ceiling windows. It was dark outside, but we were pretty high up. (C&I saw the view later during daylight. A few training fields, and bare winter trees as far as the eye can see.)
There was a conference table off to the side of the room, with these 5 kinda older men and women sitting around it. I recognized 1 of them right away, and 3 others as soon as they introduced themselves. You would too—these are people that everyone’s heard of. I don’t think I should name names tho, even here, especially because some of them are famous both as normals and as supers. It was a really intimidating group to meet. Even Chelsea was star-struck.
And, it turns out they’re all Waking Guardians. Even crazier—they’re the original founders of the National Super Council. (The whole WG has been scattered around the world for so many centuries, and they wanted to get everyone back together on the same page—esp. now, with the Ancients awake and all.)
They asked us to tell them our story, and we did. Of course we did, the whole thing. They were on our side, right? So, we trusted them. They were especially interested in the part about TDH, and they asked us a ton of questions about the time right after he rescued us and when he met with the Petrovskis. We thought they seemed weirdly fixated, but we went along with it. Afterwards they thanked us, welcomed us again and sent us off the bed.
We didn’t think the deal with TDH seemed so big, even with all the questions they asked. But then the next day they summoned us late in the afternoon. Utah took us back up again (he got to sit at the table with the important guys even tho he’s like, 24) and this time the top WG guys didn’t look friendly so much as “concerned.” You know, that look the principal has on her face when she’s all like, “I’m not mad at you, but I’m concerned,” because your grades are dropping or you’re fighting in the hallways or something. Maybe that’s just me….
The WG told us that they had thought about everything we had told them, and there was a part of the story that made them uncomfortable. Back a few thousand years ago the WG had decided not to wake up the Ancients when the world started to get nice again, because they were sure the Ancients would just go back to trying to take everything over and killing anyone they disagreed with. Lately, ever since the Ancients woke up on their own, the WG had been trying to keep tabs on them—“because we know what they are capable of.” According to these powerful guys sitting around the table, our story about Darcy proved everything that they had “been sure of” all along.
All the Ancients were evil and had to be stopped.
We tried pointing out what we thought was pretty obvious. Darcy had been evil, yeah, but TDH on the other hand had been pretty much the opposite. He had wanted to stop her, and he had risked his life to contact us and ask for help. He wasn’t trying to take over anything.
Trying to explain this to the Guard turned out to be a mistake. Apparently, they had decided that we (C&I) were pretty good at what we did, but their 1 big concern was our experience with TDH. They thought that if we had been “tricked” into believing that an Ancient wanted to help us, then “when the battle comes” they couldn’t be sure that C&I would fight “on the right side.” It feels kinda silly to write this, but they were so serious.
C&I were like, “you’re crazy—what battle? Why should there be a battle?” and the WG were all, “FOOLISH CHILDREN, of course we will soon have to battle them—to the death!” It was almost creepy. Then they told us that they needed proof that we would side with them—and unless there was some sort of proof, they couldn’t trust us. Then they sent us back down to training.
The next week or so pretty much sucked. Utah was giving us the cold shoulder, and even tho we were working our tails off, we didn’t feel like we were getting anywhere or being taught anything new. And all of a sudden we were both sure that people were watching us—like, under surveillance watching us—everywhere we went.
And then we got the very clear impression that if we didn’t prove ourselves to the WG, we would never be able to leave the Training Centre. Like, evar.
(Continue to Brook's outbox.)
