Shaping Faith: Chapter 6, Part 1

Colonel Ritter stopped talking. Analia had been staring at the screen, a bit vacantly, but the cessation of his voice made her snap out of it. She focused on him instead. He had just put a hand to his ear, as if he had heard something from his timepiece.

“Sorry, important notice,” he said, tapping some buttons on his timepiece. He paused to read the notice, and Analia saw his eyes grow wide. What had happened?

After a moment, Colonel Ritter straightened up. “Just, erm, a technical difficulty. Nothing to worry about. You’ll be informed of it soon.”

Whispers swept the group as each person speculated to their neighbor about what had happened. Rilee, one of Analia’s friends, leaned over to Analia and said “What do you think’s happened? Maybe the alarm system’s broken again.”

Analia smiled at the memory. The security alarm had started going off for no reason, sending everyone into a panic. “Nah, we’d have heard it in here,” she said.

“I bet it’s nothing serious,” she said. “You know how they always overreact.”

“Yeah,” said Analia, but she was still unconvinced. Colonel Ritter was hard to ruffle.

The colonel cleared his throat loudly. “That’s enough chatter. We will continue with the meeting.”

Analia tried to listen attentively to the requirements for the Crime Scene Forensics. They didn’t really surprise her – she had asked around and had already gotten a pretty good idea of what was expected.

Finally, Colonel Ritter dismissed everyone. Analia stood up, eager to get to lunch, but as she headed out, she was stopped by Colonel Ritter.

“That alarm, earlier,” he said. “Everyone will see it on the notice board when they go down to lunch, but I thought you might want to hear it from me first. It concerns your twin, Verona. You know her transfer was today?”

“Yes,” Analia said. Immediately, a million different possibilities rushed through her head. Had something gone wrong with the transfer? Maybe – her heart leapt – it turned out that Verona was innocent! “What happened?” she asked anxiously.

He hesitated. “She escaped. During the transfer. We think her Blocking ring was faulty. As soon as she stepped outside, she teleported away.”

Analia gaped at Colonel Ritter, instantly realizing that he was right. The wall between her thoughts and Verona’s had fallen. She hadn’t expected this. What were the chances?

“But – but she hasn’t turned up at any of the North Poles?”

The colonel shook his head.

“But she’s never been off-planet before – she shouldn’t be able to teleport anywhere but there,” Analia said, bewildered.

“We know,” Colonel Ritter said. “We think she had help. But we don’t know who helped her or why. If she contacts you, or if anything bleeds through your link, we’re trusting you to come to us right away. To be honest, this mishap is making our whole department look bad. We’ve got to find her soon. I don’t suppose you have any idea who might have helped her?”

Analia wavered. Her gut told her that Verona had gone with the Absolutes, but she wasn’t sure she wanted to tell them that. If they knew that she was a twin of an Absolute, they would put her under close scrutiny. And she still wasn’t entirely convinced that the Absolutes weren’t doing the right thing.

She made her decision. I can always tell them later. “No, none at all,” she said blankly.

The colonel nodded gravely. “Well, just keep your ears peeled. Dismissed.” He walked off.

“Yes, sir,” Analia said quietly, staring at his retreating figure.