Return to Atlantis

Chapter 12 - Enigma

A stocky, middle-aged woman opened the door from the inside on their third knock on the door that was supposed to be Ava Kinski's.

Alec looked at Phil chidingly. "For someone who is hard to miss, she looked absolutely unrecognizably different, Phil."

Phil side glanced him with a sharp look then asked the woman. "Sorry to bother you, we thought this is...er... "

"Ah you are looking for Miss Ava?" the woman replied gaily, raising her hand above her head to indicate a height. "Tall, beautiful young lady with red hair?"

The boys were not sure about 'tall' and 'beautiful' but they nodded anyway.

"Yes, this is her room. I'm housekeeping. She is not here right now. She literally just stepped out 5 minutes ago. You just missed her. Friends of hers? "

"Ah yes - we are old uni friends," Phil said dismissively as they looked at each other; Alec giving him the 'what now?' look.

"The exhibitions are opening today, this very hour," Phil said to him, thinking.

"And you reckon Ava Kinski is on her way there," Alec filled in.

"Let's go,"

They briefly thanked the housekeeping lady and went along, the housekeeping lady watching them go with a bemused expression.

She had finished dusting the furnitures ten minutes later when a tall, young lady stepped through the door.

"Oh you are back so soon," the chubby housekeeping lady whirled around from wiping the kitchen counters and greeted the young woman with red hair who was standing at the doorway.

"Did you chance upon the two boys on your way back?" the lady chatted.

The young red-head fixed the smiling woman with an icy but baffled gaze.

Seeing this look the chubby woman deduced, "Oh, I see, you didn't. Two boys came looking for you here-"

"I don't know anyone here," the girl cut off, her tone blunt and uncaring. She strode for the desk across the bed in the room to pick up the ID card that she was suppose to carry around in the ship but she forgot to take before she left earlier. The housekeeper had seen that ID card.

"You...don't..know...anyone..." The housekeeper looked a bit puzzled, but then her face lit up. "Ah, I knew they got the wrong room! They were looking for an Ava Kinski. Of course you are Ava Pearce so yes it couldn't have been you they were after."

Ava Kinski stood stunned.

****

Run...hide....don't ever come back....

The rear wing of the airship, to where she found herself, presented this scene of daybreak of the Australian outback through the see-through walls of the ship. Where everyone else is grazing the recreation centers and exhibit areas of the ship enjoying themselves, getting acquainted, experiencing the privileges of being a WDF delegate, she on the other hand retreated to this remote place alone, in the quiet.

Ava Kinski like it where there is no society. She cannot be society.

She just stood there, drawn to the way the sunrise is perching up in the sky, giving life to everything it touches. She could feel, or at least imagine, the warmth of the morning sun although the glass wall between her and the external environment makes this impossible. She remembers sunrises like this one a long, long time ago. The memory of it somehow comforting her in an imaginary way.

It makes living one more day bearable.

She stood there till the sun was in its place in the heavens. Then she held the sky in her eyes and the image of the clouds reflected back. But she saw many other things...

She saw explosions and obliterations raging in deep space just beyond Earth's atmosphere. She saw deaths...hundreds of them...senseless deaths. She saw the relentless bombardment on Earth of firepower. And then she saw that big ship with its blue lights beckoning at her, its power she could feel...warmth generating inside of her...a cruel kind of warmth. Then there was Earth...beautiful Earth...and in a snap, gone from its place in the universe...

These imaginative episodes would often run through her mind. It would no longer trigger any reaction. No more anxiety, no more crying like she used to when she was younger. They are just there...embedded in her mind. Her feelings to it...suppressed within her.

Her focus then fell on her reflection at the translucent, expansive wall of glass facing her. What she saw is the face of enigma: a girl shrouded with undecipherable shadows. She no longer strived to uncover what's behind the shadows. Her existence is a mystery to her just like how people sense the enigmatic personality she exudes.

At the back of her mind, questions occupy it like a never-ending rollercoaster. Those questions haven't resurfaced into her consciousness for such a long time now. She had no answers. Those questions would only deter her remaining will to exist.

But at the moment she had a real question: Why did the System sent military personnel here in the airship for her? They're from the System all right. Who else would know that she's a Kinski?

Seven years has passed since she left Sybil. She left with a very stern instruction from her father, that is, she is not to return. Being in Sybil was too risky for her considering the undiscovered role she played in the advent of all chaotic events that has bound Earth since...since her arrival...

And now these soldiers have come for her, right on a moving airship of which she has no escape. Could it be that everything her father had presaged and feared be happening? Had the enemy up in the heavens, just in close proximity with the Earth, made it known to the Federation their intentions? And so the Federation finally knew, finally coming for her?

Have they come to finally make her pay...

"Run...run away and never come back...don't let them find you..."