HALLUCINATION

04. MEETING WITH THE DEVIL

My fingers tapped on my leg nervously as I waited for an answer from inside the room. I felt my heartbeat fasten with each second that passed, until I heard a voice speak from the other side of the door, "Come in." I felt my breath bitch in my throat.

I felt like I was moving in slow motion as my hand reached for the door handle and turned the knob. The large door pushed opened silently and I took a step inside. The room appeared to be a small office. There was a black desk in the middle of the room with a glass tabletop. A black, leather chair was placed behind the desk with Silas sat in it at an intimidatingly high height. He sent me a smile before motioning to a smaller chair in front of the desk. "Please, take a seat," he instructed politely.

I walked over the fancy, red rug towards the chair and sat down. I glanced around the room and took in every detail of the office. I read the spine of the various books that were stacked together on the shelves behind Silas' desk. Each book was different but relatively similar. They were all about science, the human body, DNA, and anything medically related.

Silas' desk was empty and clear of any other objects, except for a small lamp. He folded his hands together over the glass table. "Good afternoon, Alexa," he said. I don't remember telling him my name, but I knew that Silas had list of every kids full name and photo. "I apologize for interrupting your tour. Maybe another girl from your group can continue showing you around another time."

I just nodded. I was unsure about why I was asked to come here. I didn't do anything that would've gotten me into trouble, but I must've done something to change the timeline. I had to be more careful and cautious of my actions. "What do you think of my compound so far?" Silas asked, breaking me out of my own thoughts.

I shrugged as I began to spin my web of lies, "I don't have much of an opinion."

"I understand," Silas replied. "You've only been here for such a short amount of time, and I've already cut into it." I drifted off into my own thoughts as my eyes continued to wander off around his office. I noticed the pictures that hung on the light grey walls. Each photo was in black and white and were framed nicely. Some were images of Silas and fellow scientists, while others were the compound. I didn't think much of the old pictures until two of them caught my eyes. One photo was of a younger Silas and a beautiful woman that appeared to be much older than her. She had smile lines and a few soft wrinkles on her forehead. The woman wore a lab coat, which meant that she must've been a scientist of sorts. "She was my mother," Silas spoke up suddenly.

I tore my eyes away from the image and met his. He must've took notice to my staring. "Sorry for your loss," I stated stoically. It was hard to feel bad for someone as horrible as Silas, but I knew what it was like to lose someone and I wasn't heartless.

"Her name was Elaine," Silas revealed. "She was an intelligent scientist, but her time was cut too short."

"What did she study?" I asked curiously.

"Genomics," Silas said. My eyebrows raised in shock. "She was fascinated with the reconstruction of DNA." Suddenly, I understood where his interest in the subject came from. His mother must have influenced him into creating the Order. Silas was trying to continue his mother's unfinished work. Everything was starting to make sense to me now, but I still didn't know his motive. Why was he so interested in creating a group of genetically modified killers? How did superpowers fit into all of this?

I found my gaze returning back to the wall of photos. I took interest in the image next to Silas and his mother. Another woman stood next to Silas, both seemingly close in age. She had dark hair and matching dark eyes. Her features seemed familiar to me, much like Elaine's had, but I couldn't quite figure out who she was. "Who is she?" I asked Silas, nodding towards the other picture.

The man followed to where I was motioning and then smirked. "She was my sister, Gem." I didn't miss the hateful look that flashed across his face. The moment he looked at the aged image, he seemed to grow angry. I knew there was more to his story, but I doubt he'd tell me. I was surprised that Silas was even sharing this much about himself.

I nodded along as I returned to the previous topic of our conversation, "Don't take this the wrong way, but I think you and I both know that you didn't call me to your office to talk about first impressions."

Silas was quiet for a moment before his lips twitched upward into a smile. "You're perceptive," he breathed a laugh, "But only half correct." I narrowed my eyes at him in confusion. "The reason I called you into my office is for that exact reason."

I shook my head slowly. "I'm not following."

"You see, Alexa, there's been an undeniably concerning question on my mind lately," Silas sighed. My fingers played with the hem of my skirt as I struggled to stay still. My mind raced with all sorts of thoughts as Silas paused. The silence and anticipation was killing me. "How did you know my name?"

My blonde brows furrowed as I was taken aback by his question. "What?"

"I don't like repeating myself, but I will because I want an answer," Silas spoke sternly. His dark eyes stared into my soul. "How did you know my name?" I sat there quietly, trying to come up with a reasonable answer, but I didn't even understand the meaning of what he was asking. What was he even talking about? Silas' face remained stoic and unreadable. He seemed to catch onto my confusion and furthered his explanation, "During our first encounter, you spoke my name before I even introduced myself. I find this to be very strange, considering that we've never met before, so the question I'm asking is 'how did you know my name'?"

I shrugged. "I don't know," I lied. I wasn't exactly sure what else I was supposed to say to get myself out of this. I couldn't tell Silas that we actually have met before, and there was no way I would be able to come up with a believable story. I was so disappointed with my slip up, but there was nothing I could do now, except try to lay low in the future.

Silas frowned. "You must know that I don't believe that," he said.

"I'm aware," I replied.

"Good," Silas spoke. "Because I'm not ready to drop this question, but I'm a patient man and I'm willing to wait for an answer."

"Well, I hope you find what you're looking for," I said with a tight lipped smile.

"Me too," Silas said with a subtle sigh. "For now, I'll allow you rejoin the others. I'm sure we'll be meeting again soon." I paused my fiddling and stood up. My legs moved a little too quickly towards the door. I was very anxious to leave his office because I was beginning to get a bad feeling about the meeting. None of this had happened in the past, and I was nervous that I was affecting the future. Hopefully, I wasn't screwing up the timeline too much. I could basically hear Five's lectures in the back of my head about how tedious time travel was.

My hand latched onto the doorknob and turned it until the door swung open. I took a step into the hallway and shut the door behind me. I let out a deep breath and ran my hands through my blonde hair as my legs swiftly walked off down the hallway. I desperately wanted this nightmare to be over already.

I could feel myself growing more and more nervous of the Order and the compound all over again. I was unsure if it was worse to live through this now with the knowledge of what's to come. Maybe ignorance of the future was better than knowing about everyone's fate here.

As unbelievable as it sounds, I missed the Hargreeves family and all of their crazy antics. I would do anything to fight the apocalypse again, even if that meant being around Luther. I wanted Five to find me and teleport us out of this timeline. I wondered how long it would take for him to figure out my location. Hopefully, I would be leaving my past behind again sooner rather than later.