Page 99 of The Commons

“I need to tell him to go.” I rise up to do so.

Her hands stop me, wiping her tears instantly. “No. It’s fine. I’m fine. Let’s go. It’s okay.” Her hands hold my cheeks.

“No, that can wait⁠—”

“No. It can’t. The faster we fight, the faster we can spend forever together, you and me. Okay?”

“Okay…” Our foreheads merge. “But at least, shower first. I’ll go see what’s going on for the both of us.”

“Okay, I’ll be there in a sec. Thanks.”

“Of course.” I hold back my emotions.

I enter the computer room and look up at the screen to see that the faculty members and Aristocrats at The Commons are now standing. Wait, they’re still here? It seems their meeting lasted through the entire night. They are all departing, and Beatrice is left alone with Patron De Londe. She clears up the files and begins to leave.

“Beatrice. Stay,” Londe says.

She smiles, then turns to him with a straight face. “Of course, sir.”

“Beatrice, I need to know that I can rely on you.”

“With my life, sir.”

“Then you know that the contents of those files in The Begon will not just ruin the reputation of The Commons, but it will destroy me, and need I say, us.”

She whispers, “Yes, Patron De Londe.”

He smiles devilishly. “Just Londe. Just Londe.”

“Wow. Since when did he permit their relationship to move to a first name basis?” Levon comments from behind us, walking in.

Swin smiles at her humor, not turning back to see her yet. “The good news is, the troops were supposed to arrive in 2000 minutes. Right, Newton? I mean… Shantavia?”

“Yeah,” I respond in a scoff.

“Well, my peeps, they’ve given up looking underground, according to our underground cameras. So, Pesh, you were right about this ship. It really is a safe zone.”

“And the bad news?” Levon walks in front of him.

It seems Swin notices her wet hair. He is distracted and allured; then suddenly, he snaps out of it and continues talking, “Um, the… the um… the bad news is Patron De Londe is onto something here, let’s all watch!” He coughs.

“What are they saying?” Levon looks at the computer, leaning forward, close to Swin’s face.

His side eye catches Levon’s face, somewhat rigid. Robotic, he turns away at the sound of Patron De Londe’s voice on the computer screen.

“Then we must self-destruct The Begon before whatever virus is trying to hack it overtakes it!” Patron De Londe says to Beatrice.

“Crap, they’re trying to destroy it!” Swin jumps up from his chair.

“Can they do that?” I ask.

“They can program the sensor to destroy The Begon, and it will blow up both the sensor and The Begon,” Swin responds, typing on the keyboard some code words that I do not understand.

“No, no, no, we can’t let that happen!” Levon exclaims.

“No, but it will in 15 hours, and we can’t do anything to stop it!” Swin blurts.

CHAPTER 23