Chapter 35

Join or die. There was only really one choice but Jean didn't want to join, nor did she want to die. "I don't want to be a part of this," she said again.

"..."

"Yeah, this isn't right. You're just forcing her to join us," Jackson agreed.

"It's not my fault now, is it? It's not like I decided it was a good idea to go around telling people that I'm a terrorist. Speaking of which, have you told anyone else?"

"No, just her. But back to the point, why-"

"I don't need to explain it again now do I? She knows who we are. It doesn't matter if you trust her or not. I.C.E. will find out. It's not a matter of if they will find out, but when. And when do, they will take her and make her spill everything."

"Are you trying to say that they're going to torture me or something?" Jean asked if that was what Wayne was hinting at when he said that.

"Yes," Wayne bluntly answered. It was a simple one-word answer that should tell Jean what kind of organization I.C.E. really is. "They will first ask you to tell them everything you know. If you don't comply, they'll find out through more 'forceful' ways. And even if you do tell them everything you know willingly, they will still 'interrogate you to make sure you aren't hiding anything," he added

"I.C.E. would do something like that?" Jean found it hard to believe that I.C.E. would do something so cruel.

"I am going to tell you this right now. I saw with my own eyes. I saw them 'interrogate' a prisoner. When they were done, that prisoner was drenched in his own blood. And if you think they're not going to do something like that to you because you're a woman, you're dead wrong." I.C.E. didn't care who it was that they were dealing with. If anyone went against them then they were treated as criminals no matter how trivial the crime.

Wayne gave Jean a moment to take in what he just said before continuing. "Now do you understand how big of a mess you got yourself into?" he asked her. But it was more like Jackson who got her into this mess than herself. But in all fairness, she was planning to get herself involved in all of this anyway so it was both their fault. She couldn't put all the blame on Jackson for this.

"I understand..." Jean told Wayne. She knew the weight of getting involved with terrorists. "Okay, say I join your terrorist organization or whatever, I don't have any experience with anything so what do I even do?"

"Wait, you're really thinking of joining!?" Jackson couldn't believe what he was hearing. It wasn't even a minute ago that she and he were arguing with Wayne to let this go, and now she suddenly changed her mind? "Are you crazy- Er, I mean you do know what we do right?"

"I literally just asked that question," Wayne pointed out, and the answer he got from her was yes, she did understand the severity of the situation. "Anyway, is that your choice? Are you joining?" he asked to confirm her decision.

"I am just saying what would happen if I were to say yes. Hypothetically speaking, not actually saying yes."

"Well, you don't exactly have another choice unless you want to die. But I guess if you were to 'hypothetically' join then we would find out what you're capable of."

"What I'm capable of?"

"Yes, as in what can you do? Are you good with computers, information gathering, chemicals, and the such."

"No, no, and no," she answered no to all three. She knew nothing about computers. Zack was an expert in it but she wasn't. As for information gathering, she had access to nothing so she couldn't get anything useful that they didn't already know. And lastly, chemicals, she knew nothing about chemicals either. She was still a high school student so she didn't understand why they were expecting that out of her.

"Huh... What about athletics? Martial arts?"

"I can't run for even ten minutes without wanting to puke afterwards." She wasn't like Samantha who was on a sports team and could probably deck the floor with almost anyone in their school if they got into a fight.

"..."

Wayne took a minute to think of some useful skills that they needed that she might have. "Cooking?"

"Cooking?" Was that really the best he could come up with? Did she really look that worthless in their eyes that he had to go with cooking? "I can cook, but it's simple things."

"Like?"

"Packaged goods if they had an instruction on the back?"

"..."

"Hey, that's better than nothing," Jackson said on the bright side.

"What do you mean? Any one of us could do it also. Well, any one of us but you I guess. I don't understand how you fail to make something when the instructions are written in the back as clear and simple as they can be."

"Following the instructions is boring. Where's the fun and excitement in trying to figure it out by yourself?"

"Do you think that doing that is fun? We have to eat the sh*t you make, and it's literal sh*t too!"

Yikes. It sounded like Jackson was terrible at making food. Well, Jean could see that since he didn't exactly like to do things the easy way. In school, he would ignore the teacher's words and try to figure out things by himself. Because of that, he was ridiculed by his fellow students and teachers. But he didn't care what they had to say about him. All he cared about was doing what he wanted to do.

"It's not that bad is it?"

"It's not!? Have you not tasted your own cooking before?"

"No," Jackson admitted. "Now that you mentioned it, I have actually never tasted my own cooking before. I mean, I usually skip meals and eat when I really need to." What he looked like match what he said. Jackson looked like a stick and Jean was pretty sure that he weighed even less than she did, and she was underweight too.

"That explains it..." Wayne sighed.

"That also explains why you guys don't let me cook anymore even though I want to."

"Well, maybe if you actually knew how to read instructions then we'd let you."

The two were now arguing back and forth about Jackson's cooking and they were completely sidetracked from the original conversation. After bickering for a bit, Wayne gave in to Jackson's idiocy and turned to Jean again. "So, what can you do?"

"Umm... study?"

"Are you serious?"

"Yes?"

"Study... As in studying for school?"

"I am a student."

"What the f-"

"Hey! She is just a student," Jackson repeated what Jean just said. "You can't expect her to know how to do everything."

"I'm not expecting her to do everything. I'm expecting her to at least be able to do one thing Ugh, you know what? Forget it. You're in the group. Introductions to the other members will happen some other time. We'll figure out something for you too then," Wayne didn't care enough anymore.

"Wait, I haven't even agreed yet."

"Yeah, why are you just forcing her to join like this?" Jackson agreed. This wasn't right. "She was only asking what she would do IF she joined. She didn't actually say that she was joining."

"Are we really going to go through this, what is it, the fifth time?" Wayne lost count of how many times he told them now that Jean didn't have a choice but to join them because Jackson told her their identity. "She's now a part of our group, whether the two of you agree with it or not."

"But I don't want to-" Jean caught herself didn't finish the sentence. There was no point in saying that she didn't want to be a terrorist. It was too late and she was now one of them whether she liked it or not. She could say that she wasn't one of them all she wanted but they knew where she lived and she was at their mercy now.

"I see that you finally realized it. Congratulations, you are now one of us."

"What!? This isn't fair." While Jean has given up arguing about it, Jackson was still keen on trying to get her out of this mess. "Say something Hans!"

Jean and Wayne looked behind them and saw Hans leaning against the wall with his arms crossed listening to the conversation. Since when did he here? How much did he hear?

Hans saw the look on Jean's face and knew what she wanted to ask. "I've been here since the beginning," he told them.

"Then you should know that this is not right. We're forcing her to join us."

"No, I agree with Wayne. She knows too much. It's either she becomes one of us or we will have to silence her."

"What!?"

"I'll inform the boss," Wayne ignored Jackson's pleads and pulled out his phone.

This was it. Jean was now a terrorist.

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