Talk with the commander

The girl nodded and got up, moving to leave. The man, however, shook his head. "Stay here; this is also part of your education." Then he faced Nemo, but even before a single word could be spoken in his direction, he heard a stream of words hit him in the face.

"Why are you so tall? Are you the commander? Who are you, and what is your name? What education are you talking about? What do you need from me, and what exactly was..."

The man moved like the wind, and while Nemo could hear the soft giggle of a girl, the paw of a bear was covering his mouth. Then a gentle pressure was applied, and while he could still speak, almost no sound was leaving his mouth. Then a few controlled words come out from the man opposite him.

"Genetics. Of the civilian unit, Industrial Zone. The commander and Xeras. Education to become an officer in the unit. I was coming to that." Then he turned and looked at the girl. "How long between questions?"

"About a minute, more or less, I guess depending on the vehemence of the interest."

Xeras nodded.

The noise from under his hand had stopped the moment he had answered the questions.

"Ok, boy, we will do it this way. You answer all my questions, and then every 40 seconds you can ask me something, but make it simple because I can't answer everything."

Nemo nodded and wanted to ask something.

"Hold it. I start."

The man took the chair, turned it around, and sat on it, both the backside of the chair and his face facing Nemo.

"I am sorry to tell you, Son, but I am almost certain that you have been tainted, and I guess pretty recently. Have you been aware of this fact?"

Nemo nodded.

"In fact, I was planning to head to the police tonight to report the incident. It happened this morning at sunrise."

Xeras nodded but also seemed a little frustrated.

"It is good that you wanted to report, but you should have done it immediately. There is a reason that everywhere—on the news, on the radio, and on posters—it says to surrender immediately. You are lucky we caught you."

Nemo couldn't hold himself back.

"Why lucky? It's just a few hours later."

Xeras had an air of anger around him now.

"I said easy questions, boy. Still, I can answer it quickly. You will most likely die once the sun sets, and we haven't prepared you for what is about to come, so that is why we say to immediately report."

Then he got up and quickly walked toward the exit.

"If you want to live, come with me."

Nemo didn't understand but still quickly followed the man. They left the tent and walked toward a small flying vehicle that Nemo had sometimes seen zoom around in the sky of Atlantis. On the walk he could see his friends talking to an officer.

"Excuse me officer I know we just talked, but are you sure you can't tell me anything about my friend?"

"Yes, please, Mr. Officer, we just want to know if he is alright."

"Hey guys, wait, I think that's Nemo."

"Yes, that's him, I'm pretty sure."

"Hey Nemo, over here, we're over here."

Nemo stopped and looked towards his friends. Then he quickly walked over to them. Xares and the girl stopped and looked after him, but neither moved to stop him. They just watched as he greeted his friends with a smile and how they talked about what had just happened. But one detail that both his friends and the officers noticed was that he never crossed the red tape line to join his friends.

"Come on, Nemo, let's go. The Farspire is just 20 minutes on foot; we can easily make it before dinner."

"I can't."

"Come on, why not? Just tell them you are going to see them tomorrow to talk about all that stuff; they never make too big a deal about this."

"Yeah, even better this way, like that you won't even have to go to work tomorrow."

"I'm sorry, guys, but I won't go with you to the spire, and I won't be able to work with you anymore as well."

His friends looked at him strangely and didn't seem to understand.

"You didn't get a weird sickness from that thing that was underneath the city?"

Nemo sighed and slowly denied this.

"It's because he became tainted tonight." Fen said.

They looked at him bewildered, then turned quickly and looked at Nemo, who just nodded. Then Nemo looked at Fen.

"How did you know?"

"I wasn't sure; you only looked sick, but just a few minutes later you were fine again, but then you also asked about my sister. Of course I still thought nothing of it, but now you say you have to go; I figured that was the reason."

"Yeah, that is the reason. I'm sorry, guys. I know it was selfish, but I wanted to spend one last day with you, but it seems that was a bad idea, and I risked all of our lives."

The boys all remained silent, not knowing what to say. It's not like they were best friends or anything. They had known each other through work, and sure, they liked each other well enough, but they were not really close. In fact, Nemo had no one that he would call a true close friend.

Still, he liked these people, and now that he had to leave, he was feeling ... lost. He wanted to say something else, but suddenly a big paw grabbed his shoulder and lifted him off the ground.

"He was tainted and has to prepare. I am sure you are all good friends to him, but you can't do anything for him now. If he wants to survive until tomorrow, I have to prepare him for tonight."

Xeras left and carried Nemo in one hand in front of him. No words left his mouth as he entered the flying carrier with Xeras and the girl.