When the soldiers have left us alone, he turns back to me and leans forward to put his arms on the table. “I’m sorry you have to be here,” he says quietly. “I hope you understand, Ms. Iparis, that I’m bound by my duty to do this.”
“Where’s Commander Jameson?” I reply. “She’s your puppet master, isn’t she? I would’ve thought she’d come interrogate me as well.”
Thomas doesn’t flinch at my taunt. “She’s containing Los Angeles at the moment, organizing the quarantine and reporting the situation to Congress. With all due respect, the world does not revolve around you.”
Containing Los Angeles. The words chill me. “Are the plagues really that bad right now?” I decide to ask yet again, keeping my eyes firmly fixed on Thomas’s face. “Is LA quarantined because of illness?”
He shakes his head. “Classified.”
“When will it be lifted? Are all the sectors quarantined?”
“Stop asking. I told you, the whole city is. Even if I knew when it would be lifted, I’d still have no reason to tell you.”
I know instantly by his expression that what he actually means is: Commander Jameson didn’t tell me what’s going on in the city, so I have no idea. Why would she need to keep him in the dark? “What happened in the city?” I press, hoping to get more out of him.
“That’s not relevant to your interrogation,” Thomas replies, tapping his fingers impatiently against his arm. “Los Angeles is no longer your concern, Ms. Iparis.”
“It’s my hometown,” I reply. “I grew up there. Metias died there. Of course it’s my concern.”
Thomas is quiet. His hand comes up to push dark hair away from his face, and his eyes search mine. Minutes tick by. “That’s what this is all about,” he finally mutters. I wonder if he’s saying this because he’s weary too after six hours in this room. “Ms. Iparis, what happened to your brother—”
“I know what happened,” I interrupt him. My voice trembles in rising anger. “You killed him. You sold him to the state.” The words hurt so much that I can barely squeeze them out.
His expression quivers. He lets out a cough and straightens in his chair. “The order came directly from Commander Jameson, and the last thing I’d do is disobey a direct order from her. You should know this rule as well as I do—although I have to admit you’ve never been very good at following it.”
“What, so you were just willing to hand him over like that, because he figured out how our parents died? He was your friend, Thomas. You grew up with him. Commander Jameson wouldn’t have given you the time of day—you wouldn’t be sitting across this table right now—if Metias hadn’t recommended you for her patrol. Or have you forgotten that?” My voice rises. “You couldn’t risk even a fraction of your own safety to help him?”
“It was a direct order,” Thomas repeats. “Commander Jameson is not to be questioned. What don’t you understand about that? She knew that he hacked into the deceased persons’ database, along with a host of other high security government catalogs. Your brother broke the law, multiple times. Commander Jameson couldn’t have a well-respected captain of her patrol committing crimes right under her nose.”
I narrow my eyes. “And that’s why you killed him in a dark alley, then framed Day for it? Because you’d happily follow your commander’s orders right off a cliff?”
Thomas slams his hand down on the table hard enough to make me jump. “It was a signed order from the state of California,” he shouts. “Do you understand what I’m saying? I had no better choice.” Then his eyes widen—he hadn’t expected those words to come out, not that way. They stun me too. He keeps talking, now at a quicker pace, seemingly determined to erase the words. A strange light glows in his eyes, something that I can’t quite pinpoint. What is it? “I’m a soldier of the Republic. When I joined the military I took an oath to obey my superiors’ orders at all costs. Metias took the same oath, and he broke it.”
There’s something odd about the way he refers to Metias, a sort of hidden emotion that throws me off. “The state is broken.” I take a deep breath. “And you’re a coward for leaving Metias at its mercy.”
Thomas’s eyes constrict as if I’d stabbed him. I study him closer, but he notices me analyzing him and jerks his face away, turning to the side and hiding his head in his hands.
I think about my brother again, this time flipping in my mind through his many years spent in Thomas’s company. Metias had known Thomas since they were kids, long before I was born. Whenever his father, our apartment floor’s janitor, would bring Thomas along to accompany him during his work shifts, Thomas and Metias would play for hours on end. Military video games. Toy guns. After I came into the picture, I remember the many quiet conversations the two of them would share in our living room, and how often they were together. I recall Thomas’s Trial score: 1365. Great for a poor sector kid, but average for kids in Ruby sector. Metias was the first to pick up on Thomas’s intense interest in being a soldier. He’d spend entire afternoons teaching Thomas everything he knew. Thomas would never have made it into Emerald sector’s Highland University without my brother’s help.
My breaths turn shallow as something falls into place. I remember the way Metias’s gaze would linger on Thomas during their training sessions. I’d always assumed that was just my brother’s way of studying Thomas’s posture and performance for accuracy. I remember how patient and gentle Metias was when explaining things to Thomas. The way his hand would touch Thomas’s shoulder. The night when I’d eaten edame at that café with Thomas and Metias, when Metias first stopped shadowing Chian. The way Metias’s hand would sometimes rest on Thomas’s arm for a beat longer than it had to. The chat I had with my brother when he took care of me on the day of his induction. How he’d laughed. I don’t need girlfriends. I’ve got a baby sister to take care of. And it was true. He’d dated a couple of girls in college, but never for longer than a week, and always with polite disinterest.