Free Minds

Chapter 18.

   I recognized that look on Dorian's face as everyone turned toward him to hear his story on why he hadn't been affected by the glasses. It was the perfect reflection of the one I just had on. A look of someone who was thinking of anything other than the truth to tell.

   Whatever he was going to say next though, wasn't going to change the fact that he was the one I was with at the dance right before the placement of the mind control tech by the glasses happened. We had both been present at that very moment, which made me wonder and feel angsty as to why he hadn't called me out on my lie. Dorian had to choose what he was going to tell Camila and Rav very carefully. For both our sakes.

"Dorian?" Camila said his name for the third time, waving her hand in front of his face. "Are you still here? Where were you at that time of the dance?"

"I," His monotone voice was several octaves lower as he gave a not-so-subtle gulp. "I remember taking mine off because I wanted to check up on Rav. I thought I had heard an external noise. As you all already know, I was hanging out at his place for the night."

   Wait, what?

"Isn't that right Beth? Beth, my date, was the last person I was with." Dorian said, looking at me. "I told I was going to be right back. Didn't I, Beth?"

   I stared into his bright green eyes that dared me to say otherwise. The eyes that were locked with mine right before everything went to hell that night. The eyes that knew my lie.

"Yes, those were his exact words." If I didn't want what I had done, which was going to put not just me, but Tali in a disadvantaged situation, I had to play along. "And I told him I had to grab an actual snack."

"Right." He mused.

   We shared a cold gaze of understanding.

   But it still didn't change the fact that Dorian should've been affected just like everyone else. What was the real reason he was here with us, not mind controlled? It was likely he and Rav had done the same thing Tali and I had, but I'm pretty sure it didn't involve an illegal chip that Clearwater River had hopefully driven into the sea by now. They didn't have that much to lose even if that was the case and the school had found out. Even though Zavlon was closed indefinitely, I was the one with a scholarship on the line and a friend to protect. He could have come clean. Especially now.

   Although I had escaped this madness in a messed up way, I had a credible basis for being here, subject to nothing's control.

   What was Dorian's?

"As enlightening as all this was, it's not really going to be what helps us get in," Rav said. "As Mr. Sacury instructed in his message, we need to find the lab as soon as possible. Especially now that his message couldn't reveal any leads and everyone else's Virtuo Glasses, I'm assuming, also self-destructed.

"It's still reassuring to know, if you ask me." Camila shrugged. "At least now I can sleep at night knowing that none of you are secretly mind controlled freaks plotting to kill me. This is kind of definite proof that you're all telling the truth."

   Not all of us. It didn't take a genius to notice Dorian deliberately ignoring me when I glanced in his direction at Camila's statement. What if the glasses had worked on him though? The idea of him being a mole for the monsters was suddenly starting to make sense.

"I think we should focus more on how we can get into Zavlon and through those creatures and find Sacury's lab all without caught and turned into mind control puppets or worse," Dorian responded.

   So we could focus less on what you're hiding?

"It took a miracle for you and me to escape the first time, remember?" Rav told him. "Security should be crazily upped by now. We need to be virtually invisible to get in."