The Hope Collection

Meeting a New Apollo(unedited)

I struggled to get back to my room without collapsing. I didn't realize the virtual reality would take so much out of me. I flopped down onto my comfy bed and layed there for a good three hours dozing in and out of sleep restlessly. It was only two in the afternoon when I awoke for the final time. I just couldn't stand laying there like a couch potato napping all day. To add to that I had skipped lunch so I was starving and felt like a zombie out for brains as I pulled myself around the spacious castle trying to find the cafeteria.

It felt like hours before I had found the stupid cafeteria and it was empty other than a few young guards on break drinking coffee. Who drinks coffee in the middle of the afternoon anyways? I walked over to the salad bar as casually as I could and grabbed a few crutans and scooped a few pieces of peach into a clear throwaway bowl. I pulled myself over to a table in the corner of the room closest to the white swinging doors to enter the cafeteria.

I ate alone and in silence. The three guards who had been drinking coffee when I walked in had left about five minutes after I had sat down. Hopefully not because of me. As I sat there I began to zone off. How many people knew what my new job was? I prayed that King Riley hadn't told anyone other than maybe his high general about my new assignment. Of course it didn't really matter if anyone knew about my job. I was probably going to die on my first mission anyways. I can see my death now.

I'm running through my enemy's hideout in an attempt to outrun my pursuers. It isn't long till they have caught up to me and have me held at gunpoint. The gun, deadly in its aim, is pointed right at my forehead. Before I have any time to think I hear the gun click. I know that sound, it means it's loaded and ready to shoot a bullet through my skull. I'm terrified and struggling, begging to be allowed to leave. The enemy guard with the gun just smiles insanely at me from under his iron helmet. I hear the gun's loud bang and my mind goes blank.

I shook my head to pull myself back into reality. Back into a reality where I am simply sitting at a table in the cafeteria munching on crutons. I started to panic a little bit, what if my harmless daydream turned into a deadly reality. At least I knew how I would die. I'll have to ask King Riley if spies carry weapons like knives or small firearms. If not I'll have to make my own weapons using my powers. It could cost me valuable time and energy escaping while being persued or trying to get ahold of a top secret document.

I got up and threw away about three out of the ten crutons I had picked up and the whole untouched clear plastic bowl of peach slices. I just couldn't keep eating while I was thinking about my death. I was going to end up making myself sick from the fear of my own death. After throwing my trash away I made my way around the huge castle looking for company or just a guard who was willing to talk to me.

I ended up making my way to the control room. I was curious to know what went on in there. I had heard stories from townspeople before I came here that the control room workers watched the entire kingdom through cameras positioned where nobody would suspect them to be. If they do spy on the kingdom, I suspect my best way to learn about spying is from those same people who spy on their allies.

I walked into the control room nonchalantly and stopped dead in my tracks at the door. The room was full of people either standing near a giant flat screen pinned to the far wall, or sitting at rows and rows of desks lining the room up to the big screen. I walked up the middle aisle to the front of the room. Even though I was trying to stay quiet the people sitting at desks looked up to peer at me through the corners of their eyes.

They all had on headphones with a microphone attached and pulled around in front of their mouths. How they seemed to hear me was a mystery I prefered not to think about. I now was nervously slinking towards the people gathered in the front. I stopped in my tracks when I noticed a familiar face among the crowd. Apollo was standing there speaking with another woman in a black suit. He himself wore a matching black suit with a dark red tie. He also wore a pair of new, spiffy glasses.