To Where the Sun Rises (Part 2 of 'A Tale of People and Apples' Trilogy)

Chapter 23: Eeva the Gold and Solan the Black

Eeva thrashed in her restraints as Outlanders spread her onto a metal table, hooking electrodes to her chest and scanning her body with machines that burred and glided over top of her.

She was in the ship which belonged to the man who kidnapped her. And she felt the ship descend to the east long ago, away from her people and friends as the battle had raged upon the shore.

Outlander scientists tried to poke her with needles which broke upon her skin, illustrating that her powers and revelation that she was a Six like her father before her was no fluke.

A green masked Outlander finally removed Eeva's gag and promptly left the room, as she lay on the cold metal table in the black and red glow of the research room, yelling for help.

Only one person remained. It was a woman who sat in the corner, her eyes frozen upon the ground, her clothes tattered and her feet bleeding. She would have been beautiful if not for her tattered hair and scared face. Her eyes were blue and hair as dark as the room.

"Who are you? Are you a prisoner?" Eeva asked her as she looked for something sharp to cut through her thick restraints. If she got her hands on anything sharp, nothing could stand in her way of escaping with her new found power.

The woman didn't respond. She just kept seated in the corner, silent.

"Please, help me get out. My friends, my people, they're in danger."

As the woman finally moved her head after seemingly being frozen the entire time, Eeva flinched. Her eyes met hers. And yet, the woman remained quiet. Eeva sensed anger in her eyes. But was it anger for her?

"What's your name?" Eeva pleaded, her eyes scanning the room as the room appeared to scan her.

The woman only raised her hands to Eeva, revealing cuffs of her own.

"Who are you? What does he want with you?"

Before the woman could answer, the man that kidnapped her walked in. He held two more people by the scruff of their neck, and gently sat them beside the woman, also in tattered clothing and cuffs of their own, who the kidnapper chained to the wall in a fashion identical to the woman. One was a man, and another was a woman but much younger than the original one, slender and with skin which matched the darkness of the room. The man prisoner looked frighteningly familiar to Eeva, but she couldn't put her finger on why it was so. Unlike the original woman, the two new prisoners had a different aura to them. Almost like they were glad to be in chains.

"Who are they? Who are you?" Eeva yelled at the man, who was now at a counter pouring himself a drink. "You're a Six, aren't you?"

He turned to Eeva with an eyebrow raised, and pointed to his three seemingly imprisoned people. "Them? You wouldn't believe me if I told you," The man said to her as he poured her a drink as well. It seemed strange he was pouring her alcohol, as if he was trying to make some sort of point. "Who am I, you ask?"

He seemed to glide his way over to her bedside, setting her drink on a black metallic counter and holding his in his hand. "I'm your father's cousin. We are family, you and I."

Eeva gasped. "Solan? Maeve's twin brother, Solan? But... my father said you were dead."

He bowed to her politely yet sinisterly, a bow that said, 'It is a pleasure to be of your acquaintance'. "No, I am not a Six," Solan added, seeming to enjoy the conversation he was having.

"Why are you doing all of this?" Eeva scowled and said, realizing he was the mastermind behind all of the pain and suffering of the entire planet in the recent weeks. "You blackmailed Lleyton into killing everyone, you... you kidnapped his son, and set Markus upon us like some crazed dog. You're killing thousands. Your own family."