Chapter 21: Mitchel
We drove further in silence. After some time, the residential area ended abruptly, giving way to warehouses and storage lots of the port-adjacent zone. The car slowed down and turned into a narrow alley. We moved past a chain-link fence, gates wide open and blocked by piles of snow, and parked in front of an old service depot. Two other cars were parked there. One of them was a black SUV like the one we arrived in, and the other was an ordinary gray sedan.
'Out.'
They led me inside the building, spending some time to unlock the rusty metal door. On the interior, the building was one big space, with a ceiling lost somewhere in the darkness. Pillars of light were falling through the dirty windows, illuminating a labyrinth of wooden crates, fishing equipment and large coils of copper wire. It was almost as cold as outside.
The man who ordered me to shut up stayed near the door, and the other one gestured for me to go on. He walked a few steps behind me, periodically giving me directions, like "turn left" or "now straight ahead". The was a shadow of unsureness in his voice, as though he hasn't yet memorized the route completely.
There was a clear space at the center of the building, hidden behind the chaotic maze of crates we just traversed. It was empty aside from a wooden desk with two crates instead of chairs and a big electric heater, which was pumping out hot air with a quiet murmur.
It didn't look like any place I've ever been to before, but somehow I immediately got the familiar feeling of the test chamber. It's what it was: the beginning of a new cell. The PA hadn't had time to properly outfit it yet, but I could almost see how this place was going to look in a couple of weeks.
'Hello, zero six eleven. My name is Corey.'
I flinched. The Protector... my Protector... was sitting on one of the crates. She looked like she always did, only somehow even more sinister. No, not exactly the same: her right palm was bandaged, clean white gauze almost shining in the twilight of the service depot.
There was a man beside her, standing almost seven feet tall. I knew from the arrogance on his face that he was a high-ranking Protector, too. A modern templar like her. Strong, intelligent. Dangerous.
But, other than that, they were nothing alike. Where my Protector was composed and relaxed, this one was all tension and sharp edges. If she was mercury, he was an armor-piercing tungsten shell. A tank buster. His clothes were different, too. More expensive, more eye-catching. Flashy.
What an asshole.