Deactivation

"Is it possible for a death convict like her to deactivate the Tempus Moneda with a bookworm cell mate?" Leo asked.

They're huddled in the conference table once again right after their work.

Dinner's coming, but they decided to have a short meeting.

Leo took a seat down on his swiveling chair, and hissed.

He doesn't know if he's annoyed or relieved their lips didn't touch each other.

Leo isn't comfortable with Zella's presence.

Something about her made him feel uneasy, as if she's holding a knife behind her back, ready to stab him anytime. Zella just had to do it and it's the end.

"It's possible. Especially if someone found out how to deactivate their Tempus Moneda and helped the future generations to find it. We don't know how, but she was too clever to do that despite of the punishment waiting for her."

Etienne scrolled down at the system, copied everything on a hard drive, and the conference room stayed silent once again.

Vincent took much of his time developing the bullet bombs, that's why he's too preoccupied to even talk.

Jon Cho scraped off the useless escape routes they have for the fugitive's location and how they could trap them inside.

Leo asked further, "I mean, how did she figured that out? It's too hard to manipulate the Tempus Moneda. The time chips may release poisonous material through her veins."

"It wouldn't if she knew the number to punch in. Multiple wrong combinations of numbers meant death, Leo. Exactly a hundred before a Telamur's citizen death," Etienne spoke up.

Leo sighed, clicking his tongue, and pursed his lips. Never did he become worried about the fugitive residing in their mansion.

She must have plotting something to kill them, but that's not going to happen fast.

The fear laced through her eyes, followed by curiosity, and blankness.

Nothing could change the fact she doesn't remember anything, and Leo grabbed the chance to exploit with untrue scenes and memories.

Randall mumbled, "Are you worried about what might happen in the next few days? We have to know her more, and how did she left the prison without even a trace. Now that they release the Silver Notice, we have to move fast, Leo."

It has been their problem since that day.

"Search every personality you can find that's connected with Zella Albert. We needed to know who she is."

…

[A month ago. 18 days after the arrest.]

As Jaina and Zella went back to the duct after finding out the secret tunnel hiding behind the cabinets, they found themselves in glee.

They never thought a tunnel would be placed right there, completely hidden, and if not with the clue on the paper, they'd be caught.

Jaina swung her body out of the ventilation onto the upper bunker.

She waited for Zella, and she slumped back safely on the mattress, too.

"Quick!" Jaina hissed. Zella covered the duct with the ventilation door and sat back down to bed, just in time when the police officer walked past ahead of their holding cell.

10 minutes was enough to canvass everything. Now, the real game begins if they found out the way out of that tunnel.

"What would be the way out of that tunnel?"

"The closest I could see was the infirmary. There's drainage over there leading to the cable line out of the prison. It's the only way to get out, we had to do it at night," Zella figured out the way, but there are still holes remaining open.

Closing it wouldn't be easy. Covering it might be the way to get out.

Zella hoisted down the bunker bed, looked at the center field, and the stared at the rest of the prisoners.

They didn't care about the others, Zella and her.

Their desire to break out grew fine, and passionate enough to keep the fire burning.

Zella whispered, "We have to break out on the 21st, 3 days after, while open gate in the evening is happening."

"That day…"

"There's a visitor, yes. We need to grab that opportunity." Zella held on the bars, sighing.

Jaina remained silent, figuring out what to do with their Tempus Moneda.

Zella didn't want to stare at it, because it kept reminding her of her deceased family. Just in a blink of an eye, they're gone.

With the help of that tiny paper, she's going to get back in her life outside of the prison…without her family.

Will she ever came back to her normal life? Or have to go to the borders and escaped the ruthless Telamur behind?

Zella asked, "What would you do if you get out? Will you stay here on Telamur or…"

"Why would I, Zella? I would escape Telamur no matter what. These time chips are ridiculous, you know. We have to eradicate it so that they wouldn't be in control," Jaina answered hastily.

Her emotions raged on, and Zella heard the eagerness in her tone.

Turning to her cell mate, she read her eyes. It's exactly the same as her thoughts.

"They're ruthless, Zella. They don't have hearts to start with. The innocent people have to pay for another man's mistake because… they just wanted it. No politician has ever agreed to get criticized by many people, especially rebels. They wanted to hide their mistake repeatedly, and calling out is a sin for the land of Idris."

It's the power of the words Jaina had and the reason she landed here.

She completely thought everyone would wake up with her book.

But she's the one left on the line. Jaina had to suffer upon speaking up about injustices. "Do you think Emerald is that better than Idris?"

"They're not way better than Idris was. Emerald's worst, Idris is worse."

Jaina continued to repeat the combination of numbers in her paper.

The sequence of the numbers overloaded the paper, causing for Jaina to stop.

Zella went beside her, stared at her Tempus Moneda, and ready to deactivate her.

"Are we getting a lot of tries to deactivate it?"

"We have 100 times before they reach your time chip and activate the poisonous material. We couldn't afford to be dead inside our holding cell, so we had to be careful. I have 200 numbers right here, the one we have couldn't be relied on. So what do we do?"

Jaina spread the paper out, and Zella got dizzy just by looking at the numbers.

"I'll have the first 100. We have 100 tries, so I should punch in the one on the paper, and you should punch in the reverse combination of the numbers." Jaina nodded.

An officer came by the cell's gate and she hitched the paper, folding into fourths.

She was fast, and Zella came up to get the cultured milks.

She thanked the officer and immediately went away.

"I got nervous with that."

…

[Present time.]

"I should sleep beside her today." Leo clasped the tie, hitching it.

Randall wore off his coat, too, relaxing upon his couch. Leo sighed, the silence overpowered.

Randall placed his hand on his forehead.

"Do you think… the inspection team will be here next week?" When the job's shifting towards the spies, an inspection team was sent out to observe their actions.

It was to prevent any unpleasant behavior that may spark an uprising.

A lot of the spies knew the dirty works, and they couldn't afford to have a whistleblower.

"Maybe, but if we showed just one fugitive, they wouldn't be able to do that anymore, Randall."

Cassanos were the top-class. They're the ones Jeremy Tyran trusted the most.

But trust is a big word, and if you promise not to break it, it has a higher chance to get severed.

Leo doesn't believe in promises anymore.

"What if we don't? Our time's being consumed by Zella Albert. She's the number one fugitive we needed to find, and Jeremy Tyran would be disappointed if we showed him another runaway besides her," Randall pointed out. Leo doesn't want to talk it for now, but he does have a point.

He wore off his coat, laid it on his arm, and pushed the chair back to its original place.

Randall raised his eyebrows.

"Going in the bedroom already?"

"I promise to sleep with her tonight. I'll do what she wished," Leo muttered.

Randall was left alone inside his boss' office.

…

After slipping in his night robe, he knocked on the door, but nobody answered.

Leo went inside, not making any noise, but she's still awake.

Zella's eyes met his, and she's reading a book. The maids must have lent her one.

She surveyed him from head-to-toe. He was…

Freaking hot more than she expected to be.

Zella swallowed, closing the book, and placed it above the drawer.

She swung her legs on the side, asking, "Are you finally going to sleep here tonight?"

She's asking like it's a normal routine: a busy husband who couldn't sleep beside his wife despite of the exhausting day.

Leo glimpsed at her, asking, "Why? Did you miss me?"

Zella snickered. "Maybe. You're the one saying you couldn't sleep here for the past few days. So I'm a bit shocked you're here inside our…"

She got cut off by Leo taking a step forward.

Both of them stared into each other's eyes. "Actually, we have a master's bedroom down the hall. Do you want to stay here or go there?"

His voice was seductive, pulling her in.