Suffer The Little Children

CHAPTER 1: THE TRAVELER
Silas’ personal vehicle ran smoothly over rough terrain, chewing up the miles quickly and efficiently. It was a sturdy vehicle, well constructed, and Silas had personally inspected it to make sure it was in top condition. With an advanced energy source, recharged consistently by the solar cells currently soaking up the sunshine, it was capable of running pretty much indefinitely. That was good as Silas had been traveling for a while now and had little hope of rescue should he get into trouble.
Silas was glad that he’d prepared for this journey as thoroughly as he had since he was heading out to face something that shouldn’t be possible. In a world filled with uncertainty and turmoil he didn’t think there was room for true surprises, but he quickly moving right for one.
As was his usual custom in such situations, Silas ran through everything that had brought him to this point in order to determine if clues might exist that he’d missed the first time around. He cast his mind back over the last several months.
Shortly after the crisis that had given him a new perspective on leadership he had realized that he must personally visit the various bases established by the Seekers and similar groups. He was the ostensible leader of these outposts of humanity, which extended over the land mass that had once held Canada, North America, Mexico and South America. The vast majority were clustered to the north of what had been Mexico before the Great Cataclysm eliminated all but a remnant of humanity.
While he had been the acknowledged leader of these scattered forces, only the inhabitans of Haven had ever seen him in person. To the rest he was little more than a face on a monitor, a voice on a speaker and various pieces of electronic correspondence. The part of him that was once Zethos knew that he needed face to face contact with the leaders of each base at least once for him to be truly real to them prior to the day that everyone could emerge safely and repopulate the planet once again.
Furthermore, the fact that Silas could travel safely would be confirmed and reinforced, which would help solidify the basic advantages he possessed that made him the natural choice for leadership. While Silas had no inherent desire to rule, he was that rare person who accepted the mantle and responsibilities because he was truly and absolutely the best choice at a time when anything else would simply not be good enough. As such, he needed to reinforce his leadership.
While Silas had not wanted to leave Rebecca, his wife for too short a time, she understood why his duty required this action. Once he explained his intentions she did everything she could to help him prepare for these tours, including gathering equipment for him to transport in his vehicle, the BearCat 3000. Affectionately nicknamed the Cat, Silas felt this vehicle embodied the best combination of ruggedness, speed, stealth, armaments and reliability ever produced by humanity. He’d had no cause to regret this decision, and with its autopilot feature was able to keep moving even while he slept.
Rebecca also helped him plan his itinerary. In one sense this should have been a relatively simple process based on the most efficient path from Haven base out to each outpost and back again, but in reality it was anything but simple. As this was fundamentally a politically motivated trip, Silas had to take a variety of factors into account.
One result of this process was that Silas visited Ager base early on, though it was not the first place he visited. He wanted to reinforce his words to Sarah during their one and only private conference without highlighting her as a focus for everyone to see. Sarah’s resistance to his suggestions on how to maximize crop yield once the super-virus had burned itself out and everyone could walk the planet’s surface in safety had been the most obvious challenge to his leadership, and he had dealt with it decisively. He needed to reinforce that action without causing her unnecessary embarrassment or giving her reason to turn against him. After a brief internal debate he had decided to see if his presence alone was enough to achieve that goal before taking more aggressive action.
Fortunately everything had gone well. Having seen Silas’ darker side once, Sarah had no desire to see it again.
Or perhaps, Silas mused, she had wanted to see it again but in a very different context. Sarah had been very open and welcoming, and he began to realize that some of her words could have had a second meaning. He had gently, but firmly, turned aside what appeared to be efforts at flirtation. In many ways that had had to handled as subtly as possible and had presented as much of a challenge as anything he had done in recent months.
He then thought back on what had happened next to bring him to his present situation, not heading to any of the bases in his network but rather to an unknown quantity that shouldn’t exist.

CHAPTER 2: THE IMPOSSIBLE VILLAGE
In a very real way Silas’ current situation was the result of one of the decisions made soon after the Caretaker’s plan to remedy what had been Silas’ fatal weaknesses as a leader had come to fruition. Silas ordered each base to send out drones to scout for any threats that might be advancing on them, particularly in the form of Mutates, those poor souls who were changed by the super virus into animal/human hybrids. The Mutates acted like savage beasts and ultimately died from the disease.
It was on his third day at Ager base when Sarah had awoken him with a summons to Ager’s control room. She sounded worried and confused, and when Silas arrived he saw why.
“Take a look at this Silas,” Sarah said, gesturing to one of the room’s monitors. “I’m not sure what it is we’re seeing.”
Silas seated himself and looked at the feed from one of the scout drones. He saw a village, one of those that had most likely been established before the super virus had manifested and swept over the world like a storm, killing or transforming everyone except those who had taken shelter at Haven, Ager or the other bases like them.
This one was larger than the one Lord Harland’s people had lived in when Silas last was one of them. The buildings looked more solidly built than most of the ones he’d seen as well, and they were in excellent repair.
Still, that hardly warranted Sarah’s reaction, so he continued to observe.
Then he saw it. Or, more precisely, he saw them.
Children. He saw a group of them, about a dozen, run chaotically from one of the larger buildings. They weren’t running in fear, but with wild abandon seen from the joy of pure freedom. They began playing tag, laughing and scampering about.
Silas zoomed in as much as the drone’s camera would allow. These children were unblemished, apparently untouched by the virus. They looked well-fed and happy.
Silas looked up at Sarah, who broke the silence. “This shouldn’t be possible, should it?” she asked. “The Super virus targets children, doesn’t it?” She was obviously hoping for an explanation.
Unfortunately, he had no explanation to give her. “No, it shouldn’t be possible,” Silas said. His mind flashed back to the child whose arm he had set just prior to the advent of the super virus, only to have to kill him hours later when he’d been transformed into a vicious beast. “And yes it does affect children,” he added.
He checked and nodded in approval when he saw that Sarah had set the drone to begin recording soon after she learned what it was seeing. He then tasked a second drone to approach the village, maintaining as much stealth as it was capable of, in order to secure additional footage from multiple points of view. He then watched the live feed for a few more minutes before reviewing what had been recorded before he got there, running it at high speed.
Unfortunately none of the footage gave him any additional insights. He then called Rebecca and Stephen back at Haven. They watched the recordings with growing amazement, and then thoughtful expressions as they tried to figure things out. Finally Rebecca began the discussion in earnest.
“Could they have been immune from the virus? We know that that’s possible,” she said.
Silas nodded as she presented the most reasonable explanation. Unfortunately there was a serious flaw in that line of thinking. “Theoretically, yes. However, the odds against are so astronomical as to make it practically impossible.”
Stephen entered the conversation. “Do you know those odds?”
“Yes,” Silas said. He knew that Stephen wasn’t challenging him, but simply striking at the heart of the matter. “When I was told about the inevitable development of the super virus and about my own immunity, I was also told that I was effectively unique. The odds were calculated as less than 1 in a million that someone would develop a natural immunity. While it may be possible that a single child could beat those odds, there’s no way that a dozen or more children could do so in such a small radius as to end up together in a single location.”
Silas continued setting forth the problems with Rebecca’s proposed explanation for what they had seen. “Also, how have they remained safe and cared for? Even if they were immune, logically they would have been surrounded by people who would have Mutated and they should have been killed.”
Rebecca considered these points and could find no flaw in Silas’ reasoning. “Could the drone be malfunctioning?” she asked.
“Sarah ran a full systems check,” Silas said, “and this would be an extremely odd malfunction, persisting for some time now and fully internally consistent. Just to be sure that that’s not the case I’ve sent a second drone, but I find it extremely unlikely that we’re seeing a computer-generated fantasy.”
“The most logical explanation then,” Stephen said, “is that someone or something gathered these children together and is caring for them. It would also indicate that that unknown entity or group has the ability to immunize them from the virus. This could either be very good or very bad.”
Silas nodded as Stephen’s thinking paralleled his own. That thinking led inevitably to a specific course of action. However, Silas wanted to consult his most respected and trusted allies before proceeding in case they saw an angle he had missed.
Rebecca voiced what they were all now thinking. “This can’t be ignored. And only you can check it out, given that you’re the only one of us who can step outside a sealed environment safely. However, I’m worried. You’ll be all alone facing an unknown person or group who has evidenced a capability we hadn’t imagined possible, and an agenda we can only guess at.”
Silas nodded again. “The risk is quite real, but so is the necessity of checking this out. We can’t just let the mystery fester. It can quite obviously present a tremendous threat to everything we hope to accomplish. If nothing else, this is happening close to Ager base, so it’s unlikely that we’ll remain undetected indefinitely. On the other hand it might provide a resource we can’t hope to match. I have to find out what’s happening, and I can’t do that from here.”
The three of them talked out the logistics over the next half hour. “Be careful my love. Come back to me,” Rebecca said to Silas. With those words the transmission ended. Silas then went about preparing for his journey.

CHAPTER 3: CAPTURED
Silas left the following day, having reviewed additional transmissions from the two drones. As he had suspected, the second drone confirmed that the first was sending real images and not the result of some odd malfunction.
The only further information Silas had was that the first group of children he saw was merely a portion of the village’s underage population. The total number couldn’t be confirmed from a distance, but seemed to number at least 40. This was an amazing total, especially given the low birthrates that had predominated for centuries, a side effect of the genetic engineering that had resulted in humanity’s current dire situation.
As Silas completed his mental review of all of the available information, this was one of those rare times that he failed to glean any additional insights. There were simply too many unknowns to do more than speculate wildly, and insufficient data to reach any reliable conclusions.
As he’d determined shortly after seeing the children for the first time, he’d have to go to the village if he was to unravel this mystery.
Soon Silas reached the point he had deemed close enough for him to walk to rest of the way, and far enough that the Cat was unlikely to be spotted. It also had the advantage of a nearby cave large enough to park his vehicle. He did so, and then put in place the camouflage netting he’d brought with him.
Preparations complete, he set out at a fast jog to the Village.
Shortly thereafter he reached the location of the first drone, which provided him with a good vantage point from which to spy out the village.
What he didn’t know was that an errant shaft of sunlight had caught the probe at just the right angle to cast a glean that lasted several seconds, and which had shone out just as a sharp pair of eyes had been cast in that direction.
So it was that as Silas moved into what he thought a secure position, his acute hearing picked up the whispered word “gotcha,” barely floating on the wind, its excited tones making it just loud enough for him to hear. Its owner hadn’t even realized that she’d spoken.
Silas’ decades of living in dangerous times, coupled with enhanced reflexes, caused him to move without hesitation. He sprang up onto his hands and hurled himself to the side just as a massive jolt of electricity struck the spot he’d vacated a bare instant ago. As he landed, an internal debate had begun as to how to respond. He cut it off savagely when he spotted his assailant, refusing to take hostile action as he evaluated who he was facing. She had been well concealed in a small depression, but had risen to fire on him, so he could see her clearly.
Silas continued moving until he’d put a stand of trees between himself and his attacker. However, this potential evasion had been anticipated, and Silas found himself enveloped in a net fired at high velocity. He was slammed into the trunk of one of the trees that he thought would shelter him, and the impact left him dazed. Thus, he was unable to effectively resist when he was detached from the tree and immobilized.
As he sat, his back against the tree, trussed up and unable to move, he listened to the discussion about what to do with him. It felt slightly surreal, an impression increased by the fact that part of his mind rebelled against his having allowed himself to fall into this situation. Silas pushed those protests aside to concentrate on what was being said.
“He doesn’t look like a new-tate,” the girl who’d fired the electrical blast at him said. She looked to be about 8 years old, with long, unkempt blond hair and gangly limbs. She was looking at Silas openly, as only the young can, and seemed to be trying to pick out some weird thing that would allow her to categorize him as a creature rather than a person. When she couldn’t find anything she looked confused and at a loss as to what to do.
It would be almost comical if she weren’t carrying a small but powerful electrical discharge weapon.
The person she had directed her statement to was a boy who looked to be a couple of years older, a bit more filled out, but who also looked at Silas with that utter lack of self-consciousness found in children. He held a slightly larger weapon than the girl, which Silas recognized as the source of the net that even now held him tight. He responded to his young colleague with utter seriousness. “Yeah, but Professor said that the change could be sult . . . sub-tl . . . hard to see.”
“But what if he is, like, a person?” she asked. She’d obviously been given a significant responsibility and was struggling to meet it. She picked up a stick which she used to poked at Silas. When he didn’t snap his jaws at her or otherwise act like a wild animal she withdrew it, looking more confused than ever.
Silas decided that it was time to speak up. “I’m not here to hurt you, and I’m not a Mutate,” he said, catching the gaze of each of his captors in turn, first the girl and then the boy. They looked at one another, but neither one was ready to kill him in cold blood, so they did what Silas had hoped they would and clearly looked to defer to higher authority. Silas spoke again in order help them along. “Could you take me to the Professor please?”
Unfortunately they seemed unable or unwilling to agree to this, which was reflected in a large degree of uncertainty and even fear. The little girl wormed her toe into the dirt, and the boy looked down. Then he looked up at Silas with renewed confidence.
“No, we can’t, but we can take you to Hollis. He’ll know what to do.”
With that the boy stepped forward and began fumbling at the controls of his net-rifle. He then seemed to realize he couldn’t just release Silas so he stopped and looked up with a confused expression.
“Um,” he said, “if I let your legs go, do you promise to not run away or anything, but go where I tell you to go?”
“Yes,” Silas said, a bit bemused.
But the boy wasn’t quite satisfied. “Pinky-swear?” he asked.
“Yes,” Silas said, “I pinky-swear.”
Thus emboldened, obviously certain that no one could break a pinky-swear, the child found the right button on his advanced weapon, and sent the proper signal to release Silas’ legs from their bondage.
As Silas stood up, part of him calculated exactly where to kick in order to disarm his pint-sized captors, and urged him to do so immediately. He rejected that option with only a modicum of difficulty, but stifled a sigh. As he followed the children, who seemed excited that their game had gone so well, he mulled over his personal difficulty, one he’d barely been able to fathom and certainly been unable to explain to anyone.
When the Caretaker’s plan to implant Zethos’ memories and brainwaves into his mind had succeeded, it had given him a matchless resource. He’d gained self-confidence and the ability to truly comprehend and deal with pettiness, selfishness and improper aggression that had been so foreign to him as to constitute blind spots in his mind’s eye. His leadership skills had grown exponentially, and he had little difficulty when it came to dealing with day to day issues of his command.
However, the fusion had been far from seamless. When it came time to address more complex situations, ones where a desire for compassion was at odds with the need for self-defense and domination, his mind remained split. When considering his course of action in such situations it was as if two advocates were arguing for their proposed solutions to the situation, ones that were often diametrically opposed to each other. One of the advocates was Zethos, while the other was the person he’d been for so many decades. His new self sat in judgment, listened to both sides, and then issued his ruling. Sometimes it was in favor of one or the other, but usually it was a combination of the proposals set forth.
Fortunately for Silas his mental processes were so fast that the trial and judgment happened in the space of time most people used to consider their actions when faced with a complex issue. Nonetheless, the process was cumbersome. Furthermore, the greater the challenge the more time it took to reach a decision. He suspected that sooner or later this would constitute a critical deficit, but he was at a loss as to how to resolve the problem.
Silas did not understand that this problem was due to a fundamental fear holding him back. So long as he hid this fear from himself he couldn’t possibly address the issue effectively.
He also didn’t know that his suspicions were exactly on the mark, and if he didn’t find a way to unify his mind before too long, it would become a moot point as his life would end most dramatically.

CHAPTER 4: HEAVY HANGS THE HEAD THAT WEARS THE CROWN
As always, reality pulled Silas away from his internal struggles before he could reach any sort of resolution. In this case reality consisted of the events inside the building he’d first seen the group of children vacate on their way to a game of tag.
Silas followed his tiny captors up to the building’s third floor, where he walked down a corridor leading to a stout door. Along the way they’d passed a handful of other children, and the boy and girl who’d captured him puffed up with pride at the stunned looks of the others. He’d learned that the girl’s name was Alisha and the boy was Ben. The children stopped and knocked on the door, then waited impatiently for it to be opened from within.
The strange trio entered a large room with two children inside. One of them had opened the door and then stepped back, confusion on his face when he saw Silas. It was the other one that held Silas’ attention, as his divided mind quickly determined that his ability to survive, as well as to accomplish his self-appointed mission, rested in the small hands of that second child.
This child looked to be no older than Ben, at least until Silas gazed at his eyes. They were the eyes of someone forced to come into adult responsibilities too soon, and held years beyond the apparent age of the body in which they rested. He sat a bit awkwardly in a chair that was clearly too large for him, and wore clothes without patches or tears. He had a short shock of dark hair and piercing black eyes.
“And who have we here?” the child asked Ben.
Ben stepped forward while Alisha looked a bit sullen at not being chosen to explain the situation. “We caught him Hollis,” Ben said excitedly. “Alisha saw the wheely thing and we played ambush just like Professor Saul taught us. We got our guns and we sat still a long time.”
Silas understood that “the wheely thing” must refer to the scout drone. Obviously they weren’t as stealthy as they needed to be.
Alisha couldn’t hold back any longer and she broke in. “We waited and waited. It was hard but we did it. Then he showed up and we zapped him.”
Hollis nodded, his expression caught between amusement and concern. “And you untied his legs Ben?”
Ben shifted uncomfortably and looked down. “He didn’t seem like a new tate. He pinky swore to follow us. He pinky swore,” Ben emphasized when he saw that Hollis was not comforted by this ultimate expression of childish compliance, then stopped talking.
Alisha belatedly shifted her electrical-discharge weapon to cover Silas, something she’d not thought of doing on the way into the village. Silas maintained his silence, sensing that the optimum time to speak had not yet arrived.
Hollis finally relented. “Well, he seems to have kept his pinky swear. You did well.”
Ben sagged slightly in relief, and Alisha let the gun’s muzzle drift away from Silas.
Silas finally broke his silence. “I’m not your enemy. I only came here to try and find out who you are and how you came to be here. I want to help, if you need it.”
Hollis considered for a moment and then stood up. He relieved Ben of his weapon and hit another control that released Silas completely. They smiled at each other.
“Ben, Alisha, why don’t you go and get something to eat? I’ll take it from here.”
The two children ran out the door, apparently happy that their latest game had finally come to an end.
Silas spoke again. “Clearly you’re a good leader but, no offense intended, you seem a bit young for the role. The children mentioned Professor Saul, but said they couldn’t bring me to him. Could you?”
Hollis pursed his lips. “No, I can’t, but I’ll do the next best thing and show you to his work room. Maybe you can figure out what I haven’t been able to.”
With that Hollis led Silas back out the door and down into a basement level. There they came across another solid-looking door, this one protected by a key-pad attached to a lock. “I don’t know the combination so I can’t open the door. Can you?”
Silas considered. “Why can’t you ask the Professor?”
Hollis sighed. “He left a few days ago and we haven’t seen him since. He spoke with me just before he left, and he was acting oddly, so I’m more than a little concerned.”
“Before I go breaking into a man’s private space, I should know as much as possible about the situation. What can you tell me?”
Hollis looked deeply into Silas’ eyes. He was obviously considering his options, and whether he could trust this stranger. He weighed Silas’ refusal to hurt Ben and Alisha despite clear provocation, as well as the dire straits that he and those who followed him were in, and decided to take a chance.
“Okay,” he said, “but this may take a while.” He then led Silas back upstairs and into a room with evenly-spaced tables and chairs and a separate alcove set apart from the rest of the room. Within this alcove a couple of children, looking to be around 11-12 years old, were stationed and handing out packets to a handful of others. The tables held yet more children, including Ben and Alisha, who had torn into their packets and were eating rations with mild relish. Silas recognized these rations as long-lasting, slightly tasty, and created in the world before the Great Disaster.
Hollis and Silas took a set of rations, sat at a table a little apart from the others, and Hollis began his tale.

CHAPTER 5: COME THE CHILDREN
“This village was relatively large and successful,” Hollis explained. “Professor Saul lived and worked here for years. He established a lab and a medical office, taking care of people for miles around, beyond even this village.”
Silas remembered having established similar practices as cover for more clandestine efforts as a Seeker, as holding such a position allowed him to quickly become a trusted and valued member of any community, with a large degree of autonomy.
Hollis continued his story. “My parents brought me to him a few years ago because I didn’t seem to be developing normally. I was fifteen and hadn’t reached puberty yet, so they were concerned. He was very interested in my condition, and I ended up staying in the Village while he studied and attempted to treat me. Over time I became his assistant, learning from him while he studied me every chance he got. For some reason he seemed unable to help me, but he never stopped trying.”
“I soon overheard Professor Saul warn the village elders that he feared a great calamity coming in the form of a killer virus. He said that he’d been working on a vaccine, and wanted to inoculate everyone. While some were skeptical others trusted him. In this way large portions of this village, as well as outlying areas, received his vaccine.”
“I’m sure you know what happened a little less than two years ago,” Hollis said, “when Professor Saul’s prediction came horribly true. Mercifully it appeared that his vaccine worked. However, those who hadn’t been vaccinated changed, and had to be put down. Unfortunately they killed several of those who had been vaccinated in the process. The survivors gathered here. Then, for a time at least, things seemed to go back to normal.”
“So what happened to the adults?” Silas asked, “why aren’t they here?”
“They began leaving. At first a few, then all of them except for the Professor. Parents told their children that they had to go away for a while, but would see them again soon. They said that they had to go to keep us safe. I asked Professor Saul if I should leave too since, despite appearances, I am an adult. He said no, but didn’t explain why it was okay for me to stay when every other adult had already left.”
“Pretty soon the demarcation became clear: those who were pre-pubescent stayed, those who were at or beyond puberty left. I confronted the Professor about this and he confirmed it, but absolutely refused to explain it any further. He then told me that he’d been intentionally keeping my condition going, forestalling puberty as long as possible.”
“What!?” Silas exclaimed, drawing a few glances from the surrounding children, who then returned to what they had been doing, exhibiting the self-centeredness and lack of concern of the wider world common in the young. “How could he do that? It’s totally immoral!”
Hollis shrugged his shoulders. “I got the real sense that he was trying to protect me, but again he wouldn’t explain. I know that he kept running tests on me, and was very busy, but I’m not sure of his work beyond that. He became more and more secretive over time until he essentially froze me out of his work.”
“The Professor stayed here most of the time, though he gave over the responsibility of keeping the children in line largely to me. He taught us some things, like the ‘ambush game’ that brought you here, but most of the time he was in his lab. While he did leave fairly regularly, he always returned within a day.”
Silas broke in again. “When he left where did he go?”
Hollis shrugged. “I don’t know where he was going, but I did see him off, so I know what direction he was heading in.”
“Did he always go the same way?”
Hollis nodded.
“Was there anything different about this last time that he left? Did he act differently?” Silas asked.
Hollis nodded again. “I know that he was getting increasingly concerned and agitated. He seemed worried about the long-term effects of keeping me from reaching puberty, and some of the other kids are approaching that point as well. My condition made it somewhat better to keep me this way, but he didn’t know what would happen if he forced a similar delay on the others.”
Hollis paused. “I say that because it might explain why he was acting differently, but it also might not. The last couple of days that I saw him he seemed very upset. When I tried to talk to him he was less open than usual. He seemed almost frantic the last time I saw him. Also, he usually warned me that he was leaving so I’d know that I’d have to keep things together myself, but this time I didn’t know he’d gone until I went to his lab and he didn’t open up, and then Jamie, one of the children here, said she saw him leaving.”
Silas considered for a moment, determining his course of action in what was obviously a complex situation. While he wanted to go after the Professor, and sensed that time might be limited, he believed that he would need to gather all available information before he did.
“Unless there’s something else you can tell me, I think it’s time I saw his lab,” he told Hollis.
Hollis led Silas back to the door. “I don’t know the code. I’ve been trying to hack into the system, but it’s pretty complicated and the Professor didn’t teach me enough about computers for me to crack it. I can get the equipment I’ve been using if you want, and maybe you would have better luck.”
Silas examined the keypad closely. It was a complex and sophisticated system, with numbers going from 0 to 9. The potential combinations were literally endless, and while he might enjoy the challenge of accessing the system the way Hollis suggested, he had a strong sense that he didn’t have the time for such an indulgence.
Sophisticated and complex systems were necessarily less sturdy than solid wood and reinforced steel.
Silas stepped back and braced himself. He didn’t often advertise his strength, and tried not to depend on it as a solution very often, but in fact he was enormously strong. This was the result of the very genetic engineering that had ultimately spelled the end of the old world and placed humanity on the cusp of destruction. For Silas, however, the efforts to perfect humanity by introducing animal DNA had worked to perfection.
And so it was that as his leg lashed out like a pile-driver, aimed for a spot just above the lock attached to the key-pad, he was able to smash the door open, its frame splintering while its sturdy lock bent and twisted into uselessness.
Hollis blinked twice in quick succession, then looked at Silas out of the corners of his eyes, head tilted a fraction. “I thought you were going to do something smart to get in.”
Silas smiled. “Sometimes the smartest thing is to take the most direct approach.”
With that the mis-matched pair entered, and Silas prepared to confront the dark secrets in the room beyond.