Chapter Two - Part 1

"Lets take a small conference space at the far wall." Kilo gestured in that general direction as best as he could holding on to his lunch tray.

I had my dinner on my tray, such as it was, I really wasn't that hungry. I was more tired than anything else and just wanted to get our meet over with.

We navigated the main lunchroom to the small room setting our trays on the little cafeteria table inside; Kilo shut the door after us.

This was more to keep our conversation from the ears of the lower level Grinders that might be getting interviewed than anyone else, and though there were only two cameras in this room it still wasn't private.

Before I sat down I pulled my com link out of my shirt and set it on the table. Kilo said, "You look beat Kid... you taken care of yourself?"

"Yeah... just tired, maybe a little stressed with this new stuff you been telling me about."

"It is gonna get quite a bit weirder..."

I looked at him as I sat down trying to figure what he meant, he said, "Lets eat first I am very hungry... this is actually my lunch, missed breakfast because of you." he laughed.

As we ate he seemed pre-occupied with the computing on his com link, he grunted once messing with the keys, and looked disgusted with something on the screen. I asked, "You need help with that old man?" I liked ribbing him; he actually appeared only four or five years older than me.

He stopped what he was doing with his rig, and even stopped chewing his food for a second, before transferring his look of contempt to me. Then grinning he started chewing his food again and shook his head no. He then held up his right index finger in the air then pointed to his mouth before swallowing.

He glanced at the camera behind me to my right and then did something I have never seen before... while he was kind of still chewing seemed to "mouth" words other than the words I heard, he said, "I just disabled the camera behind you, keep watching me talk because your supposed to be a little freaked by what us Flushers can do when we do this with our mouths."

I must have looked really freaked because he started laughing pretty hard.

His laughter ended and he continued, "Kid, you know what Flushers do normally. We look for dissenters in all branches of government, when we find them they just go away as far as you’re concerned."

He was watching me watch his mouth, I heard him, and I was taking in the intel, but this was something that was fascinating to see.

He kept the information coming, "Most of the time when a Grinder is confronted as you are now with a potential status change. I tell him or her, about the camera being disabled behind them and tell them to keep watching me to gain their confidence."

He paused to get my reaction I guess, but I was still kind of shocked so he waited a moment and took another bite of food before he continued, "These meetings can go a lot of different directions with a lot of different subjects... most go on as Program Developers, or Grinders, or whatever. Most stay in the system, no problem... some are sent to work outside as disposables, these are the ones who "just go away", and they work with robot recovery in the field until they are... well, usually, killed by the enemy."

"You little brother, are different."