Operation Honey Trap vs The Emperor of the Apocalypse-Chapter 199: Delphi Capitulates

Delphi was struggling to make herself understood through her veil and she realised she was out of practise. Communicating while your mouth was covered was much harder.

"I need to speak with your commanding officer. It’s urgent," she tried again with the young blond soldier at the front desk.

"Miss, I’m not going to fetch the boss for some random woman who walks in off the street and says she wants to talk to him," the man said rudely.

"I have critical information. It’s urgent. I won’t share it with anyone except the most senior officer at these barracks. Pass that message on to him and see what he says."

"What’s it about?" the lad said sceptically, looking her up and down with the hungry eyes she was getting used to seeing from men outside the palace walls.

"It relates to what happened to the Emperor in the capital. And that’s all I’m willing to say until your Commander gets here."

"What could you possibly know about that?" he said scornfully. "Go on, get out of here!" he waved at her, deciding she must be a nutcase.

It was a pity, ’cause she was clearly a looker under that veil. He wondered idly if she was married. Where was her husband if she was? How bad could it be to marry a psycho if they were as hot as this babe?

She sat back down on the chair in the waiting area and folded her arms implacably, clearly settling in.

"I’ll wait as long as it takes for him to come and see me."

"You certainly will not be doing that on my watch, girl!"

The man strode out from behind the desk he was supposedly ’serving the public’ over and made to grip her by the arm.

Delphi whipped out her combat dagger from under her jilbab and brandished it at him, keeping him from touching her.

"I don’t want to have to hurt you, little boy. Just fetch your commander please," she said with a steely glint in her eye.

The young man rushed back behind the reception desk and pressed a panic button, which set off a loud silver alarm bell hanging on the wall.

Delphi remained where she was, despite the ear-splitting noise. She yawned widely behind her veil. She was feeling the effects of yesterday’s huge ride and then sneaking off while she was on guard duty before she’d had a chance to get a proper sleep.

She felt guilty for leaving while she was meant to be guarding the team as they slept, but it couldn’t be helped. There were innocent lives being lost every day at Squeaking Point, which she could save simply by handing herself in, and there was no way she was going to cower in safety while non-combatants were executed in her name.

Men started to run about the barracks like headless chooks, coming in and out of the reception area and shouting at one another in complete disarray.

What a poorly trained lot, she thought scornfully. It didn’t bode well for their commander, who mustn’t be very good at his job to have trained them so poorly.

Finally, armed men started to converge on the reception area as the source of the alarm, where the fellow who had pressed it was pointing at her and shouting something about she was a psycho who had a machete.

The man couldn’t even distinguish a combat dagger from a machete! It seemed like they had plucked him straight from his classroom desk at high school and put him in an army uniform, with no training in between the two events. Cannon fodder for sure...

A more senior soldier who looked to be a sergeant, approached her cautiously, his hands outstretched to show her he meant no harm.

"Turn that alarm off!" he roared at his subordinates.

Blessed silence.

"Now, miss, Harry over there says you’ve got a machete. Is that right?"

"Good morning, Sergeant," she replied calmly. "I do have a dagger on me, yes. But I certainly don’t plan to use it. As I told baby Harry over there, I have important information in relation to the injury of the Emperor in the capital, but I won’t pass it on to anyone except your commanding officer. I intend to stay here until you take me to see him, or he comes to me, one or the other."

"And why do you have a knife, young lady?"

"I carry a dagger for self-defence, like many young women. I pulled it out under duress, only when that simpleton tried to lay hands on me and drag me out of your reception," she spoke patiently.

The sergeant glared over his shoulder at Harry, who ducked under the counter like he was looking for something.

"Your name, miss?" the Sergeant asked her politely.

"I’ll tell that to your commanding officer. It’s part of the intelligence I intend to share, but only with the most senior officer you have at these barracks."

He sighed, sensing he wasn’t going to get anywhere with her without meeting her request. In hindsight, he should just have pretended he was the commander.

"I will ask the Commander if he’ll see you, but I’m not making any promises. We’ll have to forcibly eject you if he doesn’t want to talk to you," he warned.

"That sounds fair," she nodded her approval.

The man disappeared and baby Harry stood back up from his long activity under the reception counter and glared at her with his bright blue eyes. It was like being flogged with a warm lettuce...

"It’s hardly my fault that you overreacted like that," she said indifferently.

He wanted to curse at her, but thought he’d better wait until the Commander’s reaction was clear before he got himself into any more hot water.

"Who else’s fault could it be but the hot psycho with a machete?" he satisfied himself with an angry mutter under his breath.

She caught most of his insult, and she raised her eyebrows at the man. Definitely a natural blonde, she thought...

Before long the Sergeant returned. "This way please, Miss."

She followed him past the scowling Harry, up the stairs of the former mill to the office of the Commander. 𝒇𝙧𝙚𝓮𝔀𝓮𝒃𝙣𝓸𝒗𝒆𝒍.𝙘𝒐𝒎

The Sergeant knocked on the door. "Sir, may we come in?"

"Yes, come in," the Commander replied.