Almost immediately after I arrived back in the new present, I began to hear stories that scare me. The first time I heard her name, I almost laughed. Zyra had come to visit, and she looked so much different, more beautiful but more reserved, and there were stress lines all over her face.
I hugged her for a long time, and when I pulled away she gave me a funny look. She was probably wondering why I did that. I hadn't yet found the time to tell her about my time-traveling adventure and everything that had happened, but I figured I needed to soon. I knew I had changed things in the future, but I had no idea how much until we sat down to dinner with dad and they began talking.
"So, how was your day, Zyra?" Dad asked, a concerned look on his face. I turned to look at Zyra, wondering if she had a hard case she was working on. Often, Zyra did Pro Bono cases, and then she would come home sad, because of how much the underprivileged were treated.
Thinking that was the case, I was about to put my arm around her for a hug, when she shook her head. "Keeping him safe has been such a big deal. Just yesterday, we discovered that one of his new aides, someone we had vetted and I personally interviewed, has turned out to be a traitor."
I glance between the both of them, trying to follow the conversation, but it was confusing. What on Lunar could Nina have to do with keeping anyone safe?
"It is not your fault, Zyra," Dad replied. "I know things look pretty hard right now, but it will get better."
"Of course it's my fault!" she burst out. Zyra was usually the more emotional of the both of us, but seeing her flare up that way shocked me more than anything. Seeing her breakdown in tears as the words started gushing out made me hurt.
"Of course, it's my fault. He appointed me as Chief of Staff, and I allowed someone to infiltrate his private life so closely that he could have been killed at any point. I feel like I'm not good at my job. How am I supposed to keep him safe if I can't even take care of something as little as an appointment?
The threats from Naira are growing daily. I'm so afraid of what that woman could do, what she's planning. The aide had been sending her secret information about where the General would be at any point in time." She paused, wiping her eyes with the back of her hands.
That made me realize that I had been staring at the both of them, dumbfounded. Muttering an excuse, I walked to the bathroom to get wipes. Zyra was Chief of Staff of the General? That was shocking enough. There was something else going on, something that was scaring my cousin, and I needed to find out what it was. Taking the box of wipes out, I walked back to the dining room and handed them over to Zyra. She gave me a thankful glance and nod, then cleaned up her face.
"Okay," I said, realizing that they had both stopped talking. "I need you both to please clear up some things for me. You mentioned something about Naira, and the name does sound very familiar, but then you said something about her infiltrating the General's office, and so I want some clarity on all of that."
Zyra shot me a strange look. "But Sigma, we talked about a lot of this on the phone like a week ago. Plus, you always follow the news, especially since Naira began her campaigns and stuff."
Dad and I exchanged glances, and then her expression changed. "Wait, there is something going on here that I don't know about, isn't it?" Zyra asked.
I nodded. "I'd rather not go into it right now. I will tell you," I added when she looked hurt. "I promise I'll tell you, Zyra. Later on, in private." There were things about my research that I felt only comfortable enough to share with her. Despite the fact that I had forgiven my father for everything he did and said, and I knew he wasn't the same man, not in this present, it was still hard for me to let him know a lot about me. I had this secret fear that he would go back to being the way he used to be.
"Alright." She looked happier already. "So what do you want to know?"
"Who is this Naira person? I mean, I do know if one Naira, I think her name is Naira Hill-Adega or something like that." At Zyra's nod, I knew my face went blank with shock. "Wait, I don't think I'm getting you very well. You mean she's the person you have been talking about all along?"
"Why are you acting like you don't get all of this stuff?" Zyra asked. She looked perplexed, and I didn't want to go into all of the details yet. Finally, I asked if we could meet for lunch the next day.
Dad was silent, only watching us. I agreed, and then we dropped the topic, talking about other things that had been happening. Zyra told me she'd met a good guy, but the amount of work she had on her plate due to the security problems didn't let her have time to go out with anyone.
I consoled her, silently making up my mind that I had to go and do some deep research into exactly what was going on right now. The way Zyra and Dad spoke, it seemed like things were really terrible, and that scared me.
Perhaps, my going back into the past hadn't been the best recourse after all.