After dealing with that ambush we quickly left the alleys, without letting the skirimish disturm my mind I quicky rerouted our path to London High-command.
We rejoined a waiting Etta, who looked from my slightly disheveled state to Diana's calm, powerful stance, but wisely said nothing.
We continued to the convention, a grand, stuffy hall filled with men in dark uniforms and thick-rimmed glasses. The air was heavy with cigar smoke and the scent of old paper.
Diana, to be fair, was reacting to a world she didn't understand. The entire concept of a crowded, loud city with no sense of open space was jarring for her.
She gasped at the sight of a woman in a tiny corset, her face a mask of discomfort. She had to be pulled away from a man speaking loudly and condescendingly to a younger officer, as she thought he was being treated unfairly.
It was a constant effort just to keep her from revealing who she really was.
To diffuse the situation and give her a name for the record, I quickly introduced her as Diana Prince, my other colleagues.
Inside the meeting, I stood before a table of senior British generals.
My hands trembled slightly as I laid out the contents of the diary I had stolen.
The log detailed a new type of poison gas, a vile weapon that could kill millions, and revealed that the gas masks in use were utterly useless against it. I saw their faces go pale as they read the damning evidence.
"Sir, this is a clear threat to the allied forces," I said, my voice filled with a conviction born of desperation. "We must act now. An attack on this facility could stop them before they perfect the weapon."
But to my horror, the lead general shook his head.
"We have it under control, Captain. There are ongoing negotiations for an armistice. A pre-emptive attack would be an act of war. It could compromise the entire treaty." His words were a bucket of ice water, a complete rejection of everything I had risked my life for.
'I must do something myself,' I thought, knowing there was no other way. "I propose a small, clandestine unit to take out Ludendorff's operation." My voice was a plea, but their faces were a wall of indifference.
They were not soldiers anymore; they were politicians, more concerned with diplomacy than with human lives.
"Dismissed, Captain," the general said, his voice flat. "That is not your place. You will comply with your orders."
Diana, who had been listening with quiet intensity, couldn't contain her outrage any longer. "How can you stand here and do nothing?! All the people you talked about—they will die!" she screamed, her voice echoing in the silent room.
I quickly grabbed her arm and pulled her out of the room before she caused a bigger scene, my heart pounding in my chest. I knew I was now on my own.
Time to go rogue, I thought. The fate of millions can't wait for bureaucracy.
The polished wooden door of the convention hall slammed shut behind us, cutting off the polite, stifling air of the military elite. Diana's face was a storm of fury and confusion. Her voice, usually so calm and melodic, was a roar.
"Why didn't you stand your ground and fight?!" she yelled, her eyes blazing with a righteous fire I'd never seen in a human before.
I took a deep, steadying breath, my own composure a carefully constructed shield. "Because there was no chance of changing his decision," I replied, the words flat and professional.
"You don't argue with a stone wall. You go around it." I had learned a long time ago that you couldn't fight a system that didn't want to be fought. You had to outsmart it.
"But the millions of people you talked about... they will die!" she said, her voice dropping to a desperate, aching whisper.
Her words were a physical force, stopping me dead in my tracks. It was a truth I had lived with every day, a fear that had haunted my dreams.
I turned to face her, the cold, analytical part of my brain giving way to something more raw. "No, they won't," I said, my voice firm. "I'll stop Ludendorff myself."
A flicker of disbelief crossed her face. "You mean... you were lying?" she asked, her voice quiet but sharp with accusation. The weight of my deception hung in the air between us.
"Yes," I admitted, the word a bitter taste on my tongue. "It was a spy's last resort. Sometimes, you have to say what they need to hear to get what you want."
"How do I know you're not lying to me right now?" she asked, her gaze searching, full of a pain that was both new and ancient. The sacred trust between us, so recently formed, felt as if it were crumbling.
Without a word, I reached for her lasso, the golden cord that had bound me to the truth before. I took the end, a rope made of pure light, and wrapped it around my own wrist.
The cord tightened, and a low, burning sensation coursed through my arm, a physical manifestation of the truth being forced from my soul. I looked into her eyes and spoke.
"I am taking you to the front," I said, the words coming out with a brutal honesty that was not my own. "We are probably going to die. This is a terrible idea."
The truth was a painful, searing thing. It stripped away all pretense, all bravado. It exposed the raw, terrifying reality of our mission. I quickly untied the rope, the warmth of the lasso leaving my wrist with a final, lingering burn.
My confession, though compelled by the lasso, was a promise. She had her answer, and I had my true path. We were going to war, and we were doing it together.
With my intentions now clear, I had to move fast. There was no time for formal requests or military protocol. I knew I couldn't do this alone.
So I set about to gather small unit, a group of men I knew who had seen enough of the world to know when to bend the rules and break them entirely.