Wren was taken to a windowless interrogation room and mentally mapped her possible escape route based on the turns she had counted on the way in. Two Command personnel—Soldier Tyler Struck and Officer Xavier Ford—entered and sat across from her, soon followed by a third man Wren recognized as the attractive stranger from the inn, now in a navy Command uniform, who silently took position at the door.

Testing their defenses, Wren tried to probe their minds but found their shields exceptionally strong, leading her to conclude they were Silver Block trained. Struck immediately asked how Wren had incited eight minds at the execution. Wren denied involvement and feigned ignorance, insisting she was not Aberrant and that such control would be impossible. Ford pressed that Command had witnessed the incident and began using a mocking, probing tone.

When Wren accused them of killing her uncle, Struck showed her a tablet image and stated Jim was actually Colonel Julian Ash, a Silver Block officer who deserted after losing his unit at Sun Post, and claimed he was Aberrant. Wren rejected this, insisting he was Jim Darlington, a rancher, and not a deserter or Aberrant. Ford added that at the execution Jim’s arms had glowed, which Wren denied seeing.

Struck and Ford then reviewed Wren’s background, noting her records begin at age eight. Wren stuck to her established story that Jim found and adopted her after childhood trauma, with a clinician attributing her memory gaps to that trauma. The interrogators expressed skepticism, and Wren maintained that twelve years of living with Jim would have revealed any aberrant abilities if they existed.

They shifted tactics, grilling Wren for an extended period about ranch life to test her credibility; Wren answered confidently and with derision, describing experience consistent with ranching. Returning to the incitement, Wren argued that if she had been controlling minds in the crowd while wearing a tank top, someone would have seen the characteristic Aberrant glow.

Struck and Ford asserted that Jim’s identity was confirmed by fingerprint matches to Command files, though they admitted his Company prints had been altered. Wren outwardly refused to believe this, while inwardly taking comfort that her own records, created at age twelve, would not betray her past. When the pair ended the round of questioning, Wren demanded the silent man identify himself.

The silent soldier finally spoke, giving no name but stating, “I’m the one who decides whether you walk out of here alive,” making clear he held decisive authority over her fate.