Chapter 54
The Six Summons
Six summons came in an hour.
One from the hearing office. One from Helen. One from Bell’s internal auditor. One from a reporter. One from Priya’s studio owner. One unsigned note through the public mailbox.
Elise opened the unsigned note last.
This is not a warning. This is a schedule.
Six: one for you, one for the room.
At 11:17 in each case, don't answer the first summons.
She showed it to Mara and Bell.
Bell said, "Could be old trick."
Mara answered, "Could be too exact."
Priya read all summons and said the same thing:
At 11:17, the first summons is always the trap.
Their next move was to coordinate the public venue details and put every copy in one sealed layer.
At 3:00, they met in the station stair and rehearsed route entry.
Mara carried one legal folder and said, "If we split, which folder to whom?"
Priya answered, "You keep statement, Bell holds chain diagram, I keep witness timeline, Elise keeps room map."
Elise smiled because that sounded like a prayer disguised as logistics.
At 9:30, they delivered one folder to a neutral archive office and one to Helen.
The archive clerk asked for a copy of signatures. Bell hesitated.
"We have a redacted version," Priya said.
Clerk stamped and then said, "This room has been under review for weeks."
"Exactly," Elise said.
Later that night, the bus route outside the courthouse had one bus with no destination text.
Bell thought it was a prank.
Priya thought it was a warning.
Elise thought maybe they were preparing for a route block.
At 11:17 on the corridor clock, Elise received one final call from the unknown number:
If you obey all summons, you fail at room three.
"Room three?" she asked.
No response.
Mara grabbed the line, closed it, and said, "Then we obey none yet."
They filed two formal statements under provisional review instead:
- chain correction request;
- witness protection recommendation.
The hearing office accepted both and asked for signatures by noon.
Bell said, "There are six summons. We already responded to six with two only."
Priya nodded, "The others are traps."
Elise made tea and wrote:
Never obey process that asks for your name before it asks for proof.
Then she underlined one number: 6.
Not because she was superstitious, but because now every number had become a room and every room had become an index.