After just enough time for Korven to grab a cup of coffee, she was called into the meeting room to talk to Silia. As he walks over to grab a seat in the almost-empty room, he strikes two guards and Silia. She notices that, although she doesn't know what Silia looks like, the aura given off by the woman she is to talk to is completely different from what she remembers Silia as.
Even though Silia is a shapeshifter, Korven assumed she would recognize her as soon as she saw her, no matter what form she takes.
"Silia is an assassin, so it is completely within reason to assume that the scared act she did with me was just a cover-up to gain pity from me." Korven thinks, reflecting on Silia's look
"This form seems perfect for prison, just like how taking my form was the best way to get pity from me. Maybe she lied about how her ability worked to get me to spare her; it's what I would have done." She continues.
The man she bribed to hold the meeting pulls a chair from Korven and reminds them of the time limit.
"Because this is an unregistered meeting, keep it brief and within 10-15 minutes, okay?"
Silia shrugs, and Korven looks at her, making a gesture with her head telling him to give them privacy. The man walks out of listening range as Korven starts an imaginary stopwatch.
The woman in front of her looks nonchalant, leaning back on her chair with her feet on the table. Ask Korven attempts to start a conversation. This Silia looks at her, confused, and asks,
"Who are you?"
Korven responds,
"You don't recognize me?"
Both of them look at each other in awkward confusion. Silia's deep voice surprises Korven, as she can't remember if Silia, when taking Korven's form, stole her voice as well.
"I was told my girlfriend was visiting. I don't have a girlfriend, but I still thought I would know who you are." This Silia responds.
"You don't recognize me?" Korven asks
"Am I supposed to? Are you my dealer's sister? You remind me of her, what does Szlee wan't know, I'm clean, you know?" This Silia responds in a way that Korven begins to question her own deductive reasoning.
"Look, Silia, I know there are probably many reasons why you don't want to talk to me, but I assure you that no one is listening, and if you help me, we can take down Aldrick together," Korven says, assuming she is talking to the Silia she previously met.
Korven visits her internal stopwatch, which is now at four minutes and 10-20 seconds.
"Aldrick Yyelter?" This Silia asks,
"I'm not involved with that cult at all, you've got the wrong gal."
Korven's internal stopwatch is now four and a half minutes in,
"C'mon, we don't have that much time, can you just tell me any evidence that Aldrick hired you? It's not much, but a connection with an assassin like you would send him to prison." Korven says,
"I told her too much. What if she still works for him?" Korven thinks, regretting her decision almost immediately after saying it,
"She might not even be the same Silia," she continues.
With the internal stopwatch at 5 minutes, Korven rushes to Silia for a response,
"Assassin? Aldrick Yyelter? What world are you living in? I'm in here for drug possession."
This response stops Korven in her tracks, looking around the room while trying to think of the next thing to say,
"Wait, you're not the miracle-Born who tried to kill me?" Korven asks.
This silia raises her hand, signalling for the guard to come back in while saying,
"I thought I was the drug addict, you sound insane, you know? If I were a Miracle-Born, I wouldn't be in here, you know, I would be living the high life among the rich in Qyn district."
The guard, by now, had entered the room, forcing Korven to be unable to give an actual response.
"What's wrong, ma'ams?" the guard says
With her internal stopwatch already at 7 minutes, Korven tries to quickly get them to leave so she can continue her interrogation, but to her surprise, Silia responds to the guards.
"Tell this crazy woman to leave me alone. I don't know her, and she's making me uncomfortable." She says,
"Fine, I'll leave," Korven says to Silia
"Not like she was any help," she continues while looking at the guard.
One guard escorts Korven out, while the other walks Silia back to the prison.
Disappointingly, the guard looks at Korven and asks,
"The reunion didn't work out?"
"Something like that," Korven responds, exiting back to the waiting room.
After thanking the man who had helped her secure the visit, Korven walks safely out of the building to reflect, still unsure if she was actually talking to a confused woman or the real Silia (be it a good liar).
"I could never trust the word of an assassin, but she did sound convincing enough. Maybe I'm seeing this the wrong way," she thinks,
After a few minutes of silent reflection, Korven remembers something that confused her during the visit: Silia's voice. As soon as Korven remembers this small detail, she grabs a hold of her pinky finger, imagines her apartment the day Silia broke in, and-
SNAP
With that, Korven is transported back into her apartment that day, the day she fought Silia. After admiring how quickly she defeated someone she couldn't even see, Korven watches Silia's invisibility fade as she begs for her mercy.
Looking back, Korven is shocked at how perfect the transformation was, with Silia mimicking every part of her body, even the bruises and cuts from the fight. Even though the physical transformation is perfect, Korven notices what she was looking for.
Silia's voice.
While the Silia she visited had a deep, manly voice, when Silia was begging for mercy, she didn't sound like Korven at all. Silia's voice was much softer and higher-pitched than her own.
"She can't copy voices!" Korven says, as she is transported back to the present as if nothing ever happened.
"That means that the woman I visited wasn't the real Silia at all, just someone with the same name!"
Korven's celebration at finding out the truth is quickly left meaningless as she discovers something wrong,
"If that wasn't her, then where is the real Silia?"
Korven exhales a sigh of disappointment and places another finger into her palm. She closes her eyes, half an embrace for the pain, and half to picture the moment that the man from the desk opened the door.
SNAP
Korven breaks another finger and is immediately transported to the memory, with the door to the room labelled private open, she can float in, watching as the man shuffles through private paperwork.
Even though she herself had not set foot in the private room, because for a split second she had seen the inside, she could now look through the room thoroughly. Even though she cannot physically interact with any part of the room, Korven can still look through the paperwork.
Because the pain inflicted was so strong, she can stay in this memory for 5 minutes before being forced back to reality; these time limits are the reason Korven had developed such an impeccable internal stopwatch.
After two minutes of floating around the room, Korven discovers an earlier report, one about new inmates on the female side of the prison—a list from exactly two weeks ago.
"Silia should be on this," Korven thinks as she reads the paper,
And there it is, at the bottom of the paper, the name Silia, not Silia Flien, just Silia, Silia on a piece of official paperwork, next to a dozen full government names, Silia was just Silia.
"That must be her," Korven thinks.
Like a ghost, she floats to another list, a list of every single inmate in the female prison, a list updated last week, yet the only Silia there was Silia Flien.
"How is it possible that Silia was admitted into this prison, yet only a week later, she is completely gone?" Korven questions
With the last minute of time Korven has in her memory, she finds the final piece of paper, one held by the man who was previously helping her. Korven pauses the memory's movement so she can read the piece of paper.
"Another list," She says, while reading the paper
"Transfers in and out of the prison," it says
"Dated from the last 3 weeks," Korven notes
Korven reads the paper, and to her surprise, Silia is nowhere to be found, as if she had vanished.
"But even someone who vanishes as Korven would still be documented," Korven says.
By now, Korven is back in the present, wandering a street she doesn't recognize but is far too distracted by Silia's disappearance.
Korven puts the three pieces of evidence together,
"She was admitted to the prison with no last name, then all evidence of her existence is gone, like the prison is hiding her."