Chapter 17.
Hannah Wagner notes the camera angle without looking at it. She notes the speaker direction. The air movement when the door closes. The tiny delay between a sound and the moment it reaches her ears—small, wrong details that tell her this room is not what it pretends to be.
The man across the desk reminds her of a teacher back home.
Franz Muller. Herr Muller, to Hannah.
He even has the glasses perched perilously close to the end of his nose the way Herr Muller did when he would lean forward across his desk to address the class.
“You seem nervous,” the man says.
Hannah can’t help herself—she keeps waiting for him to lapse into a thick German accent.
“I’m not nervous,” she says. “I’m observing.”
His mouth twitches. Not quite a smile. “Lying will not get you where you want to go. Is it because you are always so young relative to almost everyone around you?” he says gently.
“I’m not lying,” Hannah says. “If I were nervous, you’d already know.”
“There is no reason for you to be nervous in here, as long as you are answering my questions honestly,” the man continues. “We just want you to be yourself. Your best self, ideally.” He studies her wristband. “Why are you here, Hannah?”
She doesn’t give him the easy answer right away. She knows he wants it. Money. Ambition. A sob story. Something he can label.
“I’m not nervous. But. I want this so much,” she says, playing the type he’s clearly expecting. “More than I should.”
The man smiles.
“So much money at stake,” he says. “Completely understandable.”
Hannah shakes her head. “Money is a tool,” she says. “It’s not the point.”
“Then what is?” he asks.
Hannah’s voice stays even, but her eyes burn. “We’re running out of time,” she says. “We act like we have forever. We don’t.”
She forces herself to slow down. Control. Don’t give him a performance.
“You sound convinced,” he says.
“It’s not just wars all across the globe destroying us,” she says. “Or famines. Or disease. We’re destroying everything, from the air we breathe to our oceans and forests and wildlife.”
Another deep breath. Deeper than before. Hannah doesn’t want to appear too emotional, worried about how she will be judged if she is.
“We’re voluntarily taking poison on a daily basis.” She stands. “It’s all connected. Systems. Incentives. Denial. Somebody has to do something to convince people to stop before it’s too late.”
She takes a breath and sits down. “I’m sorry.”
“You did get a little loud, but that’s okay,” he says, writing a note.
“People listen when something is loud enough,” she says. “When it’s undeniable. When it changes their day. Their habits. Their excuses.”
“And you think you can be that loud,” he says, “even at your age?”
Hannah is prepared for the question. Really, she’s been expecting it.
“Age doesn’t decide who people follow,” she says. “Clarity does.”
She gets nothing back but silence.
“My country produced a man named Hermann Hesse,” Hannah says. “And he once wrote that every beginning holds magic.” She pauses and adds, “He wrote nothing of age limits on the magic.”
The man’s tone stays gentle. “And if you’re wrong?”
Hannah’s answer is immediate. “Then we lose everything.”