She froze when it approached and spun around, ready for an attack. She relaxed when she saw an automatic cleaning robot slipped past her. She chuckled. She put her hand on the holo-plate. The genetically modified handprint was scanned and, after a moment, shone green and the lock in the powerful door clicked open. She smiled grimly for herself when she pulled up the door and disappeared.
* * *
Umbra stopped outside Dagmar's apartment and listened. She could hear voices from within. She pulled up a miniaturized magnetic apparatus and placed it on the lock, it clicked, and she smiled when she opened the door and walked in. She stopped in the hallway to make sure no one heard her come in.
She moved through the apartment as she heard two women talking. Her gaze slid over the paintings on the walls and she could see that they were expensive. She stopped by before doorframe to the living room. She looked down to the floor and saw a microscopic rift between two parts of the parquet. If she walked there, the floor would creak. She was not moving. The conversation between two women continued.
"What were they for treasures?"
Umbra listened to Dagmar telling about the story she read in the diary. Her earpiece recorded everything she heard and knew that Arik would go through the recording meticulously when he got it. She could barely wait to see his satisfied mine when she delivered the women, the three eggs and all parts to the key.
"There were three of the lost Fabergé-eggs. For some reason, someone had managed to catch not only one or two but three of them. The box that James and the other two found. But the real treasure was in the eggs. "
"What?"
"A key. Or, rather, a key in three parts and each part was hidden in one of the eggs. "
"A key to what?"
Dagmar did not respond immediately but Umbra heard that she got up. She took a few steps and pulled out a box. She heard how she was looking for something.
"Here it is."
She heard steps.
"It's your grandfather's diary. Read it, it explains a lot. "
A few seconds elapsed while Maja flipped through the book.
"Can’t you give me the short version? It seems that my grandfather liked to write. "
Dagmar chuckled.
"The short version? Well, I can. "She paused," apparently there may be hidden terraforming-machines hidden on several of the celestial bodies in our solar system. "
Maja's voice was faltering.
"What?"
Dagmar chuckled again.
"Read the diary. It explains it much better than I can. "
Copenhagen, Denmark
March 17, 2049
She was the shadow. Umbra slid forward into the doorway. Dagmar and Maja instinctively turned to the movement and stared at the woman in front of them. They rose hastily and the fruit bowl on the table wobbled.
"Who are you?"
Umbra smiled. Her face was hard.
"I'm the shadow."
Dagmar wrinkled her forehead.
"What?"
Umbra took a step forward and the parquet floor creaked under her feet.
"I've come to take the Fabergé eggs."
Dagmar's face hardened, and her mouth became a thin stripe.
"No, never in my life. " She paused, "Over my dead body."
Umbra snorted.
"That can be arranged."
Maja, who flabbergasted followed the conversation, placed her hand on her mother's shoulder.
"Wait, it's not worth it."
Maja noticed how every muscle in her mother’s body tensed. Her heart was almost about to jump out of her body and she forced herself to take a deep breath. Dagmar hissed, as much to Maja as to Umbra.
"Never. It's mine, mine. I’ll never just give it away to someone else. "
Umbra nodded towards Maja.
"Listen to your daughter. This is not worth dying for. Just give me the box and you'll never see me again. "
Maja studied the woman in front of them, she was beautiful, with eyes that sparkled green and she moved softly like a panther. The woman seemed to have all the weight on the front of her feet, ready to attack any second. But there was also something else with her, something undefinable. Maja looked straight at the woman's face, but she could not really see her face. It was like there something in the way, a kind of thin veil that concealed the features. Maja blinked to focus but it changed nothing when she again squinted at the woman. She swallowed hard, she had never experienced anything like that. She whispered.
"Who are you?"
Umbra smiled again and snorted.
"Enough now, give me the box so I disappear. I won’t say it again. " She took a new, threatening step towards them.
Maja noticed that Dagmar had begun to regain her composure. Time started to go slower when the woman came against them and she gasped. Dagmar quickly bent down and tore the fruit knife out of the bowl and held it in front of her. Her voice was raspy with anger.
"Get the hell out of here before something bad happens to you."
Umbra looked in amazement at Dagmar and then burst out laughing.
"That’s good, your old hag." She fell quiet and her smile faded, "as you want. You had your choice. "
Maja let go of her grip on Dagmar as she bowed down and gasped when the woman disappeared. It was like magic, one second, she was on the other side of the coffee table, In the next, she stood on it. Maja could not believe her eyes when the woman held Dagmar's arm in an iron grip. Dagmar's hand still held the knife, but it pointed straight up and could not do any harm. Dagmar started screaming when the woman lifted her off the floor. The knife fell and hit the coffee table and settled on the floor. Maja was as frozen to ice when Dagmar's screams echoed her head.
She threw herself up and started beating the woman to make her release Dagmar. Dagmar continued screaming when the woman lifted her even higher and finally twisted her arm out of the socket. A revolting, shattering sound was heard, and Dagmar's voice went up another octave when pain cut through her body. Maja had never heard a human sound the way Dagmar did. A jarring, blaring sound. As a dying animal. Maja banged harder against the woman and her hand met the woman’s cheek. Her head was thrown back by the impact and she released her grip on Dagmar as screaming fell onto the floor between the coffee table and the couch.
Umbra turned her blazing eyes to Maja and before she had time to do something, Umbra struck her. She stumbled backward, and her footing caught on the coffee table leg and she fell to the floor. Dagmar still screamed but Maja's whole world swirled when her head hit the floor. Her field of vision became smaller and narrower when darkness crawled closer. The last thing she heard before the darkness enveloped her was her mother's panic-stricken voice that was begging for mercy.
* * *
Umbra gazed down at the dead body but felt nothing special. Dagmar's face was distorted in a grimace and her tongue pierced her mouth. Umbra squatted in front of her and studied the face. She let her gaze glide over the body. It was a strange feeling, only a few minutes ago, Dagmar had been alive, but now life had left her and now the body was lax in front of her. It had always fascinated her. Life and death. Two sides of the same coin.
She rose and walked over to Maja. Her breathing seemed shallow and she moaned when Umbra touched her. Well, she was still lived. She walked over to the metal box and smiled to herself. Bingo. It looked just like it has been described to her. She placed her hands on it. It was cold under her fingers. It seemed to be unlocked and she carefully opened the lid. She chuckled when she saw the two beautiful Fabergé-eggs. She picked one up and weighed it in her hand. She gently opened it and saw a small, luminous part lying hidden in the egg. She nodded.
"That was one." She repeated the procedure with the second egg, "and that was two."
She put the eggs back and closed the lid. Maja had awakened and crept slowly to her mother. Umbra saw tears flowing down Maja's cheeks.
"Mom, Mom!"
She watched when Maja struggled to crawl up to he
r mother's body. Maja laid her arm around Dagmar's shoulders and tried to lift her head but failed. Umbra walked over to Maja and sat down on her knees next to her.
"She is dead. There's nothing you can do. "
Maja sobbed when she realized that her mother was not breathing. She lifted her arm to hit Umbra, but her movements were weak, and her arm fell. Umbra smiled condescendingly at her.
"But don’t you worry any more about her. She's in a better place now. I have the treasure and you're going to come with me. "
Maja stared at Umbra.
"What?"
Umbra nodded, as much for Maja as to herself.
"Yes, it's best that you come with it, after all, it was your grandfather who found the treasure and it could be that you have to be there when the parts to the key are put together."
Maja continued staring at Umbra.
"What are you talking about?"
Umbra nodded against the metal box on the coffee table. Her voice was sincere.
"That. It contains both the Fabergé-eggs and the two parts to the keys. Didn't you know? "
Maja lied and shook her head but regretted it in the same second. The pain made her nauseous and she swallowed hard not to be sick.
"No, I didn't know."
Umbra studied her.
"It seems like your mother kept a lot of secrets for you, right?" She paused, "Not to worry, my dear. I have found the third egg and the third part of the key. "
Maja tried to process what Umbra said to her but her entire world spun in circles and she vomited.
Copenhagen, Denmark
March 17, 2049
He walked down the metal stairs and looked around. Countless different automatic transport loaders navigated within the bright-yellow lines which constituted Kastrup loading area. Invisible hands safely controlled them in a steady stream and routed them to their proper destination.
While Jonathan watched, a smaller caravan of loaders drove after each other, swung around caudal on a FedEx transport airplane and drove up through the cargo doors. The huge doors were wide-open and the first loader drove up to the opening in the cavernous airplane and began off-loading crates.
A short man came running towards him and his mouth was moving. Jonathan did not hear what the man said and shrugged. The man came closer and tried once more.
"Jonathan Jarl?"
Jonathan nodded.
"Yes, that's me."
The man was dressed in a dark uniform and a walkie-talkie was stuck onto his chest. The man spoke into it while he watched Jonathan.
"He's here. I have arranged the car and I’ll show him the way."
"How far?"
The man motioned to Jonathan for him to follow.
"Not that far. We are just going through the security check, then I take you down to the garage where the car is. I talked to Marie an hour ago. "
Jonathan smiled.
"Lead the way."
Barely ten minutes later, Jonathan got behind the wheel and put his hand on the dark panel. The car indicated that it started. Jonathan picked up the holo-plate which was placed on the passenger seat. He glanced through the latest update that Marie had sent.
Shortly after 18:00, a call from Dagmar's apartment was connected to us. The call was received by Dolores who connected it to the command center. The call appears to have been opened by Dagmar and three different voices were heard. We have identified two of them with certainty. Dagmar and her daughter Maja. The third voice also belongs to a woman and we are working on identifying it, but it is with all certainty the woman who goes by the name Umbra.
The car drove up from the underground parking garage and set a course towards inner Copenhagen and Dagmar's apartment. A quiet rain had begun to fall but Jonathan did not notice it when he continued reading.
The trail after Umbra have been visible in Spain, Morocco, last Helder Ster outside of Johannesburg and now in Copenhagen. On all three previous sites, a murder was carried out in mysterious circumstances without the police being able to trace any suspects. At the murder in Spain, however, the police managed to collect a DNA sample that they suspect belongs to the killer. And most recently, at the murder of a Japanese journalist, another DNA sample was found that after detailed analysis proved to be the same. Europol has put together a secret temporary working group the task of finding and capturing the clones of Tabula Rasa who managed to escape and, in that connection, has been given access to the DNA registers that a couple of doctors at Tabula Rasa used to document their illegal experiments. In that registry they found a DNA profile was found to be consistent with the collected DNA samples.
Jonathan chuckled. So, it was it one of the clones from Tabula Rasa who had almost killed him? Memories from the struggle a few months earlier where he managed to kill both Adam, who was a clone, and John Vendrick III who injected himself with Illegal steroids and hormones to develop himself into superhuman flickered past. He continued reading.
Umbra was born as part of triplets, all girls. But the other two girls died in unclear circumstances when they were young, so Umbra grew up alone. She was taught early on to call John Vendrick III her father. What we were able to understand from the cloning twins and triplets that the two Doctors Ln'Geem and Weng-Li developed at Tabula Rasa was that they had an extremely close relationship with their siblings. And on those occasions when a sibling died, several different psychological problems appeared in the remaining sibling. The symptoms were diffuse and not easily defined. Some of the reports mention symptoms such as developing psychotic traits. Some lost the ability to empathy and compassion.
Others talked about how they began to hear voices that commanded them to perform various actions. From a report that seems to be about three girls who were triplets, and were two of them died, was that the survivor developed some unexpected abilities. She developed a hitherto unknown ability that she was able to control the optic nerve of a person she met. The girl could thus, through an unknown mechanism, gain access to the optic nerve where she could influence it so that the person in question could not see her as she approached. This type of ability is previously unknown in the history of medicine, so there is no concept of how such an ability may be in real life.
Jonathan nodded thoughtfully. It explained a lot, that's why it seemed that Umbra looked to vibrate. She had somehow influenced his optic nerve and made him unable to focus on her properly as she moved towards him. He contemplated what he just read.
After a while he noticed a weak, unpleasant feeling growing within him. Umbra had been inside his head and taken control of his body in the most intimate way that was conceivable. He looked down at his hands and noticed that they trembled slightly. Probably Umbra's effect on him could explain some of the discomforts he felt but he also knew that his body had responded directly to the painkillers he had received before. He cursed himself that he had not been more vigilant.
He pushed away those thoughts, looked up and saw how fat raindrops slide to the side while the windscreen wipers pushed them sideways. The car swung off the highway and Jonathan laid down the reading plate on the passenger seat.
Less than five minutes left for Dagmar's apartment. Jonathan said a quiet prayer that Umbra would still be there.
* * *
He gasped. There. Jonathan recognized the figure that came out of the gate. It was a woman in dark clothing who carried something heavy. Rain still came down hard, so he could not with one hundred percent certainty identify the woman as Umbra.
Jonathan carefully watched when the woman walked up to a parked car and walked around to the trunk. He could not see what it was the woman carried and leaned forward to see. The windscreen wiper moved rhythmically by and shoved off the water and in the same moment the woman swung around to lay down the object she was carrying in the trunk. He saw her face and his heart skipped a beat. It was Umbra. The shapeless object that Umbra carried over the shoulder suddenly appeared to be alive and seemed to move. He froze. The object must be either Dagmar or Da
gmar's daughter, he could not be sure of which.
Umbra stopped just before she would toss in the person in the trunk and Jonathan saw how she seemed to argue with herself. She looked to change her mind and instead walked around to the rear right passenger door. The trunk closed automatically. Jonathan's mind raced. He had not expected to meet Umbra here in the street in an uncontrolled environment. Cars and bikes went by and if he would confront her here it was extremely risky. But on the other hand, he could not sit still when it was either Dagmar or Maja that Umbra was in the process of kidnapping. He breathed hard, there was no time to contact the Amber Group for advice before he would get hold of either Backmann or Marie, Umbra would have disappeared.
He stared out towards Umbra who turned around to check that the sidewalk was empty. At this hour it was usually filled with people, but the rain drove effectively away people from the street. The acidic, contaminated rains had increased in the last months. Both in strength and in toxicity. The authorities had introduced the global four-degree scale that went from green to yellow, then orange and finally red. Today it was orange and it meant that you only in an emergency would go out into the rain and that health insurance did not cover the possible damage you could get if you got sick by being in it.
Jonathan pulled a small box from his inner pocket and opened it. The small, purple pills rattled around inside the box and he took one, tossed it into his mouth and swallowed it. Slowly, warmth slid down through his body and he calmed down. The purple pill was a medicine that the Amber Group had developed and gave the person who swallowed a pill a certain degree of protection against pollution that could be exposed to in the rain.
He squinted out at Umbra who rose and slammed the passenger door, she started walking around to the other side to get in. If she reached it, he would not have a chance. He took a deep breath and drew up an Armatix iP1. The small gun communicated with his watch and the watch blinked on his wrist. He put his thumb on it and the light at the gun shifted from red to green. He opened the door and started running towards Umbra.
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