by LM. Preston
Aadi knew he had to move fast, so he headed back toward the vent. Just as he got below the vent, he felt a tug at his jeans. It was Ebu, grabbing his leg and climbing into his backpack. “Whew,” Aadi said just as he heard the door open.
“Now! Pull me up now, you guys!” Aadi said in a loud whisper to Eirena and Tacitus. Aadi pulled over a small table, quickly climbed onto it, and jumped up into Tacitus’s arms while Eirena pulled at his backpack to get him back into the vent. They quickly closed the vent, breathing hard as they once again felt the tingling sensation of the fear of getting caught. Aadi screwed back two of the screws, and Tacitus led the way back from where they had come. Aadi snatched off the gloves and dumped them behind him in the vents as he hurried behind Eirena. They traveled quickly but quietly, hoping they were not being followed. The time was ticking for them to be back to the meeting place. They would meet the others at the basketball courts just in time.
Chapter 35
Scott led the way to the staff quarters with Raiko and Carter close behind. Raiko looked behind her several times to tell Carter to slow down or to travel softly, and she was steadily losing grip on her patience for his clumsiness.
“Look, if you don’t stop, I am going to leave you behind! You are going to give away our position,” Raiko said while she crawled on her knees and looked back at Carter.
“Can you both be quiet? We are almost there,” Scott said, then glanced back and moved quietly for such a large boy. They all got to the staff conference area, a large room with soothing warm colors, a window that looked out to the stars, and a huge wall with a video screen on it for conferences. The large table fit over fifty people around it, and they had chairs that were placed against the walls to accommodate additional guests.
Scott was the first to reach the vent that looked down into the conference room, directly over the table, and he turned to his side. Then, he put his finger up to his mouth to get Raiko and Carter to be quiet. He then gestured for them to come closer as he moved to the opposite side of the vent.
They noticed that most of the staff was in the middle of a meeting. The video conference screen was on, and the meeting members were arguing with the people at the other meeting location.
“Look, we didn’t anticipate the controlled test group getting sick when we introduced the synthetic DNA into their systems,” said Dr. Hamilton to the screen.
“You tell me again… why we are spending this amount of money on saving the test subjects that failed? I say terminate them! Let’s start with the next controlled test groups and use adults this time. I want Earth on the forefront of conquering new worlds,” said the man on the screen.
“Mr. Mitchellson, we are trying to find a way to reverse the reaction of the failed subjects. The original test groups that Dr. Faulkner and Dr. Hamilton created have not been put fully to the test. They survived the injection of the active nanonytes with the synthetic gene markers. However, both groups are different in their original makeup. The first group, Explorer X, seems to be coming along just fine. We need to move to the next phase of their training. They now should have the instinct to conquer. We sure as heck spent enough money and time training them during the simulations. It has to be done so we can see them change into what we created them to be. We need to put them in the right environments to test these differences before we give those injections to our people,” Dr. Hamilton replied to the man on the screen. The other people at the table on the screen started to talk at the same time. Raiko feverishly tried to read the lips of the man in the screen, getting more horrified by the minute at what she could interpret.
“Well, the test subjects in both of these groups belong to TEGRC since the law mandates that all DNA replicated beings belong to the companies that create them. The so-called parent donors will not have any power to stop us. This experiment must be successful. This will allow Earth to be the leader in all space travel and the controller of all species throughout the galaxies. There is a lot at stake here, and heads will roll (literally) if this is not successful! Explorer X is the only group engineered with the gene. However, we need to move the other group up in the study since it was reported that they remained healthy. Again, I repeat, we are running out of time and funds to get this done. I will not be the only one to fall if this isn’t successful. Do I make myself completely clear? Meeting adjourned!” Then the screen went off and the staff started to leave, all of them stunned into silence.
Raiko, Scott, and Carter all stared at each other in terror. They couldn’t believe what they had just heard. Raiko wondered (and was fearfully certain) if they were the experiment that was being discussed in the meeting. She and Eirena had seen them in the database as Experiment X. Who is this other test group? Who makes up the control group? Where did they get all these kids they are using? Did our parents know what TEGRC is up to? So many questions, Raiko thought.
“I am going to see what else I can find out. Let’s take this vent off, and I can jump down onto the table after they are gone to try to get into the database from here,” Raiko said.
“Are you sure, Raiko? I mean, you would have to get back up here, and you are so short you may not be able to make the jump. Do you have another way out? Check out the map for an alternate path before you go down,” Scott said as he noticed everyone had left the room. Then, he started to unscrew the vent. Carter came up on the opposite side of Raiko and started to help Scott unscrew the vent.
“Hey, Carter, cut on that scrambler so that when Raiko drops down, she will go undetected,” Scott told Carter. Carter stopped helping with the vent and punched the code into the handheld device to turn on the scrambler. Scott picked up the vent and moved it alongside him.
As Raiko got ready to climb down, Carter dropped the scrambler device through the vent opening and onto the conference room table.
“Okay, Carter, you are really starting to make Damien look like a good partner. Be careful,” said Scott.
“Oh, I’ll get it,” Carter said, going head first after the scrambler. Scott quickly grabbed Carter by the pants to stop his fall onto the top of the table.
“Eww, you are really getting on my nerves now, man. Raiko, help me pull him up,” Scott said to Raiko, who was already in position to try to pull Carter back up.
Carter didn’t help them at all. He was too squirmy, and his movements caused him to slip from Scott’s hands and land on the table with a loud boom. Scott and Raiko looked at each other and held their breath. Scott looked down at Carter, who quickly grabbed the scrambler device and crawled under the table. A gentlemen dressed like a scientist came in and did a quick glance about the room, closed the door, and left. Raiko visibly let out all the air in her lungs that she was holding back during the guy’s inspection.
“Raiko, you go down with Carter and be quick,” Scott said as he watched Raiko turn around and go feet-first out of the vent. She landed quietly and gracefully on her feet on top of the table.
“Carter, you can come out now,” Raiko said, as she slid of the table and walked over to the computer next to the huge screen. She tried to break into the computer firewall and began to frown in frustration. “They have this locked down! Eirena would know how to break in,” Raiko said. She glanced at Carter, who peeked out of the conference room door.
“Hey, Raiko, time’s up. We gotta get out of here. Some people are coming,” Carter said as he started to run to the conference room table. Raiko looked at him and shook her head. She turned off the computer and then hopped on the table. Carter lifted her up to Scott, who easily lifted her and sat her in the duct next to him.
“I will hold onto you, and you grab Carter’s hands. When I get him high enough, I’ll grab him,” Scott said to Raiko. Scott held Raiko’s legs as she grabbed Carter’s arms, and he pulled Raiko and Carter up. Scott reached over Raiko and snatched Carter up, and the scrambling device fell out of Carter’s hand and onto the floor.
“Great! Dang it Carter!” Scott said, as he hurriedly put the vent back in place just as the groups
of scientists were coming into the meeting room. They waited until there was a lot of noise from the meeting attendees getting settled, and then Scott, Carter, and Raiko quickly screwed in the vent and moved quietly down the duct. Carter was finally getting his rhythm and stopped banging with every crawl as they made their way to the meeting place.
Chapter 36
Damien and Dakota moved purposely through the ducts. Both memorized the location of The Cave and anticipated breaking in to see what was held there. They moved silently and smoothly toward the area, being careful to not alert security to their presence. Damien had kept the scrambler on since their entry into the ducts, not trusting anyone or anything to chance. He would not risk being caught for anybody. Damien looked ahead and counted the last vent that stood over top of one of the hallways of The Cave.
He had been counting the vents since they started to crawl through the ducts to make sure that he would end up at the spot where he presumed there was some type of holding cells. Damien had observed several parts of The Cave as they climbed over the vents along the way toward its center. Just like his roommates and the girls, he was curious about who or what they held there on the ship and why.
“Here it is,” Damien said, and pointed at the vent. “Let’s check it out first,” he added as he slid up to the vent to look down. They heard screaming and wrestling and saw several guards run pass. Damien moved to the other side of the vent to get a better look at what the commotion was all about and saw the guards pile into a cell. The Cave was a series of hallways that seemed to have small prison-like cells with glass-like doors on each cell. Damien recognized that the section that they were looking in was the place where the cells were. He spied a lab or some kind of hi-tech equipment area and additional holding cells with glass-like encasings. There was a place on the map that had several doors for releasing items off the ship into deep space, which Damien was sure included medical waste. He wasn’t sure, but something just didn’t add up with this picture. He was determined to find out what he could about The Cave before the expedition to Mars the next day.
Dakota glanced up at Damien after the guards passed and said, “You ready to go in? It seems like the guards have moved on.”
“Let’s give it a moment to make sure no one is coming back. Let me check my heat tracking device to see where exactly the guards are,” said Damien. They heard rustling, and muffled screams. Dakota looked down and saw a kid chained to a wall in the cell below them. He bit at the leather-like restraints that held him. The kid was tan in color but had spots where he was completely transparent. He had long black hair and looked to be much older than they were.
“That one there looks real angry,” said Dakota.
“I would be, too, if I was held like an animal. They’d have to catch me and knock me out before they would ever get me in chains or binds,” Damien replied while he keyed in the sequence to check the entire perimeter that spanned The Cave.
“I second that, man,” said Dakota as he looked in the other cells. He noticed that not all the kids were restrained, but they all were deformed and had various transparent spots on their skin. It was easy to pick out the spots, as the boys seemed to be scantily-clad only in boxer shorts and the girls in bikinis. The kids that weren’t restrained were either asleep on the floor of their cells or banging on the glass. Others looked like they had just given up fighting and were staring into nothing. None of the cells had beds or anything that could be lifted. The toilets were nothing but small holes in the floors. Each cell door had a window-like opening that was small and rectangular, but Dakota figured it had to be opened by the guards.
“You know, I still got that key that Carter gave me. You suppose it could open some of these doors? You know, to help them out,” Dakota asked. Damien was looking down at his device.
“Why should I care? Okay, I am not going home because of you or them. For me, home is not an option. Mercy didn’t save my mother, and it won’t save them. Life sucks, especially for them right now. Remember, we didn’t come here to save anyone. We came for information. We must move. The guards went to the outer area, but I don’t know for how long,” Damien spat out.
“I’m ready. I’ll go first,” Dakota said. He turned around, and slid feet first through the vent, while he held onto the edge. He looked down, braced himself for a silent jump, and let go. He quickly moved out of the way, as Damien was right behind him. They both landed with little noise, and some of the kids in the cells started to walk toward their doors.
“Run… run… run… run…” they said over and over. Damien looked at Dakota in disgust and moved forward down the hallway.
“Why? Don’t you want our help?” Dakota asked.
A girl about three feet in height, the smallest of all of the kids held in this section, came up to her glass. Dakota went to her cell and took a deep, shocked breath at her bloodshot eyes and blue pupils.
“We are going to be disposed of, and so are you if you are caught here,” she said.
“What’s wrong with you? Why are you here?” Dakota asked. He looked around to see Damien heading to the kid that was held in the restraints.
“We all got sick after the immunizations, but we all were too strong to be held in the infirmary. They couldn’t control us with their sedation drugs. We all just want to go home to our families, but they won’t let us. They keep the weaker ones drugged and sleepy in the infirmary. We fought, and that one over there is the strongest. He threw several of the guards out of the way so we could escape to the medic cruisers, but they used a stun device on us that knocked us out. Next thing we knew, we were here. They kept bringing more after the first set of immunizations, but lately, no one new has come,” she said as she looked down and tears fell from her eyes.
“What is your name?” Dakota asked her and stepped closer to touch the glass.
“Maryann. I was named after my grandmother,” she said as she sat down and crossed her legs. “Just go away. There is no hope for us. They told us that we were going to be eliminated, and some have already been taken and disposed of. Just run,” she said and looked down at the floor while tears continued to fall from her eyes.
“Hey, I’ve got a key that may get you out. I don’t know if it will work, but it’s worth a try,” said Dakota.
“You can try it, but you won’t have any luck. Even with our enhanced strength, we can’t get through. Also, if we did escape, they have homing devices in the nanonytes they injected in us. We are just tagged dogs with nowhere to run,” she said and shook her head in despair.
Dakota took the key out and tried to unlock her cell, but had no luck. The key swipe grid on the door just beeped.
“Okay, I’ll figure out something, and I’ll be back… I promise, Maryann,” Dakota said as he walked over to Damien. Damien was staring at the kid that was bound in chains and with some leather-like strap around his wrists, which he had somehow managed to partially gnaw through. He looked pretty much like the others with spots on his tan skin that were transparent. However, he didn’t have any boils like a few of the kids that Dakota passed on the way.
“What’s your story?” Dakota asked, breaking the staring match that the boy and Damien had going on.
“My story? My story is I want off this freaking ship! They are crazy here! They inject us with some crap that turns us into monsters! You wait… you will become a monster sooner or later. Then they’ll cut you up and clone you to make more for their company’s gain. You need to get out while you can, because once they’ve got you on this ship, you are their property,” the boy said with such anger that Dakota wondered if they should even try and set him free.
“Look, what’s your name? Mine is Dakota, and this is Damien,” Dakota said as he glanced at Damien who was staring at the kid and sizing him up for a fight, it seemed.
“My name is Mason Steele,” Mason answered and pulled at his chains and bindings.
“Look, we gotta go. The guards are on the way,” Damien said and turned around and headed
to the vent. Dakota looked back at Damien as he went to the vent opening and then turned back around to face Mason.
“Hey, Mason. I am going to put this explosive device here, on the bottom of your door. If you get out, make sure you take Maryann with you,” Dakota said as he bent down and put the clear, flexible explosive on the bottom of the door.
“This will automatically activate in a few hours, and hopefully the guards won’t see it. We will be leaving for the first expedition before dawn. If I’d known I had to break you out, I would have brought something more powerful. Keep biting at the binds, because you’ll need to be free of them,” Dakota said as he pressed the pressure point on the explosive to cause the device to heat up to the point of explosion.
“Now, Dakota, or I’m leaving without you!” Damien roared.
Dakota quickly followed Damien and lifted Damien up on his shoulders while Damien pulled himself up the rest of the way into the vent opening. Damien then braced his legs on each side of the duct and reached his arms down for Dakota. Dakota grabbed his arms and climbed up Damien and into the vent. They quickly closed the vent and quietly left.
Chapter 37
Scott, Raiko, and Carter were the first to arrive back in the engineering room. They were about ten minutes earlier than the meeting time. Scott went to peek out the door to make sure no one was snooping around.
“Hey, Carter, Raiko, go get us a basketball court. I don’t care how. I don’t think it would be good for all of us to be caught here. I’ll send the others over as they come out,” Scott said.
“I got it, dude. C’mon Raiko,” Carter said and walked like he was in charge of the world. Raiko rolled her eyes and followed him.
Aadi, Eirena, and Tacitus came out with just two minutes to spare.
“Man, do we have a lot to talk about!” Scott said to Aadi as he climbed out.