by Mela NoLeuca
CHAPTER TWENTY
Ares' POV
I have never been more worried in my life.
This was nothing compared to the last prank I pulled on General Portley by pretending I was kidnapped, or that one time I pressed the emergency button.
This kind of worry was way over my league.
I was working on a time bomb and any moment there was a chance she would go off. Yes, I’m partly guessing that you’re thinking I’m having lady problems with their PMS thing, but if it were only that simple, then I swear to you, I wouldn’t be sweating as much as I was now.
Dropping a few blood samples into a petri dish, I popped it under the microscope and began turning knobs until the nanobots came into view. There they were, black spider-like specs clamping each tiny leg into a blood-cell that reminded me of a tick. Like a parasite that they were, they needed to be rid of.
At this point, I mixed in Ethan's blood programming his nanobots to destroy the ones that were in Robyn's like an antibody would a bacterium. At first Ethan's bots charged towards Robyn's, a few died in success but since her bots were stuck to blood cells, the cells died along with the robot, hemolysing into a fluid mess.
I lost count doing this. It must have been the tenth trial or eleventh, I wouldn't know. I would program and reprogram Ethan's bots to destroy Robyn's and then later on I would try to hack into the enemy software but would hesitate again before resorting to reprogramming Ethan's bots.
Raking my nails into my scalp, I rose from my stool and chaffed my face as if that as if trying to make a clean slate for my thoughts. I paced around the spacious lab and took several deep breaths to cool down. I cannot afford to hyperventilate and pass out at a time like this.
I'm going name Ethan's bots E-bots and Robyn's R-bots. The first attempt was introducing the E-bots into her system just to see what would happen, and that would be nothing. It just frolicked about, totally ignoring it, which concluded that it did not consider the R-bots as a threat.
The second trial involved manually controlling the E-bots to move in to the R-bots, I discovered resistance, which probably had something to do with their polarity. Therefore concluding why the E-bots ignored them in the first place.
I became a little more aggressive along the way after as I observed results that ranged from a robot-ish phagocytic action to cells hemolysing from the trauma the E-bots caused.
Then it hit me.
Grabbing a nearby syringe and a tourniquet, I rolled my sleeves and tied the rubber tightly above my elbow. I sat myself down on a stool and carefully drew blood off my arm. The moment I removed the syringe, I didn't bother applying pressure and all that hospital protocol stuff, my clotting time was exceptional, and I figured it was because of the same bots running through my veins.
When all this is over, I'm considering running a few tests on myself. Officially. That one trial I bargained with a few days back in the recent rescue mission was just a presumptive action. Drawing blood samples would legitimately seal the deal.
"How's it going?"
I started, nearly dropping the syringe as Gibbs walked in with a bag of food in one hand and his chart in the other. He was flashing me this grin and gestured for me to eat.
Rolling my eyes, I turned to grab a new petri dish and dropped a spec of Robyn's blood sample into it. Positioning the dish under a microscope I observed the gradual introduction of my blood, this was the moment of revelation I was looking forward to--
"You should seriously take a break man, you've been at it for almost twenty hours straight," remarked Gibbs as I hear rumpling of paper in the background.
My brows furrowed at what I was seeing. I had been pushing the plunger further and further, waiting for a glimpse of my bots. Where were they? Maybe Ethan had more compared to what I had, after all I had a much smaller body than he did when we were given these.
"Ares, you're contaminating your field!" Gibbs firmly grabbed my arm that had been injecting into the petri dish. He didn't pull my hand away but it was enough for me to snap out of it. He was right, considering how the petri dish was over flowing with my blood and some had already stuck to the end part of the microscope's lens.
"Jesus, chill out man," the afro teen looked at me as if I was some freak show who could turn my head a three sixty degree and still live. He dropped his things on the table and began cleaning up for me.
"Here," He put a wrapped burger in my hand, "eat." He commanded.
Rising from my stool, I wolfed down on my burger and searched for another set of syringes. Maybe if I drew enough blood, I can get a nanobot out of me. There was no other reason to explain why I just had the same supernatural abilities like what Ethan had. Plus, after testing the Rubrix on myself back in our mission to rescue them, I was a hundred percent sure I had it in me.
I have superior clotting time, good stamina, maybe I didn't have the same excellent vision Ethan had so I do need my glasses--but who cares, right? Tying another tourniquet on my right arm, I prepared the next syringe.
As I was about to prick the needle through my skin, Gibbs yanked the syringe from me.
"What the hell are you doing?" I roared in exasperation.
"What the hell are YOU doing?" He articulated raising the syringe he took from me.
"I need to save her! I need to remove those things from her! And you're keeping me--"
"Safe," he cut me off, "this isn't the answer Ares, draining yourself from blood--"
"I'm not! I'm trying to extract a bot from my system so I can run some tests that can save Robyn!"
"Ares, look, we all know you like her--"
"Jesus Gibbs, I'm doing this for my brother!" I yelled trying to snatch the syringe from him. "I can sue whoever claimed that, that’s libel! Or was it Slander… whatever! Give me that syringe right now or so help me I swear I will fire you!"
There was an eerie pause that matched our stare down. I breathing so heavily, hearing myself so angry actually scared me as much as it probably did this poor guy in front of me. I groaned and slapped the sides of my temples in distress, before I breathed out my apology.
"At least tell me what you plan to do," I could barely hear him speak.
"I'm trying to remove the bots from her body--"
"Why?"
I raised my hands dramatically in front of him, as if saying Hello? "Didn't you see what happened back in ERA? The enemy can control her and she follows without complain like a robot! I don't want that. Unless I manage to crack into these bots system, she's a threat to all of us..."
"Why not eliminate the threat?" Gibbs asked quietly, as if bracing himself for a blow.
I sighed, shaking my head, "if only it were that easy, but I promised she'd be safe,"
A thoughtful pause came and went before the redhead helped roll my sleeve on my right until the tourniquet came into view. A silent agreement passed between the two of us. He was my assistant and we were good friends, this was just another speed bump that tested our camaraderie.
Just as Gibbs drew out 10mL out of me, another redhead walked in the lab.
"You should, by now, realize that's useless," she sauntered towards my work area fashioning a white robe on top of her combat outfit, in her hands was a large brown envelope. She winked at me and looked into my microscope.
"If you'll excuse us," I told Gibbs who gave me a mischievous look as he exited, humming a happy tune I wasn't familiar with until he left the lab. The silence that followed abruptly was so sudden, I found myself thinking a little too hard to try and start a conversation.
"You've made quite a mess," she remarked, turning a knob. Apparently, Gibbs forgot to clean the lens of the microscope, so Emily had to do that bit.
I was in too much of a shock to move, talk or actually breathe; the wave of nostalgia was actually so powerful I never realized how much I missed... This.
Regaining my composure, I cleared my throat. After what happened some good years ago, I didn't know where to go from there. The last time she was assisting me in the lab
she disappeared, leaving nothing more but a pile of mess for me to clean up. Maybe we didn't imprison her, maybe I did figure out she wasn't my intern, but at that time she seemed so trustworthy and I swear we had a nice thing going that it didn't matter to me anymore.
I sent out a search team then, only to learn that she was the enemy who had been working for me. I've never felt even more betrayed after that day. It was funny, because apparently, that bit did matter.
"It's been a while," I couldn't help but smile, "Dr. Finiakis," I air-quoted.
Though I couldn't see her face, I could tell she was smiling. That was the name of my original Intern who she portrayed to be. She pulled away from the microscope and leaned on the table, crossing her legs nonchalantly as she propped her elbows on the edge of the table.
She always did that whenever she got bored of what she was doing in the lab.
"You should know by now that isn't my name," she was smiling playfully then.
Had it not been her hand, sliding down from my chest to my belt, I wouldn’t have noticed how dangerously narrow the proximity was between her and me. I shuddered at her touch before I could suppress that.
"You're still such a tease," The words came out a little too fast for me to realize that I said that out aloud.
She giggled seductively.
"Shouldn't you be grieving, rather than flirting?" Another set of words that came out too fast from me to stop.
Her smile faded away and made room for a soft, forlorn sigh. How I wished I were thinking more than I was talking on instinct. My chances of flirting some more with her was becoming more and more impossible by the second.
"Drawing blood from yourself in hopes of getting a bot is useless," she said smoothly avoiding eye contact.
I was taken aback. How would she know? Apparently I was just in the process of figuring that out myself.
"Impossible, I know I have one," I blurted, "look," I broke a test tube and used the shard to slice a jagged line down my palm. An itchy sensation instantly washed over my wound and soon enough the thick oozing blood was hardened into a scab in a little over a minute.
"See?" I held it out to her, "I always knew there was something special about me,"
"There may be something special about you, but it's not running through your system," she handed me the brown envelope.
The look in her eyes was more of a comforting one as if she was hushing a crying child who lost his mommy. In this case, I was the lost child, but I wasn't looking for my mommy (Good Lord), I was looking for a reason why I was like this… and partly because I was disappointed to hear this.
Taking the envelope from her hands, I took out a MRI result that should belong to a child judging by the size of it. It had several slices of the brain to show different sections in separate sheets. I wasn't a Neurologist and all I was familiar with was the Cerebrum, Cerebellum and the so-called brain stem.
Everything looked in order, but there was something off. Wedged right in the middle of the brain parts I mentioned earlier was a thumb-sized tumor-like thing.
"When was this taken and who is this? Why are you showing me this?" I scanned each shot in different angles that ranged from a posterior shot to a mid-section view as if I was missing something vital to this image.
"That was taken fifteen years ago," she began after looking dead into my eyes, searching for something I wasn't sure of.
"An MRI result to monitor where set Alpha and set Beta went," she continued, "set Alpha was a nanobot designed to specifically control just the brain and improve the biological status by injecting an adrenaline-like impulse. Unlike its counterpart, set Beta is massively produced and injected throughout each system of the body, aiding cellular structures as it takes on the role of a cell's brain. This explains how you managed to share your brother's ability to regenerate fast and such,"
"Alpha is just one big nanobot, while Beta is great in numbers. You and your brother were made unique in your own ways. It was ERA's mistake to take your brother in, love"
She gave me a moment to try and put two and two together, it was so obvious and too impractical that I was beginning to doubt the conclusion forming in my head.
"I have the Alpha Nanobot?" I asked carefully, lowering the film I was holding against the light.
She nodded, brandishing the best poker face I've ever seen in my life. "Ethan carries the Beta Nanobot to protect the carrier of the Alpha. So in a nutshell, that’s you right there," she pointed at the MRI results I was holding.
"I don't get it, why? Why me?"
"You were intellectually advanced back then, love, you took after your father. You were supposed to be the one ERA was after because in that Alpha holds everything your father worked for. Everything he knows is in there,"
"It has been in my head all along? I thought everything was in his notebook?"
"What he had in his notebook was just as good as riddles, haven't you noticed it was only you who could relate to it, love?"
She was right. I managed to find my voice, "it all makes sense now,"
My legs collapsed under me when I found a stool to sit on. This was how I managed to produce the Rubrix; though it was difficult to create I've always had an instinct that whatever I was doing was the right thing, even if everyone was laughing at my works, I knew I was right.
I felt her small, firm hand pat against my back. A silent gesture to excuse herself.
"How did you get this?" I asked incredulously, I wasn't going to let her go that easily after dropping the bomb on me just like that. I had so many questions she needed to answer.
"I'm guessing at this point you prefer my company," she took a seat right next to me, "let's just say I have my sources,"
"That means there's another group of people who know?"
She shook her head, "no worries, I can swear on my grave that this secret is safe,"
"How did you get this?" I repeated, holding the film up. I watched her intently, her eyes dared to stand a challenge against me until they glazed over and she sighed in defeat.
"When I was working for Marduk these past few days, I gained access to some confidential matters," she chuckled to herself, "I just took advantage of it, besides it was also tucked into Craw's files... I just needed to know more about him, he was always a man full of secrets,"
"I see you like mysterious men," A solemn smile framed up my lips, "he must be lucky to have you,"
She shrugged a little.
"Mind telling me how your marriage went?" I offered, knowing now was not the time to go into these things, but chances of talking to her alone like this by chance again was so rare. I just wanted to know if, at one point she was happy being with him. I knew this wasn't exactly ethical on my part, but I have to admit, I always wished I was the only one who made her the happiest.
Yes, I was searching for a hint of regret in her. That maybe she still had the mentality of wishing that it was me eloped with.
"He had a very dry humor," she began, her tone was simple it was too hard to tell what she was feeling. I just nodded.
"At first I hated him--" she paused keeping her emotions at bay and crossed her arms against her chest as if guarding herself, then spoke with a little more control, "but working with him for a while created a strange bond between us, there had been times I went after him in the field. I kept telling him he needed a partner, but he kept insisting he was ‘all good’ by himself. I kept telling him that every time he needed saving from me."
"We had a mission that nearly killed him for good, like a broken record I told him he needed a partner again,” she smiled faintly, shaking her head looked at me for a second, then dropped her gaze, “that day he told me he was fine with just me,"
I felt a little uneasy and honestly jealous as she told her story, but I had to keep calm for her sake. I asked for this after all, and now here comes the price I was paying.
"In a few days we were married, courtesy of Marduk, but our marriage was no different. It only left me as a worr
ied wreck for every mission he was assigned to. Every time he wasn't on a mission, I would spend time with him and Ethan. We were like a family..."
"There were also times he would prefer being alone, he would lock himself in his office as if he was trying to hide something from me. I always wanted to know what it was all about, but before I could actually ask him myself, the day came you killed him," she looked at me coldly, though the tone in her voice made me want to undo the deed I've done, "mind telling me why?"
"I was half expecting you're in here to get your revenge, to be honest," I stated flatly, not wanting to give away any hint that I was slightly alarmed at the moment.
"It's possible," she said after a thoughtful pause.
"Why aren't you trying to kill me?" I asked a little too quickly, I began weighing my options faster than I allowed her to speak.
"You have many reasons why you're untouchable at the moment," she beamed at me, though I was pretty sure I couldn't find the humor in that one it was a good enough reason for me to calm down and relax.
"First off, you're Ethan's brother," she held her hand up and began counting off, "next, you have the Alpha bot permanently installed in your noggin. Third, you have the advantage for saving the world from Marduk's plan of world domination," she articulated dramatically.
"For real?" I blurted aloud.
"Yuh huh, he’s a dangerous potential," she nodded, "and finally..."
She blinked and slowly looked over to me, tracing me with her eyes as though she was caressing my face. Or at least, I'd like to think so. She looked down at where my lips were at, hopefully, then she looked back into my eyes. There was a sensitive string that connected the two of us for a split second; it was too magical for me to move as if I’ve found the pot of gold everyone was looking for at the end of the rainbow that if I took one step it would vanish forever.
My stomach did a little somersault when she slowly inched closer to me. My mouth suddenly felt so dry as my hands trembled, wanting to grab her but I resisted, basking in this rare event I thought was extinct. Her eyes slowly closed and soft plump lips parted. She didn't need to say more as I closed the gap between us feeling her succulent lips against mine.
I couldn't help but smirk into the kiss as she sighed.
She still loves me.
An hour or two later, I found myself sprawled on the cold tile floor, still in my birthday suit. I sat up and looked around; the sense of loneliness gnawed my gut in her absence.
"Mind checking on Robyn?" She told me.
I turned to see her putting on her lab gown; she was already fully dressed as she waltzed to my work area. Sluggishly grabbing my clothes, I yanked them back on and ruffled my messed up hair as I walked to her.
"Mornin' beautiful," I hugged her from behind as I put on the biggest shit-eating grin I could ever muster.
She giggled and shook her head. I protested when she pulled away from me, but she ignored me as she reached over to a nearby desktop. She tapped the screen and it came to life. Big numbers in red said that Robyn had ten minutes before she would wake up from the electric sedation we put on her.
"Shit!" I breathed, all happy feeling was gone now, "I gotta go check on her, be right back, babe,"
I snagged a few syringes and bolted through the door and down to Robyn's room. The first thing I noticed was how haggard Ethan looked, I kept the small talk going and reassurances fell along the lines.
Barely keeping track of what we were saying, I added an extra dose of electrical sedatives to keep her bots at bay before I turned to my brother.
"We need to steal their research?" He asked me.
Desperation was written all over his face, he was at the brink of insanity, there was stubble forming around his chin, his hair was so unruly it was as if he had been rubbing his head through a mob of kittens to help him think. It pained me to see him like this. He was a mess and I had also been preoccupied with my work I had nearly forgotten to check up on him. I resumed writing in my chart to kill the guilt, but it was too much that I stopped.
"The hardware isn't enough, whenever we try to manually incise the bots and get into its software it self destructs, it's actually pure genius!" I sighed in defeat, I didn’t plan on telling him the bad news.
"Is there any easier way to this?" He gestured towards the sleeping blonde. The way he looked at her just made me want to work harder. There was an easier way, but I shook my head.
"I'm not in for alternatives bro, I know how much she means to you" I patted him on the shoulder and left him alone. I needed to get back to my work; maybe if Emily helped me out we could move faster.
Or maybe we could take things slow and then pick up the pace towards the end-- stop it. Jesus. I needed to seriously focus on saving Robyn and less on other things I could possibly do to that redheaded vixen. She had about thirty joules left of electrical sedation before her heart goes into shock, a.k.a Cardiac Arrest.
"Hey Emily," I said aloud, flipping through my chart, "you mentioned about gaining some access into Marduk's classified stuff right? Maybe we can try hacking into Robyn's bots again, there's a chance you..."
I looked up from my papers; there was no one else in the lab but Gibbs working in one corner. He rubbed his eyes behind his glasses then raised a hand at me, "sup!"
I raised a brow. Definitely not the redhead I was looking for.
"Oh yeah, Emily left a note for you on your table, told me to tell you not to worry and stuff,"
Hurriedly, I reached my table and grabbed the note that was sitting there. My gut was fluttering all over the moment my heart sank like the way water would ripple when someone dropped a ball.
I read through the note once, then twice and then again and again before I began pacing restlessly in the lab.
"You okay, man?"
"No!" I roared back, I was rubbing my eyes furiously, "I'm not okay," I said softly before I resumed working. I opened my desktop and began typing in new codes to reprogram Ethan's bots.
"What did the note say?" Asked Gibbs.
Shaking my head, I ignored him; I only had twenty-four hours left to either break Robyn's bots or reinforce Ethan's.
Either way, I can not risk another failure.