Undisclosed (22 page)

He loved the way the corner of her mouth curled up. Her face inclined as he reached out and touched her, ran the back of his fingers against the side of her face, pushing a loose strand of hair back behind her ear. He hesitated for a moment as if trying to gauge if it was okay. He leaned in slowly, his arm moving to the small of her back pulling her in close, the other wrapped around the back of her neck. Her eyes closed as his lips met hers. Her mouth was soft against his. Travis could feel her completely at ease as they embraced in what felt like an eternity but was only minutes. He felt his heart race as he gave himself fully into the moment. In what was like two people coming up for air, they inhaled each other as their lips parted.

They held each other’s gaze for a moment and then she pulled away, fast enough for Travis to realize something was wrong.

“Sorry, I thought …” Travis stammered.

“No, it’s—”

The door swung open and Lincoln walked in, stopping instantly as if recognizing he had interrupted. His eyes darted between them. A mild flush of red filled Jayde’s cheeks. Travis quickly threw his top on.

Lincoln gave a bemused look and then a smirk. “Jack wants us in the den.”

“Right,” Jayde said, casting a quick glance at Travis and then pushing back into place strands of her hair that had come loose from the hair tie.

Lincoln held the door open and as Travis passed him he lent in close and softly said, “That’s a nice shade of lipstick.”

Travis wiped his lips and kept moving, looking a little embarrassed.

Lincoln chuckled softly.

Chapter Twenty-Two

As Travis stepped into the den, the muffled discussion he could hear halfway down the corridor came to an abrupt halt. Huddled into one corner of the room, Ty was sprawled out on one of the couches, chugging back a can of pop while flipping through channels on a silent overhead TV. The others were gathered around the center table. Already sensing a degree of hostility towards him from Mason, who was glaring hard enough to burn holes in his head, Travis entered the gathering.

“Glad to see you made it out in one piece,” Jack said.

“Well, kind of had a little help.”

Mason snorted. “A little?”

Travis ignored him and glanced over at Jayde, who met his gaze and then looked away.

“So we know your father is being kept at the Lab. What we don’t know is where or how we can get in, but it’s a start.”

“Oh, I know how I can get in. Two days from now our class is up for a field trip to the Lab. They’ve had it booked for weeks.”

Mason tsked. Travis shot him a sideways glance.

“But without knowing where my father is in there, it’s useless. Plus, that place is massive, never mind all the security, I don’t imagine that will change.”

Mason chimed in. “Here’s what I would like to know.” He cleared his throat. “What the hell was jester boy referring to when he said you hadn’t told us? Told us what?”

Travis shook his head. Slowing and raised his eyebrows. “No clue.”

“Travis, if there is something we need to know, I think now’s the time.”

Travis was silent. He knew he had to tell them. He looked over at Jayde and then back to Jack. He thought about the cell phone—a lot had changed since he had gotten hold of it. He had good reason for not saying anything back then; it was a matter of trust. But now it was different; he could trust them. Couldn’t he? He hesitated
. What would they think?
Surely they would ask how long he’d had it, and anyway, what use would it be telling them? Ryan hadn’t cracked it yet and all they knew was the name Edin Project, and details about that were vague.

Mason stood to his feet. “Well?”

“What is your problem, man?” Travis said, aggravated, standing inches from him. Sure he could probably snap him like a twig but he was getting tired of his snide remarks.

Mason turned on him. “You are—from the moment you showed up here we’ve done nothing but put our necks on the line for you.”

Travis furrowed his brow and then it just came out. “All right. What? You want to know that I have my father’s cell phone, full of encrypted files, and it’s probably what he was planning to get to you?”

“Are you friggin’ kidding me? That’s just perfect.”

Everyone’s eyes were on him, blank expressions. Even Ty had stopped channel surfing and was staring in disbelief. Travis gulped. He’d done it now.

“So you’ve been leading us along all this time.” He narrowed his eyes. “I should …”

Travis raised his arms. “Should what? What you going to do, Mason? Put a bullet in me too?”

“Don’t tempt me.”

Jack stepped up and moved between them, placing his hand on Mason’s chest.

“Okay, I think we all need to take a breather here. Mason, walk it off.”

Mason slapped Jack’s arm away and walked out.

“Where is it?” Jack asked, an edge to his voice.

“In a safe place,” Travis said. “Look, I know how this looks but I couldn’t be sure what I had, or even if you could be trusted.”

“But your memory never revealed this?” Jayde asked.

“Because I got it after I returned from the hospital. The police dropped it off in among the belongings.”

Jack exhaled loudly. “Okay, what’s on it?”

“I don’t know, files, folders. We’re still trying to get into it.”

“We’re?” Lincoln queried. His tone was less than excited to hear that others possibly knew about them.

Travis closed his eyes tightly, realizing what he had said.
Great!

“I think he means this guy.”

Mason’s voice rang out before a figure emerged from the dark corridor being shoved from behind.

“Get off, man, what’s up with you? Did your mother never show you affection?”

Mason was pushing Ryan forward.

“I found him lurking around outside.”

“I wasn’t lurking, I was looking for Travis, until this baldheaded Sasquatch got his paws on me.” Ryan looked around, checking out all the high-tech equipment and setup. “Now this is what I’m talking about. Damn, is this equipment from your mothership?”

Travis rolled his eyes and pressed his fingers against his forehead. Mason ran his hand over the stubble on his head, scowling at Ryan, clearly not impressed.

Ty smirked. “Not unless they’re selling alien technology down at Best Buy. But it is highly modified.”

“Cool.” Ryan touched a few of the buttons.

“Hey, hey, don’t touch,” Ty said gruffly.

Ryan continued to amble around the room, surveying everything in sight.

“Wow this place is wild.”

Travis walked over to him and lifted his arms. “What’s up?”

Ryan cautiously gave everyone a quick look and whispered in his ear.

“I got in. You gotta see this.”

“Well, let’s see it,” he said out loud.

Ryan furrowed his brow.

“Yeah, they already know, it’s okay,” he reassured Ryan.

Ryan retrieved the phone from inside his jacket pocket and gave it to Travis. Travis tossed it to Ty, who caught it in one hand.

“Can you hook this up to the main screen?”

Ty began getting it ready while the others gathered around. Travis was eager to see what his father had been storing on the phone and by the tension that had built in the place, the others were too.

In front of them, on the holographic screen, folders appeared.

“I’ve only managed to get into a few items, there’s still more but the encryption is highly advanced, and I’ve never seen anything like it before. However, I have managed to get into four files. Go into that one,” Ryan indicated to Ty. Ty swiped at the large screen and opened a video file. Over the next five minutes video played and they each stood, jaws dropped, as they watched experiments performed on two individuals, the same ones that Travis’s father had seen before he went missing.

The next was a short amateurish phone-based video that cut in and out; taken from within the Bioscience division lab—its title was seen clearly on the glass door above the words
Genome Science
. A familiar faint reflection glimmered back for a second as a person approached the glass before it slid open.

“That’s my father.”

They watched as he moved through a lab full of workers in white coats busy working. He walked up to a swipe system and flashed his badge. He entered another room and proceeded to take out of a cold storage container a vial holder that contained multiple vials, each one labeled by number. It looked as if he was in the process of switching labeling on two vials before he was interrupted and the video cut out.

The next was a document full of what Travis assumed was incomprehensible text, complex math equations and language he couldn’t discern. It was entitled “Working DNA Activation Algorithm - 231.”

“Holy crap. They’re trying to awaken the Sleeping Giant.”

“It’s impossible, it’s just a myth, a story our parents would tell us—right?” Jayde said. “They’ve never been able to achieve anything more than botched genetic experiments to wreak havoc in the world, and by the looks of that last experiment, they have messed up again.”

“Sleeping giant?” Travis asked.

Jayde nodded. “Maybe the term ‘The Nephilim’ may be more familiar.”

“Like the gigantic people mentioned in the bible?” He paused a moment, his eyes asking the obvious question.

“They weren’t physical giants; that was the part of history misunderstood. They were giants because of what they were capable of; a hybrid, the perfect weapon, capable of destroying worlds. They were the first genetic offspring of the Watchers and humanity. That’s how they discovered what they were trying to do.”

“And that’s how the war began,” Travis muttered, studying Jayde’s reaction.

Jayde nodded.

“They’re not trying; it looks as if they have done it again,” Mason whipped.

“I don’t think they have,” Lincoln said.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, if that is the working DNA activation algorithm, then why did that video show an experiment that failed?”

“Bring up that video of the experiment,” Travis said.

Ty brought it back up again.

“Fast forward a bit.” Frames flew by. “Stop. Go back.”

“What is it?” Ty said.

Travis paced up and down, repeating the same words over. “Two twenty-nine, two thirty, two thirty-one, two twenty-five.”

“What the hell are you on about?” Mason growled.

“Before the doctor died he was mumbling the number two twenty-five. But that experiment only showed two twenty-nine and two thirty and both failed. We know the working version is two thirty-one, we have that algorithm in the doc—assuming it works. In the other video my father appeared to be in the process of switching two thirty-one before he was interrupted.” Travis rubbed his face and continued to pace back and forth. “I think they already had the working copy and they switched it with two twenty-five, which is more than likely part of the previous failed batch.”

“But why?”

“I don’t know, maybe to buy themselves some time to see what it fully did. There was no chance they were going to walk out with that. Maybe they thought it would get thrown out and destroyed with the nonworking batches?”

“Surely they would have gotten rid of it by now?”

“Possibly, in which case we’re the only ones with the working algorithm … but maybe not—there’s a good chance they still have the working version at the Lab and that the Watchers don’t even know it.”

“Well then, the ball is in our court.”

“No, we have to be sure it’s gone. If they were to discover they already have it my father will be of no more use to them,” he said. “I’m pretty sure the only two who know that algorithm is my father and the doctor, and they weren’t planning on telling them they had it. The doctor wanted me to know.”

“So why come after the doctor, if they have your father?”

“If they didn’t have the algorithm the next logical step would be to recreate it using my father and Dr. Evans—Deagan and his goons were probably sent to get that information, or maybe bring him in?”

“But why not just wait till he came back in on his shift? Why go after him and murder him?”

“After my father’s attempt to run, I don’t think they were taking any chances, and there is a good chance the doctor wasn’t going back in,” Travis said. “As for the murder, Deagan didn’t kill him, someone else did.”

Ty put his head in his hands. “This is about as clear as mud.”

“Look, here’s what we know—we have the algorithm—that is, if it works. My father is at the Lab somewhere, along with a tangible working serum held in the Bioscience division. We go in and destroy that serum and we’re holding all the cards.”

“You don’t even know it’s still there. Plus, you don’t even know where they’re keeping your father—it would be like trying to find a needle in a haystack,” Mason said.

“No, I don’t, but we know where the serum is and it’s all we’ve got to go on right now. Either way, I’m going in and if the serum is still there, I’ll destroy it. That way we have the only information on how to recreate or reverse it.” Travis ran his hand through his hair. “Once it’s destroyed, maybe we can use the information on the phone for leverage—lure them out, get them to hand over my father, and then you can take it from there.”