Chapter 15
Lucy lay asleep on the couch. Whilst the others sat scattered across the room.
Corey was the first to speak. “All right, Michael. Talk. Start from the beginning. Who are they?”
Michael exhaled slowly, his hands clasped together. “They call themselves The Lucent. The name means those who bring light.”
Barnaby looked up from his tablet. “Sounds like another cult.”
“It’s not a cult,” Michael replied. “It’s an organisation.
Older than most governments, at least in parts of it.
They started as a research initiative decades ago studying human evolution, genetics, the ‘divine spark.’ That’s what they called it.
Somewhere along the way, the idea twisted.
They stopped wanting to understand the world and started wanting to control it. ”
Byron frowned. “Control how?”
“They believe in human supremacy,” Michael said. “Pure humanity. They see everything else as… deviations. Flaws in creation. To them, the future depends on perfecting humanity. No magic, no divine interference, no other bloodlines.”
He rubbed at his face. “They think they’re saving the world from corruption.”
Corey leaned forward, jaw clenched. “So basically, Nazis in lab coats.”
“That’s not far off,” Michael said quietly.
“But smarter. Patient. They don’t advertise themselves, and they don’t attack openly unless they’re certain of success.
They infiltrate. Fund universities, biotech firms, military labs.
They own pharmaceutical companies, health agencies, humanitarian fronts.
On the surface, they’re everywhere. But underneath…
” He shook his head. “They’ve become a machine built to eliminate anything they consider impure. ”
Barnaby’s fingers flew across his tablet, typing rapidly. “Give me a second.”
Lines of data reflected in his glasses as he muttered under his breath.
“Lucent… Lucent Research Division, subsidiary of NovaGen Biotech… wait—linked to Helix Defence Systems. That’s a military contractor.
” He looked up, frowning. “They’re in three continents, UK, US, Japan and connected to something called The Ascension Project. ”
Mandy’s eyes widened. “That sounds like more than research.”
Barnaby nodded grimly. “Their funding network is massive. Private investors, government grants, even a few charities that look legitimate on paper. They’ve got roots in medicine, security, and education. Their motto is..” he read off the screen, “‘To illuminate the path of human destiny.’”
Davina scoffed. “Well, that sounds ominous.”
Michael looked sick. “It’s worse when you live it. They use that slogan everywhere — like a prayer. Every recruit learns it. They believe humanity’s evolution must be guided, not left to chance.”
Corey asked, “So what do they want from us? Why attack now?”
Michael hesitated. “The labs Ethan found… they weren’t research stations; they were holding facilities.
Places for interrogation and analysis. They’ve been hunting anyone with hybrid DNA for years, trying to map the differences and when you showed yourself to them, they thought are they special or not!
My note to them confirmed you have abilities. ”
“Every ability they come across, every mutation ancestry. They log it in what they call the Purity Index. They think that once they understand every variation, they can cleanse it which means to erase it from the gene pool entirely.”
Barnaby looked up sharply. “You’re saying they’re collecting biological data, but killing entire blood lines? Why would they need to keep that information, what are they using it for?”
Michael nodded. “I honestly do not know.”
Davina’s voice broke the silence. “How many are we talking? How many of them?”
Michael swallowed. “Numbers are hard to pin down. The last time I had access to their databases, there were over a hundred thousand names on the payroll — and that’s just the surface-level staff.
Scientists, agents, handlers, field units.
But beneath that are the zealots, the ones who believe in the mission more than their own lives.
They train them from childhood. Indoctrinate them.
” His eyes unfocused slightly. “They don’t need loyalty. They breed it.”
The room fell quiet. Even Barnaby stopped typing.
Byron’s voice cut through softly. “You were one of them.”
Michael nodded. “I was raised in one of their satellite homes. They told me I was lucky — chosen to serve humanity’s next step. I didn’t realise I was being trained to help them find and destroy others like me.”
Lucy stirred faintly on the couch, murmuring in her sleep. The room stayed hushed.
Byron looked to Michael. “Who’s running it? Who gives the orders?”
Michael hesitated. “They don’t use real names. Every branch report’s to, The Prime Division. No one’s ever met the person at the top. Could be one man, could be a council. Doesn’t matter. What matters is that they move like a single mind. And once The Prime Division sets a target… they don’t stop.”
Mandy shivered. “So, they won’t stop until we’re gone.”
Michael nodded faintly. “Until everything non-human is gone. Until there’s nothing left but them.”
Davina muttered, “And they call us monsters.”
The fire crackled in the hearth, throwing shadows across the walls. Everyone looked toward the windows, where the vines outside still twisted faintly in the light of dawn.
Corey spoke, “Well we have trained, and done our very best. We know it will take them time to get through, so reserve your energy, they’ll regret ever calling themselves enlightened.”
Byron placed a hand on his shoulder. “Agreed. Mandy! Can you tune into your wards and get a feel of where they are and then keep us posted. Everyone else can take turns watching.”
Michael looked up, guilt and fear warring in his expression. “They won’t stop, not for reason or mercy. But maybe… maybe they underestimated you.”
Corey headed towards the back to speak with the Doves, everyone was on high alert, but they also needed to reserve their energy.
Lucy stirred again, whispering something no one could quite hear. Her fingers twitched against the armrest.
Byron leaned closer, a faint flicker of worry in his eyes.
“Lucy?” Byron whispered, but she didn’t respond. Her breathing quickened, uneven and shallow.
Her mind was no longer here.
Lucy in her dream like state was standing in the middle of a frozen field. The snow was red. The air reeked of smoke and iron. Screams echoed through the wind, faint at first, then clearer, sharper, until they surrounded her.
Men shouted. Metal clashed. A child cried somewhere nearby.
Lucy turned, but the scene shifted faster than she could process. People, dozens, maybe hundreds they were running, falling, their blood soaking through the snow. She stumbled backward, and when she looked down, her hands were small. The world warped around her.
The dream had moved, now she was a child a little boy on his knees in the snow. A woman lay before him, bleeding out, reaching for his hand. She couldn’t hear what she was saying over the chaos, but her lips formed one word, run.
Her own scream tore through the air, but it came out as a baby’s cry.
She blinked, and suddenly she was in another place.
In the arms of a woman, her mother as she recognised, and there was a young Michael, coming towards her.
“it's time to meet the new princess” a voice came from behind him.
Realising it was her, Lucy jolted in her sleep.
A laboratory was where she ended up next, sterile and cold. Glass walls, bright white lights that buzzed overhead. She could hear muffled voices. Two men behind the glass, their words blurred by static, watching something on the other side.
Then movement again, she was jumping between Michael's memories. A woman holding a baby. The woman’s face was kind, tired, beautiful in a fragile way. Her eyes glistened as she looked down at the infant wrapped in white cloth.
Lucy’s heart twisted, there were others.
The scene cracked apart.
Screams again. The sound of gunfire. The smell of blood. Lucy was crying now, not as herself, but as the child she had been. Begging. Pleading for someone — anyone — to make it stop. It was a cycle, constantly flitting through the same memories over and over again.
“Lucy!”
The voice cut through the haze. Warm hands on her shoulders. Someone shaking her gently.
Her eyes fluttered open. For a moment, the world still spun between dream and waking.
Byron’s face came into focus first, then Davina, holding a cup that steamed with a soft herbal scent.
“Lucy, drink this. Come on, love, small sips.” Davina urged her.
Lucy blinked, half-aware, half-lost in the dream’s echo. Her voice came out fragile. “There was… blood. So much blood.”
“Shh,” Byron said softly, supporting her as Davina pressed the cup to her lips. “It’s just a dream.”
Lucy swallowed obediently, though her hands still trembled. “It wasn’t a dream,” she whispered. “I saw them. My parents. And Michael…”
Michael’s head snapped up, his expression stricken. “You saw what?”
Lucy nodded faintly. “The field. The woman, your family, my family. The blood-soaked snow.”
He said nothing, only looked away, his throat tight.
Byron, still brushing a thumb across Lucy’s knuckles. “Mandy, can you help her? Just a little healing. Speed up her recovery.”
Mandy stepped forward quietly, her eyes soft with concern. “Of course.”
She placed a hand on Lucy’s forehead. A soft glow spread through her fingers, the faint scent of lavender and rain filling the air. The tension in Lucy’s body began to ease. Her breathing steadied.
Within minutes, her eyes drifted shut again — not in exhaustion this time, but in deep, dreamless rest.