32
People say they want the truth…until they learn it.
The others filed out of the car, their shocked whispers echoing behind her, but Khalani kept staring at Takeshi.
She shook him again. “Tell me what’s wrong. What were you about to say?”
His clenched jaw and flared nostrils gradually subsided. But the veins in his neck were pronounced as he sat up, ignoring her question.
But she wasn’t going to let it go.
“Answer me, Takeshi! Who’s the girl you remember?” Her voice soared across the desolate space, catching the others’ attention.
“She’s no one,” he hissed, bumping his shoulder against hers as he jumped out of the truck.
Khalani stared after him, open-mouthed.
Every time Takeshi came close to remembering, he went cold and drew further away than before.
She didn’t understand. They’d removed the chip. The doctors had confirmed that all he needed was time.
But what if they were missing something?
The pit in her stomach deepened when she climbed out of the truck and found Winnie staring into the distance with her eyes wide.
Standing in front of them was a towering metal building. The gleaming structure spiraled into the sky, twirling round like coiled strands of DNA.
“Upon the stars,” Winnie whispered in a daze. “It’s Timothy Talbot’s painting.”
Khalani’s lips formed an O. She remembered the golden-framed painting Winnie kept in the library. It depicted a man walking toward a wondrous structure in the desert. Could it be the same building that stood majestically before them?
“This is it.” Winnie gripped her hand, eyes gleaming with pure delight. “We finally made it!”
Her lungs seized.
Ever since Winnie had shown Khalani the journal, she’d doubted Timothy Talbot existed. That Project Helix was real. But the sight before them shattered all those preconceived notions.
But for some reason, a strange feeling of déjà vu came over her. Like she’d been there before.
“You sure that’s where we’re supposed to go?” Adan asked, pulling Khalani from her implausible thoughts.
“That’s what it says on the map.” Derek held out the long sheet of paper with the bright-red circle.
“I’ve never seen anything like it,” Serene breathed, taking a step forward, but Brock gently pulled her back.
“We all go together.” He spoke with calm authority, and much to her surprise, Serene nodded, listening to him.
They walked through a broken barbed wire fence that extended for miles. Green and beige trucks were littered around the area with abandoned tents flapping in the wind.
“What was this place?” Khalani glanced around.
“A military base,” Takeshi abruptly answered. His gun was tight in hand as he intently scanned their surroundings, something violent stirring in his gaze.
Brock whipped his head. “How do you know that?”
Takeshi pointed to a rusted sign sticking out of the dirt.
Naval Air Weapons Station.
She gulped as they continued moving toward the spiraling building. Their footsteps broke the eerie silence. Even the wind died down. Beyond the building, Khalani spotted an entire field of translucent mirrors angled toward the sky. Thousands of them.
“What the—”
“Sun panels,” Winnie explained, coming to stand by her. “It’s a giant power source field.”
Khalani frowned. “What are they powering?”
“Winnie’s not sure. But they look recently cleaned.” She rubbed her chin. “Very odd, indeed.”
The heavy pressure clawing through her veins got worse as they approached the building. A large hole gaped in the side, like a bomb had gone off nearby. When the front doors wouldn’t budge, they crouched and carefully maneuvered through the broken windows, their feet crunching on shards of glass.
Khalani shuddered as they made their way inside the tall building and stepped onto smooth flooring, the interior reminding her of the entrance to Doctor Strauss’s lab. Sunlight filtered through the gargantuan hole in the side wall, illuminating a large marble desk in the center of the room.
Etched into the stone desk were two words.
PROMETHEUS INC.
“Where’s the lab?” Serene asked. “I don’t see one.”
She was right. There didn’t appear to be any cold laboratories in sight. In fact, the room they were in seemed small compared to the size of the building.
“There must be stairs. Over here, maybe.”
But when Derek opened the door to a wide staircase, it was completely blocked off by massive rocks.
“Shit.”
But Khalani’s eyes were locked on the open elevator in the back of the room.
“That’s not gonna work, Khalani,” Adan called as she slowly walked toward it. “The building has no power.”
But she was drawn to the elevator like a magnet and marched straight inside. Buttons lined the panel, numbered all the way to one hundred.
“C’mon.” She waved everyone over.
“I’m not getting in that thing,” Brock stated.
“We’re on the first floor,” Khalani argued. “Nothing’s going to happen. But if this works, I don’t want to leave anyone down here.”
Takeshi didn’t hesitate. He stepped onto the platform without argument, and the elevator immediately felt smaller in his presence. Winnie followed right after, with Derek and Adan hesitating for a moment before getting on as well.
Brock shook his head, opening his mouth to argue, but Serene rolled her eyes.
“C’mon, don’t be such a baby.”
She strolled past him and stood beside Khalani.
Brock huffed an annoyed breath, but he begrudgingly joined them.
“If I die, Khalani, it’s your fault,” Brock griped.
“Feel free to haunt me in the afterlife,” she said.
Not waiting for another objection, she pressed number two on the side panel. Khalani took a deep breath, praying for the doors to close and lift upward. But nothing happened. She pressed all the numbers on the panel, waiting for any movement.
But the elevator didn’t budge an inch.
“See? No power.” Brock moved to get off, but Khalani held out her hand.
“Wait.”
She noticed something—an odd circular etching on the panel. There was no number on it, but she recognized the thin oval shape.
She pulled Elise’s ring from her pocket, the one her father had feverishly gripped until his death. Khalani placed the stone into the circular divot. It fit perfectly.
But the elevator still didn’t power on.
Furrowing her brow, she pressed harder. Still nothing. But when she twisted the ring, the elevator lit up, and the doors closed.
“You did it, Khalani!” Serene exclaimed, but she stumbled, nearly falling over.
“What the fuck?” Derek’s eyes widened.
The elevator didn’t go up.
It brought them down.
“I don’t like this,” Adan whispered.
She gulped, the small walls of the elevator drawing closer, trapping them in as they sailed countless stories beneath the earth. Her fingers trembled, nausea spilling up the back of her throat.
Just when she thought she might keel over, the elevator doors whirled open.
“Main Terminal,” a robotic female voice announced.
They exchanged tense glances and marched into darkness.
But when Khalani held out her hand and took another step, bright fluorescent lights powered on, revealing a massive room. Long white desks formed a half-circle, with dozens of computers riddled on top. In the back of the room, floor-to-ceiling glass screens spanned the wall.
In the center, a holographic image of the Earth slowly spun, floating in the air.
“What the—” Serene jumped, holding a hand to her chest as the elevator doors closed shut and whirled back up. The silence pressed around them, and she realized they had no choice but to explore the mysterious space.
Khalani slowly moved forward, flinching when one of the lights hanging above them sparked, looking precariously close to falling.
Takeshi stayed close by her side, his black eyes scanning the area. His expression was distant, as if he were far away, thinking a million miles a minute.
She wandered to one of the white desks and unrolled a massive sheet of paper, pinning the corner down with her backpack.
“What is it?” Serene asked.
“I-I don’t know. It’s a list of weird names.”
Triticum aestivum.
Oryza sativa.
Lens culinaris.
Brassica oleracea.
Sesamum indicum.
“Those aren’t just weird names,” Derek said, peering at the paper. “Those are plant species.”
“There’s another one over here!” Adan exclaimed, unraveling a second sheet. But the names were completely different.
Bos taurus.
Ovis aries.
Equus feruscaballus.
Panthera pardus orientalis.
Gorilla beringei beringei.
“Are these plants too?”
“No.” Derek shook his head. “I’ve never heard of these.”
“Wait.” Serene pointed at one of the names. “Gorilla. That sounds familiar. Wasn’t that one of the animals that went extinct during the Great Collapse?” She turned to her brother, who held up his hands, dumbfounded.
“I don’t know. I never paid attention in animal history class.”
“No, I think she’s right,” Khalani said, scanning the tables, noticing even more extensive lengths of paper piled high beside the computers. “But why are they listed here?”
No one had an answer.
Her pulse quickened, and she abandoned the papers to stand by Takeshi. He was staring intently at the holograph projection of Earth. When Khalani peered closer, she noticed tiny dots on the map.
His frown grew more pronounced.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
A shadowed flicker appeared in his gaze, but it was gone before she could decipher it.
“Nothing.” He shook his head. “We should keep looking.”
Khalani gave him a weird look, but she didn’t have time to decipher his moods. They needed to find the lab.
“I think there are more rooms down here.” Brock opened a door at the far end, showing a brightly lit hall.
But Winnie slammed her hands on one of the desks.
“Khalani, come quick!”
She ran over as Winnie held up a tiny frame in her shaking hands. The photo showed an older man in his forties with ashy brown hair speckled with gray and a little girl perched on his shoulders who could’ve been his daughter.
“That’s Timothy Talbot! Winnie’s family had a picture of him. It’s him, she’s sure of it. This must’ve been his desk!”