Mary
10:10 AM
Despite all her planning, Dr. Adelaide never imagined a catastrophe to this degree.
It began as expected.
Mary gave Daniel his last-minute pep-talk and watched him walk up to UE 000. She hadn’t known whether the Barrier would provide any resistance to the boy’s ability. The seconds of Daniel’s invisible battle with the ship wore on—far longer than any practice session. Mary grew worried.
“Daniel, what’s happening?” Her concern finally slipped out.
General Smith hid his anxiety with skepticism, “Is he even doing anything?”
As larger and larger patches of the Barrier rippled and distorted, she silently cheered Daniel on—He’s doing it! Director Minos observed beside her, as emotionally distant as Mary tried to affect. Then, when he’d nearly broken through, the secondary shield appeared.
General Smith turned to Director Minos, “Abort the mission.”
Minos replied in a steady voice, “No.”
The man ground his teeth and growled, “UE 000 is no longer dormant. The chance of a containment breach is too high—we have no idea what it’s capable of!”
“That is why it is so valuable.” She’s staked three years of her career and all her influence on this. If it fails, she’ll be ruined.
Mary’s attention shot back to Daniel as he voiced his frustration, “That’s not fair!” Something felt wrong. She could do nothing as he shouted, “But—I won!” and things spiraled out of control.
When the ship aimed its cannon at Daniel, her heart dropped, leaving a cold cavity in her chest. She screamed against the thought of losing the boy she had come to care for.
Her relief at seeing him unhurt afterward overshadowed her confusion at his change and her fear of raining debris. Forget the blast shield, luck saved them from the boulder-sized chunks of falling concrete. Their hazard suits stopped the smaller pieces of shrapnel from drawing blood, though bruises would come later.
“Abort the mission!” the big man yelled at Minos.
“No,” the Director repeated, maintaining composure in the face of death.
“The situation is out of control. If UE 000 is provoked it could massacre millions,” Smith clenched his fists with the need to answer fear with violence.
The woman in the pinstripe suit gazed squarely back, “The outcome is uncertain, we must be patient.”
With another look at the battle between monsters, Smith ripped a remote with a single red button under glass casing from his pocket, “I will do my duty.”
“Your duty is preserving lives, General,” before Smith could flip open the casing, the Director pulled a .45 and leveled it at the military man, “I will not have you unnecessarily murder this Facility’s potential with your itchy trigger finger.”
General Smith stared down the barrel, “I’m about to kill us all, and you think I care about my own life?”
“I’m giving you the option to keep your digits,” Minos lowered the muzzle a fraction, pointing at the General’s hand, “I’ll shoot off your fingers before you hit the button.” Dr. Adelaide didn’t doubt the coldness in the Director’s eye or the steadiness of the gun, and neither did Smith.
Minos held out her free hand and the General tossed her the trigger.
“This will be in my report. You’re playing with things we don’t understand, and it’ll cost more than just our lives,” Smith said.
Dr. Adelaide didn’t have a gun and couldn’t have used it so well given the opportunity. Though she felt helpless on this gameboard, Mary knew even a small action at a critical moment could prove more powerful than a bullet.
There was a crack like thunder and the three of them turned to see colossal handprints on the sides of the ship’s shield. They heard Daniel speak those terrible words and break the ship’s defenses with a thought. As the broken cannons fell to the ground, Dr. Adelaide gasped in awe at the unbelievable display of power, “How incredible!”
“How horrifying,” said Smith, staring at Daniel.
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When the boy ceased his destruction and descended, Minos smiled for the first time in recent memory, “As you can see—you behaved rashly, Smith. Things have resolved themselves quite to our benefit. You’ll be given a medal for what we accomplished here today.”
Mary nearly ran to Daniel’s side when she saw the General’s expression shift. Smith didn’t seem to care about medals or the subdued ship. He frowned as if smelling something putrid. “There’s one thing left to do.” The general stepped around the blast shield, pulled his handgun, and fired at her boy.
The bullet hit Daniel in the back of the head and Mary’s heart stopped. There was an explosion of dust from the impact and Daniel pitched forward. No blood, thank goodness. The boy righted himself and turned to see where the shot had come from, his expression pure bewilderment.
“No!” Mary yelled as she charged. Smith fired three more shots, each hitting Daniel, each exploding into dust, each paining the boy, each knocking him back like a sucker punch, each explosion of dust smaller and weaker than the last.
She stood in the man’s way, arms outstretched, interposing herself between the two.
“Don’t think I won’t shoot you to get him,” Smith pointed the gun at her, “Out of my way.”
“No.” This was her move.
Mary looked the General dead in the eye, challenging him. He stepped up to her, pulled back the pistol’s slide, and held the muzzle to her face—precious seconds he wasn’t shooting Daniel—“Now!” Her eyes never left his.
The shot rang.
General Smith collapsed with eyes dismayed, a thin trickle of blood down his neck the sole trace of violence, and exhaled softly. Mary saw the Director nearby, standing there with a discharged pistol in hand. Dr. Adelaide couldn’t reach Smith’s gun in time to defend herself. “Are you going to kill me now?”
“Kill you?” Minos sounded surprised at the suggestion, “When you deserve the most credit for today’s victory?” Tranquil in murder, she holstered the weapon properly before going on, “I shot Smith because he was going to kill my best scientist. Don’t forget I still need you.”
The Director approached casually, and Mary backed away from the corpse, “Look at what you’ve done! How are you going to explain this?”
Minos looked down with feigned regret, “Poor General Smith was killed in action by UE 007 during its escape. There won’t be a body to autopsy considering the subject’s methods,” her voice shifted back to serious, “So there’s no reason to search the furnace for bone fragments.”
Mary shuddered, took a second to recover her composure, and asked, “What did you mean ‘escape?’” her hopes hung on the word.
“Well, since I’m about to issue the command to terminate all humanoid UEs, I assumed you would encourage them to make one final containment breach.”
“Terminate?—My test subjects? We agreed to advance UE 000’s timetable so we would have the funding to keep the humanoid UEs!”
“Dr. Adelaide, the ‘containment’ of UE 007 has been a pretense from the beginning to fool Those Above into thinking the subject could be controlled. As of now,” she gestured to the hole in the wall and the blaring alarms in the distance, “There is no way to conceal the extent of UE 007’s conflict with UE 000.
“Regrettably, when Those Above realize there is literally nothing that can contain the threat he represents, they will force the termination order—and call my judgment into question. Someone will inevitably use the subsequent investigation to have me removed from my position and they will be Directing this Facility.”
“So, you’re going to kill them first?” Daniel stepped out from behind Mary to glare at Minos, “Us?”
If the Director had any fear of this boy who wielded incomprehensible power, it didn’t show on her face, “Not if you help them escape.”
“And go where?” he threw up his hands in frustration and looked to the concrete ceiling as if searching for help, then lowered them as he turned to Mary, “I’m supposed to leave you?”
She stared at the ground, thinking it over. “Daniel, it doesn’t matter where. This place isn’t safe, and I won’t be able to help you. I’m so sorry. You need to find the others quickly and leave.”
“Yes, I’d hurry,” Minos interrupted, “I have evidence to destroy and people to bribe into silence, but I can only delay the ‘kill order’ for so long.”
“Why are you helping them if it puts your career at risk?” Mary asked.
The Director’s mouth opened a fraction while she thought of an answer, “I like to keep some justification for my actions. At least with Smith, your life was at risk. It’s as you said, destroying ‘the unique’ is a sin. Though perhaps I am more concerned with how my Head of Research would receive the deaths of her favorite subjects. Yes, the impact on your work, Doctor—when uncovering the secrets of UE 000 is the key to salvaging this mess—does concern me. If they flee and live, I will wash my hands of their fate and not pursue the matter.”
Mary supposed that was the best she could expect from the Director. Her thoughts and concerns returned to Daniel. He watched her, looking for guidance, looking for purpose, looking for protection and other things she couldn’t provide. “I wish there was something I could give you.”
When she said those words the boy turned inward, searching himself for something to hold onto as the rising waters of fate rushed them apart. He must have found it because he looked her in the eye—this time she saw no visions of death but, instead, rich soil fertilized by autumn leaves—and said, “I think… You gave me what I needed.”
She pulled him into an embrace to hide the tears in her eyes, the hazard suit between them forgotten in the moment. Though his face pressed into her stomach, he felt taller than ever.
Dr. Adelaide held him at arm’s length for a second to look him eye to eye, “Promise me one thing, Daniel. Never use your power for revenge, to murder, or out of hatred.”
“I promise,” he nodded and didn’t look away.
She nodded back, “You’re a good boy,” and she hugged him again.
For the first time, Daniel broke the embrace—knowing he had to go. “I love you too, Mary.” He turned and left. She watched him go. There was no hiding the tears this time.
“I’ve had my suspicions, Dr. Adelaide,” Minos said, “But, considering the ruthless efficiency of your work, I wasn’t sure you were capable of sentiment.”
Mary sniffed, wiped at her face, turned, and said, “Are you blind, Director? If I hadn’t sent the subject away as I did, it would have killed us all. I just saved your life.”
“Quite,” Director Minos chuckled. “You’ll need that face for the internal investigations to come. I hope you can justify the loss of life to yourself.”
“Loss of life?”
“You did forget to warn him about UE 004,” the Director pointed out.
Dr. Adelaide paled.
“Yes, there’s no telling what will happen now.”