Kyan tugged Luca towards the glass wall on their right. He shot a quick look through the window on the door to the left, to discover a bedroom cell attached to an examination room.
The lab entrance caused a vague sense of déjà vu: it was a glass door, clear, save for the frosted circle representing the Wake.
The same one Nicole had shown him from Lynch’s memories.
This was it.
Luca put his hand to the lock and, after a series of sparks and a flicker of numbers, the door whooshed open.
Inside, the bunker-like room had been split by glass into different sections, reminding Kyan all too much of the labs he’d been in yesterday.
Emergency lighting glowed on and off, its red pulse bathing the dimmed room’s details. Each pod-like space seemed to be a testing area or office. Little fridges with samples were laid out on metal tables and desks, and files and vials lined the workspaces. Some were obviously parts of creatures: claws, wings, but all … wrong.
He couldn’t linger to figure out why. They needed something to prove what was happening here.
He just had no idea what he was looking for.
‘Luca, can you check their computers and keep the cameras off at the same time?’ Kyan asked.
‘Not for long,’ answered the Nazen, his gaze unfocused and glowing.
Callum spoke: ‘Find their oldest experiment, or something with the most security, even if it’s just a name and a few details. I want to know how and when this started.’
The Nazen reached out blindly and Kyan guided his hand to the nearest computer while he scoured the room. On the back wall there was a small, inset cabinet with a single vial of blood inside, labelled HUNTBRINGER.
Almost like a trophy.
Callum had stopped in front of it. ‘What’s your guess this is what we’re looking for?’
Kyan grabbed a pair of disposable gloves from one of the stations, the first ripping as he shoved his hand inside. He took a clean vial and unstopped the one marked HUNTBRINGER, pouring some of the blood in, then going to put the original one back. Hopefully no one would notice there was about an inch of it gone, but it was better than them discovering the whole thing missing.
Before Kyan could return it, Callum stopped him by gripping his arm and leaning closer to scent the blood. For a moment, there was a blankness on his friend’s face, and then his eyes darkened with shock. As if he couldn’t control the reaction, a snarl stole over his features.
‘What?’ Kyan asked, trying to scent the blood.
‘We’re going to need a Vampire to test it,’ was all Callum said.
‘Huntbringer,’ Luca said behind them, eyes flickering, ‘that’s the oldest.’
‘Time’s running out,’ Callum said.
‘Fry it,’ Kyan said of the computer. ‘It’ll set the smoke detectors off and explain the alarm.’
Luca reached out for the cables on the back and his fingers moved blindly, unclipping something like a box on the back of it, then let a whip of his power free. A blinding stalk of electricity arced throughout the room like lightning, forking around the three of them but lashing everything else. In doing so, the electrical glow in Luca’s eyes faded. He gripped the little box.
‘Need more energy,’ he breathed, blinking hard.
Kyan’s attention snapped up to the cameras. ‘Time to go.’
He grabbed Luca’s arm and led him back out, pocketing the vial of blood.
‘We have minutes,’ Luca said, staggering slightly.
Callum was already through the door to the cells the unseeing guard was still stationed outside.
As Kyan followed, the room’s immediate darkness heightened his vision.
The cells inside were raucous with strange noises and a blast of stomach-turning scents he couldn’t easily identify.
