That night, Genesis didn't sleep well, and she found herself lying awake the next morning at just 3AM. She decided to check her chat logs and found a notification of a text from Dryden asking if he could call her earlier the night after her father was taken.
She didn't have any desire to look at her phone, let alone talk to anybody. Missing her father, Genesis kicked her feet over the edge of the bed and walked out into the hallway.
She followed the hall down to her father's office and went to sit at his computer desk. Stacks of papers covered the area surrounding the PC, and the drawer, when she opened it, had a credit card in it with a code taped to the back on a sticky note. She couldn't lie to herself, it was weird, like he saw this coming. She still hadn't reached out to her aunt Jennie but she was making mental plans to do so.
In a bold decision to do something to get answers, Genesis started to rummage through the desk in search of passwords. When she reached the fourth and final bottom drawer, so far with no luck, she was surprised to find a writing pad which, when she skimmed through it, she found it had a page of her fathers passwords all neatly written on it.
She entered the password for the computer and successfully found herself logging into his account. She scrolled through the computer's file, eyeing up each of its contents.
The file "Patients" stared back at her. That was weird, because her father didn't take patients as far as she knew, and he simply worked for a dermatology lab and a brand of anti aging cream called Sephora.
When she clicked on the folder she found it was password protected with a key. She scanned the list of passwords and quickly noted a key written towards the bottom of the page. She entered it using the keyboard and once she finished typing away she hit enter in anticipation.
The files loaded in video format.
Genesis stared at the file which read "Patient 9" and felt her curiosity quickly get the best of her as she clicked on it.
It loaded a video file that showed a large tube, and within it was an android looking creation. However it also appeared to. . . human? The closer Genesis looked, the easier it was to make out an intravenous needle in the girl's right arm, where she seemed to be receiving fluids, while her left arm appeared to be an intricate design made up of metal lattes and wires. Her head had two silver coin sized circles on both of her temples.
Genesis watched, intrigued, as the girl who could've been no older than her slowly opened her eyes which glowed electric blue. The moment she opened her eyes, lights started circuiting through the girl's left robotic arm, the rest of her body seemingly glowing blue along with it.
The camera cut to a closer view of the cyborg girl and her bright glowing eyes. Suddenly she was awake and being bombarded with attention from nurses, doctors and probably scientists. There was one problem, which was that the video appeared to have been labeled with a date that would've occurred very, very recently. Two weeks ago to be exact, noted Genesis.
The video ended with a hand covering the camera lens, and Genesis exited the file to find and select another. This file was labeled "Patient 7" and when she selected it, this file also showed up as a video. Genesis watched the video as it played, zoomed in on yet another person.
Patient number 7 appeared to be another girl, however this time she was resting in a cot in a secluded room. She appeared chained to the wall by her ankles, but seemingly was free to move upon the bed and around the area near it.
This girl was aggressive, and she consistently fought against the shackles at her ankles. When two presumed scientists entered the room, one held a syringe, and two more nurses rushed in to restrain her before she was injected with the contents of the syringe. It was unclear where the syringe had hit, but the girl slumped over and appeared to be asleep afterwards. There was no context in the video file name, and Genesis didn't know what to take from seeing it just yet, but for something like this to be on her father's computer, she was truthfully baffled.
She tried one more file, settling on "Patient 6" and watched this video file as it opened and started playing out. The little boy was standing at a wall where the nurse marked his height. His eyes began glowing red, instead of the familiar electric blue like the first girl. He started to shift his face to an angry look, similar to that nurse bot from the cafeteria that day.
The boy started to become aggressive, shouting "I refuse!" before he angrily started to swing his fists, both of them glowing an electrifying red color.
These were clearly some types of experiments, but Genesis was clueless as to what exactly they were experimenting with. What her father was experimenting with. Innocent people, even a child. Yet something about them seemed cyborgish? Android bots both male and female, were common in the present day, and even the most impoverished households had some type of android bot or nano pet in their home.
Genesis exited the computer file and recalled the stack of papers she had awoken with on her bed the day prior. She closed every file and program, and then she logged out of her father's personal computer and tiptoed out of the room, shutting the door behind her as it had been shut before.
She decided to make breakfast and cooked up a few slices of bacon and some eggs for herself. She munched on her toast and finished her plate before deciding to go to her room and read through the documents that the voice, she suspected, had taken control over her to retrieve, probably from her father's office.
The absence of her father was painfully obvious, and she decided it was time for her to call her aunt Jennie. When she dialed Jennie's number, she waited patiently as the phone rang, and she sighed a breath out of relief as she heard her aunt's line pick up.
"Hello?"
"Aunt Jennie?" Genesis asked. "It's dad. Something really bad happened yesterday when I got home from school. They came and took dad," she finished.
"What do you mean? Who did?" Jennie asked in confusion.
"These men came in black vehicles and some were dressed in black, there was a weird guy in a red suit, a balding guy and another one that I barely remember but the rest dressed in black and they all forced dad outside and left with him in a fucking vehicle."
"Oh christ, I always told Daniel he was going to regret getting caught up in other people's business. I'm not saying this is his fault, we will find him, I'm on my way now." Jennie said. "I'll see you in half an hour."
When Jennie showed up knocking at the front door Genesis sighed in relief. Jennie stared down at Genesis with her icy pale green eyes and sighed. "It's 7AM, but with this shit about your father, don't stress going to school today kid." Jennie hummed, sitting at the dining room table.
"Thank you Jennie," Genesis said with a bright smile.
"So these men, did they say who they were with?" Jennie asked, clearly trying to piece everything together.
"Yeah, they said it was government business," Genesis said. "I went on his computer and found these weird videos, too. I also found these weird documents in his office about lab results about not just me, but also about my mom," Genesis bit her lip upon informing her aunt of the fact that she'd been snooping.
"You probably shouldn't have been sneaking around his office, but I believe you and it sounds freaky," Jennie admitted. Then she zoned in all of her focus on Genesis and pulled her closer by the forearm. "You have gotta show me," said aunt Jennie.
Jennie was a child at heart, and had as curious a nature as Genesis, who loved every minute of Jennie's quirky personality. Her out of place jokes and calm nature made it easier for Genesis to be honest as well, and she contemplated telling her aunt about the voice. Shaking her head and deciding not to, Genesis led her aunt to her father's office and logged into the PC using the same passwords as she had before with success. She found the file labeled "Patients" and skimmed the short list of numbers, the file listing the videos of the patients in quick succession for them to view.
"So wait, what are these videos?" Jennie asked, scanning the computer screen with pale green eyes.
"Just watch," Genesis said. "It's like they're cyborgs or something."
After Jennie viewed the same three videos as Genesis, she asked Genesis, "What about the other videos?"
"I haven't seen them," Genesis said.
"Shut up, your scientist father has a secret file of videos featuring weird cyborg kids and you only chose to watch three?"
"Umm," Genesis replied. "I was planning on watching them at some point, just a few at a time. Move over," Genesis said to her aunt, shoving her a bit to the side.
"Okay," Jennie said, moving over slightly. She peered at the screen with Genesis as she viewed the file labeled "Patient 5" and clicked on it. The screen popped up without a video this time and instead presented a slideshow of headshots of a young man who, according to the images, was named Cyrus Harkfield. The images listed his age to be no more than eighteen years old. Something was so familiar about those eyes, Genesis couldn't register just how, but lately she was being bombarded with one stressful experience after another, so she'd shelf the feeling and come back to the photos later.
The next file that Genesis chose was labeled "Patient 4" and a video pulled up onto the screen upon clicking.
The patient in the video was being asked to repeat simple words back to the person holding the cards up, the contents on each card unable to be seen by any viewer of the video. He had bright electric blue eyes and was quiet and obedient up until fifteen seconds into the video.
"I hate this. Being here," the patient said. "I want to leave!"
In a rushed and fluid motion, Patient 4's eyes stopped glowing blue and defaulted to an angry red color. Within seconds shots sounded off in the video, presumably from some type of gun, until Genesis realized that the weapon was the patient themselves. In the video when Genesis looked closely, the patient seemed to be shooting some type of hyper beams out of his eyes and wrists.
Jennie gasped. "These aren't androids. They're literal cyborgs," she said, stunned. "And most of them are unhappy from the looks of it."
"I know. These videos were all uploaded to the computer on the same day over two weeks ago. If he was really involved so deeply with something like cyborg production, the only reason he would've done it would be because somebody convinced him that he could help. Somebody manipulated your father, there's no way he'd participate willingly in this, I won't believe that." Jennie said, processing the situation.
"I have no doubt he must've thought he'd been doing some type of good. Who would have him work on something as intense as a literal cyborg operation though? The government, or somebody else?" Genesis groaned. "Everything is so confusing right now. I just wish he was here to tell me what to do."
"Well, we'll find him. I'll hire a private investigator if I have to. He didn't just vanish. Men physically took him," Jennie said. "Albeit government men, but still," she said confidently, raising a brow.
"On second thought, Jennie. I think I'm going to go to school, here's my cellphone, plug it in on the charging dock for me with you?" Genesis said, handing her aunt her cellphone, She got up from the desk, turned to face her aunt, gave a small smile and headed to the front of the door to slip into her shoes.
Her aunt came chasing after her, "School? Are you sure?" She questioned frantically. "I don't even want you out of my sight."
Genesis looked up from the floor, tying both her shoes, and smiled one more confident smile at her aunt. She gave a small grin back to Genesis. "I'm proud of you. We'll sort this all out when you get home."
"Okay aunt Jennie, I love you," Genesis said, grabbing her school book bag off of its familiar hook on the wall next to the front door. "I'll see you in eight hours."
"Bye kid,"Jennie said and Genesis heard her aunt whisper after her, which Genesis picked up on due to her Seraph hearing abilities, which allowed her to hone in on and focus on specific sounds. She noted the sadness in Jennie's voice as she trudged out the door just in time to stop the school bus from missing her.
When she got on the bus, she locked eyes with Cyrus, who sat at the very back seat of the bus. The same boy whose headshots were in the file. The same Cyrus Harkfield that was listed as Patient 5 on her father's computer.