Beautiful Demon

Twenty-five

Third Person POV

"Okay, let's think this through."Bellamy says scrubbing a hand across his jaw. "Becca created the flame after apocalypse one. She obviously provided the tech to Eligius III before that. That means that--

"They're not commanders." Gaia finishes vehemently.

"Right." He says nodding. "So what the hell are they?"

"Let's find out." Jordan says as his hand fly over the keyboard in front of him.

"Monty taught him how to hack, too. That's my kind of parenting." John says with a tight smile.

John would never say it out loud or let his feelings on the matter show- but he missed him. Like others they too had a bond-and not just the familiar ones they'd developed on the ring.

"It was suppose to be my turn to save him." He thought to himself.

He'd saved Monty's life when Praimfeya came for them all, Monty saved his before the Earth once again swallowed by fire.

"No hacking needed." Jordan says pulling John from his thoughts. "The Eligius system all use the same access code."

"Eureka." Gaia says standing behind the boy watching the screens. "Try that."

"Here we go again." An older man's voice is heard from the screen. "Today's subject is Brooke, Earth embryo 47. Presents with black blood. 21 Earth years old, 22 doing time in the incubator." He states tiredly.

"You can do this, Gabriel. 25 years of work, the failures." Another, younger voice is heard before a man enters the screen, a scared girl struggling in his arms. "This is the one."

"If I'm right, the reason all previous metempsychosis trials have failed is because the host's neuroanatomy was not developed enough to support the file size of a mature human mind." An older man with wrinkles lining his face appears before the screen, needle in hand.

"Gabriel, let's go. I'll hold her down." Another man yells out to him struggling to hold a young woman down on the table. "Do it!"

"Do-Do what?" John stuffers his eyes going wide as he watches on and thinking the worst. "What are they doing?"

"For God's sake, give her a sedative!" The younger man snarls

"We can't. Full consciousness is crucial." Gabriel says looking to the woman sadly. "You know that." He says injecting something into her arm before looking to the monitor's ahead.

The other man shakes his head. "If this works, I'll find a better way, and easier way, okay, I promise."

"Rostral Dorsolateral Pontine Tegmentum's now fully dormant." He rattles off ignoring the struggling. "We have to wait for the serum to reahc the claustrum....And dormant." He says just as the woman's body became incredibly still.

"Did they just kill that girl?" Jordan asks shocked by what he'd just saw. "Did we just watch someone die?"

"Heart rate and breathing -- normal." Gabriel says as he checks her breathing, counts her pulse. "Lower brain function is still intact. The body's ready."

The video cuts out and then another one begins to play.

"Something's happening. She's waking up. Josephine, can you hear me? Josephine. Shh. Shh. It's okay. It's okay. Josephine, no it's okay. You're safe. You're safe now. It's me. Just breathe. Hey. Listen to me."

"Gabriel?" The name flowed as if it was an unspoken prayer. "Is it real this time?"

"This is real." He says with a smile, as happy tears began to leak from the corners of his eyes