Endgame (Book 3)

Chapter 28

Surprisingly, Ashley was waiting for me by the back entrance when I arrived at the base. I saw her from far away- another advantage to flying I hadn't noticed before.

I allowed a small grin as I landed solidly on the ground. She seemed a bit miffed, but I wanted to skip over whatever she wanted to talk about so we could discuss the whereabouts of Jeremiah. I had to speak with him.

"In all of two hours, you managed to get mixed up in a robbery and almost get blown to bits." Her arms folded, she stared at me, expecting me to defend myself.

"Absolutely," I said urgently. "Anyway-"

"No, 'anyway.' We have rules and procedures for that stuff. You have to at least let us know before you go off and play hero."

"Yeah, and we can talk about that later. But we need to talk about a more pressing matter: Zero."

She has already begun to speak, but the mention of him made her pale and shut her up. "Is that why you need to talk to Jeremiah?"

I nodded my head slowly. "I think he's sick."

She spun on her heels quickly. "You're in luck. He just got back."

"Oh, well, in that case..."

I left her behind, moving around her and speeding into the building, fervently searching for Jeremiah. I sped up and down corridors, around sharp bends, and through large-looking rooms, each time finding no sign of him. I returned to Ashley, humbled.

"Lead the way," I said dejectedly.

"Maybe next time." She patted my shoulder in mock concern, knowing exactly what I tried to do.

I followed her as she sashayed down the halls and stayed close to her heels. I avoided looking down at her swaying hips and her yoga pants, my cheeks slightly red at the thought.

She took me to the opposite side of the building, where she pulled out and waved her keycard at a blank, white wall.

"Um, you know that's a wall, right?" I asked her.

She smiled. A small section of the wall slid to the side, revealing a spiral staircase leading down to another lower down.

As we took careful steps to go down the stairs, a sense of familiarity suddenly struck me. These stairs were identical to the ones in the Antarctica Afterlight base. Almost as if I knew about them...or was that my future-seeing abilities at work?

The hallway darkened as we stepped off at the bottom. The whole place looked the same as the ones above, but in lower light, it seemed creepy. Disturbing.

I checked Ashley's location and watched her hesitate as well. Either she had never come down here before, or the place made her as jittery as me.

After a calming breath, we both continued on, the quiet sounds of our shoes on the floor seeming painstakingly loud. Our breaths were audible as well.

Ashley's voice was close to a whisper as she spoke. "We keep the worst prisoners down here, and this is also where Jeremiah's office is. Only he and I can come down here, but that excludes the guards who have to be present at all times."

Yeah, keep the head of the most important government operation right now next to the deadliest meta prisoners in the world.

"Where do you keep the not-so-bad prisoners?" I asked.

"They're transported to another facility we had made years ago in preparation for the chance that the metahuman population would grow," she explained.