The Homecoming

Chapter 16

Leah ran breathlessly into the room where Ivan was hanging out with the rest of her crew. Andrew was already waiting for her there, wondering where she had disappeared after he woke up in the middle of the night.

"What happened, Leah? Where were you?" Andrew approached her, resting his hands on her shoulders. She was shivering.

"They... They're not going to help us. They're preparing our spaceship for going back the same route. To Hiatune." Leah was speaking discontinuously, struggling to catch a proper breath.

Olga detached herself from the group and approached Leah. "What are you talking about?"

"They used us as evidence that aliens and alien abduction exists. They're going to experiment on them and probably keep us hostage for all of the information. If we don't do something, they'll steal all of our weapons, and then we're next."

"Oh my God." Roxy shuddered, holding onto Luca's hand. He held her protectively, pulling her closer to his chest.

"This makes everything more difficult." Andrew sighed, a small lump in his cheek forming from tension. He approached Leah and pulled her into his arms. She grabbed him by his shirt, still struggling to steady her breathing. Then, she looked up at him with promising eyes.

"There is something we can do. But you'll have to help me. We'll have to be strong sooner than we expected, but it's necessary." Leah said to him.

Andrew nodded, willing to protect her until his last breath. Leah pulled herself out of his arms and looked at Olga.

"They're preparing the spaceship right now, which means that they're planning to leave before the sunrise – before we head for our military bases. I have a plan. But I can't promise that it will work."

"We don't have a choice." Olga said, and then her pupils dilated when she realized that Ivan was with them and he was listening. At that point, he was nothing more than enemy. She turned around to look at him, but he seemed as shocked as everyone else. Still, there was something in his eyes that was telling her he knew more than them.

Suddenly, everybody was staring at him.

"Trey Parker... is pure evil. He made my father do things that otherwise he wouldn't have done, even if someone pointed a gun to his head." Ivan said, approaching Olga. "I have a solution for this, too. It's hidden in my father's laboratory. I can retrieve it... that is, if you decide to trust me."

Olga was staring deep into his eyes... his soul. "As I've already said... we don't have a choice." She said, glancing at everyone for approval. No one uttered a word; they trusted her judgment more than they trusted themselves.

***

After making sure that no one could see him, Ivan sneaked into his father's laboratory. There, Dr. Kent kept all of his most valuable scientific inventions. But, he had a bad habit of forgetting to lock the door of his lab every time he went out for a short period of time. He was putting too much trust into the institution that saw him only as one of its puppets, and now was the time for Ivan to use his father's flaw to his own advantage.

He had to be quick or he could get into trouble. He scanned the entire laboratory, his eyes looking for a special glass container that was going to be their only salvation. He didn't intend on overlooking his father's mistakes anymore. Dr. Kent was digging his own grave by never knowing how to say 'no' to that abomination of a man, going by the name of Trey Parker.

Ivan walked between the seemingly endless rows of glass containers, helplessly looking for the destructive black mass with flame-colored substance. He had to find it before his father returns.