Leo's POV
"No, no no no!" Big D panicked, pressing frantically on the cyber desk.
"Where'd the feed go?" I asked, continuing to hear static through my earpiece.
"Obviously there's something blocking Zoey's signal," Big D muttered.
"Really?" I deadpanned.
"Well, what did you want me to say?" Big D snapped.
"Just keep pressing the desk," I said.
"I will," Big D mocked.
Zoey's POV
"Wow, look at this place," I said to myself. The room I had stepped into was full of cool techy stuff. I'd describe it in better detail, but I would probably get to five 'weird shaped doodads' before giving up. I wanted to find something that would prove that Synican had stolen Uncle D's exoskeleton tech, but frankly I didn't know where to start.
"Can't wait to start?" A voice asked behind me, and I jumped, whirling around to see who was behind me. There was the man himself, Dylan Synican, chuckling at my surprise.
"I get the feeling," he said, "If I had been stuck up in AI Research for as long as you had, I'd be down here now too."
"Not a fan of coding?" I asked.
"One of the many keys to my success: hiring lots of people to do the crap I don't want to do," Synican replied.
"I like that idea," I agreed.
"But let's not dwell on that," Synican said, "We have a project to work on don't we?"
"Yes we do," I agreed, watching in anticipation as Synican started typing on his tablet. He finally pulled up the exo-skeleton project, and I quickly scanned over it.
And it was definitely a copy of Uncle D's.
"Wow," I said, "Pretty intricate."
"Isn't it," Synican mused, "Which leads me to wonder, why did you just scan over it?"
"Huh?" I asked.
"You took a glance and seemed to have it," Synican said.
"And?" I asked, not exactly following.
"The only way that speed of recognition happens is if you've seen that project before," he explained, "Eyes don't lie."
"What are you suggesting?" I scoffed, "That I've hacked into your systems?"
"Ha! Like you'd get past my cyber security team," Synican scoffed, "No, you've seen that from Davenport."
"I have no idea what you're talking about," I lied.
"Yes you do," Synican said as he gestured for three security guards to come over, "I honestly thought that Davenport would send a spy over sooner. But that doesn't change the fact that he wants to prove that I stole tech from him, and he won't be able to."
"That's really not why I came," I said.
"Oh please, do you really think that Davenport's stupid plan would fool me for long?" Synican said.
"You know, I really want to keep disagreeing with you," I said, "But honestly, his plan was really stupid."
"Just like all his plans," Synican mused, "And as an extra layer of security, he probably sent one of his bionic humans."
"Whoa there mister Synican," I bluffed, "That's a pretty big assumption you made there."
"Oh please, don't expect me to believe that you aren't one of his chip kids," Synican said.
"If I'm one of his 'chip kids' then why isn't there a chip in my neck?" I deadpanned.
"Again, you expect me to believe that?" Synican asked.
"Oh please, don't tell me that you didn't steal an x-ray machine from someone," I said.
"Don't push it little miss sass," Synican sneered, grabbing an x-ray scanner off a nearby shelf. He turned it on and scanned my neck. Upon finding nothing, his eyebrows scrunched together.
"Didn't find what you were looking for?" I asked sarcastically.
"Oh man, Davenport really is stupider than I expected," Synican said, and then turned to the security guards, "Get her."
Without skipping a beat, Synican's security guards charged at me. Using Lexie's shortness to my advantage, I ducked and rolled under their legs, tripping one of them in the process. As he hit the floor, the other two turned around and I got up. One of the guards charged at me, and I used his momentum to flip him over my shoulder. The third one caught my hand as I threw a punch, and as there was no way I was going to out-muscle him, I did the only logical thing.
Kneed him in the place where the sun don't shine and watched him crumple to the floor.
I turned to Synican, deadpanning, "That was pathetic." I lunged toward him. He ran the other way.
Deciding that pursuing Synican was probably a bad idea, I ran out of the room, bolting for any way out of the building. The problem with that, however, was that the building I was in was enormous and was probably intentionally built to give people like me trying to escape a hard time.
"Zoey you're back!" I heard Leo exclaim into my ear.
"I'm sorry I wasn't under the impression that I left?" I asked, turning a corner and narrowly escaping slamming into the wall in the process.
"You went into some place where the comm signal was blocked," Leo explained.
"So you're telling me that you missed the entire part where I exposed Synican, listened to him roast Uncle D, and then took out three of his guards?" I asked.
"I guess," Leo said, distracted, "Wait. You did what now?!"
"Can't you rewatch stuff on that thing?" I asked.
"Well yeah," Leo said, "Wait, why are you running?"
"We're you listening?" I snapped, "I exposed Synican and I really don't think he appreciated it."
"Well, I don't think I'll appreciate his roasts," Uncle D said, in the background, "At least you stood up for me, right?"
"Not a chance," I laughed.
"You're not making many friends today," Uncle D grumbled, "But the footage is downloaded."
"Great!" I said. I whipped around another corner, and then my head hit something very hard.
Whelp, that ended that.
Leo's POV
"Zoey?" I asked as the view from her camera fell. I turned to Big D.
"Did her com set fall off?" I asked.
The question was answered in due time when the camera rose again, focusing on the a face of Dylan Synican himself.
"You idiot," Synican said condescendingly, promptly smashing the camera on the ground.
"Zoey!" I cried. But it was no use.
"Wow," Big D said, "He really hasn't aged well."
"You're one to talk," I scoffed, "Besides, that's not the point!"
"What's not the point?"
The two of us turned around to see Adam, Bree, and Chase, finally back from their mission.
"Oh hey guys," Big D said uneasily, "So, you probably just picked the worst possible time to come back here."
"What did you screw up this time?" Bree groaned.
"It's more of a question of who," I squeaked.
"What does that mean?" Chase asked.
"You know, what? I need a bathroom break," I declared, standing up and turning to Big D, "You can explain to Chase how his girlfriend got captured by an evil inventor who, by the way, aged a lot better than you."
I quickly ran out of the room.
Zoey's POV
I woke up on a cold concrete floor, the air damp and musty.
Great, I had been kidnapped again.
I sat up, trying to somewhat compose myself before I heard a door open in the distance and footsteps approaching my cell. When the footsteps arrived, it turned out to be everyone's favorite currently evil inventor.
"Wow, I feel so special, being greeted by someone as busy as you just seconds after waking up from being knocked out," I said.
"Watch it, I have the upper hand here," Synican said.
"Well I'd hope so," I scoffed, "I'm a foot and a half shorter than you at least, if your hands were lower than mine I'd be very worried."
"You know what I mean," Synican groaned, "Why did Davenport send you here? To spy on me to see how much of his crap I stole so he could sue me for it or something?"
"No, that's just a bonus we stumbled across," I said.
"Then why did you come here?"
"Like I'm gonna tell you."
"You're not making this easy."
"But you sure are, I refuse to answer your question once and then you get all pissy about it."
"Don't make me resort to extreme measures."
"Oh no, please don't send more scary guards in!"
"Can anything come out of your mouth that isn't sarcastic?"
"Yes. I've seen pictures of you in your college days, and you have objectively aged horribly."
"Excuse me?"
"What? That was 100% sarcasm free. And as a bonus it was the truth."
"You're unbelievable."
"So are your wrinkles."
"Can you stop talking about my appearance?"
"You know, I bet you spent a lot of money on those skin revival creams or whatever that fancy stuff is called. If you give me a pen and paper, I'll write a very thorough letter on why you should get your money back."
"I can't take this anymore!" Synican screamed. He promptly stormed out of the cell block, leaving me in the cell smirking and the security guard at his post gaping.
"Take notes," I said to the guard, "One day you'll look at the wrong thing too and be in the same cell as me, and then you'll remember this day."
"Little girl, you're gonna die," the guard warned.
"Nah, I'll be fine," I mused, "He needs information from me. And when it comes to interrogation stuff, there's not much fancytech for Synican to steal from Davenport."
The guard just shook his head. And I started to plot a way out of the cell.
I crouched over myself, shielding one of my hands from any visible cameras or guards. After a quick test, I discovered that Synican had indeed believed me about not being bionic. My bionics worked just fine, and sparks danced between my fingers.
"Alright, so how to get out of here," I thought. I figured that I should probably hide my bionics for as long as possible, which would mean getting rid of the cameras, and that guard. Hopefully Synican was stupid enough to make this work.
I put my hand on the lock of the cell, which looked like it was electronicky. I concentrated, and just sent pulse after pulse of electricity out of my hand, making all of the security cameras spark out until they died.
The guard whirled around, his face panicked.
"What just happened?" He said.
"Haven't you figured it out? Your boss is an idiot," I smirked, turning intangible and phasing through the bars of my cell. I turned tangible again, but before my left foot was out of the cell, promptly making me fall on the floor.
The guard just laughed, "Synican's the idiot?"
"I never said he was the only idiot," I shot back, phasing the rest of my foot through the cell.
"Well, now Synican is gonna find out all about you," the guard smirked.
"Nope," I smiled, zapping his radio to oblivion, "You forget who you're messing with."
"Right," the guard gulped.
"What's your name?" I asked.
"Jayden," he said.
"Well Jayden," I said, "It's been a time, and don't worry, this won't hurt too much."
"What do you mean by th—" I cut him off by zapping him too. He collapsed on the floor, unconscious.
"And another guard down that couldn't put up a fight," I said to myself, "Mr. Synican, I think you need to hire a new security company."
I almost ran out of the cell block before realizing that I probably shouldn't run out into the middle of Synican's building being Lexie.
"Hmmm," I muttered, who to be. Then it hit me.
——————————
Dylan Synican's POV
I was finding it rather hard to pretend that Lexie didn't exist. Granted, I knew that Lexie wasn't her real name, but it was the closest that I was gonna get without calling her the Davenport girl.
There I was again, thinking about her. I had a company to run, and people to check in on.
"Jennifer, how's Project Geoplex going?"
"Right on schedule Mr. Synican, I think we're getting close to a finished project."
"Great, hey Kalvin, how's that expo speech coming?"
"Pretty good, though you might want to talk to the software division. Every time I type Synican it autocorrects to sugarcane, syndicate, or.... nope we're not saying that one out loud."
"I'll take your word for it and talk to them. Hey! Darrell, did you fix that code yet?"
"Uh, no I'm still trying to figure it out."
"Still? It's been a day and a half."
"Literally no one can figure it out, no one gets it!"
"Alright, well get back to work. Hey Reyanne, the autocorrect is turning my name into expletives."
"Again? Ugh! I thought we just fixed that."
"Jill, can you get me a cup of coffee?"
"Really? That's pretty sexist of you Mister Synican."
"Then make James do it. I really don't care who gets me coffee, you were just in my line of sight."
"Hey Mr. Synican, you're 3-o-clock just called and said they can't meet until after 6."
"Those pricks, uh, switch them with the semiconductor company, they've got nothing better to do than meet with me."
"Oh, Mr. Synican, I fixed that code."
"In thirty seconds? I'm impressed Darrell."
"What do you mean thirty seconds, it took our whole unit a day in a half," Darrell said, confused.
"Didn't you just come up to me and say that you were still hopelessly lost with that?" I asked.
"No," he said.
"Then who did I just talk to—"
"What?"
"The freaking Davenport girl," I said, "I don't have time for this."
I grabbed the radio out of my pocket, "Guys, we have a clone of Darrell running around, please deal with it."
"Mr. Synican, what's going on?" Darrell asked.
"Well—"
"Biscuits biscuits biscuits," Darrell-clone said, barreling towards us with three guards hot on his trail.
"—that's what's going on," I finished. But I barely had time to finish before Darrell's clone ran by us, taking Darrell in the process.
"Why me!" He cried as both Darrell's disappeared around the corner.
"Why me is right," I muttered, jogging after the action. Once I heard a crash, I started running faster. I arrived on the scene to see both Darrell's climbing out of a pile of collapsed drywall.
It wasn't enough to clone one of my employees, they had to mess with my drywall too!
"Alright, enough is enough," I said firmly, pulling a blaster out of my pocket and pointing at both Darrells, "Which one of you is the Davenport spy?"
"It's not me! I swear!" One of the Darrells said, panicked.
"What are you talking about?" The other Darrell said, "Who's Davenport? What spying?"
"No, no no no! He's lying, he's trying to trick you!"
"No I'm not, you are!"
"He's pointing a freaking gun at us!"
"Yeah! So just admit you're whatever he's talking about before we both DIE!"
"I'd rather die than let you get away with this!"
"That'd sound so much more noble if you were telling the truth!"
"Well I am telling the truth!"
"No you aren't, I am!"
"ENOUGH!!!!" I bellowed, shutting both Darrells up, "This gun is one of the main achievements of my research into bionic technology. It can disrupt the bionic signals sent through whoever gets shot by it."
"So what does that mean?" One of the Darrells asked.
"One of you will be perfectly unharmed by this," I said, "The other, who knows what'll happen. Hopefully it hurts."
And with that, I shot both Darrells. One collapsed onto the ground, morphing into a short girl with red hair. The other one just looked with wide eyes before also fainting, hitting his head hard onto the ground.
"Oh Darrell," I mused.
——————————
Zoey's POV
I slowly stood up, fighting the dizziness that threatened to consume my body. Looking down, I saw that Synican wasn't wrong. I was no longer in disguise. But I couldn't give him the win. Not yet.
"So, this is who you really are," Synican mused, "Does Davenport have something for short people, or something?"
I just groaned.
"So, do you have a real name?" He asked.
"Wouldn't you like to know," I said.
"Well, it won't really matter," Synican said, "Once I leak the security footage online, they'll trace it back to you in time."
"And what purpose would that serve?" I asked.
"Well, I've almost perfected my bionic technology in androids," Synican started.
"You mean you've almost finished copying the technology?" I interjected.
"Sure, whatever," Synican said, "Point is, once I reveal my bionic technology to the world, the only competition I might have is Davenport's bionic humans. And what better way than this footage to prove how unstable bionic humans are, and how my android technology is superior."
"Wow, you just have it all figured out," I said, leaning against the wall for support.
"Yes I do," Synican said, then frowned, "Wait. I sense a but coming."
"Ding ding ding!" I said, "See, the cheap knockoff is never better than the original."
"There are always exceptions to that rule," Synican said.
"If you were an exception, you would've made sure that that gun really worked before spilling your entire plan to me," I said, and promptly started electrocuting the wall, trying to short circuit the entire complex.
Synican tossed his blaster to a guard and pulled out his phone, yelling, "Shoot her down!"
I threw my hand out, electrocuting the guards quickly before turning my attention back to the wall. After a good thirty seconds, the lights in the area shut off. I actually felt the entire electrical system of the Synican complex collapse.
I turned to Synican, growling, "You're next."
"Not so fast," Synican said, holding up his phone. On the screen played a video of me electrocuting the wall in fury.
"And," I said, trying to keep my cool.
"While I don't like coding, I still can do it," Synican, "And if you electrocute this phone, that video goes onto every social media site, and your bionics will be exposed to the world."
"Well, how about this," I said, grabbing a gun from the nearest incapacitated guard and pointing it at Synican, "This seems pretty real, and it definitely won't electrocute anything."
"Oh don't be silly," Synican chuckled, "Cut the theatrics and put that thing down."
"Theatrics?" I said.
"All of the guards you've electrocuted today are still alive while you have more than enough power to kill them," Synican said, "You're not gonna shoot that gun. You don't have the guts for murder."
"I don't?" I said between my teeth.
"No," Synican said, "You don't"
I gritted my teeth, and closed my eyes, taking a deep breath.
I then realized that closing my eyes probably wasn't a very good idea.
So I opened my eyes, took another deep breath and steadied my hands.
"See, I knew you wouldn't do it," Synican chuckled, "You Davenports will never win cause you'll never finish the job."
"Goodbye Dylan," I whispered, and pulled the trigger.
Bam.
And it was all over.
The man collapsed onto the ground, dark red blood oozing out of the hole in his forehead.
The rest of my movements were in a daze. Wiping fingerprints off the gun, deleting the video off Synican's phone before smashing it on the ground, finding the quickest way out of the complex.
I had killed Dylan Synican.
The cool, evening air hit my face as I walked to the street. I got a Lyft and had it take me back to the hotel where I had been staying as Lexie. I entered the room and collapsed onto the bed.
I had killed Dylan Synican.
I barely slept through the night. Synican haunted me the whole time. His cold, lifeless eyes that had only been able to halfway make a surprised expression before the bullet had entered his skull.
I had killed Dylan Synican.
——————————
The next morning, I couldn't face the Davenports. Not after what I had done, I wasn't ready to talk to them yet.
I pulled out the emergency phone from my suitcase and texted Chase, saying that I'd just meet them at the school. I checked out of the hotel and morphed into an eagle. As I soared through the sky, I tried to forget what I had done. I had done what I had to do. Or had I? Did I have to kill Synican?
Was I a killer now?
I flapped my wings harder, as if somehow, if I flew fast enough, I could fly away from my problems. But the farther I went, the more the whole situation wrapped around me and dragged me down.
I wasn't a murder. I wasn't a murderer. I was not a murderer.
Maybe if I said it to myself enough times I would believe it.
I landed inconspicuously by the school, becoming human again. Using every ounce of my will to keep myself from breaking down into tears right then and there, I walked into Mission Creek High School.
And I didn't even walk two steps before everything got worse.
"ZOEY!" Jaz screamed, in what sounded like a mix of relief and terror, as she barreled at me and wrapped me in a huge hug, "We were so worried, we thought they had gotten you!"
"Who had gotten me? What?" I asked.
"Them," Colton said gravely, holding his phone up for me to see. It was a video of Adam, Bree, and Chase.
And it was titled, "The World's First Bionic Humans."
——————————
February 17, 2019
Oops
I don't know why that took so freaking long. And don't even get me started on the title, it sounds cool but I don't even know if it makes any form of sense. Honestly though, I think it was because I had been thinking of this original part for so long that I had way to many things I wanted to write, and didn't know how to write it out.
I don't know, I don't really know what I'm doing anymore. (Also, sorry that sounded so depressing, but keep in mind I'm writing this note right after I wrote that ending).
Speaking of that ending........... y'all know what's next.
Also, shout-out to Bebe Rexha's "Last Hurrah" for getting me through the last thousand words of this part 👍
Don't kill people
AJ