009 - Ashina

The drive to the lab was draining.

Each mile I covered felt like a count to something I couldn’t come back from.

The coordinates were precise, thankfully. It helped to give my mind something sharp to cling to, something that wasn’t the guilt clawing its way up my throat. Because I needed to focus on that and not miss it.

Like I had with Maya.

UntiI I turned by the last coordinates.

The narrow road was twisted like a serpent, curving through shadowy woods. The dense trees on either side of the road cast long arms across the cracked pavement.

My hands were slick on the steering wheel, despite the death grip I had on it. I slowed down as the final GPS marker blinked green.

And just ahead of me was the gate, that was hidden beneath a blanket of overgrowth, rusted and was sagging on its hinges like it has not been maintained in decades, was a gate.

I stopped the car. The engine idled in a low rumble as I stared ahead, trying to make sense of what I was about to walk into.

My eyes flicked to the rearview mirror to look behind.

Maya was still unconscious, with her body covered with a thin emergency blanket. I’d stopped to drape over her at some point during the journey when she started shivering. Her breathing was steady through the journey, although every few minutes her fingers twitched.

I swallowed hard and looked away from her and looked at my reflection in the mirror, grimacing at my reflection. I looked like a ghost. Pale. Bruised. Very much haunted. My hair was a tangled mess. There was blood crusted around my temple, and the hollowness in my eyes made something tighten in my chest.  

I had never looked this bad since that day 5 years ago when my life was torn apart.

And yet there was I, back to that same state and back to a life I had sworn then I would never go back to.

Except now, I wasn’t alone in my destruction. I’d dragged an innocent girl into this hell with me.

My hand trembled as I reached up and brushed a smear of dried blood from my cheek.

“It’s all your fault,” I whispered, barely able to meet my own eyes. “All your fault.”

The words stuck in my throat, bitterly.

But again, there was no use falling apart from the guilt eating up at me. Not until Maya was back to being human. I had to make sure she was alright. Even if it meant asking for help from the last person I would ever want one from in the entire universe.

I exhaled, picked up my phone, and dialed Dr. Veyra.

The line barely rang once before she picked it up.

“Finally,” Dr Veyra’s voice came through the phone, in dry amusement. "For a second there, I thought you were going to turn around. I was already prepping to send my security after you. Since you know where my secret lab is, that’s not exactly knowledge I’d let anyone walk away with.”

I closed my eyes, forcing down the nausea building in my gut. I took a deep breath to harden my heart and prepare myself to see the horrors I knew I would encounter the moment I stepped into the lab.

I huffed, opening my eyes. “Are we doing this or not?” I said flatly. “We have less than twenty minutes before she wakes up.”

“I’ll buzz you,” she said immediately, all amusement vanished from her voice. “I’ll be waiting for you at the entrance. See you in a bit, Dr. Kai.”

A second later, the gate creaked open with a mechanical groan and started the engine again and rolled forward.

As soon as my car passed the perimeter, a faint shimmer passed over the windshield, making me slow down.

Wards?

There was an instant supernatural sweep that washed over the vehicle, humming statically against my skin. My steering wheel vibrated as magical wards scanned Maya and I, registering our genetic markers, scanning our aura, cataloguing every trace of magic, and taking in our bloodstream before I could go further.

I hadn’t even gone too far when steel barricades jutted from the ground to form a single narrow lane. Hidden cameras emerged from tree trunks, and motion-sensor drones hovered in from the treetops. They scanned the entirety of the vehicle before mechanical arms waved me forward to the next checkpoint.

“Seriously?” I muttered through gritted teeth as I stopped yet again for another scanning magical ward.

My heartbeat spiked as it scanned my memories.

A robotic voice crackled: "Identify: Ashina Kai. Status: Non-hostile. Blood Signature: Verified."

The barricades dropped.

I groaned but pushed forward; at this rate, Maya was going to wake up whilst in this car.

The passage led to a long tunnel that moved into the base of the mountain. Outside, everything looked rugged, poor, and not well-maintained. But the deeper I drove, the more it changed.

Fluorescent lights lit the tunnel with a cold, clinical glow.  Surveillance drones clung like bats to the high, vaulted ceiling of the tunnel tracking my movement and every act.

Everything screamed dirty money, power, and lots of secrets.

I didn’t let myself think too much about how a rogue scientist like Dr. Veyra had managed to fund all this.

I wasn’t here to scrutinize her but to use her appliances for Maya. That was what mattered.

The tunnel ended at a massive open bay that was a vast underground parking lot, the size of several football fields. In the distance, flanked by two towering steel and glass structures that disguised their defensive capabilities, stood the lab building itself.

The entire structure radiated the kind of cold, sterile brilliance that could only be born of vast, endless wealth and dangerous ambition.

I parked. My hands didn’t move at first. It took a conscious effort to pull the keys, to open the door, and to climb out just as the main doors hissed open.

Dr. Veyra emerged from the door, clad in white with her dark hair pulled into a severe knot and her lips painted like dried blood. She smiled at me like I was an overdue experiment finally walking in.

“Where is she?”

I didn’t respond and instead just popped open the back door.

The moment Veyra saw Maya, her smile dropped. She turned back to the building, snapping her fingers to call the attention of her guys.

“Now!”

A team of medics in scrubs rushed forward instantly, with a reinforced stretching, and lifted Maya’s limp body so easily. One of them murmured vitals, and another began prepping a sedative booster just in case.

I couldn’t move. It was like my feet were nailed to the ground. My chest ached, my lungs refusing to expand properly. I could hardly breathe as I stood by, frozen and just watching them.

It played out in a blur. Just like in the movies, when someone was rushed to the ER, and all the family could do was watch.

It was antagonizing and frightening.

A weight pressed gently on my shoulder, and I flinched, turning to the side to see Dr. Veyra beside me with a cool and unreadable gaze.

"Let’s get this show on the road, shall we?"