Faithful Freefall (24.2)

"Hurry up," Mina gritted out, "If you can't open that lock soon someone is going to get suspicious." She looked around the corner, keeping an eye out for anyone coming their way, her hand already on the button to open her axe to full size.

"I'm trying," Bella responded, sounding just as stressed, "But if I try too many combinations that are wrong, then we'll end up setting off alarms. Just keep an eye out for anyone coming this way."

Owen leaned into the keypad, looking closely at it, "Think, Bella, does this guy have any friends, family, spouse, anything? Or maybe a birthday?" 

Bella shook her head, "I have no idea, Heranzik's files never mentioned a family or anything. We can…His birthday is October seventeenth, try that."

The boy leaned forward and inputted '1017' into the keypad but the number flashed red and there was a small sound that indicated they were wrong, "Fuck, that's not it. Only two attempts left. Seriously, what the hell could it be? I mean, he was so private about his life…" Owen muttered.

"Oh, fuck, guys, someone's coming!" Mina called back quietly, looking at them panicked. 

Bella looked at the door, and then back at Mina, "Hey, Mina, remember when I said that you'd be learning how to get information from people and how to be a distraction? Yeah, time for you to put that into action. Go out there and distract them. Just flirt with them and try to move them away from this area."

"What!? I don't know how to—"

"You don't know until you try, besides, we don't have many other options!" Owen hissed, "I need Bella here since she's the only other person who might be able to help me figure out the password. I love you, Mina, but you are useless in that sense. You don't know this doctor, Bella and I do. Now get out there and pretend that person is Lumina! You certainly have no trouble flirting with her. Go!" He pushed Mina out into the hallway. 

As Mina was shoved forward, internally, she cursed Owen out as she came face to face with a guard, "Hey, uh…Come here often, handsome?" She asked, smiling sheepishly.

"Oh, dear God, she's hopeless," Bella muttered under her breath as she looked closely at the lock and Owen smacked his forehead.

The guard looked at her, unimpressed, and Mina laughed, "Hey, lighten up, I was kidding! Listen, I'm kind of new here and I kinda got a bit lost," She scratched her neck, "You mind showing me where Lab 20 is? I've got a bit of a deadline honestly."

"Show me your identification," The guard said monotonously.

Mina sighed before reaching into her pocket to pull out her ID, "You're no fun at all," She mumbled before holding it up for him to see, "Here, happy now?" As the guard nodded, she shifted back, "Anyway, how about we make a deal? Just play a fun little game with me, and if you win, I'll stop bothering you. If I win, you do whatever I ask you to. How does that sound?"

The guard just looked at her, "Are you serious?" He asked.

"Oh, come on, just humor me!" Mina pouted, "Tell me you have anything better to do now than just patrol these halls. Loosen up, will you? Just one game."

He sighed, "Fine, what is this game?"

"It's simple," Mina grinned, "We fight hand-to-hand combat, right here right now. The first one to get pinned down for three seconds loses. No weapons. How does that sound?"

The guard raised an eyebrow, "You really think you can beat me?" He asked, leaning back and crossing his arms. It almost seemed as though he was trying to make himself seem taller, even though he seemed like he was already a foot taller than her.

"What, are you scared of being embarrassed? Come on, it won't hurt you try and beat me at least, wouldn't it?" Mina asked, rolling up her sleeves, "You know what, I'll even add an extra condition. If I don't take you down in sixty seconds, then I lose. How's that sound?"

"Sure, you've got a deal. But don't blame yourself when you lose," The guard said, chucking away the rifle strapped to his back and readying himself.

Instantly, Mina rushed forward. She knew that while she had a deceptive stature which made her seem weaker than she really was, it wouldn't be as easy for her to simply brute force someone who had to be at least eight inches taller than her. One thing she did have on her side, though, was speed. All she had to do was use that to her advantage to knock the man off his feet.

She did exactly that, slipping around the man to kick him in the back of the knees, and as the man stumbled a bit, taken by surprise swung her leg up to kick him straight in his back, causing him to fall forward. Grabbing his arms, she pulled them behind him and pinned them behind his back, stepping over his body to lean her knee forcefully on his spine.

"Three…Two…One…And I win," Mina said, smirking, "Want me to let you up now, or would you like to stay on the ground for a bit longer, hm?"

"I, uh—Yeah, let me up," The man said, sounding a bit flustered. Mina let her leg up and brushed herself off, crossing her arms and leaning against the wall as he sat up, "You're…Much stronger than you look."

Mina laughed, "Yeah, well, I think it's an advantage to me. People tend to underestimate me, and that's usually the thing that screws them over in the end. You know that from personal experience now, don't you?"

The man nodded, "Yeah…Yeah, I do," He looked at her, almost stars in his eyes, and his face flushed pink.

Oh. Oh, maybe Mina could do this flirting thing. Maybe she could do it better than she thought she could.

"Alright, you've got to hold up your end of the deal. I need to find Lab 20, show me where it is. You can tell me a bit about yourself as we go," She said, grinning a bit as she grabbed his arm and pulled him up.

The man looked a bit surprised, "You want to know about me?" He asked, pointing at himself.

Mina smiled at him, tugging him towards the main hub of the level, "Yeah, I mean, why wouldn't I want to know about the guy whose ass I just beat? Now, come on, I've got some stuff I need to get done," She led him away from the hallway where Bella and Owen had been hiding.

The ginger-haired woman peeked out from the hallway and let out a breath of relief as she watched Mina leading the man away, "When I told her to flirt, I wasn't expecting anything like that, but I guess…Each person flirts in their own way, I suppose," She muttered. Hearing the click of a door, she turned back to see Owen holding the door slightly ajar, looking just as surprised as her, "How did you—"

"You see these four numbers? They're the most worn out on the keypad," Owen pointed out, "1, 2, 0, and 8. I just tried to rearrange them into dates, either 1028 or 0128. I put in 1028 and it worked by luck."

"Holy shit, Owen," Bella looked at him, "You're a fucking genius. No wonder they originally planned on adding you to the gifted child program."

Owen pushed open the door, "Actually, seeing as with our whole scenario, you were a scientist, right? That means that you must have been at least part cyborg, right? Since Risále and Leon are 'successful' cyborgs while Kaedan and I are 'failed' cyborg subjects."

"Ah? Yeah, I have the same supercomputer chip inputted into my head but…" Bella stepped into the room, "Well, the supercomputer chips are strange. Even though all three of us have a chip each, we can each only access certain information. A lot of my strategies and battle plans are driven by the fact that I can calculate most counterattacks and the possibility of success, plus possible outcomes. Leon has an uncanny memory and is like a walking library. That's why he knows so much about what's happening, though in an absolutely horrible play of fate, he can't actually talk to anyone about it. Risále seems to have the ability to actually create most of the experiments done by the White Lotus scientists, basically, you can consider her a master of engineering, whether it be technological, mechanical, or even biomedical. Hence why she's the one who knows how to create the digital virus that can disengage the mind control chips on everyone here, Honestly, Chaewon and Elliot know more about this than I do," Bella explained. She tossed over what looked like a set of keys to him, "Start checking the drawers, see what you can find."

Owen nodded and he began to unlock the drawers in the desk, "By the way, did you see that some of the scientists were also chipped?" He asked.

Bella sighed as she looked through a couple of shelves, "From what I can tell, all the scientists with only Level 1 access have all been chipped. If my assumptions are right, they were probably the guinea pigs when this chip was first created. We…We found Lumina and Xander's parents," Owen whirled around to look at her, "Lumina identified them. They're Level 1 scientists. We had to knock them out."

"Jesus Christ, how's Lumina doing?"

"I think she's coping for now," Bella muttered, "I wish there was more we could have done at that time but all we could do was prioritize not hurting them."

Owen looked down, "We have to save them," He said determinedly, "Xander and Lumina, they've lost so much already, if we can save their parents, we have to do it."

Bella's eyes softened, "And we will," She leaned over to ruffle his hair, "That's exactly what Leon's team is working on right now. If he can get up to the mainframe on Level 4, we'll be able to free them. That's why we're in here, we need to find a Level 4 access card—"

"Uh. Bella," Owen said, his voice sounding strained, "I…I think you should take a look at this drawer over here…" Bella walked over to see that in the drawer, there were a bunch of files. 

What was more important, though, was that in the very front of those files, two names stood out.

Leonardo Minhyuk Song and Risále Celine Manon.

She pulled out the files, handing Leon's file over to Owen, "...Bella, his is empty," He muttered, bending down to look through the other files, "There's nothing in here for him."

"There's stuff in Risále's," She muttered, "Dear God, there's a lot…There's a lot in here," She flipped through the pages, "Projects she was involved in, observations about her behaviors, and…" She squinted, "Oh, fuck," She muttered."

Owen leaned up to look over her shoulder, "What? What is it?"

Bella shut the file abruptly, "Risále cannot see this under any circumstances. She's already struggling with some of her memories about her time as a scientist returning, this information could really hurt her. But we need to get this to Leon. I don't know all the projects mentioned here, but he probably knows them all—" 

There was a sudden knocking on the door, "Hey, guys, hurry up and let us in!" Mina said, her voice just loud enough to carry through the door but sounding frantic. Owen and Bella looked at each other, and Owen nodded, tucking the file under his hoodie. Bella ran over and opened the door, and within moments, Mina ran in, and to their surprise, she was followed by Fenix and Lumina.

"We…" Fenix wheezed out as Owen ran over to him, checking him over, "I'm fine, Owen," He muttered, pressing a kiss to his boyfriend's cheek, "But we may…Have a problem."

Bella looked around, "Wait, where's Leon?" She asked, the concern apparent in her voice, "Wasn't he with you two?"

"Yeah, that's—" Lumina managed to get out between breaths, "That's part of the problem. He's up on the fourth floor. Apparently, he's going to confront Dr. De Luca."

The ginger-haired woman's eyes widened, "You've got to be kidding me," She said, "We've got to get to him!" She spoke into her earpiece, "Leon? Leon, are you okay? We're going to come after you, okay—"

"No!" Leon responded almost instantly, "Don't come for me, I can handle this on my own! You guys focus on securing a way out of here. Just trust me, I can do this."

Mina grabbed Bella's shoulder, "Besides, I'm pretty sure we have a bigger problem right now—"

She was interrupted by loud banging on the office door.