When she woke up this morning, Ava expected it to be bad, worse even, but after the twins kept their promise to help, she let hope get the better of her. A storm moved and twisted all around them. The cloudy sky roared and cried under thick afternoon air. Mist chilled Ava’s face, drenched her uniform and curled a loose piece of hair until it was completely frizzed. Exactly why she put her hair up in a bun.

Layers of water ran over the vines and skyscrapers into rivers. The foot of this rickety building became a pond, covering the open field and the laboratory's green hill. It was deep enough to slow their foot, shallow enough to stand their ground. The carnival wasn't any better. This place was about to go under. This would be their last chance at getting inside.

Puddles sloshed about as Ava made her way towards the edge of the flat roofline. Carefully, she stopped near the edge while water ran over like a never-ending waterfall. The world was vastly consuming itself and she felt the depths of it in her heart.

The end of the world was coming faster than the UFE predicted.

One by one the twins joined Ava on the ledge. Rain dripped from Gio’s chin as he gave her the knapsack. She took out the binoculars and zoomed in. The wolf demons slept below, huddled close together in scattered piles with a tinge of spike to their obsidian furs. There were less than before, yet still too many for one person to kill.

“So what’s the plan?” Mika asked, squinting. He didn’t bring binoculars. “Please tell me you have a plan.”

With Mika next to Ava, it was hard to ignore the heat radiating off him. Harder to not be envious of his alien trait. As she spoke, a fog left her mouth. “Of course I have a plan.” She put the binoculars away and swung the knapsack over her shoulders. “Sam will help Gio kill the demons while you watch my back.”

Surprised, Mika pointed to himself. A slither of a smile crept on his lips. Standing this close, it looked more sinful than ever before. “You want me to watch your back?”

“Considering your track record, you suck at killing demons. I don’t wanna have to hear your dying screams while I’m trying to get inside,” she said. “It’ll break my concentration.”

His smile dropped. “So you’re saying I’m the weakest one here.”

“I’m saying, you’re the one who has the most important job.”

No glob demon would get the better of Ava this time. With Mika’s barrier and Sam’s help, Ava could put all her energy on getting inside. She’d make sure they got through that door. No matter what it cost.

After Gio and Sam figured out their plan of attack, they fanned out, one on either end of the building. The roof swayed side to side from their short movements. Seconds later, they disappeared. Gio popped up in the middle of the field, his arm raised towards the stormy sky. Spider demons dropped from the trees from hordes of silk. Their spikes stabbed the watery grass, moving quickly and faster towards him like mechanical toys.

His energy surged with the wind, forcing tidal waves against the skyscraper walls. Thunder vibrated up Ava’s body as lightning crashed onto Gio. Sparks ran through his body and into the ground, sending vipers across the bed of demons, killing them in their sleep. Many burst around him but it didn’t destroy them all.

The remaining wolf demons howled, screeching the air with their snapping tongues, searching with their glowing yellow eyes. Sam appeared by Gio’s side. Swiping his left hand out, he used koto to freeze many in their paths, making Gio’s kills easier than before. They were completely in sync, maybe even a better duo than Ava and her brother.

Mika grabbed his swords, unsheathing them by his side. As he stepped forward, she immediately slapped the Bō against his chest and blocked him from making a rash decision. Impatience filtered through his tight lips.

“When we get to the door, use koto to make a protective barrier around me. Whatever you do afterwards is up to you,” Ava said. “I just need that barrier up.”

Mika turned his gaze on Sam. “I may suck at killing demons, but you’re terrible at asking for help.” He held out his arm as any prince would. “Ready, friend?”

Was he joking? She gripped his shoulder. They left the roofline and teleported close to the entrance, but not close enough. The path Gio and Sam made was slowly being consumed by the growing number of demons.

Ava took off. Her running boots splashed water with each step, growing less and less chaotic until she glided above the waving surface. Two wolf demons jumped out and blocked her path. She morphed the Bō into a sword, ready to strike them down.

Mika popped up to her left and swung his two blades for their growling throats. Swiftly, she evaded them. Ava was closing in. She was almost there.

A long, thick spike stabbed the ground in front of Ava. There was no time to stop. She skid between its legs, under its belly. Its black fur grumbled and moved in spiky waves. Green acid furrowed across its skin into a small ball above her head. Shit.

She morphed the Bō into a sword and swung towards a leg. It cut like lumber, collapsed like a tree. The goop of acid dropped on the spider demon’s own body, burning and decaying its own flesh. A child’s scream howled from its fangs—its mouth.

Mika stabbed it in the head, silencing the demon forever. He smiled. “It looks like I’m the one saving you today.”

What could she say? She’d been off her game since they got here. It had to be from the lack of sleep and this god damn cold weather. She stood and waved for Mika to follow. “Come on, sidekick. We’re almost there.”

The door was within feet now, and once they reached it, she sighed with relief. The vines swayed in the chilly wind, still cut from her sword yet thrived with life. The monitor was undamaged from the heavy rainfall and lit the moment she touched the cracked screen.

“Put up the barrier,” Ava ordered.

Without a word, a warm, blue-tinted light appeared above and around her. It blocked out the mist and enclosed the mossy wall of the laboratory. She stabbed her sword into the watery grass, then pulled out her phone. Let’s get started.

It was quicker this time after having done it once. Ava successfully connected her wristwatch. By the time she pulled her glove off, Harry answered the phone. “What’s the passcode?”

He grunted as the sound of his fingers tapped through the phone. Club music thrived in the background. “Hold up. Almost got it,” Harry quickly said. “I’m in the middle of cracking it. For the tenth time, I might add.”

“Are you serious? I thought you said it changes every hour!” Ava pressed further into the screen. A ping went off, flashing her rank and name with another check mark.

“Someone changed it to every two minutes. They know we’re trying to get inside. You should be lucky I’m still doing this. I might get caught—there! I’ve got it!” He took a deep breath as her hand hovered over the keypad. “J8+F9*h2.”

Ava swiftly typed across the screen. The keypad disappeared, then changed to the loading symbol, spiraling. For a moment, there was no sound. No movement. Her eyes burned into the monitor, impatience swirled higher.

It was taking so long—this was taking forever. If it didn’t load soon, Ava would smack her hand against this death spiral until it most likely broke.

The screen went blank.

Snap.

Creaking and screeching, grinded across the pavement as the steel door crept open. The monitor flashed back on, displaying the UFE logo of the ruined world and then words across the cracked screen: Access Granted.

“I’m in,” Ava whispered. “I'm in.” Warm tears accumulated in her eyes, and this time, she didn’t hold back. She was so overjoyed.

She couldn’t believe it. It took months, hours to get to this point. She took all the punishments from the naysayers. She let herself be pushed around by the Council. No more. Finally, she’d be able to control her weapon—have her life back. It was finally happening.

I’d finally be free.

“We’re in!” Ava shouted behind her. Mika stood there.

He was still inside the barrier, feet behind her.

Rain dripped off his wavy strands. She thought for sure he’d fight. As the barrier descended, he gawked at her—eyes wide, mouth slack. A hot tear rolled down her frozen cheek. She wiped it away with the back of her hand. He wasn't supposed to see that.

Behind Mika, Gio and Sam were running up behind them with demons hot on their trail. Ava yanked the sword out of the grass, grabbed Mika's wrist and pulled him inside. The demons were gaining traction. There was no time to wait. She slammed the emergency switch. The door halted to a screech, then started closing back up.

Gio and Sam ran faster, their hands straight, arms pumping them forward. They teleported, slipped through the crack, and were consumed in total darkness.

Silence.

Water sloshed against their boots. Ava snapped a light stick from the knapsack and shined it overhead. A glass wall separated them from the rest of the laboratory. It was thick and hard, covered in sword markings with bullets embedded halfway through. Her whole index finger fit in one of the many holes.

Lights flickered on above and spread through the empty room and down a spiraling staircase. Corpses and bones, swords and guns, laid scattered around the dome enclosure. Lab coats and broken tablets were the only items left of who they once were before.

A blast of stale air hit them from all sides until a green light circled the glass frame. The wall opened from the middle of a seamless straight cut, and let out a stream of rainwater, drowning all the destruction and exposing the walls.

Between the splotches of dried blood and soot, the walls were a shocking white. Ava sucked in a sharp breath, instantly remembering the last battle. The Prim white uniform and their white ships, shooting at Earth from the sky. The pictures of their stark, white buildings.

It’s just a color. It’s just a color. Nothing to fear.

Above, on the ceiling, a foreign logo was pressed into the smooth texture like a giant stamp. It looked familiar, but Ava couldn’t pinpoint where, but it was obvious this place was built before Gregori established the UFE. On the wall, painted in a deep shade of blue, a bird sat perched on the world, spreading its stiff wings out towards the stars. The UFE was etched in the world while The AVA Project was above its beak; both new additions.

“What happened here?”

Sam looked at a skeleton leaning against a wall. His eyes were full of hurt and pain. He reached out to touch it, but stopped and clenched his sword instead. Ava was surprised he felt any sympathy for the death of another race.

“There used to be a group of people who were against having abilities and immortality from the get-go. So once they caught wind of my creation, they took action and tried to stop me from being born,” Ava said. “Obviously they failed.”

As she carefully approached the staircase more lights flickered on, circling the dome edging, under this man-made hill. Words on the wall bled through the cheap paint job. They grew clearer as she approached the staircase, reading, Thank you for your contribution to society and all that has kept our world safe. - BioGENEtics

BioGENEtics was the health organization who removed the world of disease and plagues. If Gregori was the son of the man who owned BioGENEtics, then it made sense why the UFE reused their facility for manufacturing abilities and creating Ava. This had to be the right place. This had to be where Ava was born.

Ignoring protocol, she quickly ran down the spiraling staircase. It was floating, no sides or railing to stop someone from falling off and down this three story basement. But there was no time to be cautious. The rain was getting worse outside.

“Whoa—wait,” Mika called out as Ava carefully stepped over more broken tablets. “Shouldn’t we stop and think about this first? There might be traps set up in this place.”

He was hot on her trail but didn’t stop her. Like the entrance, the rooms they passed had glass walls separating them like a barrier. Yet unlike the entrance, all the doors were wide open like they were waiting for their arrival.

When they reached the second level, Mika finally caught up. “It’s been twenty years since this happened. I doubt there are any live traps left,” Ava said as calmly as she could.

“Time is irrelevant for traps.”

“He’s right. Back home we’re still finding traps set from when our great-grandfather was ruling,” Sam yelled down. He was with Gio, falling behind. They were still trying to catch their breaths from the fight. Their heavy breathing echoed all the way down here.

When they reached the third, and last, floor, a large wall covered half the area, deeply set inside the Earth’s crust. This had to be it. Mika grabbed Ava’s arm before she could step inside, before the lights flickered on. Her patience grew thin.

“Then at least give us something to do before you go off and get yourself killed.”

A grin crosses her lips. It was amusing how he could be funny without realizing it. Maybe they could be more useful than she thought.

“The whole point of this mission is to find my birth record.” Ava brought the knapsack around and pulled out the chargers. “It should be on any of these tablets. We just need one to work, and these will help power them on.”

If these tablets were anything like the ones they used at the Capitol, then all the information should be stored on any tablet and working as a central computer. Interestingly, these tablets were broken. If the scientists really wanted to destroy the files, then they would’ve burned them instead. They wanted the files to be opened.

She gave them each five twig thin USB sticks. The twins stared at them, confused. “It's simple. You just plug it in and see if the tablet turns on. And if it does, tell me.”

Quickly turning on her heel, Ava entered the laboratory. Her steps were so fast the lights fell behind, flicking on only after she stepped into the darkness. Glass crunched beneath her boots from flasks and display cases. Few vials still lined the walls, some on the metal tables. They were pushed to the sides in disarray, yet the further she went, the damage was less.

Except for one—a broken chamber smashed in from the center. It was attached from the ceiling to the floor, molding together as if part of the Earth and the Earth were part of it. Ava had no attachment to it, but the Bō pulsed in her hand like she was supposed to, like it understood what this meant.

To the left, cabinets lined the wall, doors hung from broken hinges, specimens and small skeletons scattered the cement floor. But to her right, there was a table full of broken tablets like they were tossed here for someone to break. A hammer lied next to them.

This was it. One of these tablets had to work. Ava sifted through the pile. One by one, she plugged a charger at the top. And one by one, they stayed dead. It took six tablets before she used one charger up and still she came up empty.

At this rate, I may not find one, but it had to be here, somewhere. Ava circled the chamber, searched for a secret hiding spot. Nothing but glass and shimmering rainbows. Wait. Rainbows?

Glimmers reflected off the surface of the tube, pointing directly behind her and not the lights above. She walked over to the wall and crouched. It was rough and full of edges marked by a digging machine like rock and not man-made concrete. The faint scent of water and earth wafted from it and was solid until she pressed into a soft area.

There’s something in the wall.

Ava took out her pocket knife and stabbed into the rock. It easily crumbled into clumps at her boots, of dirt and clay. The rock softened and she dug into it. The edge of a thin ageless clear box showed itself after a few more scoops. She yanked it out the rest of the way and had it on her lap in minutes.

There was a tablet inside, and unlike the rest, this one didn’t break. The box was rectangular, looking brand new with no scratches from what the eye could see, and weighed heavily in her hands. Except, how the heck did it open? No visible seam lined the edges.

A light shot across the center out of the glass box, then came back into a wave, creating a handprint across the top. It must require a print recognition. Great, there was no way Ava’s prints would work. Who knew how old this box was. She’d just have to take it to Harry. Maybe he’d have a way of cracking into it.

“Hey! I found a tablet that works!” Gio called out.

Quickly, Ava stuffed the box into the knapsack and ran over. He stood over a pile of broken tablets stacked on top of one another. A hammer laid beside them. Gio held a cracked tablet in front of his chest. The UFE logo displayed as a faded background picture, then a screen flashed on asking for a passcode.

Ava quickly took it from his hands and removed her glove. She slid her finger across the screen. Nothing. Tried swiping at a different angle. Still nothing. It wasn’t picking up her fingerprints no matter how gentle or hard she pressed down. Dammit!

Glass crunched behind her. “I found another one that turned on, but it won’t stay on for long. And I’ve run out of chargers,” Sam said.

He handed it over. The screen was cracked as well, making this whole mission more difficult than it needed to be. Taking out her unused chargers, Ava put them in one at a time until it seemed like the tablet would stay on.

Like the other tablet, it asked for a passcode, and this time it reacted to her touch. She typed in her passcode. Incorrect. Then the buildings passcode. Incorrect. Then Marc’s passcode out of spite. Incorrect.

These goddamn passcodes!

Gio snatched the tablet out of her grip. “Don't break it. It's not the tablet's fault.”

Not the tablet's fault, my ass. Why was everything so difficult? She was this close—this close—to finding her birth record. But no. Technology just hated her.

Her fists clenched and unclenched. “You guys didn’t find any others?”

Mika shook his head as he walked over, and tossed the chargers onto the table. “That’s it. I only found a pile in the corner completely torn into pieces.”

Ava let out a deep sigh, then stuffed the tablets into the knapsack with the pristine one she found. “Then we’ll have to go with Plan B. Call Harry.”

Gio put a finger to his earphone. “Harry, do you copy? Harry? Helloooo?” He frowned. “I'm only getting static. We're too far underground.”

Ava pulled out her phone. No signal. “We’ll have to go to him then. We have working tablets. All we need to do is get them cracked open.”

“Where are we going?” Mika asked, standing next to Sam.

That made her pause. She kept forgetting they were Ama princes. Amaranthine was so different from Earth, they haven’t experienced life yet. They haven’t been tainted. And she wasn’t about to be the first.

Ava shook her head. “You're going home. Gio and I will take it from here.”

Mika stepped closer and got in her face. “You're kidding yourself if you think I'll go home without finding out what's on that birth record.”

“Where we’re going isn’t for your virgin eyes.”

Sam lifted an eyebrow. “So then you’re going to a brothel?”

How did he even know that word? What decade was being translated? Not once have they taken off those translator bracelets. Who knew what words ran through their brains. This was too much.

“Yes and no,” Ava said, rubbing the bridge of her nose. They looked confused. “You know what? It doesn’t matter because you’re still not coming—”

Mika covered her mouth and went very still. His whole body stiffened, eyes swiftly glanced around the ceiling—the entire room fell silent. Something was off. Even Ava felt it.

He suddenly yanked her towards the floor. A knife sliced the air above their heads and stabbed into the cabinet behind them. Its ghostly remnants sent chills across her back.

Junipea sat on top of a metal table, his muddy shoes on a rolling chair. Raindrops rolled off his chin, off his curled orange hair. He tossed a knife into the air, flipping it around and around, catching it each time with ease of the wrist.

“This is why I don’t like your new guardians,” he said. “They always take the fun out of everything.”