Other links:
Sapphire Angel, Superheroine (Book 1)
Power Play (Book 2)
Deconstruction (this book - Book 3)
Mark Devlin was still sore when he returned to the fourth floor of the facility, but he would never reveal just how debilitating the experience in the entry hall had been. He couldn't risk his men losing any respect for him, especially after Sapphire Angel had shown only discomfort at the experience.
As he entered the door to the Enigma Project area, two scientists hurried toward him. Roy Valik looked up at him through the glass window of the laboratory, and rushed through the door, his face bursting with enthusiasm.
"We need to do a few quick heath checks, Mr. Devlin," the scientist closest to Devlin said. "We can do thorough testing later, after you've talked to Dr. Valik."
"Make it quick," Devlin replied, standing tall and giving a curt nod. He extended his arm, and the man wrapped a blood pressure monitor around his forearm. The other scientist held up a small flashlight, shining it into Devlin's eyes, and then his mouth.
"Nothing out of the ordinary," the man with the blood pressure monitor said.
"Of course not," Devlin replied. "This is me, remember? Strong as an ox. I'll stop down later for a complete workup."
By then Valik was pacing back and forth behind the scientists, rubbing his hands together in anticipation.
"Well?" Devlin asked, turning to Valik as the other scientists exited through the door.
"Where to begin, where to begin...?" Valik stammered, his voice quivering with excitement.
"How about we begin with you telling me you got some good data? I hope I didn't go through that risky experience in the entry hall for nothing."
"I'm sorry it was necessary," Valik replied. "If we had more time, we could have made it a little less unpleasant. As it was, my men worked all night retrofitting the employee entrance hall with almost every sensor and probe from the labs."
"And what did you find?"
"It's much too early to determine much. We have reams of data to sift through and analyze, as you can imagine. I can tell, you, though, there is something... unnatural about the source of Sapphire Angel's powers. Some spikes in some readings. But I already suspected that."
"You did?"
"It's simple. Her body mass shouldn't be able to accomplish the feats of strength the news media has reported. Her agility also defies physics. So there must be something else behind it. I'll go where the data takes me, but I have some theories. Perhaps someone has perfected a super soldier serum, like the one we've failed to develop. Or maybe her costume is a special exoskeleton and enhances her strength and abilities. Or perhaps there's something else going on."
"Do you possess enough data to find answers, and not guesses?"
"I won't know until I get through it all. And there's a lot to organize and analyze. I wish you had let me take her measurements, though. That would have helped."
"I didn't want to raise her suspicions, Roy. She's pretty sharp."
"I understand. Wishful thinking. But I'd give anything to put her through a complete workup."
"I don't think it's in the cards," Devlin replied. "Remember, we want to turn her attention elsewhere, not draw it to us. Be glad I let you run the probes in the entry hall. As it was, there was a risk she would suspect what was really going on. Perhaps if she had experienced more than discomfort, she would have been more suspicious. We were fortunate."
"I know, I know," Valik said, bobbing his head. "I'll see what I can find with the data we have. It might be enough. Although she came here at her own request, perhaps it will end up being a benefit to us and our research."
A twinkle came to Devlin's eye. "We can hope, Roy. If we can untangle the secrets of Sapphire Angel, it would be the coup of the century. WarTech could name its price for that knowledge."
Roy Valik nodded, but had a faraway look in his eyes, as if he were dreaming. Or perhaps plotting and planning.
By the time Beth made it back to the townhouse, a tangle of angst had formed in the pit of her stomach. Conner would be back from his trip to Senator Chappelle's offices, which meant she needed to convey what Sapphire Angel had learned about WarTech, without conveying how she had learned it. More lies.
Or should she lie? She could pull Conner aside and tell him the truth. If she didn't trust him, should she even be with him? Beth sighed, knowing the decision wasn't that simple, and wishing her life could be more like her friends' lives. But if a simple life meant giving up her alter ego, it was out of the question. Sapphire Angel was part of her.
Beth heard voices from the living room as she stepped through the front door. As she walked down the hall, she felt as if she were walking to her execution. No, it was worse than that. She felt as if she were walking to execute someone else. Ever time she told a lie to Conner, it not only sucked the humanity out of her, little by little, it disrespected him without him even knowing it.
Conner, Jack, and Ross sat on the sofa and looked up at her as she entered the room. Jack sat on one end, and climbed to his feet without speaking, moving to the recliner in the corner. She eyed the now-empty spot next to Conner as if it were a trap. With a bite of her lip, she moved to it and sat.
"How did you make out at WarTech?" Conner asked.
"Okay, I guess," she shrugged, not turning to face him. "How did you make out at the Senator's office?"
Before Conner answered, Ross interjected.
"Wait until you hear this!" he exclaimed.
"Hear what?" Beth asked.
"I got nowhere with Chappelle," Conner answered. "He wouldn't talk to me. It was a short trip. Abrupt, even."
"Oh, sorry."
"But that's not the interesting part. He informed me he wasn't going over everything again, because he'd already been questioned at his office about Eric's appearance. By Sapphire Angel."
"She's here, in town?" Beth asked, feigning surprise. She wanted to blurt out she'd already met with Chappelle as Sapphire Angel, and the senator was searching his servers for Eric's email and any responses to it. If she hadn't heard from him yet, though, he probably wouldn't be calling her.
"Yes!" Ross interrupted. "Sapphire Angel visited Senator Chappelle yesterday. We've been so wrapped up in searching for Eric, we missed it. After Conner got back and told us she was in town, I checked out the news. Stories of her appearance in town are everywhere. People are going nuts."
The pit of angst in Beth's stomach grew as Ross spoke. She continued to look straight ahead, fighting down the urge to take Conner by the hand, lead him away from Jack and Ross, and confess her secret.
"Wow," she murmured instead. "I wonder what she's doing out here?"
"It has to be a good sign, right?" Jack asked.
"It suggests to me there's something going on with WarTech," Conner answered. "I think Eric stumbled into something big. Why else would Sapphire Angel be here?"
Thanks to the power of her necklace, her friends hadn't even pondered the coincidence of Sapphire Angel and Beth arriving in town at the same time. For a moment, resentment flashed through her — resentment at the necklace, for making lying to her friends so easy. Beth looked down, hiding a scowl.
"How did you make out?" Conner asked her.
"I spent most of my morning asking around town, talking to random people," she replied. "I didn't get names most of the time, but I pieced some things together."
"Start with the important stuff first," Conner asked.
"Let me lay the groundwork, so you have context."
Conner nodded and shrugged, but said nothing. Beth told him of the composition of the company, and the layout of the WarTech campus and the main building, without revealing she had visited the place.
"Did you find out anything about their programmers?" Jack asked, interrupting her before she finished.
"Someone I talked to in town knew a bit. He said their contract workers — like Eric — handle less important matters. I assume it means WarTech handles the top secret stuff in-house. But I couldn't find out anything about it, and they don't permit their programmers to discuss what they do. Oh, and only their own programmers live in the housing at the facility. No contract workers live there."
"That sounds like background stuff," Ross said. "Did you find anything useful?" He cringed before continuing. "Sorry, that came out wrong."
"It's okay," Beth replied. "I might have learned something important. I learned what the Enigma Project is. That was what Eric wanted to talk to Senator Chappelle about."
The three men all leaned toward her.
"What is it?" they asked simultaneously. Now they were interested.
"WarTech's specialty is analyzing our enemies' weapons and technology. The company figures out how it works, and how to counter it. They call that venture the Enigma Project."
"Why would Eric need to talk to Senator Chappelle about it?" Ross asked.
"I don't know," she replied. "That's what we need to find out."
The enthusiasm in the room evaporated as Conner, Ross, and Jack sat back.
"And how are we going to do that?" Ross asked. "It took three days just to learn this little bit."
"We'll find a way," Beth answered. "There has to be someone out there who knows something."
"The way you get people to talk, perhaps," Conner replied. "I'm surprised you found out as much as you did by talking to people. I poked around, too, and couldn't get anyone to talk to me."
Beth looked down so Conner wouldn't see her face, which had flushed red. She couldn't keep lying like this, if she wanted to keep her sanity. Conner continued speaking without turning her way.
"But I do think I may have a lead, even though people wouldn't talk to me like they talked to Beth," Conner said. "After striking out at the Senator's office, I poked around and did some research. I dug into employment records, hoping to find someone who had left WarTech recently who'd be willing to talk."
"That stuff is public record?" Jack asked.
Conner grinned. "I have ways to get information."
"And?"
"I found a record of one person who quit WarTech two days ago. A programmer named Dameon Wilson. He lived in the WarTech housing complex. I found an apartment in town he rented just before quitting, and I paid it a visit. But get this — not only wasn't he there, but I looked through the windows, and the place looked empty. Not even any furniture. The neighbors say nobody ever moved in."
Beth wrinkled her nose. "Foul play?"
"Perhaps," Conner said with a shrug. "It could be coincidence. Maybe he just left town for a few days, and will move in when he gets back. But he's not living at the WarTech complex — they get you out of there right away when you quit. My next step was going to be to pay a visit to his half-brother. A guy named Gavin Pierce — different last name than Dameon. It was nearly impossible to track him down, but he lives in town. I have an address for him."
Beth jumped up from her chair.
"What are we waiting for?" she said, hoping to divert attention away from her lies. "We need to get to the brother before anybody else does. Maybe Dameon wasn't kidnapped like Eric. If he disappeared on his own, we might not be the only ones trying to track him down."
Conner nodded. "We might get lucky. It took some effort for me to find his brother, since they have different last names. I'm pretty good at that sort of thing, so maybe we'll be one step ahead of anybody else looking for him. That assumes he hasn't been kidnapped, of course, and that he disappeared on his own."
Conner rose as Beth looked to Jack and Ross, who were also rising from their seats.
"You guys should stay here. We don't want to spook him with a crowd of visitors."
Jack and Ross exchanged looks before nodding.
"We'll let you know right away if we find anything."
Beth hurried to the door, with Conner in tow. Perhaps they finally had a lead.
Other links:
Sapphire Angel, Superheroine (Book 1)
Power Play (Book 2)
Deconstruction (this book - Book 3)
Whoa.....so that entire tour WAS a trap to get info on Sapphire Angel.....okay, NOW I can start viewing Valik negatively for his earlier behavior. If he had actually managed to get her measurements, who knows where we’d be right now? Seems like they want to use her secrets as a way to make money.....greed, man. It’s a plague. Corrupts people to do terrible things for money. No question.
I can only imagine how much it must be tearing Beth apart on the inside, not being able to reveal her identity as Sapphire Angel to Conner, Ross, or Jack. The part about her walking “to her execution” was so well-written and, in my opinion, captures exactly what she was going through perfectly. Personally, I think all three of them can be trusted; one of them is her lover and the other two are her good friends from college, so for now, I don’t see any reason why they’d want to betray her, especially Conner. On one hand, this would be so much easier (I think I voiced this at one point during the previous novel as well). On another hand.....there is always risk involved, like.....what would happen if one of the bad guys apprehended Conner, Ross, or Jack and forced them to spill her identity? If they stuck to their guns and defended her secret to the end, that’d be rather admirable......I could see them being that kind of person.
Dameon Wilson and Gavin Pierce.....sounds like two new people are about to enter the fray. If I had to guess, Dameon, like Eric, was apprehended by WarTech or their allies because they knew too much regarding their activities. If Gavin Pierce really is Dameon’s half-brother, though.....can’t guarantee he’ll be in top shape after his part-sibling got abducted. Oh, well. Let’s hope we can get him to talk.....these two (well, really only Gavin) are the only leads we’ve got.
In my opinion, I think Beth should just tell them. Although Conner could blow up and say stuff like “We loved each other, and you didn’t tell me anything about this?” or something to that effect.
I wonder what Mantis is up to.......
Be back on Monday! Hope you’re having a wonderful Thanksgiving! 🍗🦃🍗