Chapter Twelve - The Beginning of the End
"Will someone tell me why my office is like a bloody microwave?" Lester shouted across the main Hub of the ARC at no one in particular. Jess, who was the only one in the Hub at the ADD, was also hot and very tired; had been listening to Lester complain for the entire day now, and she finally snapped. She swiveled her chair round to face Lester.
"Lester, it's not just your office that's hot, the whole building is. Philip was the one who decided now would be a good time to upgrade the air conditioning. So please stop complaining and get a fan or something" Jess said, turning back to look at the ADD.
Lester just stood, looking over at the ADD.
"Miss Parker, a word" Lester said shortly, turning round and walking into his office. Jess stood up from the ADD and walked through the Hub. She then walked into Lester's office and sat down on the chair, she knew she had crossed a line speaking to her boss in that way.
"Now, I'll blame that little outburst on the weather, and we shall forget all about it. now, that paperwork I asked you to do. Is it complete yet?" Lester asked, looking at her intently. Jess knew he was talking about the virus infecting Burton's personal files.
"It should be finished by the end of the day, I hope. I haven't had a chance to finish it due to the increase in anomalies that have been appearing at the moment" she answered, glad that he wasn't shouting at her.
"Make sure you get it done please" Lester said and Jess gave him a small nod "You may go". With that, Jess stood up and left the office, she decided she needed to check on her hideaway in the lower levels. Walking through the ARC, she headed towards the stairs and her way down three flights, she made it into the corridor. There was no one in the corridor, knowing the CCTV camera was disabled, she walked towards the storage cupboard and unlocked the door, turning on the light as she walked in, she locked the door behind her and looked at the computer screen.
98% COMPLETE
Smiling, she knew it probably take another ten minutes before the she would be able to access the files. She sat waiting for the final 2% to finish downloading, and then she began wondering what she was going to find, the young field coordinator then started to quietly hum to herself as she looked at her phone screen. Ten minutes later, the computer beeped and Jess jumped up, looking the screen, the sight that met her made smile.
COMPLETE- TO CONTINUE, DOWNLOAD ATTACHMENT
Jess clicked on the mouse, and began downloading the attachment that would give her complete control over Burton's files. A few minutes later, the attachment had downloaded and Jess was ready to go through the files. She was debating whether or not to tell Lester or not.
Deciding to tell Lester later, she set about scrolling through the files. One file in particular caught her eye. She double clicked the file and it opened on the screen.
It was the Coroner's report for Sarah Page.
"Why the hell does he have this in his private files…?" Jess murmured to herself. She knew the file was easily accessible; she had looked through it when she first arrived at the ARC, but why would he have it in his personal files? Pulling out a memory stick from her pocket, she stuck it into the computer and decided to copy the files onto it.
Then another one caught her eye- NEURAL CLAMP CONTROL BLUEPRINTS
Jess double clicked the document and it opened up, it was a document showing what looked like a small octopus. There was a large circle with groups of needle poking out the bottom, and then there was four tubes sticking out of the centre. It reminded Jess of Doctor Octopus in Spiderman, remembering back to when Connor had made her watch it after she forced him to watch Desperate Housewives; she then clicked onto the next page, and was nearly sick.
There was a picture of a creature Jess had never seen before, it was a close up to the creatures head, lying in a puddle of blood. Jess looked closer at the screen, the picture was showing the back of whatever this creatures head. There was a large incision in the skull of the creature, and then Jess saw the Neural Clamp, lying to the side, it was also covered in blood.
"What is this" Jess questioned in her head. Opening another file, she found some CCTV footage dating for the February 12th 2021.
"2021…that's in the future" Jess mumbled, clicking it open; the screen filled with a rather grainy picture of a large room, in the middle of it was large table. Jess then noticed that there was someone in the room. She immediately saw it was Sarah Page.
She continued to watch as Sarah bent down to look at something on the ground, then Jess noticed movement in the right hand side of the screen. Jess looked closer and could see a figure knelt down on the floor.
Then she saw Sarah stand up and pick up something on the table, it looked like a handgun. She then saw something jump out from the shadows and leap at Sarah, it knocked her to the ground and raised it claw. Jess couldn't watch, but she knew what happened next. After a few seconds, she looked back towards the screen. Sarah was lying flat on the ground, there was a dark blur slowly growing around her.
Then she saw someone run into the room, Jess recognized it as Becker. Then the footage swapped to a different corridor, a man walked down it, holding what looked like a gun in his hand, Jess squinted closer and gasped, the man was Philip Burton.
She closed the file with numb fingers before opening the last one- NEW DAWN.
Jess slowly moved the mouse over the file and clicked it open. She read through the file, slowly, her mouth dropped open and she just started at the document.
"Oh god" was all she could get out.
xxxxx
Philip was sat in his car, waiting for the traffic lights to turn green, when suddenly, his mobile started ringing. He put his Bluetooth headset in his ear and pressed the answer key.
"Philip Burton" he said.
"Sir, we have a security breach" said the voice of his leading researcher on New Dawn.
"What do you mean?" Philip asked, this couldn't be happened, not the day before New Dawn would finally be put into action.
"Someone has hacked into the file for New Dawn, they know everything" the researcher said.
"Neutralise them" Philip said, resting his head in his hands.
"Don't you want to know who it is?" the researcher asked.
"No, I don't care, just get rid of them" Philip said, ending the call.
"Take me back to the ARC" he ordered his driver.
xxxxx
Jess pulled out the memory stick and ran from the room, locking the door as she went. She knew she had to get out of the ARC as quickly as she could. If Philip found out she knew, she was dead.
Jess ran up the stairs as fast as her high heels would let her; she needed to find the others, and tell them what she had found. Reaching the Hub, she grabbed her coat and car keys and ran from the room. Lester had seen her return and was about to ask her something, but when he left his office, she had already disappeared from the Hub.
