Chapter 6: Under Pressure
I dragged myself out of bed and sat down glaring at Adam, waiting for his good excuse for getting us all up so early. My eyes couldn't help looking over at Jeremy to see if I could tell his mood. There were a few things that got under my skin, one of them was not feeling accepted. To my disappointment he eyes stayed on Adam as he sat down. When I looked up at Adam I could tell he was frustrated in more ways than one; first of all none of us were talking to each other. Lexa kept her distance from Jeremy and he kept his distance from me and I knew now was not a good time to be around Lexa.
After a heavy sigh Adam began to speak, "this team needs to focus… now is not a good time for you three to be fighting over little matters. I have a mission for you three and it's very dire that we successfully complete it. My sources tell me that Eckhart is hot on the trail of engineering mutants with the ability to heal themselves from any wound. Cell regeneration...this could mean an unstoppable mutant, even from the most serious of wounds. I need you three to break into the lab and retrieve all of his research on this, because in the hands of Mason Eckhart this could mean world domination… imagine a military force with these cells in their body; missing arms, legs, bullet wounds etc would heal themselves or re-grow limbs in such cases. I didn't think it was possible to find that strain of DNA that contained the codes for the production of these kinds of cells. It's going to be one of your most dangerous missions yet, breaking into Genomex is not one of the easiest of tasks. You will need to communicate effectively with each other and stick to a plan. Here are the blue prints of the facility," he pointed on a screen, "two of you will go inside from here…while another has the task of getting the information and will enter through the basement, which has a small window here. Valerie that will be your job, since you're feral senses can detect if anyone is coming before Lexa and Jeremy arrive. Once you two meet it will be your job to make sure Valerie isn't suspected." Adam felt the bridge of his nose, "If I had a choice…I wouldn't send you on this mission because of how things are right now…but you must understand the importance of this and learn to work together on this, then you may go back to your silly silent treatments and bickering, alright?"
I nodded to him and watched the others do the same. Adam had given us only an hour to prepare, probably to give things less time to get worse. After my shower and getting dressed I met the others by the Helix, that's when I realized how risky this really was and at the moment I didn't have any trust in Jeremy or Lexa to watch my back.
With a lab coat on and a fake badge ID, I slipped into the basement through the tiny window once the room had cleared out for a moment. Looking at my watch I noted the time and started looking around the room trying to picture the blue prints as well. I grabbed a clipboard from the table and walked out of the lab room and down the hall. A man smiled at me and I forced one back even though my lip was quivering a little in nervousness. There was no room to fuck up this time. Taking a deep breath I spotted the office of the scientist who was working on the project.
"I've found it..." I whispered into my comlink to Jeremy and Lexa, as well as Adam who listened in from the Helix.
I stood observing something while I waited for their response, but heard none. Turning around I looked for them but didn't see either of them. I knew they couldn't have been caught because an alarm would have surely been pulled.
"Valerie… Jeremy's gone, he took off," I heard Lexa say finally in response.
"I need you here now..." I said back and went into the office and started working quickly. "Damn you Jer," I whispered transferring the file onto a disk and then crashing the system, it was the only way to be sure it was gone. As soon as it did the alarms did go off and I realized the door to the office locked to keep me from escaping.
"Lex...I'm trapped."
