Project Gemini (WATTYS 2016 WINNER!)

Chapter Nine - What Lies Beneath. (Part 2 of 2).

BROKEN GLASS STOPPED her from going any further, her bare feet numb with the cold. The spiderweb of metal walkways between them glistened with shards of glass, tiny fragments of medicine vials broken and trampled out of frustration. Pieces too big to slip through the gaps lay in wait between them, blinking in the dancing firelight. Sharp jolts of panic clutched her throat, and she knew that in less than four minutes time that floodgate was going to let thousands of gallons of water down on them.

Four minutes.

Jasper stood at the end, his back flush to the metal floodgate as he looped the chains around his arms. The only thing between her and a watery grave if she left the tunnel too late. His eyes never left her, a desperate edge to them, those narrowed eyes oh so accusing as they slipped to her knife. An insatiable need growing in them. Desire. Then hate, pure, envious hate. The look of a man with nothing to lose, not anymore at least.

She stiffened, sinking into a low crouch and brandished the knife before her, letting the tarnished metal reflect the light. Coiled to fight. If it came to it only one of them was getting out of here alive, and she knew sure as hell that he wasn't going to come quietly. I can take him.

"You made it, after everything," Jasper said, his eyes settled on the knife and narrowed. "It's not true, whatever you think I did. You're living a lie, Eva. Your tattoo. Your orders. The people around you—they're all liars. Whoever ordered you down here to get to me isn't telling you the full truth. I'm not the man you think I am."

"And the bodies?" she asked. "The skulls in the water, the smell of rot and decay in the air, that's a lie too?"

A muscle jumped in his jaw, "Don't make this harder than it has to be."

"Then I need the truth god dammit," she said. "That night in the street after the Reapers attacked, your teeth fell to the ground. You ran, only guilty people run—" he drew back into the shadows as she neared, "—and now you're a wanted man. All the evidence is pointing to you, even Astrid imprisoned you—."

"She saved me," he snapped. "So don't you dare talk shit about her."

"Saved you from who? You're a damn fugitive."

"And you're a saint?" He thrust back against the wall and punched the metal with the ball of his fist. Biting his lip he clicked his tongue as he shook his head. "I just need you to trust me until we're out of here. Run away with me. We can escape, there's a boat coming. You owe these people nothing."

Eva hesitated, she could run. This could be it. She could get out of here. Get out of the chaos and the insanity like she was meant to do the day of the testing. Go to Europe, France, Germany, anywhere but London and live free as part as a gang. Every second she was here was every second she played into the Chancellor's hands, another string attached to her puppeteer.

And look over my shoulder every second of it.

No, she had to do this right. She had to play by their game. The Prime Minister could offer her a pardon, let her live quietly if she played by his rules. If she ran she'd be hunted and shot out of the water before she even made it to France. And her family too, her father and her mother would feel the fall. Cast out of Parliament and have decades of scientific research trashed in seconds. Escapees were punished, and so her family would be.

The air stank of secrets and lies, nothing was as simple as she thought it was. Her medical files were gone and R.B.I.C were plastered everywhere, their influence touching everything. It'd be too easy to walk away, she shook her head. Lowering the knife a fraction to look him in the eye.

"Just tell me where the body is," she said. "Please."

"You're making a mistake," he sighed. "I tried to reason with you, Eva. Now we'll have to do this the hard way."