Chapter 108 - 108: Missing Something
"What information?" Xander asked, wondering what could be the matter.
"I had a meeting with Varant recently. In that meeting, he gave me a mission," Ayn explained to Xander, breaking the silence that filled the room.
Xander knew that Ayn called him to talk about Lucifer. Now that she was talking about her mission, did these two things have anything in common? He wondered.
Placing both his palms on the smooth surface of the table, he asked, "Is your mission related to Lucifer?"
"Not really. My mission is related to something else. It is just that Varant mentioned something interesting when I was with him." Ayn explained after refuting Xander's assumption.
"What did you hear?" Xander inquired as he scooted forward in his seat while sharply looking up into Ayn's beautiful eyes.
"It's about the Variant Uprising," Ayn answered, hinting at something vaguely.
"Variant Uprising? How are they related to Lucifer?" Xander asked, not understanding why such a big organization is linked to Lucifer when their goal is entirely different.
"I thought you would be able to guess just from that. Apparently, you are getting slow," Ayn concluded as she started laughing. Her chuckle was light, laced with a hum of amusement at the observation.
"I am not guessing here. Tell me what it's about," Xander answered as he rolled his eyes. He didn't feel embarrassed at the fact that Ayn was laughing at him since she was a friend. He knew she was just teasing him.
Even though he said that he wasn't going to guess, his head was constantly trying to find a relation between the two.
He asked instantly as he thought of something, "Are they after Lucifer for some reason?"
"Bingo. It looks like you still got the zeal," Ayn acknowledged as she smiled.
"So they are after Lucifer? How do they even know about him? And I don't think we have any spies on their side. How did you know they were after Lucifer when even I had no clue about it?" Xander inquired, feeling suspicious. What was it that they knew and he didn't?
"You know about the facility that you were investigating regarding Lucifer?" Ayn asked a question in return.
"Yeah. I didn't get permission to investigate that place. That General Maxwell has the authority of that place. He didn't even let me see the facility. What about it?" Xander remembered the facility Ayn talked about.
After finding out that the kid who was slaughtering innocent civilians was the son of Zale Azarel and Clarisse, he had gone to the facility himself to find out why the son of such great people turned out that way and how he supposedly died inside the facility. Even though he had hoped to investigate the facility, he didn't get permission.
He would've needed to put in a lot of effort to get permission, and even then, the chances of him succeeding were too low. That was why he had decided to use the illegal methods.
He used Ayn's help to get her prisoner to hack the surveillance systems of the facility. That was how he got the footage of Lucifer's torture to know why he hated humans.
He still had that footage that he didn't share with anyone since he could be punished for having that footage that was received using illegal methods. He could not only be arrested for this but also removed from his position as the Delta Squad leader.
That wasn't all. Even Ayn could have been punished for helping him. That was why he hadn't released that footage to others.
"Varant is trying to catch all members of Variant Uprising. He found out that a few well-known members of Variant Uprising were seen near that facility," Ayn explained as she turned her laptop around, which had the image of that location.
"When his team went there, that place was found empty, but a few hints were seen that made it obvious that those guys had camped near the facility," she continued.
A few packets and plastic glasses could be seen loitering around. Some holes of pillars could also be seen in the image that Ayn was showing.
"You know what this implies, right?" she asked in complete seriousness.
"Yeah. It's that…" Xander started answering, but before he could finish, Ayn started speaking.
"It's that they were there for an extended period of time. The question remains, why were they there? And why did they leave without doing anything? The answer to that question is up to our assumption since we can't read their minds, but I have some ideas as to why they were there," Ayn answered.
"Lucifer….' Xander muttered.
"Yeah. I believe they were there for Lucifer. Lucifer is a strong kid with immense potential for the future. Any organization would lust after him, especially the evil organization of Variant Uprising, which aims for world domination. What better candidate for them than Lucifer, who hated the humans just like they do," Ayn implied.
"They must have known about Lucifer being the one causing the slaughters. After all, it's easy finding his identity. They have many powerful variants which are expert in tech related fields. It isn't below them to find out about Lucifer," she continued as she stood up from her seat. The seat moved up a little as Ayn stood up.
She turned back and walked towards the window behind her.
Gazing outside the window, she said softly, "A kid that spent half his life in the facility… his heart burning in flames of revenge… slaughtering everyone that came in his path… it's not tough to find out where he would go."
"If I were in their place, I would also think that he would go to the facility to destroy it. What better way to bring a kid who hated everyone to their side than to help him in his revenge. I believe that's why they were there, thinking that Lucifer would come there," she said.
"They vacated that place. If what you are saying is right, doesn't that mean they realized that Lucifer isn't coming there?" Xander let out as he stood up as well. He had a feeling that something was really wrong here.
He still didn't put the pieces together. Flourance had called him, saying that Lucifer was caught by them and that they were coming back.
He didn't think that something could have gone wrong with them since he was confident that Flourance would call him if something like that happened.
What was this feeling then? What was he missing? What was it that he couldn't place his fingers on? Many questions floated in his head.
"Maybe, but I have a different theory. I think that they realized that we found out their location. The ground evidence made it evident that they left not long before our teams reached there. They must have found out about our raid and left before we could get there," Ayn theorized as she glanced back at Xander.
"Yeah… that must be it," Xander muttered under his breath, thinking that her words held some merit.
Her answer came with a moment of silence when no one said anything.
Ring! Ring!
"Wha-" Xander was about to say something, but he stopped as his phone started ringing.
Bringing his phone out of his pocket, he looked at the name.