Page 48 of From the Noblest Motives
As he descended the stairs, he realized Cyril might be in his study. Perhaps he'd be willing to answer some questions then, ones about his organization and his concrete goals rather than the lofty idyllic catchall of variant rights.
The room was empty when Damien poked his head in, and he turned his back on Cyril's desk to study the lines of his passage. Toward the front of the house and to the right—kitchen. Toward the front and to the left—staircase. Of greater interest were the overlapping trails that led to the back of the house, to places Damien had yet to explore.
There wasn't much house left behind the old library turned study, which was expected, since the structure sprawled farther side to side than back to front. The hallway took him past one closed door on the right. He turned the knob to open it, and the door inched inward and stuck. A heavy hit from his shoulder knocked it inward enough to reveal a ruined solarium, many of the panels of the skylights and floor-to-ceiling windows broken long ago, the air laden with humidity and heavy with the sweet scent of well-established honeysuckle vines. It took a few tries to wrestle the moisture-swollen door shut again.
No human trails had entered the solarium in a long time.
The door farther down on the left housed the laundry, and with its concrete floor, had probably always been the utility room. Not much of interest there.
At any rate, Cyril's trail headed for the final door—the one that led outside.I did want a look around the grounds. Might as well be now.
A half-circular terrace of gray granite lay directly outside the backdoor. Someone had recently made some effort to clear the creeping ivy and vines from the stones, the marks of their tendrils still visible. Three plastic folding chairs and a little table made a seating group to the right. Maybe it was nice to sit out here when it wasn't so humid and the mosquitoes weren't as active.
The rest of the garden remained untouched and had obviously gone wild many decades prior. Hints of white-gravel paths remained between some of the brambles and bushes, and Damien wasn't at all surprised when Cyril's trail led down one of these. It could indicate a daily walk, something to clear his head. Damien understood the need for those, but his instincts told him this wasn't a simple stroll.
This way obviously saw regular foot traffic, since a path had been carved out of the undergrowth, with the bushes creating an arched roof overhead. Damien found walking through it unnerving, since the buzz of cicadas and the chirping of crickets and tree frogs covered even the sound of his own footsteps. Someone could have been walking directly behind him, and he wouldn't have known.
He found himself turning every few steps to check and feeling ridiculous for doing so.
The sight of a clearing up ahead had him speeding up, and he stepped out into a concrete-paved open space dappled with sunlight. The structure directly in front of him might have been an old coach house and the one to its right, maybe an equipment shed or a garage. No sign of Cyril.
Damien tried the door to the coach house first. Locked. From there, he walked the perimeter until he spotted an old-fashioned set of metal cellar doors. Rust covered the handles, but the hinges looked in good shape, maybe—
No. That makes no sense. It can't be.
Five distinct trails converged at the cellar doors. One was Cyril's from that morning, while the other four were older. Four trails that hit him like a kick in the gut.
Hillary, Deshaun, Maia, and Danilo—the trails of the last missing students from the Western Academy, the ones he'd lost in the shadow of the Wind River Mountains. The ones whose trails had vanished. How could they be here?
Suspicions mounting, Damien traced their trails back to the coach house. Through a window grimed with dust and cobwebs he spotted several vehicles, one of them an eight-passenger skimmer—an expensive-looking one of a type he'd never seen before. He walked all around the building to confirm that, yes, all four of the kids' trails started inside at that skimmer.
His thoughts turned from suspicions to accusations. How could his father, a variant himself who advocated for variant rights, who supposedly steered an entire underground organization of activists—how could he do this?
Damien found a length of old pipe in the grass. He hefted it to feel the weight. It would do. The smarter thing would have been to wait until Blaze and Shudder returned. Wait until he had backup. But he couldn't stand the thought of leaving variant children in an underground lab one moment more than he had to. That's what this had to be. Cyril was experimenting on kids. Otherwise, he would've made sure they had gotten back to their families.
Everything so convenient. Too good to be true. Of course. He'd known something was off and had been unable to muster any joy over finding his father again. He'd known—and still some part of him, the feral child cowering in the dark, had wanted to believe. So desperately to believe.
He knew better. Trust was an exception, granted after it was earned. Cyril had earnednothing.
One yank on the right-hand cellar door opened it. No locks, no resistance. This was a trap, but it was too obvious a trap, which only made Damien's curiosity scrabble harder at the puzzle. What he wouldn't do was go into this without precautions. He messaged Blaze about the location of the building and about where he would be.
If you don't hear from me by the time you get back, come after me.
That would worry Blaze but hopefully not panic him. Damien hefted his pipe and made his way down the cement steps as quietly as possible, leaving the door open for a quick exit. A single bare bulb lit the space at the bottom and revealed another door, also unlocked. The hair on the back of Damien's neck prickled as he eased the door open and found himself in the laboratory he'd expected. The medical chair in the center of the room, the banks of electronics, the wires and counters with unfamiliar equipment—all of it just as he'd imagined, just as it appeared in his nightmares about the Fredamine Project. But the spotless lab with its white-tiled walls was empty.
There was no variant young person in the chair being subjected to terrible experiments and waiting for rescue. No one was in the lab at all.
Puzzled, Damien stepped inside and spotted two more doors to the left and right. Voices came from behind the right-hand door. Voices and—laughter? He edged toward the voices where the door was ajar. Several young people and Cyril, though none of the young people sounded distressed or frightened.
With a tight grip on his pipe, Damien pushed the door open and stood frozen in the doorway, trying to process what he was seeing. Hillary sat at a desk with several holo screens, tapping away at the keyboard interfaces, completely comfortable. Three other tech stations were occupied, and Damien recognized each young person from their photos—all four missing Western Academy students. Cyril leaned against a counter at the end of the room, chuckling at something one of the kids had just said.
"Damien. Good morning." Cyril motioned for him to come in. "I was hoping you'd join us."
Yes. That was obvious. Damien edged into the room, lowering his pipe club so he wouldn't frighten the children. He ignored Cyril and spoke instead to Hillary. "I've been looking for you. For all of you."
"Hey. Um, we heard." Hillary blushed all the way to her hairline. "Sorry about that."
He took in the other kids' faces—chagrined, but not afraid—and turned to Cyril. "I need an explanation."
