Ava Cobalt [Book 1]

Sept. 2020

[September 2020]

Ava was 15 now. She had been monitoring Hi5 studios for about three years, wondering when the Syntec stuff would start hitting. They had found the various keys, so far so good. But now...now they found the Mountaineer. Wesley's Mountaineer. Where Benjamin had been watching them. Ava was watching the video. As they got closer to the vehicle, she realized what it was.

Ava: Shit. Shit, shit, shit. This is bad. This is really bad.

She closed her eyes and imagined the drama that would follow.

Ava: Not going to happen.

Ava was going to have to do something. She wasn't going to just wait and watch like some people. (Deb) She was going to do something dangerous, destructive, and possibly deadly.

Isn't that your typical Tuesday? Uh... yes. Uh-huh. Guess what? It is Tuesday! Good. This is going to work out perfectly then!

Ava grabbed a backpack, checked to make sure it had some tech inside and headed for her car. She hopped in and pulled out. And Benjamin didn't even notice.

[Hi5 Studios]

Ava had parked on the street. She wanted to seem like a normal person and not raise a few suspicions. She made sure that no one was by Wes' Mountaineer, then went over to it. It was unlocked. She knew Matt and the others had already locked it. That meant someone else had been here recently. She was going to cause a little bit of hell for that someone. She opened the door and locked it. It wasn't much, but it could make life a bit harder for him. She also shuffled some of the papers around, then closed the door. She sighed. What else could she do? She started thinking, then realized she heard voices.

Shit!

She ran off, hiding in the bushes. She could still see from here, just getting poked a lot. A figure in black sped past her. It was Benjamin, and he was on the phone.

Benjamin: Of course sir. Everything is under control. Just some... hiccups, not preconceived. I understand. Yes, sir.

Ava watched silently. He put his phone away.

Huh. Changing your fashion style, Ben? Or, is this a Nelson choice?

Benjamin was in a short black coat, rather than his normal black lab coat. Also, he didn't have on his usual breathing mask.

Must've hopped up on Serum to do that. Damn. He's changed some. Using Wes' identity, and risking his life? Wow, you've grown up some, Benji.

He was sneaking towards the back door of one of the bases. He slid into one of the bushes, and Samantha came out, throwing the door wide open not paying attention to anything but her phone. He raced in, and Ava growled in her throat. Damn, it. Should've stopped him. And blow our cover? Go back to being stabbed daily? Hey, I still get stabbed daily! Yeah, well you're doing a good thing this time. Yeah. Still, now what? He's inside, probably trying to plant that listening, phone hacker case thingy. Yeah.

Ava waited until the coast was clear, then headed back to her car. She could at least get some things from the RV, while Benjamin was gone. She hadn't done much to help and kinda felt like she failed. Need to get my serum-immuned self together. More like just getting my shit together.

On the way back, she decided to lay out some distractions for Benjamin. Yeah, it meant she wasn't going to get a good night's sleep, but it would keep him from his work.

[RV]

Ava had already grabbed some food and serum. Now she was looking for some of his more personal documents.

Aha!

She found the chat logs between him and Deb and the picture. Ava laid them on his bed, as though they had fallen out of the cabinet. Ava read one of the letters between Benjamin and Deb. Ava did feel pity for Benjamin. Deb had promised to try and help him, but she had just put off making the antidote. She did let him waste away. But, was Benjamin any better? He was trying to make a serum bomb to infect millions of others. Ava still wasn't sure of his purpose, but she knew hers. Stopping him, and helping Project 863. 

Ava had gotten so wrapped up in reading that she had ignored her phone chiming. Suddenly she heard a car pulling up.

Shit!!

She dropped the paper and rushed out of the RV. She was so grateful for the serum giving her the super soldier abilities, but none of the side effects. It came in handy for situations like this. She leaped through one of the windows she left open just in case of something like this. She whipped around and slammed the window shut. She was breathing heavily.

Ava: Okay, dumbass. Can we please, for the love of God, not do that again? Please? Don't want to end up as a puddle on the ground. Or worse. A science experiment again.

Ava dropped her backpack to the floor and caught her breath. Jesus Christ, that scared her so bad. She grabbed her backpack and headed to the kitchen table. She carefully took everything she had gathered out and set it out so she could see it better. For organizing.

She had grabbed some of those meals that Benjamin made. Some bottles of water. She carefully took a small, wrapped package and unwrapped it. Three vials of serum. Red, of course. She sighed. Whenever she went to the RV and took serum, she injected it into herself. There was no way for her to dispose of it, and she wasn't going to let Benjamin have it. So, injecting was the only option.

She set them on the counter where they wouldn't get broken. She set about putting everything else away. As she went to put one of the meals in a cabinet, it slipped out of her hand. To keep it from hitting the vials, she tried to catch it. Instead of the meals hitting one of the vials, Ava's hand did.

The vial cracked and started leaking onto Ava's hand.

She struggled to not scream in pain. She grabbed the vial, opened a window one-handed, and threw it as far as she could. Quickly shutting the window, she ran her hand under the cold water. Her skin was...raw. She let the water run over her hand until her hand looked less red and sore. The pain, thankfully, had gone down.

She turned the water off and sat down. She carefully rotated her hand, examining the damage. The water had worked wonders. Only a couple of parts of her hand would probably scar. Thankfully, it was her left hand. Being right-hand dominant, that was a relief. She got up and went to the bathroom where the first-aid kit was. She cleaned it, then loosely wrapped her hand.

Ava: Well... that hurt like hell.

She went back into the kitchen and sighed at the counter smoking. There was nothing she could do until it had finished eating away. So she put on gloves and carefully filled up her injection gun, which was lying nearby. She sighed.

God, I despise this.

She injected herself. Between the pain in her hand and this, it was next to impossible to not scream.

Ava, gritting teeth: God, damn it, this hurts!

She finished injecting, then half fell into her chair. Today had worn her out.