Eno awoke from his sleep feeling very tired. The covers had been lifted off his body and the cold warmth of the pillow told him that Martin had been gone for a long time.
A little disappointed, Eno sat up and turned his eyes to find a note next to his pillow. In Martin’s strong handwriting, he had written that there was breakfast on the table and that he should warm it up when he woke up and that he would be back in the evening.
Eno’s mood improved and he buried himself under the covers and took a deep breath of the Alpha’s scent before getting up and getting out of bed. In Martin’s absence, Eno threw on a robe, slipped on his slippers and moved to the bathroom to wash his face and brush his teeth, humming an old-fashioned tune and squeezing toothpaste.
Eno had been avoiding Martin for days with unease since the day he asked him who he really liked, finally being cornered on the sofa and then being told by Alpha that he didn’t care. Their life became exactly as Eno had fantasised it would be, and Eno was on the verge of floating to the sky with happiness as he was fed full by Martin every day.
He stuck his toothbrush in his mouth and drummed it back and forth when he suddenly felt a jolt in his belly. Eno hadn’t paid any attention to it, but when he wiped the water droplets from his face with a towel, his belly moved again, with a very distinct movement.
Eno had a feeling in his heart that it couldn’t be. He calculated that it had been more than three months since his last heat, so if he was pregnant, it was indeed time for fetal movement. Eno stood dumbfounded at the sink, all he could think about was the report that said he couldn’t have a baby. Although he knew that AOs with such a high degree of genetic matching had almost a 100% fertility rate, but his uterus was so severely damaged, wasn’t the probability of pregnancy extremely low, didn’t it offset it?
His first thought was to talk to Martin, but his second thought was that it would be funny if there was a mistake, so it would be better to hide it from him and buy two more pregnancy tests online to be sure.
He finished his order and walked down the stairs to eat the breakfast Martin had prepared. Martin did learn a few dishes from him, but each time he said they were too bad to eat and wouldn’t let him try them, so he fed him what he bought directly from outside. A couple of small, round custard buns and two tea eggs sat squarely in a thermos, and a thick white rice porridge was cooking in a pot, still steaming.
Eno smiled involuntarily and sat down to finish his loving breakfast. After the meal, he lounged on the sofa for a while, debating whether he should stop working out later since he might be pregnant, when there was a sudden knock on the door, waking up the distracted Omega.
Thinking that the pregnancy test couldn’t have arrived so soon, Eno got up and answered the door. There was a man in a Star Express uniform standing at the door, handing him a thin delivery: “Mr. Eno? I’m sorry to disturb you, this is a special delivery, please sign for it in person.”
The vast majority of homes in the Federation had courier lockers, and only extremely valuable deliveries were purchased with special services that required hand delivery to the recipient. Eno didn’t pick it up, frowning as he asked: “The sender is?”
The little man brought the courier to his eyes and after looking carefully at the consignment note said: “It’s Mr. Ivan.”
Eno went cold, signed his name on the return slip and took the courier bag into the house. He fetched scissors and returned to cut open the bag and emptied out its contents, which consisted of a palm-sized card, an identity chip card, a strange instrument and a photograph.
He picked up the card first and there was just a short line on it: Want the truth? I’ll wait for you.
Below it was Ivan’s signature, a handwriting he knew too well to be a fake. On the back of the card was an odd line of address, which Eno checked with his navigation software and found to be on the Inhuman side of the star field, but the straight-line distance is not that far from York.
Eno’s thin lips tightened as he picked up the picture next. It was a picture of Martin walking down the street with his back to the camera behind, the red dot of the sniper rifle pointed plainly at the back of his head, the intent clear.
Eno slumped back in his chair, his heart conflicted and pained, and finally turned into a sense of helplessness. It was as if fate had always played tricks on him, leaving him destined to spend his life looking at happiness from a distance, but never be able to enter it.
He was so close to being happy.
Tears slid down his jaw in a line, staining his light-coloured robe and turning it a deep, heavy pink. He sat paralyzed for a long moment, finally making up his mind as if he were determined, his palm unconsciously brushing his lower abdomen as he murmured, “Baobao1this is the literal baby can’t live without its father, don’t you think so, Baobao?”
Eno got up decisively, found a piece of paper and scribbled down a few words, then placed the tiny instrument in the courier on his wrist, the monitoring bracelet broke with a sound, without any alarm sounding.
Eno went back to the house, packed his bag, took one last look at the two-storey house standing alone in the light of the pale blue sky, and headed for the planet’s port without looking back.
York Star Ren’ai Hospital, Rehabilitation Department.
Martin sat at the dressing table, expressionless as several Omegas fiddled with his face. As layers of make-up remover made of special materials were smoothed away from his face, the yellow, dry face was soon peeled off, revealing the widely known, handsome face that belonged to Major General Drake.
Omega make-up artists were still removing some of the camouflage props such as his eyebrows and wig at his temples. Drake was using a military undercover level disguise technique, not to mention hiding him from Eno’s eyes, even Grey and Carl sometimes dared not recognise him. Finally, one of the technicians made a small incision in his throat and removed the voice changer hidden inside, and Drake’s voice became low and magnetic, without the coarse rasp.
After all this bustle, only Drake and his lieutenant, Nightingale, were left in the small recovery room. The outside hallway was completely sealed off, and a few plainclothes soldiers guarded the entrance to the building, securing the small room.
Drake switched on the encrypted video channel and the light screen revealed Grey’s stony face. After a few flashes of snowflakes, Carl also appeared in the light screen, and all three men had extraordinarily mixed expressions.
“Let’s get started.” Drake said with a clear cough, “In a hurry to get home.”
Without further ado, Grey shared an encrypted file and whispered: “This thing is a lot bigger than we thought, you guys read it first.”
Drake manoeuvred his cursor to turn the pages quickly and locked eyes with Nightingale, each of their expressions dripping with deep shock.
In the year 2048 of the Commonwealth Era, twenty-one year old biology genius Ivan graduated with a PhD from the Commonwealth Central Academy of Sciences and entered the Commonwealth Central Biological Laboratory. He had been hired by the Federation Central Academy of Sciences for a thesis he had done in graduate school, and was conducting research on the subject at the Central Laboratory as well.
Ivan proposed an Omega genetic modification programme to enhance the overall Omega physique, and if the experiment was successful, the Alpha would no longer be the only candidate to go into battle. Because as the war progressed, the number of Alpha’s dwindled, leaving more and more Omegas unmarried. Moreover, the one-to-one marriage system has been practised in the Federation for thousands of years, and Alpha’s bottom line is there. They can accept the Federation giving them an Omega, but they will never accept multiple Omega. Therefore, those Omegas with not so good genes and not assigned by the Mastermind are left, and can only marry Betas, giving birth to more Betas, further reducing the combat effectiveness of the race.
So Ivan’s plan was undoubtedly a life-saving one, and was also quickly approved to enter the experimental phase. As for the progress of the experiment, it has been destroyed, and no one knows exactly how far he got in the first place.
That same year, Ivan asked the Mastermind to marry Ally, marrying her when she came of age in 2051 of the Commonwealth era. Two years later, they had a lovely child named Eno, and another two years later, Ally was pregnant with Lea.
In 2055, a test tube containing improved genes was lost from the Federation’s Central Biological Laboratory, while Victor, Irwin’s Omega assistant, disappeared. The lab highly suspects that Victor stole the modified gene, and a secret manhunt for him has been launched, but no trace of him has been found.
In 2074, Dr. Ivan, the leader of the experiment, died in a fire, and the experiment was terminated and all related documents destroyed. The entire existence of the experiment was sealed in a first-class confidential file, to which only extremely high authority had access.
Drake frowned and said: “This gene should be embedded in Eno, but that’s not the same as what Eno told me, he said the Kersis conducted this experiment in secret.”
“Of course it has something to do with the Kersis.” Grey said pulling up another file out, “Do you know why the experimental project was urgently suspended after Ivan’s death? Because his body was found on a desert planet and the real Ivan…had already died in 2055.”
Drake’s pupils constricted and he hastily opened that investigation document. A painter who had gone to that barren and inhospitable place to sketch had slipped while crying and looking for water, eaten a mouthful of sand, and pulled out a corpse beneath the yellow sand, and reported it to the police in terror.
The police urgently extracted the DNA remaining in the bones and teeth, and found that it completely corresponded to Ivan, and there were obvious chisel marks on the back of the neck. Combined with the pheromone of Ivan who replaced him alive, his glands may have been poached directly.
Drake’s muscles trembled slightly with anger: “If they knew that Ivan was a fake, why didn’t they just arrest him?”
“Because there’s a procedure to follow. And with Eno’s wedding the next day, the fake Ivan would have had to be there that day anyway.” Grey said calmly, “The task force’s emergency deliberations resulted in a straightforward arrest when the wedding took place, and the leader who approved it was of the Kersi faction, and I’d already checked out the network of connections. It’s likely that he was the one who reported the incident in advance, causing the fake Ivan to slip away after setting fire to all the evidence.”
He lowered his voice and said: “Victor, the missing Omega assistant next to Ivan, was also admitted to the biology academy under the name of the Kersi family. Part of the reason for closing the case so quickly after the fire was that the nature of this experiment with Ivan was too sensitive to really lay out, and part of it was also that someone from above was pressing down.”
After a moment of silence in the room, Drake concluded: “According to Eno, there was some collusion between this fake Ivan and the Kersis, and this genetic modification technology reached the Inhuman side after the fire, so the Kersis…may have colluded with the Inhumans?”
“High probability.” Grey said, “As far as I know, there is a mimicry line of powers on the Inhuman side, because it’s so rare, it may not be possible to produce one in 180 years.”
“And the one with the highest talent among them is even rarer in 300-500 years, the ability is a copy of the form, an exact copy. As long as one follows the target around long enough and observes him, even the tone of voice and the small habits of ordinary life can be made identical. Not even ordinary gene extraction can identify it, unless brain cells are extracted for genetic testing, which is more than enough for the laboratory’s blood tester.”
“The last Inhuman with this ability assassinated the council president 400 years ago and pretended to be the council president for fifteen days before he was discovered, which triggered a 10 power purge in the council that basically changed all the blood. The upper echelons mostly knew such a being existed, it was just so rare that many forgot about it.”
Grey let out a long sigh, his weathered face full of exhaustion: “Everything is just a speculation, we still need stronger evidence. Do your informants on the Inhuman side have any leads?”
Drake shook his head heavily: “No red iris related leads, just a lot of non-combat Inhuman kids being collected and no one knows where they were sent. It’s highly suspected that there are concentrated experiments going on on the Inhuman side at the moment, and the informants are still trying to find out exactly where.”
“OK.” Grey said as he pressed his temples, “It’s gotten to this point, take your time and sooner or later you’ll be able to press them to death. I’ll go to the council president in a couple of days to discuss this. That’s enough for today, think about what you’ll say to Eno when you get back. If he gets angry and scolds you, listen to him, you hear me?”
The Federation’s president came from a humble background and was a man of rare integrity, and he was partly responsible for Grey’s success against the nobility as Commander-in-Chief of the army. If even he had been infiltrated by the Kersis, the Federation would have been finished long ago.
Drake’s cold brow softened and he nodded. A smile spread across Carl’s face, which had been streaked with sadness since the connection, and he told Drake to bring Eno home sooner rather than later to show them. The main thing a father wanted was for his son to be happy, and as long as Drake was open to the idea, they would never mind Eno’s status any more than he did, and would just treat him equally well. It was not as if they had never met Eno before, and they both felt that although the boy did not seem to have much of a personality, he was not bad by nature.
The couple soon disappeared into the light screen and Drake took Nightingale out the door, first to the florist to buy a large bouquet of red roses and then to Nightingale’s car, where he kept holding up a small mirror to fix his hair that had been sprayed with half a bottle of hair spray and asked Nightingale with a big smile on his face: “Do you know how many steps it takes to eat a wheelchair?”
Nightingale: “???”
For a moment he wondered if the boss was mad with joy, then he heard Drake say with a straight face: “Three steps, first take out the wheelchair, second eat it, third step hasn’t been thought of yet.”
Dumbfounded, Nightingale became convinced that his boss was really mad and pondered the future of the Silver Cross with despondency; the more he thought about it, the more dire the future became.
Over there, Drake didn’t find his snide remark in the least bit cold and began to chase Nightingale again, asking him if he looked handsome today. “Handsome, handsome, handsome. More handsome than even you look in your promos.” Nightingale broke down and cried out, “Why do you have to bring me along if you’re looking for your sister-in-law? I don’t want to get involved with you at all! Can you respect the pure relationship with your subordinates? I don’t want to be cannon fodder in the crematorium ah!!!”
Drake said coolly: “The Drake Supreme Ultra HD autographed photo Julia wants……”
“Go go go!” Nightingale wordlessly wiped a hot tear and started the car, thinking he’d better quit early and go home to sell sweet potatoes.
It didn’t take them long to drive up to the slums, and Drake had wanted to get out of the car gallantly, but considering that he didn’t know if there were any Kersi family spies around that hadn’t been cleared out, he put on his hat and went inside with his face blocked.
Drake had already conjured up a thousand possible reactions from Eno and was nervous as hell. But there was an appalling silence in the house, and something loomed on the coffee table.
Drake’s heart suddenly clenched and almost stopped beating. His right eyelid twitches as if he had a premonition, and Drake strode over to pick up the note, his face grim.
Curious, Nightingale padded over to it, only to see that it read: Gone to take revenge, don’t miss. I’ll be back, I beg you to wait for me, it won’t be long, I’ll surprise you when I come back, okay?
Eno’s tone was so humble, so desperate for happiness that instead of magnanimously letting go and letting Martin find another, he selfishly begged Martin to wait for him, not to leave him alone again. This longing was more urgent than any mood, and he would rather die out there and let Martin wait for him until he despairs than go home and see another Omega sitting beside Martin, perhaps with a living, breathing child.
His love for Drake was a letting go, but for Martin it was far less spontaneous. They did truly have joyous times together, a happiness so precious in his life that he might never have it again, that he simply could not let go.
Next to the note was a blatantly surreptitious photograph, the red dots on the target where the infrared aiming line fell were blindingly red. Eno had deliberately left the photo as if to say ‘look I didn’t just leave you for no reason, so don’t be angry, wait for me again, wait for me to give you a quiet and peaceful life.’
I beg you to wait for me.
Drake’s nails pinched into his palms, oozing blood to calm himself, he turned and ordered Nightingale: “Close the net, wrap up the Kersis, don’t miss a single rat.”
Nightingale was alarmed: “Don’t we have insufficient evidence, and we haven’t got permission from above……”
“The premise of insufficient evidence is that they are really innocent.” Drake’s expression was terrifying, and he slowly revealed a grim smile, “Won’t there be evidence if they confess? Have our legion cut off all contact with Grey and don’t drag my two dads into it. I’ll interrogate Kersi myself, and I’ll take the blame if anything happens. Go ba.”
He has been known as the male god of the Federation for too long, so long that he almost forgot how much blood was stained on his hands in order to help Grey get to the top.
melon: 😢😢😢
