Thank you so much to AlienGhostWizard14 for your review!

Special thanks goes out to LabGirl2001, Lady Cougar-Trombone, 88keys, AllAmericanSlurp and xxWasabiWarriorAlertxx because these people had been completely supportive of me and this story ever since the first chapter, which was published three months ago (can you believe that?). Nearly every chapter, you guys post reviews, and that means a lot to me. Thank you.

Everybody, stay warm for the winter! Just remember: bundle up, hot cocoa's your friend - and it's not a bionic chip. ;)

- Shaine (musicnotes093)

Twenty-Three.

Consciousness came back to Leo in short, scattered measures. The first came in through a haze, as if the room was congested with fog, and all he could see were shapes and colors. What he saw that first time was predominantly gray. There hung a huge sphere of light somewhere above him. He remembered it to be quite assaultive, because it spread greedily in his line of vision, but it was not enough to keep him from seeing the two other forms that towered on either side of him.

He couldn't see the one that stood to his right, but he could feel him (or, he wondered, was it her?) holding onto his right arm—perhaps to prevent him from struggling away. He saw just a brief glimpse of the one that was on his left. The man seemed to be operating on his arm, but he wasn't too certain. His vision was blocked by something blue, something he had only seen in hospitals before.

The man looked up just once, moved precisely to reposition the plastic tube on his face, before resuming his task.

An odd smell wafted through Leo's nose then—from the plastic tube, he guessed—and it reminded him of how tired he was and how the darkness was more comfortable.

The second time he awakened, the world was still as unclear, but he could sense things much better. He picked up this much: the cold cement under his face, the light sprinkle of dirt that tumbled closer then parted as he breathed in then out, and the three pairs of feet standing a considerable distance away from him.

They were unmoving, and they seemed to stand there as a protection for him.

Against who, he didn't know. There was still that darkness, and he preferred it much more.

When he woke up the next time, he had enough energy to stay lucid for more than a few seconds. He wanted to sleep again, but a part of him urged him to investigate his situation. He was really weak, but he was exhausted with the numerous flashes of awareness that did not make sense. He wanted to sit up, maybe speak, but he found no strength for either. It was as if his body, every nerve, every fiber, had turned into lead, and his brain had no control of them anymore.

So he resorted to the only act he could do: he looked up.

"Hello, Leo," Douglas said, smiling at him.

Leo wanted to move away, but all his body would afford him was a soft sigh.

"Don't force it," Douglas said, walking behind the dark green wall formed by the three teenagers – a boy, a girl, a boy – standing mechanically a few feet away in what looked like their mission suits. "You've just gone through a major surgery. You'll probably feel a little out of it for about another day, but you should get well after that." He scratched his chin pensively. "Don't worry. I, uh, didn't take anything out. I actually put something in."

Leo struggled to do something, anything, but he was denied of actions involving his own volition.

"I've gotta say, you surprised me, kid," Douglas continued. "I was not expecting to find you near my old facility. I really thought I had killed you, which, I couldn't figure out how. For a minute, I was convinced that there was something in the tranquilizer that triggered an allergic reaction or something. I thought I've made a massive mistake, and you wouldn't believe how hard that's been for me."

Reluctantly surrendering to the fact that he could not do anything else, Leo turned his eyes back to his step-uncle, hoping that doing so would at least communicate the questions he had in mind. Where am I? he wondered, especially as he caught glimpses of the deathly gray cement walls, above which were web-like protrusions of rusted metals and a few open pipes. There was also a small window to his left, and it offered a preview of something bright and tropical outside.

Douglas saw what the boy was staring at, and it caused a soft grin to pull on his lips. "I can't tell you where we are," he said. "What I can tell you is that the place is beautiful. Not in here, of course, but outside." He shrugged. "It's very quiet and secluded. I like it."

Leo heaved a breath.

"Oh. By the way, you know what really surprised me?" Douglas said. "That you're with someone like Torrance Carlisle. I never pegged her to be the type of person you'd want to be friends with. It's almost as bad as hanging out with Jessi Nash. Torrance's not as loyal, though. Jessi would fight for me to the death. I think that's why I set her as my backup plan, sending her a time-sensitive message to look for me if your family ever catches me, which, thanks to Chase and that cryoblaster, you did."

Douglas nodded. "She's a sweet girl. She sent her boyfriend to break me out of the place Donald held me in. Oh, and uh—" he took out his phone from his pocket then waved it to show Leo, "she sent me a text two days ago about a potential new recruit." He frowned as he scrolled through the message on the screen. "'Potential recruit, sixteen years-old. Male'," he read aloud. "Intermediate to advanced computer skills. Advanced technological skills and capabilities. Offers physical access to Davenport Industries, close enough to get to Donald himself without even being suspected a thing." He smiled at Leo. "I was a little skeptical, because the description fitted only two people I know: Chase and you," he said. "Chase, well, we know – impossible, and you, well, dead. I wondered who this was, so I told her to take you." His brows shot up amusedly. "Seeing that she's now in jail, and you're not in her clutches, I guess she wasn't able to. It seems like Torrance made her choice."

Leo stared at him, quite taken aback by the amount of information he knew about both girls. He refused to believe that Torrance ever knew about Douglas; she wouldn't have betrayed him like this.

This thought suddenly led him to search for Torrance. He began to worry about her safety.

"Oh, you should have seen the things your new friend has done." Douglas chuckled mischievously. "She's a very bad little girl, that one. And I have all the evidences against her." He shook his head. "Yeah, too bad she's turned against me. With the number of cybercrimes under her belt, I can make sure she stays in jail forever."

Leo mustered enough strength to form a wrinkle on his brows. How would he…? he wondered. Victor Krane's the only person who knows about Torrance's past jobs.

Douglas scoffed when he accurately guessed what he was thinking. A smirk pulled on the side of his mouth. He walked towards Leo, descended down on one knee, and then bent down a little to draw closer to him. "Kid," he said. "I am Victor Krane."

Leo reeled back, and the anxiety he had over Torrance's safety worsened into a fear that hit him full on.

Douglas was walking back to the three when Leo looked up again. "I have to applaud your efforts, though," he said. "You are a brilliant kid. That program you installed on Adam's, Bree's and Chase's chips? It works. I don't know how you did it, but I tried to upload the newest version of the Triton app that I have. Blocked me out. Destroyed it, actually. Thankfully it was just a copy." He smiled. "You've set your siblings free."

A sick sensation began to crystallize at the pit of Leo's stomach as he observed his step-uncle closely, especially the insincere smile on his face.

"The problem is, what you solved is a problem that you should have never even worried about in the first place. Now if you had uploaded your program onto these three—" Douglas placed his hands on the shoulders of the boy on the right, "that would have been a different story. You would have saved your family, not just free them."

Leo turned his attention to the three teenagers, each with differing features, all with similar blank, vapid stares. Strangely, a sense of familiarity lingered at the back of his mind.

Douglas smirked. "Come on," he prompted. "You told me once that your memory's not too bad. Surely you remember them?"

Leo gazed at them one by one, analyzing their features. The boy standing next to Douglas was sandy-haired. He had hazel eyes, from what he could judge at his distance, and a softly pronounced jaw line. The girl in the middle had lengthy, dark brown hair, and soft, dark brown eyes. The boy at the end had curls of dark hair and honey-hued eyes under lightly thicker eyebrows.

Emptiness came first.

Then, as he scanned their features a third time, it clicked.

The sandy-haired waiter at the ball who served the poison-laced strawberry smoothie.

The girl at the parking lot who drove the car towards his direction.

The teenage boy jogging outside the Nash's residence in Chula Vista, the one that encouraged them to go inside the house where Douglas was.

Douglas took in the shadow of recognition on Leo's face with satisfaction. "You see now where you have gone wrong? I hid everything about the plan in plain sight," he said. "Project Deflection has four necessary elements, and it's spelled out in the first four letters of the name. D-E-F-L." He pointed to the three beside him, one by one as he introduced them, starting from the sandy-haired boy. "Darwin. Echo. Fielder…" then, with a point to him, "Leo." He smiled wider and more dangerously. "I told you you were the only one keeping your family alive," he said. "You should have stayed dead."

Everything around Leo seemed to collapse into pieces that only led to a deep, endless haze. The darkness it brought felt foreign and caustic. It laid bare his restlessness, his hopelessness as he lied trapped in his mind and in the unbearable weight of his body. It crumbled every foundation he thought he had made with one swift slap, and it reduced the wall of protection he had worked hard to build into something that was now just imaginary.

As he watched them, he was forced to realize that he had made a mistake.

He had made a terrible, terrible mistake.

END OF STORY TWO.