Contract Marriage with My Secret Partner in Crime-Chapter 76: Project Helix

[Later that night, at a private lab Reynold trusted]

"Project Helix," the technician muttered, adjusting her glasses. "That’s what this chemical matches with. At least partially."

Reynold narrowed his eyes. "What do you mean, partially?"

"It’s like... a prototype. A failed version. It’s missing key stabilizers. If someone injected this," she paused, "they’d experience unpredictable changes. High fevers. Neurological fluctuations. Cellular mutations. Most wouldn’t survive."

Reynold’s chest tightened. Fevers. Changes. Mutations.

Ted Frin had no medical history to show instability. He was healthy. Normal.

But what if he wasn’t anymore?

"Do you think someone injected this into him?" he asked.

She hesitated. "I think someone was trying to see what it could do. This stuff is unstable, but it’s designed to evolve. It adapts to the host."

Jeric, standing behind them, let out a low whistle. "Sounds like something out of a comic book."

"No," Reynold said, quieter now. "Sounds like something that ties back to twelve years ago."

Jeric looked up. "You think it’s connected?"

"The explosion. The facility. The missing files. My sister," he paused, "and Cassius."

Jeric’s expression darkened.

"Ted Frin’s just the surface," Reynold continued. "We need to find out who’s making this... and why. If the Diamond Family’s behind it, we’re not just dealing with a missing person case."

"We’re dealing with a war."

---

Meanwhile, across the city in a Diamond Family estate, a man in a tailored suit stood behind a floor-length window, a glass of red wine in hand. His eyes watched the city lights below, calm and calculating.

A soft knock echoed at the door.

"Enter," he said.

A younger man stepped in, bowing slightly. "They found the old lab."

The man did not turn around. He simply swirled his wine gently.

"And the sample?"

"Gone. Likely retrieved by Reynold Draven himself."

Finally, he turned, a faint smile forming on his lips.

"Then we’ll have to speed things up."

He walked toward the desk, picked up a photo of Ted Frin, and turned it face down.

"Let’s see what happens when the next subject awakens."

---

[Back in Reynold’s SUV]

Jeric sat in the passenger seat, arms crossed. "You think Ted’s still alive?"

Reynold didn’t respond at first. He stared at the tablet on the dashboard again. Zephany’s interview was still open, her voice echoing faintly from earlier.

He started the engine. "Maybe. We’re not done yet. We’re just getting started."

---

[The SUV — Moving through the city]

Rain tapped lightly against the windshield, a rhythm too soft to disturb the silence inside the vehicle. The city had grown darker, streets damp and slick, bathed in the glow of amber streetlights. Reynold gripped the steering wheel tighter, his knuckles pale. Jeric glanced at him, sensing the shift in the air.

"You didn’t say anything after the lab," Jeric finally said.

Reynold’s gaze stayed locked on the road. "There’s something off about all of this. Ted Frin wasn’t just a target. He was... chosen."

"For what?"

Reynold didn’t answer.

Jeric leaned back into his seat, chewing on that silence. "You think the Diamond Family knows we’re sniffing around?"

"They already know," Reynold muttered. "We’re probably being watched."

Jeric looked out the window. "Wouldn’t be the first time."

They took a sharp turn off the main road, disappearing down a narrow alley that led to a hidden service entrance behind an old apartment complex.

Reynold parked. "Stay sharp."

---

[Apartment 4C — Ted Frin’s Place]

The apartment was modest, clean, but had a strange sterile feeling to it. Like someone had tried too hard to hide something.

Reynold scanned the room quickly. The walls were bare, the laptop gone, the closet empty. Jeric checked the drawers and pulled out a single sheet of paper.

"Only this," he said, handing it to Reynold.

It was a hand-drawn map. Unlabeled. Just streets and markings, but at the bottom right, one word was scribbled in a tight, rushed scrawl:

Hollowgate.

Reynold stared at it. He hadn’t heard that name in years.

"You know it?" Jeric asked.

Reynold folded the map carefully. "It’s not on any official city record. But I’ve been there once. When I was a rookie."

"And?"

Reynold met Jeric’s eyes. "We weren’t supposed to find anything. But something found us."

---

[Midnight — Outside Hollowgate]

The entrance was a rusted metal gate wedged between two crumbling brick buildings. There were no signs or lights, only a faint buzzing sound in the distance. The place felt wrong.

Reynold stepped forward, boots crunching on shattered glass. Jeric stayed close, flashlight sweeping through the darkness.

They found a corridor underground — narrow, damp, and descending steeply. As they stepped inside, the air shifted, colder and heavier.

At the end of the corridor, a thick steel door. No handle. Just a keypad.

Jeric frowned. "Think Ted came here?"

"I think he was brought here."

Reynold knelt, brushing dust off the keypad. He pressed a few keys at random. No response. Then, from inside, a faint hum.

Suddenly, the keypad lit up green.

The door hissed.

Opened.

A single cold breath escaped Jeric’s mouth. "We shouldn’t be here."

But Reynold stepped through.

Inside was a small chamber with white walls, spotlessly clean, contrasting the decay outside. The hum grew louder. There was a glass chamber at the center, empty. Monitors surrounded it. All were off, except one.

A grainy video began to play.

A man strapped to a chair. Head down. Barely conscious.

Jeric squinted. "Is that—?"

Reynold stepped closer.

The face came into focus.

It was Ted Frin.

But he was different. Thin. Eyes hollow. Skin marked with faint lines that looked like veins, but they pulsed blue.

Jeric whispered, "What did they do to him?"

The video ended abruptly. The screen went black.

Then, a metallic voice came through the speaker above:

"Subject #11 has shown signs of rejection. Initiating Phase Two."

A loud clang echoed from behind them.

The steel door had closed.

Locked.

Reynold turned slowly toward Jeric.

"I think we just walked into their next experiment."

---

[Elsewhere — An Underground Office]

"Did they take the bait?"

A shadowed figure stared at a glowing monitor showing Reynold and Jeric trapped inside the chamber.

A younger voice replied through a headset, "They’re inside. Monitoring active. We’ll see how they respond to the environment."

The shadowed figure gave a faint smile.

"They’re smart. But not smart enough to back out now."

On another screen, an encrypted feed showed someone waking up inside a separate chamber.

Ted Frin’s eyes snapped open.

But they were no longer entirely human. Not anymore.

---

[Back in the chamber]

Jeric pounded on the door. "Nothing. No exit. You seeing this?"

Reynold looked up at a small vent near the ceiling. Thin, barely wide enough for a person to crawl through.

"Only one way out," he said. "But we have to move now. Before Phase Two starts."

"What’s Phase Two?"

Reynold didn’t respond.

He just looked at the empty chamber that once held Ted Frin and the faint blue smear on the glass where a hand had once pressed.

They were not just dealing with a missing person.

They were standing at the edge of something much bigger.

And something alive.