Chapter 164: Relief
Chapter 162
"Wha—?" The smiling guard’s mouth fell open in sheer shock as the straw connected to the soda bottle slipped from between his lips.
Dropping the beverage in a frantic panic, he quickly shot up from his chair and began typing on the haptic keyboard with hurried, desperate movements.
He was searching, looking, and pondering in total confusion, his eyes darting across the code.
"How is the footage non-existent? This simply shouldn’t be possible..." he mumbled incoherently as he continued inputting commands at a breakneck pace.
He was attempting to summon any visual data from the previous day that matched the timestamp the Captain had explicitly requested.
But he found nothing.
He tried searching for the footage from just minutes prior to the gap, but he couldn’t see anything there either.
When he checked an hour before the requested timestamp, the footage was present and clear.
However, every single frame from 3:25 pm to 6:00 pm was gone.
It had been erased as if it hadn’t even existed to begin with.
The data had vanished without leaving a single trace behind.
While the man was practically spiraling into a panic, a mechanical spider silently slid out from the housing of the screen and began scurrying away at an astonishing speed.
Following closely after it was the second spider; together, they slipped out of the control room unnoticed, leaving the smiling man alone in his confusion.
’Wh-what do I tell the Captain? There’s no way this should have been possible. Nobody was anywhere near this station, let alone messing with the system without my knowledge, so how did this happen?’
It wasn’t as if the system reported the footage had been deleted; it simply categorized the files as non-existent.
This implied that the footage from that specific duration was either never recorded or had never occupied space on the drive.
"Hard drive," the man muttered, spinning around to quickly check the physical storage hardware.
Five minutes later, the exact same result popped up.
It was as if the footage hadn’t been captured at all.
But that shouldn’t have been possible by any metric.
The cameras were calibrated to record every sector 24/7, so how could this have occurred?
’Ah crap... my ears are going to bleed from the Captain’s beratment today.’
He let out a heavy sigh as he proceeded to collapse back into his chair in a state of total exhaustion.
Sweat was already dripping down his face, which he proceeded to wipe away with the back of his sleeves.
__
Meanwhile, in Van’s workshop, the boy could now be seen opening his eyes slowly, the light returning to his pupils.
His hands fell away from his computer terminal as a wave of intense exhaustion washed over him in an instant.
A thin trail of blood trickled down his nose, which he quickly wiped away with a shaky breath of relief.
Spinning his chair around to face the anxious trio, he stared at them for a long moment.
They looked back at him with expectant, high-strung expressions on their faces.
"Well? What’s the update?" Kai poked, a prominent frown of worry on his face.
Van kept them in suspense for a few more seconds, allowing the tension to build.
The silence in the room was palpable as he studied their faces.
Then, a small, triumphant smile curved his lips as he nodded at them.
"It’s done. The footage has been thoroughly wiped out—both from the software and the hardware. Everything is gone."
Kai and Ray exhaled in a burst of pure, exhilarated relief, wide smiles breaking across their faces.
Chloe fell to her knees, her legs finally giving out from the stress.
"Hallelujah," she groaned out, her voice thick with emotion.
Even though she wouldn’t have been seen on whatever footage the boys wanted to erase, she had still been genuinely worried about their safety.
Hearing Van’s good news caused a massive wave of relief to wash over her.
Faint scurrying sounds could be heard coming from the base of the door.
Turning towards the noise, they watched as the door opened just a crack; two mechanical spiders rushed inside before the door hissed shut behind them with a low click.
Leaping from the floor, they landed accurately on Van’s lap.
He proceeded to lightly rub their metallic bodies with a fond smile on his face.
"Good job, you both."
Pointing his finger at the small machines, they climbed onto it, and he proceeded to place them carefully on the desk behind him.
He then turned around to look at his friends, who were staring at him with confused expressions on their faces.
"What? Without them, this wouldn’t have been possible," Van added, clicking his tongue with a tired sigh before slumping back into his chair again.
Ray turned to look at Chloe as she slowly stood up from her kneeling position.
He lingered for a few seconds, hesitant, before awkwardly muttering,
"Thank you."
"Hm?" Chloe lifted an eyebrow, a playful glint in her eyes. "Sorry?"
Ray rubbed his hand for a few seconds, looking away while repeating his words again with more clarity.
"I said; Thank you. Without you today, this wouldn’t have been possible. If you hadn’t led us to the control room and proceeded to distract the guards for those precious seconds, we would have failed.
You just saved the three of us from getting expelled and possibly severely punished by the Corps, so I’m truly grateful for that."
Chloe stared at the boy for a few seconds before a warm smile spread across her face.
"You are welcome. I also didn’t get to properly thank you for saving my life in the Gate when the Aberrant attacked. If it hadn’t been for you transforming into a werewolf, I wouldn’t be here today."
She thought for a few moments before adding,
"... I couldn’t stand back and watch the one who saved me get used as an experiment by the government just because he is a werewolf. No matter how helpful you are while you’re alive, you would still be seen as a threat. I couldn’t allow that to happen."
Ray smiled, turning to look at Van for a few moments before turning back and walking toward the exit.
"Maybe this world hasn’t completely lost its humanity," he mumbled before opening the door and exiting the room.
***
The combat class had just concluded, and the Aspirants all rushed out, leaving Captain Jake alone in the quiet hall.
With a tired sigh, he glanced at his watch before looking up to see the last of the students walking out at a hurried pace.
’The footage should have been sent to me by now. Let me go check it o—’
His phone vibrated in his pants, interrupting his thoughts.
Pulling it out, he stared at the caller ID for a second before answering and placing it to his ear.
"Speak."
— Uh... Captain Jake, I have some bad news.
A few seconds passed with Jake remaining motionless as he listened to the man’s words, a cold, calculating look settling on his face.
A full minute passed with the caller waiting anxiously for a response, but there was none.
— Captain? Are you still there?
Another second passed in awkward silence before Jake finally sighed.
"I see. The footage is non-existent, huh? Aight."
Without pause, he ended the call and glanced at the door with a deeply conflicted look on his face.
"So, I was right. The assassins are truly in this Corps, eh?" he mumbled, a dark, predatory glint flashing across his eyes.
"... Ninety-nine days for the thief, one day for the owner. You can run, but you definitely can’t hide."
With that ominous thought, he exited the room, leaving the silence of the hall behind him.