Gabriel drove the SUV through the night with no concern for speed limits or other vehicles. With Edward sitting in the passenger's seat, he felt confident that they had a mental block on all traffic cops and other motorists. Glancing in the rearview mirror, his eyes met Alena's, sending messages of love and encouragement to him without ever saying a word.
Even with the disappointment of not changing to his kind, she was still the positive motivation that encouraged him to keep progressing through this life. The phone call that had sparked this impromptu road trip had informed the group that two children had been found in an abandoned lab somewhere in the bowels of the children's hospital. Not the first time, Gabriel pondered on how the sight of these beings would affect his mate. With the strain on her emotions, he considered directing her to an office so she could avoid seeing the product of the experiment.
When Phillip had reported the findings at the hospital, he had mentioned finding evidence of failed experiments in various stages. Although a warrior by nature, Gabriel internally shudder at the thought of seeing his brothers' offspring deceased and preserved in jars. Looking at his side window, he sighed in relief to know that none of these creatures were products of his seed.
"Edward," he asked the man next to him, "you asked if one of the vials had your name on it and didn't seem shocked when Phillip answered with an affirmative. How would anyone have your DNA?"
"From a changeling that I sired," he answered quietly.
"Isn't Iona the only changeling sired by you?"
"Yes."
"But how....?" Gabriel started and then paused at the expression on Edward's face.
Alena had observed the conversation and sympathized with the difficulties Gabe would be tackling in his investigation. She had hoped to hear Edward's explanation of how someone had obtained his DNA but after a meaningful look passed between the men, no other words were said. Realizing that the men were now having a telepathic conversation, Alena started talking to her sister hoping to distract her from the awkward silence in the car.
"Iona," she offered, "I've never had a very strong stomach for, uh, medical things. If there are dead babies preserved in jars, I'll freak out. So I was thinking that maybe I'd visit my old office and collect some work. Would you like to go with me?"
When Iona turned her face from the window, Alena saw the tears running down her cheeks. With a silent nod of agreement, Iona returned her gaze to the side staring into the dark. Feeling pity for the girl, Alena reached for her hand and gave it a gentle squeeze never letting go. Looking back to the front, she caught Gabriel's eyes glancing back at her. New stress lines were forming around his eyes and his jaw was clenched tight. With a quick wink to her, he turned his attention back to the road but nodded as if agreeing with a comment.
Arriving at the hospital entrance, Gabriel drove into a parking garage reserved for the executive staff. He turned off the ignition and sat quietly at the wheel, no one making the first move to leave the car. Finally after a few moments, he looked at Edward again with a question in his eyes.
"I have to see them," Edward responded.
"I will have guards meet us in the executive suite. They can watch over the girls while you and I go to the lab."
With a nod in agreement, Edward opened the car door and exited the car. When the others were standing with him, he looked at Gabriel and motioned for him to lead the way. They walked together toward the elevator never breaking their silence. Within a minute they were entering the dark, vacant offices used by the executive staff during the day. Gabriel quietly spoke to a man waiting at the entrance and unlocked the door to the CEO's office.
"Baby, you and your sister should wait here for us. Maybe you could log onto the system and see if you can find anything that might help us."
"I can access the electronic medical records and, if they were used to document the procedure, I could print the reports. Unfortunately, there's no way I can understand the terminology."
"Print everything you can find. We'll find someone to explain the clinical issues to us later," he replied hesitating at the door apparently dreading his next move. "Ok," he finally said, "let's go and see what we have."
Walking with Edward from the offices, they met a man standing in the hall. After initial introductions, they followed the man to a service elevator that carried them up three floors and then to the hidden stairwell leading them down one level to the mysterious lab. They met Phillip at the entrance of the chamber.
Entering the lab, Gabriel and Edward turned their faces away unprepared for the combination smell of formaldehyde and death. With a determination to resolve the matter as quickly as possible, they followed Phillip past the empty tables and sinks to a door located in the rear of the room. Another vampire guarded the door opening it at their approach.
The room was a scene from a horror movie. Shelves containing a various sizes of jars lined the walls. If Gabriel had to guess, he estimated more than one hundred jars displayed the failed attempts to reproduce the members of the Third Creation. Looking closely at one jar, Gabriel felt his constitution waver as he realized that he was staring at the dead eyes of a brother.
Edward inhaled deeply and looked at the walls painted institutional green decades ago. The depressing color along with the smell of death was accompanied by a beeping sound coming from an area hidden behind a curtain. With a look at Gabriel, he nodded toward the curtain and finally exhaled his long held breath.
"Sir," Phillip said to Edward, "I feel that I should prepare you for this but I don't know how to describe it."
"Let's just get it over with," Edward said walking to the curtain.
With a quick snap of his wrist, the curtain slid across the track revealing a large area filled with a variety of medical equipment. Monitors, IV bags, tubes and incubators dominated the space but Edward's eyes locked on the small bodies inside the neonatal beds.
"Gabriel," he called with a voice raw from emotion, "They're babies!"
Stepping between the two incubators, Gabriel gazed at the bodies, naked except for the bandages covering their eyes, trapped inside the plastic cells. They were small and thin with no signs of muscular development. With a double take, Gabriel leaned over one and frowned in thought.
"This one is a girl," he said in awe. "I guess I assumed our DNA would only produce males."
"I thought they would be young adults," Edward returned. "We were never babies."
Stepping forward, Phillip stood beside Gabriel and began reciting their findings.
