Chapter 65 Enhanced Immunity

Chapter 65 Enhanced Immunity
Blake Rivers - POV
Five minutes to save everyone and I had no plan.
I watched Dr. Vance walk away, his shoes clicking on concrete like a countdown timer. The soldiers stayed. Forty weapons trained on us. Forty fingers on triggers.
Emma stood frozen beside her grandmother, shock written across every line of her body. Cole positioned himself between her and the nearest threats, ready to die protecting her.
Someone had to buy time. Negotiate. Manipulate.
That was always my job.
I stepped forward with my hands visible. Reading the soldiers the way my family had trained me since childhood. Micro-expressions revealing truth beneath lies. Body language exposing hidden wants.
"We should talk." I pitched my voice reasonable. Conversational. Like we weren't seconds from execution.
One soldier shifted position. The lead contractor judging by placement. Late thirties. Military posture. Scar bisecting his left eyebrow. He'd been watching me since we entered.
"Nothing to talk about." His voice came out flat. Professional. "Orders are clear."
"Orders are never clear." I took another step. "Always room for interpretation."
"Not today."
I studied his face. Looking for cracks everyone had. The fears and doubts and secret wants they'd never voice. My ability usually lit them up like neon.
Except I wasn't seeing anything.
His micro-expressions were smooth. Controlled. Almost mechanical in their perfection.
Too perfect.
"You're enhanced," I said. Not a question.
His jaw tightened. There. Finally. A crack.
"Don't know what you mean."
"You're reading me the same way I'm reading you." I watched his pupils dilate slightly. Stress response. "Except you're trained to hide it. Military psyops probably. Enhanced empathy or low-level telepathy. Something that makes you immune to people like me."
"Stay where you are." His weapon came up fractionally.
I stopped but kept talking. "How long have you been enhanced?"
"Doesn't matter."
"It does." I watched the pulse in his neck accelerate. "Because enhanced individuals are drawn to Emma. You feel it. The pull. The need to protect her instead of threaten her. It's not comfortable."
His finger moved closer to the trigger. "Shut up."
"You've been fighting it since we walked in." I pressed harder, watching his breathing pattern shift. "The instinct screaming at you that following these orders is wrong. It's getting stronger. Louder."
"I said shut up."
But I'd found the crack. Now I just had to widen it before time ran out.
"Project Ascension activated you." I gentled my voice. Made it understanding. "Probably years ago. Told you it was enhancement. Made you better at your job. Except they didn't mention the side effects. The way enhanced individuals bond whether they want to or not."
"You don't know anything." His voice stayed level but sweat beaded despite the underground cold.
"I know you're feeling what Emma triggered." Through the bond I felt her attention sharpen. She understood what I was doing. "The awakening. It's amplifying already enhanced individuals too. Creating connections. And you're fighting it because vulnerability feels like weakness."
Several soldiers shifted. Uncomfortable. I'd touched something real.
"How many of you are enhanced?" I addressed them all. "Project Ascension doesn't hire normal contractors for supernatural operations. They need people who can handle enhanced threats. So they use enhanced soldiers. Promise you purpose. Safety. Belonging."
"They promised paychecks," the lead soldier said. "That's all."
"Never just paychecks." Another step. He didn't stop me. "They promised you wouldn't be alone anymore. Wouldn't be freaks. That your abilities would mean something."
His jaw worked. Silent.
"But now you feel her pull." I gestured at Emma without breaking eye contact. "The bridge opening. The bond forming. And you're realizing they lied about what you are. What you could be."
"Blake." Emma's voice soft behind me. Warning maybe. Or encouragement.
I ignored her. Stayed focused on the soldier. "What's your name?"
Silence stretched. Then, "Mitchell. Captain James Mitchell."
"Captain Mitchell." I used his name deliberately. Making him human instead of obstacle. "How long with Project Ascension?"
"Eight years."
"How many operations?"
"Dozens."
"How many people captured? Experimented on?" I paused. "Killed?"
His expression finally cracked. Guilt bleeding through. "I followed orders."
"Everyone follows orders." I kept my voice gentle. "Until they realize the orders are wrong. That the people giving them don't see us as human."
"You don't understand." Mitchell's voice roughened. "Project Ascension is bigger than you think. Connected. They have resources, political backing, funding from..."
He stopped himself.
"Funding from who?" I leaned forward slightly.
"Classified."
"You mean you don't know." I read the hesitation correctly. "They compartmentalize. Keep you in the dark. Give you mission parameters but never the full picture."
Mitchell's face went carefully blank but his team was listening now.
"Emma triggered something unprecedented," I continued. "Thousands of enhanced individuals activating globally. All drawn here. You think Project Ascension can contain that? Control thousands of confused, scared, newly awakened people?"
"That's why we're here." His voice lacked conviction. "To maintain order."
"You're here to follow orders you don't understand from people who see you as disposable assets." I let that settle. "But you're enhanced. Part of the awakening whether you chose it. And Emma's pull is telling you something orders can't override."
"What's it telling me?" Challenge in the words.
"That she's not the enemy." Simple. True. "That Project Ascension lied about what conduits are. What we could be. That everything you've been told serves someone else's agenda."
Mitchell lowered his weapon an inch. "Even if that's true, I have orders. My team has orders. We don't follow through, we're marked for elimination."
There. The real fear.
"You think they let enhanced soldiers retire?" I asked quietly. "That they let people with your knowledge just walk away alive?"
His silence answered.
"You're already compromised." I pushed the advantage. "The moment you felt Emma's pull. Project Ascension knows enhanced individuals are drawn to conduits. They count on it. Use it for control."
"What's your point?" Mitchell's voice went hard.
"You have a choice." I looked at his team. At the other soldiers. "All of you. Follow orders that end with you dying or controlled forever. Or help us. Protect Emma. Survive what's coming."
"You're asking us to commit treason."
"I'm asking you to choose being human over being weapons." I met his eyes. "Emma represents choice. Freedom. Project Ascension represents the opposite."
"Pretty speech." Dr. Vance's voice cut across the chamber. He'd returned. Standing at the entrance with that cold smile. "But Captain Mitchell knows the cost of betrayal."
Mitchell went pale.
"Your family, Captain." Dr. Vance's smile widened. "Wife. Two daughters. Seven and nine years old. That nice house in Virginia. Protected by our resources. For now."
The threat hung explicit and ugly.
"You threaten children?" Emma's voice carried fury across the space.
"I ensure loyalty." No shame in Vance's tone. "Captain Mitchell understands. His family's safety depends on cooperation. As do all contractor families. Standard arrangement."
I watched Mitchell's micro-expressions shift. Conflict between duty to family and growing horror at what he served.
"There's always another way," I said quietly. "Project Ascension isn't invincible. They need secrecy. Compartmentalization. Break that and their power structure collapses."
"How?" Mitchell asked.
"Information." I kept my voice low. "Who funds them? Who gives orders? Who sits at the top? That information in the right hands destroys them. Protects your family better than cooperation."
Dr. Vance's smile faltered briefly.
"You don't have that information," he said.
"But Captain Mitchell might." I watched the soldier's face. "Eight years running operations. You've seen things. Heard things. Pieced together patterns. You know more than they think."
Mitchell's jaw worked. Internal war visible.
"Even if I knew something," he said slowly. "Even if I could tell you who funds this. What could you do with it?"
"Enhanced individuals are waking worldwide." I gestured at Emma. "Thousands drawn here. They'll want answers. Justice. They'll want to burn down the system that would have hunted them."
"You're talking about war." Something like awe in Mitchell's voice.
"I'm talking about ending one." I corrected. "Project Ascension's been waging war on enhanced people for decades. Emma's awakening changes the battlefield. Gives us numbers. Power."
"Us?" Dr. Vance laughed. "You assume Captain Mitchell would betray his oath. Risk his family. Join your revolution."
"I assume he's smart enough to see truth." I focused on Mitchell. "You feel the pull. You feel the rightness of protecting her. That's not weakness. That's your enhanced instinct recognizing what she represents. What you could be."
Mitchell's weapon lowered another inch.
"If I helped," he said carefully. "If I provided information about funding sources. Real sources. What would you do?"
"Expose them." Emma stepped forward. Cole moved with her but she waved him back. "Dismantle the operation. Free everyone they're holding. Protect enhanced people from being hunted."
"Ambitious." Dark humor in Mitchell's voice.
"Necessary." Emma's voice went soft. Compelling. "You have daughters. You want them growing up in a world where Project Ascension can experiment on people? Kill them for not cooperating?"
Mitchell's face worked. "No."
"Then help us." Emma moved closer. "Not because I'm ordering you. Because it's right. Because your daughters deserve better."
The chamber went silent.
Mitchell looked at Vance. At Emma. At his team.
"Project Ascension has multiple funding sources," he said slowly. "Government black budgets. Private donors. Shell corporations. But there's one primary benefactor. Someone backing this for decades. Since before it officially existed."
"Who?" I asked.
Mitchell met my eyes. "I'll tell you. One condition. You get my team out alive. Protect our families. Give me your word you'll destroy Project Ascension completely."
"Deal." Emma said it instantly.
"The primary source." Mitchell took a breath. "The person really running this from the shadows. Who built the infrastructure. Who has unlimited resources and protection."
"Don't say that name, Captain." Vance's voice went deadly.
But Mitchell had chosen.
"University Chancellor Margaret Blackwood," he said. "The founder's direct descendant. Running Project Ascension from inside university administration for forty years."
Everything exploded.