Rain again.
Always rain.
It fell quietly that morning, soft and relentless, like the world itself refused to stop mourning.
The funeral was small — no crowd, no press, no neighbors with gossip. Just silence, mud, and the sharp scent of wilted lilies.
Evans stood near the back, black suit clinging to his shoulders, his shoes half-sunk in wet earth.
Before him, the casket gleamed with the dull reflection of storm clouds.
Alaric Ward — Beloved Son.
The date beneath was fresh, too new to look real.
Next to the grave, Mrs. Ward knelt, her trembling hands holding a framed photo — the one she'd kept in the living room since Alaric was little. In the picture, he was smiling wide, missing a tooth, sunlight in his hair.
She was crying quietly now. Not loud, not dramatic — just small, broken sounds that barely made it past her throat.
Evans wanted to walk up to her. To say something. Anything. But every word he rehearsed in his head died before reaching his mouth.
Because what could he possibly say?
That her son wasn't really dead?
That he was sitting in some government cell because he'd discovered something he wasn't supposed to?
He couldn't.
He'd promised Alaric.
So instead, he stood there, gripping the folded umbrella in his hand like it could anchor him to the ground.
The pastor spoke softly, voice almost drowned out by rain.
When he said, "May he rest beside his father," Evans looked up sharply.
There it was — the second headstone, older, faded, but still legible:
Isaac Ward.
Died in a car crash, eight years ago.
Evans had heard about it once — whispered stories in the neighborhood.
Alaric never talked about it much. Just once, when they were younger, he'd said:
"He was driving home from work. Brake failure. They said it was quick."
Now, both of them were gone the same way.
At least that's what Mrs. Ward believed.
Evans's stomach turned. The lie felt heavier now, buried right beside the truth.
He wondered if it was worse to bury a body or bury the truth.
When the crowd dispersed — mostly relatives Evans had never met — Mrs. Ward stayed behind.
Evans lingered too, unsure why. Maybe he wanted to protect her from the silence that would follow.
She was staring at the two graves side by side, her fingers brushing the damp marble.
When she finally spoke, her voice was distant, fragile.
"Isaac was a good man," she said softly. "And Alaric… he was just like him. Too curious. Too kind."
Evans bit his lip. He didn't trust his own voice anymore.
She turned slightly toward him. "He always spoke about you, you know. Said you were the smart one. The brave one."
He looked down. "He… he gave me too much credit."
Mrs. Ward smiled faintly, though her eyes were red. "He believed in you, Evans. Maybe that's why I do too."
Then her expression faltered. "You're sure—? About the accident?"
Evans's throat went dry. He forced a nod. "Yeah. The car flipped off the highway. There wasn't— there wasn't much left."
Her lips quivered. "Just like his father…"
He wanted to scream.
To tell her the truth.
To tell her her son wasn't gone, that he was locked up because of something neither of them understood.
But then he remembered Alaric's words. That faint smile. That quiet acceptance.
"Tell my mom I died in a car accident."
And so he said nothing.
Because breaking a promise wouldn't bring either of them peace.
That night, Evans couldn't sleep.
The house was too quiet, the air too heavy. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw Alaric — the flash of gold, the blinding surge, the look of calm surrender before the cops closed in.
He turned on his desk lamp, its faint hum filling the silence.
The Subject 17 file photo lay on his desk, next to stacks of half-decoded notes.
He'd been studying it for days, line by line, even through tears, even through exhaustion.
But no matter how hard he looked, one part kept haunting him — a red-stamped code at the bottom:
"Aurion Containment Directive 7A — Subject Viability: Terminated."
Terminated.
That word didn't mean dead. Not in corporate language.
It meant hidden.
It meant erased.
Evans leaned back, running his hands through his hair.
He whispered to himself, "They didn't kill you, did they, Alaric? They just… hid what you are."
He opened his laptop again, scrolling through the fragments of Aurion's research.
Every file was the same — redacted names, missing pages, coded identifiers.
But one name appeared again and again: Project Voltaic Core.
And each time, it was linked with the initials — I.W.
Isaac Ward.
Alaric's father.
Evans froze. His eyes widened as he traced the connections.
If Isaac had worked at Aurion — if he'd been part of the same program that created Alaric — then maybe the crash wasn't an accident at all.
He grabbed his notebook, scribbling equations, drawing connections between the neural patterns in the file and the old patent entries from Aurion's archives.
Electric field modulation. Neural signal amplification. Human-voltaic transfer.
"God," he muttered, trembling. "They didn't just experiment on Alaric… They continued his father's work."
His chest tightened. He could feel the pieces clicking together like gears in a clock.
And it terrified him.
By dawn, the room was a disaster — papers scattered, screens glowing with half-finished theories.
Evans sat slumped over his desk, drained.
He stared at the printed Subject 17 photo. The edges were smudged now, the ink slightly warped from rain and tears.
He picked it up slowly.
He could turn it in. Hand it to the police.
Let someone else handle it.
But deep down, he knew what would happen.
Aurion would make it disappear.
They'd rewrite the report, delete the evidence, and erase Alaric again.
He couldn't let that happen.
He stood up, walking to his closet. From the top shelf, he pulled out a small wooden box — his father's old lockbox, the one he'd kept after the funeral years ago.
He placed the file inside, sealed it, and hid the box under the floorboard beneath his bed.
He whispered into the quiet,
"No one's seeing this. Not yet. Not until I know everything."
He sat down on the edge of his bed, staring at the floor.
His hands were shaking again, but there was something else this time — not fear.
Resolve.
He reached for the photo of him and Alaric from last summer — the one where they were laughing over burnt marshmallows in the backyard.
He stared at it for a long time.
"I'll fix this," he said softly. "I swear, I'll bring you back. Not as a secret. Not as Subject 17. As Alaric Ward."
Outside, thunder rolled again, low and distant.
The storm hadn't passed.
But this time, Evans didn't look away.