I'm not sure what I was expecting, but the hallway was pretty unremarkable. Pictures of the Ramos family hung on the wall and a long red carpet lead from the doorway to the end of the hallway. There was one door at the far end but besides that nothing out of the ordinary. I still couldn't see through any of the walls, but close inspection lead me to believe that there used to be doors along the sides that were now sealed off.

"Are you pleased, Primera?" Delilah said as she walked up behind me. She was still holding her sleeping son in her arms. Despite trying to keep a tone of authority, I could tell she was just as curious as I was about what was on the second floor of her house.

"Not yet, I did not come here for the hallway." I replied and walked straight towards the door. I reached out to turn the doorknob and felt a painful jolt of energy.
"What the hell?" I cursed and stumbled back, my hand somewhat numb.

"Watch your language, por favor." Delilah said, covering Miguel's ears. I did not see the need, as he was asleep, but then again human customs seemed to often escape me.

"I do believe you have just discovered static electricity, congratulations Primera." she said with a slight, very unprofessional, grin and turned the doorknob without any problems. Well, it was locked but she was able to change that fairly quickly. Maybe some criminals had uses after all.

"That was not static electricity, Ramos." I replied and glared at the door. I went to open it again and I felt the same shock, this time strong enough to actually numb my hand. Numbness for me was a different sensation than for humans. It wasn't that I couldn't feel my hand, it was that my hand stopped working.

"I guess it's just not meant to be." Delilah commented and turned to leave with her child. I glanced at her with an annoyed look that I gave most humans. After what I had just been through at the hospital, I was not going to let this door stop me.

"Oh, look, it's open." I said as I grabbed the door and forced it open. The surge of energy that went through my arm that time was stronger than expected. My breathing quickened and my systems momentarily malfunctioned, but I was able to tough it out and overcome the pain. The door was tougher to push open than expected, but Delilah and myself were able to walk in.

The room was very wide and opened, though it was not very organized. It was a combination of a study and a laboratory and had papers, technological devices, and random objects thrown about throughout it. Delilah hit the light switch and the whole room was revealed. I was still unimpressed so far, for a moment anyway.

I quickly saw that several thick wires ran from the door to an orb on a nearby desk. It hummed with energy and seemed to be powering the door with some sort of electricity. I now realized what had been shocking me when I grabbed the doorknob.

"That is so strange." Delilah commented,
"Have you ever seen anything like that?"

"No." I stated plainly and walked over to observe the orb. I was lying, but I could not tell Delilah or anyone who had my command key what this was. I touched it softly and immediately felt a surge of energy react to my fingertips. I have seen this orb before, once. It was a much smaller version and nearly indestructible, able to change shape and regrow itself when needed. It lay hidden in my chest and I had only seen it after an early mission of mine resulted in a grenade being thrown in my direction. The orb on the table was a larger, more primitive version of my heart. What was it doing here and why did I have such negative reactions towards it, I could not say.

I began unplugging it from the door, fighting against the negative feedback that shocked me when I touched it. Delilah walked around the room and examined the papers and objects.

"These were written by my father," she concluded,
"He sent me to good schools growing up, but I'm not quite sure what to make of these. Perhaps you should take a look."

I nodded in agreement and walked over to take a look. Even with a techno-bionic brain like mine, these papers were challenging to read. Ricardo Ramos was quite a brilliant man.

"These were his notes and projects for the last few years before his death." I began telling Delilah,
"Apparently, he was scared of dying and losing his family so he wanted to work on something that could preserve his life. He switched his focus from energy to nano technology and created a hybrid version of the two fields. He wanted to create something that could sustain itself, thus prolong his life whenever he needed. From these notes, I feel it became an obsession for him." I felt Delilah become tense, so I did not mention that I could also tell that her father was losing his mind as the notes progressed.

"He created a prototype of an energy source, I believe it was that orb near the door." I began again,
"Then he moved on to create a test subject. He felt if he could create small samples, an arm, heart, or a brain, then he could use them to repair his body as it became damaged. Shall I continue?" I asked Delilah.

"Yes, do not worry I am not a little girl anymore." She replied and nodded firmly.

"He has many diagrams and notes on his failed attempts, each one a different design. Eventually, he found the right combination of elements and nanobots to create what he needed. He created a hand that was able to operate on it's own, and he knew he'd need to create a brain in order to control it." After reading ahead to the next paragraph, I stopped and picked up a device laying nearby on the table. It had roughly the shape of a magnifying glass, thought the piece was solid and there was a screen in the middle.

"This device apparently could track his creations in case he ever lost some nanobots. He worked on making several more organs and limbs and got them all working independently, though he was unsure how to use them together and control them once attached to a human brain. He created a brain of his own to control the other parts, and these notes say indicate brain was successful. They point to the creation of a test subject to see if the brain could control an entire system. He labeled it the Evolutionary Vitality program..." I paused and finally realized what I was reading.

"Was my father successful?"Delilah asked. She, along with the vast majority of my previous employers, only knew me as Eve Primera. It is the name I gave myself not long after my awakening when I was alone on the streets. They did not know or care to check that I had the label EV-01 on my wrist. 

"I believe he was." I stated and began to walk around the room and examine everything even more closely. I realized that without the orb that was powering the door, I was now able to see through the walls in the room. The orb must have been connected to the wiring in the wall as well, and the energy from it disrupted my abilities. This troubled me, as perhaps this was why Evelyn was able to fool me so easily. She had the same heart that I did. 

I made my way towards the back of the room, where other rooms should have been, and saw even more proof of Ricardo's projects. One thing in particular caught my eye, and I walked straight to it, almost as if in a trance. I placed my hand against a large, metallic cylinder with a small window on the front, nearly at eye level. My eyes blinked rapidly and I began remembering when I first awoke, seven years ago, from a device just like this one. I almost remembered living inside it in my early development, but the memories were not quite clear. Everything about that time period was hard for me to recover, as my brain was still being put together then, but I did know one thing. This was not the same object that contained me while I was being created, I destroyed mine after I awoke. I was alone in an abandoned lab, unsure of what was happening, but someone was already giving me orders with my command key. Apparently my creator had already sold it off to a Russian mafia crime lord at that point and I began my seemingly never ending mission to get my key back. Of course, now I had a new mission at the moment and a plethora of questions to answer. My first one was that if this was not the device that helped create me, then what did it create?