Henric screamed out while Rick and David got into position. David had Colter's last grenade, and Rick was ready to fire.

"If you're thinking about anything stupid, don't." a voice called out, using some sort of loudspeaker. "We have you surrounded. In fact, we had an entire crew waiting for you in the museum below. Nobody expected you to take a nap on the stairs," the man laughed. "But here we are."

David and Rick whispered to each other, trying to come up with a plan. Henric tried to wake the clone up, but he was gone. His bracelet started beeping and Henric lifted his wrist. The screen read, COD: Respiratory Failure.

"If they killed Colter I know they don't give a shit about me!" said David in a hushed whisper. "I might as well shoot myself now."

"If you think you can make it all the way down, you can't. We'd drop a bunch of grenades down and you'd be dead before you reached the bottom."

Rick and David looked down the endless flight of steps and came to silent agreement. They slowly began to walk up the steps but Henric wouldn't move.

"Come on." Rick demanded. "He's dead and there's hundreds like him."

Henric reluctantly stood up and walked behind Rick, who slipped the gun in his pants. Rick glanced back to make sure he was still following.

"Raise your hands. I'm pretty sure they want us alive."

They made their way to the top and David quickly dashed behind both of them.

"Let's just see how they respond first, okay?"

Rick muttered something under his breath but moved in front of the doorway.

"You can't be serious. I'm so sick of clones."

In front of them were two clones and three soldiers. The soldiers had on very dark red gear, unlike Colter's blue gear. One clone had the same gear as the soldiers and the other wore a suit. He was the only one not holding a gun.

"You are slightly mistaken. I am the original." The man showed his wrist and the clone showed his, revealing which one had a bracelet. "My name is Melvin. We aren't here to kill you two, we work for Lavaunzier, not Bickerstaff." Melvin made a gesture to his crew and they lowered their weapons. "Your friend is a coward by the way. Hello? You hiding behind the kids? We see you."

David quietly stepped forward. "Bickerstaff threatened to kill me, and seeing how you shot Colter's head off, I was sure I'd be next."

"We aren't here for you. You shouldn't be here at all. Lavaunzier can handle it's own problems, we didn't need Bickerstaff butting in."

"Yeah sure. Tell that to your half baked mini me's running half naked around here."

Melvin's smile disappeared. "You're trying to get killed, aren't you?

"Why are you tracking us? What do you want us for?" Rick demanded.

"We're just here to take you to your dad. That's all. If you want to know how all of this happened we can tell you on the way."

"Well what are we waiting for?" said Henric "Let's go." Rick, Henric and David walked alongside Melvin while his crew trailed from behind.

"Shouldn't they be in front, in case something attacks us?" asked David.

"Nonsense." Melvin replied. "The only things out on these two floors are the Bickerstaff cleanup crew and the clones. And that's because the clones are the only creatures smart enough to escape. Fortunately for us, the clones running amok have all but expired. They don't keep the good ones here."

"Where do the good clones go?" Henric asked him.

"Military bases, other labs, some in the Belway network and some not, space... everywhere. I'm glad these are dead though. I get sick of seeing my own face every now and then."

They passed by their dad's office and saw that the door was fixed. The hallway wasn't littered with blood, bodies and bullets, it was completely clean. No damage, no destruction.

"Why is everything back to normal? This area looked like trash when we left it." said Rick.

"It was the clean up ghost, clearly. I'm calling it that because I don't know what else to and the scientists gave it a long ass number instead of a name. I don't know how, no, nobody knows how or why he does what he does. Everyone that tried to experiment on him disappeared."

"Did you see the kid just like him?" asked David. "That thing almost killed us before we could make it down the steps."

"Oh, I have seen it." Melvin confirmed. "Tacarria makes the creepiest crap imaginable."

They made it back to the elevator without encountering anyone, or anything else. Besides the people around him, it felt just like it did when Henric entered some time ago.

"I need two of you to stay up here and dismiss any more Bickerstaff agents that come by. We're trying to keep this discreet."

Two soldiers walked away as Melvin pressed the down button. They entered and Melvin repeatedly pressed the down button, revealing the scanner Henric had seen before. Once he put his card against the touch screen display changed. The map disappeared and a list of areas popped up on the screen. Melvin kept swiping until he got to the bottom of the list and clicked on Mermaid Aquarium.

"Those can't all be real places." said Henric. "The museum only had four exhibits."

"That's because those exhibits are the four last levels of this lab. The scientists that oversee those floors are grouped together, and the museums are made to show investors progress. Well that, and to inflate their egos." Melvin replied. "There are twenty floors here, and most only know about three. It's much easier to make five stops instead of twenty, especially with an elevator this damn slow."

"But what was my... our dad doing this whole time? I've been through both of his offices and the lab, and I haven't seen a sign of him anywhere. Why didn't he come for us?"

"Henric stared Melvin down, his eyes demanding an answer.

"I'll explain when you meet him, but you have to do exactly as I say after that."

"And if we don't?" Rick replied, scowling. Melvin looked at him coldly.

"Then you'll die like everything else here."