The unlocked door creaks into a somber void.

Am I in the wrong place? Jason muses as he stands in the doorway, glancing back at the staircase. But I've already reached the bottom of the stairs.

"Hello," he says, peering as he takes a step inside. "Is anyone there?"

The lights flash on, temporarily blinding Jason. His eyes slowly get accustomed to the now well-lit chamber.

This is definitely not the right place. His gaze falls on the polished door. It can't be this room.

Jason steps back and pulls the door close. Midway, he stops when he sees someone arise from underneath a large, messy desk.

I can ask where Room 15 is, he thinks as he tries to see the man's face.

"Um, excuse me," Jason says. "Sir, can you please-" He suddenly inclines on the door, finding himself on the hazy edge of consciousness.

Through his cloudy vision, Jason watches the man turn to face him, "Can you please-" He drops to the ground.

The man sighs and walks briskly to an unconscious Jason, lime green streaks swirling around his pupils.

...

"Eliza?" Anthony calls, standing at the foot of the staircase. He peers at the dark end of the staircase above, trying to identify the silhouette that treads toward him.

The lights across the hallway reveal a weary Jason as he slowly descends to the bottom of the staircase.

Where is she? Anthony glances over Jason's shoulder. She is not here. Blind with impatience and rage, he stops Jason who treads with his sagging head.

The newcomer lifts his head and squints his bloodshot eyes, trying to recognize the familiar face that stopped him.

"Where's Eliza?" Anthony asks, fumed.

"Dr. Banks?" Jason whispers, his eyes lit up in astonishment.

The physician pauses, stepping closer, "How do you know me?"

"Dr. Banks!" Jason gasps, stifling his tears of relief. "It's been almost fifteen years since-" He skids to the bench beside him.

"Jason?!" Anthony hastens to the semi-conscious man who props himself on the bench. "What's happening?"

"You remember me," the newcomer mumbles, trying to cast a smile. He begins to weep, "Please help me, Dr. Banks."

"Jason?" Anthony scans Jason's body, his gaze falling on his wristband.

Anthony taps his own wristband as he makes Jason lie flat on the wide bench. The screen materializes before him as he places the unconscious newcomer's feet on the armrest.

His eyes widen when he sees Jason's rising heartbeat rate and decrementing blood pressure. He's in shock. Anthony glances at the varsity diver's pale, clammy face.

"El-el-el.." Jason stammers as he tries to get up.

"No, you need to lie down." Anthony pushes him back down.

I need my bag. The physician looks around. Why is there no medical kit here?

"Tony?"

He turns back to see his subordinate approaching him. "Mark!" He stops Jason from getting up again. "Bring me a kit now!"

Mark rushes away in a split second.

"Elizabeth Banks!" Jason gasps.

"What about her?" Anthony asks, alarmed. He leans in to hear the now semi-conscious man, when he goes back to muttering.

"She has to meet her."

"Tony!" Mark sprints toward him, carrying a black duffel bag.

Anthony grabs the bag, dumps it down on the floor and unzips it. Meanwhile, his subordinate leans against the wall, trying to regain control of his breathing.

"Mark, sanitize the patient's right arm," Anthony says, pulling out a syringe from the packet. He draws in a colorless fluid from a small vial.

Mark nods and pulls the black bag toward him. He finds and takes out a pack of antiseptic wipes.

Anthony injects the liquid into Jason's arm and checks the screen displaying Jason's vitals. He's back. He sighs with relief as the blood pressure returns to its normal range.

"Tony?" Mark says, startled. "I can't see him anymore."

Anthony casts a staggered look at his subordinate and then glances at the newcomer, who's now relaxed on the bench.

"But I can see-" he pauses, his gaze fixated on Jason. Does he-

"Did you make him invisible?" Mark asks, extending his arm and wavering it over Jason.

"No." Anthony taps his wristband. A new screen displays a line chart depicting a series of spikes in the last minute.

"He's invisible right now," Mark says, looking at the number of spikes increase.

Anthony rummages through the contents of the bag and takes out another vial containing a sea blue liquid, "He'll be back in a minute."

"Okay," Mark says, getting up. He organises his pool of questions, "Tony, who is he?"

"His name's Jason Smith," Anthony answers in a calm tone, fishing out a syringe. "Eliza found him at the door."

"Jason Smith?" Mark says, stepping back as the rings of familiarity play in his mind. "Wait, the first boy you treated?"

Anthony turns back, forehead creased, "What?"

"The Hathaway Bridge Collapse in '03," Mark says, trying to remind his chief. "The boy with the rod in his abdomen."

"Oh," Anthony realises, looking at Jason. So that's how he knew me.

"How did we not know of him?" Mark says, trying to picture Jason on the bench.

"I don't know," Anthony responds, injecting Jason with the blue liquid. "Now, can you see him?"

"Yes," Mark replies, not astonished by Jason's reappearance. "How did he come here?"

"I'll explain it later," Anthony gets up. "Right now, he needs testing."

Mark nods and takes out a device from the bag.

Anthony leans in to hear a mumbling Jason.

"Elizabeth Banks- I need to show Elizabeth Banks something."

Anthony's brows furrow. Why is he blabbering her name so much?

Mark taps some commands on the screen that materializes from his wristband. The device, laid on the floor, expands into a four-foot-tall robot and chimes as it starts up. The next moment, it extends its arms which transform into a stretcher.

"It's ready," Mark apprises to his chief.

Anthony makes space for the robot, who lifts Jason up.

"Which room?" his subordinate asks, tapping his wristband.

"Um, Room 15," he replies, watching the robot secure the newcomer with belts that emerge from the stretcher.

Mark nods and taps the commands. The robot proceeds across the hall, carrying Jason.

"How's the other patient?" Anthony asks as he takes out a small device from the bag.

"She's fine," Mark replies. "Did you find Eliza?"

"Not yet," he answers. He turns on the device, which soon sucks the used syringes and wipes. If Jason's like this, then-

Mark extends his arm to take the device, "Don't worry about her. She'll know what to do."

"Gently," Anthony tells the robot as it lays Jason on the bed. Mark sets up the devices and drugs for testing.

"Should I perform a Level 4 test?" Mark suggests as his chief examines the unconscious patient.

"Do a Level 5," Anthony replies, noticing Jason's glowing fingertips. "I want to check everything."

"Okay," Mark says, grabbing a box from the cabinet beside him.

"This," Anthony shows Jason's fingernails. "is a sign of memory altercation, right?"

Mark places the box on the floor and looks at Jason's hands, "Yeah."

"I retrieved some of his memories an hour earlier to know how he came. But I didn't alter his memories."

"This looks like the altercation occurred less than fifteen minutes ago," Mark states, examining Jason's fingernails. "See, the bands are beginning to separate."

Anthony leans in, noticing the fuzzy green blobs beginning to structure themselves as distinct bands across each of Jason's fingernails.

"Was he with Fred before he met you?" Mark asks, looking at his chief.

"I don't know," he responds, his gaze still fixated at the young man's fingertips. "Can this be Jenny's?"

"Then then marks would be in amber," Mark says. "And she still isn't ready yet." She's busy practicing with my vegetables. He scoffs in his mind, bitterly reminiscing the latest incident of Greenhouse 5.

Anthony takes a deep breath. But Jason came from upstairs. How did Fred-

Ping!

REQUESTED MEETING IN ROOM 1.

"That's where Nathan is, right?" Mark says as he attaches Jason to a set of monitors. "Go. He must have found Eliza."

Anthony nods, "Also-"

"I'll call you when the results are out."

The physician exhales slowly, "Thanks for taking care of him."

His subordinate nods with a grin on his face, "Now go."

Anthony exits Room 15, "Okay." He taps his wristband a few times as he strides across the empty hallway. A screen pops up, displaying Fred in his room, munching on blueberries as he reads War and Peace.

The effect of retrieving his memories could have been delayed. Anthony rubs his frustrated face as the screen vanishes before him.

...

"Hello, Liz."

Eliza straightens her back. Why does he sound familiar?

"By the time you've received this message, you would have witnessed the trembling foyer."

She glances at the now lit hallway. How does he know-

"Now, this and the Lock Mode is instigated by someone who has closely monitored this house for the last five months."

Five months? Eliza rubs her forehead. How did Dad miss this?

"So, Liz, to stop the forthcoming events from occurring, you need to follow my instructions."

Who is he?

"You must have noticed the red scar before your friend pulled you out of the foyer."

How does he know about Adam? Eliza abruptly gets up.

"Follow the scar, and you will find me at its end."

I can block this. The owner of Pearl Manor walks briskly to the Control Room, taking out the orange band from her pocket.

"Also, you will know everything about the day your mother died."

She abrupts to a halt. How does he know things that nobody here knows?

"Liz, you have two minutes to find me. If you don't follow my instructions, then I'm afraid I won't be able to protect you. And mind you, the foyer and the Lock Mode are just the beginning."

The message disrupts into static.

Of what?

Beep!

"End of message. Initiating a two-minute timer," the automated voice announces.

"Wait, what?" Eliza taps her earpiece. She then taps on her left hand. "Oh... my wristband." She bits her lip, rubbing her bare wrist.

Eliza lingers for a moment, staring at the hallway leading to the Control Room.

...

"Her wristband was detected in Room 1 of the Second Floor," Nathan apprises as he swipes across several blueprints on one monitor. Several monitors surround him, a rigid Anthony beside. "From the camera footage, I found her in the Control Room."

Anthony sees his daughter on the screen, tapping something on her keyboard, "Now that she's there-"

"She isn't there," Nathan cuts in.

"But she's right there," Anthony says, pointing to the screen.

"Look closely."

The physician looks closely at the monitor displaying Eliza clacking on her keyboard vigorously. Before his annoyance reaches the best of him, Anthony notices something.

"It's her foot," Anthony says, looking at his daughter, who moves her left foot back but appears forward the next second. "So, wait." He turns to Nathan. "How is this happening?"

"I found it!"

Anthony flinches, turning back to see Alexa jump in her seat. She was here?!

"You found it?" Nathan says, walking to the chief technician, who sits in front of another set of screens.

"This here," Alexa points to the code highlighted in blue. "was the code used to hack the sensors connected to the foyer."

"Hack?" Anthony says. "Sensors?"

"You didn't tell him yet?" Alexa says, glaring at her subordinate.

"I had to double-check it," Nathan responds as he taps his wristband, the screen displaying one of the blueprints he saw earlier. "These are the sensors located beneath the foyer."

Anthony steps forward to see the highlighted devices located several feet below the foyer.

"We had installed these to detect earthquakes beforehand," the elementalist continues. "But recently, they were programmed to produce and send artificial seismic waves to the part above, which is the foyer and the hallway connected to it."

Anthony crosses his arms, "So the ground there-"

"-is trembling as we speak." Alexa completes the sentence.

Anthony looks at Alexa, then at Nathan. "We need to find Eliza." He storms to the monitors and taps on the keyboard. A series of visuals appear on the screen, all displaying a grey screen.

"Tony, the cameras are down," Alexa says.

"The last we could retrieve from the cameras was this," Nathan says, showing another screen to the distraught father.

"Blackout in the foyer," Anthony says and looks at the adjacent screens. "But nowhere else?"

Nathan nods.

"Someone's hacking our systems," The chief technician says, showing several screens. "The Lock Mode, the foyer incident, and this." She points to a bunch of code. "Eliza tried to unlock the gates, but someone from the outside blocked her right when she entered the final code."

"So she could get us out of here if that person didn't block her codes?" Nathan asks.

Alexa nods, "Also, I can't get access to our satellite."

"What?" Anthony asks.

"The hacker inserted a few undetected codes a couple of months ago," she pauses. "But to gain complete control of our systems, that hacker got access to our satellite."

"So, our wristbands are under control?" her subordinate says, rubbing the back of his neck.

"Was," Alexa says. "That was one of the few things I could control."

Ping!

The chief technician turns back to see the message, "Jessie's dead."

Anthony lets out a frustrated sigh, "Can we stop all of this?"

"No," Alexa says. "But I'm trying to stop the next planned task."

"Which is?" Nathan asks.

"Setting the greenhouses on fire," Alexa says and turns back. "There are high chances, due to the inactive Fire Control System upstairs, that Pearl Manor would be ashes by tomorrow."

Sirens blare in Anthony's mind. Eliza is still stuck there.

"Tony, I'll find a way of bringing Eliza back," Nathan says, rushing to his space.

Jason will know something. Anthony bolts out of the room.

"Tony, where are you going?" Nathan says, following.

"Stop." Alexa says, turning back to the screens.

Nathan looks back, "But he-"

"You'll be helping him here," Alexa says, tapping on her keyboard.

Nathan exhales sharply as he looks at Anthony exiting the hallway.

"Nathan?" Alexa says, sternly.

"Give me the access key to Eliza's earpiece," Nathan says, returning to his space.

He can explain what's happening. Anthony says, marching across the hallway.

Anthony swipes his card on the card lock hurriedly.

Stay calm. Anthony recalls Jason's state. He exhales slowly as the door slides open.

"What!" He says, looking at the empty room.

...

Beep!

"90 seconds." The voice chimes.

I can't block these hacks. Eliza turns back and storms into the hallway, glancing at the broken vases and the barely hanging portraits.

"This is great. Actual people are thriving out there, and someone's already hijacking my systems."

Beep!

"60 seconds."

Eliza lets out an annoyed sigh as she marches past the scattered rubble on the floor.

She enters the foyer, her gaze fixated on the shattered chandelier on the floor. How on earth did he know about Adam?

Eliza takes out her card from her coat, noticing her pale hand shake as she swipes her card on the card lock.

"Why didn't I see any of this coming?" Eliza says, forcing a deep inhalation as the door swings open. Her gaze falls on the bright red scar in the night sky.

"This should be the end." She walks toward what appears to be the scar's end. As she walks closer, she notices something drip from the scar. Is that blood?

Beep!

"30 seconds."

"It can't be," Eliza assures herself. She finds a man sitting on the lawn a few meters ahead with his face drooped down.

"You!" Eliza barks and lopes toward the man, her earpiece beeping the last ten seconds.

The man raises his right hand, which presses a button on what appears to be a joystick.

"Program Disabled. Restart upon further command," the voice announces.

The earpiece goes silent when its owner stops right before the man, "Who are you and why-" Eliza stops as she sees the man's distorted face as he lifts his head. Woah.

"Jus ah moman," the man mutters, his face burned to the highest decree. "Sury, you ha tu se thet."

Eliza shudders as the man straightens his broken jaw and nose.

"Elizabeth Banks?"

Eliza turns around to see the owner of the familiar voice. Please let this be in my head.

Her eyes widen as she sees Jason run toward her. "Elizabeth Banks!"

"He knows you?" The man asks.

Eliza ignores the man and steps forward, signaling Jason to turn back.

"You need to come with me-" Jason stops upon seeing the creature behind Eliza. "That-that's the hawk." He steps back.

"What?" Eliza turns back to see the man, whose face has now started to heal itself.

Jason gasps as he sees his attacker transmute into a man. He staggers back but halts when he sees the man's face.

"Hello, Liz," The man gets up. "It's not surprising." He dusts off the dirt from his black suit. "That after all these years, you don't remember me."

"You know her?" Jason asks.

Eliza shoots him a baffled look. "You know him?"

"Mr. Dames," Jason says. "How did you do that?"

"My name's not Dames, Jason," The man looks at Eliza. "And what I did right now is not important."

"Who is behind all of this?" Eliza says.

"We have a crisis at hand right now," the man says. "If you want to stop all of this, you have to let me in."

"But you told me this will stop when I meet you," Eliza says.

"Temporarily," the man answers. He takes out a transparent pouch from his coat.

Eliza's eyes widen upon seeing the golden locket. That's Mom's.

"If you want to end this," the man steps forward, sliding the pouch back in his pocket. "Then you have to let me in."

"ELIZABETH!" A voice hisses from behind.

Who is it now? Eliza scrunches her face as she turns around.

The man peers at the figure who storms toward them and chuckles, "Ah, Dr. Banks hasn't changed at all."

"Dad?" Eliza sees her furious dad enter the compound. Now how did he come here?

"Dad? " Jason says, bemused.

"What are you doing there?" Anthony yells, marching toward her.

"Liz, there's been a change of plans." The man draws the device further.

"What are you doing?" Jason says, looking at the device poking toward Eliza.

"Step back," The man says, his thumb resting on the button.

Eliza stands still. "What-"

Sparks generate out of the device. The man drops it to the ground, "Step back now!"

Thud!

Eliza and Jason fall to the ground in effect to an invisible force.

Anthony stops in his tracks. NO!

Eliza looks at Jason, who stares at the sky. He's okay. She shifts her gaze to the sky. WHAT?!

The red scar on the sky disintegrates right above her. Soon, the forest cover behind the man transforms into a manicured lawn, a skyline visible just a few miles ahead.

What in the world?! Eliza and Jason gaze at their transfigured surroundings while they sit up.

The man looks back and grins, it worked.

Anthony's eyes widen as he recognizes the man who heads toward Eliza, that scumbag is still alive?!