The world was blur beneath his eye lids but as soon as he'd shut them, he was fluttering them open, alert at once. When Joshua Phillips was a child, he'd earned the nickname superman, back then at ten, he still had a little of his naivety, back then when he thought that being extra smart, being extra strong would make his father even prouder, so he'd stretched himself to the maximum, he did his homework, read ahead of his classes and rarely ever allowed himself play or sleep. In the end, he'd ended up in the hospital for exhaustion, his father had been extra displeased and his elder sister had teased him, calling him superman for days. Even now, the nickname still stuck, although he couldn't remember the last time he'd seen his sisters.

Joshua spun on his chair and pretended to be reading something on his tablet computer as he heard footsteps. He made a point to keep the device close to him at almost always, even when he wasn't using it. At the last minute, he raised his head and his eyebrows followed, it was Firepemi in front of him, dishevelled and looking like he'd grabbed the first shirt he found which was a rumpled white dress shirt that was half tucked into trousers.

"Coming from a date?" Joshua asked, although he didn't really care. He was just trying to find out if Nina was back in Lagos.

Fire took the sofa and stretched his legs in front of him, running a hand down his knees. He was recovering from a recent football injury.

"No, Nina isn't back yet," He said.

Joshua waited for Firepemi to say something but Fire only juggled his knees, it wasn't a nervous action, he seemed jittery but it seemed fuelled by anger. Joshua was half tempted to wait and see how long Fire could endure the silence, but he was already exhausted himself and he was certain that something was wrong, very wrong and that it had to do with with Fire.

"Is there something you want to tell me?" Joshua finally asked, he leaned forward and half wondered whether to play the angry route or pretend to be calm. He rarely ever had to deal with traitors within The ORION Project, especially not from someone so close to the legacy. A part of him wanted to believe that Fire wasn't capable of betrayal but that part of him was just sentimental. Sanmi had repeated Firepemi's name over and over again. Under the guise of the same Fire, Joshua's father had sent a text to Kendrick and Grace, a text they'd replied to. That was enough confirmation for him.

Joshua waited for Firepemi to fib, to be defensive, but instead, the other boy echoed back the same question to him.

"I should ask you that, Joshua, is there something you want to tell me?" Fire snapped.

Joshua wanted to laugh, so this was Fire's route, pretense. It was so different from what he'd expected, the anger in Fire's voice was so real that even Joshua was almost fooled. Or maybe he didn't even phantom that anybody might be on to him.

Fine, two could play that game. He leaned back and began to tap at a free space on his desk with a pen, he continued until the sound drove Fire mad and he was hurling himself from his seat with a furious set to his jaw.

"What is really going on here, Joshua?" Fire asked. He began pacing the wide space from the sofa to the bookshelf at the other end. Joshua just stared, there was something forced about his pacing, he was either really angry or he was a really shitty actor. In fact, Joshua was tempted to tell him.

"Nina returns from the country, she's with me for a couple of weeks and then your father is arriving from no where, taking control of the Dome and suddenly Nina's father is asking her to stay in Abuja. The last time I checked, you were ORION'S leader not Remilekun Phillips who now calls all the shots."

Joshua considered hurling the pen at Fire but instead, he forced himself to adopt an air of patience and set it down. He was really beginning to get angry at Firepemi's false concern and a part of him refuse to accept that even though he didn't have people he called friends, he'd thought of Fire as a confidant and because Fire had once briefly run ORION, he'd thought of him as a sort of mentor too. Fire should have been untouchable, a part of his life that would remain the same no matter what.

"You don't tell me how I run my kingdom and if I want someone else to run it for me, I wouldn't ask your advice either," Joshua said calmly.

Fire wore a look of incredulous disbelief, as if he'd expected Joshua to thank him.

"Come on, everyone's thinking it, soon they'll be saying it with their own mouths," Fire hissed. "When is he taking his ass back to the capital?"

Joshua ground his teeth, the only outward sign of his anger. It was true, the whispers were rising, people were daring to call The ORION Project a family business, soon they'd be calling him a wimp for allowing his father to rule things. He didn't like it one bit and he certainly hated that he'd come to answer to the man he'd broken free from a long time ago again, but it wasn't only the country that Remilekun Phillips knew how to manipulate and threaten, he knew very well how to play that game with his family too.

"Mind your business, Firepemi, I think you have more things to worry about." said Joshua, forcing that light tone back in his voice. Fire stopped pacing, he looked at Joshua, and to his credit, he didn't flinch. Too bad for him that Joshua had been taught to scent deceit like a hound, he saw how Fire averted his eyes in a too quick motion.

"Are you doubting my loyalty?" Fire said theatrically, moving in quick strides to stand in front of Joshua. The question was so sudden that Joshua was taken aback, Fire had suddenly gone from pretending to losing his cool. He took Joshua's pen in his glove clad hand and set it back down.

It would be so easy to call for an arrest now, to point fingers and provide evidence but it was also so hard, ORION didn't operate so easy, if Fire had been an ordinary recruit then Joshua would have already called for a quiet kill but he was legacy, his mother would be crushed, she'd demand a fair trial and the schematics of it all was too stressful for him to deal with. What was important was that Grace Ilori would soon be useless to ORION in a matter of hours and whatever Fire was planning with her would be useless. She'd even think he'd betrayed her and it would all be one big telenovela.

"Just telling you where you stand, Fire, nothing more," Joshua said breezily. He smiled a little, deliberately. Fire took a step back. "I have everything under control, besides, I've come this far, too far to let anyone mess it up, not my father, not anybody else." And he meant those words, he fixed his gaze on Fire so he knew it too.

"Now, can you please leave? I have things to do." Joshua added, looking back at his tablet dismissively, he opened an article detailing a recent celebrity scandal and knew that Amina had once again hacked into the device. When he looked back up some minutes later to write something down, Fire was gone and so was Joshua's pen that had been lying on the table.

Joshua remembered the black gloves Fire was wearing, the theatrics and melodrama and a chill ran down his spine. He immediately reached for his phone and dialled the receptionist on the first floor, it took several minutes for the call to be put off hold. The Dome was busy at this time, running requests from the several offices, there was a particular batch newly reformed agents coming in in a few days and everything was being set for their arrival, usually when the government Secret Service decided to reform some particular criminals, they were sent to ORION for reformation before they were sent out on official operations.

"May I take your request, sir?" The woman's voice came curtly.

"Firepemi Kingston was in my office some minutes ago, has he left the Dome yet?"

There was a few moments of silence then the voice came again.

"I believe he just did, security footage shows that he was in the company of Senator Kingston, sir."

Dayo Kingston too. Joshua wanted to laugh. How high were the odds that the suddenly visit wasn't just a social call? He was sure that whatever Fire's deal with Grace Ilori was, his mother was on it too.

* * *

There was a small crowd in the office, most of them bustling around to install connect wires to the big desktop computer, Remilekun Phillips was seated in the middle of the chaos wearing a colorful Ankara agbada and frowning at the whole scene when Grace was led into the room. His eyes found hers immediately and his frown deepened, the skin between his forehead dipping down to a v. It was the first time the man actually looked his age.

Grave forced herself to walk calmly, even as she was well aware of the gun at her temple, nudging her forward.

"I thought we had a deal to come back for me when the time on the computer lapsed," Grace heard herself say breezily. She looked in time to skip over a stray wire. Kendrick still reached for her, his arm wrapped around her waist to steady her even before she could trip. Her heart skipped a beat and she jerked herself away, forcing a anger she didn't feel into the action, knowing that the Vice President was watching their every move. She knew Kendrick was going to be used as a tool for persuasion, it was better that they thought she and Kendrick were hostile.

Grace caught Remilekun Phillips's eyebrow quirk and hid her smile.

"I thought the same thing, but it didn't stop me from calling my best computer experts to have a look," The older man said. He spread out his arms. "And look, they were able to remove the encryption."

She hoped her worry didn't show on her face. Just several hours ago, everything seemed in place, the ARTEMIS council had officially reached out to ORION'S own council, Dayo Kingston was seemingly on their side but now, Fire seemed to have sold them out and the time they'd been counting on was gone.

Everything was wrong now.

"Good for you," Grace said blandly.

Remilekun smiled thinly. "I suppose." He waved a hand dismissively and the small crowd began to pile out, leaving only a few of them and the woman who'd kidnapped them.

"Nafisat, always a pleasure," Remilekun greeted. To Grace's surprise, he stood, the Vice President stood and walked to shake her free hand.

Nafisat only nodded. "There are some things worth coming out of retirement for, like this." She turned to Grace with a mocking smile but there was something in that look that Grace knew too well, she'd mastered it in a matter of days. It was the look people gave her once they saw Tamika in Grace, most times, it was a fond look but this one was an old grudge that was never buried.

Grace already had a guess as to who the woman was.

"Tamika Afolabi once told me that she was looking to start a revolution, I'm here to see those words finally fail," Nafisat said cheerily. She slid the gun to Remilekun and took a seat on the waiting chairs resting near the door.

"You know what to do, Grace, Eden awaits you." Remilekun said with a brief mocking bow. Grace grit her teeth and imagined knocking him off his feet. She could do it easy but the hefty men in suits that had stayed behind were watching her stonily. It wasn't time to bet on whether they had guns tucked in their waistbands.

There was an odd silence in the room as Grace strode to the computer mounted on the desk, she shimmied through the little space between the desk and the office chair resting against the wall and it was only then that she looked up at her little audience. Kendrick was wearing a calm expression but she saw how his eyes would dart around for a few seconds, making calculating their odds.

"I see there is no need for threats, good girl," Remilekun said softly. Grace huffed a laugh.

"You think I'm doing this for you? Well, no, I'm not, I'm doing this so you and your cult can finally leave me alone and let me live." Grace said, stressing her words deliberately. People like Remilekun Phillips liked to feel good about themselves while they did their evil, in some twisted part of his head, he probably thought he'd made her see reason. It was his God Complex speaking.

Nafisat snorted a laugh. "She is so much like her mother, it's funny."

Grace fixed the older woman with a steely gaze. "And you're a bitch, it's not even funny."

Kendrick spluttered a laugh, Remilekun hid his own smile but there was anger in his eyes while Nafisat only leaned back, jaw clenched.

"Can you?" Remilekun asked, gesturing at the screen before her. She bent a little so she could be facing it square. Indeed, the timer was gone, in place was a riddle and it was the most ridiculous thing she'd ever seen. A part of her had been expecting top tier riddles but Tamika must have known that if anyone came this far with the encryption, then there was no need for the steel wall. It was time to unravel it all.

What goes up and never comes down?

She must have laughed, because all eyes were solely on her, there was even curiosity in the eyes of the standing bodyguards. A child could have answered that riddle.

"Is something wrong?" Remilekun asked, raising his arms to adjust the billowing sleeves of his agbada.

Grace forced a nonchalant look. "Has anyone glanced through this thing?"

His frown deepened. Kendrick gave her a shake of his head, don't engage, he was telling her. She ignored him, she was beginning to think that Remilekun was messing with her, that the real Project Eden was somewhere else.

"I saw no need," He said flatly. He took a step forward and stopped, as if he meant to threaten her. "I see no use for stalling either, you know who will pay dearly for it."

Grace nodded. She typed in the hurried answer, thinking that Remilekun Phillips's greed would be his downfall. She wondered if he'd even bothered to try to confirm the legitimacy of all the secrets on Eden, if he had then he would have known that many of it were false, the ones that weren't were secrets of men long dead now.

The next riddles were as silly and apart from the sound of her fingers hitting the keyboard, there was a frosty silence in the room. It was only when Remilekun made an impatient noise as she typed in the answer to the second to the last riddle that she saw the sweat at his brow, the fidgety movement of his arms and knew that he was desperate. As the last riddle appeared on the screen, he finally made his way towards her.

"What is taking so long?" He grunted. Pushing her aside so he could peer at the screen. Grace risked a glance at Kendrick and caught his worried look, she knew what he was thinking. They'd been taken without any alarm, for all Tolu Kingston knew, they were speaking to Firepemi and making plans, throughout the journey, it had been hard to pinpoint where Nafisat had been driving to because of the car's tinted windows and here they were, in a place where it would be so easy to get rid of them with no witnesses. Did anybody even know Remilekun Phillips was in the state?

Remilekun made a sound that distracted her and when she looked, his fists were clenched tightly and the riddle on the screen was taunting him with their words. Again, Tamika had come through with the burn, Grace wanted to ask him if he wanted ice for it.

When the hunter becomes prey, sent to the stars by a woman.

It was so funny that the words weren't even a riddle, they were just a single story, one that Remilekun must know, one that Grace had read on recently. The story of Orion and Artemis. A story that had become the story of Tamika Afolabi and Remilekun Phillips.

Remilekun typed something into the screen and sure enough, the last page of the program appeared, the words spilling onto the screen slowly. Remilekun didn't even wait for them to finish before he was turning and dragging Grace by the arm away from the computer, he almost tripped on a wire in a bid to drag her away.

"I believe my use of you comes to an end here, you failed, Tamika." He hissed. His eyes were wild, Tolu Kingston wasn't the only one stuck in the past. Remilekun was still trying to best a ghost.

Nafisat snorted. Kendrick made for her and stopped at the simultaneous cocking of guns. Their eyes met, Grace knew what was coming, braced herself for it. She jerked away from the old man's grip and shot him a glower even as her heart thudded painfully, she was certain they could all hear it.

"Do it and be done with it," Nafisat called, goaded. Over her taunts, Kendrick was issuing threats of his own, shaking like a leaf.

"I swear if you touch her. . ."

Remilekun Phillips didn't seem to hear either of them, he was looking at Grace, a number of emotions flashed through his eyes, loathing, madness and something like fondness. He raised a finger, whistled the command for emphasis. There was silence, the kind heavy with anticipation. Kendrick found her, wrapping his arms around her as if to shield her but she was suddenly, oddly calm. Death should be quick, she prayed.

"Get rid of them, I don't want any blood on my computer," Remilekun Phillips said. He smiled ruefully when she opened her eyes. "So long, old friend."

Silence again, and then the smattering of applause. At first, Grace thought it was the gunshots, thought she was already dead, then she dared to open her eyes.

It was the phone.

* * *

Are they out of the woods yet? :-D