"What's the status of Caen? It has been close to a day, and he hasn't contacted us. Are you able to contact him?"
Inside a room, Raia was asking his men a few questions. His face was riddled with worries about Lucifer and Caen because of not being able to contact them.
It had been over a day since Lucifer left with Caen, and he wasn't back yet.
"None. It's like all connections are cut off. I feel like something is really wrong. We need to go there and check ourselves," Kellian answered.
"Strange. This shouldn't have happened. I'll come with you to check personally," Raia commented as his frown deepened. "Arrange the helicopter. We'll leave in ten minutes."
"Right away," Kellian said as he stood up and started leaving.
As Kellian left, Raia shifted his focus to Vega, who was sitting near him.
"You, try hacking the APF and the authorities to make sure they have no idea about Lucifer either," he told Vega.
"I will. But I have a feeling it might be too late already. There can only be two things that happened. Lucifer killed Caen and ran away the first opportunity he got there. Second, Lucifer and Caen are both caught," Vega replied.
"I think the second is highly likely. And if he's caught, it would be really tough to save him. He might already be dead," he further added.
"I don't care. I want him back wherever he is. Even if it's the APF, Lucifer can't be allowed to die!" Raia said firmly.
"I apologize, it's my mistake. I shouldn't have given him the promise to let him leave. I'll take the full responsibility," Vega alluded to Raia.
"I promised to let him leave, thinking it would be safe now. And then I left to find more about Lucifer. It did not result in anything significant either since I only confirmed that Lucifer was actually Zale's son. I should have been here instead to stop him from going," He further continued.
"It's not your fault. If he is caught, it's my fault. I was sure that they wouldn't be able to find him with all the precautions we took, but I was wrong. I underestimated their resources and overestimated Caen," Raia replied as he shook his head lightly.
He stood up and walked over to the door to leave but stopped at the exit.
Looking back, he started speaking. "I should have sent more people with him. To top it up, Predictor's words further clouded me since he said Lucifer and Caen would come back safely."
" I forgot that if his words are true ten percent of the time, they're wrong ninety percent of the time as well. It's not your fault. So work hard. We need to find him," he told Vega before he departed, not knowing that it seemed to be too late already.
Lucifer wasn't with APF. He wasn't at the beach either. He was lying in the bottom of the sea, which was facing high tides. Even APF wouldn't be able to find his body now.
...
The APF helicopter landed on top of their headquarters.
A medical team was already standing on the roof. They were waiting as they were already informed about the critical condition of Varant, who was still unconscious.
Varant's face was still pale, but fortunately, his eyes had stopped bleeding. As for his breathing and his heart rate, it was slow but stable.
The medical team approached the helicopter after Riali and Rowen stepped out, carrying Caen.
"Be careful with him," Riali reminded the team that was approaching the helicopter.
The team entered the helicopter and carried Varant out with extreme care.
Varant was taken downstairs to the proper medical facility where he was going to be treated.
As for Riali and Rowen, they took Caen to the prison that was specially made for Variants and locked the unconscious Caen inside before they started leaving.
"Sir, would a doctor be coming to see him?" A guard asked Riali, wondering if he needed to open the door again.
"There's no need. We didn't hit her hard enough for her to be needing a doctor. She'll just stay unconscious. Anyway, keep a strict eye on her. She's an important member of Variant Uprising," Riali answered before he left. "Moreover no one except us two should be allowed to know about her or approach this lady."
...
Time kept trickling away as Variant Uprising searched for Lucifer but to no avail. They even went to the beach, only to find it empty. There seemed to be no obvious signs of battle or anything. There wasn't any blood either.
This whole thing was confusing, but they were almost certain that APF was involved.
"He's not here either. Should we go back?" Kellian asked Raia, who was standing near the sea, staring at the tides that weren't as powerful as they generally were.
"Where did that kid go? He was the key, and now I lost him," Raia muttered, staring at the sea, unaware that the thing he was staring at was what kept Lucifer hidden.
"Let's go back," he said to Kellian as he turned back and started leaving.
...
The videos of Lucifer that were shown on the TV had worked miracles. Many people were now willing to join the Variant Uprising. From the villain organization, their status was elevated to an anti-hero organization that actually fought for justice.
Even though APF tried to damage control by calling that footage fake, this excuse didn't work on a big section of the public, especially the unaffiliated Variants. They could feel that it was true. To make such a thing up seemed impossible to them.
A lot of people joined the Variant Uprising, increasing their strength, while some people chose a different form of protest.
There was a demand from the public to punish Xander for killing innocent Variant kids, and that demand was only gaining momentum.
Unfortunately, APF couldn't even bring Xander out to give justification since Xander was in a coma now.
The APF still didn't lose hope as they played even more tricks. They released all the details of Caen and made him the culprit. The story they went with was that it wasn't Xander who attacked Lucifer, but Caen, who was disguised as Xander.
Since a lot of people didn't know about Caen, they didn't know that he could only copy faces and not abilities of other Variants, but it didn't matter. APF wanted this chaos to die down fast.
The subtle cold war of recruitment continued for two months as the efforts of Variant Uprising trying to find Lucifer continued.
They searched far and wide while trying their best to hack into the APF systems to know if Lucifer was there. Unfortunately, the protection in the system was too high this time.
The entire APF was on high alert.