Landing the Phoenix on the asteroid proved to be a challenge - it was a lot bigger than Kam's personal speeder. Not to mention that Kade's strength wasn't at its usual level, so steering the ship was a two person job. I was forever grateful that Axon had been paying more attention to Kade while in flight. Together, they managed to get the Phoenix into a large crevice on the asteroid's surface. It was quite a walk to the bunker's entrance, but at least the Phoenix was well hidden. Not that anyone should pass by the area but you could never be too careful.

Once inside the bunker, I found it amusing to see the expressions on my friend's faces.

Lenna was very interested in the construction of the base - how did they carve into the asteroid to create it?

Axon seemed a little put off by the lack of visible tech in the place. I couldn't exactly blame him. It made me feel a little off kilter, too.

Kade, bless him, was more concerned about the garbage all over the coffee table than anything else. He looked to Regris with a disgusted expression, "How do you live in this mess?"

Regris, who had greeted us all with the same big smile he had given me, laughed it off. "Ah, you just get used to it."

Kade didn't look like he was so sure.

Once everyone had been introduced and the table cleared of unwanted files and blueprints, Kam presented a few in particular - the same ones he had used to prove to me that his story was true. He didn't bring out the picture of my mom again, though. Thankfully. I wasn't ready to see it again just yet. I didn't know if I ever would be.

Running his finger along the list of bank statements paid out by Red Industries, his face was grim. "See these? All of the circled ones are routed to accounts that aren't registered to anyone. They've used fake names and ID's. After a little more digging, we discovered that the money is then transfered out of those fake accounts directly to the GPF." His brows raised as he shrugged a shoulder, "Apparently, they weren't concerned about people trying to dig into their business."

Lenna shook her head, her eyes scanning the numbers. They were big numbers. "And the GPF are only getting - what? Ten percent? - of the profits of CD?"

Regris nodded grimly, "Exactly. So you can imagine how big the whole profit is."

Yeah, we could. But I couldn't wrap my head around how much money that really was. I'd never seen that amount of dollars in my life. "But something still doesn't make sense. How did this even start? CD hasn't been on the market for that long. I mean, what, maybe a year? These numbers suggest it's been out there a hell of a lot longer."

Grunting, Regris pulled out more papers with more numbers on them but these weren't dollars. Graphs showed something else equally as disturbing. "It has been on the market a lot longer, just not out in the open, if that makes sense." He pointed to the number of Maji that had been kidnapped over the last ten years. "They first had to perfect the formula, which took a while, as you can see. Then they put out small amounts at random intervals, to test the product. A few rounds of that and then a little over a year ago they put the drug out for real. And it picked up ground fast."

Axon snorted, the first time he had made a sound since first entering the bunker. "Of course it did. A drug that can give the user magic-like powers? Everyone wishes for that at some point in their life."

For the first time, I wondered if he had tried it. I didn't think he would actually do it, but then until recently he had been having a rough time finding his place in the crew. Could I really blame him if he tried a substance that would make him more useful - in his eyes? I didn't think I really could. But then I'd been born this way; I didn't know anything less. "Okay, so they released the drug. But didn't the preliminary tests show that too much and the user goes insane before they eventually croak?"

"We can't tell. The earliest recorded death by what could be CD happened about three years ago, but we know there must have been more."

Kade met my eyes across the table, "They covered them up."

Regris sighed, "That is what we suspect. That's probably one of the main reasons they first hired the GPF - aside from keeping General Tarkir under their thumb. They needed help keeping it all under wraps."

"Until too many people started dying and doctors linked it to CD." I felt like puking. All of this had started out long before my life had been turned upside down. And my father had known about it. Maybe not for the full ten years but I figured it was probably close. He had risked everything to try and stop RI from killing innocent people. But he lost and so did I. And now we were all that stood from the rest of the universe loosing and RI taking everything. Right.

"Alright," Lenna leaned closer to the blueprints at the far end of the table. "We've got the story, and say that it's all true - which I haven't decided on yet - what's the plan from here? Obviously what you've been doing hasn't been working."

A little bit of a low blow, but then she had a point. If my father and a select few had been working to put a stop to RI's dealings in CD for the last five years, they hadn't gotten very far. What could we possibly add to the equation that could change things now?

Kam's eyes glanced at me briefly before shuffling through the papers. Seriously, these guys needed a filing system if they were so set on going old-school. "We've been working on something - something to keep the Maji off the GPF's radar and keep them safe. But the prototypes have been faulty." He pulled out a blueprint of a small device, tiny enough to fit into a button hole.

My eyes scanned the sheet quickly, taking in the measurements, tech used, and side-notations. "This tiny thing is supposed to make a Maji human?" I shook my head over and over. "You guys are insane. You're actually insane."

Sighing heavily, holding his eyes closed for a moment, Kam's hand clenched on the edge of the table. "We're not insane, thank you." He looked across the table at me, "When activated, the device will change the very makeup of a blood sample, making it appear like normal ol' blood." His head tilted from side to side, "Well, theoretically."

"Theoretically?" I couldn't believe what I was hearing. Me, the tech-wizard of the crew, and I was in total shock. What he was talking about was impossible.

Regris took over, sliding the paper closer to us both. "We discovered that Maji blood has certain properties to it that can react to a magnetic pull under the right circumstances. This device is designed to be attached to the person's wrist, under the skin. When their blood is drawn - either by their finger or arm - it passes by the device first. The device changes the polarity in the blood, drawing out the bits that make a Maji a Maji. Their blood would appear perfectly normal to the person reading the scan."

As I tried to wrap my mind around what he was saying - which sounded crazier than the fact that Maji existed at all - I looked to my friends. Their faces had equal parts shock and disbelief as my own did. Closing my eyes for a moment, I took a deep breath before opening them again. "Okay. So you're telling me that this device does something to the blood of a Maji to make them appear human to a blood scan?"

"That is what I just said. Yes."

When did I get dropped in some other dimension? Because I had to be imagining all this, right?

"Alright, so let's say I actually believe this insane story." Kade started, his brows pulled tight on his forehead. "Why isn't it working?"

Kam sighed, "We don't know, we can't figure it out. It works for a short period of time and then seems to short circuit or something." Clearing his throat, he glanced at me through his lashes. Those damn blue eyes looked even better that way. "We hope you can fix it. Find what the problem is and make it work."

My brows rose impossibly high on my forehead. "Me? You want me to try and fix this thing that should only exist in movies?"

Standing to his full height, Kam squared his shoulders. Even without the uniform on, he sure looked like the military boy I knew he was. "Yes. You're our only hope."