Page 115 of Villains Series

FOUR YEARS AGO

EON—LABORATORY WING

THOMAS Haverty was a man of vision.

So he wasn’t at all surprised when Stell stripped him of his post at EON. Wasn’t surprised when security escorted him from the lab, took his access card, his files, his crisp white coat. So many men of genius were stymied by short-sighted fools. Scientists condemned before they were lauded. Gods crucified before they were worshipped.

“This way, Mr. Haverty,”

said a soldier in a black suit.

“Doctor,”

he corrected as he stepped through the scanner, spread his arms, and let them search his clothes, his skin, his skeleton, all to make sure he hadn’t stolen anything from the lab. As if Haverty would do something so obvious, so stupid.

They escorted him all the way to the parking lot, and proceeded to search his car, too, before returning his keys and signaling the security post to let him out. The gates slid closed behind him with grim finality.

Haverty drove the twenty-four miles back to the outer edge of Merit, to a small apartment on the southern side of the city. He let himself in, set the keys in their designated tray, peeled off his coat and shoes, and rolled up his sleeves.

A few stray flecks of Mr. Cardale’s blood still stained the inside of his wrist, beyond the protection of his latex gloves. Haverty considered the dots for a moment, the strange pattern like a smattering of stars, a constellation waiting to be discovered.

He held his wrist out and went to his office. A windowless room, sterile and white and lined with refrigerated shelves of samples, vials of blood, small glass jars containing a dozen different drugs, folder after folder of hand-copied notes.

No, Haverty hadn’t been foolish enough to steal from EON on his way out. Instead, he’d done it every day. Stolen his research one piece at a time. A single sample. A slide. An ampule. Each token small enough to be claimed an accident, if he’d been caught. A slip of the mind. Patience really was the highest virtue. And progress was a thing achieved one halting step at a time.

Every night—or morning—when he’d returned home, Haverty had taken up a notepad and reprinted word for word the notes he’d made in the sanctum of the EON compound.

Men ahead of their time were always, by definition, outside of it.

Haverty was no different. Stell couldn’t see—EON couldn’t see—but he knew that the ends would justify the means. He would show them. He would crack the ExtraOrdinary code, and change the face of science, and they would welcome him back. They would worship him.

He crossed the lab and drew a small glass slide from a top drawer, along with a scalpel, delicately scraping flecks of Eliot Cardale’s brown-red blood onto the surface.

He had so much work to do.