Needless to say, Eli was wrong. 

    “You did what?” their captain yelled. 

    “We talked with Heechul-”

    “I heard you the first time I was just checking to make sure I hear right.”

    “Captain, this needed to happen.” Soohyun spoke up.

    “You, I knew when you joined the team after what happened that you would cause trouble. Why can’t you boys just understand. This is not our place.”

    “Captain please,” Eli begged, “let us do this. Just let us follow the lead we got from Shin Hye and if nothing turns up we will drop it.”

    The captain peered down at them before begrudgingly saying, “You have one week-”

    “Thank you so much-”

    “And if you have nothing worthy of court by the end of the week-”

    “Understood.”

    Eli and Soohyun left the office after that and began researching. The first thing to do was follow up on the trail Shin Hye said she followed while she was escaping from the lab. 

    It was easy enough to map it out and follow the trail which, Eli could admit, led back to a fairly creepy old building in the middle of nowhere, outside of New Boston. The problem was finding evidence that they could use to get a warrant into the building. 

    Eli and Soohyun checked countless places around the forest where the base was hidden, looking for anyone that could report any suspicious behavior. The difficult part was doing it discreetly enough to avoid alerting the Regional Science and Technology Fellowship about their searching. 

    It was Thursday and Eli and Soohyun were beginning to feel hopeless when they received a phone call. One of the families that lived around the forest, one they had questioned earlier that week, called saying they heard screaming and saw a suspicious black van pulling down a dirt road heading towards the hideout. 

    Luckily for them, the mother had gotten down the plate number and it was match to the van that had been seen outside of the morgue multiple times around the week that bodies had gone missing, including the body of Shin Hye. 

    Gathering up their witness and the van reports, they were able to put together a request for a warrant. But then came another road block. 

    “Damn it.”

    “What?” Eli inquired.

    “Judge ing Reynolds...”

    “Who is... oh, is that the judge that hates you?”

    Soohyun shot him a glare, “Yeah, that’s him.”

    “Well .”

    “Come on, I got one person that may be able to help.”

    Eli let Soohyun drag him down the hall and into another office. There he came face to face with a person he had not officially talked to since his first day on the unit. 

    “AJ, we need your help.” Soohyun exclaimed. 

    “What can I do?” 

    “We need to get this warrant signed by Judge Reynolds by the end of the day.” After saying so Soohyun dropped the request form on AJ’s desk.

    AJ looked up at Soohyun with skeptical eyes. “And how the hell and I supposed to do that? He hates you.”

    “That’s why I need your help. He doesn’t hate you, and he doesn’t even know him.” Soohyun jutted his thumb towards Eli. 

    AJ took a moment to stare hard at both Soohyun and Eli, almost debating weather it was worth it or not. 

    “AJ-”

    “Fine, I’ll see what I can do.” Eli broke into a smile at that. “But, come back here at five o’ clock, I have a date tonight and I am not missing it because of you two s.”

    In a better mood than that morning, Eli spent the afternoon getting everything ready for the raid tomorrow, if everything went okay with the warrant. 

    Eli was in even higher spirits when AJ strolled into their base at quarter to five with a freshly signed warrant in his hand. “You guys owe me one,” he called as he left for his date. 

    That night Eli could not sleep. Thousands of things were racing through his mind. He was worried about what would happen to Shin Hye after the press release the following friday. He was concerned about the raid tomorrow; nobody knew what they were going to find in there, let alone how many more people like Shin Hye, failed experiments, they may find. 

    There were so many factors and it was all making Eli antsy and nervous for the next day. But one thing was sure, Eli was happy; he was happier than he had been in a while. For once he was doing something that actually meant something. 

    In two more weeks it would be May, and only then would Eli find out if everything he had done was worth something. 

    Getting dressed for the raid was nerve racking. Even with Soohyun and the rest of the team behind him, Eli still felt uncomfortable. 

    Around him it seemed like everything was moving so much faster than he was. Before he knew it they were parked outside of the building and the trucks were unloading. 

    Like his fellow team members, Eli moved into position. Than the count down began. 

    “On my count,” their captain’s voice rang over their intercoms, “five, four, three, two, move out.” 

    Their feet rounded against the ground and the sound of the metal doors being pushed down rang through Eli’s ears. All around him the soldiers’ feet kicked up dust, forcing a cough from Eli every few steps. 

    He squinted as he followed the others inside the building. For a while everything was dim as he followed the footsteps down the old hallways. Then they reached a door.

    With two men at it, the soldiers slammed the door open and light flooded the hallways. 

    Everything after that was chaos. They had found the right place alright; it took them two hours to clear the whole building, as the laboratories went down into four separate basements. 

    The things he saw sickened him, Eli’s gut wrenched and twisted at the horror they found down in those basements. True to Shin Hye’s word, there were dozens of other experiments, all poor souls, trapped and tortured in those white hospital like halls. 

    Eli would not tell anyone, but he saw Soohyun throw up when they left.