Rick's eyes stayed locked on the board, but the weight of his words hung in the air like static.
No answer from Jennifer.
No comfort.
Just the hum of machines and the cold glow of unanswered questions.
Then—
From the garage, distant but clear, came the sound of the heavy door sliding open.
Footsteps echoed through the hallway.
Then—777's voice, casual and totally oblivious:
"I'm back. And I bought some snacks too."
In the server room, Rick didn't even lift his head.
"The genius dumb fuck head ruined my entire thought process just like that," he muttered.
Then, louder:
"Jennifer. Go tell him to come in here."
"Already did," she replied. "He's on his way."
Sure enough, a few seconds later, 777 pushed open the door—plastic bags in one hand, a half-open granola bar in the other.
He stopped in the doorway, eyebrows raised.
"You need to eat something or you'll—"
"Yeah, yeah," Rick cut him off. "Give it here."
777 tossed the bag of snacks over. Rick caught it, barely looked at it, then chucked it to the side like it had personally insulted him. He jabbed a finger at the chair across from him.
"Sit. And start analyzing this shit."
777 sank into the chair with a sigh and cracked his neck.
"Alright, alright. So what do we got?"
Rick didn't even pause. He rattled it off like a list he'd memorized in pain.
"One—no signs of anomalies at the house.
Two—trackers died in Central Park.
Three—Tobey was seen following someone.
Four—Shalit's blood was found, with signs of vomiting.
And five—that police officer said he got a message about a helicopter taking off from the abandoned lot near his flat."
777 leaned back, chewing the inside of his cheek as he stared at the screen.
He was thinking—just for a second.
But Rick beat him to the punch, mid-bite of a granola bar.
"Kidnapping?" he said, eyes narrowing. "Tobey must've been in that helicopter. But the real question is… did he go willingly?"
He stood up, still holding the bar, eyes locked on the data wall.
"First thing we need to do is track that chopper. Jennifer, you already on that?"
Jennifer responded, calm and crisp:
"No, sir. I hacked the traffic cameras nearby, but the helicopter had no identification markings. No tail number. No flight signature. It was invisible to air traffic."
Rick's jaw tightened.
777 tilted his head. "And what about the disk?"
A small pause.
Jennifer's voice returned.
"It contains nothing suspicious. Standard data load. Random filler files.
No trace of embedded commands or hidden partitions."
The room fell quiet for a moment.
Rick stared at the screen, eyes glassy, shoulders heavy.
Everything was real.
But nothing was lining up.
Not in any direction that made sense.
"We got no fucking thing in our hands right now," 777 muttered, rubbing a hand down his face.
"Just breadcrumbs. And every one of them leads to nothing."
He leaned forward, glaring at the digital whiteboard like it owed him an apology.
"Anything strange we missed?"
Rick didn't look at him.
"Just that random-ass cat meme," he said darkly. "Came from an untraceable server. Still no ID tag. Still can't be tracked."
Then his eyes flicked to the ceiling.
"Jennifer. You find anything while dismantling the shed?"
Her response came quick, emotionless as ever.
"Yes. The notes pinned to the board inside the shed—they were written in a coded language."
Rick cursed under his breath.
777's eye twitched.
"Damn this code language shit," he snapped, slamming his hand down on the chair arm. "It takes a hell of a lot of time to crack."
The chair groaned under the impact, but it didn't argue.
Neither did Rick.
Because he knew 777 was right.
They were stuck—
and the timer in the background was still ticking.
The room stayed heavy. The air felt like it was pressing down on them—thick with frustration and dust from old leads going cold.
777 let his hand slide off the chair arm, muttering something under his breath about encryption and emotional damage.
Then—
Jennifer spoke again. Calm. Unbothered. Like she was just announcing the weather.
"Correction. The code language recovered from the shed is not entirely unfamiliar."
Rick froze mid-chew. 777 lifted his head slowly.
Jennifer continued, unfazed.
"It shares approximately 12.3% structural overlap with a syntax pattern once recorded in Tobey's digital handwriting."
Silence.
Rick's grip tightened around the edge of the chair.
"...Come again?" he said, voice low.
"The symbols and formatting on the shed's pin board include unique modifiers and spacing rules consistent with Tobey's input behavior. Specifically, his early sandbox notepad logs, dated six months ago."
"You're telling me…" 777 said, blinking. "...that a kid left a fingerprint on a coded message board in a secret shed linked to blood, missing persons, and a ghost chopper?"
"Statistically," Jennifer replied, "I am telling you the patterns match with a 12.3% confidence rating, rising to 16.7% if we include stylized spacing."
Rick stood up slowly.
The silence wasn't quiet anymore.
It was charged.
Like static waiting for a spark.
Rick's voice cut through it, cold and sharp.
"Jennifer… no—wait. Can you cross-check the notes from the shed with those old research papers?"
"The ones from the mad scientist?" 777 asked, leaning forward.
Rick didn't even blink. "Yeah. Those."
Jennifer processed for barely a second.
"Match found. Eighty-point-four percent overlap.
Technically speaking… it's the same language."
777 slowly turned his head toward Rick, eyebrows raised like they were about to fly off his face.
"You're telling me," he said, "your son somehow managed to build a coded language based off some lunatic's research papers.
And not only that—he used it for himself."
He paused.
"...So you know what it says, right?
Right?"
Rick just stared at the board.
"Nope."
There was a beat of pure silence.
Then Jennifer, still the calmest voice in the room, clarified:
"Technically speaking, Tobey created his own coded language using the structural principles of the mad scientist's writing.
That does not mean they are functionally identical."
She paused.
"In linguistic terms—same DNA. Different voice."
777 leaned back in his chair and groaned into his hands.
"Oh, this is worse than I thought. We couldn't even crack that lunatic's research papers with fifty-six scientists and Jennifer working overtime—and now we find out Tobey built his own version off it? Cool. Great. Awesome. Totally not horrifying."
He rubbed his face and stared at the ceiling like it had answers.
"So now what? We're back to nothing?"
Rick didn't answer right away. He just stood there, eyes scanning the board like he was trying to see behind it. Then, finally:
"There's a pretty high chance," he said, voice low, "that Tobey and Shalit are together. But in what condition… we don't know."
He looked at the screen.
The blood.
The tablet.
The chopper.
The code.
"There's only one smart move left to make."
777 leaned forward, eyes hopeful. "And that is… go to the bar?"
Rick didn't even hesitate.
"I will kill you if you joke again during a serious situation."
"Okay—okay," 777 said quickly, holding up both hands. "Just trying to lighten the—never mind."
He exhaled hard. Then blinked.
"You're thinking of retracing our steps," he said. "Back to when we dismantled that lunatic's organization."
Rick didn't say anything. He didn't need to.
777 sat up straighter, eyes narrowing.
"Wait. Hold on. You're still on that mission? The undercover, non-aggressive deep-cover op to expose the corrupt company you're working for?"
Rick didn't flinch.
"There's a difference," he said calmly, "between completing a mission and just… passing time after collecting all the proof."
777 blinked, brain lagging behind.
"So you're telling me... you have all the evidence?" he asked. "Like, everything?"
"Yes," Rick answered, flat as a heart monitor.
"And you just haven't submitted it?"
"Nope."
777 looked personally offended by the idea.
"Dude. How long does it take to wrap the formality stuff with the Bureau then? Two days? A week?"
Rick didn't bother answering.
Instead, he said one word.
"Jennifer."
"Yes, sir," she responded, already anticipating the request. "Mission finalization protocols are nearly complete. Bureau will receive full confirmation and closure notice by tomorrow morning. You'll be officially debriefed and free of active status."
777 slumped back in his chair.
"…Huh. Okay. Sounds good."
Then, after a beat—
777 leaned back, mouth full of crumbs, and muttered:
"I guess now we can go back to hunting rogue science cults again, huh?"
He paused, then added:
"So… where do we even start?"
Rick didn't look at him.
He just stared at the board, jaw tight, eyes colder than before.
"Where we ended," he said flatly.
"You dumb fuck."