Pieces of Mystery (1)

Selena took over an hour and got nothing. While Hydro, the boy had already introduced himself to be called that, he only took less than twenty minutes to open the computer. It's like magic.

Oxy and Selena exchanged glances when they saw the computer wallpaper appear on the screen. That's a photo of Dome's family.

"Well, at least he still used his family picture," Selena commented sarcastically.

"How did you do it?" asked Oxy to Hydro, so amazed. "You did it just like magic," she commented and felt happy that Hydro could handle the situation.

"Science will seem like magic to fools," said Hydro.

"What? Are you calling us stupid, huh?" Selena exclaimed, immediately offended.

Hydro in the camera phone was a big boy with a rounded face, using thick glasses, just smirking.

"Am not," Hydro just shrugged his shoulders. "Actually, what are you guys looking for?" He asked.

"Something that would certainly satisfy Oxy Jane's curiosity," Selena replied.

"How is your father's case?" asked Hydro to Selena.

"My mother is fighting for my father, she hired a lawyer.."

"Sounds good," said Hydro.

"Of course, we still have to fight for him." Looked like Selena was still angry because of the passcode issue that doesn't use her birthdate or something related to her.

"She's just disappointed that Mr. Dome was not using her birthdate for the passcode," Oxy explained to Hydro.

"Oh come on," Hydro laughed. "How can anyone use a passcode using their daughter's birthdate?"

"I'm just an adopted child," Selena corrected.

"Even for thousands of years, you won't be able to crack the code your father used. The passcode used a complicated combination of numbers and letters. Luckily, I'm here to help you," Hydro sounded very disdainful.

"Whatever, smart-ass," Selena snorted.

"Hey," Oxy said to stop Selena and Hydro who were arguing over the video call. "This computer has nothing in it."

"Are you sure?" Selena lowered her head to look at the screen.

"Yeah, almost empty. I only found photos and videos of your family, and there was nothing anymore."

"Hell no," Selena immediately took over the mouse to open one of the videos. "We spend hours like crazy fools just to find videos and photos of my family?"

"The police should have already checked," said Hydro. "The computer returned means the police did not find anything too."

Oxy sighed, looking disappointed.

"Oh, Oxy Jane was so disappointed," said Selena. "Check again, genius. My father is the most mysterious man in the world. He could have kept his secrets behind sight."

Suddenly, Hydro snapped his fingers. "Girl, you are smart than I thought!" he commented to Selena. "Okay, girls. Don't touch the computer. Let me remote from here again. Now, get out of the way."

"Well, at least we have the genius," Selena said.

"You guys can sleep or do anything you fools do. Let me work alone."

"Okay, please, Mr. Genius." Selena immediately pulled Oxy's arm to leave the room.

"My mom's coming home soon," Selena plopped down on the bed. "She's not going to check into Dad's workroom. So don't worry, we'll let the genius do the work."

Oxy nodded in agreement.

"So how about you stay here for the night?" Selena suggested.

The invitation surprised Oxy a little. She was never invited to a friend's house. It was the first time in her life that he had received such an invitation.

"Don't tell me you haven't sleepover at your friend's house yet," Selena noticed Oxy's odd reaction.

Oxy shrugged, slightly embarrassed. "Honestly..." She asked. "You're my first friend, maybe for the sixteen years of my life."

"No way," Selena gasped. "I mean, you might be stupid at making friends, but come on... You should have had real friends in your life before. Maybe when you were in kindergarten. I have many friends at that time!"

"My kindergarten was the worst," Oxy admitted. And it's true, Darren had been actively interfering in her life ever since.

"I know it, that's your smug brother, right?"

Oxy was surprised to hear Selena's taunt of Darren.

"You don't like him?" Oxy asked reflexively. Usually, girls were attracted to Darren because he was cool and handsome.

"I like him? Hell no. He kept bothering me while I'm staying at your house the night before. How come he's so confident to greet me with that sleepy face? The dirt in his eyes was still stuck, you know!"

Oxy was laughing now. "Ugh!"

"That's right. I wonder why is he so popular. He's just a bunch of cowards."

"Well, you're right." Oxy nodded in agreement. "I'll call my mother," she had already decided. "I will sleep over this night in your house."

"Great!"

--

"Hey, hey, did you guys forget me?" Hydro called them on video calls several times but they only could pick it up after dinner.

"Of course not, Dolphin," Selena said to Hydro from her cell phone.

"What? Dolphin?" Hydro protested hearing that nickname for him.

Oxy also waved at Hydro from her phone. "We're having dinner."

"Oh, I forgot. We have lives to take care of, dinner and other nitpicking," said Hydro.

"Don't tell me you haven't eaten," Selena said. "You have to eat so your brain cells don't die."

"Thanks for the advice, Sloth," Hydro replied to Selena,

"Hey! Who is a sloth? Am not!" Selena protested because Hydro nicknamed her too.

"Oh yeah, you're a sloth with big eyes." hydro still made fun of her.

"Guys," Oxy immediately interrupted them. "So you've found something on Mr. Dome's computer?"

"Yup." Hydro grinned smugly.

Hydro's answer made Oxy excited.

"Check the computer now, I've saved the extracted video Mr. Dome had hidden in his family videos," said Hydro.

"Extract videos?" Selena asked cluelessly.

"There are twenty videos of your family," said Hydro. "And in every video, Mr. Dome puts a secret piece of video into it. So I took each video clip then put it together."

Selena looked more confused. "I ever think if our videos were broken because there were always appeared pauses or strange images inside."

"And now you know if your father saved the pieces of videos inside your family videos."

"Then you've done combine all the pieces together?"

"Yep," Hydro nodded.

"Dolphin!" Selena exclaimed with joy. "I have a nickname for my father. Mr. Crow. That's ridiculous but it is suited for him. He liked to complicate his way of life. Why won't he just give the video right away? Why did he have to cut it up and hide it like that?" Selena didn't understand.

"Try using your brain, Sloth." Hydro snorted. "That video must be a top secret. Well, stop talking too much, just check it out. You guys will be surprised to see the contents of the video."

Hydro instantly turned off the call.

"He's so arrogant!" cried Selena in annoyance.

"When can we go to your father's workroom?" asked Oxy impatiently.

"Wait a minute, Owl," Selena complained against Oxy's insistence. And she already had a nickname for Oxy, as Owl.

"I'm going to check my mother first. I will ask her permission. Well, let's go."

--

Oxy and Selena were already at the computer. The two of them waited patiently, and the wallpaper of Mr. Dome with nine-year-old Selena and Mrs. Dome appeared on the screen.

"Is this the video?" Selena asked when she found a video icon in the middle of the screen. "Good, The Dolphin got everything ready. So we don't have to check and combine the video clips just like he did."

The video was turned on. They both watched in silence. The video was a CCTV showing the date two days before Oxy's born, and it was almost midnight. The video was a bit blurry, but they could see Mr. Dome's presence. The thin and tall man, but not bald at the time, Mr. Dome who was sixteen years younger than today was wearing a long white lab coat.

The CCTV captured a room filled with electrical equipment and several big monitors and many keyboards. The video image was black and white, but they could see flashes and sparks emerging from a hexagon-shaped object.

Then there was an explosion, the hexagon-shaped object caught fire and people panicked.

The video only lasted 70 seconds and then the screen went black.

"What's that?" Selena asked confused. "What kind of experiment they did do? That electric effect looked so dangerous!"

Oxy and Selena had the same guess after watching the video.

The video might show an experiment related to the disappearance of Cerebra from the real world. So, Mr. Dome was one of the people who were involved in the experiment.[]