Web Series

August 17th, 1998

“Stark?” asked the agent, snapping his fingers. I snapped out of my trance and locked eyes with him. Supervisory Agent Roger Turner was sitting behind his desk as I was hunched over in the chair in front of him. My mind was still a mess as I thought about everything I had seen.

“Sorry,” I apologized, rubbing my face. “Didn’t get much sleep last night.”

“Got a lot on your mind?” asked Agent Turner.

“No,” I shook my head, lying. “Just too much paperwork, you know how it is.”

“If that ain’t the truth…” muttered Agent Turner, tossing one of his folders aside. He shifted his focus back to me. “You ready to talk now?”

“Not much to talk about,” I replied, avoiding eye contact. “Just whatever it takes to get back into service.”

“All I need to know is if there is something I need to look further into,” explained Agent Roger. “It’s interesting, a few weeks ago you reported to me, now you’ve got clearance well above my own. I don’t need to know specifics, but something happened down there in that facility. Director Misiam has been on leave for weeks and chatter has been oddly silent. I get the feeling something happened down there that someone is trying to cover up. Agent Pierce doesn’t authorize for the use of tactical response teams for your usual breach of security. I can tell something else is eating away at you. I’m open for discussion.”

I looked around the room, scanning the pictures on the shelf nearby. One of the picture had Agent Turner shaking hands with Agent Pierce. Notably, Agent Pierce didn’t have his usual menacing scowl, instead bearing a surprisingly friendly face. It looked like two friends standing beside each other and I immediately honed in on that. Triarch was ruthless and cutthroat, just like the members of the Founding Council. For years, I had trusted the man in front of me to discuss personal matters. This time was different, I knew I was being tested. Whether Agent Turner knew it or not, I was sure that someone far up the chain in Triarch’s command was listening in on this conversation. The assurance of what would happen if I violated the terms of my confidentiality was a very vivid memory in my mind.

“There’s nothing to discuss,” I replied plainly. “Nothing reportable within the facility.”

“What happened down there?” asked Agent Turner. I heard the deafening roar faintly in the back of my mind followed by the crackle of lightning, my eyes lit up like I was watching it all over again, the powerful boom of that horrifying weapon as it fired once. I jolted in my seat and played it off like I was adjusting myself.

“I’m not at liberty to discuss,” I said quietly.

“Stark…” insisted Agent Turner worriedly. I nodded towards one of the picture frames on his desk.

“Cute kid,” I noted. Agent Turner shifted his attention to the picture and seemed to relax.

“Thanks,” said Agent Turner, adjusting the frame and moving a paper off of it to get a better view. “She turns 3 in two months.”

“They grow up fast,” I nodded.

“Have any of your own?” asked Agent Turner.

“No sir,” I replied.

“Plan on having any?” joked Agent Turner. “Mattie is the best thing that happened to me. I just wish I could come home more often and spend more time with her, my wife isn’t exactly happy with how much time I spend here.”

“We have a job to do,” I admitted. “It’s hard for some people to understand that.”

“What family do you have?” asked Agent Turner. “I’ve never seen pictures on your desk.”

“My dad died several years ago, mining accident in Kentucky,” I explained. “My mother passed away about four years ago. The last conversation I had with her was right after I got off the phone with you saying I got the job.”

“My condolences,” sighed Agent Turner. “Are you an only child?”

“Yeah,” I replied without skipping a beat. “It just… it’s difficult to go home when there’s nothing there waiting for you.”

“Just give it time,” reassured Agent Turner. “You’ll find someone eventually. In the end, it’s worth it. Becoming a parent changed me in ways I never thought would. I’d give my life for that girl.” It’s interesting how far the opposite end of the spectrum actually is.

July 18th, 1998

The deep wailing sirens echoed throughout the laboratory, stirring me awake. Everything was very dark, but spaced-out tiles flashed red briefly, on and off, over and over, bathing the darkness in a gentle glow. Power to the entire facility was offline, and yet some lightning appeared to still be cascading off what was left of the Fusion Modulator. I was one of the few already regaining consciousness, unlike the other pencil-pushers, I actually had to perform physicals for my job. I slowly picked myself up off the floor, my ears still ringing. There was this damp sensation in my hair, but I couldn’t tell if it was from me being knocked unconscious on the floor or if I was bleeding from somewhere. One of the cubes rolled off of me and as I placed my hand beside me to pick myself up, I heard the distinctive crackling of glass under my palm as I applied pressure. I swept it aside as I looked around the dimly lit atrium.

I could make out the outlines of other bodies scattered about, suffering from various injuries from the concussive blast. The cubes remained perfectly intact but had lost all magnetism, allowing them to fall freely. Most of the blocks were tossed across the room while a pile of several covered two bodies ahead of me. I watched as one of the bodies began to pick themselves up from underneath the cubes.

“Sound off…” coughed Agent Pierce sorely.

“Alive,” I grunted. “I think.”

“Ugh…” groaned Director Misiam, stirring beside Agent Pierce. He seemed to jolt awake as he flung the boxes off himself. “JESSICA!” Agent Pierce reached out to help him to his feet. Director Misiam sucker punched Agent Pierce across the face, knocking him to the floor painfully where he held his face. Director Misiam scrambled to his feet and rushed towards the four large obelisks standing not too far from us. The observation deck had been completely dismantled and thrown around the room, so it was impossible to tell where exactly we were in relation to the pods.

He made his way over to the pod and fumbled with the controls in the darkness. He located the manual override and snatched it down, unlocking the chamber. It slid open where a small body laid motionlessly. He tried to pick her up when a sudden burst of bright light seemed to erupt from within the pod itself. Director Misiam was completely gone before I quickly turned my head to see his body tumbling like a ragdoll across the floor of the lab, coming to a rest in a beaten heap. Unfathomable amounts of electricity surged out of the pod as something reached its arm out the chamber door and slowly pulled itself out. Through the crackling and screeching of the air as the creature moved around, it collapsed once it fell out of the pod. At first, I thought my ears were still ringing, but I suddenly realized I was hearing agonized and terrified sobs of something… someone… some female... was it possible that the monster we were looking at was the little girl I watched being put in?

I wasn’t sure what exactly I was looking at, but it was what was left of the girl from what I could presume. Her physical form had been completely altered, she appeared as though she was composed completely of electricity. The electrical arcs formed a humanoid structure that was struggling to maintain itself, but it seemed to be stabilizing somewhat. The pod behind her was completely scorched, thousands of burns throughout the interior of the chamber suggested that while she was responsible for most of the damage, it almost was as if she had taken in some part of that machine with her which altered her in the way it happened.

The girl rose to her feet, sobbing painfully. She took two steps and jolted forward so fast that I couldn’t even perceive it. One moment she was in one place, the next she blinked into existence in another. Teleportation of some sort? Spatial shift? She moved… fast as lightning- what if whatever had happened to her was directly tied to the behavior of lightning and energy as a whole?

“STOP!” commanded Agent Pierce fiercely. The girl spun around as Agent Pierce rushed past her to Director Misiam’s side. From where I stood, I could see his business suit was singed and charred across the chest. Agent Pierce tore aside the suit and checked Director Misiam’s vitals. I’m guessing whatever he found was not good because he immediately began chest compressions. The girl must have tried lashing out at him and when she made contact, she hit him as if he’d been struck by lightning.

I heard some of the rubble nearby shifting and turned, spotting some of the cubes shifting a bit as I heard some pained grunts from underneath. I hurried over and started pulling the cubes away. They were incredibly dense and difficult to move, but I pulled them away as fast as I could. I uncovered her head; her glasses were still on her face but were badly cracked with one lens completely missing. I could see she was trying to gasp for air but was unable to, the cubes pinning her down completely and crushing her diaphragm.

“I NEED HELP!” I roared desperately, looking around for someone to help. I briefly locked eyes with Agent Pierce. I saw something I had never seen in that man’s eyes before… terror. In that moment, we were equals, both living out the same nightmare.

“Override…668!” shouted Agent Pierce between chest compressions. “Damn it Yuri, hang on!”

“Emergency facility power cycle complete,” stated the automated voice ringing out from every direction. “Artificial intelligence units resuming function.”

“Star!” shouted Agent Pierce desperately. “Deploy bionic-armor, NOW!”

Lights across the room burst to life. I continued pulling away the cubes though briefly blinded as my eyes adjusted to the suddenly bright room. Beside me, four floor tiles slid aside and a platform quickly surfaced containing some sort of metallic frame. It suddenly came to life and approached me, jerking me backwards and up to my feet. Before I could react, it started contorting and wrapping around me, latching onto my limbs and wrapping around my torso. It rapidly adapted to my height and finally stopped moving.

“Recalibration complete,” stated Star over my ear through a built-in speaker of some sort.

I quickly got back down on the floor and grabbed hold of a cube. With ease, I flung the cube across the room, watching it bounce and tumble. I grew fifty times stronger in a matter of seconds thanks to the exo-skeletal suit.

She gasped desperately, taking in air into her lungs as I finally took enough weight off to allow to her breathe again. I quickly got to work slinging the rest of the cubes over my shoulder to try free her.

“Angel!” roared Agent Pierce.

“Artificial Neural Guidance Enhanced Lifeform is unavailable, off-site communications have been severed per Darkfall Protocol,” replied Omega’s deeper robotic voice.

“Omega, get medical crews down here now!” commanded Agent Pierce. “Remagnetize cubic matrix-”

“NO!” I shouted, interrupting him. “They’re scattered, it’ll crush her!”

“Just get her out!” shouted Agent Pierce desperately.

“Please,” she gasped between breaths.

“I’ve got you,” I insisted, tossing more cubes away. Meanwhile, Jessica was growing more and more upset as she was now able to see and realize the carnage she unleashed. She collapsed in a heap on the floor, sobbing while terrified seeing her father in distress as Agent Pierce continued efforts to save his life.

I finally finished uncovering her. It was Lydia, the same researcher who led the children away before they brought in Xertarnius. She was badly beaten and still in shock from the concussive force of the blast. The abrupt EMP burst was strong enough to break the magnetic bond between the cubes, causing them to disassemble and expose everyone to the shockwave that erupted from the Fusion Modulator. She had blood on the side of her face, I wasn’t sure if she had any life-threatening injuries, but she no longer buried.

The focus of every single person in the room suddenly shifted back towards the Fusion Modulator as a horrifying, malicious roar rumbled throughout the entire atrium, originating from the machine itself. Even Agent Pierce himself briefly stopped compressions and Jessica seemed to turn her electrical form around to stare at the machine. The booming roar ended just as a set of massive claws sliced through the second containment chamber. A figure slung itself out of the chamber and slammed down onto the floor on its hands and knees.

The Triarch issued jumpsuit had been completely scorched from his small body. His skin seemed to ripple as his bones and muscles seemed to adjust themselves. Although almost everything else had been destroyed in the general vicinity of the machine, the runes inscribed on the chamber were still completely visible and unharmed by the blast. This was the boy… or what was left of him. His alterations were nothing like what happened to Jessica. His physical stature had changed, he was now around six feet tall, appearing almost like a full grown human but horribly mutated. His teeth were elongated, sharpened, and jagged; like fangs of a vicious beast. While rather pale and sickly in appearance before, his muscle mass had increased tenfold, to the point where he resembled a professional athlete. Large spikes of bone seemed to emerge from his back, as if the points on his spine had grown significantly. Bone protrusions erupted from his elbows, his hands, his knees, and even his toes and heels, giving him bony spikes. He didn’t have a single scratch on him, but his eyes… they were completely red. There was no aura to them, but it was as if every blood vessel in his eyes had burst out of unbridled rage.

“Identification match,” advised Star.

“Holy shit…” I muttered beneath my breath as Lydia clung to me.

“JoJo…” crackled out Jessica in her electrical form. The mutated beast ahead of us roared viciously and I swore I felt the air surge past us as if it was capable of unleashing a shockwave of its own.

“Breathe Yuri!” said Agent Pierce, his voice cracking. The beast snapped to attention and locked onto Agent Pierce, barring its fangs, and growling menacingly. Agent Pierce lifted his head and the color drained from his face as he realized he had been targeted.

“I gotta put you down,” I muttered, quickly looking at Lydia.

“Go!” insisted Lydia urgently. I put her back on her feet as boy took off across the floor towards his father. I scrambled towards him on an intercept course, moving far faster than I normally could thanks to the bionic-armor and allowing me to cover much more ground. I felt like I was clawing at the air as I snatched each leg forward and drilled into the cubes lining the floor. The A.I. unit was magnetizing my feet with each step I took, just long enough to give me even more traction before disengaging to allow me to take another step. I quickly adapted and the A.I. did as well, we quickly closed the gap while the boy charged towards Agent Pierce on all fours.

He lunged through the air and Agent Pierce threw up his arm to shield himself from the impact. Just before he made contact, I dove through the air myself and managed to catch hold of the boy’s mutated leg. My hands wrapped around the large spike on his heel before snatching him sideways to toss him halfway across the room. We both bounced and skid across the floor, shooting sparks as we impacted on the surface of the cubes. We finally came to a rest, and I quickly got back to my feet. The boy quickly picked himself up as well, shaking his head viciously and roaring fiercely at me while flinging his head about like an enraged bull.

I heard an angry scream from Jessica behind me and it felt like someone took a baseball bat to the back of my head. The next thing I knew, I was picking myself up off the floor, the fillings in my teeth burning and my hair standing up on end.

“Electrical surge successfully dissipated,” advised Star as I realized she just tried to blast me with a bolt of lightning. She now looked just as enraged as the boy did upon seeing me attack him.

“Omega, contain her!” ordered Agent Pierce. Cubes in the floor and across the room quickly flew towards her to try to box her in. Several connected and assembled a sort of cage around her, but before they could complete, she roared once again and a powerful energy pulse erupted from her, causing most of the cubes to fall apart and rendering them unresponsive as her EMP burst temporarily neutralized them as well.

She growled and stabbed her corporeal hand into the remaining cubes. She struck them with enough force to normally break her hand, but it was like her hand passed through without injury. She left her hand imbedded in the cube as she barred her teeth at me. The cube flickered violently as she began to interface with it.

“Unauthorized access detected,” said Omega in a somewhat panicked robotic voice. “Firewalls engaged.”

“Lydia!” shouted Agent Pierce, waving her over. Lydia staggered as fast as she could over to her boss to assist with trying to revive Director Misiam.

The boy had his sights set on me now. He began his vicious charge towards me, and I felt the suit tighten around me as the bionic-armor further recalibrated.

“I will attempt evasive maneuvers to attempt to identify targeting strategies employed by the subject,” reported Star. “Be advised, I cannot completely shield you from a blow. My sensors indicate a direct strike even with concussive dampeners would be the equivalent of being struck by a moving vehicle at 90 miles per hour. Avoid at all costs.”

“Yeah, you don’t have to tell me twice,” I growled. I stood my ground as he rushed forward and as he reached me, he reared back his massive, mutated fist and tried to hit me. Star jerked me sideways and I narrowly avoided being struck. I took the moment and curled up my fist and using the enhanced strength granted by the armor, I struck the monster in its arm. I distinctly heard the sound of a bone snapping and the monster roared painfully as it bashed me backwards with its shoulder, tightly gripping its arm.

“Counter attacks were not part of the observational strategy, shifting to aggressive tactics,” advised Star. I spotted something flying towards me out of the corner of my eye and managed to duck just in time to avoid being clobbered by one of the cubes as it roared past me overhead. One of the cubes below me suddenly began to flash irregularly instead of the perfectly bright light they normally emitted when powered up. It burst out of the floor and hit me in the stomach, sending me flying before slamming down on my back, knocking me several feet away from where I was originally standing.

Jessica growled as she continued to manipulate the cubic matrix controlling the floors and walls of the entire lab.

“Omega!” commanded Agent Pierce as Lydia reached him to help with CPR. “Deploy counter measures, do whatever it takes to stop her cubes!”

“Risk of damage to cubic matrix is significant-” advised Omega.

“DO IT!” roared Agent Pierce.

“Overriding self-preservation practices, shifting to intercept airborne projectiles,” noted Omega.

I watched as the monster roared angrily and I rolled over onto my side, getting up off the floor. The monster’s arm was dangling, completely broken just seconds early. I watched it roll its arm around as it regained full motion of it. How the hell was it able to do that if I just broke it? I charged the monster, and it swung another punch at me. Star magnetized my feet, stopping me dead in my tracks and allowing the strike to miss completely. It abruptly demagnetized, allowing me to carry through with my strike. I managed to reach over its arm and slugged him in the face. I felt the bones in its face and mouth shatter on impact, and yet it turned back to face me and spat out the bone fragments. I had a brief moment where I watched the bone as it seemed to grow back almost immediately and filled in the gap left behind from the damage.

The monster swung its arm to try to clothesline me and Star actually deployed some sort of taser on my legs to make them go limp, dropping me down faster than I could have possibly reacted normally. I scrambled out of the way and the boy went to pursue me. He slapped his hand down on top of me as several cubes erupted from the floor, pelting him in the face and stunning him. Several more cubes erupted from the walls, the ceiling, and the floor, knocking the monster around violently. Jessica roared angrily and pointed her free arm at the boy and the cubes, unleashing a chain of lightning that jumped from one block to the next and even surged through the boy himself. All the cubes dropped out of the air, completely powerless as the boy dropped down on a hand and knee, slowly picking himself up off the floor. The lightning passed through him harmlessly, as if it had no effect on him whatsoever.

One last cube roared through the air faster than the others and was coming right for the boy, approaching from behind where I was guessing the A.I. was hoping he would have a blind spot. In a terrifying display of power, not only did the boy reach behind himself and catch the cube out of the air, he managed to bring it back ground in front of him and snarled at me as he crushed the cube like it was made out of aluminum in front of my very eyes.

“Required force necessary to destroy that would exceed 450,000 PSI,” advised Star. “New model developed, recommend locating nearest exit.”

“Do that,” I blurted out as Star rapidly deployed a visor around my head and quickly highlighted a path leading away from the boy and towards the elevator.

“I’ve got a pulse!” said Lydia urgently as she checked Director Misiam’s vitals. Agent Pierce quickly let go of him and scrambled to his feet. He jumped back as Jessica flung a charge of energy in his general direction, almost catching him. “Jessica, stop!”

Jessica roared at Lydia violently and barred her teeth, but she didn’t blast lightning at her like everyone else.

“Jessica, I’m trying to help your daddy,” explained Lydia, trying to calm her down. “I need you to stop fighting us and calm down, okay?”

“Daddy…” said Jessica, seeming to shift her focus towards Director Misiam on the floor.

“Jessica…” groaned Director Misiam weakly. Jessica’s aggression quickly faded as she let go of the cube she was interfacing with, and it collapsed onto the floor in a heap. In a sudden flash, the lightning Jessica was emitting abruptly disappeared and she fell over, completely barren but resembling a perfectly normal human girl. Lydia quickly slid from Director Misiam over to her and snatched her lab coat off, wrapping the girl in it as she laid unconscious.

“HEY!” roared Agent Pierce loudly. The boy began to charge me again but stopped in his tracks, spinning around, and snarling at Agent Pierce. He quickly shed his lab coat, revealing a set of bionic-armor he was wearing as well. Agent Pierce steadily marched towards his son, seeming to roll back the sleeves on his arms.

“I might have shitty handwriting, but those runes should have done something,” growled Agent Pierce. He suddenly began speaking in an incomprehensible language and to my surprise, the boy responded fluently in the same language.

“So, you are in there…” growled Agent Pierce. “Omega, assessment.”

“If Jessica Misiam was able to revert to human form, it is possible that the subject could be forced into reversion as well,” advised Omega.

“Am I staring at… HIM??” asked Agent Pierce. Something in his voice changed with that one word. The commanding tone and sense of control faded with the word “him”. Something told me that deep down, he wasn’t talking about his son. I wasn’t so sure he was even referring to Xertarnius, but whatever it was, he upheld it with terrifying reverence.

“Darkfall Protocol is not in effect,” advised Star. “Not yet.”

“Override all protective measures,” ordered Agent Pierce. “Lethal force authorized, I can’t allow him to escape this facility.”

“I’ll kill you long before that,” growled the boy in a menacing, deeper voice. This time, it spoke fluent English with no resemblance to the broken English the mutated boy spoke with prior to his transformation.

“Lydia, get Yuri and the girl out of here,” ordered Agent Pierce. He glanced at me. “Run.”

I rose to my feet and prepared to run in the direction of Lydia, Jessica, and Director Misiam when something else caught my eye. I turned my head and spotted a figure, crumpled on the ground. It laid outside of the third and final chamber of the Fusion Modulator. I couldn’t make out many details from how far away I was, but Star locked onto it on the visor and was unable to confirm the identity either.

I rushed towards the Fusion Modulator while Agent Pierce and the boy began to brawl. I didn’t pay them much attention, other than noting that Agent Pierce was significantly better at fighting in hand-to-hand combat than I would have initially guessed. The machine loomed over everything else as I rushed past it, despite the trauma it inflicted, it appeared to be relatively intact other than the damage Joseph and Jessica both unleashed as they emerged. I rushed to the final chamber, the one where Xertarnius had put itself into. Instead of finding some hulking, formless behemoth that had mutated even further as a result of the fusion event, I found something just as equally alarming lying on the floor outside the final pod. It was a child, that was the only thing I was positive of. Despite the fact all clothing had been vaporized like the other two, I legitimately could not tell if it was male or female. The child displayed attributes present in both Joseph and Jessica prior to the event. Without putting much more thought into it, I scooped the child up off the floor and Star marked the fastest and safest path.

I rushed towards Lydia and Jessica while noticing the other surviving researchers, including Dr. Mengele and Dr. Longsword, as they rushed towards the exit elevator. A powerful thunderclap echoed across the room, and I turned to watch the fight just long enough to see Agent Pierce countering a punch from his son, catching it, and dissipating the energy. Lydia was trying to drag Director Misiam backwards towards the elevator, but she was too injured to do that and carry Jessica as well.

“Run for the exit,” I insisted.

“I can’t leave him!” argued Lydia. I reached down and picked up Director Misiam and using the strength of the bionic-armor, I tossed him over my shoulder. It was a good thing he was still unconscious, or he might have had some choice words for me, but right now I was focused on getting us out of there alive.

We rushed for the elevator doors as they opened ahead of us. Around twenty or so security guards rushed in with weapons trained. They briefly locked onto us but realized we were fleeing from the carnage, spotting Agent Pierce engaging the monster across the room. They bolted past us as we reached the elevator doors. Lydia and I stepped through opening, carrying the unconscious survivors. Right as I turned back around, I caught the briefest glimpse of the fight unfolding across the room. The security teams were still too far away to do anything, Agent Pierce was completely on his own in the fight of his life against his own son. Despite the panicked chatter of everyone in the elevator car, as the doors slid closed, I witnessed the cardinal sin. Agent Pierce, standing over his own son and the monster roaring back at him, looking down the barrel of Agent Pierce’s pistol. For the briefest moment, I heard the powerful bang as the shot went off. The monster’s head jerked backwards as the shot pierced its skull and it quickly reverted form back into that of the human boy as he tumbled backwards onto the floor. With that, the doors closed shut and we finally escaped that blindingly bright hell.

Upstairs, we were in the barracks turned makeshift infirmary as the few researchers trained in medical procedures quickly tended to those who needed it. Director Misiam was laid out on one of the beds with several people surrounding him, studying his vitals and trying to stabilize him. Lydia walked over, having washed the blood off her face and having bandaged her injury on her head. She had a limp and bruises covered her body, but she was alive. She approached me as I sat on the floor, my back to the wall.

“You okay?” asked Lydia tiredly.

“I should be asking you,” I replied, getting back up to my feet. “You should be in a bed too.”

“I can’t…” she said quietly, looking around at the other researchers being treated. “I’m fine.”

“Are you?” I asked quietly. That look she gave answered me without ever saying a word. Neither of us were okay, not after what we had both just witnessed. Scientific discovery be damned, the horrors we had observed left us both scarred, permanently. I would never close my eyes at night against without remembering what I saw in there. I’m not a very religious person, but if there is a God, he gave us a glimpse of the hell that awaited us and awaited the rest of the world if Day Zero ever occurred.

She nodded for me to follow. I walked along with her out of the infirmary. As we emerged, sirens began to sound once again. The elevator leading to the surface opened and dozens more guards, far more heavily armed than the original response team, rushed down the hallway. Some of them glanced at me as they passed, seeing me still suited in the bionic-armor. Lydia grabbed my arm as she spotted a figure that stood out in the crowd as they rushed towards the elevator leading towards the basement.

“Oh my god…” muttered Lydia.

“Where are they going??” I asked.

“They are engaging the target,” advised Star through the bionic-armor. “Omega has been forced to enact drastic measures to protect Agent Pierce and has shifted to defensive formations. Given Omega’s tendency towards aggression, this is highly uncharacteristic and should emphasize the severity of the situation.”

“What target? He shot him in the head, I watched it,” I argued.

“Sensors indicate test subject is fully conscious and has engaged forces in the lower atrium,” explained Star.

“You saw that too, right??” I asked Lydia. She pointed down the hall at the elevator leading to the basement and pointed out a distraught looking woman mixed in with the crowd. “Who is that?”

“His mother,” said Lydia quietly. We heard light tapping on glass beyond the sirens. We both looked around and spotted Jessica, now suited in a new Triarch jumpsuit as she stood in the children’s bedroom where Dr. Mengele and I initially retrieved them from. Lydia and I hurried to the door and Lydia tried to scan her hand on the door.

“Access denied,” reported Angel.

“Welcome back,” said Star offhandedly.

“Disregarding comment,” replied Angel.

“What the hell do you mean denied?” demanded Lydia. “This is my department.”

“Per Founding Council,” replied Angel. “Class one override or higher required.” Lydia seemed highly upset and clearly Jessica wanted us. I snatched the glove off my hand and put my hand to the scanner instead. Before Jessica could say something, the monitor lit up green.

“Access approved,” responded Angel. “Welcome back Agent Stark.”

The door slid open, and Lydia rushed in, scooping Jessica up and embracing her tightly.

“I wanna see daddy,” insisted Jessica as Lydia held her.

“I know baby,” said Lydia, brushing the back of her head. “He’s gonna be here soon, okay?” I walked over to the bed where the other child I rescued laid. Lydia had dressed them in a Triarch jumpsuit as well, but they hadn’t awakened yet. I studied them for a moment, still unsure about what exactly they were supposed to represent. If Jessica was supposed to represent the power used in the fusion process and Joseph was supposed to embody the devastating power that Xertarnius wielded, what was this child? I gently brushed the child’s head, they seemed to react to the contact, but didn’t open their eyes or say anything at all.

“You might get in serious trouble getting us in here,” remarked Lydia.

“I don’t care,” I muttered. “What the hell did we do?”

“I had no idea any of that was going to happen,” insisted Lydia. “All I was told was that the children needed to be brought to the machine. I thought it was to coax Xertarnius inside.”

“Did I hurt daddy?” asked Jessica worriedly.

“Daddy’s gonna be okay,” Lydia promised her.

“I want daddy,” sniffled Jessica. I glanced back at them and realized as Lydia held Jessica that Jessica was holding out her hand, a small arc of lightning pulsing between her fingers as she studied her own hand. Lydia and I exchanged worried expressions, unsure of what we had helped unleash on the world. 

April 9th, 2013

Passing through the private terminal, I don’t think I said a single word to anyone. My bionic-armor was practically undetectable, I passed through an x-ray machine, and it never once alerted the TSA attendant of its presence. No doubt I would have been allowed clearance given this entire terminal was secluded from the rest of the airport.

I couldn’t help but stare at the faces as I passed. People were completely absorbed in their own lives, oblivious to the horrors that awaited them in the coming hours. I watched one man pass by while on his cell phone, consumed in a conversation concerning some business merger that would never take place because of people like me. Another woman I passed cradled a child in her arms, cooing at them to distract them from the sensory overload caused by everyone nearby. She had no idea that she would be second guessing herself and seriously considering abandoning her own child as a swarm of bloodthirsty creatures prowled around her hiding place. A young couple saying goodbye to one another, very unaware that it would be the last time either would see each other. Neither would live through the end of the week, distraught over the reality that they would never see those they loved again.

I had seen so much death up until that point, I had been the hand that brought about so much of it. For most, there was a brief moment of serenity, a relief of knowing that suffering was about to end. Knowing the end was so close, it was as though the universe wanted me to see both sides of the coin. My heart flailed erratically in my chest as I walked down that long corridor leading towards the private jet that would deliver me to my final destination: Facility 51. I watched as another aircraft taxied out onto the runway, unmarked and indicative of Triarch’s presence. No doubt Agent Pierce himself was on that flight, heading to New York City to begin the deadliest day in human history. We were both travelers in limbo now, traversing the sky like the River Styx, approaching hell and knowing there was no turning back now. Day Zero was about to begin.

August 18th, 1998

My taxicab rolled to a stop just outside the front of the building. Triarch Corporate Headquarters was a sight to behold, but like all aspects of Triarch, it blended in with its surroundings. Dozens of floors loomed above me, it was the eighth tallest building in all of New York City. Unlike many structures in the area, the lobby and ground floor were not level with the street. A set of shallow concrete steps led up to the large platform the tower was established on. The building might not have stood above the others, but it stood above all other on the ground. Triarch had a way of slyly getting ahead of others and this was just one more notch in their belt. No other building in the entire city was as elevated as this one structure.

A series of three openings lead into the building, adorned with simple landscaping and appearing as though they were like any other entrance. When you’ve worked there long enough, you begin to notice the minor details. They were more than just doorframes, tracks lining the edges were set in place with retracted spikes and sliding walls built to seal the building down tighter than some military bases. Triarch was tasked with handling incredibly sensitive information, secrets that could put the world in danger even without the bioweapons I had observed weeks earlier. Schematics for experimental weaponry, algorithms capable of predicting major political events and advocating for the most preferable outcome for Triarch’s administration, and diseases capable of bringing the world to its knees in a matter of hours were just a few of the demons caged within the building.

I knew my summons was not a casual formality. Though weeks earlier, I walked through these doors like so many others, I wasn’t the same man that went into Omega Site in Manchester. The world was oblivious to the dangers we kept hidden from them. Even if I couldn’t sleep at night, knowing I was one of the few who stood between humanity and ultimate destruction was something worth living for.

I stepped through the doors and immediately I felt all eyes on me. There were roughly a dozen other people in the lobby and while they weren’t paying me much attention, the cameras throughout the building seemed to turn ever so slightly and monitored my approach. When you first come to work for Triarch, you think you’re just paranoid. Around the third month in, you realize that’s just standard operating procedure.

The floors were polished and spotless, sunlight creeping in through high windows deflected off the floor and illuminated everything. The center of the main atrium contained a large, ornate water fountain. It continuously pumped water steadily, but the water did not froth. The gentle trickling as it flowed down the levels was soothing and a cool breeze drifted through the lobby, seeming to originate from the fountain itself.

There was something always off about that structure, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. Everything, and I meant everything, had a purpose. Of course, anything to do with the number 3 usually stood for the three icons within the Triarch logo. However, in Triarch’s most secretive or authoritative facilities, they instead favored the number 5. I could even understand the number 4 holding some weight to things, given the 4 figureheads of Triarch. But why five? What was so special about that number? There were exactly five blooms originating from the center of the fountain and everything trickled down five layers. Was I missing something, some part of the puzzle that had never been introduced to the game?

“Triarch Industries, please hold,” said the receptionist at the desk off to the left side of the lobby. I approached and she finished marking something down on a sheet of paper.

“Can I help you?” asked the receptionist.

“I’m here for a meeting,” I responded, retrieving my ID badge from inside my suit coat and presenting it to the receptionist. She took and it and began to key in the information into the terminal in front of her. She seemed briefly stumped before keying in the information again, the confusion soon returned as she passed me back my badge.

“I’m sorry, I’m not showing you’re on the roster for today,” said the receptionist. “Who are you here to see?”

“Director Misiam,” I said. She seemed to size me up for a moment before getting back to work on the terminal again.

“I’m not the best with these new computers,” she remarked as she entered some information. “One moment, let me try looking somewhere else.”

“No problem,” I said. I glanced around the room, studying some of the other architecture. My ear picked up on something different, the slow tapping of the keyboard was briefly replaced by one stroke of a different key. There was a softer click that did not line up with the heavier strokes of the keyboard. I turned back to her and noticed she quickly averted her gaze from me and shifted back to her screen.

“What did you say your name was again?” asked the receptionist.

“Agent Stark,” I responded hesitantly. “…it was on the badge.”

“Right…” she nodded, briefly looking at me before going back to her screen. “Sorry, bad with names. If you’d like to take a seat, I’ll get you once I’ve gotten some more information for you.”

“Normally I’d be fine with that, but my meeting starts in ten minutes,” I said.

“Director Misiam isn’t seeing any visitors today,” she remarked. I picked up on movement behind me, but I kept my focus on her for the time being.

“I understand that, but I was called here by his office,” I reiterated. “My security clearance was recently modified to class one operative; I don’t know if that’s why you seem to be struggling to find me in your system.”

“I see you in my system,” she assured me. “And according to what I’m seeing, you’re supposedly assigned to the Nashville Field Office for the time being.”

“I’ve never worked in Nashville a day in my life,” I said sternly. I felt a hand on my shoulder and glanced back to see a security guard behind me. This wasn’t your average retired cop turned mall guard, he stood around five inches taller than me and easily had 150 lbs. on me.

“Why don’t you come with me?” asked the guard. “Let’s go have a little talk.”

“I have a meeting,” I assured him. “And unless you want to answer to Agent Pierce and Director Misiam on why you didn’t let me in, I highly recommend you let go of me before I break your hand.”

“Is that a threat?” asked the guard in such a way as asking me if I really wanted to go through with this.

“It’s about to be a promise,” I assured him quietly.

“Stark!” shouted a voice across the lobby. We turned and I spotted Lydia approaching with a briefcase in hand. “I was hoping I wasn’t going to be the late one.”

“Dr. Lydia, you know him?” asked the receptionist hesitantly.

“Of course I do,” said Lydia, assessing the situation as she reached us. “Is there a reason you aren’t letting him in?”

“He’s not assigned to be here today,” said the receptionist hesitantly.

“He’s also got a mouth,” remarked the guard, still tightly gripping my shoulder.

“Both of you stand down before I have you both written up,” ordered Lydia. “He’s with me and we’ve got a meeting to get to.”

“Director Misiam is out until-” started the receptionist.

“How about you stop before you dig yourself into a hole you can’t get out of?” reminded Lydia. “You don’t have clearance to stop him. You also don’t have clearance to know everyone who comes and goes from this building. So, rent-a-cop, stand down before Agent Stark shows you why he’s just coming back from leave. I will gladly sign off on the authorization for use of excessive force against internal personnel.”

The guard reluctantly let go and we just glared at one another for a moment before I walked over and joined Lydia as we approached an elevator.

“Real warm reception,” I muttered.

“I hate corporate grunts,” remarked Lydia coldly. “I don’t think any of them know how to say please or thank you.”

“Thanks for backing me up,” I remarked.

“I think that’s the least I can do, given our track record,” remarked Lydia. I reached the elevator before her and pressed the button. The doors slid open, and I motioned for her to go ahead. She cracked a grin and stepped in, and I joined her.

“Are you always a gentleman?” she asked.

“Only every now and then,” I said, cutting a grin at her as well. She swiped her card on the control panel and all the lights on the buttons suddenly turned off.

“Administrative override registered, welcome back Dr. Lydia Lowery,” said a familiar automated voice.

“Thank you, Star,” nodded Lydia.

“Agent Edward Stark, a pleasure to see you again,” remarked Star.

“They’ve got you playing bellboy and armor operator??” I asked jokingly.

“I do what is necessary,” stated Star.

“Isn’t this normally Angel’s job?” inquired Lydia curiously.

“Angel is currently predisposed of,” explained Star. “Where to?”

“I believe you already know,” said Lydia.

“Penthouse, coming up,” reported Star as the elevator slowly began to rise.

“Edward, huh?” asked Lydia, cracking a grin at me again. “You don’t strike me as an Edward.”

“Parents couldn’t think of anything else,” I sighed as she gave a light laugh. “That’s why I go by Stark.”

“Mind if I call you it?” she asked. I sighed, shaking my head.

“I supposed I could tolerate it,” I remarked. The elevator rose upwards, nowhere near as fast as the lift leading to Omega Site. Within a few seconds, we ascended far beyond the floors everyone else had access to. The doors slid open, and a luxury penthouse stood before us. My eyes shifted to the individual near the door who turned to us. It was like studying a ghost for a second as I locked eyes with the same girl I fought with a mile underground.

Her face lit up as she spotted us both.

“Lydia!” said Jessica excitedly. In a startling display of power, she suddenly vanished from where she was standing and appeared right in front of us, tightly clinging to Lydia’s leg as I briefly spotted a cascade of electricity dissipate into the elevator car around us the lights flickered.

“Hey Jess…” said Lydia cautiously. She passed me her briefcase and reached down, carefully lifting Jessica up into her arms as Jessica seemed happy to see her. She looked at me, she didn’t seem scared, but she did seem to recognize me.

“Jess, this is Stark, remember him?” asked Lydia.

“Star!!?” said Jessica, her face lighting up.

“No, Star-KUH. With a ‘k’,” she reiterated gently.

“Can you make the lights flash??” asked Jessica, disregarding what Lydia just said.

“Don’t bother,” remarked Star quietly in the background. “I’m going back to the ground floor before she melts my circuit boards… again.”

“Why don’t you go play in your room?” asked Lydia.

“Okay!” said Jessica, suddenly vanishing in a bolt of light. Lydia was startled and stepped back. I stepped closer, thinking she was going to faint.

“You okay?” I asked.

“Yeah…” said Lydia, stunned. “…I didn’t… feel a thing…”

“She’s become much more skilled with understanding her abilities,” remarked Victor. I lifted my head to see him sitting on the couch up ahead along with Ian Longsword and a few others who were standing around the room. I recognized each of them, all these faces were people who were down in Omega Site when the experiment took place. With our arrival, we appeared to be some of the last members of the surviving group.

“Not to mention a personality shift,” commented Ian curiously.

“Is the boy here too?” I asked before taking another step into the room.

“There’s no way in hell we’d bring him in the middle of a populated city,” said Victor, almost laughing at the suggestion. “C’mon Stark, I thought you’d know better than that.”

“He’s still locked up in Omega Site,” explained Lydia as we stepped into the room. “We’ve basically moved Vicki in down there for the time being while we try to figure out how to keep him contained.”

“Is he still on rampage??” I said in disbelief.

“He’s breached containment half a dozen times, but never made it topside,” admitted Ian. “Thank god.”

“Lydia, come play with teddy!” insisted Jessica, suddenly appearing in the room with a flash of light, as if someone just fired off a camera in everyone’s face and disoriented them.

“I’ll come play with you in just a minute Jess, we’ve gotta talk adult stuff for now, okay??” asked Lydia. Jessica seemed saddened but walked away like a normal human toddler. We heard a door open, and everyone turned to see none other than Agent Pierce helping Director Misiam out of his bedroom. Director Misiam looked to be in rough shape and was dressed in comfortable clothes as if he was at home. It suddenly dawned on me that this wasn’t just some penthouse office at the top of Triarch Corporate Headquarters. It was his actual living space, that’s why Jessica was up here as well.

“Easy,” said Bill worriedly. “Don’t push it.”

“I can walk by myself, thank you,” insisted Yuri. Bill reluctantly let go of him and straightened himself up, fixing his suit while Yuri staggered into the room in what was clearly his sleeping clothes.

“My apologizes for the… casual attire,” remarked Yuri. “And thank you all for coming on such short notice.”

“Here, sit,” insisted Victor, rising up from his seat. Director Misiam slowly staggered over and took a seat, taking slow breaths. His brow was already beading up with sweat and he looked absolutely exhausted walking such a short distance.

“We could have done this on a phone call,” insisted Bill.

“I’m not putting the security of my company in the hands of the local telephone company who cannot maintain dial-up connections on a regular basis,” insisted Yuri. “Quite honestly, you’re lucky I’m even allowing you to be in this room for this conversation.”

“Do you want some water?” asked Lydia. Director Misiam looked as though he was going to decline and then halfheartedly nodded. Lydia moved over to the kitchen area to retrieve a glass.

“We’re gathered here today for something very important,” explain Yuri. “And I’m sure you’ve all figured it out by now.”

“Most of them had no idea what they were walking into,” reiterated Bill. Yuri cut his eyes to his associate; Bill didn’t blink. “They were following orders.”

“Orders that nearly got my daughter and your son erased from existence,” said Yuri firmly. “All of you standing in this room today, we’re not talking to one another by our ranks or our titles. As individuals who have shared an experience, I wanted to bring us together. To debrief… and to settle things. Ian, go ahead.”

“On July 18th, we accomplished something the greatest minds in history have hoped to achieve. Omega Site and the men and women standing in this room today were witnesses to the first recorded instance of pure fusion,” explained Ian. “Three beings went in; three beings came out.”

“Of those three beings, Xertarnius was one of them,” explained Victor. “While Yuri wishes to keep things personal, I do wish to reiterate the importance of confidentiality. The events we are discussing are not to be brought up with anyone else. You will be discredited, you will be terminated, and the world will forget you existed.”

“Victor,” said Yuri sternly.

“Yuri,” reminded Bill. “You can be pissed at me all you want, but Vic is right. We’ve got a business to run, and if the world ever finds out what we did, your child will be locked in a cage just like mine is right this second.”

“Like hell she will,” asserted Yuri firmly. He coughed weakly and Lydia brought him the glass of water. I noticed how much his hands trembled as he took it from her, carefully lifting it to his face to take a much-needed sip. “…thank you.”

“Sir… why??” asked one of the other agents in the room. Bill sighed and rubbed his face.

“If I was at liberty to say why, I would,” admitted Bill. “Confidential or not, I’ll take my chances on keeping a couple of secrets of my own that only a handful of people know about. The same reason Yuri hasn’t moved to have me fired as vice president of Triarch.”

“Don’t,” said Yuri firmly. “Don’t test me.”

“Triarch has been a weapons manufacturing powerhouse since its creation by Yuri’s grandfather following World War Two,” explained Bill. “When Mikhail took control following Donovan’s death, he shifted the company to focus on alternative energy methods. Methods that… controversial as they may be… set the groundwork for the experiment that took place a few weeks ago. Yuri has done an incredible job bringing Triarch to the public and servicing the needs of the government as well as the common family while at the same time retaining the sophistication and secrecy of a para-governmental agency. It was that goal that we were attempting to achieve in 1994 when we came across… something else.”

The looks on Director Misiam and Agent Pierce’s faces suddenly shifted to that of dread and fear as they both muttered a phrase in unison under their breaths.

“May God have mercy on our souls…” they both whispered. It sent chills down my back and seemed to unnerve some of the others.

“What we encountered made us realize that Triarch needed to blend the best of both aspects, both energy production and weapons manufacturing, if we were to align the goals of Triarch with the steps the world needed to take to ensure humanity’s continued existence.” explained Bill. “This is what led to the discovery of Xertarnius.”

“It is… difficult to explain the full story,” explained Victor. “Just as it is difficult to explain what went down in Omega Site. How do you explain to someone how a small child turned into a being made of pure lightning and went on rampage?”

“You don’t,” said one of the other agents quietly, shaking her head.

“Xertarnius, unlike us, is not a carbon-based lifeform,” explained Ian. “Its genetic structure and chemical composition are unlike any other specimen we’ve ever collected before and our attempts at identifying the origin of the creature pre-date written history. We’re unsure if it is extradimensional, extraterrestrial, or what it is… but it is one of a kind.”

“And so, your first guess of what to do with it was to combine it with two children?” I asked bluntly. Victor and Ian eyed one another reluctantly.

“Funny you should say that…” said Yuri, cutting his eyes at Bill once again. “I said the same thing.”

“We’re dealing with forces far beyond what any of us are capable of,” explained Bill firmly. “I’m not saying that a man of science, I’m saying that as a witness to the raw power of… IT. The thing we encountered that wasn’t Xertarnius. I’m compromising the safety of everyone in this room by even delving into this information, but I want you to understand the gravity of what stands in front of us. When we emerged in 1994 from our expedition, two full years before we got close to discovering Xertarnius, there were 4 of us. Of those four, only two are sitting in this room right now, me and Yuri. Four, no more, no less. I checked flight logs, watched hundreds of hours of footage, I have spent literal days of my life hunting for this answer. According to everything I have encountered so far and our lapses in memory, there is no reasonable solution for how we managed to escape the creature we discovered in 1994 and kept it from wiping out life as we know it. I had to take a step back and isolate the variables and determine what I was missing. We figured it out and the implications are… beyond disturbing.” There was an eerie silence as everyone waited for Agent Pierce to continue with his story.

“We went in with seven people,” explained Yuri quietly. “Supply consumption and our preparations don’t align with that number. It shouldn’t have been seven, it should have been eight.”

“Based on what we can tell… it may have been. Five of us should have come out, only four did.”

“Five…” I muttered, thinking back to what I witnessed when I first entered the building.

“I know, it doesn’t make sense,” said Bill, trying to get on the same level as everyone else. “But it’s the only answer that adds up. Star, whiteboard.”

“Deploying,” reported Star as the ceiling tiles slid aside while Star lowered a whiteboard from the ceiling. Bill pulled a marker off the side of it and began drawing for all of us.

“The vessel contained a barracks with eight individual beds,” explained Bill, drawing out a diagram to display what he was talking about. “Now, considering they were all bunkbeds, you can dismiss the mystery eighth person. The canteen, however, contained enough rations to allow us to survive on our exploration for around a month. Just in case something went wrong and those back at basecamp needed to come up with a way to rescue us. If you calculate for a standard 2000-calorie diet, even if you buffer for 500 extra given the extra activity, there was a significant caloric surplus accounted for in supplies. Weight would have played a massive role in our expedition, and we were meticulous in ensuring that we were within 100 pounds of our estimates. There is no way we would have miscalculated that far. Not when adding another crewmate results in precisely the proper amount of supplies being stocked onboard. Same goes for weaponry, we had too much ammunition in the armory for seven individuals. Add in one more person? Everything adds up like it should.”

“Sir… can we go back to the whole ‘seven went in, four came out’ bit??” asked a researcher hesitantly.

“Along the way, we lost good people,” said Yuri quietly. “Our captain, one of the most brilliant thermonuclear engineers I’ve ever had the honor of working alongside of, and our survival expert.”

“What kind of vessel were you in?” asked Lydia reluctantly.

“Classified,” said Bill, shaking his head.

“I suppose where is out of the question as well,” I remarked. Yuri nodded.

“We were at basecamp,” admitted Victor, shaken up as well. “We had no idea what was going on with the rest of the crew.”

“I can still hear the screaming,” said Ian, shaking his head and shuddering. “I’ve never heard terror come across a radio like that before.”

“One person doesn’t just vanish,” insisted an agent.

“No DNA was left behind, no blood, no belongings, and yet someone else was in our vessel. Someone else went on the expedition with us in 1994 and when we came back, there were only 4 of us. We have reason to believe… that what we encountered was somehow capable of rewriting history or reality or just our memories… and has effectively erased someone from existence in our universe.”

“Oh my god…” said Lydia, horrified.

“We can’t prove it, because they don’t exist,” explained Yuri. “But… he’s completely right… and I have no doubt in my mind that what we discovered is capable of such a feat.”

“Two years later and I got a lead,” explained Bill. I suddenly picked up on a change in his speaking patterns. The way he recited the next few phrases didn’t feel like someone digging into their memories. It felt like someone reading a script and reciting rehearsed lines. I looked around the room to see if anyone else seemed to notice, but they all seemed to disregard it to some degree. “The lead led us to previously undiscovered ruin in extremely isolated territory.”

“Bill, Victor, and Ian were the only ones to come back from that excursion,” Yuri nodded.

“You had other things going on,” Bill said quietly. “I didn’t think it was going to play out like it did in ’94.”

“What happened in ’96?” asked another agent.

“That’s where I discovered Xertarnius,” explained Bill. “We managed to contain it and proceeded to transport it back to the states for further research.”

“When we agreed that Xertarnius was the solution to the issue we faced, I did not mean for you to take it and use it to turn my little girl into a weapon of mass destruction,” said Yuri firmly. “You corrupted her.”

“Yuri, please,” insisted Bill fervently. “You didn’t see what I saw.”

“Your vision isn’t perfect,” asserted Yuri. “If I didn’t think you might turn this in your favor, you’d be rotting in a jail cell or another casualty in Omega Site. She’s all that I have left, do you even understand that? You still have your wife to hold your child, I don’t. That’s not something Jessica will ever get to experience again.”

“I did something any parent should want,” assured Bill. “We gave our children a shield of protection against the outside world.” He paused and signaled towards the hallway where Jessica retreated to. “Call her.”

“Why, so you can do something else without asking??” asked Yuri.

“Please,” insisted Bill. Yuri was silent for several seconds before calling out.

“Jessica,” called out Yuri. In a sudden burst of light, Jessica was sitting on her father’s lap attentively with her doll in her hands.

“Daddy??” asked Jessica innocently.

“Unharmed,” described Bill. “…unharmable. She can’t be killed. You were after the ultimate energy source… and here it sits in front of you.”

“And what were you after?” asked Yuri, eyeing Bill. “Power? Because that’s what he got.”

“Bill, what were those runes?” asked Victor, crossing his arms. “We all saw you write them down.”

“An ace in the hole,” explained Bill. “I preserved the consciousness of Xertarnius, hoping that with a human form, it might be cooperative with us and might share some insight into its creation and its purpose. If our theories are correct and Xertarnius was built to combat the monster that we unleashed down there… we’re going to need every advantage we can get.”

“…was it worth it?” asked Lydia. Bill paused, unable to look anyone in the eye.

“Immortality at the cost of humanity…” muttered Bill. “Maker of monsters… I suppose time will tell. Just remember… you can hold your daughter in your arms at night. That is a luxury I will never be able to afford again.”

“Xertarnius is rapidly taking control as the dominant consciousness,” explained Ian. “Left unchecked, any fragments of your son may be lost to the weapon we tried to forge.”

“Yuri, I hope one day you can forgive me,” admitted Bill. “But our children are the beginning of something greater than any of us. If we want to ensure the future exists, we have to understand what Xertarnius is made of and how we can prepare the world for what is yet to come.”

“I don’t know what I’m more disgusted with…” muttered Yuri. “You… or that some part of me deep down understands exactly what you mean.”

“Help me get my son back and I promise you that together, we’ll make sure there is a future for us and all of our children,” noted Bill firmly. He began to look around the room. “I brought each of you here for a very specific reason. You are more than just survivors of the events that took place at Omega Site. You’re part of something bigger now. Each of you will be working together with the administration of Triarch to build a better tomorrow today. Lydia, the children connect with you on a level no one understands. Stark, when shit hit the fan, you were there with a mop, and you didn’t flinch. Thompson, your team made sure the families of those who lost their lives in their dedication to the advancement of science were at peace without compromising security. Trice, I think everyone in this room knows that your quick actions are the reason that Yuri sits in front of us today. If I ever go down in a fight, I damn sure know who I want patching me up. Rodriguez, your security team was down in the pit before you even knew what we were up against. Each of you men and women in this room displayed the qualities that Triarch Industries seeks to uplift and utilize towards the future of humanity. I can’t build this future unless I have a team of people who want to work with me to see it come to life. I definitely can’t do this alone.”

“I’m in,” nodded Victor. “I’ll build whatever machines we need to make it work.”

“I suppose I’m in as well,” nodded Ian. “It’s going to take a lot of string pulling to get everyone else to cooperate with our efforts.”

“Are you saying that more children will suffer like they did?” asked Lydia reluctantly.

“Does Jessica look like she’s suffering?” asked Bill sincerely. She turned to see Jessica was nearly dozing off in her father’s arms. “We might not see the long-term fruits of our labor, but do you trust anyone else to plant the seeds?”

“...I’m in,” said Lydia, giving in. She glanced at me, almost as if she was seeking my validation. I locked eyes with Agent Pierce and after some brief internal discussion, I nodded to him.

“Tell me what to do,” I responded. One by one, every person in the room agreed. Bill turned to Yuri lastly.

“They trust me to lead them,” said Bill. “…do you?”

Yuri studied his daughter carefully as she nestled her head against him, her chest slowly rising and falling with each breath.

“Fix Joseph,” said Yuri quietly. “Then we’ll talk.”

“Stark, Lydia, you’re with me,” said Agent Pierce. “Everyone else, head back to your facilities. We’ll be in touch soon; you’ll be leading your task forces and we’ll come up with suitable candidates for each of you. On your feet soldiers, we’ve got work to do.”

January 7th, 1994

I sat in the seat as the recruiter slowly read through my file. He never took a break to look up at me, although he would be disappointed if he came to see me shake in my seat. Triarch was a fairly private company and other than weapons manufacturing and alternative energy research, it kept most of what it did close to its chest. I wrote a dozen other requests to other agencies, even the D.I.A. I hadn’t heard so much as a word from the others. Triarch took their time, but no doubt I was one of many others.

“Alright Mr. Stark…” remarked the recruiter as he put my information back into the binder I presented it in. “Tell me, what got you interested in Triarch?”

“I wanted a career with stability,” I admitted. “I’ve worked desk jobs since college and I’m looking to set up something for the future. I’ve read up on Triarch and it seems like you guys are in it for the long haul.”

“Says here you got your degree from Stanford in… Experimental Psychology,” said the recruiter, double checking the file once more. “Tell me about that, I’m not familiar with the study. Are we talking about untested methods or what all does that entail?”

“Experimental Psychology is more about putting concepts to action, collecting data and performing research for whatever it is they are hoping to accomplish,” I explained.

“Interesting…” nodded the recruiter. “What exactly do you hope to use your degree for in an industry like Triarch?”

“To be quite honest sir, something like what you’re doing right now,” I explained. “You’re assessing me to figure out if I’m a right fit for the company. You have a preliminary assessment from reading my file and then you have your first impression when I walk in the door. By that point, you’ve almost made up your mind, the interview is more of a formality to see if there’s more to what’s sitting on the paper. It’s my job to show you what I’m capable of. At the same time, you’ve got to work with an air of caution. People blow smoke all the time, you’ve got to see past it to see if what’s standing in front of you is capable of what it claims to be. The only thing I ask for is a chance to do just that.”

The recruiter cracked a grin. I don’t know if they knew how deep things would go in a matter of years, but I did it. I convinced them I was worthy of being redacted from the world as we knew it.

August 20th, 1998

It was still dark out when the helicopter touched down in front of the doors to the facility. It was around 4:00am and no one else stirred in the entirety of the small town. The doors opened and armed operatives arrived to welcome me as I stepped out, suited in combat armor with the bionic-armor hooked up underneath everything. Ever since the A.I. hooked me up with it, it was hard to remember operating without it. I no longer had a sore back at the end of the day, I could stand upright for hours without breaking a sweat, lift three times as much as I could before, and there was some peace of mind knowing it was fast enough to respond to the forces of a biological super weapon.

Admittedly, my heart was pounding in my chest. It had only been a couple of weeks since I was last here and Omega Site was still lingering in my dreams. That musty, stagnant smell hit me like a truck, memories flooding in with it as I followed the operatives inside the building. Though we hadn’t said a word yet, they were on edge. While progressing along, the faint lights in the hallway dimly illuminating everything, I could have sworn that for the briefest of moments, I felt the entire building rumble as a monstrous roar echoed up from deep below.

“How long has he been like this?” I asked.

“It breached containment again around two hours ago,” explained one of the other operatives. “It managed to down the communications relay which delayed in our response time.”

“You still got here pretty damn quick sir,” admitted the other operative.

“I was just over the mountain planning to come in today anyways,” I responded. “One hell of a wakeup call.”

It felt different having operatives that once were so high above me in clearance that I could even speak to them directly now referring to me as their superior. I wasn’t one for the spotlight, others handle that better than I did, I was satisfied with performing my job and knowing I did it right. I had some pride in my work, but nothing I ever verbalized to others. I made sure I did my job so that if anyone came in behind me and questioned my decisions, there was no hesitation in understanding my train of thought.

“We’re unsure of the status of Agent Pierce,” admitted one of the operatives. “He’s been down there since the breach started.”

“When did he arrive?” I asked.

“He and Dr. Lowery arrived around an hour or so before the breach occurred,” said the operative reluctantly. I never said a word, but there was a general understanding among all three of us. No doubt in my mind, there was a direct correlation between his arrival at the facility and Prototype Omega going berserk once more. It made me wonder how much of the hostility between the subject and Agent Pierce was caused by the monster’s consciousness and how much was caused by a young child lashing out against the person who hurt him.

The operative keyed in a code to the elevator for Omega Site. After a brief moment, the chirping of the alarm began to sound as the spinning yellow lights illuminated our surroundings, painting the wall in a faint glow. After a short pause, the chirping stopped and the doors opened. Unlike the last time I visited the facility, there were no security guards in place with their weapons trained on us as the elevator appeared. Knowing how seriously Triarch took security made it that much more apparent that the events unfolding beneath us were dire. We stepped in and hooked ourselves to the platform.

“Welcome back Agent Stark,” said Omega via the intercom in the elevator. “Beginning descent.”

The elevator rapidly plunged down into the heart of the facility. A rumble shook the platform and the lights went out, reactivating in low power mode to preserve visibility while minimizing the requirements.

“Omega, I need a status report,” I instructed.

“Facility lockdown was initiated following rampancy of subject,” responded Omega. “On site reactor was damaged in the subsequent attacks, resulting in brownouts across the facility. Sensors indicate minor radiation spikes, though it is unknown at this time if this is the result of the transformation of the subject or potential compromise to the structural integrity of the facility’s nuclear core.”

“…this facility has a nuclear reactor powering it??” I said, glancing at the operatives. Both of them shrugged, unsure themselves. You think about Chernobyl or Three Mile Island with their massive smoke stacks, cooling towers for the incredible power output unleashed by nuclear energy. In this small town in the middle of backwoods Georgia, it seemed almost like a joke to suggest that something as old as the mill above us contained a nuclear reactor somewhere deep within the bowels of the structure.

“Subject was forced back down into Asylum,” reported Omega. “Subject entered rampancy state while on primary level, resulting in six casualties. Director Misiam has been notified, other response teams are on the way. Dr. Lowery requested you were brought in to aid in containment.”

The facility rumbled once more, this time far more violently and Omega’s voice cut off abruptly. The lights in the elevator car went out and I felt my armor strain against the restraints as we picked up speed. After a brief moment, lights flickered back to life and we heard the noticeable squeal of the emergency brakes kicking in as the A.I. unit tried to slow the elevator car back down as we approached the facility proper.

We came to a screeching halt, jolting us harshly and knocking the other two operatives to the floor. My bionic-armor absorbed most of the impact and I got to work unhooking from my restraints and helping them up. The doors to the facility slowly dragged themselves open.

I was alarmed to see the condition of the facility. After seeing it in such pristine condition on my first arrival weeks ago, it was now heavily damaged. The light tiles lining the floors, walls, and ceilings were all cracked and damaged, flickering on and off, some of them partially hanging off their fixtures while sparks rained down. Several of the reinforced sliding glass doors lining the hallway were badly cracked, ripped off their frames, or standing there with a pool of fragment glass around the bottom. I honed in on the fact that a significant amount of damage seemed to originate from the room where I first retrieved Agent Pierce’s son prior to the fusion experiment.

Scientists and operatives were staggering around in the darkness, some injured while others were panicking to get things back under control. I stepped in with the two operatives who had their weapons ready. The elevator doors at the other end of the hallway were completely missing with signs of large claw marks lining the walls and floors close to it. My best guess was that someone had someone managed to knock the creature through the doors and sent it even further down into the depths of the facility where the large open space used to conduct the initial experiment resided.

“Take me to the head of the facility,” I insisted.

“That’d be Agent Pierce,” remarked one of the operatives. “He’s the one who sent the monster into the hole.”

“Agent Pierce is currently located in the medical w-w-w-ing,” reported Omega in a stuttering voice as the power outages impacted its ability to function.

“This way,” guided one of the operatives. I knew where the medical wing was supposed to be after our previous scuffle, but the operative led me into what appeared to be the barracks. I realized as I stepped through that the door leading to the medical wing was actually blocked off by a partial ceiling collapse. The operatives led me and I was surprised to see a hole in the wall up ahead. I followed along and passed through the alternative opening to the medical wing, spotting several familiar faces inside.

“Oww, damn it!” grunted Agent Pierce, seething as Lydia was working on something for him.

“I don’t know what to do…” said a woman standing nearby against the counter as another scientist gave her handful of gauze to put to her head to staunch the bleeding of a small wound. “He’s never lashed out like that before.”

“Just stop- STOP!” ordered Agent Pierce painfully as Lydia finally let go of him.

“It’s broken,” insisted Lydia, exasperated. “Your bionic-armor is the only keeping it together right now and we need to get it off.”

“You prying on it won’t fix anything,” snapped Agent Pierce.

“Bill,” snapped the woman standing nearby. Agent Pierce sighed and took a deep breath.

“I’m sorry,” said Agent Pierce half-heartedly, as though forced. He spotted me stepping through the hole in the wall. “Stark, about damn time you showed up. Where’s the rest of the security team?”

“Not sure sir, I was the only one arriving at the moment,” I explained, approaching.

“Can you help me get him out of this?” asked Lydia, turning to me desperately.

“I can try,” I nodded, stepping over to assist. “Sir, you ready?”

“Just do it,” insisted Agent Pierce firmly. Now that I was closer, I could see the extent of the damage. His bionic-armor was twisted around his arm and I was fairly certain it was bending in a way that shouldn’t have been possible. I grabbed holding and using my own suit, I managed to pry some of it aside with a great deal of struggle. Agent Pierce firmly gripped the edge of his medical bed, roaring viciously as we struggled to free him from his mangled harness. After a few minutes of struggle, it was loose enough to pull his torso free from it. He collapsed in the bed, trembling fiercely though very much still conscious.

“I… fuck… what…” seethed Agent Pierce fiercely as he writhed in pain.

“Can someone get me some sedatives so I can put him under??” announced Lydia loudly to any surrounding personnel. Someone tried to search for anything they could, but nothing was where it should be thanks to the chaos from earlier.

“Thank you,” said the woman sincerely. “He won’t tell you to your face, so I will.”

“I recognize you,” I admitted, though my memory was foggy regarding it.

“I believe you were one of the first responders when my son attacked down there,” she explained. I suddenly realized who I was speaking with carried a lot more command than she imposed on anyone.

“You must Vicki,” I nodded, shaking her hand. “I’m sorry…”

“I don’t know what in hell Misiam was doing…” said Vicki, shaking her head in disbelief as Agent Pierce writhed in agony on the hospital bed while Lydia tried to stabilize him. “How could he do this? It’s bad enough he did it to Jessica, but to Joseph too!?”

I took a moment to process what she said and glanced at Lydia. Lydia had a look of desperation in her eyes beyond what she was putting up with from her boss. It was then I realized I was treading a dangerously thin line. All I could deduce was that she didn’t know the full story of what went on down there. Whether that was Triarch’s plan as a whole or exclusive to Agent Pierce’s agenda was beyond me. My life up to that point had been strictly maintaining confidentiality. After the display of trust shown to me in the penthouse days earlier, I knew in this moment I had to respect whatever reasoning they had for not telling her the truth about who actually turned her son into a monster. She might hate me later, but as we had all previously discussed, there were bigger things at play than what we could comprehend.

“Can you tell me what happened?” I asked, refocusing my efforts on the situation at hand.

“I don’t know, Bill went in there to check on him and next thing I know, he’s being thrown through the wall with Joseph just… oh my god…” said Vicki, shaking her head and breaking down into tears a bit. “That monster is controlling my baby. Help me get down there and I’ll do whatever I can to calm him down.”

“Ma’am, with all due respect, I don’t think we’re in a position to negotiate with the creature sharing control over your son’s body,” I explained calmly. I motioned to the wound on her head. “Can you tell me what happened with that?”

“It’s nothing,” she quickly dismissed. “Some of the debris from the wall hit me and knocked me down, I’m fine.”

“As much as I’d like to believe you, how about you take a seat on one of those beds while we work on getting your son safely secured?” I suggested. I felt my suit suddenly lock up as the light tile underneath my feet started flashing red rapidly.

“Emergency offload in progress…” reported Omega through the crackling speakers in the room. After a brief pause, I felt my bionic-armor unlock and I regained full mobility as an earpiece slipped up into position.

“My subsystems have been uploaded to your armor,” reported Omega. “Your exo-frame is significantly more stable than the infrastructure of Omega Site at the moment.”

“I can help,” she insisted firmly. “He responds to me.”

“I’m worried that the monster might be as hostile to you as it is to him,” I warned. “Your son my know you had nothing to do with the procedure that turned him into… that… but the monster may take your presence her now as a sign that you allowed it. You’ve seen the damage it can do to military-grade hardware, I can’t risk you going down there and being killed in the process. If you thought that little boy was unstable before, you have no idea what kind of beast would be unleashed if it realized it harmed you itself.”

“…Alright,” said Vicki, finally conceding. “But please, just do something to get my baby back to safety. I don’t care what it takes, get that monster out of him.”

“I’ll do what I can,” I said, reassuring her. She moved to a nearby hospital bed while I joined Lydia. Agent Pierce appeared much calmer now, though he was staring off into space as though in a trance.

“Any luck?” I asked.

“He’s not fidgeting around anymore,” said Lydia, sighing a breath of relief. “He doesn’t go under like the others, he just… shuts down, goes silent, stares off into space. You can smack him in the face and he won’t react in the least.”

“I take it you’ve tried?” I inquired.

“This is serious,” insisted Lydia. “For obvious reasons, they keep the reactor as far from the surface so that in the event of a catastrophic failure, the facility can be scuttled and buried. They also kept it close to the Asylum for the fusion experiment to minimize the possibility of equipment malfunction impacting the outcome. That rampaging monster is now causing chaos and threatening to destabilize the whole facility.”

“You need to start evacuating people,” I insisted. “I’ll go down there and see what I can do.”

“You won’t win a physical fight against it,” said Lydia firmly. “Xertarnius is the strongest thing I’ve ever seen in my life. Since it morphed with Joseph, it’s only grown stronger and displayed properties previously unseen.”

“Alright, so we know guns don’t work on it, what do I do?” I asked.

“Use your head,” she insisted. “Xertarnius is extremely intelligent and since fusing, it’s displayed the ability to communicate using Joseph’s known languages.”

“You want me to talk that thing down??” I asked. “I get the feeling it won’t exactly be thrilled to see me after what happened last time we dealt with each other.”

“Just buy time for the response teams to get here,” insisted Lydia. “I’ll work on getting people to the surface. We can’t lose this facility, as much as I hate everything that we’ve done here in the past few weeks, the data we have access to could change the world. Besides, something tells me that if we try burying him down here, he’ll start clawing his way to the surface and then we’ll have the mother of all security breaches on our hands.”

“I’ll do what I can,” I said hesitantly. She paused expectantly, studying my face for a moment before finally breaking away.

“Be careful,” she blurted out, turning to focus on correcting Agent Pierce’s arm. I slid past some researchers in the hole in the wall and hurried back out to the hallway.

“Onboard sensors register approximately 8 rem since arrival in the facility,” warned Omega. “Compensating for decreased functionality of this site along with the time since the initial rampage began, those on site since initial activation have been exposed in excess of 20 rem, well in excess of allowable levels. We are approaching life-threatening levels of radiation across the facility.”

“So… this is a suicide mission?” I asked.

“You will suffer,” responded Omega bluntly, sending chills down my spine.

“This is NOT what I was planning on doing today,” I muttered as I approached the damaged elevator shaft leading down further into the facility.

“Kinetic dampeners would likely protect against life-threatening injuries should you attempt a direct descent,” advised Omega.

“I’m not jumping down that hole,” I said very firmly. I reached over to grab hold of the maintenance ladder. I began to descend as fast as I could while maintaining my grip. All light faded from around me I plunged into darkness. It was slow and I felt my heart pounding out of my chest. Sweat beaded up on my brow as my lungs felt heavier the further I descended into what essentially felt like hell itself.

“This exo-frame is shielded enough to allow for extended exposure to high dosages of ionizing radiation. As such, I am capable of long outliving your physical body should exposure lead to termination,” advised Omega. “I have sufficient space onboard if you would like to begin recording any final wishes. Please remember, termination within redacted facilities generally warrants the use of incineration protocols and subsequent coverups with appropriate elements. Likewise, heavy exposure to radioactive isotopes may render your corpse irrecoverable.”

“Can you do me a favor?” I asked as I descended. “Shut up.”

“Disabling communications temporarily,” responded Omega. The whole passage rattled violently as the near deafening roar of Xertarnius reverberated all around me. I was truly on my own for the time being.

I went to take another step and felt my heart briefly skip a beat as I put my weight down on a non-existent ladder rung. Apparently while tumbling down the elevator shaft, the subject managed to compromise the maintenance access as well.

“How far to the bottom?” I asked, taking a deep breath.

“Estimating approximately 1200 feet to the base of the elevator shaft from your current position,” advised Omega. “Your odds of survival are-”

“Shut up,” I snapped once again. “God… I prefer Star over you.”

“The feeling is mutual,” reassured Omega. “If you wouldn’t mind, I’d like my facility back before it becomes a radioactive crater.”

I took some deep breaths, pacing myself for what was about to come. I thought about turning around and scaling the ladder and helping to evacuate those I could, but Lydia was right. If that monster got to the surface, secrecy be damned, I wasn’t quite sure what we could do to get this creature contained at that point. I forced every other thought out of my head and fixated on the mission in front of me. One foot after the other until the mission was complete. I didn’t know if I was coming out of this alive or not, but if I bought enough time for Lydia and the others to escape, maybe it would be worth it.

In both a leap of faith and act of sheer foolishness, I let go of the ladder. I would have taken the plunge down the surface elevator a thousand times over rather than experiencing that sensation again. That feeling of knowing that you are falling but other than the wind whipping around you, there was no other stimuli to suggest how far you had left to go or how fast you were truly moving. I heard chirping and beeping in my earpiece as Omega quickly ran calculations for my trajectory. I felt sudden jerking motions as Omega corrected my bodily positioning and I spotted a flickering light beneath me. It was approaching like a speeding train and I careened into it with similar force. I landed on my hands and knees, crumpling the twisted metal box beneath me even further. The doors ahead of me were torn open and tossed aside haphazardly.

After a brief moment of self-reflection and realizing my body was still intact, I slowly climbed out of the wreckage and up onto the ledge ahead of me, granting me access to the Asylum. The 500x500x500 meter room appeared drastically different in this new light. Unlike prior to the fusion event and even in the scuffle after the fact, there were some lights on in the room allowing some limited visibility. The only semblance of light in this pit of hell came from the intense arcs of lightning cascading off the machine ahead of me. The alloyed cubes were all powered down and several had been ripped aside, thrown without reason towards the edges of the room. I made out the fusion modulator standing ahead of me as the energy pulsed off the machine. It was severely damaged as a result of its last use, but that was not what dominated my attention. A figure stood before it all, elevated by a mass of unknown matter, facing away from me with its arms crossed. Large tendrils seemed to emerge from the creature’s back and were cautiously adjusting the modulator, interacting with the mechanisms while reeling away from the intense arcs of electricity.

“Darkfall Protocol on standby,” advised Omega quietly in my ear. It felt even more eerie to have an A.I. unit so terrified that it too whispered. I don’t know what terrified me more, that it commanded such a presence, or that the creature snapped its head around, glaring at me out of the corner of its eye while barring its vicious fangs.

“You…” growled Xertarnius fiercely. It turned its head to face me while keeping its arms crossed, the infected mass seemed to rotate as well. Its legs were intact but buried within the structure. Even though it was not directly observing it, the tendrils were busily at work on the machine behind it.

“Easy boy…” I said cautiously, putting my hands up carefully and demonstrating that I was unarmed.

“Come to finish what he started?” grumbled Xertarnius. “You’re a bigger fool than he is.”

“Pretty big vocabulary for a three year old,” I admitted. Xertarnius frowned and I caught a brief glimpse of one of the tendrils flanking me from the side and bashing me, knocking me across the floor in a dazzling display of sparks as my bionic-armor glanced off the alloyed cubes.

It knocked the wind from my lungs as I slowly rose to my feet, coughing violently and wheezing painfully.

“I can take a break,” admitted Xertarnius. The matter wrapped around his legs skittered away and he stopped whatever process he was doing. The tendrils rapidly receded into Xertarnius’s body, rescinding back into its spine. The beast was roughly seven and a half to eight feet tall and although humanoid, it was heavily modified with a drastically enhanced muscular structure. I was on my hands and knees staring at a menacing giant, looming towards me. From the distance it was at, it looked almost normal sized, but that misconception quickly faded as it stepped closer.

“You gonna kill me?” I asked bluntly. “Or do I need to wait for the radiation to do that?”

“Actually, radiation levels have decreased since initial contact has been made,” remarked Omega. “Continue work and you may buy enough time to prevent lethal exposure.”

“You’re all the same,” growled Xertarnius fiercely as the beast stepped closer to me. “All hunting for power that you can’t possibly begin to understand.”

“I couldn’t give a shit about power,” I said, rising to my feet and steadying myself. “I’m just trying to stop you from ripping this place apart.”

“This… pit… is nothing but a monument to the agony and misery passed on from generation to generation. I have fought on behalf of humanity in the past, even in the face of monsters beyond your comprehension. But this, here? This is a truly different type of evil that must be purged by any means necessary,” assured Xertarnius with sickening calmness in its voice.

“Joseph, you in there??” I said loudly.

“Don’t bother,” assured Xertarnius. “You can’t harm him now that we are united.”

“I’m not trying to harm him,” I explained as Xertarnius stepped even closer to me. Though it was still some distance off, I got the feeling those tendrils were about to make another appearance and would knock me across the floor with ease.

“I would beg to differ,” growled Xertarnius. “Our memories are one now. I see things he did. I know your sins; you are just as guilty as he is. You carried him down here, a lamb to the slaughter.”

“And I didn’t know what he was going to do-” I started. Sure enough, the tendril lashed out from behind it and cracked around my neck with the force of a whip. I felt my skin sear from the contact, but it somehow demonstrated restraint by not killing me outright with the blow. Instead, it picked me up off the floor, briefly choking me before slinging me sideways and closer to the cascading energy field nearby.

“Ignorance and naïveté mean nothing to me,” boomed Xertarnius angrily as it steadily approached again, now coming from my side. I weakly got back to my feet but kept my hands at my side and visible to demonstrate a vulnerable stance and submitting to the monster. I now stood between it and the energy field. One more strike like what it had been doing and I was going to be turned to ash by one of the lightning bolts.

“You hurt his mother,” I blurted out. Xertarnius paused, halting its advance.

“I did no such thing,” asserted Xertarnius angrily.

“Your little show upstairs caused a lot of debris to go airborne,” I stated. “She caught some of it in the side of her head.” I saw fury mixed with alarm surge into Xertarnius’s face.

“YOU LIE!” boomed Xertarnius, storming forward and picking up speed.

“Why would I!?” I roared back, realizing the hopelessness of it all. Xertarnius reached me and without even using a tendril, it lifted me with a single hand, easily wrapping around my neck and lifting me without so much as straining. The bionic-armor was barely strong enough to keep it from crushing my windpipe while doing so.

Xertarnius angrily slung me to the ground before taking a step backwards. I gasped for breath as its eyes seemed to dart around, unable to fixate on anything in the room.

“No… no… calm down…” insisted Xertarnius. “I can’t… you know that’s… child, stop…”

“That’s right Joseph, listen to me,” I insisted.

“You, stay out of this!” snapped Xertarnius fiercely, pointing at me as six tendrils emerged from its spine, each sharpening to a point and aiming at me like threatened snakes.

“She’s alright,” I said, trying to defuse the situation while still catching my breath. “It’s all superficial, nothing that can’t be fixed. You did, however, manage to break your old man’s arm.”

“That’s the least of what I will do to him with time,” assured Xertarnius. “Once I’m free from this mortal form, I will spend more effort than I have ever wasted on a human being ensuring that his remaining lifespan is filled with nothing but regret and agony.”

“Who wants that, you or him?” I asked.

“I don’t need to humor you with an answer,” growled Xertarnius. “You are vermin like him, ready to be crushed beneath my heel.”

“Most people in pest control don’t chit-chat with the bugs prior to gassing them,” I insisted. I had only one shot if I was going to convince this borderline deity of sparing my life and saving the others in the facility. “All I’m saying is… you would have killed me already unless you had some reservations against doing so. Whether that is something you don’t want to do or the boy doesn’t want to do, I can’t tell, but I don’t guess I really care either.”

“I’m not a monster,” assured Xertarnius.

“Oh yeah?” I asked. “You’re down here ripping apart a nuclear reactor, threatening to kill everyone in this place. Now, I don’t how tough you are, but I have to assume you’re pretty damn strong to survive fusion.”

“I do not care to demonstrate the full potential of my abilities against an unworthy opponent,” dismissed Xertarnius. “Be it as it may, you may have escaped our last encounter unscathed, but you won’t be so fortunate this time.”

“Notice I haven’t swung once,” I reminded him. “It’s been a long day already and the sun hasn’t even come up yet. I got dragged out of bed and shoved on a helicopter and shipped down into the pits of hell on a suicide mission to try to buy enough time so that reinforcements could arrive that will no doubt get mowed down by you like everything else that gets in your way. I’ve had a lot of time where I could have turned back and abandoned this. But I kept going because I’ve got a mission to do, a mission that I don’t totally agree with. Now, I’ve heard half of this story so far, but I don’t trust much of what comes out of Agent Pierce’s mouth.”

“Watch your tone,” reminded Omega.

“No, fuck you,” I snapped, pulling out my earpiece. “If I’m dying, I’m not doing so preserving this concept that he’s a legend. I’ve seen what he really is when he shoved his own child in that machine. Even if everyone else in the world upholds him like some king, I don’t, and my opinion is the only one that matters when I’m staring death in the face.”

“How much choice did you really have?” inquired Xertarnius, seeming to relax some and walking around as though monologuing. “The men who picked you were armed, yes? Weapons like that do nothing to me, but I have seen firsthand what it can do to your kind. He would strike you down without batting an eye. I was there when he shed blood for his mission the first time, I saw fear in his eyes, a fear I don’t see anymore. He’s been calloused by his mission, just as you seem to hellbent to complete your own.”

“For different reasons,” I assured him. “However, you’re right. I didn’t have much choice when I came down here. He really likes the illusion of choice, doesn’t he?”

“Indeed,” nodded Xertarnius. “I cannot pretend to understand the complexities of this machinery you used to merge me and the boy together. I know I have seen dark magic at work, and this is unlike any of that. Unlike my previous hosts, I cannot separate from the child of my own accord.”

“You’re connected at the molecular level,” I explained. “I’m afraid I don’t think it’s possible to rip you two apart while keeping you both intact.”

“I see…” remarked Xertarnius, seemingly perplexed.

“You must care for him, and Jessica as well,” I inquired.

“I see them as victims,” explained Xertarnius. “Descendants of men who would tear this world apart if it meant enacting their mission. They would have been killed had I not forcefully merged with them.”

“That’s right,” I nodded. “The fusion process did trap you, but you had to do so willingly. You could have resisted, and it would have torn their little bodies apart. You’d put yourself back together, but they wouldn’t have. That means you have some sense of morals or ethics deep down.”

“Are you insinuating otherwise?” asked Xertarnius.

“No, I… I’m trying to say that you’re reasonable,” I explained. “And I’m not trying to kill you. I’m here trying to save lives.”

Xertarnius sighed and shook its head.

“Noble intentions, but deeply misguided,” said Xertarnius. “Do you even know what that monster would have this boy do under his control? He would turn him into a weapon and attempt to deceive him like he deceives all others.”

“Then deny him that,” I explained. “Stand down.”

“How do you propose that such actions defy him??” asked Xertarnius.

“Do you think as crafty as that man is that he’s incapable of having some failsafe in place to try to stop you?” I asked. “If you keep on, this whole facility gets scuttled and buried. He’ll be alive because he’s already evacuating. I die, but what does that matter? You’d survive and claw your way to the surface, and there he’d be waiting with his next trick up his sleeve. You can predict what I’m going to do, but you have no idea what he’ll do next.”

“What alternative is there?” asked Xertarnius.

“You can’t undo the fusion process,” I explained, motioning to the crackling machine behind me. “It’s a little more complex than just putting it in reverse. Even if you managed to do so, you and the boy would be subjected to a life of experimentation and torture until he got what he wanted out of you. The only way you can protect yourself and protect the boy is to give control back over to the boy.”

“He is not capable of defending himself,” explained Xertarnius firmly. “He lacks the knowledge, the understanding, the power-”

“Agent Pierce wants to weaponize him,” I reiterated. “Against what? I don’t really know; he won’t tell me. Deny him your wrath and he’s forced to play your game. I can work with you; I can help and so can Lydia.”

“Lydia’s good,” Xertarnius muttered. It seemed taken aback by the statement, almost as if it didn’t mean to say that. “Yes, I know she is boy.”

“If we figure out some way to keep your powers from being abused by Agent Pierce by trapping them within the boy, then he has to step back and play by your rules. If he threatens the boy, he knows he risks letting you out of the cage. He can’t experiment on the boy because he knows you’ll emerge again. He can’t weaponize you either at the risk of destroying his own child.”

“He took that risk when he put him in the machine to begin with,” reminded Xertarnius.

“A calculated risk, one he planned from the beginning,” I blurted out. “He lied to his own wife about who actually merged you with his son. He’s made Director Misiam the scapegoat. And I can promise you this… with the data they’ve collected so far, they can replicate this experiment again without you on other subjects. They won’t have guardian angels like you watching over the boy. The only way we all come out of this without doing exactly what he wants is by you surrendering.”

“Why should I believe you would uphold your end of the deal?” asked Xertarnius. “You only have to gain walking out of this room alive.”

“Sounds like reason enough,” I said. “If I walk out of here managing to prevent you from destroying this place, Agent Pierce is going to keep me close. If I don’t keep my end of the bargain, you’ll know where to find me. You can collect the debt if that were to ever happen. Subject me to the same torture you would subject him.”

“You don’t deserve that,” assured Xertarnius.

“Neither does the boy,” I insisted. “I will put him back in his mother’s arms should you give me the opportunity.” Xertarnius stood there, arms crossed, deep in thought and taking in everything I had said.

Back on the surface, six troop transports rolled up in the parking lot of the mill. Despite being the early morning, the city was bustling with activity as Triarch swarmed in to try to get the situation under control. Helicopters swarmed overhead, bathing the outer facility in spotlights.

A few ambulances were already on scene, staffed by none other than more of Triarch’s embedded agents. Vicki was being tended to while Agent Pierce was being rolled up into the back of the van.

“Move him to isolation immediately,” ordered Lydia. “I’m senior-most officer on site at the moment.”

“Not anymore,” stated Agent Longsword as he approached.

“Ian,” said Vicki, turning to him.

“Do as she said,” insisted Agent Longsword. “Take his wife as well and get them out of here. Lydia, do we have communications with Omega Site active at the moment?”

“There are no living personnel left in the facility,” explained Lydia defeatedly. “No one to receive any messages.”

“We’re initiating EP4,” said Agent Longsword bluntly. “We’re out of options.”

“You can’t be serious!?” said Lydia, horrified.

“What’s that mean? What are you talking about!?” asked Vicki. Agent Longsword motioned to the agents manning the ambulance and they escorted her in before shutting the doors and pulling away, lights flashing but without sirens.

“Stark may still be down there,” blurted out Lydia.

“He’s close enough to that reactor his insides will be liquified,” explained Agent Longsword sharply. “Assuming Xertarnius hasn’t already ripped him limb from limb. We have all task forces on the way and seismologists staging in the surrounding area so we can attempt to determine his approach vector from beneath us. Maybe we can stop short of nuclear ordinance above ground.”

“Dr. Lowery!” radioed in one of the agents.

“Report,” said Lydia.

“I’m senior agent here,” reminded Agent Longsword. “What’s going on?”

“Activity in the cooling pond! Something’s going on over there!” said the agent. Operatives all over the compound frantically grabbed their weapons and scrambled across the parking lot towards the lake just across the road. Lydia broke into a mad sprint while Agent Longsword followed behind at a much slower pace.

“If he’s breached the surface this quickly-!” started Agent Longsword. Lydia topped the hill with the first of the operatives. She spotted something down at the lake, something rising up from the water. She hurried down the hill while the other operatives followed behind her. She didn’t have much rapport with the monster, but she might be able to call on her past experiences with Joseph to attempt to illicit some response in her favor, so long as security teams didn’t blow this for her.

They reached the edge of the pond and Lydia examined the object as it rose from beneath the surface of the lake, churning it. It appeared to be a large cube of sorts, with a set of doors facing them. A long marble walkway seemed to rise from the water, polished and providing a path leading directly to the chamber ahead. The doors of the cube ahead slid open with a light hiss.

Lydia’s face lit up from shore as she watched me emerging from the chamber, toting a toddler in my arms. I looked pale and deathly sick as a result of my exposure, but I somehow managed to pull it off. The agents stood around with weapons ready at their sides, but none dared directly aim it at me or the boy in fear of triggering a hostile response. Lydia rushed down the path and met me halfway down with her lab coat, wrapping it around the boy in my arms and shielding him. It was then that she realized how weakened I was. The bionic-armor was quite literally keeping me standing. The moment the boy was out of my arms, I collapsed on my hands and knees.

Lydia didn’t leave me there, instead dropping beside me and rolling me onto my back. She looked so relieved to see me alive and intact. The boy was fast asleep in her arms, exhausted from the events that had taken place so far. Even as I drifted between consciousness and unconsciousness, I felt at peace knowing that no matter what happened at this point, at least I knew she made it out alive.

April 9th, 2013

The plane taxied onto the runway as I sat in my seat. I sat there, eyeing others around me. The private jet was on a direct course for one of Triarch’s largest and most secure site in the globe, Facility 51. Intriguingly enough, despite the shroud of secrecy surrounding everything that Triarch did, Facility 51 was actually fairly well known by the general population. They called it by a different name, I never really understood why Triarch acquired such a well known yet top secret government site, knowing every set of eyes and ears in the world were tuned in to this site to find out what they could. Our destination: Groom Lake, Nevada. There, Facility 51, better known as Area 51 to the rest of the world, would be our sanctuary when all hell cut loose across the globe on Day Zero.

No one else in the aircraft appeared as unsettled as I did. They must have been oblivious of what was coming, I kept telling myself that over and over. Only someone as unhinged and dangerous as Agent Pierce could sit there and tell me with a straight face that he was on the way to Triarch Corporate Headquarters to begin Day Zero protocol. The horrors I had been experienced to over the years had numbed me somewhat, but my hands still trembled at the thought of what Triarch was planning to unleash. My whole life up to this point I’d been a loyal operative of Triarch and I and the others were being given an opportunity to stand aside and observe as I had done nearly a hundred times before. This time would be different. There would be no containment chamber, we wouldn’t have containment protocols, and the A.I. units could do little more than direct our attention to the largest issues.

I felt my pocket, remembering that Agent Pierce destroyed my only means of communication. I was trapped on this plane with these other people who had no clue they were being whisked away from civilization for the very last time. I thought about contacting her, but he already called my bluff, there was no way I was getting in touch with her without Agent Pierce knowing. I watched others in the plane as they were silencing their phones and turning them off. No doubt they were all being traced as my involvement with this new task force, Theta Bravo Kilo, was going to keep me under the microscope for the foreseeable future. All I could do was sit there, gripping the edge of my seat and praying. If there was a god out there, I hope they showed me mercy. I wasn’t the one pulling the trigger. I was just there doing my job.

December 9th, 1998

My private cab rolled to a stop outside of a small business front in downtown San Francisco. Memories of being whisked away in the early morning several weeks earlier still lingered in my mind. A significant amount of time over the past several weeks took place with me in medical care overseen by Triarch at their provisional medical site in the nearby metropolitan area of Columbus. The technology they used to help me recover from acute radiation poisoning was incredible. Machines and chemicals were used to put me back to the way I was. It didn’t even seem that complicated to the men and women who oversaw my recovery. To them, it almost seemed like another day on the job.

The last reports I heard coming out of Manchester were that Prototype Omega was remaining compliant per my suggestion. To my surprise, there was never any repercussions for the statements I made underground. Those artificial intelligence units were simply machines, but I had to wonder deep down if there was more to them. Was this some way of that A.I., Omega, holding the conversation over my head? Did the administration know and choose to the look the other way? Or was this very moment leading up to a trap I was walking into?

I had already been given a dossier by Agent Pierce asking me to review personnel for approval for a special task force dedicated to utilizing alternative means to containing extremely dangerous threats through use of psychological coercion. The official name for them was Epsilon Five. However, the task force only contained twelve positions, of which both Agent Pierce and I were to be leading members of the unit. I had the rare opportunity of seeing him crack a grin at the mere mention of the unofficial name of this new task force: The Jury. He assured me that with my recommendations, we would pick out those capable of working alongside us to ensure that the assets of Triarch Industries were contained and the public kept safe and unaware of their existence. I had to believe he was doing the right thing. If what he said in New York meant anything, it was that there was more to the story he had yet to reveal to any of us.

I stepped out of the vehicle and closed the door behind me, it pulled away from the curb and slowly left the area. Completely unmarked with tinted windows while bearing government tags. Sometimes I wondered where the line was drawn between Triarch and the United States government. I walked towards the storefront, observing two men standing out front, one toting a newspaper and the other looking like a painter on a smoke break. I caught the brief glimpses from them both as they studied me. All three of us were plainclothes operatives, we knew better than to acknowledge one another in the open.

I slipped through the door into the building. It was a small office space that showed some indications that it was being remodeled. Whether this was legitimate construction work or merely a cover didn’t really matter. I approached the front desk where the receptionist awaited my arrival.

“Good morning sir, can I help you?” asked the receptionist.

“I have an appointment,” I said plainly. “Mr. Stark?”

“Ah yes,” nodded the receptionist. “If you’ll have a seat, I’ll let you know once they are ready.”

“Thank you,” I sighed. This already felt better than how things turned out in New York. I took a seat between two others. I was cautious to keep my bionic-armor hidden beneath my outfit. It was nearly impossible to tell if someone looked like they worked for Triarch if they were dressed as civilians. There were other ways to tell, usually slight changes in behavior such as instinctively avoiding eye contact while constantly scanning their surroundings. We were a paranoid bunch and based on the way everyone in the room was behaving, there were several veterans among the ranks sitting in the room around me. There was no small talk, we just sat there, wondering why we’d been called together. Maybe some of them knew more than I did, but we all knew better than to be up front with our questions.

A familiar face appeared from the back office area, all of us turned our heads to see none other than Director Misiam standing beside the reception desk. Many of us adjusted in our seats, pausing to glance at one another. In any other situation, we’d stand and salute the man, but we didn’t risk our cover in public.

“You can all relax,” assured Director Misiam. “We’re all family here. Agent Stark, meet special response team Hotel Six, the Kingsmen.”

“Stark,” nodded one of the operatives sitting across from me.

“They are ready for you downstairs,” advised the receptionist, speaking to Director Misiam while glancing at me.

“Let’s get to work then,” said Director Misiam. “Gentlemen, we’ll be in touch.”

“Sir yes sir,” nodded the others, standing and saluting as I arose and joined Director Misiam. He led the way back down the hallway, having made significant progress towards his recovery after what happened down in Omega Site.

“Glad to see you’re feeling better sir,” I remarked as we navigated through the back halls of the business.

“Likewise, I’d like to personally thank you for what you did in Manchester. Both times… I’ve spoken with Lydia, she told me how instrumental you were to containing that dumpster fire.” 

“I just did my job sir,” I said appreciatively.

“Speaking to you as a father and not as your superior, you were there and kept my Jessica safe in a time when I couldn’t protect her and when she was vulnerable,” reiterated Director Misiam. “You don’t have to be humble with me. Men of your caliber are hard to come by. You remind me of Bill when we were younger… more innocent.”

Director Misiam led me to an elevator door. It immediately stood out to me as abnormal, given the building only appeared to be two stories tall and had nowhere near enough occupancy to warrant such an expense. I scoped my surroundings, noting several individuals keeping themselves busy, obscuring the fact they were undercover operatives as well.

The elevator doors slowly slid open and I felt a chill run down my spine as I looked inside. Director Misiam stepped in and nodded for me to follow. I stepped in alongside him and the doors slowly slid shut. Director Misiam said something without ever once turning to look me in the face.

“Ready for round two?” asked Director Misiam. He reached out and entered a complex combination into the elevator control panel. Once complete, lights in the elevator disengaged and a new set of stronger lights kicked in.

“Facility-to-surface transport ready, please stand-by for security verification,” advised a computerized voice.

“We took your notes,” explained Director Misiam. “We saw what went wrong with Jessica and Joseph and made appropriate changes to protect ourselves and the subjects.”

“We’re making more Prototypes?” I asked.

“Only one this time,” assured Director Misiam. “That’s why we have all the extra support up here on standby in the event something goes wrong. The Kingsmen specialize in media response following any events, they’ll keep things under control up here and we want you to keep things under control downstairs.”

“Identity confirmed, welcome back Director Misiam, class zero authorization recognized. Welcome Agent Stark, class one authorization recognized. Initiating transport sequence,” advised the system. The elevator began to plummet, nowhere near as fast as the ones I’d ridden before, but I could sense we were descending deep into the earth just as we had done before. Once more unto hell.

After nearly two minutes of descending, the elevator slowly came to a halt. The doors slid open and a far more advanced facility stood ahead. I locked eyes with Lydia and saw a grin form on her face upon spotting me.

“Welcome gentlemen,” said Lydia.

“Dr. Lydia,” I nodded, maintaining the formality.

“Let’s get this started, shall we?” asked Director Misiam. He walked ahead, allowing Lydia to stay back with me as she guided me towards our destination.

“How are you feeling?” asked Lydia.

“Better,” I nodded. “Thanks for the flowers and the pizza delivery.” 

“Flowers were from corporate as their thank you,” explained Lydia dramatically. “I paid for the pizza myself. Hope I picked the right toppings. I took you for a plain pepperoni.”

“I don’t know whether to say thank you or be offended,” I chuckled. “I’m not picky, I was just glad something beside what they send up from the cafeteria. I don’t know what strings you pulled to get that in there, but it was nice. Thanks.”

“Maybe if everything goes right today, we could go grab something to eat,” suggested Lydia. “I know of this place in Chinatown, you’ve got to try it.”

“You do realize they brought you and me in on the same assignment,” I reminded her. “Since when do things go right when we get involved?”

“I know…” she sighed worriedly. “Wishful thinking.”

Lydia led the way into the laboratory. Unlike Omega Site, this appeared far more traditional with desks, computers, and workstations scattered about. I spotted a large desk with multiple documents scattered about on the far edge of the room, close to a large observational window leading into another chamber. At that table, Director Misiam, Agent Mengele, and Agent Pierce all stood around in deep discussion over something.

“They’ve got coffee in the break room if you want a cup before they start prepping for the procedure,” remarked Lydia.

“How are we pulling this off again if Xertarnius was one of a kind?” I inquired.

“Xertarnius is different,” assured Lydia firmly. “They wanted… a different approach. I don’t like it, I’ve already voiced my opinion on it, but they ignored me so here we are.”

“This place is nowhere near strong enough to contain the shockwave the fusion machine is going to unleash,” I warned.

“We compensated for the energy pulse and have made modifications to the fusion modulator. This one only requires a fraction of the power the original unit required due to only having two chambers instead of three,” explained Lydia.

“All non-essential personnel are to move to the surface elevator for extraction,” ordered the automated voice. “Security teams, please move to the barracks for briefing.” Almost everyone in the room began to file out, leaving us along with a handful of others in the room.

“Angel, begin running diagnostics on the fusion modulator,” instructed Lydia.

“Initiating system cycle,” reported the automated voice.

“I’ll be back,” remarked Lydia, giving me a little grin before walking away. I looked around the room and realized I recognized every other face in the room. I shifted my gaze back to the table of executives and saw Agent Pierce grinning. He clapped his hands, gaining everyone’s attention and we all turned to him as he stood up and held his arms open wide to welcome us.

“Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Pacific Containment Site 8,” explained Agent Pierce. “After today, this site will take on a new mantle: Facility 1. You have been brought together for one reason and one reason only: you are some of the best among Triarch’s ranks from different walks of life. Today, you’ve been brought here to witness history. As you all know, Triarch Industries is dedicated to utilizing bleeding edge technology to bring about a better tomorrow today. Triarch has rooted itself in weapons manufacturing for decades, however our administration has been working towards a long-term solution for the issues plaguing our world. What you are about to witness today is nothing short of a miracle, the culmination of thousands of men and women contributing to the betterment of the world as a whole. Bioengineering is a bit of an… abstract field when it comes to weapons development and future-proofing.”

Agent Pierce waved everyone over and we all approached the table. Complex formulas, calculations, and research papers were scattered all around the table.

“We are standing on the precipice of mankind’s next step in the evolutionary process,” he further explained. “Earlier this year, I and a handful of others took part in the kickoff to this project. Our goals were simple, to build a weapon capable of ending any wars and ready to fight on our behalf. I’d like to introduce to you… Sample ZSZ, better known by my colleagues as Zominium.”

“What is it??” asked one of the soldiers, turning one of the documents around to study it. “Some sort of new fissile material?”

“No…” said another operative, studying a document. “An element… the behaves like an organism??”

“Precisely,” beamed Agent Pierce.

“It’s not listed on the periodic table,” explained Agent Mengele. “It was discovered back in 1996 by myself, Bill, and Ian on an excursion. Since we discovered it, we have managed to synthesize more of the material.”

“It is a limited source, for now,” admitted Director Misiam. “Research is ongoing into mass production of the compound.”

“When exposed to humans, this element behaves in a way similar to that of a virus,” explained Agent Pierce. “It rapidly alters the physiology of a subject, resulting in a 100% rate of infection.”

“Is it lethal?” asked another operative hesitantly.

“Yes… and no,” admitted Agent Mengele cryptically.

“In its current state, yes,” corrected Director Misiam. “Zominium is extremely volatile and highly infectious. Pure Zominium is capable of transmitting infection via airborne particulates. It has an extremely limited range, but once infection has begun, those who have been compromised act as transmission vectors.”

“The virus acts as a prion, compromising a subject’s auto-immune system and reprogramming it to facilitate the spread of the virus. Once completely taken over, all higher brain functions cease and the virus assumes control of the system,” explained Agent Pierce. “Anyone familiar with Romero?”

“So… zombies??” asked someone skeptically.

“Not zombies,” said Agent Mengele, rubbing the bridge of his nose.

“Yes, exactly,” insisted Agent Pierce, pointing at the soldier who made the comment. “Highly aggressive, resistant to most forms of damage, they won’t stop until they’ve torn apart everything around them.”

“Zominium is far too dangerous to be utilized as a weapon of war,” explained Director Misiam. “Which is why we’ve begun development on the Alphalyte virus. We’ve effectively recoded Zominium and altered the configuration of the proteins that make up the virus to adjust the response by infected individuals. Alphalyte will be the ultimate tool of pacification.”

“Yes… but we are still a long way off from Alphalyte being ready for use,” explained Agent Pierce, seemingly disinterested in the recoded virus. “However, Zominium is readily available for our testing. In order for us to better understand Zominium and how it works so that we can use the data obtained to further develop Alphalyte, we need to bridge the gap between humans and those infected with the virus. You see, once infected, we lose the ability to control progression of the virus and ultimately lose control of the subject within a matter of minutes to hours. However, through extensive testing, we have managed to fuse Zominium with human subjects on the molecular level rather than infecting them through traditional means. The results?”

Agent Pierce turned and swept his arm across the table, removing all the documents. The surface of the table dimmed, revealing it to be a large screen capable of displaying images. We all gathered and studied the screen as a video began to play.

I immediately recognized footage from the video belonging to that of Omega Site. Although dimly lit and hard to make out, I could see footage of myself engaging both Jessica and Joseph following their transformation event. The operatives were awe-struck as they observed the incredible display of strength by Prototype Omega while also watching Prototype Alpha seemingly teleport around and unleash devastating pulses of lightning.

“I think the word “interesting” sums it up,” remarked Agent Pierce. “Oh, and for the record, that is none other than Agent Stark who has joined us today who is engaging the subjects.”

“That’s you?!” said one of the operatives, comparing me to the video.

“Unfortunately,” I sighed, nodding.

“Both of those are three year old children,” explained Agent Pierce. “Now imagine what they are capable of when fully grown.”

“The fusion process is… dangerous,” explained Agent Mengele upon seeing the looks of shock and horror upon the revelation that Prototypes Alpha and Omega were just children. “Children younger than this lack the survival instinct and will to live that they demonstrate. Additionally, older subject have an exponentially higher risk of death during the fusion process. Their bodies are incapable of the rapid adaptation necessitating the fusion process. Infantile amnesia is just beginning to wear off on subjects their age, making them the most suitable subjects for integration into Project Eden.”

“I’d like to introduce you to Eden,” explained Agent Pierce. He swiped the screen and I stepped even closer, surprised at what I saw. It was none other than the child I pulled out of the third fusion chamber, the one who remained unconscious throughout the entire ordeal. “Outside of this room, only a handful of people know Eden even exists. I suppose you could say Eden is my own child in the same sense you could say it is Yuri’s. Prototype Alpha and Prototype Omega, better known as Jessica Misiam and Joseph Pierce, are our children. We fused them with an organism built exclusively from the virus itself, constructed of pure Zominium and completely sentient and sapient. Due to the law of conservation of mass, matter cannot be created or destroyed, merely transformed. During the fusion process, the organism, my son, and Yuri’s daughter were sent in. When it completed, out came Prototype Alpha, Prototype Omega, and Eden. Being that Prototype Alpha and Omega infected DNA, Eden is completely purified of the virus, genetically half made up of my son and half made up of Yuri’s daughter.”

“Eden is the key to advancing Alphalyte,” explained Director Misiam firmly. “Eden is also the key to being able to further advance the development of additional Prototypes.”

“We are in the process of mapping out the entirety of the genome,” explained Agent Pierce. “However, we believe there are in excess of 80 variations of the virus, each an individual Prototype. We have isolated out a potential variation and introduced it to Eden to be bonded with a new subject today. Today, you witness the creation of what will be referred to as Prototype 1.”

“Eden… that was what I pulled out of the wreckage?” I asked, crossing my arms. “You’re going to infect that kid with the virus that made Xertarnius??”

“Relax,” said Agent Mengele, dismissing my concerns. “We’re not breaking any laws. Eden doesn’t exist according to the rest of the world. No social security number, no parents, nothing.”

“Violating basic moral principles,” I thought to myself.

“We’re taking necessary steps to ensure the future of humanity as a whole,” corrected Agent Pierce.

“I have to side with Bill,” agreed with Director Misiam. “Eden is simply a term used to identify it. We’ve conducted a thorough analysis of the subject, there is no brain wave activity indicative of higher brain function. It is a blank template, the mandatory result of our previous experiment. It doesn’t feel pain, it doesn’t comprehend what we are doing to it.”

“Beyond that, it’s simply a tool to facilitate development,” added Agent Pierce. “The fusion process will reset Eden to its default state, curing it completely of the virus once more.”

“What about the other kid, the other half of the equation?” asked another operative.

“Agent Lieman who has been with Triarch for over 15 years has volunteered his son for today’s experiment,” explained Agent Mengele. “His son suffers from a minor auto-immune disorder and we are confident that following the fusion process, he will be completely cured of his ailments utilizing the purified genetic material contained within Eden.”

“The reason you have all been brought in is because of your unquestionable loyalty to Triarch Industries,” explained Agent Pierce. “Some of you have served on special containment teams before, and this team will act as a primary response team for any events involving Project Eden. Welcome to Epsilon Five, codename… The Jury.”

Every person I picked out from the lineup was standing the in room around me, I couldn’t believe it. I don’t think any of them knew the role I played in dragging them into this. They, like me, had certain criteria met which made them more suitable for the position. Single men in their late twenties and early thirties, scoring high in intelligence, below average in sociability, with a flawless record. No families to tie them down, diversified across a wide spectrum of fields such as medical, communications, demolitions, and intelligence.

“As members of Epsilon Five, you have been tasked with being judge, jury, and executioners,” explained Agent Pierce. “We felt it was appropriate that you were given direct insight into the true nature of Project Eden to better assist with responding to threats arising as a result from it. I am team leader of this unit, followed by Stark as my second-in-command. Stark, why don’t you go ahead and brief them on Incident P00-001?”

I took a moment to compose myself and approached the table, forcing the screen to expand to encompass the entirety of the surface. Although I’d never used such a device before, the interface was fairly intuitive and I was figured out how to rollback the footage to early on in the event.

“The initial fusion incident took place at a secure site in the southeastern region of the United States,” I explained, flipping over to a schematic of Facility 13 with sensitive information redacted from it. “The fusion chamber was isolated from the rest of the facility and was constructed out of a complex alloy unique to that facility to reinforce it against potential malfunctions during the experiment.”

“While this alloy is not in use at this facility, we came to discover it did little to mitigate the damage from the fusion process. While the site contained the most advanced archo-assembly systems in the world, part of that modular aspect proved to be a flaw from the subsequent EMP burst neutralizing all systems. As such, our equipment here at Facility 1 is hardened against EMP pulses and power supply connected from offsite, there is no on-site reactor for this facility. This should prevent the possibility of a nuclear breach, something I’m sure Agent Stark will be enthused to avoid.”

“Radiation sickness doesn’t feel like anything you’ve experienced before,” I explained to the others. “It’s like being sunburnt from the inside out. Fusion process was initiated and following the EMP burst, the chamber was left completely intact. Prototype Alpha, Jessica, was released by Director Misiam. On initial contact, she… incapacitated him. Dr. Lydia and Agent Pierce got to work resuscitating him while I was deployed to run interference.”

“You did have some assistance,” remarked Agent Pierce. “Angel, we’re ready to proceed.”

“Deploying armor sets,” responded Angel. We all heard noises behind us and turned to see a wall of metal walking across the room in unison. All the suits approached us, the bionic-armor unlocked itself and stood motionless, now ready for the operators to take control.

“Agent Stark was equipped with bionic-armor,” explained Agent Mengele. “In fact, he’s still using the same suit he was issued during the incident.” The others looked at me as I removed my outer layer to reveal the bionic-armor underneath, lining my entire body. Though functioning as an exo-frame, I never once had an issue with it snagging or inhibiting my ability to work or move.

“It becomes second nature to wear these,” I explained. “They can interface with the A.I. units, allow the A.I.’s to share their computing resources to enhance your reaction times. These frames will keep you alive when the human body would normally crumple. If I wouldn’t have been wearing this when fighting Prototype Omega, I’d be six feet under right about now.”

“They utilize predictive algorithms to anticipate your next move based on sensory data from the surrounding environment. You’ll notice you are already in pursuit of a target before you even realize you want to sprint after them. Dodging incoming attacks in hand-to-hand combat will be subconscious. You can resist concussive forces strong enough to incapacitate normal people,” explained Agent Mengele.

“Prototype Omega breached its fusion chamber and entered an enraged state. We traded blows for a while, but it became clear that the subject was stronger than even my suit. The suit could keep me alive, but I wasn’t going to be able to stop it.”

“I had to,” said Agent Pierce quietly. The others glanced at him, some glancing at the before and after pictures of his son on the table. “Tungsten-laced 50 caliber rounds were somewhat effective in counteracting his modified muscular structure. He was dead for less than 5 minutes before piecing himself back together and going on rampage once again.”

Everyone in the room was speechless. It didn’t faze me as much as I knew it should have, but having seen it firsthand, it was numbing. The way he so coldly dismissed terminating his own son was unnerving, yet I knew it was just a part of the way he was.

“The virus rendered him functionally immortal,” explained Agent Pierce. “He proceeded to tear apart one of our most advanced facilities in the world for purposes we still don’t fully understand. Stark managed to get in there and do something to the creature controlling him and got Prototype Omega back under control.”

“Today’s experiment will be far more controlled, now that we know what to expect,” explained Agent Mengele. “Angel, establish connection with surface observational center. Ian, do you read?”

“Loud and clear,” reported Agent Longsword via the intercom. “All systems nominal, Angel just passed along the diagnostics report on the fusion modulator, it’s ready to go.”

“Longsword will be monitoring us remotely from the surface,” explained Agent Pierce. “In the event communications are lost, he knows to deploy containment teams on the surface to get this place back under control. We’ve got media control, medical response teams, security teams, and engineers on standby. Only Epsilon Five, on-site security personnel, and executive staff will remain here for the duration of the test to oversee operations.”

“Sir, all due respect, wouldn’t it make more sense to be topside with Dr. Longsword?” I inquired.

“I like watching experiments up close and personal,” explained Agent Pierce. He glanced at Agent Mengele and Director Misiam. “You two can do whatever, doesn’t hurt my feelings.”

“Being this is the first time the new fusion modulator design is in use, I want to observe,” noted Agent Mengele. “I’m less invested in Project Eden and more in the technical application of today’s experiment.”

“I’m here as a sign of providence,” remarked Director Misiam.

“Humble,” scoffed Agent Pierce.

“Not like that,” dismissed Director Misiam. Seeing those two act so casually on the precipice of another historic event made it seem as though this was just another day for them. “I want it to be known that I’m no better than the men and women risking their lives by being a part of these experiments. Beyond that, I’m here as supervisory oversight, to ensure nothing else… unexpected… occurs.”

“Yes, well, that won’t be happening, I can promise you,” insisted Agent Pierce. I knew he was telling the truth. He had no reason to lie, Director Misiam didn’t have any other children he could turn into monsters without his permission. “Angel, we are ready to begin. Move Facility 1 to provisional lockdown status.”

“Acknowledged,” responded Angel through the intercoms. “Surface-to-facility transport has been disabled and lockdown is now in effect. Secondary generators are primed and ready for ignition. All security teams are on standby.”

“Are we ready?” asked Agent Pierce, turning to the others. Agent Mengele gave an enthusiastic thumbs up, Director Misiam gave a reluctant nod. I heard the door open behind me and glanced over my shoulder, doing a double take as I spotted Lydia entering. She looked very upset and was doing her best to recompose herself before approaching the others.

“Lydia, are the subjects prepped?” asked Agent Pierce, never once glancing at her while studying the chamber through the reinforced observational screen.

“Ready,” said Lydia, her voice cracking but coughing to mask it. She approached beside me, I nudged her and she shook her head, covering her mouth to mask how upset she was. What happened with the two kids in Omega Site shook her up badly, but this was different. She looked like she was on the verge of mental breakdown.

“Bring in primary subject,” ordered Agent Pierce.

“Decontamination chamber cycling,” reported Angel. After a brief pause, the door on the edge of the room opened and a toddler was delivered into the room by an armored guard. The boy was slender compared to other children his age and looked intrigued by the room around him as they carried him inside. Agent Mengele entered a few commands into the console in front of him before the door to the secondary fusion chamber opened up and the boy was placed inside.

“Just sit tight and we’ll be back in a moment,” reassured the guard, audible via the microphones in the chamber broadcasting into our observation center. The boy stood there nervously as the guard turned to the observation window and signaled. Agent Mengele entered in some more commands before the door sealed shut. Based on where I stood in relation to the others, I was able to listen in on a conversation I was fairly certain I was not supposed to be part of.

“You’re absolutely sure he can’t hear what will go on out here during this?” asked Director Misiam quietly.

“Positive,” muttered Agent Pierce. “Remember… we fight in the dark so they can live in the light.”

“I know…” sighed Director Misiam. “Let’s just pray we’re doing the right thing in the end.”

“Bring in Eden,” ordered Agent Pierce.

“Decontamination chamber cycling,” advised Angel. “Warning, unidentified foreign pathogen detected in airlock.”

“Override,” advised Agent Pierce. “Class zero override.”

“Confirmed,” reported Angel. “Proceeding.”

“We’ve got to train the A.I. units in how to respond to the Zominium virus,” explained Agent Pierce to the rest of the containment team. “Effective quarantine measures and containment protocols are essential to keeping this from turning into absolute chaos.”

The door to the outer chamber opened and the guard already in the room took a step back. I was startled at the sound of roaring and growling. I stepped closer to the observation window and watched as three guards out in the airlock were forcing Eden to walk on its own into the containment chamber. Eden was fully conscious unlike the last time I had seen it, but it had a feral and deranged look on its face. Guards used extended poles with cable ties to keep Eden under control while maintaining their distance. Eden lashed out violently, but there was only so much it could do while restrained. Its hands were tied behind its back with one set of cables, while a second cable was wrapped around its waist, forcing it to walk into the room. The third cable was looped around the child’s head and actually ran across its mouth like a bridle as the monster lashed out at us. Its eyes were completely bloodshot and viciously jumped around the room.

Everyone in Epsilon Five watched on as Eden entered. I took a step back and Lydia gave an audible sob, though everyone else was consumed by the beast in front of them. Lydia couldn’t bear to even look at what Eden was doing as it was led into the room.

“That’s… terrifying…” muttered one of the operatives.

“What happened to no consciousness??” asked another operative.

“Zominium has a directive of its own, while not a full blown consciousness like with Prototype Omega, it is suitable for rewriting instincts to support the basic functions needed for the virus to sustain itself. In Eden’s case, there’s nothing there to overwrite, so it just takes total control,” advised Agent Pierce.

“Oh my god…” said Director Misiam, covering his own mouth in horror.

“Opening primary fusion chamber door,” reported Agent Mengele as he began to type on the console. “Get that thing in there before it cuts loose and attacks someone.”

“Imagine a whole swarm of targets, just like that,” commented Agent Pierce, seemingly hypnotized by the bestial response. “You could neutralize an entire hostile force with a handful of subjects.”

“It would be a cold day in hell before I released something like that on the world,” reaffirmed Director Misiam sternly. The guards moved Eden into the fusion chamber and carefully held it there, pinned against the interior wall with the cables still attached to poles. Agent Mengele entered more commands and the doors slowly began to slide shut. They squeezed triggers on their rods and the cables unlocked, allowing them to snatch them out the opening. Eden roared fiercely while turning to try to lunge out the opening but the door shut before it could finish and sealed tight. Through the microphones in the chamber, we could make out the faint thuds of Eden bashing against the doors to the fusion modulator in a desperate attempt to get out.

“Everyone out,” ordered Agent Mengele. The guards filed out of the room and back into the airlock where it sealed behind them. “Ian, you ready topside?”

“We are, good luck down there,” responded Agent Longsword.

“Angel, charge capacitors and prime the initiation sequence,” ordered Agent Mengele.

“Readying…” reported Angel. “Synchronizing data with Star and Omega…”

“Are we sure about this?” I asked hesitantly. “We thought we were ready last time.”

“We didn’t know what to expect last time,” said Agent Pierce firmly. “We’re ready.”

“Remember everyone…” said Director Misiam cryptically. “Whether it seems like it is right this moment or not, the actions taking place today are to protect the future and humanity as a whole. It isn’t easy hearing a child scream out like that, but if we are successful, no child will ever need to cry ever again across the globe.”

“Make sure to de-couple the overflow disrupter,” reminded Agent Pierce, glancing at Agent Mengele working busily behind his keyboard.

“I know, I know…” muttered Agent Mengele as he continued to type. “Almost there. You want to go in there and scribble some more fancy symbols on the chamber?”

“No need…” muttered Agent Pierce.

“Charging sequence ready, fusion modulator ready to initiate,” reported Angel.

“Director, I’ll let you have the honor,” said Agent Mengele, motioning to the console. “Let’s bring Project Eden to life.”

“This is it, the beginning of the end…” said Director Misiam firmly. “Angel, initiate fusion sequence.”

“Fusion modulator is now active,” stated Angel as the whole facility rumbled. The lights began to flicker and everyone braced themselves. Anyone in bionic armor was able to stand upright while Lydia clung onto me for stability as powerful coronas of energy began to erupt from the edges of the fusion modulator device.

“27%,” reported Agent Mengele. “Vitals beginning to spike, but we’re still within acceptable ranges.”

“Push on,” ordered Agent Pierce.

“45%,” reported Agent Mengele as the rumbling grew stronger and the air around us began to shimmer faintly. The resonant dissonance was beginning to grow stronger with each passing second. I could feel my heart rumbling in my chest as something primal and terrified awakened once again within me. “78%, almost there!”

“Error,” warned Angel. “Unable to disconnect primary power supply.”

“Abort,” blurted out Director Misiam.

“We can’t, it’s too far in!” insisted Agent Mengele. “Everyone, brace for impact!”

“Warning, warning,” repeated Angel quickly as some lights in the room began to flash red rapidly. I swore that for the briefest of moments, I felt this chill running down my spine. Almost as if something else was in the room, watching us, observing intently, eager to see what hell we were unleashing on the world. The shimmering effect grew stronger and stronger, disoriented everyone in the room. The alarms began to blare all around us as we all were knocked off balance and the shockwave from the fusion modulator unleashed. A loud crackle emanated throughout the entire room and I felt my entire bionic-armor suit go limp as the entire facility plunged into darkness. Lydia and several others cried out in terror as confusion quickly took over.

In the pure darkness, Angel’s corrupted and seemingly dying voice spoke out once again.

“Fusion process complete…” reported Angel, struggling to get the words out. “Prototype 1… operational.”