Behold, the very beginning of one of my two new attempts at writing full stories. I cannot guarantee that this will update fast but I am already a decent way into it so it shouldn't be too terrible a wait.
A Dream of Armageddon
Prologue
My name is Alex Mercer. I am a killer, a monster, and a terrorist.
After Manhattan, I thought I was almost done. I thought I could end it all before Blackwatch and the rest recovered. They didn't know I was alive, so they wouldn't be expecting me, after all.
But I had to look after my own, first.
I took Dana, and Ragland, and ran, making sure we never stopped most of the time. I might have been believed destroyed when the bomb detonated, but that didn't mean it was safe.
Blackwatch was searching high and low in every nook and cranny for signs of the virus in the Northeast.
We made it to a town called Smithfield in Virginia before splitting up. I did everything I could to help Ragland disappear, give him a chance at a new life. I owed him that much. If he hadn't taken care of Dana, she probably wouldn't have survived long enough for me to work out how to reverse some of the damage Greene did.
To be honest, I was happy to see Ragland go. He'd helped me a lot, sure, but I can't say I really cared about him. Certainly not enough to justify protecting him the way I did Dana.
It only took two months for Dana to recover almost completely, though I couldn't undo everything without killing her. During that time, when Dana was asleep or just didn't need me hovering around her, I did what I could to prepare for what lay over the horizon.
You see, New York had plenty of criminals. Some were of the more obvious sort and others were the more subtle types. Regardless, I had most of their financial data. By the time I got done transferring money around, making sure it would be years before it could be traced, if ever, I had private accounts with millions of dollars in them to draw from.
I don't need money, of course. I don't eat or sleep or drink. I don't need a roof over my head or clothes or anything else that people generally spend money on.
Dana would though, and I had to take care of her as best I could. She deserved that.
Besides money, I also gathered information. Like a hawk, I kept my eyes on the news, specifically relating to New York. I put some of my less violent and more intellectual skills to work, keeping track of Blackwatch and Gentek. Hacking was still more Dana's thing at that point then it was mine, but I managed.
That's how I found out my initial plans were already falling apart.
Gentek, on orders from higher authorities than Randall, had moved a number of active samples out of Manhattan even before Firebreak was authorised. Peter hadn't known about it. They were still moving resources to other facilities around the country.
What got my attention and set our destination were the contents of one particular shipment, bound for a Gentek lab in Miami, that contained the research notes and samples from lab Three-A in the Gentek building back in Manhattan. That was Alexander's lab, and those were the notes and viral samples he had personally worked on.
Now, I knew for certain that Blackwatch had less advanced strains of Blacklight, prototypes of me. I didn't know then what they could do with those, what they would do, but I didn't want to give them the chance. As soon as Dana was up to it, we continued south. If I'd been paying more attention rather than going through the frightening scenarios of what those less advanced strains were capable of, I might have known we were being followed.
Next Time: Explosions! Fighting! Melodramatic Exposition!