AUTHOR'S NOTE: The product of a fever-dream at 2:00AM, this is the first time I've actually been committed enough to a plot bunny to put it on paper. Usual full disclaimer of me owning nothing and of reader discretion being advised. Small snippets of game dialogue are borrowed.
Inspired heavily by Hyliian and Laluzi, who are much better at this than I am. Check them out, if you haven't already!
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The virus watched Ragland pack up his bag of tools with a rustle, turn off the medical equipment with a low drone, and pat smooth the sheets of the hospital bed. It gave out a soft grunt of irritation. It had only been a few days since it recovered from being a pool of primordial sludge, since it accepted its inhumanity and true nature behind the facade that was Alexander J. Mercer's skin. And yet now, it found itself closer to humanity than it could have ever thought. Certainly more than its creator ever was in all 29 of his years.
That its maker failed to embrace or even understand his fellow man was no surprise in of itself. Dr. Alexander J. Mercer was, after all, a certified grade-A sociopath. He was fiercely intelligent, coldly manipulative, and rabidly petty—so convinced of his own superiority that he could barely even recognize the sameness in his underlings and acquaintances (but not friends, never friends, never equals). It had taken the pursuit of Blackwatch's hitmen, the realization of creeping death upon his shoulder, for Dr. Mercer to finally grasp that in the end, he was no different than any of his colleagues—that Blackwatch would end him like it had all the others, with none to appreciate his genius or mourn his passing.
The realization had broken him, and so he had broken Blacklight's prison. Alexander Mercer, genius of genetic engineering and failure of a human being, unleashed his creation onto all within Penn Station, damning them to short and painful deaths and triggering the nightmare that would quickly consume all of New York.
True, the virus could hardly claim to treat humanity little better, in the beginning. In the frenzied, desperate days of its awakening, it had hardly cared who it consumed, so frantic was it to survive. The virus massacred civilians who only sought to flee the madness gripping the city, butchered first responders and soldiers that tried to protect their fellow neighbors, and carved apart (with no small amount of glee) Blackwatch troops who'd sworn their lives to ending the threat of biological attack no matter the cost. It had ravaged Infected and uninfected alike in its bid to attain biomass, to grow stronger, to destroy any in its path.
And yet, for each unfortunate soul it consumed, it gained a slew of alien memories—pictures and names and faces belonging to those it had ripped apart and assimilated. For each poor refugee the Blacklight virus subsumed, each brave yet luckless police officer or Marine it tore apart, it absorbed countless thoughts, feelings, emotions, meanings, ideas, all utterly unrecognizable yet tantalizingly familiar.
(In its quieter, introspective moments, it wondered if that was why it had taken on the guise of its creator. Perhaps the virus had recognized even in instinctual infancy that it needed an anchor to tether its mind to, lest it rip its mind apart every time it consumed.)
Keeping itself apart from humanity was never an option after that. Every time it consumed its prey, their voices found their way into its mind, permanently binding the two. It saw what they saw, heard what they heard, felt what they felt—over and over again, from their earliest childhood to the day of their death at its hands. With each soul it took upon itself, it knew more of its makers, and superseded its maker.
(The virus wondered if it would have refrained from walking such a bloody path, had it known that its victims would stay with it forever. The thousands of screaming voices in the Web of Intrigue only laughed mockingly.)
It relived the life of Elizabeth T. Cox, mother of twins, who had been on her way back from getting ingredients for a cake (to distract her kids from the mess you created, from the hell you spawned).
Of Julian Castillo, a shopkeeper who'd wisely barricaded his storefront upon hearing a sudden brawl between the virus and a Blackwatch kill-team, only to find that he could not ignore the pleas of his neighbors trapped outside (only to find himself face-to-face with the virus itself in a rapidly-disappearing pile of bodies).
Of Jonathan A. Rhodes of the US Marines, who'd finished his tour of duty and wanted only to surprise his mom with his return, and of Maria Johnson of the NYPD, who was eager to get back to an engrossing novel waiting for her in her too-small apartment, and of Thomas Becker, balding petty thief and drifter who'd taken advantage of the chaos to land a few good scores, and of countless others that even now gripped and clawed at his psyche in a swirling storm of personas and minds.
How could it not understand mankind after that? After living innumerable times across countless threads of life? After having the experiences of a thousand thousand men and women (and children, the voices snarled) wrapped in its head?
How could it not understand love after remembering the faint flickers of Dr. Mercer's childhood, spent shielding his sister from the world around them? Joy when he took her ice-skating after Dana had suffered a particularly bad day at school? (Sacrifice, when he locked her in her room so that he would take the brunt of their mother's "affections"?)
How could it not comprehend grief, when the virus stared at the crumpled sheets and inactive equipment before it, listening but unhearing the placating words of sympathy Ragland gave it?
"—I'm sorry. I'll…give you some time alone."
The virus nodded listlessly, eyes intent only on the unmoving (unbreathing) body before him.
Dana.
She was cold. Cold like nothing alive should ever be.
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"...What the hell happened to you, Alex?"
"...I haven't even seen you in five years..."
"...Whatever happens, you'll still be my brother."
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The virus didn't break down sobbing, didn't cry. Couldn't. Why would it? It wasn't human, not anymore, not ever. She wasn't its sister, not really. She was just...
It reached out to her body as if by instinct, to brush the stray strands of hair from her face only to freeze its hand halfway there. Where five fingers should have been, wicked claws each half a foot long stretched out, with their form shifting constantly as agitated tendrils churned and swarmed. The virus grabbed its hand tightly and forced its limbs to settle back down.
Don't fool yourself, the voices in its mind hissed. You might understand us, but you'll never be like us. You're a monster, nothing more.
As the virus stared at Dana A. Mercer's body, it thought of how foolish it'd been, thinking otherwise.
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Ragland froze at the doorway to the cramped room housing Dana Mercer's body, before slowly laying a comforting hand on the virus' shoulder. He'd seen that face, that expression too many times before.
He'd always hated having to give family members bad news.