The door of Madame Red's office swung open suddenly, nearly scarring the woman half to death. From behind it appeared a furious blonde, followed by a rather concerned bluenette boy, hovering a little ways behind him.
"Alois, was that really necessary?" the woman asked. "You nearly scarred the life out of me! Would it kill you to knock next time?"
"No, but would it kill you to explain this?!" the blonde said, holding out a file and a disc to the doctor.
"Alois does this have anything to do with the discussion from earlier?" Doctor Durless said, taking the file from the boy and opening it. "I told you, you and the rest of the five are stay pu-" She stopped. She looked up from the file to the angry boy in front of her. "Where did you get this?" she asked, her tone serious.
"Doesn't matter." the boy said. "What I wanna know is what the bloody hell is the big idea?! Making more superheroes like some sort of assembly line?! What the fuck is wrong with you people?!"
"Alois, I'm going to have to ask you to calm down and be reasonable." the doctor said. "It's for safety reasons. If any of you were to either die, or betray the United Kingdom, we would have to either replace you, or in the latter scenario, take you out."
"So you don't trust us?!"
"Judging by the fact that you hacked a government database, I'm not sure if I can anymore..."
The boy looked at the ground and clenched his fists. He couldn't argue. She was right, really. Still, it infuriated him.
Madame red picked up the disc and looked at it for a moment, turning it over to look for some kind of label. "What's this?" she asked.
He didn't look up. "Security footage from Victoria Labs." he said. "We found one of the Noah's Ark Cirus members on camera. Their leader."
Now the bluenette spoke up. "He was in the room talking to a doctor and another man in the same room as Project A.S.H. That's how we found out about it, miss."
Madame Red's eyes went wide for a moment before she spun around in her chair to face her computer. She shoved the disc into the disc-drive and pressed play. Lo and behold, the boys spoke truth. There it was, plain as day. Joker waltzed right into the room and spoke with the two men in the room in quite the casual manner. The men treated him with hospitality, it would seem, greeting the young man with friendly smiles and making conversation. She recognized both men. The Doctor on the screen was the head of that project, and the man wrapped in bandages and sitting in a wheelchair was Baron Kelvin, one of the men who helped fund the project.
"This is bad..." she said to the lads. "I'm so sorry I doubted you boys..." Madame Red immediately grabbed her phone and dialed it before pressing it up to her ear.
"This is Angelina Durless, adviser to the PhantomFive, 'Project Watchdog'. We have a situation." she said to the person on the other end. "No, calling it a 'situation' would be an understatement. Intel indicates that Project A.S.H. may be corrupt. Pull the plug immediately."
The boys looked at each other for a moment while they strained their ears to try and hear the person on the other end of the phone. Madame Red sat there for a moment while listening to what the person had to say. Finally she slammed her hand down on the desk and stood up, sending her chair flying backwards and almost into the blonde's burned leg.
"'Authorization', my ass! You listen here! This has the potential to become a national emergency! Worst case scenario, it moves international! Do you hear me?! Pull the damn plug!" she yelled into the device.
"Whoa... You go, Red..." said the blonde boy. Madame Red straightened herself, and cleared her throat.
"Thank you." she said to the person on the phone before hanging up. She turned to the boys. "Tell everyone to be ready to deploy at any moment. Should project A.S.H leave that lab, you'll be our only hope!"
"Yes ma'am!" Alois said with a salute. Finally, some action! He grabbed the foot of the lad hovering behind him, and guided him into the hallway, through which they ran to convey the message to their team. The doctor picked her chair up off of it's side from where it lay in the floor, repositioned it, and sat down. She put her face in her hands.
"I hope you're ready..."
Meanwhile in an undisclosed location, Britain's finest hardened military veterans geared up and headed out in full gear to Victoria Labs. It was obvious to everyone that this was going to get messy very quickly. Combat boots stampeded against the linoleum flooring of the building as they prepared themselves for the worst.
Guns were loaded, the safety turned off, now all that's left is to pull the trigger, whether it be at a man or a monster. They kicked open the door and fanned out, completely surrounding the Head Doctor and the man known as "Baron Kelvin", a.k.a. "Tom, The Piper's Son". The tow men put their hands up in the air in surrender.
"What is the meaning of this?!" shouted the man in the wheelchair.
"Quiet! We've been ordered to pull the plug on this project." said some nameless soldier with his gun aimed right into the face of the man.
"But, it's almost complete! Why shut it down now!?" the doctor's words were ignored however, as they were met by the man being bashed in the face by the butt of a gun to silence him. He fell to the ground with a thud.
"Orders are orders. You're under arrest until this is all straightened out." another soldier said. The doctor sat himself up against the control panel, spitting up blood from cutting his lip on his teeth.
"Doctor! Release it!" ordered the Baron, only to have a gun shoved in his face.
The other man propped himself up against the control panel, using it as support before pounding his fist against a button. He was promptly beaten again by the same soldier who had hit him the first time. Soon, however, his attention and the attention of the other soldiers in the room were captured by the coffin-like capsule beginning to open. They all pointed their guns at the container, preparing for the worst.
Finally, the lid finally came off, revealing a man with silver hair dressed in a white suit behind it, seemingly sleeping. Project A.S.H slowly opened his amethyst eyes, seeing the frightened soldiers. As soon as he moved, however, the soldiers immediately began to empty their weapons into the capsule that he lay in. This, however, only seemed to anger the man.
He sprung forth, swinging his fist at the closest soldier, hitting him with full force. The poor military man's skull merely caved in on the impact, and Project A.S.H simply tossed him aside before moving onto the next. He hit the next soldier in the chest, shattering his ribcage, bone fragments piercing his heart and lungs. The "Hero" moved onto the next soldier, and the next soldier, and the next, and the next. Finally, he ran out of men in uniform.
Project A.S.H. turned to the man in the wheelchair, and walked towards him. Baron Kelvin immediately put his hands up in surrender.
"Wait! Wait! I'm on your side! I'm one of your creators!" he said. A.S.H. stopped in his tracks.
"'Creator'?" he echoed, his voice surprisingly soft.
"Yes, yes, yes, yes!" the bandaged man said. "I helped create you! I created you to be the perfect being!"
"Perfect being? Me?"
"Yes, you were designed to be the perfect hero! Perfect in every way! Perfect, pure." the man insisted.
"Exactly how does one go about being the 'perfect hero', if I may ask?" the silver-haired man said.
"Easy! You go around, cleansing the earth of the scum of society! Any impure souls who may tread the ground, it's your duty to rid the planet of them!"
"'Impure'?" the artificial man asked. "Are you 'pure', creator?"
"Not yet, but I will be! I've just underwent a new surgery to become perfect! After just a few more, I'll be perfect! Pure! Beautiful! Hey, wait, what are you doing?!" the man asked. His eyes went wide as he saw the silver-haired man cock back his fist.
"You are imperfect. Impure. It is my duty to cleanse the planet of impure souls like you."
Project A.S.H.'s fist propelled forward, killing the man almost instantly. He left that laboratory room soaked in blood. A.S.H. had a mission. He had a purpose. He was going to rid the planet of impurity once and for all.
A/N: Derp.
IMPURE! IMPURE! IMPURE!
Get it? Project A.S.H. everyone...
Back to the Five tomorrow. This is gonna be a BIG baddie. Not the BIGGEST, just big...
You'll never guess who the biggest baddie is gonna be~!
Until the next chapter, my duckies!