Collaboration with Glorifiedscapegoat.
Nezumi's army grew larger as it descended the floors, an ocean of white lab coats that soon became mixed with black uniforms and bullet-proof vests. One of the guards headed the procession, an AK-47 clutched in his hands.
Nezumi had snared them all as he walked down the stairs. His army's varying assortment of dress shoes and combat boots sang out against the iron stairwell, a countdown that warmed Nezumi's heart when he realized it meant Horizon Laboratories was going down for good. His body buzzed with excitement, the effects of the serum twisting its way through his veins and adding renewed energy to his more dormant abilities.
Shou had informed him that the effects weren't permanent. Nezumi's body would metabolize the foreign substance in a matter of minutes, the boost of power ebbing its way out of his system as he continued to sweat under the too-warm fabric of his jumpsuit. Would the effects last longer if he stripped his clothes off in the middle of the hall?
The thought made him laugh. What would the Lab do if they saw him striding through the hall, naked as the day he was born, pulling them into his army like he was some manner of god come to punish them for all their corruption and bloodshed?
He shook the thought away. The Lab's serum might have heightened his abilities, but that didn't mean Nezumi needed to be a slave to it.
Nezumi glanced over at Shou. He'd kept him close to his side, his Influence a tight leash that kept Shou obedient and quiet. With the serum coursing through his veins, Shou's mind had crumpled to his will like a ball of wet tissue paper. Nezumi could still feel flutters of resistance beneath his Hand, but it felt no different than a fly attempting to break free of a sticky ribbon. Shou could flutter and pull with all his might; the only way he was breaking free was if he tore his wings off in the process.
Nezumi paused in the stairwell, and his army halted without being told.
It was intoxicating, how easy it was to make them obey. Nezumi felt it like an echo in his soul. An echo that quickly transformed into a ricochet. He'd Reached without much effort, and each mind had surged to obey him. Every headache that had plagued him when he Pushed too hard, every nosebleed and lie he'd struggled through crumbled away as Nezumi stood stockstill in the middle of his human barricade.
He turned to Shou and said, "How close are we to Section P?"
Shou looked over at him and blinked. His eyes were blank and listless; in this moment, he looked weak and pathetic, a man who'd fallen down on his luck and had been seduced into bigger and brighter things at the cost of his soul. And yet, Nezumi couldn't find it in his heart to feel sorry for him. Whatever darkness had plagued Shou's life before Horizon Laboratories swept into it, it didn't change the fact that Shou had chosen human experimentation over prolonged misery.
Sour hatred festered in the pit of Nezumi's stomach. If Shou had ignored Horizon Laboratories' tempting offer, he would have suffered. Whatever disgusting things he'd needed to do in order to survive each day, at least he would have kept his pride. He might have spent the rest of his days scraping by, skipping meals to make ends meet, but he would have kept his integrity. He could have died knowing he hadn't been part of an organization that orphaned children and perverted human biology all in the name of "science."
"How close are we to Section P?" Nezumi repeated, slower this time.
"We're on level nine. Section P's on level…" Shou crossed his eyes and furrowed his brow. "Six? It's one level up from M and L."
The thought of Section M made Nezumi's stomach twist. Rashi's furious face lanced through his mind's eye; Nezumi shoved the thought aside. He didn't know the sadistic officer's schedule. Perhaps this was one of those rare occurrences when Officer Rashi sat at home, doing whatever it was psychopaths did in their spare time.
Pity. I would have loved to watch him squirm. Nezumi's lips quirked upward. The way things stood now, it wouldn't matter if the officer had his scrambler in. Nezumi could shred through his defenses like a tornado through a trailer park. It'd be worth it to watch Rashi's face go slack beneath his command, worth it to turn him into a puppet.
But the serum probably wouldn't last long enough for Nezumi to cross paths with Officer Rashi.
Ah, well. It would be just as fun to see the look of horror on his face as he realized that Nezumi had taken full control of Section F and almost everyone else on the descending floors. And all in a matter of five minutes.
"How do we get to Section P from here?" Nezumi asked.
Shou gestured down to the base of the stairwell. Nezumi's army congregated around it, staring into the void like a collection of glass-eyed dolls."We can take the stairs down to level six. Section P's not too far from the door. Although, security might be pretty tight."
"Why?"
"They increased security after the riot a few weeks ago. After that, the guards on Section P were placed on high alert. That's what I heard anyway. I don't really know."
Nezumi frowned. "Why just Section P?"
"Because that's where most of the VCs are kept."
Nezumi blinked. "Most of the VCs are kept in Section P?"
"Yeah. They used to be pretty evenly spaced out before the breach, but Section P's better equipped to store them. The walls are reinforced, and the security's top-notch. The other Sections are just overflow." He shrugged again, and this time, Nezumi let it go.
Nezumi tapped his finger against his lips and surveyed his army. He'd pulled in enough to be a more than formidable force. Section P might have increased security, but Nezumi had a secret weapon.
He sent out the command, and his army continued their descent down the stairwell.
Three floors down, on Nezumi's silent command, a guard swiped a crisp blue ID card to allow them access to the sixth floor, guiding Nezumi securely into the pristine white hallways connecting the varying Sections to one another.
Nezumi strode casually behind the wall of bodies, stretching his Influence out and brushing through the minds of each presence he passed. He could feel them all lighting up beneath his touch, their feeble minds too overwhelmed with terror and ignorance to comprehend the horrors Nezumi planned to inflict on them.
Shou pointed to a large metal door at the midway point in the hall. Nezumi couldn't see the dark blue letters spray-painted on the wall, but he imagined they'd spell out a crudely done SECTION P as he approached.
"Security's not that bad," Nezumi remarked aloud. "There's no one here."
"There're cameras," Shou pointed out. "And the guards are probably in Section P right now. There's no point in patrolling the halls."
Nezumi snorted. If more guards had patrolled the halls, Nezumi might not have gotten as far as he had. Then again, he might have yanked them into his army, too. So many endless possibilities, all of them congealing together in his mind. The serum made him giddy and overexcited, as if he'd downed three gallons of hot coffee with sugar.
"Let's go," he said, and his army moved forward as a single entity.
⁂
Breaking into Section P proved to be far easier than Nezumi could have anticipated. One of the guards he'd dragged into his army had security clearance for this particular sector, and with a quick swipe of his ID card, the metal doors slid open.
Beyond the threshold, Nezumi spotted a tiny lobby with a large wooden desk pressed against the far wall. Beside it sat a massive pair of doors, accessible only by a password inputted by the receptionist. An effective way to ensure only authorized personnel went in or out. Nezumi swept his gaze around the room, peering into the minds of his minions to bridge the gaps he couldn't see beyond their shoulders.
A few glass-walled sitting rooms rested on each side of the room, empty aside from a few ugly green couches and neat coffee tables littered with business magazines. The lobby itself buzzed with halogen lights and smelled vaguely of cheap air freshener. Linen scent. Not nearly strong enough to eliminate the stench of bleach. It felt more like a doctor's office than a place of science, but the buzzing just beyond the reaches of his mind assured Nezumi that beyond the second set of metal doors, there were plenty of VCs to liberate.
A young woman with a beehive of black hair sat behind the desk. She glanced up at the sound of the doors sliding open, a bored look and a permanent pout plastered on her lips.
"Um," she said, dragging out her words. "Is there something I can help you with—?"
Her brow furrowed as she took in the collection of technicians and guards standing in the middle of the lobby. She slowly rose from her desk, dressed in a flowery blouse, leaning forward and surveying the group as if she couldn't quite comprehend what she was seeing.
The gears in her mind began to turn, confusion giving way to feral horror as comprehension flooded to the forefront of her brain. The crowd shuffled forward, forming an uncomfortable ring around the wooden desk.
Without a word, the sea of white and black parted, and Nezumi stepped forward.
The receptionist darted for the shiny red phone at her desk, but Nezumi Reached out easily and purred, :Don't do that.:
Her hand stilled above the receiver.
"Very good," Nezumi said aloud. "Now, you don't want to call your friends just yet."
"I don't want to call them," the receptionist agreed.
"You want to let us into the cell block."
The receptionist nodded eagerly. She drew up her computer screen and quickly began inputting a number of keystrokes into the system. Nezumi didn't bother memorizing them. The receptionist's mind had fallen to his will easily enough; once he was inside the cell block, he didn't think it would take as much effort to escape.
With a few quick clicks, the receptionist inputted a code that surged through the electric wires and synapses connecting the computer system to the door's locking mechanism. With a click and a whir, the little red light signifying that the door was locked shifted to green.
"There," the receptionist remarked. She sat down in her chair, the seat groaning with the addition of her weight. The office hadn't been given a new desk chair since she'd arrived. Nezumi could feel her aggravation like a vapor. "Just walk up to the door and it'll open."
"Good." Nezumi turned and marched with his army toward the metal doors. He paused and turned back to the receptionist. "Keep them open. We won't be long."
The receptionist saluted.
Nezumi stepped up to the doors, and sure enough, they drew to the side and allowed him to step into the pristine tile hall.
Just beyond the first set of doors sat yet another small hallway. Nezumi began to wonder if Horizon Labs had donated a charitable amount to the local door-manufacturing company just to get this many access points. On both sides of the hall, glass windows revealed small offices with a pair of guards in each room.
One of them, a tall man with salt and pepper hair, lifted his head and locked eyes with Nezumi. Horror darted across his face, and he reached for his belt.
Nezumi cocked his head to the side and watched as one of the Lab technicians surged forward and ripped the door open. Not even locked. Pathetic. A small portion of his army—consisting of guards with blue buzz batons, guns, and technicians with their white lab coats—flooded into the first room and quickly subdued the guards.
With a quick flick of his wrist, another handful of his legion wrenched the doors to the other office open before the guards could consider locking it. They flooded inside, snatching away the officers' guns and pinning them to the table with their arms behind their backs.
The takedown occurred in a matter of moments, so comically fast that Nezumi almost burst out laughing. This was the best Horizon Laboratories could do? After almost seventeen years of torment and misery, this was the extent of their security system?
Nezumi strode forward and pulled the four officer's minds into his hive. "Listen up," he announced, a twinge forming in the side of his skull. He didn't know how much time he had left before the serum worked its way out of his system. He had never controlled so many people simultaneously before, and he doubted his army would remain loyal to him without his supercharged ability to crumple their mental defenses. His influence kept them grounded now, but as soon as the serum burned off, he would lose the army he'd enmassed throughout the Lab.
There wasn't much time left.
"Release every VC in every single cage," Nezumi commanded, using his Reach to send the command through the horde of bodies clustered in the hallway. "Inform them that this is the end for Horizon Labs. If they want freedom, tell them to do whatever it takes to get out of here. Whatever it takes."
He dismissed them and hurried down the hall. The second set of doors gave way without much issue, and Nezumi watched as the chaos unfurled around him.
An ocean of VCs in their dark green uniforms peered back at him, confusion and reverence on their faces as the lab technicians and security guards that had kept them prisoner for so long unlocked their cages and instructed them to escape at any cost.
Nezumi drifted through the assemblage of Horizon Lab's fallen employees, grinning like a lunatic as he realized that all his years of toiling away in the mud had led him to this moment. The painful months after his parents' deaths, the years of embarrassing himself just to get a free meal, the decade of loneliness that vanished for only a few short months—all of it had led to this one, glorious moment.
A pain lanced through Nezumi's chest at the realization that Shion wasn't here to see it, too. He shoved it aside. There would be time for mourning after he'd dragged this hideous place to the ground. These walls had become Shion's grave, but Nezumi wasn't going to let him be trapped here. He'd rip these walls apart, piece by piece, turning Horizon Lab's precious employees against themselves, and he'd break the ghosts out once and for all.
Nezumi was halfway down the hall when a series of alarms started blaring.
Someone on the other end of the cameras must have spotted the riot and alerted the guards in other sections to the breach.
Nezumi smirked.
It didn't matter what they did now.
It was too late.
He surveyed each cage, searching for a familiar sign of black fur. He couldn't imagine the mutt would choose to be in human form inside their cage. Even so, he kept an eye out for long brown hair and a set of beady, judgmental eyes. His minions unlocked the cell doors and released the VCs with glassy, unfocused smiles.
Nezumi rounded the corner to a new set of cells and bustled down toward one of them. He let his Influence roam around the cages, searching through the glass walls and picking through each individual mind until he found one that buzzed with familiar confusion and feral anger.
:There you are.:
Inukashi's thoughts jolted at the sound of his voice. Nezumi followed the tether that guided him to the appropriate cell.
Inukashi stared back at him from beyond the glass, just barely emerging from their shift. They looked out at the tagalong army of technicians who unlocked the cages across from them. The VCs who shrieked with excitement as they were finally, finally liberated. One of the VCs punched one of the guards in the face—a personal grudge that needed to be satisfied—and the guard grinned like an idiot through it all, his thoughts too far gone to register the strike as a threat.
"Holy fuck," Inukashi breathed.
"Hey, mutt." Nezumi smirked as one of the guards stepped beside him and unlocked Inukashi's cell. "Ready to get out of here?"
⁂
It had rained all night, but the reinforced steel walls blocked out the continuous rolls of thunder that'd darkened the sky since early this morning. Officer Rashi only knew the weather from the local report that flashed across his desktop, informing him that the rain would turn to a wintry mix soon, but the approaching weekend would be sunny and clear.
Down in the lower levels of Horizon Laboratories, Officer Rashi didn't have access to the pretty glass windows the idiot technicians in Section F took for granted. And after years of dedicated service and obeying the orders of men lesser than himself, Officer Rashi didn't even have the luxury of an office with updated equipment and neat purple-blue carpets.
After the reaming he'd received from Chief Officer Masahiro following VC-221's transport from Section M, Rashi supposed he should be thankful to still have a job, period. The commander had torn him apart for the better part of two hours, slapping his hand on the table and snarling "Shut it!" every time Rashi opened his mouth to interject a detail or argue a flaw in the commander's story.
According to Masahiro's intel and the mad doctor's reports, Officer Rashi had subjected VC-221 to "inhumane and unnecessary punishments" without just cause.
Bullshit.
Rashi clicked his tongue angrily at the memory and logged off his computer. He'd been glaring at his screen and the report he was meant to write for an hour, and he didn't see it changing anytime soon.
Section M had been extraordinarily dull since his superiors ordered him back to his office with a strict warning that any further reprimands would result in suspension and possible termination. Takaya Mirai's now-permanent absence meant there wasn't anyone to keep an eye on the prisoners—but Section M didn't have many to begin with.
VC-221 had been the only exceptional prisoner Rashi had in his fold; the others were a half-dozen weaker VCs whose powers ranged from minor healing to the ability to change the temperature in confined spaces. Their presence in Section M almost felt like an insult. Officer Rashi had scared the fight out of them in their first few nights under his watch, without needing to resort to using his buzz baton. It made his work easier, but Rashi found their lack of defiance dull.
Since his arrival in Horizon Laboratories, VC-221 had held an interesting challenge where all others had failed. During their few weeks together, Rashi had enjoyed breaking him down to his most basic components, picking him apart both physically and mentally and watching him crumble beneath the pressure. The kid had a set of balls on him, Rashi had to reluctantly admit, but even the mightiest of opponents had a breaking point.
It'd taken some doing and far more research than Rashi cared to invest in a subject, but he had discovered that weakness. The plain-Jane kid Mirai had dragged back in the transport van. The S-class threat the doctor had euthanized in the infirmary. From the reports, VC-221 had something of a soft spot for him, and Rashi planned to exploit it until the well ran dry.
Ripping the charm bracelet off the kid's limp wrist had been easy. Once the doctor euthanized him, the body would be stripped and dumped in the incinerator. No point in letting such an asset go to waste. The look of horror that flickered across 221's face as Rashi dropped the bracelet into the meal box and nudged it shut had been worth every aggravating moment.
Rashi didn't have his nemesis here to torment. VC-17 had perished under a barrage of bullets, in a dingy little cabin in the woods, alongside that joke of a woman he'd bred with and the traitorous bitch who'd helped them flee. He'd been forced to make do with the situation he'd been given—tormenting 17 by torturing his son.
But now VC-221 was somewhere else, and Officer Rashi was bored.
He tapped his uninjured index finger against his desk and counted the cracked tiles on the ceiling. Three of them were damaged enough that he suspected a pipe was leaking. The water damage couldn't be just a coincidence. Rashi had submitted three maintenance slips since he'd noticed the leak a month ago, but no plumbers had been down to repair it. If the pipe burst and flooded his office, he'd be pissed. Even more so if he was in his office when it finally went.
His taped middle and pointer fingers on his right hand throbbed, and Officer Rashi remembered that it was time to take his medicine. The infirmary had prescribed him with oxycodone for the first few days following the injury, but Rashi stopped taking them in lieu of over-the-counter Tylenol. He didn't like what oxy did to him; it took the worst of the pain away, sure, but it left him bent over the toilet and emptying his stomach for the better part of an hour.
221 had broken his fingers in three places, bending them back so far the nerves had been severely damaged. His physician implored him to be hopeful that he might make a full recovery, but it would take some time. Every time Rashi stared at the clean white tape, his blood burned.
He was considering heading to the break room for a cup of coffee—not because he needed one, but so he could do something other than sit in his office like a punished child—when a piercing alarm sang through the halls.
Rashi's head snapped upright.
He recognized this alarm. It'd been awhile since they'd needed to implement it, but every officer and agent employed by Horizon Laboratories understood the Code Black signal when they heard it.
A breach.
A widespread one.
An image of VC-221's blank face flashed across his mind's eye. Officer Rashi's lips drew back into a vicious grin. Of course that fucking brat was causing trouble again.
He carefully took his gun from the drawer and slid it into the holster at his hip. It had taken years to practice shooting with his right hand since 17 bit his pinkie and ring fingers off, and while he wasn't the best shot, Rashi knew he wouldn't miss. Especially not if he jammed the barrel right against 221's forehead and pulled the trigger before those silver eyes had time to blink.
Time to have some fun.