Blades
Miles away, beyond the mountains and through the desert another cloning vat was being prepared to be opened. A cloning vat similar to the one that Terra was awaken from, but regardless of how similar they looked they where different, this vat had genetic manufacture tube etched in large red letters across one of its metallic sides. Dozens of scientists collected around the strange devise, and the young boy inside. His name was Jonathan Griffin, but the scientists had nick-named his Splice. John had been in a tube almost his whole life, taken from his mother when he was still unborn, taken by the organization. Other children had been used, but the foreign DNA fused in to their bodies destroyed them. Splice was the only one who survived. Animal DNA, Tamaranian DNA, mutated DNA. Any type of genetic code that would help the scientists achieve their goal of creating a perfect soldier was fussed in to him.
His body had become deformed as a side effect of the unfamiliar additions in to his genetic code. Sharp black spines ran down his length of his spine, extensions of the darkened bone hidden beneath his skin, John's lower jaw and teeth where enlarged and malformed to a point beyond recognition, and his eyes where a solid black with no visible iris at their center. The mutation gave him powerful abilities, Splice could detect any type of EM wave with his eyes, AM, FM, TV, Micro, Radar, Infrared, Visible, Ultraviolet, X-ray, even Gamma. Military fighting tactics where artificially placed into his brain along with all the necessary survival knowledge he would ever need. But their greatest accomplishment was his damage resistance; his entire skeletal structure along with several points on his organic body had been mutated into a black and lifeless hardened form. His body had reached a point that even bullets could not penetrate his skin. The scientist where feverishly working around the sleeping Splice, John's creators where preparing for their benefactor to arrive, they where waiting for Hunter.
General Hunter was on a small personal jet, his face was heavily bandaged and he could be heard occasionally cursing in pain under his breath. He sipped at a gin and tonic as he sat alone in the large passenger compartment. To Hunter even the short four hour flight seemed like an eternity, every second brought another twinge of pain. Hunter watched the clouds beyond his window with indifference, he very much doubted that the Titans would be successful in the destruction of Terra or her friends, but he never passed up the chance to have his enemies kill each other off. The best he could hope for would be a casualty or two on one of the sides. The wounds on his face constantly sent shots of agony down his spine, and every time the pain came the image of Torrent descending down upon him found it's was into Hunters mind. Anger welled up in him and he swept the glass of alcohol from the table with the back of his hand shattering it against the wall, he reached up and clicked on a small communicator above him,
"Pilot! How close are we to the lab?" A cattery mechanical voice responded,
"We're just setting down now Sir."
"Excellent." He could barely contain his excitement. This day had been years in the making. His construction of the perfect assassin had taken thousands of dollars and years of labor. The wheels of the air plane screeched as they struck the asphalt of the runway. When Hunter stepped out of the plane and on to the off ramp he was greeted by three scientists. One stepped forward to address the general directly.
"Greetings General, my name is Dr. Spencer If you'll follow me Sir, we'll start the presentation." He extended his hand and gestured for Hunter to walk toward the lab at the end of the small runway.
The lab was implanted into a cliff side and the desert that surrounded it was silent and lifeless. This kind of libratory the third of its kind in the world, one here, one in the tundra of the northern Rock Mountains, and one on the coast near an old abandoned fair ground. The four men approached the hanger size entrance door, several cameras with small glowing green lights that clicked on and followed the men as they advanced. The scientist that had addressed Hunter walked up to a control box to one side of the door, a four digit code was typed in and he scanned his retina in front of a small lens. Instantly after the scan was complete the door began to open. As Hunter passed through the arch way he noticed just how reinforced the door was, the door itself was five feet of solid metal, no gaps. Inside the facility there where dozens of armed guards and cameras every twenty feet, Hunter turned to Dr. Spencer,
"Why all the security, this is a secret location, no one should be able to find this place in order to attack it."
"Oh, it's not for if we are attacked sir. It's for if what we're creating gets out." The Spencer stepped into an elevator at the end of the hall and waited for Hunter to join him. The other scientist waited outside. The general smiled, he could tell that he was going to be pleased in their results. He stepped in and the elevator doors closed.
"Um… if you do not mind me asking, dear general, what happened to you face?" Dr. Spencer was obviously timid about asking Hunter about his injury but the curiosity had been strong enough to overpower that lack of courage.
"I do mind Scientist, and if I where you I would not ask again." The scientist nodded quickly, the rest of the elevator ride was traveled in silence.
When the metallic doors slid open again they reviled a room with blank walls, a man stood next to a projector at it's center and two chairs where placed at either side of him. He motioned for the scientist and Hunter to take their seats. Hunter spoke to the man at the projector as he entered the room,
"What is this all about? I don't have a lot of time to spare." but Hunter sat in his chair in spite of his objection.
"I assure you Mr. Hunter this is of the utmost necessity, if you do not understand the weapon we are about to give to you, the repercussions could be significantly costly. Shall I begin?" He brought a remote from his pocket and killed the lights in the room with a click of a button. Next, he switched on the projector, a large picture of an unborn fetus appeared on the blank wall.
"We need an unstable Genetic code in order to tamper with its structure. The human's undeveloped stage was the best choice, the subjects where selected from several facilities from around the country. We started out with about a thousand possible candidates." He flipped the screen to show a photo of an entire storage house filled with small green vials containing small unborn children. "The first alteration we attempted was the instantaneous teleportation ability you suggested, the experiment was a complete failure, more then half of our subjects died within several hours. The ones that survived showed no sigh of the acquiring the ability. We did find latter that this alteration to their code did increased the subject's reaction time in the combat simulators. The survivors however where also altered in physical appearance." The picture on the wall changed again to a photo of the altered fetus, there was a line of white spikes protruding from the skin that ran down the length of its spinal cord. "Next was the advanced vision modification, this was a complete success, only three candidates lost their eyes and had to be terminated. All the subjects could now detect any kind of EM spectrum wave." The projector clicked and the fetus was shone again with large black eyes in place of the squinted lids that where once there. "The hardened organic material that you purposed was not as lofty of a success, over the next two years four hundred of our subjects died from complications that arose from the solidification. The fifty fetuses that where left alive only had several points in their body that accepted the organic solidification, twenty of the survivors had inner organs hardened and had to be terminated." The nest photo showed several subjects that had strange black designs placed across their body in various places. "The artificial memory transplants work well, only a few subjects died. The Terra DNA you sent us was tried on ten of the twenty five subjects left. All ten died. The majority of the last fifteen where frozen to keep them from growing out of their fetal stage. The ones we allowed to grow died because of complications in the ageing process, the hormonal problems were fixed and five of the ten left where unfrozen to test if the experiment worked." The projector clicked again and showed a small young girl in a test tube. "Once they where awoken they either had a psychotic breakdown or turned against us. So we killed the five subjects that we had awoken. We realized that complete control over our creations was absolutely necessary. In the frozen five we implanted a smaller version of your control disks. Three did not survive the procedure and died. We allowed one to age in suspended animation as he slept in his tube and awoke the other. The girl did well; she excelled in all tests and proved to be very efficient in battle." The photo showed a girl destroying a large robotic solder. "The disk worked, she obeyed all of our commands, but her emotions got in the way, we attempted to remove them by an extension of the control disk but the operation killed her. We tried a similar surgical treatment on the frozen subject, we failed in our attempt but he survived. So we expanded the power of the control disk so control his emotions. This solution is expected to be a success." The man clicked the projector off and turned the lights on.
"Very good," Hunter stood and cracked his neck, "may I go see him now."
"Yes you may," The Dr. Spencer stood "If you'll follow me." He walked up to the wall that the images had been projected on. He placed his hand on the wall, a line of light scanned his prints then a piece of the wall pushed in and opened to reveal a door way. The scientist stepped through followed closely by Hunter.
The two men walked down a stairway and into a long metallic hallway, the florescent lights hummed softly over head. Neither of the men talked as they strode down the long hall, the general's shoes striking the ground and the scientists coat swishing as he swung his arms where the only sounds the echoed down the empty hallway. The doors they passed on their left and right had no light or sound issuing from them, only the one door at the apex of the hall had light gleaming outward from every side. When they reached the door, it slid open, no codes, no scans, no locks.
Directly opposite of the door was the tube containing John, it sat away from the other scientific equipment, though there where dozens of wires leading from to the other machines to keep tabs on the boy inside. John was there, sleeping his dreamless sleep, oblivious to the world around him. The scientists each held a glass of champagne and where wearing white lab coats. The bits of small talk that had been taking place died away when Hunter stepped into the room. He glanced around briefly then withdrew a single metallic cylinder from his pocket, he popped its lid off and pulled a cigar from the container with his teeth, he held the role of expensive tobacco with out lighting it in his mouth for several seconds as he studied the silent collection of men in lab coats and the equipment around them. After he was satisfied with his observations he struck a match with his thumb and puffed his Cuban until the tip glowed red. He shook the flaming match out as he began to speak,
"So, this is the boy." A long intake of smoke, "He doesn't look like much. When are we going to thaw him out?"
"Immediately, that is if you are ready dear General." Dr, Spencer seemed to be the only one of the other men with the ability to speak, he also seemed to be the leader of the scientist for how the others let him talk for them. Hunter nodded slightly and held the cigar between clinched teeth. As if on queue every scientist walked briskly to one end of the room, this area was void of all equipment save a large screen and a small control panel. The scientist coward away as Hunter walked over to join them; he stood alone in front of the screen as the rest crammed in to the corners. The lead scientist, Dr. Spencer, stepped up to the control panel, he pressed a series of buttons then the sound of mechanical parts began to rumble from every direction. The general looked around in amusement. Two plates of metal began to descend from the ceiling, one to shield the machinery on one side of the room from view and the other to hide the scientists and Hunter at the other. When both walls had completely set down, the lead scientist produced a small key from his pocket, he clicked it into a small slot and looked at Hunter.
"Will he be able to see us? Shouldn't his eye enhancements be able to detect us?"
"No sir, these walls are customized for just this occasion, they consist of solid lead, not even he can detect us."
"Very good, proceed then." Hunter smirked and puffed smoke from his nostrils.
The key was turn, and the screen in front of Hunter clicked on, there was a slight hissing noise and the lid on the cloning vat snapped open.