Chapter One: Right
"I might as well fight against cancer." Ragland rubbed his eyes as he spoke.
"Her immune system still hasn't reacted?"
"No," the doctor answered firmly. "That's why she's in a quarantine unit, Mercer. It's not to contain Redlight, but for her body's safety. With her immune systems down, she's more vulnerable than ever."
Silence was his reply. Ragland turned around to see the hooded man standing inside the air-tight clear plastic of the quarantine tent.
"There's no cure for Redlight," Alex said this quietly as he gazed down at the young woman rigged with cords and wires.
"The other patients came out fine, Alex. The survivors are proof of that," Ragland replied.
"They weren't the target." Silver eyes looked up from beneath the hood. "Dana was purposely infected with a special strain. Besides, the survivors weren't cured by medical means. Redlight just… stopped and everything else was just natural reaction," Alex told the doctor before gazing back at his sister. He grimaced.
"Ragland, Greene wouldn't have existed nor would the Hope incident happened if Redlight just gave up. And that was the time when it had no head, no variables to influence the results." Alex started pacing back and forth then stopped to stare at the doctor. "And no one got simply cured," he pointed out. "Redlight leaves marks," he told grimly.
"Yet the survivors showed no sign of major mutation."
"Despite that, small outbreaks still happen. Hope was wiped out, no survivors. Somehow they were carriers that laid low—"
Ragland cut in. "The survivors couldn't be carriers. Symptoms would show."
Alex stared at him hard. "Other diseases showed no symptoms until the very last moment. Even with all the blood tests, you can't guarantee a true positive."
"Only time does," the doctor muttered and sighed at this.
"Something's different with this outbreak," Alex said. "Too many factors, too many living. I doubt Redlight just wilted away in their bodies."
Ragland stared at the living virus before looking at the young woman on the bed. "Is she the proof?"
"She hasn't woken up!" Alex snapped. "What else is there? It sits in her, doing—" He grinded his teeth. "Something is controlling the variables. For all I know, the survivors are just there to carry out future outbreaks."
"But it would've been wiped out if Redlight just stopped in their body, Alex," Ragland repeated. "You've said it yourself."
Alex Mercer sighed and rubbed his face. "Nothing about Redlight makes sense, Ragland. Four decades of studies and yet it still throws surprises." He grunted in frustration. "All I know is that there's definitely something controlling it."
"I still don't—"
"Dana, should have died by now," Alex told the doctor sharply. "Her body is doing nothing, Redlight should have free access to do whatever it wanted. To finish what it is doing to her! Except it isn't!"
"She's a medical anomaly, Alex. Rare but they happen."
"Greene was a medical anomaly before she became what she was!" Alex snarled and the doctor winced.
"If you're saying what I think you're saying," Ragland told him slowly. "We still don't know the incubation period for her to become—"
"Two years," Alex answered curtly. "Greene only had two years and less living in that town before she became what she was. But even then, she showed sign of being a perfect host before. Her anomaly was the first sign."
"So technically we still have time before it happens," Ragland said as he stared at the living virus.
Alex just bristled, red and black tendrils rippling before they settled back into immaculate black leather, and the doctor began to hold his breath.
"You're right," Alex said then tugged his hood in frustration. "But we still need a cure. If Dana's body is not going to wipe Redlight out for her, then…" He hesitated, his breathing shuddering at the thought.
"She's not dying, Alex. Not yet."
"As she sits here, she's being risked of earning how many dozens of infections before Redlight finishes what it does! It's churning, replicating! Slowly eating her before the mutation happens!" Alex shouted. "All the current cures aren't working! You've said it yourself," he repeated Ragland's words.
"Alex, calm down," Ragland said gently as the living virus breathed heavily, black and red tendrils shivering uncontrollably out of his anger.
"I…" He looked at his pale hands then at the comatose woman.
Beneath those white blankets and paper-thin cover, her body were arrayed with incisions. Threads that spoke how she was opened up plenty of time, gone through surgeries more than her body could recover. All to get samples, all to fight the virus. All along her spine, her wrists, her elbows even her feet were spotted with how many injection marks, dotting her pale skin enough that her blood vessels were bruised red. Just like Greene... just like Greene.
His fists tightened. "I'm the virus. I can control my virus," he said as if assuring himself.
And yet, he slaughtered many, consume many, feeling the addictive rush of… infecting. Was he really controlling? He wasn't entirely hunting for just truth and vengeance. They were just convenient excuses to go along when he knew no better.
In the end, part of him was fascinated yet horrified at the feelings that brought with consuming. He knew he was following an instinct alien and entirely inhuman back then, and he used this as excuse to rage at those who he thought were guilty at making him what he is. To hunt, to infect was a blurry line for his young naïve self. When truth freed him, a part of him was relieved.
He wasn't infected, he wasn't sick, it wasn't something he needed to control, something to be cured, there was nothing wrong with him in the first place. He was the infection, and this was how it was meant to be.
It still wasn't… right. He closed his eyes, remembering the flash of Dana's horrified face and then on that day when she was forcefully taken.
He looked up from his deep thoughts. "Can you use my virus to make a cure out of it?"
Ragland narrowed his eyes. "As a means to destroy Redlight and perhaps mutate her immune system to be stronger…"
They were walking on ice, right now. Blacklight was a weapon of war. That was the reason it was made for, not as a cure for cancer, but war. Alex repeated to himself, he was above that. He was more than just a creature of design, a creature of how many lifespans of memories stolen. He could control his virus, he told himself. He could do things with it, so why not as a cure?
Certain Redlight strains could hurt him. The parasite was proof enough, and a cure version of his virus was going to go against that?
But he didn't suffer from consuming Greene whose body churned how many strains of Redlight. One or two of them should hurt him when he consumed, but it didn't. It was proof that his virus was stronger.
Dana had a special strain in her, and the cure couldn't afford to be weaker than his. Blacklight's deadliest traits could be used to combat Redlight, but its traits were not something desired in a cure as it has too many risks.
"I don't know much how Blacklight technically functions besides theories," Ragland began. "Alex, we're making a cure out of a virus that's ten times worse than the mother virus," the doctor said, doubtful.
He was the virus. He could control it… he could lower its mortality rate. I have to.
"You've cured me from a cancer that was supposed to kill me, Ragland," Alex pointed out. "I know you can do it for Dana as well."
Except she's more… fragile than you.
Ironic, for a virus to put faith in a Gentek scientist. An ex-Gentek scientist, Alex corrected himself before marching towards the medical tools within the metal trolley. Pulling out the drawer, he peeled the air-sealed plastic and began to set up the needle. It was all natural to him, setting up the needle, as if he had done it a million times before.
Without bothering to find his artery or pulling his sleeves, he just stabbed into himself and pulled out the vile, inky red blackness of his biomass.
"Extract the virus, replicate in whatever petri dish. Do what you have to do to make a cure out of it," Alex said when he placed the filled needle on the metal tray, his eyes averting their gaze away. "Don't make me regret this, Ragland," he told the doctor sternly, glaring before returning his diligent gaze back to his sister.
He felt like he was breaking every promise for doing this. But if Dana's survival depended on that… then he would gladly do it even with the risks.
Because nothing scared Alex more than losing his sister. Not again. What would he do without her?
Three months later
"Why has the government kept this information from the public—" the reporter voiced.
"Shut the TV, Elise," grumbled the man lounging on the couch.
"But it's talking about the Outbreak," a seven-year-old girl said.
"Just shut the TV."
"Everyone is talking about it, dad."
"It's eleven o'clock, way past your bedtime," he told her flatly. "Good kids like you should've been in bed before."
"But it's the weekends tomorrow!"
"So?" He gave her a stern glare.
Elise relented under his stare before brightening up. "Tuck me in!" She raised both of her arms up in expectation.
"No."
"Oh c'mon!"
The man exhaled as he sat up on the couch, "How about I tuck you into the garage's freezer." He grinned maliciously. "With all the dead bodies Hank told you about."
The girl just gave him a flat glare. "Not funny, dad. He made it up, he said so."
"You're right." He gave in and stood up, walking over her before heaving her up into his arms.
Her room wasn't far, in front of the entrance into the hallway. He purposely turned away from her door and went towards the stairs instead, where the garage waited down below, earning a loud, "Dad!"
A snicker from him was her answer before he corrected his path back.
"How come you don't bother playing sports with the other parents?" murmured the little girl when she leaned her head against his shoulder. "You love football."
"I do," he replied softly. "But I get way too competitive and when I do… bones break," he finished weakly.
"You?" She pulled up and stared at him. "I don't think you can break any bones, dad."
"Oh. Why's that?" he asked, opening the door to her room wide.
He didn't turn on the light, just relied on the corridor's warm light behind his back. From the faint warm light that managed to creep in here, he could see her wall was creamy white with green vines lacing across the wallpaper. Toys of various kinds scattered in the corner, around the wooden chest that usually housed them. She had her own desk and drawers facing another wall. Her closet by the exit door behind him and her bed was against the wall, in front of the window.
"Jenkin said you're too lanky. A breeze could knock you over!" She giggled.
Jenkin… He gritted his teeth together, keeping his face impassive for his girl as he put her on her bed, pulling the blankets cover back while at it.
"You're too nice and goofy to break anyone's bones," she continued.
He hummed silently at that before putting her covers back onto her.
"What?" she perked, noticing her dad's green eyes staring off in the dark.
"Nothing," he murmured and smiled back then kissed her forehead. "Goodnight, Elise," he said then stood up, walking out her dark room, leaving the door slightly ajar for the corridor's light to spill in.
"Goodnight!" she replied cheerfully after him.
He switched off the main living room light before stacking neatly the neglected piles of papers with drawings on them onto the table. Grabbing the tossed magazine underneath the coffee table as well the dirty socks, he began to go around the room, picking up and putting them back into their places… in the dark.
His green eyes narrowed, checking for any details that told of a messy home. There weren't any. Listening carefully, he heard the sound of fridge humming and soft breathing of two children in their rooms, adjacent to each other.
He blinked in the dark before making his way to his opened kitchen. Turning the hot tap water without bothering to open the cold, he began washing the dishes rigorously under scalding water.
The man paused before looking down at his feet… where a half-eaten metal bowl sat on the floor. With a furrow on his eyebrows, he picked it up. As if on cue, a black Labrador burst out from the corridor and came running onto the kitchen's smooth wooden floor before noticing the glare of her owner with her half-eaten bowl gestured up for the world to see. She immediately ran out of the room, knowing she was in mighty trouble.
"Don't I feed you enough?" the man muttered before continuing his washing.
Dishes done and dried before being placed back, he wiped the table's surface three times, even the kitchen cabinet's handles… which led to him rigorously polishing all the house's doorknobs.
He had nothing to do at a night like this, and for good reason. He could afford to lose some shuteye for once.
Stopping his weekly sterilization, he went back to his couch to pick up his phone tucked in the corners. Upon looking up, his eyes went to the clock above the TV, noticing it was barely midnight.
Way too early, he thought before laying down on the couch. He laid there, still and unmoving for a while before curiosity got to him. Turning the TV back on with the lowest volume ever imagined, he listened to the news update on NYC's outbreak.
"Wrong," he muttered when the reporter spoke of the numbers of death, displaying New York's rivers that held how many barges that once burn infected bodies of NYC's citizens. "So wrong," he said softly.
He lifted the remote, preparing to shut the TV, then stopped when they showed a blurry image of the so called dead terrorist that caused it all. Feature barely clear with that hood shading him, not to mention poor quality image. "Wrong," he said again before shutting the TV completely.
A deep part of him stirred, eager to feel the outside's air instead of just lying there, waiting.
It was strange for him, to feel so restless. Perhaps it was the Outbreak. He sighed before his face hardened.
Three terrorist attacks on New York over the decade. There was the 9/11, then there was this biological one… and lastly that was really making people literally scream and protest right now even here, nuclear terrorism.
The end of the world has come and all that jazz. It would have come… if they truly lost Manhattan to the infected. It could have been worse. The whole world taken over instead of Manhattan.
Protest, protest, protest. We want answers! And all that at Washington, D.C. and at any major cities of other states.
Neighbors were talking, the school teachers were talking, the community was chatting, the internet thrumming; Facebook, Bebo, Blogspot… The Outbreak was on the tip of everyone's tongue.
He played the smiling face, giving condolence when he could, saying few things, even so far adding the part he lost his mother in the Outbreak as well lost contact of his siblings. Not like he was lying at all.
Except it grated on and on. It didn't help the old visions were clouding his sight literally red. More often than not, they stayed in the corner of his sight growing into his visions when he happened to be close at breaking that face he had so carefully woven through the years.
The world talking, chatting. The hivemind whispered, chattered and hissed. The world screamed. The hive screamed, or was it the haunting sounds of Hope dying that had accompanied since his birth? And his visions got worse as they kept on talking. It was hard to keep smiling.
He had been reclusive for the past month, and annoying neighbors noted that.
Patrick Gordon was a nice human man who technically have no close friends. Philip Greene, the runaway, the Runner, lay beneath that, waiting for a crack in the face.
He laid there, on the couch, relishing the fact there were no eyes to watch him slip. He had played this game. He was familiar with it with all his life, picking the right image that was so far from who he was. It shouldn't be that hard to continue at winning it. Except it was.
Was it because she's gone now?
'The time for waiting is over.'
Well, he didn't feel anything. He expected a part of him to die. To feel hollow or something. Restless perhaps? More violent? Instead, he was reminded of his lack of reactions. The oddness that set him apart, maybe he was really like his mother, unresponsive to the pain, the anger, the obscenity and cruelty, an inhuman patience to everything.
He burst into a soft laughter that shook his chest.
She had never left. Like the visions, her whispers continue. Just out of sight, out of mind, comes and goes. She lived through her children.
The hivemind whispered. Someone was dreaming. Someone was hunting. He was waiting.
"Telle mère, telle fille," he whispered, softly chuckling under his breath.
It will never end. You can't fight nature.
There was a sound of glass breaking down at the basement. He quirked an eyebrow up at the expecting intruder. A person would at least be smart enough to notice the difference between tonight and the other nights he went out for his weekly late-night jogging. Sliding off the couch, he went downstairs quietly.
In the end, the thief ended up in his garage's freezer. Whole and fresh.
"Sir?" A woman's voice disturbed him from his thoughts. "Can you sign this form for me?"
He looked up, shaking his head then took the form from his secretary's hand. "Uh, sure," he murmured, giving a quick flick with the pen before handing it back. "Isn't it a bit late for you to be working, Jenny?" he asked her lightly before turning back to gazing outside the window.
Downtown Houston spread below his office, and like many metropolitan cities, it was noisy and full of bright lights from streetlamps, office buildings and cars. A change that he found drastic for the ten-years-ago lab rat who mostly lived under white luminescent lights for all his life.
Jenny spoke, a bit flustered. "It's just that when it comes to deadlines, there are some of us who prefer to hand it in right near the end when they," her voice turned tighter, "should've handed those in earlier, which gives me not ENOUGH time!" she hissed with her shaking hands throttling the paper in front of her. "To process them," she finished then paused awkwardly at his staring. "I'm sorry," she said weakly. "I've shouldn't have yelled."
"You're three months pregnant. It's understandable," he told her gently. "You should've taken your leave."
"And have paperwork to catch up on when I come back," she snorted. "No thanks." She shook her head as she neatly stacked the wrinkled papers into one neat pile.
"Jenny."
"The office has enough relaxed environment-"
"Jenny," he snapped in annoyance. "Go home," he added to the stilled woman. "I'll deal with the paperwork," he said, grabbing the piles and wrestling it off her stiff grip – an easy thing to do.
His secretary sighed before giving him a soft smile. "Thank you, sir," she said before slowly leaving his office under his gaze.
Finally, he thought with a shake and a roll of his eyes. He stood up over his window, mulling things over. Lately he'd been agitated by something. It wasn't his employees... or maybe it was considering they could be a bunch of monkeys when he turned his back on them.
Perhaps it was the old paranoia. He did run away after all, and he ran for a long time despite the whispering. Frankly, he was annoyed by his mother's simple thinking and just shut her voice out. To her, the world was calling out to them and he heard it too. All his childhood... filled with noise of the world, visions of what Redlight wanted of the future, visions that invaded his sight of what a virus could be if technology failed to catch up.
Hope chattered and mother whispered. He'd lived in a waking dream, and she... she must help them with the only way she knew, mothering. A virus mothering was something out of a nightmare. New York was proof of that.
Really, what she did, made a mess, and he did not like messes. So he contained her endeavors, restricted the virus' movement, made the virus not waterborne, even made sure the birds that feast on the flesh of the infected dead and living would not spread the disease across the water. He was better than she was when it came to that aspect of the virus. Plus, he found it amusing to see his 'siblings' struggling when put in water. Like a child fascinated by an ant drowning. He found it fun to toy against his mother, after all, she was the one who taught him.
Then sweet silence came, silence that he fought hard to build in his mind. Except there was a voice. A Runner in making. A backup. Mother was clever after all.
"Mister Gordon," a rough voice called out.
Now who— He turned around, crossed. Next thing he knew, he was lying on broken glass, on another rooftop, adjacent to his building.
...the hell?
This was going to be one hell of a stressful week, he thought crossly as he slowly got up.
He stared in disgust at his broken glasses on the ground. He had to buy that since he'd worked hard to keep his virus inactive. Shape shifting a new pair would defeat the purpose. A hefty amount of active virus would give all the symptoms and heat Blackwatch needed to track with their annoying UAVs, and it kept his end of the virus cut off from the hivemind. Meaning mother couldn't track him as well as Blackwatch.
Granted, that meant no easy access to biomass, forcing him to shift his body cells so that he was able to survive with human food only. As well as having... organs: heart, kidneys, even a brain. He'd been living like this for the most part of his life, ten years outside the lab had not change this, and that meant he barely had the mass he needed to deal with something violent, like say, his brother.
He exhaled heavily and turned around. Maybe it was one of those super soldiers with the ability to track infecteds. Since New York, they were many deployments of them because Blackwatch had no patient to wait around what a three-weeks-old variant of the mother virus would do when time finally run out on them.
He searched around for his assailant and looked up back to his office... now with a huge broken hole in the windows.
The bills that were gonna come out of that…
Not so surprisingly, it wasn't those bulky super soldiers. It was some hoody hobo standing in the hole. Pariah couldn't help but feel slightly disappointed, he had expected better from him. He would've exhaled, but instead he was wondering what that bulky thing he was holding was. The answer came with a blur of white when it was thrown in a straight line.
He dodged quickly albeit too slow for his taste when it smashed into the concrete besides him with flying parts almost hitting him. A photocopy machine! He stared. Now that he was reminded of it, he was thrown down here when something hit him behind his back.
Glancing behind in his crouching, he noted the white plastic and heavy machinery shattered, embed into the cracked concrete ground. A broken photocopy. Two photocopiers! He looked back up and glared.
"DO YOU KNOW HOW EXPENSIVE THOSE ARE!" he roared back at the black hooded figure.
In response, the hooded man jumped down to the rooftop he was on, cracking the concrete. He heard the snap of thick coils whipped, and in major surprise at himself, he caught and grabbed the end of his little brother's arm. Fingers gouged into flesh when he focused, his virus eagerly entering the streams and stiffening the arm. A satisfying reaction answered when his hooded assailant snarled.
"Let us talk first," Pariah said between gritted teeth, voice barely in control as he glared at the menacing end of his family tree.
A violent pull, he let go and watched when the black whip was back to being normal arm. The hoody glared at him as the infected arm twitched violently... not under his control, Pariah thought smugly, satisfied but surprisingly feeling strained already.
"Look, if you have noticed!" he yelled at the dunce, "I. Haven't. Been. Infecting. The—"
He was grabbed and slammed back to his building. The world slowed around them as his virus rammed up his reaction time. While mid-air as papers and glass shards flying everywhere, he saw a raised fist was aiming down on him.
Oh no you don't! He kicked, slamming the hoody into the ceiling as he fell and ungracefully rolled on the carpet. A familiar warmth of heat grew in his body. His body was waking up and his virus was back to full speed, chaining chemical reactions to give him the speed.
But no biomass... he wouldn't last as he would grow tired. His cells needed to eat and his virus needed to replicate to keep up the pace of speed he needed right now. Right there and then he scolded on his stupid decision on laying low.
"Look, Zeus," he said, breathing heavily when he heard the heavy thump before the Runner slowly got up from the debris, silver-blue eyes glaring and narrowed on him.
"I HAVEN'T BEEN—"
Again, he was shoved back, against the concrete wall through how many tables, chairs and computers, all of them breaking and being thrown out of the way. But not without gouging his fingers into his younger brother's chest, spreading his virus to stiffen any action that came next. He dug deeper into his flesh and glared back at the icy blue eyes.
Frustration, rage, visions clouded red, cracking as red veins entered and grew, turning the office into the familiar red dream. He mentally pulled the virus.
"You broke two of my photocopiers. You wrecked my office. You ruined my glasses," he snarled as black biomass spilled onto his fingers at his mental pull, wrapping around his wrist, assimilating into him.
Pariah was stealing biomass. "I'm going to screw over your body, brother," he hissed, then pushed violently, slamming the body and leaving a small crater into the floor.
Bills, bills, bills. He paced around the crater as the body stiffly got up. He noted in satisfaction that his virus was keeping Zeus from functioning well. Also, he might have broken a pipeline, and now he was kind of glad he didn't make do with the thought of throwing him through multiple floors.
Even if he did deserve it.
A sharp snarling cry of anger or pain came from the living Blacklight.
I need to calm down.
Rage was not good, rage meant he would literally let his... virus grow out of control, kill everything it contacts…
'Do not destroy.'
He took a deep breath, closing his eyes and opened to see bare normal ceilings again. Crouching before the struggling body, he stared at Zeus.
"Zeus!" he snapped in the tone that he saved for his worst employee. "I'll be frank. You're either dumber than I thought-" He saw a blur of quick movements, but he willed his virus, stiffening the raised arm. Hatefully, Zeus stared at him.
"After all I did to New York. Helped you against Redlight!" he shouted, feeling himself more strain as Zeus fought against his virus. Holy shi-biscuit! He mentally corrected, holding back from grinding his teeth in the effort. Don't show weakness. "And your sister!" Pariah added. "No, our sister."
Because, frankly, mother would be disappointed with him if he was discriminating against his sisters. She'd only softly chided when he killed the infected monkeys during his experiments when he was a child.
"Leave Dana out of this!" A snarl came and Pariah was again lying on the floor, staring at the ceiling, wondering how could someone be that fast.
Note, mentioning sister seems to give him an edge against his virus. Because – Pariah rolled out of the way when the big heavy blade came down.
"She wouldn't have survived at all–" He jumped back as claws slashed before him in a silver glint from the city lights. "Medical attention!" he added as black coiled whip came out from black-red blurs of tendrils reweaving. The barbs on the whip's end glistened in the dark before... ruining another photocopier. "Or your last-ditch attempt–" The blade slashed the air above him as he bent back before he kicked him with his left leg... right into Zeus' own open chest, sending his brother back... into countless filing cabinets.
Those haven't been digitalized yet, he grimaced. Jenny is going to kill me.
"What was I saying?" Pariah wondered aloud to the air as he panted. "Oh yeah. She wouldn't have survived without my help. Frankly Zeus, you're sloppy and inexperienced when it comes to that kind of detail work."
A filing cabinet hit him in the face. Pariah growled deeply when he got back up. "Brother, you need anger management class!"
Oh, Zeus was pissing him off. He turned but froze when he noticed why he was staring past him, unarmed as a viral abomination could get.
"Jenny," Pariah blurted at the woman standing... staring at the wreckage.
"Sir?"
Fuck, he thought uncharacteristically. Slowly he walked up but the woman stepped back and stared at him with that big doe eyes... demanding explanation. He stopped walking. He really needed her to leave so that he could clean up the mess - he looked guiltily around him as he shoved his hands into his pocket under her stare - from her mind.
With the state of this office, my reputation is going to get ruined anyway. He grumbled.
"Patrick," Jenny repeated... using his chosen name.
"I decided to renovate," he blurted.
She stared at the wreckage. "And him?" She turned to the black hoody who was stunned, fixated in place.
"Uh... " he droned, groping for an excuse.
"I'm his brother," a quiet gravelly voice came from the hoody, which made Pariah notice that hoods look ridiculous in an office background even when dark. "I'm helping him out."
"By destroying?" Her voice started to turn small... and scared.
"Jenny," Pariah said gently. "Why don't you go home like I said earlier," he suggested.
She stared at him.
"Okay?" He looked at her while inside he was begging her to leave. "Just forget what you've seen. Okay?"
He would make sure of that later. His secretary just nodded slowly then turned around; pressing the elevator button then disappeared behind the door.
She was probably running for the hills. He grimaced at this thought and turned. No presence of his assailant. Wisely, Zeus had left. He could sense him already leaving downtown... with a mess for him to clean up.
This was going to be one hell of a stressful month... Pariah gave a snarl and kicked a neglecting computer on the floor.
"Sir?" a male voice asked as he scribbled down his signature on the checks.
"What?" he grunted sullenly. He was in a foul mood, and it was not just because of the state of his ruined office. The insurance company wasn't making it easier either, since an attack or not, they needed to make contact with the building's owner. Not to mention a report needed to be made to the police to make this count as an attack.
Despite knowing he was in his bad mood, there was still a questioning look on his employee's face.
"Why is there a hole in your window?"
Really? That's what you're here to ask me. What happened to my window? Not what the hell happened to the office or why the toilet downstairs was busted as well as the kitchen sink's tap. Or where was Jenny? He slapped his face and rubbed it slowly. "There's a photocopier on the roof beside us."
Logic. Photocopier, hole in the window, everyone was going to think some asshole flipped and threw it out and managed to hit the roof across them... somehow.
Rick, his daring employee full of questions, wisely backed out of his office.
Well, at least he could take advantage on the fact that his employees are handing in their reports before the deadline. Would have saved Jenny a lot of trouble... but it was not like she was here to appreciate that now.
His office phone rang, and he promptly picked up. "Hello, Patrick Gordon speaking," he said flatly into the phone. He was not in the mood to be cheerful or be bothered to make himself feel like it.
"Uh… sir? It's me, Robert." A couple of coughs followed. "I'm a bit sick today."
He raised his eyebrow, fighting the urge to say, oh really. His employees literally couldn't be sick. Because every single one of them had shaken his hand, resulting in his virus working subtly in their bodies. He improved their behavior. Serotonin regulation was a reward for job's done well. Little hormone tweaks to stave off depression, made even their darkest times bearable and… this was the important part… his virus in their bodies supercharged their immune systems. They were pretty much incapable of catching most illness.
His useful and happy little worker bees.
Technically, it wasn't like he was overriding their personalities or brainwashing them.
Much.
It made the long, miserable climb up the corporate ladder bearable at least.
He ground his teeth together and exhaled.
"It's alright. Take the day off. The office is in… poor condition right now," he told the caller.
"Thank you, sir." He heard the sigh of relief.
"I expect you to be back in two days' time. No excuses," he said flatly and ended the call.
Rubbing his forehead, he pulled out his cellphone and sifted through his contacts. It took three phone rings, and finally she picked up.
"Hello, Jess-" he began.
"Who is this?" A querulous voice asked suspiciously.
"It's Patrick Gordon. Your neighbor," he replied.
"Oh Patrick!" the old woman chirped.
He made a face at the sudden outburst before he continued. "I need a big favor. Can you watch my kids for a week or two?"
"Take care of your children, hmm?"
"Yes, there's plenty of food in the pantry and they can mostly watch themselves, but I really just would love it if you could watch them," he continued.
The older woman's voice cooed, "That's okay dear. I love them having around. I almost feel like they're my own grandchildren."
Well, that's mostly my fault, he thought to himself. Not that you'd mind, since you really don't have any of your own.
"Thank you. Can you pick them up today?"
"Sure, I can. They have to take the bus with me though."
"It'll be good exercise for them." He gave a fake, but convincing laugh. "Also, I have to leave Sasquatch as well. They wouldn't know what to do without her."
But as much as his children loved the dog, the more important reason was because Sasquatch knew how to protect them.
"Your dog is going to have to sleep outside the house," she added at that, slightly less friendly.
Gordon made a mental note to himself to make sure she started loving Sasquatch as well. May as well have her like the whole package.
"Yes, I know that. Sasquatch doesn't mind. She's a very frisky dog, but knows how to behave," he replied lightly before slowly pacing back and forth. "So it's sorted then?"
"It will be just fine, Patrick," the old woman said slyly. "Do you mind if I ask where you're going? What's the emergency?"
He paused for a long moment, trying to decide what he could actually tell her. "I'm going to see some of my family."
"The ones you lost contact with in the Outbreak? Oh, I hope they are alright!"
She remembered that much at least. He blinked at that. Jess was an eighty-year-old widow who lived alone in a big house. Her mind was going and though he gave her the occasional nudge to keep her going, he was often surprised at how spry she could be at times without his intervention.
"I hope so too." He smiled. Not. "Well, I've got to go."
"Have a nice day, Patrick," she replied cheerfully and hung up the phone.
So polite, even go so far using his full name. Not like Jenkin. He bared his teeth when reminded the cheerful 'Pat!' coming out of that asshole's mouth.
He put his phone into his pocket before walking up to his desk, snatching his suit's jacket. Walking out into the ruined office, he headed towards the elevators, passing by Rick's desk.
"Rick!" he called out the spaced-out employee.
"Yeah!" Rick fumbled in surprise.
"You're in charge for a week or two!" he snapped without stopping his stride.
"You want me to manage the repairs though!" Rick called back, confused and alarmed.
"Consider this a chance to show me you can handle more responsibility!" he snapped back as the elevator's door is closing. "If you do well, we'll talk about that raise."
"But—"
The elevator doors fully shut, and his reflection stared back at him. A slightly pale man with dark blonde hair, wearing a bow tie with a pen poking out of his chest pocket. The most assuredly goofiest-wearing boss, as his daughter would say. He cursed the day he cured the girl completely of her leukemia. Too late now. She already wormed in. Still, he tilted his head at his reflection; it was a very affective image, certainly far from the cold ruthless lab rat of eight years ago.
But that didn't fool Zeus one bit, he had no reason to believe he was able to shapeshift. All the work he put in during his time at the lab without giving away a single symptom, denying Blackwatch of any variants of the virus, tested negative in every one of their tests, practically given them the illusion he was clean, that the Blacklight infection was nonexistent in his body despite the deaths he had caused – and yet, frustratingly, turned out for nothing in the face of Zeus' paranoia.
Right. He thought. Change, get Sasquatch, drive to Jess, drop her off… leave the car? Considering Zeus' eagerness to destroy things, he decided to leave it.
The elevator door opened, and he marched through the parking lot to his silver sedan. With a click of a button, he opened and slid into the car, turning on the engine after closing the door after.
What did Zeus want? Why was he here? Considering his habits in Manhattan, it was probably to fight and consume him. It was how he found his answers, it was how he solved his problems, it was how he made do in a war that wanted to end him. But for what purpose, what answer, what solution would it give him in consuming the son of Elizabeth Greene?
He knew what he was speculated to be. The purpose of all lifeforms. The natural release of non-coding regions. The cure to all known ailments, the churning machine of both known and unknown disease that could end civilization. Or whatever nonsenses those scientists cooked up in that goopy brain of his.
He thought about it. It was obvious. The sister. As he sat now, waiting in Houston traffic, he could hear her dreaming… and whispering.
Zeus wanted to cure his sister. Something went wrong. A mess so bad he came running here, wanting to undo whatever he did that made her condition worse. He had heard her screams in the hive.
Like the other New Yorkers that were infected, Redlight simply shut down within their body, if they were lucky, their body were strong enough to rid the infection. His siblings, he played with and made some Hunters pull a suicide by dumping themselves into the river spontaneously. That was all. But her… why didn't it just die?
Mother lived through her children… her virus.
Perhaps when it reached a certain point of infection, the body had assimilated the virus so even when shut down, it would be ignored when the immune system get back on track, latency. Or… she had a special strain.
So she was the backup Runner. Zeus' little sister… if counting her age as an infected, not the years she lived.
"Clever," he murmured.
At first, he thought it was just some random New Yorker, but mother wanted her son to protect the family even after everything he had done to her children. From his brief delve in the hive, the fear and knowledge they had on the creature named Zeus spoke that he was protective of the girl. The slaughter and collapse of many hives that strayed into Zeus territory told much, as well the death of many Blackwatch soldiers. The girl was the logical choice.
He should kill her and Zeus. Get rid of them. Those two would only threaten this life of his and bring more complications he didn't need.
'Do not destroy.'
What then, if he didn't destroy? They would part ways. Zeus wouldn't want him near the girl for whatever irrational or rational reasons.
He tightened his grip on his wheel, slightly cracking the thick plastic. He would have to put a cover for that.
'Do not destroy.'
"It's my call," he whispered back before changing gears and shutting the engine.
Someone was dreaming. Someone was retching in pain. He was hunting.
…and Sasquatch had eaten the thief's body, he thought when he saw the opened freezer's door.
A man in a grey khaki and black turtleneck slammed down onto the cracked concrete. He grinded his jaws against each other before inhaling deeply, eyebrows creased together in concentration. He had been following the dents and cracks obviously left by footsteps with the force of a lumbering giant.
It helped using the tug in the hivemind.
Pariah scratched his dark blonde hair beneath his black beany, feeling the slight rustle of his long raincoat shifting a bit before settling. Too long those pieces of biomass had been sitting in the garage's freezer. It was where he kept the extra weights of the many bodies he consumed. They'd been masquerading as dead meats meant for 'barbeque' as he had told Hank… when the boy almost microwaved one of them.
Tilting his head, he crouched down before the drops of black-red biomass and reached out. They immediately snatched onto his fingers, disappearing into his sleeve and becoming a part of him.
It took him so much effort to make Zeus bleed. Zeus was a natural at fighting back foreign parasites, an ability he'd stolen from the Redlight infecteds. He had to work extra hard to keep his virus he implanted during their fight on top of Zeus' own immune system. Natural Blacklight and Artificial Blacklight adapting and counter-adapting at an insane rate. A war on the molecular level.
Satisfyingly, one rooftop had a heap amount of biomass spilled atop, enough for three bodies, and he was picking up a lot of them. Considering there weren't any mess on the streets, he imagined Zeus would occasionally stop and bleed profusely, avoiding the streets while at it, and if he was lucky, lose a few drops, but unfortunately not.
He really made sure of that.
Pariah stared at the sky before narrowing his eyes at the next mini-crater in the concrete. He followed after, finding another few drops of biomass. Biomass left tracks for virus sensors, and no way was he going to give Blackwatch a reason to come here.
He trailed obsessively, meticulous in his search for others, until he landed in a dark narrow alleyway. The trail of biomass dragged across the ground, leading up to the body seated against the brick walls. Slowly, he walked up to him, putting more effort in keeping Zeus incapacitated.
"Perhaps you shouldn't have ruined my office," he told the hooded being breathing haggardly.
He saw teeth bared in a snarl beneath the hood.
"Hurts like hell, doesn't it?" Pariah said grimly and snatched the neck, pulling him up despite the protesting grip digging into his wrist. He kept his face impassive despite the considerable amount of insane mental effort to keep Zeus from sprouting his claws out. "Can't consume, can't change, can't do anything. Maybe, just maybe I can cure you of your miserable excuse of existence."
He glared at the silvery blue eyes narrowing down on him. "Think about it," he told him. "Live like a human. Forced to eat their food to survive as your body wars against yourself. I have a virus in you that can specifically impair you, and force you to adapt into that," he said brightly. "Every trick you learn, every skill, every ability all for nothing."
Zeus hissed as biomass spilled from his lips. Shit. Pariah kept his face from twitching as Zeus pushed against his virus to the breaking point.
'Do not destroy.'
Pariah dropped him to the ground, leaving him coughing.
"You wanna talk now, brother?" Pariah said drily when he crouched down before him.
He looked up, glaring at him cautiously. No claws, no blades, just the glare of icy blue eyes. He bought it. Pariah kept his face still at his triumph as Zeus finally spoke. "Why didn't you—"
"Consume your sorry piece of ass?" Pariah finished brightly, giving an impish smile. "It would be mercy. You have the screams of how many humans in you, and really, I don't want that. I was born with Hope wailing all around me when Blackwatch destroyed the town. I don't need more screaming in me."
Pariah stood up and backed away, giving the other space when Zeus slowly rose. "I could have broken you down considering you're now a light enough meal," he continued thoughtfully. Just a little incentive for him to think twice. "But breaking down something like you would take more energy." He mused. "Truce?" he asked the young cautious Blacklight.
Zeus glared at him for a long time. "Truce," he said so quietly.
Pariah surged forward, gouging his fingers into the chest before pulling off a chunk of biomass, only to have numerous black-red biomass spilled and weaved back into Zeus body.
"What the hell!" Zeus snarled, stumbling back when Pariah was again on the other side of the alleyway.
"Just getting my virus back," Pariah replied lightly, tossing up and down what looked like a piece of black biomass. "And giving back what's yours." He smiled. His green eyes were almost amber-yellow now that the alley was truly dark.
Ripples of tendrils flickered across Zeus' body until they settled. The living virus blinked, then narrowed his eyes suspiciously back at him.
"See, I'm nice," Pariah told him. "Now can I expect the same from you?" He tilted his head in waiting.
"For now," his 'brother' murmured reluctantly.
Pariah stared at him for a long time at that and said suddenly, "Let's get some tacos." He promptly turned around and walked away.
"Wait," He heard confusion in the voice behind him. "What?"
"Tacos!" Pariah called back. "There's a good store nearby that makes those."
He heard the repeated, "What?" again when he walked out of the alleyway.
Alex Mercer couldn't believe he was standing in front of a mobile taco stall, holding a warm taco in his hand while listening to a radio rerun of some football game.
This… this was surreal. He stared at the doomsday bringer grumbling about how that particular football game made some ass lose heaps amount of money.
Someone's phone rang, and he watched the dark blonde man in his late thirties pulled the phone out of his own pocket and pressed the call button.
"Dad!"
Alex heard the high-pitch voice of a little girl from the phone.
"Elise, what is it now?" Pariah smiled slightly before shooting a frown at Mercer's staring. Turning around, he walked off a few feet away, keeping his back facing him.
Even far, Alex could still hear the conversation clearly. An ability he took for granted when he listened for Blackwatch's activity from Marine's radios.
"Hank is bullying me!"
"Give the phone to Hank then," Pariah told grimly. "Heng Jian Li!" His tone immediately snapped into perfect Chinese. "What did I tell you about hitting your sister!"
Alex blinked at the flawless Mandarin.
"She was bothering me with my homework!" whined a boy.
"You ask her to stop, nicely. Not hit her."
"I did!"
"Elise just wants to play. Do you hit Sass when she bothers you too much?"
"No." A sullen tone came from the phone.
"Apologize to her and if she bothers you too much, tell her…" He could hear a grimace in Pariah's voice.
"Tell her what?"
"No sweets of any kind for a week."
"Elise, dad says he won't give you any sweets for a month!" The boy's voice switched to English.
"What!" a distant screech called from the phone.
"He also says he will lock you in the garage's freezer if you continue!"
"Heng Jian Li," Pariah snarled at that.
"Bye baba!" The phone went flat.
"That boy," Pariah seethed aloud. Now he had a mess at home to sort out.
Alex looked at him cautiously when he marched back and completely finished his tacos in one bite.
"You better have a very good reason for entering my life," Pariah snapped and pointed at him then noticed his staring. "What?"
"You took a father's place," Alex said, voicing his thought aloud. Why?
Hazel green eyes stared back at him for a long time before gazing at the stall owner busily cleaning up.
"Let's take a walk," he said and immediately left his question like that.
Alex held back a scowl. The whole thing was confusing, but he wanted answers and consuming was out of the question. Pariah was the natural… Blacklight, that is if anything about what Hope tried to achieve with the dead Hope's children said something about it. Everything in the genetic unlocked, all he needed was to learn what he could do like how a child would learn how to walk.
If strains of Redlight engineered could hurt him, as the parasite had taught him, Pariah's own virus definitely could even when he had adapted and evolved from the parasite experience. He was Blacklight – no, Redlight perfected, and was a whole another level. Made it look like a breeze, engineering a parasite that could hurt and kill him again.
Consuming him won't be pleasant nor would he go down easy...
Alex followed the older man, tossing his own barely eaten taco in the trash while feeling his own body's cells breaking down the bites he'd taken. Alex ignored the passerby's brushing past him as he caught up with Pariah.
"I didn't take someone's place," Pariah said without turning to look at him as they walk. "I made it."
Alex shot him a look, surprised.
"Why consume an identity burdened with relationships and troubles? I didn't want that," Pariah told him. "I wanted my own."
"Why a father?" Why this kind of identity? It did not fit the image of an escaped lab rat. Greene's child. Anyone of Pariah's contacts showed no sign of the virus amongst them, it made it hard to believe this was the man he was after, but he could because the hivemind was tugging at him as well as… Greene's whispering.
The silent end of the hive.
"Because it was the farthest image of who I was," Pariah answered nonchalantly.
A Runner running from what he was. From who he was. Just why? Alex frowned at the thought. He did not know who he ate that gave him that thought.
"You're probably asking why I still haven't caused an outbreak." Pariah smirked at his confusion. "Then you should probably ask why do I need to cause an outbreak."
"The Reason." The words popped out of Alex's mouth.
Pariah's face darkened at those words. "The reason," he murmured and gazed at Houston's tall buildings around them. "A future where diseases run rampant. Really, I rather think the robots would rule the world," he said drily.
Alex gave him an accusing look.
"I don't care if the humans survive the future. In the end," he continued. "They will go extinct anyway, one way or another. Either from death, or sacrificing their humanity in order to adapt," Pariah told him as they stopped in waiting at the junction.
"You speak as if the future is definite."
Pariah shrugged, "Anyone can believe whatever they want. Me, I just don't think it would be that simple. One way another, there will be war. If we are the clue of what's to come, that is," he added the last part.
The walking green man went on, and they moved.
"Enough about me. Now it's your turn." Pariah glanced at him. "Why did you come?" he asked flatly.
Alex hesitated. He had a sneaking suspicious Pariah already knew… considering he mentioned her in their fight. It also meant he had always been watching in the background, through the hivemind. Alex bristled at that. "Dana," he said stiffly. "My sister."
Pariah was quiet. "What's in it for me, hm?" The older Runner asked.
"Are you offering help?" Alex asked, cautious, gazing at him sharply, checking signs of trickery in what might be an offer.
"I might," the man said quietly. "I can hear her," he added.
"What?"
"Her voice in the hive. She's dreaming. Or is it recalling?" Pariah tilted his head. "Sometimes she has pleasant dreams. Most of the time it's a nightmare, especially on that day mother took her."
"Ragland said she shown no activity—"
"She's not brain dead if that's what you mean. But yes, she's in deep slumber," Pariah said. "You know what she's going to be."
"She isn't yet. I still have time."
Pariah smiled. "Yes, you do have time. But do you really believe that?"
Alex hesitated, recalling the image of the soft yellow glow spreading through her body. "Her brain is mostly untouched."
"It won't be soon," Pariah told him grimly.
"Then what would you do!?" Alex snapped.
"Kill her. End her misery," Pariah told him, stopping when he gazed at him sharply.
Alex bared his teeth at that thought. No, no that was not going to happen. She's not going to be another Greene. She wasn't… Greene. His nails digging into his palms as his fists tightened. The very hands that had crushed the mother of monsters.
"Any sane human wouldn't want to be the next mother of monsters," Pariah said gently. "You're losing her. Let her go, Zeus."
"No."
Pariah stared at him sharply, at the sheer stubbornness staring back at him.
"I can't cure her. But you can." Alex stepped forward and stood straight before the dark-haired man. He gazed back at the green eyes, gauging his reaction.
"What makes you think I'm capable of that?" Pariah laughed, pissing him off to no end. "And why should I? What do I get in return?"
'Family.'
Alex scowled but noticed the distant look in the green eyes.
"You heard her," Alex said accusingly. "You can still hear her voice."
"I am her son, after all. Redlight's pride and joy, if her inaction was a way to show it," Pariah said bitterly. "Mother has been whispering to you. She told you what I can do." He stared at him, tilting his head. "Maybe not indirectly, but it's very subtle."
"Greene's dead, she can't do anything to me!" Alex snapped and began pacing. He felt restless, he felt like he wanted to punch something, mostly Pariah's face gazing at him right now.
"You're the one who consumed her. I say that's the opposite," Pariah replied flatly. "If I am the cure, what makes you really think I won't kill the girl? Or better yet, consume her."
Alex bared his teeth at that.
"Just think, Zeus. If she dies, what then?" Pariah said coldly. "Will you wander the Earth forever, burdened with the sins of others and yours? Be driven mad? Succumb to mother's whisper? Live on bitterly? Or just dump yourself into the center of the Earth, killing yourself?"
Dana… he gazed at the concrete at his feet.
"And if she survives, does she know what you are, who you are? Would you think she would accept you?" Pariah continued.
"I could say the same for your thing you have with your family," Alex said sharply.
"I plan to tell them when they are mature enough," Pariah answered calmly. "You though, I'm not sure you want to."
A monster, killer, terrorist. What kind of brother was that? He grimaced. He didn't know what she thought of him, only a brother from the last words they spoke with each other. But a brother who was innocent, simply caught in the wrong place at the wrong time? He was none of that.
"Another thing you should be asking. If she survives, she would be hunted for the rest of her life. She is, after all, your sister. You wouldn't be able to stay with her if you want to give her a life."
A poor substitute of a brother.
No. He thought stubbornly.
"That's her call," Alex finally spoke. It was her call. Her choice. Even if it meant he would no longer be her brother in her eyes. He held back from grimacing. The fear what she would see him as… of losing her.
Pariah blinked at his answer. "I guess I have to come." He sighed.
"What?" Alex turned and stared at him sharply.
"You heard me, I will come."
Alex stared at him for a long, suspicious. "To cure her?"
"I might."
Alex bristled.
"If it's too late, then I have to do what I have to do," Pariah said flatly. "Since you can't do it," he added before walking away.
Pariah then paused and turned to him. "What city is she at?"
"Minnesota," Alex answered. She was moved so many times, befuddling scientists as she went. But as long she was farthest from Maryland, where Blackwatch was based at, he could tolerate… for a while. "Rochester," he added.
"We'll take the plane."
"What?"
"The plane, Zeus. It's faster. If the booking is not full of course."
Plane? Why a plane?! Planes meant he had to sit for the whole hours of flight, inside a narrow compartment, filled with people, doing nothing as time ticked by! Precious time that meant he might lose his sister if he does nothing.
"You're coming or not?!" Pariah called.
He wanted to say no and just immediately run off, but if he wanted to be assured that he was guaranteed a full cooperation…
Passport. Even if he shapeshifted to another person, he still needed a passport with his image on it. Technically, he did have a passport. A fake one for Dana and him. With his face everywhere even how blurry it was… he just… wasn't itching to try to test it even when changing some aspect of his face.
What the actual fuck was he doing? He wanted to hyperventilate right there and then.
Pariah handed him his ticket. He stiffly grabbed it.
"No luggage, sir?" the stewardess spoke.
"No," Pariah answered. Just their body of extra weights.
Alex was paranoid at the thought of the plane crashing simply because of the ton of weight they carried. He didn't know how much mass Pariah carried but he highly doubted Pariah would let his guard down ever since the fight.
"Is he alright?" the stewardess spoke when she noticed how he looked.
"This is going to be his first time flying." Pariah smiled at the stewardess.
The stewardess gave a pitying smile. "Please be assured we will make sure your experience with us enjoyable."
What was wrong with him? He could handle being in a helicopter. He could handle being in a tank. But a plane? He was having a full-blown panic attack. Didn't help that Pariah was smiling at him like an asshole when he walked away.
"Where are you going?" Alex called out.
"To eat," he answered.
Again? He thought incredulously but followed after.
Pariah stopped by an elevator, pressing the button before going in. Alex walked in, gazing sharply at the camera in the corner, expecting a shudder from the elevator at the weights it had to carry.
The older man pressed the close button, but the door jerked to a stop, and a slim looking businesswoman stepped in. At the immediate action, the overload sign blinked on, making that annoying beeping when past its limit.
Pariah gave an act of staring in confusion. "It says twenty-five but it's just us two," he told the woman. "I think one of us have to lose weight," he added, looking at her up and down.
That made her scowl and immediately set herself out of the elevator.
"Can't take a bloody joke," Pariah muttered as the door closed after her.
Alex breathed in deeply, keeping himself from breaking the armchair. It helped he was in first class seat as it was more spacious.
He told himself that even if the plane crashed, he would survive it. He survived a goddamn nuclear explosion. He could survive this. He could glide and survive from a terminal velocity fall, so he could abandon this plane if it became too much.
He blamed his distaste on small space and overcrowded area.
The turbulence shook the plane violently and Alex watched incredulously when Pariah pulled a beer bottle out from somewhere in his biomass, simply drinking through what should be a stressful flight when everyone else had been confiscated of their drinks and meals. He probably hid it when the stewardess came around.
A pursed came from the blonde man. "I don't know why I like the taste of alcohol," he drawled. "Must be the hobo in me," Pariah murmured. "But then people like foul-tasting coffee and tea," he added wryly.
"What are you doing?" Alex said accusingly.
"Keeping your mind off the turbulence."
The plane jerked violently, and Alex gritted his teeth, fighting very hard not to crack plastic on the armchair.
Pariah suddenly burst uproariously, earning looks from other passengers.
Glaring, Alex gritted. "Well, it's not working," he said, barely snarling. "I still don't understand why you bought tickets when-"
"You don't know how bright things get in our body when we use our abilities," Pariah cut in, tone quiet and so low if it weren't for his sharp inhuman hearing picking it up. "Our scent changes when we do, it would release… the particles they could use to track. So, I minimize when I can. I'm very strict on that rule," he said. "Second, that's asking for missing bodies and that attracts attention. Maybe not at us, but it still attracts attention."
Alex grimaced. "Blackwatch hasn't–"
"Noticed my missing presence." Pariah smiled. "It's a doppelganger," he added, recalling the autistic child at Vandenberg's facility. "There are many things you can do. Shapeshifting another is one of them."
He knew other ways then. Other ways of what the virus could do.
Pariah looked past him, at the window. "We're here," he said.
Alex followed his gaze. As they came out of the thick clouds, a lit city sprawled across the flatlands as a river curved through it. Rochester was quite a small city and its tall buildings weren't many, nor were as high as Manhattan's. It was the only distaste he has for the city as Alex had relied on Manhattan's forest of buildings to cut the line of sight.
Pariah just hummed at the sight before turning back to his drinking. The captain's announcement went on. They were about to land soon.
One step closer to Dana. But entirely her fate in the mercy of another… he grimaced. Pariah could control the virus in ways he couldn't even dream of. He was the likeliest person in the world that could save Dana.
Person… Alex mused at that thought. Since when had Pariah became a person in his eyes?
Pariah wasn't lying. He was a minimal-fuck, choosing to take a taxi instead of… running there. Considering Rochester's lack of high buildings, he could understand. Nothing like the blurry black outlines of two humanoid blobs running and hopping in impossible speed and distance to catch attention of the public below.
Alex silently seethed in impatient as he sat in the car with the glaring presence of its low roof sitting heavily on his mind.
"How's her condition?" Pariah cut into his foul mood.
"She's…" Alex perked up and grimaced at the question. "Her spine was damaged."
"No wonder she screamed," Pariah murmured.
"What?"
"I heard her scream in the hive when it happened," Pariah replied. "Tell me exactly how it happened."
"We made a cure," Alex began slowly, recalling that horrible day. At first, it seemed to be working, and then she almost died.
"Out of Redlight?"
"No."
"Good, because it would only be assimilated and just add to the problem," Pariah said.
"Out of Blacklight we built a cure."
Pariah spun and stared at him for a long time. "You've made a cure out of a virus that's ten times dangerous than Redlight's 99.999 mortality rate." He gazed at him with wide eyes. "You're barely learning how to control your own virus and you go and build a cure version of yours from a virus that doctors know nothing about."
"You've underestimated Ragland," Alex snapped, feeling defensive. "He cured me from a parasite engineered from your mother's strains. I would've been dead if it weren't for that."
Pariah blinked. "A doctor who has no idea on the inner workings of our body and virus besides sketchy theories. Must be one heck of a radical doctor," he muttered, remembering his own team of scientists.
"How do you know about Blacklight so much?" Alex said suspiciously. He hardly thought Redlight's Hive was smart enough to discern information concerning the technical details of Blacklight.
"Mother's Infected Carriers. Some of them managed to be Blackwatch who received briefings about the virus. Some of them were Gentek scientists. They were intelligent enough," he answered without looking at him. "Though I have to say, your own kin was troublesome."
Alex gave a confused look. He had no kin. They were no survivors of Blacklight. The virus only killed when it mutates things. Heck, Blacklight only infects when he actively wants it.
"The one that refer itself as the Supreme Hunter," Pariah continued when noticing his confusion. "How many times that audacious child almost walked into my part of the hivemind," he muttered. Like a child afraid of the dark, it stayed away from the silent part of the hive, keeping him undiscovered.
"He's stupid, a brute and scaredy cat. I blame mother's part of birthing him that gave him those traits. You gave him intelligence," he added, pointing at Alex. "He resented you, Zeus. For rejecting him," Pariah told him with a smirk. "You are whatever it wished to be. It was curious, did you know? It wanted answers just like you did, sought it like you did, and learned just as much, if not more than you. Even tried to understand its place in this world too," he added softly.
"Well that thing was slowly killing me," Alex growled. "It was eating off my back."
"Children can be back breaking. I guess it took that trait literally," Pariah joked, before falling into silence as the taxi finally approached the hospital.
They stepped out of the taxi with Alex watching Pariah briefly.
"Good man," Pariah said when he passed the cash over the window.
Alex narrowed his eyes, his visions and hearing dulling as he concentrated. It was so subtle how Pariah worked. The white glow was barely there on the head. No way viral sensors would pick it up. If they couldn't pick up Infected Carriers, then they weren't capable of picking up Pariah's work.
"You're a lying bastard," Alex muttered when the taxi drove away. He'd been infecting, and Alex wasn't surprised at all at that revelation.
Pariah raised an eyebrow in answer. "Despite whatever your belief you have concerning my origin. I wasn't conceived in the usual manner," Pariah slightly grimaced, recalling how the other Hope's children came to be. "I was made possible because of my mother's genetics," he replied and walked past him. "So no, technically I'm not a bastard. I'm literally Redlight's child."
War dialing. Redlight hijacking the conception, restructuring everything within the cells. All became failure, and mothers eaten up to replace those cells quickly, but even the mothers were failures as well.
Except for her. That one eighteen-year-old hippy girl.
Greene's own body practically mutated completely to make her capable of carrying what the virus was creating from her own DNA, a parasite. It was literally destroying her body to make Pariah. No wonder she was weak when Randall took her child.
"What did you do to him?" Alex said suspiciously, remembering the taxi guy when he pulled back into the present.
"The taxi guy? Made him forget the conversation we had," Pariah answered before stepping into the hospital.
Alex scowled and grumbled darkly. Striding into reception, he noted Pariah was waiting by the very door that led to the restricted hallway for staffs and patients. He already knew where to go.
The hivemind, he remembered. He could sense Dana's presence through the hivemind, just like how Alex could sense. During his hunt for him, he had to concentrate really hard on the tug as it was almost unnoticeable.
Even worse, he had doubted that tug when it pointed to the man Patrick Gordon. The dark blonde goofy-clothed man barely showed anything of who and what he was in Infected Vision. It was only in their brief fight that Pariah's body had started to glow furiously white. He made a mental note to ask him how he did it later. It might come in handy if he needed to hide from the Super Soldiers.
Alex pulled out the authentication card and waved it at the receptionist before sliding it into the scanner. Entering the code, he pulled the door left. "This way," he told him, and without waiting he strode towards the quarantine ward Dana was kept.
"This virus is a cancer, Ragland," he heard a woman say. "It's a miracle she's still alive!"
"We can't just give up-"
"She will need all the king's men and horses, but even then, I doubt all the power in the world can cure her."
Alex walked into the room, interrupting the conversation. Ragland looked up before giving a questioning look at the older man behind him.
"Dr. Markel," the brunette woman greeted Alex. "A bit late to visit the patient?" She quirked an eyebrow.
"Actually," Alex grated. "It's early."
She blinked and looked at the clock hanging on the wall, almost to four. "I'll be damned. I stayed overnight," she murmured before turning to the stout doctor behind her. "Ragland, I'm going to pack up. I still think the treatment is going nowhere," she told.
"Archer. It's too early to say that," Ragland spoke but grimaced when she shook her head and left.
"You should go," Alex told the doctor when noting the tired man rubbing his forehead. "I'll take it from here."
The doctor sighed. "Alright," he said, slowly getting up from his chair, leaving the room before glancing curiously at the new stranger by Alex's side. "You will have to introduce me this new friend of yours later, Alex," the doctor added before walking out of the room.
They listened carefully to the sound of receding footsteps, leaving only the beeping of the heart monitor, the pumping from the medical ventilator and the soft breathing belonging to a woman.
"Let's do this," Pariah said and approached the clear plastic of the quarantine section of the room.
He unzipped the entrance and entered the sterilization part where hazmat suits hung. Alex followed through, zipping the tent behind him. Pariah immediately unzipped the door that truly led into the patient room.
He walked in and went to grab an idle chair, dragging it closer to the bed before sitting down. Alex stood still as Pariah silently assessed, noting how the green eyes turned yellow briefly.
"She still can be saved," Pariah said, and Alex exhaled, relieved.
Pariah reached out to grab the pale still hand lying over the blanket, but the young Blacklight immediately snatched his hand before they could touch hers. Alex glared at him.
The older Runner just exhaled in exasperation before pulling his hands back. "What do you want me to do, hm?" he said accusingly and stared back at his sour glare. "It's easier for me to have direct contact on the girl."
"You can control your mother's virus," Alex growled.
Pariah blinked and leaned back into the chair. "And what? You think it's simple as that. If you so happen to know, mother's virus is not equipped to undo the damage or modification it has done to the body. Mine though, is."
"I don't want you infecting her with your own virus," Alex said stubbornly as he looked down on him.
"You're really making this unnecessarily difficult," Pariah pointed out. "Tell me, how we're going to do this then?" He raised an eyebrow in waiting, crossing his arms and tapping his foot on the floor.
Alex just glared back at the green eyes before giving a long gaze at his sister, all corded up. Pariah could control his mother's virus. And he, Alex, Blacklight came from Redlight, just synthesized and engineered that it became entirely new different strain. He was still a part of it, if anything that Greene had said, I am your mother, made sense that is.
To that extend… Pariah could control his virus, maybe him as well. If he used that as an advantage, that would mean he would know what Pariah was up to, or doing to Dana's body, if he acted through him. After all, he could feel his virus working.
He would kill himself if he just let a killer walked in and do whatever he wanted to his sister's body. Besides Pariah was Redlight's child, what if he made her a Runner instead, another mother to continue his mother's will? Alex's face darkened at these thoughts. It wouldn't make sense because it didn't fit the current face Pariah had. But what if he was just playing him?
Why was he helping him in the first place? All of this, everything about his charade as a human being reeks.
"Use my virus," Alex answered finally. "Through me," he added.
Pariah blinked then his face turned serious. "Alright." He sighed before giving him a glare. "But don't get in the way and don't struggle or we might permanently damage her." He stood up and gestured at the chair for Alex to sit.
Alex did so and grimaced when he felt a hand grab his shoulder.
"Know that your choice affects the chance of her recovering from the damage in her body, her spine especially," Pariah added sternly.
"You can give her her legs back?" Alex looked up at him.
"Yes, but since we're going your way," Pariah said drily, "The risk she won't recover from paralysis exist. So don't be difficult," he pointed as if speaking to a child, warning the boogeyman would come out of the closet if he doesn't behave.
It was certainly effective, considering Alex was keeping his anger in check.
"Grab her hand and place the other one on her neck," Pariah said.
Gently, very gently, Alex put her hand onto his, feeling the slightly clammy skin of hers while he did.
Dana. Alex almost trembled. Behind the calm cold visage, he was actually frightened. So frightened. What-ifs ran through his thoughts, of all things that could go wrong. The worst of them was that he'd done everything in his power, and still fail. That thought frightened him. The cure version of his virus fucked her up so bad… what if his own original just makes it worse? Shit, Alex felt the coils in him tightening. A squeeze on his shoulder and he looked up from his thoughts.
Pariah leaned forward and placed his other hand on her torso, completing the circle.
"I'm not going to infect her," Pariah said at his glaring. "You can be assured of that. Besides, your virus, mine as well as mother's is pushing a bit," he told him flatly. "There's nothing more overkill than that," he muttered then shut his eyes.
Alex breathed as his eyes switched to infected vision. The bright yellow glow shone so brightly, combined with the pale white of his own version of virus clinging to her back.
"By the power vested by me, I cure you," Pariah's voice cut into his vision.
Alex made a face and gave a hard unamused glare at Pariah. The older man just grinned back.
"Lighten up," Pariah drawled before shutting his eyes again.
He felt it immediately, the pull. Bright furious white splashed from his hands and into Dana's when he felt the tiny bit of him slid away. It clashed against the yellow, turning its lazy pacing into bustling molecular war.
'You'll kill her!' Alex snapped.
'Quiet!' Pariah snarled and slammed him back to the most alien senses of mental impressions and tugs, pulling his mind into another awareness that he knew was always part of him yet so entirely strange. The viral instinct.
The brain. The important part was the brain. He had to get there first then work his way downward. If Redlight damaged it, well he could undo the damage, he just wasn't sure the girl will be… well, the same girl even with the same brain structure and DNA.
Hence the brain was the most important and best chance to minimize any chance of infection. He was certainly surprised at the onslaught from his mother's virus. Pariah just grinned. This was a game he was so familiar with and enjoyed ever since he was young.
Zeus' Blacklight was certainly different. It was like… a version of his virus but hasn't grown to its full potential. It was quite a fast learner when it had to do something it needed to do. What it could do would certainly be enough.
Her body was too damaged, he shouldn't sacrifice more of her cells just to self-terminate Redlight. It would still leave the problem of undoing damage.
Mother's virus was simple but dangerously effective what it could do, clever in a way. It infected Zeus' virus and its cure version, changed them. The cure version just ended up rampaging after that. This was the only thing Redlight could do in defense. Change.
Blacklight didn't just destroy, it repurposed the virus, combined and mutated into something it couldn't assimilate back. It became something else entirely, something more than its mother was, and the girl's own cells became the coliseum that contained the fight.
He took advantage of that. He went and snatched the new version of the virus, pushing it against its own very mother, completely copied its own mother's traits. It assimilated the rampaging cure version of Blacklight, changed its behavior. But unlike its mother, what it assimilated couldn't be changed back for Redlight's use… that immunity came from Blacklight. It was a better version of its mother. The new child pushed back, replicating when needed to, mutated the girl's own cells to be stronger. Pariah's smile widened in glee, he couldn't help but enjoy this.
It was everywhere. It was so complex and beautiful. It was enough to fix the damage. Heal. Regenerate. Make her own body strong enough to flush the rest of the Redlight strain that was too weak.
Pariah smiled, satisfied. Using his eyes once he pulled out, the white glow with a pink outline of a woman laid in front of him, her head mostly untouched as the glow dimmed when he shut the virus down. His vision focused, colors entered back and his hand slid from the shoulder. His hearing tuned into the beeping of the heart monitor. Its fast-paced beeps slowing down into a steady rhythm.
A soft exhale came out the girl's mouth as if knowing the battle was finally over.
"She's going to be fine, Zeus," Pariah told the hooded man seated by his side.
"We'll see," his brother murmured.
Chapter Two: She Rises
And Dana woke up then rule the world.
"Well that escalated quickly," Pariah said before noticing the glare coming from Zeus. "It was an honest oopsie!"