Chapter 76 The Suspicious Abandoned Processing Plant—Black Widow’s Team Vanishes

Ethan was still unaware that the operation he had arranged to capture Obadiah Stane had gone awry.

However, that operation had merely been a casual move on the board. Ethan had planned to interrogate Obadiah for intelligence before allowing him to serve one final purpose.

He wanted Iron Monger to temper Tony Stark and force him to mature as soon as possible.

Turning the Avengers into a force the Foundation could use—one capable of standing alone as a shield and drawing the attention of all manner of powerful beings in the future—had always been part of Ethan’s plan.

In fact, if he knew that Obadiah’s Iron Monger armor had mutated into a unique infected entity after being exposed to an SCP-008 daughter strain with the Twelve Round Table Council’s assistance, he would only have been happier.

Containing such a unique anomaly would undoubtedly grant him even greater rewards.

A pig had to be fattened before it was slaughtered.

At that moment, Ethan’s attention was focused on the abandoned processing plant where Agent Natasha, Agent Skye, a S.H.I.E.L.D. anomalous-response unit, and a squad of MTF operators—more than a hundred people in total—had vanished.

An Owl-class drone surveyed the area from above.

Although the team had been out of contact for approximately six hours, traces of an intense firefight were still clearly visible.

Blackwatch corpses lay scattered across the ground, accompanied by the bodies of numerous infected creatures and mutated organisms.

A few stray zombies wandered aimlessly nearby, likely having drifted over from the surrounding infected zone.

“Designated marksmen are in position.”

“Fire-support teams are ready.”

“Sir, the MTF is standing by.”

The operators’ voices sounded through Ethan’s earpiece as he carefully scanned the surrounding area with his psionic power.

A Psychic Commander could use mental energy to detect both friendly and hostile units within a given area.

With the specially modified command variant of the Owl drone equipped with a psionic amplifier, Ethan’s perception extended across a radius of five kilometers.

Yet after completing his reconnaissance, he found no trace of Natasha, Skye, or their accompanying MTF squad.

He could not even locate the bodies of any friendlies.

Instead, he discovered numerous Blackwatch corpses, all of whom appeared to have been killed by conventional firearms.

This meant that the force led by Natasha and Skye had launched a surprise assault—and that the attack had undoubtedly succeeded. They had eliminated the Blackwatch troops stationed here.

But that only made the situation stranger.

Where had everyone gone?

Ethan suddenly detected an unusual device inside the facility. He also found several suspicious corpses nearby, all of them seemingly Blackwatch researchers.

“Sir, the drone has detected Blackwatch forces approaching. Should we intercept them?”

Hearing the report, Ethan withdrew from his mental-detection state and glanced at the Blackwatch formation displayed on his tablet.

An unsurprised expression crossed his face.

“So they’ve finally realized that something is wrong with the ‘military investigation team’ and decided to eliminate us?”

He remained perfectly calm as he issued his orders.

“Leave part of our force behind to intercept Blackwatch. Form a separate assault team. I’ll lead them into the target area with Gwen and Elivise.”

Ever since discovering that Elivise was SCP-008’s progenitor entity, Ethan had developed a rough understanding of her current condition.

Based on the properties of the Blacklight virus in Prototype, Elivise could be in one of two states.

The first possibility was that the real Elivise had already died, and the Blacklight virus—now fused with SCP-008—had occupied her body and resurrected itself in her form.

The second possibility was that Elivise had completely fused with the SCP-008 progenitor strain and the Blacklight virus, transforming into an entirely new life-form.

Put simply, either the Blacklight virus had taken over Elivise’s body after her death, or she and the virus had entered a complete symbiotic relationship similar to Venom and its host.

That would explain why Elivise had lost most of her memories.

Her amnesia was likely only temporary.

As the Blacklight virus fused with SCP-008 continued to evolve and strengthen, her memories would gradually return. She would become increasingly powerful until she eventually grew into a queen capable of controlling every zombie virus.

That was precisely why Ethan could neither allow such an entity to wander freely nor excessively restrict her movements.

To contain SCP-008 under the present circumstances, he first needed to earn Elivise’s trust and persuade her to accept containment voluntarily.

If he simply allowed her to do as she pleased, Ethan feared that she might eventually walk the same path as Alex Mercer.

The Blacklight virus could effortlessly absorb the memories and knowledge of every creature it consumed. Without proper guidance and restraint, that vast mass of chaotic memories could overwhelm Elivise’s original consciousness.

She would eventually meet one of two fates.

Either she would transcend her humanity and become a saintlike being—or, like Alex Mercer, she would witness too much of humanity’s darkest side, succumb to despair, and attempt to exterminate the world with the virus.

Ethan had already formed a hypothesis about the requirements of this containment mission.

To clean up the catastrophe caused by SCP-008, he needed to earn Elivise’s complete trust while helping her grow powerful enough to truly control the anomaly’s power.

Catherine and Gwen were the only two people Elivise currently knew and trusted. Ethan naturally intended to keep them close to her.

Moreover, Elivise and Gwen were both superhuman combatants. They would not become liabilities during the operation ahead.

Once Ethan issued his orders, the MTF operators waiting in ambush immediately launched their attack.

A Blackwatch mechanized unit was rushing toward the laboratory.

Before assaulting the facility, Natasha and Skye’s team had deployed an electronic-jamming system. Consequently, Blackwatch only realized something was wrong during a routine shift change more than five hours later.

By coincidence, Ethan’s group had arrived in the area around the same time.

Blackwatch clearly attached enormous importance to this facility. After losing contact with the garrison guarding it, they immediately dispatched a mechanized infantry force to investigate.

Judging by its size, it was at least a full mechanized infantry company.

The leading M2 Bradley entered the intersection.

Before its crew could react, two streaks of fire flashed from the high-rise buildings overlooking the street.

Two antitank rockets struck the Bradley almost simultaneously.

The lightly armored infantry fighting vehicle erupted in flames, and its ammunition cooked off moments later.

The two troop carriers nearby had no time to react before they were caught in the resulting explosions. Roof hatches were blown into the air as ammunition detonated one round after another, showering the street with fire and shrapnel.

The soldiers inside the two vehicles suffered devastating casualties.

“Ambush! Dismount and return fire!”

The Blackwatch field commander reacted quickly, but it was already too late.

They had been ambushed at an intersection during urban combat, with tall buildings and firing positions surrounding them on every side.

In terrain like this, even a brick dropped from a rooftop could kill a soldier below.

Worse still, MTF operators positioned in two separate high-rises caught the Blackwatch unit in a crossfire, leaving them with almost no cover.

The machine gunners opened fire, laying down relentless suppressive fire, while the designated marksmen systematically eliminated officers and other high-priority targets.

The Blackwatch reinforcements suffered catastrophic casualties. Their commander hurriedly began calling for support.

But an even greater problem soon emerged.

The thunder of gunfire and explosions attracted the zombies wandering through the nearby infected zone. Howls rose one after another in the distance.

It was the warning sign of an approaching horde.

That, too, was part of the plan.

By drawing a zombie horde into the area, Ethan could prevent further Blackwatch reinforcements from reaching the facility in time.

The Blackwatch force had been utterly suppressed and suffered severe losses. At that point, however, the MTF operators deliberately eased their attack.

The battered Blackwatch soldiers soon discovered why.

Vast numbers of zombies were pouring onto the battlefield.

The earlier gunfire and explosions had acted like a dinner bell, drawing countless infected out of the quarantine zone.

Having lost nearly all their infantry fighting vehicles, the surviving Blackwatch troops were forced to establish defensive positions around the burning wreckage and fight the horde.

Their weakened firepower could no longer halt the flood of zombies.

Ethan did not bother watching them get devoured to the last man.

He turned toward Gwen and Elivise.

“Let’s go.”

He gestured to 2B.

Several MTF operators carrying grappling launchers stepped forward and fired lines toward the building below. The grappling bolts anchored themselves to its rooftop, creating a series of ziplines.

Ethan took the lead, sliding down onto the roof.

Spider-Gwen and Elivise had it even easier. They simply leaped from the building and landed below.

Once the assault team regrouped on the rooftop, Ethan led them forward, eliminating the scattered zombies wandering nearby.

Thanks to the MTF-E11 rifles’ advanced suppressors, even close-range gunfire sounded almost as quiet as it did in the movies. The team entered the target building without causing any significant disturbance.

The farther they advanced, the more corpses they discovered.

They were all Blackwatch soldiers who had been killed during the earlier surprise assault.

At last, Ethan and his assault team reached the abandoned processing plant’s innermost area.

What lay before them was not a waste-treatment facility at all.

It was an advanced laboratory.

At its center stood a suspicious, futuristic machine, still humming quietly as it continued to operate.