Chapter 21: Mutiny

The tunnel narrowed, the cracked concrete giving way to smooth, seamless metal. The air grew colder, sterile, carrying the faint, sharp scent of ozone and old-world preservatives.

At the end of the corridor stood a massive circular blast door. No rust. No decay. It looked like it had been sealed yesterday.

Darwin stopped. He stepped up to a recessed terminal beside the door. He raised his right hand—his bionic arm—and pressed his metallic palm against the scanner. Then, he leaned in. His left eye, the one with the mechanical pupil, whirred softly. A faint blue light scanned his retina.

"Commander?" a soldier asked, his rifle lowered in confusion.

"Clearance recognized," a synthetic, automated voice echoed from the walls. "Enter override."

Darwin’s bionic fingers tapped a rapid, complex sequence on the keypad. "Authorization: Darwin, Alpha-Actual. Code: Velithari-Seven."

The heavy locks disengaged with a series of deep, hydraulic thuds that vibrated through the floor. The massive door slid open, revealing a pristine, white-lit stasis laboratory.

"Secure the perimeter," Darwin ordered, moving straight for a central console. "Don’t touch the pods."

They stepped inside. The room was lined with reinforced glass pods, most shattered and empty, but a few at the far end remained intact, filled with a pale, glowing preservation fluid.

Then, every bracelet on the squad’s wrists flashed blinding red.

But there was no rank. No F, E, or D. The screens simply glitched, flashing a harsh, repeating error:

ERROR: NO MUTAGENIC CORE DETECTED.

Before anyone could process the glitch, the intact pods hissed open. The preservation fluid spilled across the floor in a rush.

Four massive shapes dropped to the tiles. They were canine, but horribly wrong. Hairless, pale grey skin was pulled tight over corded, unnatural muscle. Their jaws were elongated, dripping a viscous, smoking fluid that ate into the metal floor. Their eyes glowed with a sickly, artificial yellow light.

"Bioengineered guard dogs," Kojiro rasped from where he was leaning against the wall, still pale and shaking from the worm core. "Pre-collapse military tech. No mutagenic cores huh?. Our bracelets are useless against ’em."

The dogs didn’t roar. They moved in terrifying, synchronized silence.

"Fire!" Darwin barked.

Plasma bolts filled the room. One dog took a bolt to the shoulder but didn’t even flinch, its artificial biology ignoring the pain. It lunged, closing the distance in a heartbeat.

Gio raised his hand. ’Come.’

A single wasp construct materialized.

His Bioenergy was at 26%. He had plenty of raw energy to summon the bear, but the mental toll of the last two days—the constant scanning, the respawning wasps, the sheer terror of the serpent—left his mind feeling like bruised fruit. A blinding headache throbbed behind his eyes. If he summoned the bear now, the mental feedback would likely drop him to his knees.

The construct darted forward, but a dog snapped it out of the air mid-flight, its jaws crushing the white light.

[Construct destroyed. Reconstructing. 1%]

The wasp instantly reformed, but the momentary mental disconnect of the destruction made Gio stagger, a sharp spike of pain driving through his temples. He gritted his teeth, forcing the construct to dive-bomb the dog’s face.

The lead dog bypassed the wasp and lunged straight for Melody, its jaws opening to unleash a stream of acidic saliva. Melody raised her claws, but she was too slow.

"Melody, move!" Lloyd screamed.

He didn’t run away. He ran forward.

Lloyd dropped his plasma rifle. It clattered uselessly against the metal floor. He stepped directly between Melody and the leaping hound, throwing his hands out.

"Get back!"

The air in front of Lloyd shimmered.

With a sound like cracking glass, a translucent, hexagonal forcefield erupted from his palms. It was a shimmering wall of hard-light, glowing with a soft, blue energy.

The bioengineered hound slammed into the shield.

CRACK.

The forcefield held. The dog’s acidic saliva splashed against the barrier, hissing, but the energy matrix repelled it instantly. The hound yelped as the kinetic feedback threw it backward, skidding across the pristine floor.

Lloyd stood there, his arms trembling, sweat already beading on his forehead. The shield hummed, casting blue light across his pale face.

"You... you’re a Manifestation-Type?" Melody breathed, staring at him.

"Huh... a barrier," Lloyd grunted, his voice strained but with a grin. "My mutation finally kicked in..."

The other three dogs recovered and charged, realizing the physical bite wasn’t working.

"Keep it up, pretty boy!" Blaze roared, his hands igniting.

Lloyd gritted his teeth and pushed. The forcefield expanded, stretching into a dome that covered Melody, Reuben, and Tabitha.

The dogs slammed into the barrier, their claws sparking against the hard-light. They were trapped on the outside, snapping uselessly.

"Now!" Lloyd shouted, blood trickling from his nose. "Shoot ’em through the gaps!"

The soldiers and recruits opened fire. With the dogs pinned against the shield, they couldn’t dodge. Plasma bolts tore through the hounds’ pale hides. One by one, the bioengineered monsters collapsed, their artificial eyes flickering and dying.

Lloyd dropped to his knees, the shield shattering into a million fading blue motes. He gasped for air, wiping the blood from his lip.

Melody offered him a hand. He took it, and she pulled him up.

"Not bad, Vanworth," she said softly.

Lloyd managed a weak, genuine smile. "Thanks."

Darwin didn’t praise him. He was already at the console, extracting a pristine, black data drive.

"Secure the drive," Darwin ordered the nearest soldier. "We move. The noise’ll attract—"

"We aren’t going anywhere." A voice said.

The voice was rough, heavy, and echoed with finality.

Darwin turned slowly.

Rask stood at the entrance of the vault, his bone-spikes fully extended, gleaming under the sterile lights. Beside him were three other prisoners, their weapons raised and aimed squarely at the soldiers’ backs.

"Rask," Darwin said, his voice dangerously calm. "Stand down."

"No." Rask spat on the pristine floor. "We’ve been walking in the dark for two days. Fought worms, dogs, and whatever the hell’s banging on that door behind us. You’re leading us into a graveyard, Darwin. I saw the map on your datapad when you weren’t looking. There’s no exit on the other side of this vault. Just a dead end."

"That’s classified," Darwin said.

"I’m a prisoner, not an idiot," Rask snarled. "We’re taking the supplies in this lab, and we’re going back the way we came. We’re done taking orders from a man who doesn’t care if we live or die."

The remaining civilians and nobles shrank back, terrified. The prisoners had snapped.

Gio stepped forward, his hand resting on his plasma handgun. His head was pounding, but his Bioenergy was stable enough.

"Rask," Gio said quietly. "Don’t do this. We go back, we die."

"Then I’ll take my chances with the snake," Rask said, his eyes locking onto Gio. "Step aside, kid. Or I’ll put a spike through your chest right now."

The tension in the vault snapped taut. A mutiny had begun.