Chapter 104: Collars and Scars

The cold sound of churning river water rushed through the sluice gates below while scalding steam billowed from the stranger’s chest.

Damp mist clung to the rusted railings of the catwalk as yellow emergency lanterns flickered across the ceiling above their heads.

Fin kept his left hand firmly planted on the stranger’s shoulder, holding him steady above the drop while easing his hatchet back toward his hip.

Across the narrow catwalk, Ruby held her tower shield in a solid forward plant, her spear point leveled three inches above the stranger’s throat.

Nila leaned against the wall with two thin daggers poised between her fingers, her calculating gaze tracking every ragged breath the stranger drew.

"Do not move," Ruby warned, her voice echoing flatly against the wet stone vault, "drop those bone spikes on the grating before I pin you to the wall."

"They do not drop," the stranger coughed, a thin trickle of dark blood running from the corner of his cracked lips, "they are bolted straight through my wrist bones with steel brackets."

"Leave him be, Ruby." Fin felt the frantic, agonizing heat radiating through the stranger’s torn cotton shirt. "He is not going anywhere on those legs."

The stranger slumped backward against the damp iron railing, his knees sliding across the slick grating as his strength gave out completely.

His synthetic chest graft hissed with pale vapor, the jagged surgical stitches stretching tight over flesh that looked raw and blistered.

"Why are you holding back?" the stranger rasped, staring up at Fin through matted dark hair with a mixture of bitter defiance and exhausted wonder, "you caught my blade, you felt what I am, so drive that axe through my throat."

"I do not chop up people who are already dying on their feet." Fin stepped back and leaned casually against the railing with his arms crossed over his chest. "Especially people who carry the same butcher marks I spent three months hunting down."

"We do not carry the same marks," the stranger choked out, his hand clutching at his burning breastbone as another tremor wracked his ribs, "you are clean, whole, and unbreakable, while I am just a leaking counterfeit that should have rotted in a ditch."

"Talk plainly." Fin’s tone turned sharp and direct. "Who gave you those counterfeit organs, and why were you raiding Genesis transports four years ago?"

The stranger let out a ragged, wheezing laugh that ended in a wet cough, his head tilting back against the cold stones of the wall.

"Four years ago I was just another starving rat sleeping in the loading alleys behind the District Four protein warehouse," the stranger whispered, his eyes distant as memories surfaced, "Genesis snatch teams grabbed twelve of us off the street in one night."

Fin went still, the hair on the back of his neck standing up as the familiar district names clicked into place.

"They took us to Facility Zero," the stranger continued, his fingers digging into his bruised thighs, "they told us they were going to build the first human being capable of infinite power."

"The Prototype Zero project," Fin noted, his tactical mind piecing together the timeline with cold, mounting clarity.

"They cut my chest open on an operating table," the stranger muttered, his voice trembling with remembered terror, "they carved out half my natural lung and stitched in that synthetic filter."

He tapped the hissing brass collar locked around his throat, the metal hot enough to scorch the surrounding skin into angry red welts.

"They bolted this collar on to keep the synthetic graft from burning out my heart." The stranger spat a mouthful of blood onto the wet grating. "They called me Subject One, the first operational twin."

"You broke out." Ruby spoke from behind her shield, her eyes narrowing as she listened to the boy’s confession.

"I broke out during a core transfer," Subject One nodded, his knuckles whitening, "I was burning alive from cellular rejection, and I needed high-grade monster cores to feed the siphon."

He paused for a long second, looking directly up into Fin’s eyes with sudden, sickening realization.

"Four years ago," Subject One whispered, his voice barely audible over the roaring sluice, "I hit their transport truck right behind the District Four warehouse dock."

Fin felt a cold shock ripple down his spine, though his outward expression remained completely calm and unreadable.

"The driver panicked and smashed the storage crates against the security pylon." Subject One closed his eyes in shame. "The impact ruptured the local dimensional barrier, and the breach alarm went off before I could drag the cores away."

"An orc pack broke through the fence." Fin spoke in a level voice, remembering the dark alley, the cold rain, and the axe that cleaved his chest.

"You were there," Subject One gasped, his eyes flying open in sheer horror, "you were the warehouse porter who took the blade in the alley."

"I was nineteen, making six coppers an hour packing protein cartons." Fin looked down at his calloused palms. "I bled to death on those wet cobblestones while you ran for the docks."

Silence fell over the catwalk, dense and suffocating despite the roaring torrent of dark water below.

Ruby tightened her grip on her spear shaft, while Nila’s fingers shifted along the balance of her throwing daggers.

Subject One closed his eyes, dropping his head down toward his bruised chest in complete, unresisting surrender.

"Then finish it," Subject One whispered, his voice stripped of all fight, "I caused the breach that got you killed, so take your blood price."

Fin looked at the shivering young man, seeing the brass collar, the raw surgical scars, and the desperate agony of a boy who was thrown away like broken machinery.

He unclasped his water skin from his belt and held it out, letting the clean leather canteen dangle before the stranger’s face.

"Drink." Fin held the canteen steady.

Subject One blinked in disbelief, staring at the water skin as if it were an unexploded grenade.

"What?" Subject One stammered, his jaw slack.

"I said drink." Fin took a step forward and shoved the canteen into the boy’s trembling hands. "Blood vengeance does not pay my sister’s grocery bills, and it does not tear down Facility Zero."

The distant hum of the pumping station vibrated through the steel grating while the stranger leaned quietly against the wall.

Cold river spray drifted across their faces as the sound of running water filled the dark cavern between their quiet voices.

Subject One took the canteen with shaking fingers, pulling the wooden stopper and drinking deeply, water spilling down his scarred throat and soothing his parched mouth.

"You died," Subject One muttered, wiping his chin with the back of his wrist bracket, "how are you standing here?"

"A voice woke me up." Fin kept the details sparse and private. "And gave me the real system that your corporate masters were trying to copy."

"Subject NULL," Subject One breathed, awe replacing the terror in his voice, "the naturally born empty vessel that Prototype Zero was copied from."

"I am just Fin." He shook his head with a faint grin. "A warehouse porter who does not like seeing kids locked in cages."

"They have forty-eight of them down there right now." Subject One’s voice hardened with bitter hatred. "In Sub-Level Three, floating in amber vats hooked to nutrient tubes."

"Batch Six." Nila stepped forward beside Fin. "We found their shipping manifest on the supply truck yesterday morning."

"Krell is the chief synthesist," Subject One snarled, his teeth grinding together in fury, "he runs the incubator hall, and he holds the master suppression key that can unlock this collar."

"Then our job is very simple." Fin looked down at Subject One with calm, unwavering certainty.

"You want Krell dead, and you want that collar off your neck." Fin laid out the terms clearly. "I want those forty-eight children carried out alive, and I want Facility Zero burned to the bedrock."

"I know the way in." Subject One reached inside his ragged coat and pulled out a folded piece of oilcloth.

He spread the cloth flat on the grating, revealing a hand-drawn diagram of the facility’s subterranean layout.

"The main blast doors from Conduit 9 lead into the turbine hall." Subject One tapped a line on the cloth with his finger. "But there is an unmapped ventilation flue that bypasses the golem charging racks and drops directly into Sub-Level Three."

"Can Maya tap the turbine controls from the ventilation shaft?" Ruby leaned over the drawing with sharp interest.

"Easily," Subject One nodded, his eyes meeting Ruby’s without flinching, "if you cut the cooling line to the main generator, the inner security blast gates will lock in an open emergency state."

Fin reached out, taking the folded oilcloth and tucking it securely into his dark jacket pocket.

"What is your name?" Fin extended his right hand to the young man on the floor.

The scarred stranger hesitated for a brief second before gripping Fin’s outstretched hand with calloused, trembling fingers.

"They wiped my registry file four years ago," the stranger murmured, his grip tightening as Fin pulled him to his feet, "they called me Subject One, but before they put the collar on, my mother called me Darek."

"Alright, Darek." Fin gave the boy’s shoulder a firm pat. "Rest your legs and drink that water. Come dawn, we are going to break into that facility and tear their walls down."