(AN: This is for V-2360 for dropping a review. A very nice one at that too. Enjoy :D)
Elias had just pulled the blanket up to his chest.
The room was dark, quiet, safe—finally. His muscles were loosening, the tension of the night bleeding away as sleep crept in.
Then—
▉▉▉ SYSTEM ALERT ▉▉▉
The sound wasn't loud.
It was absolute.
Elias' eyes snapped open.
His heart lurched as translucent prompts flooded his vision, layering one over another so fast he barely had time to breathe.
"—What…?"
Ten profiles unfolded in the air before him.
Ten faces.
Ten names.
Ten sets of detailed personal information.
Age.
Criminal history.
Psychological profile.
Known affiliations.
Current status: detained.
And beneath each of them, glowing in cold, unmistakable text:
[Designation: ENEMY]
Elias sat up in bed so abruptly the sheets slid down to his waist.
"No," he whispered.
"That's—no."
His breathing quickened.
Enemy?
They were hostile earlier.
Hostile.
That was all.
Temporary.
Conditional.
A threat in the moment.
Enemies were different
.
Enemies were… permanent.
His gaze darted across the prompts, searching for an error, a delay, some sign the system had misclassified them.
Nothing changed.
All ten remained marked.
Enemy.
A chill crawled up his spine, cold and deliberate.
"Why am I reacting like this…?" Elias muttered, pressing a hand to his chest.
His heartbeat felt wrong—too loud, too fast, like his body knew something his mind hadn't accepted yet.
Then another window surfaced.
Not a notification.
Not a reward.
A law.
Text he had seen before.
Text he had tried to forget.
[CORE SYSTEM LAW — EXCERPT
III. Judgement Is Absolute
- Enemies designated by the system must be judged.
- Should the Host refuse, delay, or fail to execute judgement personally—
- The system will enact judgement on the Host's behalf. ]
Elias stared at the highlighted third clause.
His throat went dry.
"So this is why…" he murmured.
He hadn't killed them.
He hadn't wanted to.
They were stopped.
Neutralized.
Taken away.
The system had allowed it—had said nothing.
Until now.
The realization settled heavily in his chest.
To the system, mercy was not virtue.
It was failure.
One by one, the system expanded the profiles of the ten men. Their lives laid bare with merciless clarity.
The profiles did not disappear.
They expanded.
One by one, the system forced Elias to see them—not as silhouettes or threats, but as people with names, ages, and histories detailed enough that ignorance was no longer an option.
The first profile enlarged.
[Name: Marcus Hale
Age: 34
Affiliation: Iron Serpents (Local gang leader)
Crimes: Armed robbery, extortion, aggravated assault
Designation: ENEMY
Next.
Name: Luis Calderon
Age: 27
Crimes: Drug trafficking, violent intimidation
Designation: ENEMY
Name: Raymond Pike
Age: 41
Crimes: Kidnapping, unlawful imprisonment
Designation: ENEMY
Name: Devon Brooks
Age: 22
Crimes: Armed theft, assault
Designation: ENEMY
Name: Tyler Knox
Age: 29
Crimes: Weapons distribution
Designation: ENEMY
The five who had confronted him directly.
Then the four shadows.
Name: Eric Malloy
Age: 31
Crimes: Surveillance, gang enforcement
Designation: ENEMY
Name: Jonah Reed
Age: 25
Crimes: Drug courier, lookout
Designation: ENEMY
Name: Samuel Ortiz
Age: 38
Crimes: Contract violence
Designation: ENEMY
Name: Kevin Wu
Age: 19
Crimes: Accessory to violent crime
Designation: ENEMY ]
Ten faces.
Ten lives.
Some older. Some painfully young.
Petty crimes escalating into violent ones. Assaults brushed aside. Victims silenced. Deals cut. Confessions avoided—until tonight.
Patterns.
Probabilities.
Projected recidivism rates.
The system did not see men.
It saw outcomes.
And it had reached a conclusion.
Then—
▉▉▉ NEW NOTIFICATION ▉▉▉
The previous windows collapsed inward, reforming into something new.
Smaller.
More focused.
[CHOSEN JUDGE: DEPLOYED]
Elias' pupils shrank.
"What… do you mean chosen—"
An image appeared.
It was unmistakable.
A pale, spider-like organism with a curled tail and elongated limbs, frozen in perfect clarity.
A facehugger.
His breath caught.
"No." he whispered.
Another line of text materialized beneath the image.
[Judge Quantity: 1
Reason:
Once hatched, the Judge matures within minutes.
Directive:
Eliminate all designated enemies.]
Elias felt the blood drain from his face.
One.
Only one.
Because one was enough
His mind raced, horror and dread tangling together as the implication fully sank in.
He hadn't chosen judgement.
So the system had.
And whatever it had just released…
would not hesitate.
▉▉▉ SYSTEM RESTRICTION ▉▉▉
[Host Intervention: FORBIDDEN
- Judgement has been delegated.
- The Host is required to witness the outcome. ]
Elias' breath stuttered.
Witness.
He didn't get to act.
Didn't get to choose.
Didn't even get the mercy of ignorance.
He fell back against the headboard, hands trembling as the window panel in front of him shifted.
.
.
.
Elsewhere — Federal Detention Facility, Night
The prison stood silent beneath the night sky, concrete and steel bathed in harsh white lights.
Cameras swept the perimeter.
Guards walked their routes.
Routine.
Secure.
On the rooftop, nothing moved.
Then—
Something dropped.
It landed without a sound.
Pale limbs unfolded against the concrete, tail twitching once before going still.
The facehugger did not hesitate.
It moved with terrifying speed, slipping through ventilation gaps no human body could pass.
Alarms never triggered. Cameras saw nothing more than static distortions too brief to flag.
The first scream came from Cell D–17.
It wasn't anger.
It wasn't defiance.
It was pure, animal terror
.
The man inside—Devon Brooks, 22—had been mid-sentence, laughing nervously at something another inmate had said, when something dropped onto his face from above.
He didn't even see it.
One second there was air.
The next, pale limbs unfolded across his skull like a living trap.
"GET IT OFF—GET IT OFF—!"
The facehugger locked itself in place with frightening precision, its fingers tightening around his head, tail coiling around his neck.
The cell erupted into chaos.
Inmates surged to the bars, shouting.
"What the hell is that thing?!"
Two prisoners rushed forward instinctively, grabbing at the creature's limbs, trying to pull it free.
They managed to tear one finger loose.
That was their mistake.
The blood sprayed.
Not red—clear, smoking, sizzling.
It splashed across their hands.
Their faces.
They screamed instantly, flesh bubbling as the acid burned through skin, one man collapsing, clawing at his own melting cheeks as smoke curled upward.
"ACID—IT'S ACID—!"
The others backed away in horror.
Devon's struggling slowed.
The facehugger tightened, its body convulsing as a long, slick appendage slid down his throat.
Those who didn't move—those frozen in terror—watched as his limbs twitched, then went slack.
Unconscious.
The appendage withdrew.
The creature remained.
Silence fell.
Then—
"GUARDS! GUARDS!"
The shouts echoed down the corridor.
Doors slammed.
Boots thundered.
By the time the first officers arrived, they were met with chaos: prisoners screaming, two men on the ground clutching their ruined faces, smoke rising from the floor—and in the center of it all, a young gangster slumped against the wall with something wrapped around his head.
Weapons were raised instantly.
"What happened?!" an officer demanded while unlocking the cell.
One of the prisoners—shaking, pale—pointed wildly.
"That thing—! It jumped him! Its blood burns! It put something inside him—!"
Devon stirred.
His eyes snapped open.
He saw the thing on his face.
His scream tore through the block.
"HELP ME—PLEASE—GET IT OFF—!"
His voice muffled but surprisingly understandable.
He clawed at it desperately, staggering toward the officers, hands shaking as he begged them with raw panic in his eyes.
One of the prisoners shouted hoarsely,
"DON'T CUT IT—ITS BLOOD—!"
They listened.
Carefully—methodically—they pried the facehugger loose, avoiding its body as much as possible.
The creature detached.
It hit the floor.
Dead.
Devon collapsed to his knees, coughing violently, gagging as he sucked air into his lungs.
"I—I'm fine," he gasped, frantic. "It's gone, right? It's gone—"
A superior officer stepped forward, voice sharp but controlled.
"We're taking you to medical. Full scan. Whatever that thing did, we're finding it."
Devon nodded instantly.
"Yeah—yeah—do it now—get it out of me—please—"
Another inmate whispered, voice shaking, "I saw it… it put something in him."
Devon froze.
His breathing hitched.
Then—
He clutched his chest.
Hard.
Pain ripped through him like a blade.
"What—what's wrong?" an officer asked.
Devon screamed.
"IT HURTS—GET IT OUT—GET IT OUT OF ME—!"
He tore open his jumpsuit in panic.
His chest bulged.
The skin stretched unnaturally—
Then ruptured.
A creature burst free in a spray of blood and bone, shrieking as it emerged.
Devon Brooks collapsed, dead before he hit the floor.
For one frozen second, no one moved.
Then the creature leapt.
It hit the wall, skittered across the ceiling, and vanished through an open maintenance corridor.
Pandemonium erupted.
Weapons fired too late.
"WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT?!"
The report reached the station command minutes later.
Disbelief followed.
Until a low, echoing growl reverberated through the building.
The commander went pale.
"Lock down the facility," he ordered.
"Get every available unit. Now."
Then he made the call.
This time, there was no hesitation.
"This is beyond us," he said into the phone.
"We need SHIELD."
.
.
Somewhere else—
far from screaming corridors and blood-soaked floors—
Something was growing in minutes.
And its only instinct was clear.
Bring judgement to the enemies of the Host.
End of chapter 7