Scene 1
0.1 Seconds
• •
A hand reached out.
Left hand.
It seized the first soldier's face.
Heat exploded.
The face melted. Skin first. Fat layer next. Muscle after. Skull last. 0.1 seconds. Inside Ian's palm, a human head became liquid. The eyeballs burst. The brain boiled. No scream made it out. The brain had died before the vocal cords could melt.
Incomplete scream.
Ian's brow furrowed.
His right hand moved.
Second soldier.
This time he took the throat. Modulated the heat. Slowly. Skin only, at first. The soldier's mouth fell open. Eyes rolled back. Vocal cords vibrated.
The scream erupted.
Long.
The iron skewer in Ian's left femur withdrew. Pain dissolved. The inside of the bone turned cool. As though ice water had been poured in. A fire that had burned for seventeen years was extinguished by a single scream.
He let go.
The body collapsed.
No—not a body. A shape. The remains of what had been human. Melted flesh and charred bone scattered across the tile.
Ian's gaze went forward.
End of the corridor.
Eli was on the floor.
Curled. Both hands covering her head. Her entire body trembling. Breathing audible. Over fifty per minute. Hyperventilation. Full panic.
Ian's foot moved. One step. Two.
He stood before Eli.
The child's head rose.
Eyes met.
Terror.
Terror was all the child's eyes held. Not the eyes from two years ago, the ones that had clutched Ian's sleeve and fallen asleep. These were the eyes of someone who had seen a monster. Not someone who had come to save her—someone who had come to devour her.
Ian looked into those eyes.
He felt nothing.
Grief? Absent.
Guilt? Absent.
Only confirmed: this child's scream was not needed yet. The painkiller supply was sufficient. For now.
Ian's hand reached out.
Eli flinched.
Tried to scream. Mouth opening. But before sound could form, Ian's hand covered the child's mouth.
"Quiet."
His vocal cords vibrated. Roughly. Like a machine long out of use.
"The scream comes later."
Eli's eyes widened further.
Eyes that did not understand. Words that could not be understood. Not the words of a savior. The words of a monster.
Ian lifted the child. One arm. Light. The weight of an eight-year-old. A malnourished body. Bone and skin and nothing more.
"Maria."
Footsteps approached from behind.
"Take her."
Maria received the child. Eli thrashed. But Maria's arms were wire-rigid. The child's resistance was neutralized.
"Wait at the end of the corridor."
Ian said.
"I'll clean out the facility and be back."
Maria bowed her head.
"It is an honor."
Ian's gaze turned forward.
An alarm began to wail.
Red lights pulsed across the ceiling.
Footsteps. Many. Dozens.
Ian's mouth shifted. Barely.
"There they are."
Heat bloomed at his fingertips.
"The painkillers."
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Scene 2
Moving Ampoules
• •
They poured from the end of the corridor.
Black reinforced suits. Full-body gloves. Full-face helmets. In their hands, not batons—electroshock units. The Empire's Suppression Company. Not riot-control. Specimen-control.
Twelve.
Ian didn't count.
There was no need to count.
Twelve painkillers were running toward him.
The point man aimed his electroshock unit. Blue current crackled at the tip. Five hundred thousand volts. Enough to collapse a human nervous system.
Ian didn't dodge.
He walked.
The unit fired. Electrodes flew. They embedded in Ian's chest. Current flowed.
Nothing happened.
Heat swallowed the current. The electrodes melted. The cable charred. The spark backflowed through to the operator's hand.
First scream.
Ian's knee lightened.
The second soldier charged. Swung a suppression baton. Aimed at Ian's side. Before the baton made contact, Ian's hand rose. Caught it. The metal softened and ran inside his palm.
He reached out. Seized the soldier's helmet. Injected heat.
The helmet melted. The head inside it, too. The smell of a skull evaporating. The stench of burning protein. Smoke of bone turning to ash.
Second scream.
The ankle pain vanished.
Third. Fourth. Fifth.
Ian walked. Did not stop. Soldiers rushed in. Batons swung. Electroshock units fired. None of it stopped Ian. The heat melted everything. Metal. Plastic. Flesh. Bone.
Six. Seven.
The corridor turned red.
Blood spreading across white tile. Hot blood. Boiling blood. Hissing the instant it touched the floor, evaporating on contact. Orange heat blanketing the surface. White floor. Red blood. Orange flame.
Eight.
Nine.
The inside of Ian's bones turned cool. Phantom pain dissolving. Iron skewers pulling out one at a time. From the spine. The femur. The knee. The ankle.
Ten.
Eleven.
The last soldier backed away. Breathing leaked from inside the helmet. Rough and fast. The respiration of someone consumed by fear.
"M-monster…"
Ian's hand reached out.
Removed the helmet.
A young face appeared. Mid-twenties. Eyes shaking. Lips trembling.
"Please—please spare—"
Ian's palm settled over the face.
Heat rose.
Slowly.
The skin cooked. Reddened. Cracked. Fat melted and ran. The soldier's mouth opened. A scream erupted. Long. High. Dense.
Twelve.
Every pain inside Ian's body vanished.
He released.
The body fell.
The corridor went quiet.
Twelve shapes lay scattered on the floor. Melted helmets. Charred gloves. Evaporated flesh. White tile scorched black. Red blood pooling. Orange heat slowly cooling.
Ian exhaled.
The inside of his bones was quiet. Empty.
At the far end of the corridor, one more door.
Steel.
RESEARCH WING — AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY
Ian's foot moved.
The steel door began to melt.
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Scene 3
Uncontrollable
• •
The research wing.
White walls. White floor. White ceiling.
A sterile room.
Glass partitions divided the space. Each partition held a single bed. Leather straps on each bed. Wrist. Ankle. Neck. Restraints designed to immobilize a human being.
Ian's gaze swept the partitions.
Empty.
Every bed was empty. Only the leather straps hung limp. Blood dried on them. Old blood. The blood of hundreds. The walls remembered how many had screamed in this place.
"You made it this far."
A voice.
Ian's gaze turned.
Far end of the room.
A man stood. White coat. Round glasses. Gray hair. A tablet in his hands. Fingers moving busily across the screen. Inputting data. A researcher.
"CS-0042."
The man said.
"Or should I call you the 'completed form'?"
Ian did not respond.
He walked. One step.
"Stop."
The man's fingers tapped the tablet.
"One more step and I activate the restraint code."
Ian's foot did not stop.
Second step.
The man's brow furrowed.
"You were warned."
His finger pressed the screen.
Nothing happened.
The man's expression froze. He pressed again. Three times. Four. Five. No response.
"Why—why isn't it—"
Ian's foot stopped.
Three meters from the man.
"Restraint code."
Ian said.
"What is that?"
The man's gaze moved from the tablet to Ian. Fear was present. But beneath it, something else. Arrogance. A creator's arrogance toward his creation.
"A suppression device implanted in your body. Designed to amplify pain. You should be crawling on the floor right now."
Ian's pupils shifted. Barely.
Suppression device.
Pain amplification.
"But it isn't working."
"Impossible…"
The man's voice trembled.
"I personally managed your experimentation records. Three years ago, during the primary injection, the device was definitely implanted—"
"Burned away."
Ian said.
One more step. Two meters.
"Everything inside my body burned. The suppression device. The restraint code. Every chain you planted."
The man's back hit the wall.
"W-wait. Let's negotiate. What do you want? Information? I can give it. Every record of the Clean Slate project. The locations of other completed forms. Everything the Empire did to you—"
Ian's hand reached out.
Seized the man's wrist. The hand holding the tablet.
Heat flowed in.
From the fingers.
The man's mouth opened. A scream tried to erupt. Ian's other hand rose and gripped the man's jaw. Held the mouth shut.
"I don't need information."
Ian said.
Heat climbed from the wrist. Skin cooked. Muscle contracted. Bone blackened. The man's eyes rolled. His body convulsed. Between the fingers gripping his jaw, a moan leaked.
"All I need is the scream."
He released the jaw.
The scream exploded.
The final iron skewer pulled free from Ian's spine. The bones emptied completely. Painless. Numb. Weightless.
He let go.
The man collapsed.
No arm. Burned to the shoulder. Charred flesh dangling. Still breathing. Not yet dead. But soon.
Ian did not look down at the man.
His gaze went deeper into the room.
Another door.
Not steel. Glass. Thick reinforced glass. Beyond it, a blue glow was seeping through. The light of liquid. The light of tanks.
Ian's foot moved.
He stood before the glass door.
Looked inside.
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Scene 4
Kin
• •
Tanks.
Six.
Floor-to-ceiling cylindrical glass columns standing in a row. Blue liquid filled each one. Oxygen tubes descended from above. Life-support systems. Incubators.
Inside them, people.
First tank. A man. Early thirties. Eyes closed. Wounds covering his body. Burn scars. The same kind as Ian's.
Second tank. A woman. Twenties. Left arm missing. Severed at the shoulder. The stump charred black.
Third. Fourth. Fifth.
All covered in wounds.
All missing something.
All breathing.
Ian's gaze stopped on the sixth tank.
A boy.
Fifteen or so. Thin. Pale skin. A number was inscribed on his chest. Black ink. Tattooed like a brand.
CS-0038.
Ian's chest bore the same marking. CS-0042. Four numbers later. The same production line.
The boy's eyelids trembled.
Ian's feet stopped.
The eyes opened.
Black irises. Not amber. No flame. But inside them, something was present. Recognition. Awareness. Waking.
The boy's lips moved.
Inside the liquid. No sound. But the shape could be read.
Brother.
Ian's eyebrow shifted. Barely.
Movement in the other tanks.
First tank. The man's eyes opened.
Second tank. The woman's head turned.
Third. Fourth. Fifth.
All the subjects woke simultaneously.
All eyes locked onto Ian.
Six pairs of eyes.
No fear inside them. No reverence. No worship. Only a single emotion shared across all six.
Recognition.
The instinct of kin recognizing kin.
The resonance that only those who have endured the same suffering can possess.
Ian looked at them.
He felt nothing.
Sympathy? Absent.
Solidarity? Absent.
Only one question surfaced.
What would their screams taste like?
The screams of those who knew the same pain. The screams of those with the same skewers embedded in their bones. Could those screams relieve his phantom pain? Or would they have no effect at all?
Ian's left femur throbbed.
It was back.
The painlessness had ended.
The reprieve earned from the researcher's scream was spent. The skewers had begun to move again. Scraping the inside of the bone.
Heat rose from Ian's fingertips.
Toward the tanks.
The glass began to glow.
Orange.
The boy's lips moved again.
Wait.
Ian's hand stopped.
The boy's palm pressed against the inside of the glass. In the blue liquid. From that palm, something rose.
Black smoke.
Not heat. Something cold. Something that looked like darkness itself. Frost formed on the glass surface. The liquid began to freeze.
Ian's pupils dilated. Barely.
An ability.
He was not the only completed form.
The other subjects had their own.
The boy's lips moved a third time.
Take us.
Behind Ian, the alarm wailed again.
Footsteps. Many. Not dozens. Hundreds. The entire facility was turning inside out. The Empire's main force was coming.
Ian's gaze moved between the tanks and the corridor.
The skewer in his left femur dug deeper.
Time to choose.
Ian's hand moved.
Toward the glass of the tank.