2025-04-18 10:49:09POV: Danny
The red shapes appear in my vision again.
Danger.
I blink to push them away, but it doesn't help.
Alyssa insists:
“Danny.”
The nervousness, the disjointed information, and that damn feeling of not knowing what's happening quickly turn into anger.
“It’s Commander to you,” I snapped.
Jun flinches, but Alyssa merely lifts her chin slightly, as if trying hard not to insult me right then and there.
“Very well. Commander,” she says my title with a slight tone of mockery, “what the hell is going on with this mission?”
I glance at the clock. I take a deep breath.
“Kovac sent me here not just because of my skills.”
“What do you mean by that?”
I feel my eyes burn with the tears that threaten to roll down my face.
“He came to my house. That’s when he gave me this.” I point to the watch.
...
TWO WEEKS BEFORE
I look at the object in my hand. It’s a simple, analog watch, and apparently quite worn. Kovac, sitting across from me on the couch, says nothing as I carefully inspect it.
Traces of red stains. A wrong tune, a sound off-key that seems to worsen when I move the watch.
The watch felt heavier in my hand than its size suggested. Kovac watched my fingers trembling as I held the object.
“Do you know what this means, Danny?” Kovac asked, his voice softer than I’d ever heard it.
I shook my head, unable to speak. The red stains danced around the watch, pulsing in sync with my quickening breath.
“Piotr would be your age now,” he continued, intertwining his fingers. “When I look at you... I see the same spark he had. The same determination.”
“Sir, I...” My voice faltered as the watch emitted a high-pitched sound, like a muffled scream.
Kovac leaned forward.
“The accident on Mars... It was, and still is, the worst thing that’s ever happened in my life. I still see him in my dreams. I still hear... his voice.”
Then I realize: 4:23. That was the time the watch stopped working.
“It was all that was left of him,” the Great Hero murmured.
With tears in my eyes, I continued to stare at the lifeless object. The most important man in the country was entrusting me with his most precious possession.
He would never betray me...
Right?
...
The lunar module seemed to shrink since the start of the meeting. The air carried a metallic scent I couldn't ignore.
Alyssa sat to my right, her fingers tapping a funeral march on the aluminum table. Raj, to my left, fidgeted incessantly with his datapad. Jun was breathing very fast, his eyes darting between us like a trapped animal.
“Let’s start with the collection protocol,” I said, opening the file on the central panel. “Helium-3 has characteristics that—”
“That no one bothered to explain properly,” Alyssa cut in, slamming her datapad on the table. “Danny, sorry, Commander... but we’ve been here for weeks collecting this material and only now you decide to talk about risks?”
Raj, despite the outburst he had earlier, seemed much more controlled than before.
“Let’s stay calm, okay? If the Commander is bringing this up now, there must be a reason.”
She glared at Raj as if he had insulted her, but said nothing.
Lena, who had been silently watching from the corner of the room, crossed her arms.
“Kovac gave us all the necessary protocols. If we follow—”
“Protocols?” Jun interrupted, his voice shrill. “You still don’t get it? The protocols are a lie!” His fingers gripped the table with white-knuckled force. “They knew! They’ve always known!”
Raj placed a cautious hand on Jun's arm.
“Doctor, maybe you want to—”
“Don’t you see?” Jun repeated, grabbing Raj's hand, standing up so abruptly that his chair fell with a crash. “It’s everywhere! In the air filters, in the samples, in our clothes! ‘The worms!’ They’re inside us now, consuming us from within!”
Alyssa recoiled in her chair.
“Worms? What the hell, Jun?”
“The ones that glow! The ones that sing!” Jun clutched his head, his fingers digging into his hair. “They enter through your eyes, your ears... make tiny holes in your mind until—”
Lena moved like lightning. Before any of us could react, she had Jun pinned against the wall, a syringe pressed to his neck.
“Lena!” I rose from my chair, but it was too late.
The hiss of the syringe echoed through the room. Jun struggled for half a second before his eyes rolled back and his body collapsed into Lena’s arms.
“What was that?” Alyssa shouted, getting up so quickly she knocked over her chair. “What the hell did you do to him?”
“Modified Propofol,” Lena replied calmly, gently lowering Jun’s body to the floor with professional care. “Standard for psychotic episodes in confined spaces.”
Raj was examining Jun with a mixture of concern and fear.
“He’s one of the calmest men I know. I’ve never seen him like this. Never.”
“Stress hallucinations,” Lena responded quickly, cleaning the syringe with a cloth. “Prolonged isolation, lunar radiation... Kovac warned this could happen.”
I watched Lena as she spoke. There was something about the way her eyes avoided mine, the way her fingers trembled slightly as she put the syringe away.
“Kovac trained you for this?” I asked, making sure to keep my voice neutral.
Lena finally looked me in the eye.
“Kovac trained me for all eventualities. Like he should’ve done with all of us.”
Alyssa made a sound somewhere between a laugh and a grunt.
“So we had to be prepared for THIS? Don’t tell me this is normal and happens all the time, Lena.”
“He’s doing the best he can! Do you think anyone else cares about humanity like he does? About the peace he’s trying to bring?”
“Peace? Well, if the price we have to pay is this, then he can shove his peace right up—”
“Enough.” I raised my voice. Everyone turned to me. “Jun needs to be taken to the infirmary. Raj, you take care of that. Alyssa, check the air filtration systems. Lena...” I glared at her. “You come with me to the lab. I want to see those samples myself.”
“And Jun?” Raj asked, already kneeling next to the unconscious scientist.
“He’ll join us when he’s properly recovered.” I turned to the door, trying to ignore how the red stains now covered nearly all of my peripheral vision. “If he recovers.”
As I left the room, I felt something warm dripping from my nose.
Shit. Another nosebleed, and this time I wouldn’t be able to hide it in time.
My vision blurred, the red stains multiplying so much I was practically blind.
“Commander?” Raj’s voice seemed to come from another world.
I tried to respond, but instead of words, I spat a spray of blood that splattered onto the metallic floor. My legs gave out before I could shout a warning.
The last thing I heard was the ticking of the watch.
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Chapter 32
POV: DannyI woke up with the taste of metal and static in my mouth.The ceiling above me pulsed in shades of blue and violet, the fluorescent lights leaving ghostly trails every time I blinked. My body felt heavy as lead, but my mind... my mind was clearer than ever.The voices that used to echo in my head had quieted to a constant whisper, like a radio tuned between stations."You're more stable today."Sofia was sitting in a chair beside my bed, watching me with those calculating eyes that seemed to see straight through flesh and bone. She held a steaming cup of coffee that smelled like old fuel and reheated grounds."Stable isn’t the word I’d use," I replied, trying to sit up. My muscles protested but obeyed; an improvement compared to the paralysis from before. "How many days this time?""Three." She took a sip of the awful coffee without flinching. "You had a violent seizure after the injection. Technically, you should have died."I looked at my arms. The blue veins now formed i
Chapter 31
POV: DannyConsciousness returned like a tsunami of pain. Every nerve, every muscle, every cell in my body screamed in agony.My lungs burned as if they’d been filled with liquid nitrogen, my veins throbbed with sharp pulses of pain radiating from the places where Helium-3 had crystallized beneath my skin.I opened my eyes slowly, my eyelids as heavy as steel doors, and was met by a low ceiling of rusted metal groaning under the pressure of the complex."He's coming to."The voice was rough, tired, but unmistakably Sofia’s.I turned my head, a movement that demanded all my strength, and saw her sitting on a makeshift chair next to my cot, her face marked by weeks of deprivation and stress."You're damn lucky, kid.""How... long?" My voice came out as a raspy whisper.Sofia leaned forward, her elbows resting on her knees."Three days, almost four. You were in a coma induced by your reaction to AZ-7."She grabbed a water bottle and held it to my lips. The cool liquid slid down my throat
Chapter 30
POV: KovacThe bluish light of the preservation chamber hit me like a blow when the doors slid open for me.I didn’t hear Minerva’s welcome signals. Only silence.I had to steady a tremor in my hands as I crossed the threshold, each step echoing on the metallic floor like a hammer striking my coffin.The air was cold, cold as the space between stars. Cold as Piotr’s body when all the tests failed; when I saw that despite the blood in his eyes, he was irredeemably human. And weak.Lena was there.Dead. Lying on the surgical steel table, her hands crossed over her chest like in prayer.Someone had prepared her: combed her hair, closed her eyes, dressed her in a white linen gown that seemed to absorb the chamber’s bluish light. Her skin, despite the makeup, still showed signs of damage: bluish, thick veins that would’ve turned her into crystal if she’d survived a little longer.She looked asleep. Slowly, I touched her petrified face. There was no softness left in her cheek. No vitality l
Chapter 29
POV: LenaThe images wouldn't stop flashing through the sanctuary of my forced unconsciousness.Doctors surrounding me.Kovac, a strange mix of fascinated, horrified, and calculating all at once.My belly thrashing wildly, blue veins bulging as I pushed harder and harder, ready to bring my child into the world.Adrian’s face, his rosy cheeks and delicate features; he looked like me, not his father.And then... my baby being taken from me. Kovac’s dismissal. The discard.. . .The first thought that struck me when I regained consciousness was that I was submerged.Cold liquid filled my lungs, but somehow I was breathing: each inhale brought a stream of bluish fluid that burned like vodka on an open wound.I tried to scream, but my mouth was sealed by a metal mask. My arms and legs were restrained by titanium straps, bound to a slanted table inside a transparent chamber."Good morning, Agent Carter."The voice came from everywhere at once, smooth and mechanical. Minerva."You are in a s
Chapter 28
POV: LenaThe music.It came and went like waves on a beach. It was as if I were outside myself, connected to the cosmos, the Earth, and my own soul all at once, yet unable to anchor to any single point.And then...My knees hit the cold metal of the hallway floor as another contraction bent me in half. The scream that tore from my throat echoed against the empty walls, mingling with the distant sounds of alarms and explosions.“Fuck... fuck... fuck!”My nails scraped the floor as I tried to drag myself forward. The scent of my own blood, mixed with the bluish amniotic fluid gushing between my legs, filled my nostrils. Every movement was a stab to my womb, but I had to reach them.Danny. Sofia. The traitors.The image of the Helium-3 launcher slipping from my hands still burned in my mind. I had them. I HAD THEM! And that bastard Danny with his sad, abandoned-dog eyes...How had that bitch infiltrated the complex? How had she gotten in so cleanly? Our security system had never failed.
Chapter 27
POV: DannyThe narrow air duct pressed against my chest with every movement, the rusty metal creaking under our weight.I could hardly believe what was happening. This wasn’t an escape, it was a mega operation. Orchestrated and executed by none other than Sofia Reyes, the person Alyssa had told me about before she gave up on life.If she were alive, how would she react to seeing her? Would her usually pessimistic attitude change drastically upon seeing her savior?“Fifty more meters,” Sofia whispered ahead, her tactical flashlight illuminating fragments of the path.The light revealed strange marks on the duct walls: deep scratches, dark stains that looked like acid burns, and in some places... fingerprints fused into the metal.Galek, the rebel with burns, growled behind me:“If the thermal sensors catch us—”“We already discussed this in our training,” Sofia interrupted, voice harsh. “We die horribly. Sad scene, dramatic music. Not gonna happen. So keep a cool head, okay?”She hande
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