Red Mist Jakarta: Second Chance

The Uninvited Guests

"Holy mother of—" Ageng choked, his hands gripping the window frame. "Did that guy just fly?"

"I told you, they’re jumpers!" Wawan yelled, pointing a finger at the glass. "And he just ruined that helicopter's tail rotor!"

Outside, the massive jumper collided with the black helicopter with a sickening, metallic screech. The aircraft shuddered, its tail rotor spinning wildly into pieces before the engine roared in protest.

"Budi! Budi, please!" Adiwangsa’s voice shrieked through the radio static, competing with the howling wind. "We’re going down! Open the roof gate!"

"Wawan, grab your mother and get behind the concrete pillar," Budi commanded, his voice ice-cold. "Ageng, safety off. If anything else crawls over that roof ledge, you shoot."

"Shoot? Shoot with what, a pipe?!" Ageng yelled, his voice cracking as he looked at the metal rod in his hands.

"Take this," Budi said, tossing him a spare G2 pistol. "Just point and pull. Don’t shoot your own foot."

"Oh my god, a gun! Ageng, don't touch it, you'll put an eye out!" Tuti screamed, waving her massive Tupperware container of rendang like a shield.

"Tuti, people are jumping fifty stories! A gun is literally my best friend right now!" Ageng roared back, fumbling with the pistol.

The helicopter slammed onto the reinforced helipad above, the impact vibrating through the penthouse ceiling. A loud, scraping grind of metal echoed, followed by the hiss of escaping steam.

"Is it dead?" Tuti whispered, ducking.

"No, but their pride is," Budi said, checking his wrist monitor. The rooftop camera showed the smoking wreck of the helicopter. The cockpit doors popped open. "Look at that. The elite of Jakarta, scrambling like rats in a flooded sewer."

"Wait, is that the guy who tried to poison you?" Ageng asked, squinting at the monitor. "He looks... really sweaty. And sticky."

"That’s him," Budi muttered. "Mr. Adiwangsa himself. And he brought company."

On the screen, Adiwangsa was dragging a middle-aged woman in a ruined Chanel dress out of the cabin. Behind them stepped a young woman with sharp, pale features and jet-black hair, moving with an eerie, detached grace despite the chaos.

"Who’s the girl?" Wawan asked. "She looks like an anime boss."

"Maya," Budi said, his jaw tightening. "Adiwangsa’s daughter. The golden child."

Budi walked over to the reinforced airlock door leading to the roof. The heavy glass viewport showed the trio banging on the steel plating, their faces pale with terror.

"Budi! Open this damn door!" Adiwangsa roared through the intercom, his expensive suit covered in soot. "There are more of those things climbing the fire escape! They’re coming up!"

Budi pressed the talk button, a smug grin playing on his lips. "Why should I, Adiwangsa? Last time we talked, you were trying to feed me pesticides."

"I'll give you whatever you want! Money, gold, land! My offshore accounts!"

"Money is useless now, you old fool," Budi chuckled. "The banks went dark ten minutes ago. Your billion rupiah is just numbers on a dead server."

"Please!" Adiwangsa’s wife, Sofia, sobbed, her manicured nails scratching at the glass. "They’re coming! I can hear them!"

Budi glanced at his thermal scanner. "Hold on. Let’s do a quick scan. I don't want any unwanted passengers."

The red laser swept over the three of them.

"Wait, look at your bodyguard," Budi said, pointing to a muscular man who had just staggered out of the helicopter cockpit, clutching his shoulder. "He’s got a nice little bite mark on his neck."

"It's just a scratch!" the bodyguard yelled, his eyes already turning bloodshot as he banged on the glass. "Let me in! I can still fight!"

"Yeah, and I can fly," Budi retorted. "No chance. Ageng, prep the airlock manual override. If they try to force it, we vent the carbon dioxide."

"Budi, you monster!" Adiwangsa screamed. "He saved our lives!"

"And now he’s about to eat your face," Budi said flatly. "Watch."

The bodyguard’s body suddenly convulsed. He dropped to his knees, his spine snapping backward with a loud, sickening crack. His eyes rolled back, leaving only a milky, predatory white. He turned on Adiwangsa, his mouth snapping open with a wet, clicking sound.

"Oh god! Shoot him! Budi, shoot him!" Adiwangsa shrieked, dragging his wife behind him.

Before Budi could even raise his rifle, Maya stepped forward. With a swift, chillingly precise movement, she grabbed a heavy metal fire extinguisher from the helicopter's side bracket and slammed it directly into the bodyguard's temple. The force of the blow knocked the mutating man off the edge of the helipad, sending him plummeting fifty-two stories into the red mist below.

"Wow," Wawan whispered from behind Budi. "She definitely plays Ranked."

"That was... surprisingly efficient," Budi said, his eyebrows raised.

Maya wiped a speck of blood from her cheek, her face completely expressionless. She walked up to the glass viewport and stared directly into the camera.

"Let us in, Budi," Maya said, her voice calm, devoid of the panic that consumed her parents. "The bodyguard is gone. We are clean. And I have something you actually need."

Budi hissed. "And what makes you think I need anything from the Adiwangsa family?"

"Because you didn't just survive," Maya said, her voice projecting clearly through the intercom. "You prepared. You knew this was coming. You bought this penthouse, reinforced it, and stocked it before the first case was even reported. Am I right?"

"She’s smart," Tuti murmured, chewing on a piece of dried beef. "A bit too pale, but smart."

"Shut up, Tuti," Ageng whispered.

"I’m a good planner, Maya," Budi said. "That doesn't mean I need to share my snacks with your family."

"You have the physical security, Budi. But you don’t have the science," Maya countered. She tapped a small, heavily encrypted silver flash drive she held in her hand. "My father’s company wasn't just shipping illegal weapons. We were funding the research. The biological catalyst in the Red Mist? We have the genetic sequence. And we have the clinical trial data for the suppression therapy."

Budi's heart skipped a beat. In his past life, the Red Mist had been an absolute mystery. Nobody knew its origin, and nobody knew how to resist it. If Maya actually had the genetic data...

"She’s bluffing," Budi said, though his mind was racing. "Your father is a crook, Maya. He doesn't do science; he does bribes."

"He didn't do it. I did," Maya said. "I ran the project. Why do you think I'm still alive?"

"Budi, please!" Adiwangsa begged, looking back at the roof edge. A low, rhythmic scratching sound was creeping up the concrete walls. "They’re climbing! They’re hopping up the balconies! Let us in!"

"Fine," Budi grumbled, punching a code into the keypad. "Airlock only. You step in, the door locks behind you. If the bio-scanner flashes red on any of you, I'll personally put a bullet through your skull. Clear?"

"Clear," Maya said.

The heavy steel door hissed open, allowing the three of them to scramble into the narrow, sterile airlock. The door slammed shut behind them, sealing with a heavy, pressurized hiss.

The red laser swept over them again. Green. Green. Green.

"Alright," Budi said, opening the inner door. "Welcome to the end of the world. Take off your jackets. If I see a single drop of blood that isn't yours, you go over the balcony."

Adiwangsa collapsed onto the concrete floor, gasping for air, his hands shaking violently. "We... we made it. Oh my god, Sofia, we’re alive."

"Don't get comfortable, Adiwangsa," Budi said, keeping his rifle pointed at the older man's chest. "You’re guests here, which means you’re at the bottom of the food chain. You eat when I tell you, you sleep where I tell you, and if you touch my monitors, I'll throw you to the jumpers."

"You... you insolent little cockroach!" Adiwangsa snarled, his old arrogance briefly flaring. "Do you know who I am? I made you!"

"And I paid you a billion rupiah to unmake me," Budi smiled coldly, stepping closer. "Right now, your name is worth exactly zero. You want to survive? You shut up and do what you’re told."

"He’s right, Hari," Sofia whimpered, clutching his arm. "Just... do what he says."

Maya, meanwhile, was looking around the penthouse, her eyes scanning the reinforced shutters, the humming HEPA filters, and the massive weapon crates.

"Impressive," she said, her voice smooth. "You really did build a fortress. But you're missing the most important part."

"And what’s that?" Budi asked, crossing his arms.

"A doctor," Maya said, looking directly at him. She slid her sleeve up, revealing a small, medical port embedded in her forearm. The skin around it was slightly discolored, with faint, glowing blue veins tracing up her bicep. "Or, more specifically, a test subject."

"What the hell is that?" Ageng gasped, taking a step back. "Is she infected?"

"No," Maya said. "I’m the reason the virus works. And I’m the only one who can stop it from killing you."

Budi stared at her arm, his mind cataloging his memories from the future. In his past life, there had been rumors of a "Synthesized Host" that the elites were desperately searching for before the final fallback zones collapsed.

"Explain," Budi demanded, his tone dropping all hint of mockery.

"I have a congenital cellular degeneration," Maya said, her expression unchanging, as if she were reading a weather report. "My father’s scientists used a precursor of the Red Mist's biological catalyst to keep my nervous system from collapsing. I’ve been living with a modified version of the strain for three years."

"Wait, so you're... a jumper?" Wawan asked, his eyes wide. "Can you do the double jump?"

"No," Maya replied, a tiny, amused smirk playing on her lips. "But my blood contains the antibodies that prevent the virus from over-stimulating the muscular system. Without it, anyone who inhales the Red Mist eventually burns out their own heart within forty-eight hours."

Budi's eyes narrowed. "And why are you telling me this now?"

"Because my father doesn't have the data. He thinks we’re just going to a military bunker in Bandung," Maya said, casting a cold glance at Adiwangsa, who looked suddenly sheepish. "But the military bunkers will fall by tomorrow. I need a place with high-grade filtration, independent power, and someone who actually knows how to survive the collapse. You have all of that, Budi."

She stepped closer to him, the faint scent of sterile alcohol and lavender drifting off her. She held out the silver flash drive.

"I propose a pact," she whispered, her eyes locking onto his. "You keep me alive, and I give you the key to surviving the Red Mist. But there's a catch."

Budi felt a chill run down his spine. "What catch?"

"The suppression therapy in my blood... it's unstable," Maya said, her voice dropping to a whisper that only Budi could hear. "And if we don't synthesize the next batch within seventy-two hours, I don't just die. I become the first mutated strain. And trust me, Budi... you won't be able to lock me out."

Outside, a massive, guttural roar echoed from the streets below, followed by the sound of something heavy slamming against the penthouse's reinforced outer shutters with the force of a wrecking ball.

Budi looked at the flash drive, then at the beautiful, deadly daughter of his worst enemy. The clock was ticking, and the game had just gotten a whole lot more complicated.