The Breach

The sparks from the plasma torches hit the reinforced glass of the Clean-Room door. They had mere seconds.

Aris didn't hesitate. They pressed the heavy pneumatic nozzle of the syringe directly against the center of Kaelen’s chest, right over his heart, and pulled the trigger.

The mechanism hissed, violently injecting the glowing silver serum straight into the Prince’s myocardium.

Kaelen’s entire body arched off the steel table with terrifying force. A choked, guttural gasp tore from his throat. The veins in his neck, previously gray and hardened, suddenly illuminated with a blinding, pure silver light. The luminescence spiderwebbed across his chest, fighting a visible, violent war against the dark necrosis of The Rust beneath his skin.

He fell back onto the table. His eyes rolled wide open, staring blindly at the ceiling. The silver light flared brilliantly for one long, agonizing second.

And then, he fell completely, terrifyingly still. No convulsions. No wheezing breath. Just absolute silence.

Before Aris could check for a pulse, the pressurized doors of the Clean-Room blew off their hinges in a deafening concussive blast of smoke and shattered glass.

Aris stumbled backward, dropping the empty pneumatic syringe. It clattered loudly against the blood-stained linoleum.

Through the thick, acrid smoke of the breached doorway, a dozen heavily armored corporate extraction operatives poured into the tiny room. They moved with lethal, synchronized precision, assault rifles raised and locked.

Aris slowly raised their hands into the air, the harsh crimson emergency lights strobing across their face.

Half a dozen red laser sights cut through the smoke, converging directly on the center of Aris's chest. On the steel table beside them, the Prince lay motionless, the silver glow in his veins slowly fading into an indeterminate, muted hue.

The commander of the extraction team stepped forward, his rifle aimed squarely at Aris’s head, his finger tightening on the trigger.

The sirens wailed. The neon flickered. And the world held its breath.