A child was conceived under the influence of herion.
Her unknown birth parents were as high as a bird.
Ironic, isn't it?
What other choice did they have?
They had no money for a child,
much less wanted one in the first place?
Those two looked into every possibility to make some quick cash off of this "miracle" they have created, finding it worth something at the least.
At last, they found their answer in the form of a door to door salesman. For a company called: ITEX.
He was let in with the promise of making the two a fortune off of the misfortunate situation they were in at that moment.
He explained that in exchange for the unborn child, he would grant the parents an easy ten thousand dollars for their troubles.
Of course, they accepted, not really caring what happened to the baby after its birth in a few months.
November 24, 199x
2:42 AM
Hours of meaningless and loveless labor for this child. In the company's hospital bed, ready to steal it away when it emerged.
A beautiful baby girl.
As promised, the couple were given their ten thousand dollars for their time and were sent free after the woman finished her part.
Little is known what happened to these two. Some say, they left NYC, and fled to Alantic City where they overdosed a month or two after the exchange.
As for the child....
So began her life of nothing but torment.
The program she was handed over to was called the By-Half Plan. In short, Doctors and Scientists wanted to play God with a human, and turn them into an immortal being.
The plan was to create the world's first and only manmade Angel, able to travel between realms and speak with the Deities themselves about the upcoming Apocolypse, as forseen by the Biblical texts. Humankind aimed to save their own skin, at the loss of one of their own.
Selfish
The first done to this baby was place her in this cage, like a feral dog. It was almost an ordinary dog crate, except with very hefty locks on the outside, to prevent her from escaping.
At a week old, the experiments began. Very small ones. Simple pricks of needles, injecting chemicals into her fresh, untouched veins, attempting for her to grow a tolerance to them for the future. They wanted her to adapt.
Week two, ITEX had their first flatline for Subject 00. Brought back after twenty minutes of desperation to not have to start over, since they only had a certain amount of time and budget.
When her brunette hair started to grow out a month in, ITEX employees realized something. They got to shape an Angel. Whatever they wanted her to look like, it was their choice.
A poll.
One needle to the skull, her locks would change in color permanently.
Black.
Another change. Her eyes. One needle to each eye, sinking right into the soft tissues, injecting the most stunning blue pigment they could get their hands on.
As she increased in age, so did the experiments.
At the ripe old age of six, a major procedure needed to be done.
Ripped away from the cage she grew up in, Subject 00 screamed bloody murder. It took minutes to strap her to a cold metal table, leather digging into her pale flesh, constricting any movement. A strange, large machine was brought over the child. Of course, she never knew what was happening at the time.
With her arms extended and strapped down, veins were perfectly bulging from the skin, easy to detect.
Two thick medical IVs were stuck into her veins, causing the child to continue to scream. Attached to the strange machine, the Subject was ready.
Moving to the sides of the table, one Doctor flipped a few switches, causing this pinkish liquid to slowly trail through the plastic tubing and into the little girl.
IT WAS LIKE FIRE.
The girl cried, begged, squealed, screeched, shrieked.
Until there wasn't anything coming from her lungs anymore.
She laid there, motionless, but concious.
The pain ran throughout her body.
-/-
It finished after an hour.
What the child did not realize was she had small percentages of animal DNA flowing through her bloodstream, shaping the cells she already had.
Speed:
Cheetah
0.5%
Strength:
Elephant
0.5%
Flight:
Raven
2.0%
After this major procedure, it was nothing but training her mind, her body, and her loyalty.
Like before, she was barely fed, only given supplements to keep her alive. She was starved more often to test her, if she would bite the hand that fed her.
She would be forced to run on treadmills for days at a time, stamina and speed checks; to lift up to sixty tons at a time, strength and endurance checks; to injest the knowledge of every language and be able to speak it, however never taught to read or write.
It would only be a few weeks until those black wings would tear, rip and burst through the skin on her back, meaning she would have to learn to fly, like a baby bird forced from its nest.
She was fifteen.
At the age of sixteen, she had her chance.
The scientists had put her kennel on wheels and pulled her along towards another laboratory. It was loose, the bars.
Subject 00 had only seconds for this plan to work.
C R E A K !
The young lady was able to bend the metal bars far enough for her naked, thin, and yet thick frame to fit through. Using the speed that the Doctors and Scientists gave her, she bolted as fast as she could to the nearest window.
C R A A A S H !
She was finally free.
For the first time in her life, she smelled the fresh air, saw the nature growing and roaming around her, felt the grass on her bare feet. She was...entranced, yet strangely terrified.
That quickly changed with the danger behind her.
Spreading that twenty foot wing-span, she's off.
-/-
Subject 00 glided into the city that night.
NYC, the city that never sleeps.
She was cold, naked, hungry.
Desperate.
Taking the first chance to land, she slid into an alleyway behind a fast food chain.
The smell from behind the dumpster nearby was so off-putting but incredibly enticing since she was hungry.
Ignoring any morals (as if she had any) she dove in the trash and fished out enough stale bread and fries to fill her for the night.
At least, before she vomitted most of it up later from the conditioning her stomach had been put through.
Subject 00 quickly adapted to eating after the second time throwing everything up.
Sitting there, the lady gazed around at her surroundings.
Everything seemed so lively for it being this dark outside. She didn't understand anything around her.
Seeing a billboard above her head, the lady took herself up to stand at the ledge, looking at the letters in front of her.
She couldn't read it, however.
It was for a Gentleman's Club.
But...she stared at the name of the man who ran it.
Ryan.
The name seemed to stick...
And in that moment, it was hers.
-/-
Moving forward a few years of struggling for shelter, spending nights in strange men's beds for cash, fishing through dumpsters for scraps of food or clothing...
Ryan has learned what it is like on the outside.
Well, not entirely.
Some things still aren't branded in her memory.
Ryan managed to find a job without any background check! One where she wouldn't need to learn to read or write.
She became a stripper at a local joint called The Devil's Angels.
As far as the owner is concerned, she is another broken woman from a shitty alcoholic father who couldn't keep his hands to himself.
With her thick, voluptuous frame, long ebony curls, shining oceanic colored eyes, pale fair skin, he couldn't have asked for a more beautiful woman to work for him.
You would think they would question the giant wings on her back, right?
No.
Everyone who comes in sees the wings as a prop from how drunk or high they are. No one questions if they are real.
Perfect for Ryan.
Not everything is all rainbows and sunshine however....
The nightmares of her growing environment still plague her mind every night when she closes her artificial eyes.
The stabbing,
pokes,
jabs,
cuts,
blood,
smells,
everything.
Moving on from this is going to be a very difficult task for the Little Bird.
With ITEX still searching for their lost subject, to the struggle to feed and clothe herself every day and night.
But in the end...
She's ready as she's ever going to be.
-/-
Subject 00's Official Doctorial Checksheet:
Physical abilities:
- Training has allowed Subject 00 the ability to lift up to 60 tons with enough rage.
- Speed is a key factor for the Subject. Last clock in: 102 MPH.
- Can be increased with enough outer stimuli.
- Flight is critical for Subject.
- Height is not a factor, only air quality and pressure.
- Atmosphere flight: still not possible.
- Healing factor is still a progress.
- Subject 00 can heal others, but not itself.
- Takes on others injuries on its body.
Mental Abilities:
- Subject is able to analyze minds of anyone it has come across, even the most reluctant to let it.
- Excellent memory tests
- Able to recall every previous lesson at the snap of fingers.
- Language tests are successful.
- Every language can be translated by sense of hearing, including creature.
Spiritual Abilities:
- Black, smoke-like wisps work as intended. Choke whatever living being they touch if inhaled. Can also take the shape of any animal it chooses.
- Subject seems to have an attraction towards animals, and they seem to attract back.
- "Mother Nature" aspect.
Others "aspects" noteable for Subject 00:
- Likes to collect shiny items, such as paper clips.
- Could be a factor of the Raven DNA
- Able to use anything to its well being.
- Turned metal fragment into knife by strength
- Seems to like the colors blue, black and white.
- Ironic.
- Does not like meat.
- Will eat if starved beyond recognition
- Prefers plants and plant by-products
- Animal by-products such as milk seem to rest well with it
- Terrified of thunderstorms
- Due to fact of living conditions throughout life
- Alone in labortories
- Due to fact of living conditions throughout life
Overall, Subject 00 still in need of work. Some failed tests can be redone next session.
ITEX Head Researcher
By-Half Experiment
-/-
Friends? What are those?
Jason Kei Hale...is an interesting person that Ryan has associated with in her earlier years. With some romantic tension between them somewhat gone after a difficult split and two years of distance, they meet again in Vegas by chance. Now, they are again grouped together with a mission they never finished: take down the organization that created Ryan. Both equiped with different skills and abilities, they set out to stop the organization from creating new threats to destroy humankind.
Current status: "Answer the fucking phone, Jason..."
Rules of RP:
- FC: Lily Collins
- At least a paragraph for a response.
- 18+ activity is here. Writer is 23. No one under the age of 18, please.
- I love to Roleplay a ton of different ways. Please, don't be afraid to ask for another setting if the current doesn't tickle your fancy.
- Have fun! That's what we are here for, right?
Comments
The sheer speed of the avian’s escape route through the corridors had the young girl’s face buried into the woman’s chest. Never had she moved so quick, so fast, besides the yanking of arms to hurry through the space she had known for who-knows-how long. The stuffed puppy was clutched onto with curled fingers that refused to let it go. At least, unlike the demon wherever he was, the young girl had the choice not to leave her friend behind.
A cough escaped her chest on occasion when she gasped a sharp inhale at the sudden twists and turns, coupled with the blaring alarms that grew louder as they passed by the speaker units. As the next door was crashed through, the young girl gave an audible squeak of terror to prove her vocal cords worked before the sudden silence took them over and served as a screeching halt to the chaos.
-/-
The tight grip of the girl’s fingers showed a tremble after holding it for so long. Her eyes were shut tight until the quiet of the room set in and the sudden movements stopped. Her eyes opened slowly. The right was a warm brown, the other a blue that mimicked Ryan’s hue. She was frozen in space for a moment until she worked up the security to look around. Her gaze met Ryan’s own like the bloodied, foreign, feathered woman was unlike anything she had seen. Even in the hellhole they had somehow climbed out of.
There was a flinch and a small squeak of surprise when the dampened towel touched the young girl’s face. After admitting defeat and clearing her lungs from another series of coughs, she stayed still for the treatment besides a series of blinks and a tighter grip put around the puppy’s head. Bright eyes blinked back at Ryan when she was placed on the stool. They seemed to threaten tears on their brims, even if it was only from the shock of it all.
No symbols. No bracelet, barcode, or even a bump beneath her skin to signify where something might have been placed. The child’s forearms where the veins were exposed said differently. The scarring was ever present on her fair skin as small raised bumps, where needles had inevitably met it. When glanced over she seemed to pull the puppy closer to her body once more; the stuffing inside showed signs of a groove where her arms most commonly clutched it. Slowly but surely her hands loosened when Ryan requested it of her.
Do you have a name?
The young girl blinked toward Ryan. Once, twice, several times before her rosy lips pursed.
-/-
Physically, it was a light tingle to Ryan’s temple just as soon as the young girl’s aura entered her mind. Mentally? It was like a jolt of energy. It flashed through the avian’s thoughts in an instant, just as quickly as the sirens had stopped. There were streaks of white and sudden sounds of machines, carts rolling, doors slamming. The voices they had heard in the laboratory faded in and out as well. There were the lingering thoughts of cold air, sharp pains, and the softness of a texture under Ryan’s fingertips…
Just as soon as the vision came, it was gone. The sensations had compacted themselves into a single second, or so it seemed.
The hiss of the vents overhead alone had made hearing difficult for the demon’s sharp ears, which buckled to the static interference of it all. With the haze of the room setting in heavier and heavier he knew that even his mask of a curse couldn’t protect his lungs from whatever concoction was settling in around them. Within the missile silo, it seemed the creatures left penned up in the dark and decrepit place had received the worst of what was to come for the rest of them.
He was left with an ultimatum that he knew better than to ignore. No matter what the decisions the Hunters had made, the air was becoming too thick with chemicals for full sight of their position in the underground lab.
The Bird had her own worries for the moment, or so it seemed. The little girl had appeared just as suddenly as the mist itself. She gave a small tug as if to help the avian up off the ground with what strength she could muster, her hand disappearing in Ryan’s once it was taken. Those digits were oddly cool to the touch compared to the other. She stood silent in contrast while her wide doe-eyes peered up at Ryan with a sense of timid wonder that could have felt like a mirror… minus the ache the older ‘experiment’ felt from it all.
The alarms blaring were no regular occurrence but seemed to be the least of the child’s concerns compared to the strangers that had appeared ever-so-sudden in the once quiet lab. The little girl’s chin shot up when Ryan stood with an urgency. She would have stepped back if not for the woman’s hand that curled around hers instinctively, freezing the young girl where she stood. “...”
When suddenly hoisted off her feet, the eight-year-old let out a squeak in her arms that was cut short when a hand came to rest on the back of her head. Her face buried into the fabric where a series of coughs was felt in Ryan’s shoulder. They were running out of time, weren’t they?
The young girl felt the room spin when Ryan spun into action, picking her route upwards and letting loose a crash of glass that made the child whimper amidst the sporadic coughs she let loose. The second floor was in a deeper haze than the one below, even. No matter how much the avian’s wings forced the air to move around them, the room was growing thicker and thicker.
Even Ryan herself was bound to feel lightheaded, muscles weakening.
What of the cat? What of Rosa? The shrieks in the silo had lessened in intensity, indicating that there wasn’t much time before the noxious cloud taking over the air would swallow them as well.
The little girl’s coughing had turned into a pattern that was near-suffocating. With an audible whimper, her arms wrapped themselves tightly around Ryan’s frames, fingers curling themselves into her clothes and skin before–
Silence.
It was deathly silent. In a blink, the sirens had vanished.
The air was clear–if either were brave enough to take a breath.
The girl was still clutching Ryan with a death grip, her thin frame trembling.
The flashing lights had been replaced with a warm morning glow, illuminating the features of an all-too-familiar place.
They were back in the hotel suite. The sun had seemingly just started to rise on the horizon, despite what felt like an eternity under ground. The blood on their clothes and the feathers that dispersed on the floor proved that Ryan certainly couldn’t be dreaming…
So where were Jason and Rosalie?
With one look at the creature, against his better judgment when entering the bunker, the Hunter willed the curse forth. Blue hues that were once mortified at what he was looking at disappeared behind the shroud of black eye sockets. Kei’s ears pinned back to his skull promptly at the sound the wolfish creature let out. He could feel the trembling through Ryan’s skin from the cattle prod’s strike… was she up for that?
It didn’t matter, they were out of options and time before their problem grew any larger. “Be careful,” Kei hissed under his breath, with as much urgency as he could muster in a whisper. The pistol was raised to his chest and cocked for the sign to move.
Matted, tattered ears quivered to the sounds behind it, but there was no stopping the werewolf from its long-awaited meal. Golden eyes suddenly snapped back when the blur of movement approached from its peripheral, turning its head to-
Smack.
The instant the two collided, Kei rose up from the ground and pulled the pistol up to eye level. Shit. As the two tumbled he adjusted his sight, struggling to find a window where a wall of feathers wasn’t visible behind the wolf’s body.
No time. When the avian was sent flying, Kei reluctantly darted from behind the table and took his shot. The pistol popped off several times as the bullets smashed into the wolf’s shoulder and ribs from one side, causing a wailing shriek from the wolf who thrashed but didn’t take its eyes off Ryan. The bird’s blood from the strike of its claws and the werewolf’s own wounds mixed in its fur as the beast kept on with its assault.
Bam. The next shot came from left field when Rosalie’s head popped up from the computer workbench, holding a handgun at arm’s length. This time the werewolf’s screams lit up the room as the bullet’s impact dispersed the silver shards it was designed with, sending the beast scrambling on the floor. The wolf’s trajectory changed suddenly as it eyed the being behind the computers, raising on its hind legs to-
“Hey! -Hey fucker, I’m right here!”
The mag in Kei’s pistol had been ripped out in place of another, held up as a last defense of the Huntress in the center of the room. The werewolf re-centered itself on the demon as a rippling snarl surged through its maw, laced with crimson saliva that dripped down its chin. The beast charged, and shortly after the firing of the gun filled the air. One last gurgled shriek escaped the wolf before it collapsed to the ground.
Rosalie’s head ducked down in defense and her eyes darted to the screen beside her when she saw the loading bar complete itself and disappear on the screen. She scrambled to pull the flash drive from its port, only to watch the screens flash red.
Hisssssss- The vents above sprung to life, and a hazy mist started to seep into the air throughout the compound. Down the lengthy hall, the beasts hidden in the silo seemed to sense it first as thrashing and shrieking echoed.
“We have to get out NOW! Jason, to the left, behind you! There’s a port hole exit that leads up to-”
“We can’t! We’re not going withou-”
Rosalie stood quickly, tucking away the thumb drive in her jacket. “Kei this is an order! Now! Move!”
-/-
Meanwhile…
Out of the haze that Ryan had been left in from the impact, the sounds in the room were just as foggy. She would, however, notice a small figure standing before her. The young girl couldn’t have been more than eight years old. Her long, golden hair fell in waves on her shoulders and was practically white against the laboratory atmosphere. Plain white clothes adorned her body all the same, minus some flecks of blood from the scene she had seemingly appeared into. A ragged stuffed animal was clutched tight in one hand, which appeared to be a dog. A pair of bright, heterochromatic eyes peered at Ryan full of fear like she had never seen anything like the carnage before. The right was brown, the left, blue. The child took one timid look around the room before her hand reached out a small hand toward Ryan's.
SLAM. The clock started to tick. The vaulted door ripped free and hurled across the once-sterile space, sending shards of metal and debris of furniture flying in its wake. The pristine interior of the lab was scarred with the shrieking metal that had been sent against pale tile floors, set to crush whatever was in its path.
Jason rushed into the room promptly after, as did Rosalie. The two hunters fanned out on either side of the space from where Ryan had made her grand entrance and chosen her first target to throw off of his feet and into the concrete he would clump against. The demon kept his weapon raised for backup once the second target was locked onto, closing an eye and shifting to an angle that separated the two figures as they faced off in the crowded space. The low buzz of the cattle prod reverberated in the demon’s ears just long enough to shout-
“Ryan stay back!-”
It was too late. He watched her silhouette shrink at the stab of electricity that coursed through her muscles and put a wicked grin of success on the scientist’s face. It was THE experiment, he thought! Not only would he be going home, but he would claim the reward and never have to return and work in that wretched underground slaughterhouse ever aga-
Pop. The single shot from the pistol echoed. The bullet met the man’s temple and embedded itself. Within the moment, the white-hot touch of the cattle prod ceased and it clattered to the tile floor below. The scientist’s final steps crumpled him to the ground alongside it and a similar pool of crimson started to seep through the grout and tile beneath him.
“It’s me! It’s me, it’s done…” Jason was sure to exclaim as he reached out for Ryan and took her arm, pulling her up and attempting to get her back on her feet. The mic that now only rang in his ear was ripped out and thrown onto the tile.
Meanwhile…
Rosalie’s eyes locked onto the woman who clattered to the floor. With a sprint to close the gap, she swung herself past the cart once full of procedural tools. Her boots kicked aside loose needles which flung out in all directions, careful not to slip in the sterilizing fluids that spilled out onto the floor.
“N-Noooo! No NO no No-” Before the scientist could think to fight, another squeal of terror left her chest and her arms threw themselves up instinctively, eyes wide open with terror at the visitor. The scientist scrambled backward and reached for one of the computer desks beside the test subject in the center of the room. The scientist got as far as to stand with the help of the desk, however, her eyes took themselves off Rosa just long enough for the Huntress to grab a fistful of hair to pull the woman back.
“I-I’m sorry! I’m sorr—don’tkillme please!” The woman broke into a sob.
“DOWN, Now!” The Huntress barked from a depth in her chest, which shook the woman to drop to her knees and throw her hands up, yelping at the poke of a sharp instrument that had been strewn on the tile below her. “I need into these computers, now! Now if you don’t tell me the passcodes I-”
“We’re all going to die! It doesn’t matter! I-It doesn’t matter, we-”
. . .
The primary computer screen started to flash red as one of the indicators on the screen rose higher and higher. Error sounds came from the speakers and screeched out of time from the cryo alarms that were still wailing. The numbers themselves glowed and flashed a dangerous crimson and a whirring sound came from the components beside the creature bound to the table…
“Rosa, what is that!?” Jason hollered once he assessed what was happening near the center of the room.
The Huntress flung the woman aside and let her scramble to the wall while she dialed in on the screen closely in disbelief. She scrambled to pull a small object from her pocket and plugged it into one of the available ports.
“Rosa!? What-”
“-We need to get out. We need to leave, but we need what is on these computers! I need you to buy me some time,”
“Buy time from what!?”
. . .
A low, ominous growl grew audible from the specimen on the table. The sound grew heavier until it suddenly erupted into an ear-aching roar. The steel shackles snapped like they were plastic as the beast suddenly thrashed, breaking free of the table and ripping IV lines in its wake. The specimen was a werewolf—perhaps once in its life. The beast now stood and tested its balance, letting out a guttural shriek once it got to its feet and thrashed its head to and fro for signs of a living meal. The creature’s muscle twitched and bulged painfully as it gathered its bearings, nose twitching in Rosa’s direction and then the other two…
The scientist that was remaining let out a scream that she could no longer hold in her chest.
The specimen’s ears gave only a twitch before it honed in on the sound. Suddenly, in a mad grotesque scramble, the creature charged and attacked. One last scream was heard before it cut off in a wet fashion and the tearing of flesh and splatter of blood replaced it.
Wolves, Jason thought, feeling an ache in his chest as he slowly let go of Ryan and took a crouch behind a piece of lab equipment. They had to hold that thing off before it found their comrade that was anxiously typing in codes on a black screen prompt at the main computer.
It was always fucking wolves.
Rosalie’s composure was only a testament to her work in the Hunter Society. Her specialty was forensics and autopsy; due to the nature of the vampire in the signage museum, it was fate that brought her into the depths with the two. It was the magnitude of the operation that startled her and left her with a thousand places to begin. Still, they needed to keep moving. If there were any human signs of life, they needed to be handled before making any more assessments. She drew in a deep breath once the coast was clear in the corridor, but the scent of cleaning supplies and other unmentionable scents of the past.
Jason’s attentive gaze went from one wall to the next, down to the grout in the tiles that showed signs of age over however long the facility had been there. When she spoke, he followed Ryan’s arm along as it went up to make the gesture. There was something haunted in his expression that showed he was following her. For brief moments at a time, his eyes flit to the drains on the floor. They could likely tell stories that he never wanted to hear, let alone what the walls would echo. He was careful not to tap against the tiles when he stepped forward little by little.
The coast was clear for the room. After one more sweep around, what was left was the next set of vault-like blast doors. Rosalie stepped forward after Ryan. Her hand placed itself along the cool metal but felt no sound nor vibrations on the other side. She cast a look to her. The gun was held steadily in her free hand. “I can’t hear anything, do you..?” She whispered. “Can you get us through? On three… we will cover you.”
-/-
On the other end of the wall, the three scientists hovered over their specimen with due diligence. The woman looked onward without distraction and held a tablet in her hand. The screen was lit up with charts yet to be fully filled with data. A third, taller man was studying the vitals on the screen and looking forward to going home to a family he hadn’t seen in months since he took over the shift. There were always excuses and covers. Reasons for the absences. Work had to be done, or so he told his wife who would never come to know. It was the last week before his shift change.
He stood beside the beastly man strapped onto the metal table. The figure had the features of a werewolf as if it were painfully mid-way through its’s shift. Its chest rose and fell as adrenaline was trickled slowly through its IV, alongside a second vial of liquid.
The grimace remained on Jason’s face while he thought about it. The visceral sounds mixed with the thoughts of how many, how long, and just what the hell had ever sparked a project so vile in the first place. Ryan’s answer did little to ease that besides confirmation that their mission in the underground had a purpose after all. With that purpose? They might have needed her. No one would know what they were looking at better, old demons or not. Blue hues didn’t lessen their stare any while she deliberated.
A deep inhale left his chest eventually after she nodded.
“Maybe not,” Jason murmured, given a few seconds of thought while he listened to the cries and screeches die down slowly but surely when they were out of view. He wouldn’t glance back. His expression hardened. “But what can’t be saved still needs to be stopped, one way or another. There’s a nightmare going on down here that needs to end. Tonight.”
“-That would create quite a bit of noise,” Rosalie finally spoke up, prying her own gaze away from the opening and walking tentatively toward the other two. Her arms were folded, hands grasping her biceps as well. “Even if there are answers below… there are several layers to the rest of this facility. We need to know who we are dealing with before we do anything hasty. Furthermore,” Rosa looked toward Ryan directly. “If anything happened down there, we wouldn’t be able to reach you. Not quickly enough.”
“You’ve looked at the plans for this place longer than either of us. Just where are we headed?” Jason commented.
“Downstairs,” Rosa responded hastily. A sense of urgency had traded places with the gentle demeanor in the hotel. “We go down two more floors. There will be a junction in the room to follow. This facility is littered with blast doors designed to withstand launches from the silo. With luck they will be open, if not…”
“-If not we’ll deal with it. Which way?”
“Down,” Rosalie slid past both of them and walked toward the silo exit. The staircase greeted them once more. Ice blues swept across the ceilings on occasion, eyeing the corners and crevices for cameras or any other form of surveillance. There were none. So deep in the desert, maybe they had gone undetected for long enough to ignore intruders. Maybe they weren’t far enough in.
-/-
The end of the stairway brought them to a lower level. The heavy steel door waiting at the end of the room was cracked open, its oxidized hinges likely rusted still from dis-use. Rosalie paused her lead to tuck against the wall, peeking into the space while her hand gripped a pistol on her belt. Jason did similarly. She looked back at them both and gave the other Hunter a series of hand signals. Three. Two. One. Go.
Rosalie stepped partway into the threshold and looked around the room abruptly. Jason was on her heels and ready with the hammer clicked should he need it.
All parties could have held their breath for the moment, but it passed soon enough. The next room was empty. The tile on the floors changed greatly, however; the space was newly renovated and clad in white compared to the rusted entrance of the base. Shower spouts were stationed along the wall, as well as drains scattered along the floor. and the pungent smell of cleaner was made more and more evident the closer they had become to the room.
No signs of movement. No signs of life. Slowly Rosa made the call to creep forward. The space was empty. On the far left wall, another vault-like door was sealed. It looked free of rust and freshly installed, unlike the one they had passed through.
Jason felt her recoil as she brushed past but didn’t turn immediately. His eyes were frozen on the pit and what stalked about within it while his head tried to process it quick enough. Her thoughts echoed his own and he swallowed a breath when he had held it in too long. The air in the depths was something else entirely. He expected it to be stale, but the time the creatures had spent beneath was evident. Long enough. The flashlight was flicked on. Subconsciously he had gripped the sidewall as he tried to make sense of the levels below. He would have bet anything that the view from a perspective looking up would be twice as dreadful.
He flicked the light off when his stomach and mind had enough of the sight. His thoughts wandered back to the altered vampire of the neon graveyard mere nights before. “They were all people… weren’t they?” He was hesitant to speak the fear that he already felt he knew. Drawing in a tense breath, Jason turned himself away from the silo.
There was no questioning whether the message was received by the way his eyes came to life and his brow pinched together. His eyes met hers, startled on top of everything else… How long had she been able to do that? His stare flickered back to the pit and then back down the hallway they had come. “Come on,” Jason muttered almost inaudibly, looking toward both of them. He started walking while sticking close to the avian.
Rosa was shaken to life by the man’s words, her own cold stare set on the pit from several feet back where she had chosen not to step closer. The huntress had handled the autopsy on the vampire on the biological side of the Hunter Society’s work. She had seen the horrors that came with the job but the haunting sound that echoed off those walls was something else entirely. Her footsteps followed both of them but her gaze passed through Ryan for the most part, wondering silently how the woman was faring through it all. Internal demons were tricky things. Some doors were left closed for a reason.
Before they reached the end of the cylindrical hallway, while still under its cover, Jason’s footsteps slowed. Ryan would feel a hand grasp her shoulder lightly to get her attention. If he had it, he drew in another breath and spoke nearly under his breath. “Little Bird… If you need to leave, I won’t hold it against you. Not for a second… but if there’s anyone or any-thing that isn’t too far gone down here, they won’t make it out of a place like this without help.”
The edge of the hallway led to a dropoff into the darkness where the end of the corridor was no longer lit. The footsteps echoed differently at the end of it where a ladder was the primary ticket down to the depths besides a pulley and cable system rigged just out of reach toward the center of the space. The walls were circular around the opening. Even in the dark, she might make out the silhouettes of barred rooms that went down well over seven or eight stories…
Then the first set of eyes appeared. Eerily luminescent orbs appeared in the dark one level below. With it came the first of the unsettling shrieks. It was a gurgling, at times shrill sound. The sound grew louder as more echoed the alert. Some cries were guttural; others sounded practically human if only words could be made out. More and more sets of milky white and reflective eyes stared out from the circular cells where the silhouettes of creatures clanged and reached through the metal bars desperately- some in rage, others in fear. Many, out of hunger.
They were experiments. They were holding cells.
Silently the Hunter pulled out a flashlight and flicked it on, letting it do a sweep of the cavity. The old base’s missile silo was crawling with activity once the first of the creatures had noticed. Limbs reached out around the circular space, clawing at the open air past the bars like they were conditioned toward the sight of life in the corridor.
"...Fucking hell,"
He felt a chill. The flashlight was flicked off and returned to his belt when he had seen enough. Jason took a few steps back before he could even think about it; it was all he could do while he tried to process the sight. His gaze flickered to Ryan next, almost hesitant. His instincts told him to leave when they sure as hell wouldn’t find answers below. Behind them, Rosalie uttered not a word as she covered her mouth toward what she could see in the distance.
Jason moved out of the way when he knew best to. In the meanwhile, Rosalie was keeping guard around the hole, shifting a glance about the horizon line steadily. Nothing still. The snap of the lock caught her attention as it should have. Jason didn’t so much as flinch when he knew what to expect of it, and to his satisfaction, the lump of metal pulled free from its hold and was tossed to land among the sand.
Rosa’s eyes widened in the meanwhile as the lock broke free without more than a second’s notice. She worked with vampires and semi-immortals alike, but Ryan was a wild card in the books thus far. The surprise wore off in the moment’s passing while she worked at the door’s metal plating and the woman drew in a breath. A nod sufficed as an answer.
Jason stepped through first without a moment’s hesitation. The concrete landing led into what looked like an industrial stairwell. The flights of stairs zig-zagged down what looked like four or five flights deep. The night vision goggles were clipped back on his belt and he cast a tentative look down the stairwell center. “Think anyone’s home?” Jason murmured under his breath. The receivers in their ears wouldn’t echo at such close proximity. Had they heard the noise? If that was the case, they were still too far up to know. The creaking and groaning of the complex itself served as a distraction for the imagination. Even the fluorescent lighting that hung overhead gave off a low-pitched whine of old electronics.
Nonetheless, they started walking. The concrete steps were sturdy enough to put full weight on as they went. A pistol was pulled from its holster as he made the first round down the stairs, flicking the safety off. Rosa peeked over the railing on occasion to look ahead, having ditched the goggles herself.
On the second floor, the stairway diverted. A circular tunnel-like doorway appeared to their left on the platform. The faint green walls of their entrance hadn’t aged well over the years. Paint peeled freely from the surfaces left untouched, where others were well rusted.
“If there’s anything down here then what the hell are they doing with this place?” Jason muttered.
“This site was decommissioned in the mid ’60s… but the brackets on the lighting are new. The stairs have been patched. The rest of it? Well…” Rosalie let her voice trail off as she stared down the cylindrical hallway.
All three might have heard it… the sound held an eerie echo with how it emanated from whatever source. Was that a voice? A cry? Jason bristled. He glanced to Ryan, then let his head tilt to gesture toward the hall.
[Not dead, just dormant]
The ground met them soon enough. Both party’s feet hit one after the other, hitting the ground running at a haphazard pace for the cat that had no expectations but the relief when he’d hit the sand and soil below. The clips were undone once the chute fell to a standstill some distance away. The harnesses were undone and left where they were dropped; it was a small price to pay if the job went as needed. They might have been a hundred feet away, maybe two. They wouldn’t know until they started walking.
Jason reached for his belt and pulled the night vision goggles free from where they hung, slipping them on. He turned them on with a click and did a sweep of the surroundings… nothing. Nothing aside from the figure wielding the glow stick on the other end. Rosalie tapped the earpiece that served as the universal for those given to them at the hotel, and a low beep was heard in their ears as the devices turned on and connected.
“Testing, ...can you hear me?” The Aussie woman’s voice came over the headset’s frequency in a quiet tone. In the meanwhile, the two started walking to meet her.
“Loud and clear,” Jason’s voice muttered afterward. “Ryan?”
Whether she answered or not, the two closed the gap across the desert in the next several minutes. From the glow of the light source their silhouettes appeared first. Rosalie’s hand rose to wave once at Ryan, confirming who it was as if there could be others walking around midst the night.
“We landed West,” She stated. A pair of night vision goggles were unclipped from her belt. “Therefore, the entrance hatch… should.. Be…”
“There.” Jason answered. In the green glow of the stick, he was pointing off into the dark. In the distance, the desert ground went on without interruption until the rocky terrain looked a little too geometric and level to be true.
The closer they walked, the larger it became. The concrete and steel slab was 8-10 feet on each side. The metal sheeting was slid away to reveal the stairwell that went down into the earth and stopped at a steel door. A ladder was crudely placed in the 3 foot drop off before the stairs began. Jason crouched on the ledge before dropping down into the stairwell.
“I could pick it… by morning,” Jason spoke up unenthusiastically. It echoed just slightly after through the earpieces. He was looking at the door. Metal plating was put over the top of the latch and the lock wasn’t the standard hardware store purchase. He stepped back and glanced at Ryan. “Think you could get us in?”
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