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The coordinates were set arbitrarily, and the car slowly cruised along the street.
Dr. Scholes gazed at the steady stream of traffic around them, gradually calming down. Then she asked,
"SHIELD… what kind of place is it, really?"
"A rather interesting one," Arthur replied. "It was founded during World War II, had several predecessors, and nowadays, it mainly deals with things the general public shouldn't know about. For example... extraterrestrial lifeforms that can attach themselves to human hosts."
"You already know?"
Dr. Scholes' face turned pale instantly. Her body slumped weakly.
"The specifics, we were hoping to hear them from you," Arthur said. "That's the reason we came to find you today. The Life Foundation, what exactly did that spaceship bring back?"
Dr. Scholes was emotionally fragile.
To be honest, she was just a researcher, not a battle-hardened agent. At this very moment, her conscience was eating away at her. So she didn't even question how Arthur knew it was a spaceship. She simply said, "Didn't you already know? It was a kind of alien lifeform… like a parasite."
"Oh?"
Arthur immediately understood, this was confirmation.
He hardly needed to ask further; the truth was evident. Still, there were a few things he wanted to clarify.
"How did you first discover them? And what were you planning to do with them? Change the world, or destroy it?"
"I just wanted to save people!!" Tears welled up in Dr. Scholes' eyes and streamed down her face. "He used to have my complete trust. Young, capable, with great ideals and ambition. I was willing to sacrifice anything for the cause because we were doing something that could leave an indelible mark on the world. But everything changed. Ever since that spaceship accidentally discovered that comet… everything has changed."
Fear makes people unravel. With no formal training, the doctor suddenly found herself desperate to speak.
Arthur simply pulled over and handed her a tissue.
"Thank you."
Dr. Scholes wiped her tears.
"It was an accident. Based on the reports we received, they encountered a comet on their return trip. And they discovered a strange form of life on it. You see, humans have always believed we were alone in the universe. But we've never stopped searching. The Life Foundation was founded on that very mission. Drake believed that Earth was running out of resources, overpopulation and overexploitation were pushing us to the brink. He thought the only future for humanity lay in space. The purpose of launching the spaceship was to seek habitable planets."
"Of course, that mission turned up nothing. But the comet we stumbled upon gave us new hope. Millions of alien lifeforms living in extremely hostile environments!"
At this point, Dr. Scholes looked directly at Arthur.
"We managed to bring back a few specimens. But something went wrong during transport. The spaceship crash-landed, and to this day, the whereabouts of one of the specimens remain unknown."
Hearing this, Arthur felt the missing piece of the puzzle snap into place.
These so-called specimens… they were Symbiotes, the alien organisms that could bond to human hosts.
One symbiote went missing. One fewer person was seen in the ambulance. Then it appeared somewhere else, and killed many people. In all that chaos, who knows how many others went missing?
At that thought, Arthur immediately opened a comm link.
As soon as the call connected, Arthur spoke naturally:
"I need you to look into something for me, Case No. 2 in the archives. Reconstruct all available intel from the time of the incident. Cross-reference it with the info modules. I need to know exactly what happened back then."
On the other end, Natasha paused for a second, then frowned and said, "Your voice... sounds really familiar."
"...Don't sweat the details."
"And please stop using the women's bathhouse to take showers!"
"Why would I do that kind of thing?" Arthur was slightly irritated. "Besides, if I really wanted to, would I even need to? I've got plenty of ways."
"That I believe."
"…"
"Give me ten minutes. The base's tech systems have already been upgraded. Honestly, I've always thought if Tony would just bring J.A.R.V.I.S. over too, things would be perfect. But that stingy bastard just won't budge."
Natasha kept grumbling as she cut off the transmission.
Arthur turned back to Dr. Scholes and said, "Please, go on."
"Ah… Oh."
Dr. Scholes was momentarily dazed. She couldn't shake the feeling that Arthur's voice during the call had sounded exactly like the person he was speaking to. And their conversation… had an oddly surreal vibe to it.
She was about to continue, then asked in confusion,
"Wait, where was I?"
"One of the specimens went missing," Arthur reminded her. "And then?"
"And then… the remaining specimens were successfully recovered. That's when we began a series of… mad experiments."
"Human testing?"
"No… at first, we used rabbits," Dr. Scholes quickly clarified. "No matter how crazy Drake was, he wouldn't jump to that level right away. Initially, we experimented on all sorts of lifeforms to test symbiosis. Rabbits turned out to work the best, but they couldn't maintain the bond for long. Still, the early results gave Drake enormous confidence… and then he started pushing for… for human trials."
"How did that go?" Arthur asked.
"Not well. So far, everyone involved in those experiments... has died."
Dr. Scholes' expression turned sorrowful.
"He's lost all sense of morality. I don't even know what to do anymore. I wanted to stop him, but I was powerless. Given what little I could do, I thought I might at least try to expose it all to the world. But things didn't go well… and I'm terrified something even worse might happen soon."
"Unforeseen disasters happen all the time," Arthur replied calmly.
As he spoke, his wristband began to glow. With two taps on the interface, Arthur projected a file onto the car's windshield.
In the next moment, it was as if they were inside a VR game.
The setting transformed into a city street at night, glowing with lights...
But strewn with corpses everywhere.