"Ahhhhhh!"
Agonizing screams echoed through the steel halls of Zane's island. The source wasn't hidden; it was everywhere—seeping from the reinforced walls, bouncing through the laboratory's metallic corridors, and clinging to the air like the stench of something rotten.
Inside the experiment hall, Zane sat cross-legged on a cushioned sofa, a laptop floating on a holographic platform in front of him. His glasses reflected rows of unreadable codes and diagrams scrolling across the translucent screen. One hand typed lazily, while the other held a fizzy drink, the straw slurping obnoxiously loud against the symphony of pain around him.
Just across from him, a massive shelf stretched like a twisted display case. At the center sat a glass tumbler, tall and cylindrical, resting on a glowing burner. Within it boiled a transparent, flesh-colored liquid that squirmed and bubbled as though it had a mind of its own.
