Rain hammered the city like it meant to drown it.
Lucien darted through the alleyways, one arm curled protectively around his little brother, whose shallow breaths were warm against his chest. Every heartbeat echoed like a footfall behind him. Every splash of water from his bare feet felt like a signal flare. His skin stung from the cold. His arms burned from carrying the boy. But he didn't stop.
They ran.
Behind them, the neon-stained ruins of his uncle's tower still flickered, half-lit like the corpse of a memory. Smoke drifted above the rooftops, curling into the clouds like the world exhaling something it couldn't stomach.
"Just hold on," Lucien whispered. "Just a little more."
The city was awake tonight in a way it never should've been.
Drones buzzed overhead like mechanical hornets, their red lights sweeping across wet rooftops. Somewhere far behind, a voice crackled through speakers in a dozen languages:
> "By order of the Mutant Retrieval Unit—Subject 87X is marked for collection. Detain on sight. Lethal force authorized."
Lucien ducked beneath a scaffold and slipped through a tight gap between two vending stalls. Rain-soaked fruit glowed like alien gems behind smudged glass. He didn't dare stop.
He crossed a courtyard flooded ankle-deep with water, weaving through pillars of rusted piping and leaning statues of old, broken deities. The city had once tried to be beautiful—before fear took it by the throat and strangled the color from its walls.
"Almost there," he breathed, glancing behind him.
But the sound found them first.
A high, electronic snap—like a whip cracking in the air.
Then:
Blue light. A net of it.
Lucien didn't have time to curse. One step too slow. One corner too sharp.
The energy snare unfolded mid-air like a trap sprung from the sky itself. It struck his back and exploded in a burst of static. His whole body arched in pain. He crumpled mid-sprint, twisting instinctively to shield his brother from the fall.
He hit the ground hard. The world rolled sideways.
The last thing he saw before unconsciousness claimed him was a sleek black boot slamming into the water beside his head, followed by a dozen more.
And the cold, red eyes of a drone blinking down from the rain.
---
Lucien awoke to silence.
No thunder. No rain. No wind.
Just the low, artificial hum of fluorescent lights and the buzz of something alive in the wires.
He lay on a metal table, his limbs bound by thick magnetic cuffs that pulsed with light. A cold gel clung to his skin where wires had been attached. His throat was dry. His mouth, bitter.
No windows.
No doors visible.
Just metal.
His breath caught. He turned his head, heart rising in his chest.
There—on another table across from his own—his brother.
Still breathing. Pale. Strapped down.
Lucien yanked at his cuffs. Nothing.
The door hissed open.
Six figures walked in.
Four of them wore white coats over armor—scientists, if that word still meant anything here. Their eyes glowed faintly, cybernetic implants twitching across their temples. One held a scanner that beeped every time it neared Lucien's chest.
"Subject 87X confirmed," one said flatly. "No traceable genome origin. Power source anomalous. Energetic yield inconsistent with mutant classification."
The fifth man—taller, broader—wore no coat. Only a black uniform stitched with a symbol Lucien didn't recognize: a spiral crossed by a scalpel. He stood silently.
And behind them all came the sixth.
He did not speak immediately. He wore a long coat, darker than coal, and a surgical mask over his mouth. His glasses glinted beneath the lights. When he finally did speak, his voice was soft, curious.
"You should not exist," he said. "And yet you do."
Lucien's voice rasped through cracked lips. "Where are we?"
The man stepped closer. "Facility Null-6. Deep beneath the Atlantic Trench. A research center for… exceptional mutations."
"You mean prisoners."
"I mean specimens."
Lucien's muscles tensed. He could feel a seed stirring behind his sternum—soft, hot, and pulsing like a second heartbeat.
The man leaned forward. "You don't understand what you are. We scanned every cell, traced every possible heritage. And yet, your powers do not belong to the DNA. They belong to the will. You are not inherited. You are imagined. That is… fascinating."
Lucien's eyes burned with fury. "Touch my brother, and I swear—"
"You'll what?" the man interrupted gently. "Sprout another miracle? Grow a forest of death from your fingernails? No. Not here. Not in this cage. Your seed magic is locked by neural inhibitors. You're just another body now. And we will break you down… piece by piece."
The room darkened slightly. The lights shifted red.
"Start with the sibling," the masked man said. "Observe his regeneration under minor trauma. Document transfer potential."
"No!" Lucien screamed. He thrashed in his cuffs. "No, he's just a boy!"
They didn't listen.
A metal arm unfolded from the ceiling above his brother. It lowered slowly. A scalpel glinted in its grasp. The hum of machinery rose like a chant.
Lucien's heart slammed in his chest. His thoughts fractured. And deep inside him, something shattered.
Like a wall collapsing. Like the floor of his soul opening into something terrible and infinite.
He didn't know what it was yet.
But it moved.
Beneath his skin, beneath his blood, Oblivion stirred.
And this time… it would not stay silent for long.