The Verdant Bio-Dome's auxiliary lab hummed with suppressed energy, its alloy walls glowing faintly from the residual bio-radiation of Dr. Mordecai Thorne's latest experiments. Kael Voss pressed himself against a stack of cryogenic storage vats, his breath shallow as he activated the neural dampeners in his utility suit—muffling his bio-energy signature to a whisper. Through the lab's transparent partition, he watched Dr. Thorne pace before a holographic projection of the Immortality Codex, the violet tendrils of bio-toxin beneath his ashen skin writhing with barely contained urgency.
Beside the doctor stood the hooded figure, their emerald cloak pooling on the floor like liquid shadow. Kael's enhanced senses—sharpened by the fourth tier of the Unnamed Gene Calibration Protocol—picked up the faint whir of mechanical joints beneath the cloak, confirming his suspicion: the figure was no organic being, but a bio-engineered combat droid, its frame reinforced with adamantium alloy and loaded with gene-locked weaponry.
"Time is running out," Dr. Thorne rasped, slamming a fist against the console. The hologram flickered, revealing a fragmented sequence of the Codex—glowing golden symbols that Kael recognized as the same ones etched on his emerald vessel. "The Necro Parasite Spores will keep him compliant, but we need the fourth tier's pure bio-energy now. If my genetic sequence collapses before then…" He trailed off, his sunken eyes narrowing with a feral intensity. "Bring him to the integration chamber. We'll extract the energy by force if we must."
Kael's heart raced. He'd snuck into the auxiliary lab to retrieve a backup data chip containing the Quantum Blink Strike Technique's neural mappings—stolen by Dr. Thorne during their last confrontation—but now he'd stumbled onto the doctor's final, desperate plan. Forcing energy extraction would tear his genetic sequence apart, leaving him a husk while Dr. Thorne absorbed his life force to repair his own shattered genes.
The hooded droid turned, its head swiveling with mechanical precision as it scanned the lab. Kael tensed, his fingers brushing the palm-sized plasma dagger clipped to his belt—Ryder's gift, forged from the core of a downed Wolfpack raider ship. But brute force would be suicide; the droid's armor could withstand plasma blasts, and Dr. Thorne's tailored genetic energy strikes could disable him in an instant.
He needed the Quantum Blink.
Kael closed his eyes, recalling the neural mappings he'd memorized from Ryder's smuggled archives. The technique relied not on bio-energy, but on precise neural control—rewiring his sensory receptors to bend light and space, allowing him to move faster than the human eye could track. It was risky; botching the neural trigger could fry his optic nerves or lock his muscles in permanent spasm. But with the droid's scanner closing in on his position, he had no choice.
He focused on the neural synapses in his cerebellum, activating the first layer of the Quantum Blink protocol. A surge of tingling energy raced down his spine as his perception of time warped—every tick of the lab's chronometer stretched into a heartbeat, the hum of the machinery slowing to a deep rumble. When he opened his eyes, the world had shifted: colors blurred into streaks, and the droid's movements appeared glacially slow.
With a silent exhale, Kael triggered the second layer.
He vanished.
To Dr. Thorne and the droid, it was as if Kael had ceased to exist—no trace of his bio-energy, no flicker of movement. In reality, he was moving at a fraction of light speed, his body phased just outside the visible spectrum by the Quantum Blink's light-bending field. He darted across the lab, his boots barely touching the floor, and snatched the data chip from Dr. Thorne's console—its surface still warm from the doctor's grasp.
"Where is he?" Dr. Thorne snarled, spinning toward the droid. "Your scanner—did you lose him?"
The droid's head tilted, its internal sensors whirring frantically. "Bio-signature undetected. Probable deployment of quantum stealth technology. Recommend full lab lockdown."
Kael didn't stay to listen. He raced toward the lab's emergency exit, his mind already calculating the third layer of the protocol—the strike. If he could land a precise blow on Dr. Thorne's neural inhibitor implant, he might buy himself enough time to escape. But as he rounded a corner, the droid lunged—its cloak flaring to reveal a forearm-mounted plasma cannon.
Time snapped back to normal.
The plasma blast seared past Kael's shoulder, melting a crater in the alloy wall. He stumbled, the Quantum Blink's strain sending a sharp pain through his temples, but he didn't falter. He activated the strike layer, his body blurting forward as he drove the plasma dagger into the droid's neck joint—where its armor was thinnest.
Sparks erupted as the dagger pierced the droid's core. It froze mid-motion, its red optical sensors dimming before going dark. Kael wrenched the dagger free, spinning to face Dr. Thorne—who stood with his palm raised, a crackling sphere of tailored genetic energy glowing between his fingers.
"You've been holding out on me," Dr. Thorne hissed, the violet bio-toxin tendrils beneath his skin darkening with rage. "The Quantum Blink—how did you master it? I never authorized access to combat protocols!"
Kael backed toward the exit, his grip tightening on the plasma dagger. "You never authorized a lot of things, Dr. Thorne. Like poisoning me with Necro Parasite Spores. Or using me as a vessel for your immortality." He activated the exit's biometric lock, his thumbprint overriding the doctor's security clearance—Ryder had hacked the system weeks earlier, a "just in case" favor.
The door slid open, revealing the bio-dome's twilight-shrouded corridor. Dr. Thorne roared, launching the genetic energy sphere at Kael's chest. Kael didn't dodge—he triggered the Quantum Blink one last time.
The energy sphere passed through where he'd been a split second earlier, exploding against the exit frame in a shower of molten metal. When Kael reappeared ten meters down the corridor, his vision swam with static, but he kept running. Behind him, he heard Dr. Thorne's scream of frustration, followed by the distant whir of additional security droids activating.
Kael didn't stop until he reached the bio-dome's outer airlock. He fumbled with the controls, his hands shaking from the Quantum Blink's residual strain, and stepped into the cold vacuum of space—protected by his suit's life-support field. Ahead, the Crimson Veil Nebula glowed like a sea of fire, its interference masking his escape from the bio-dome's sensors.
He pulled the data chip from his pocket, inserting it into his suit's neural interface. The hologram of the Quantum Blink mappings flickered to life, alongside a new message from Ryder: "Meet at the biopool at dawn. Brought backup—your serum worked wonders on the Wolfpack defectors."
Kael smiled faintly, despite the pain in his temples and the weight of the Necro Parasite Spores festering in his cells. Dr. Thorne's betrayal had forced his hand, but it had also unlocked his true potential. The Quantum Blink wasn't just a combat technique—it was his ticket to freedom.
As he activated his suit's thrusters, soaring toward the nebula's safety, Kael vowed to end Dr. Thorne's reign of manipulation once and for all. The Immortality Codex's secrets, the Necro Spores, the doctor's twisted experiments—all of it would come to an end. And this time, he wouldn't fight alone.
The stars blurred around him as he accelerated, his Quantum Blink training already refining his reflexes. For the first time in years, Kael Voss felt truly in control of his fate—his gene ascension no longer a prison, but a weapon.
And he was ready to strike back.