Location: Dún Bráonach, County Donegal, Ireland
Date: January 21, 2019
Time: 08:45 GMT
The village of Dún Bráonach did not welcome visitors. It endured them, like a chronic ache in the bones during winter.
It was a place forgotten by maps and time. Cottages with thatched roofs and walls of blackened limestone huddled together against the relentless Atlantic gale, their backs turned to the sea as if trying to ignore the roaring monster below. The air was thick, tasting of brine and the bitter, earthy scent of burning turf.
The mist here was heavier than in the Highlands. It was a living thing—wet, clinging, swallowing sound and distance alike. It felt as though the land itself was holding its breath.
Growl.
The silence was sliced open by the low, throaty purr of the Ducati.
Alen rolled in from the single-track coastal road, killing the engine as he reached the gravel square that served as the village center. The silence rushed back in immediately, heavier than before. He swung a leg over the bike and stepped onto the wet ground. His brown military-style boots crunched softly on the gravel. He stood 6'1", a shadow against the gray morning.
He wore the gear of a ghost. The mid-length, weathered black leather trench coat hung heavy on his frame, its deep crimson lining flashing briefly like a wound before being hidden again. On the left shoulder, the faded Union Jack patch was barely visible against the dark leather. Beneath the coat, a black commando sweater hugged his lean, conditioned muscle, tucked into black tactical pants.
His hoodie was pulled up, casting the upper half of his face in obsidian shadow. Only the sharp line of his jaw and a grim, set mouth were visible. Raindrops clung to the strands of messy dark hair that escaped the hood. Under the left arm of his coat, the Samurai Edge – AW Model-01 rested in its shoulder holster. Cold. Heavy. Ready.
He looked like he belonged nowhere. That was the point.
Before moving deeper into the village, Alen reached into the deep pocket of his coat. He retrieved a device no larger than a sparrow—a prototype reconnaissance drone made of matte-black carbon fiber.
"Trinity," Alen murmured, his voice barely a vibration in his throat. "Activate drone. Full perimeter sweep. I want heat signatures, structural density, and exit routes."
≪ Stealth drone active. ≫
The AI's voice was a whisper of liquid mercury in his earpiece.
≪ I see what you see, Master. Uplink established. Be safe. ≫
Alen tossed the device into the air. It didn't whir; it simply caught the wind and vanished into the fog, silent as an owl.
Reality-Lens: Active.
Alen's perception shifted instantly. The gray world was overlaid with a digital lattice.
* Terrain: Slippery. High-grade peat moss.
* Structures: Unreinforced limestone. 17th-century masonry.
* Threats: Minimal.
* Heat Signatures: Flickering faintly behind thick walls.
He began to walk.
The village felt abandoned, yet the data told him otherwise. It wasn't empty; it was hiding. Behind the small, salt-crusted windows, faces watched him. Elderly faces, etched with the deep lines of hardship and superstition. To them, he wasn't a man. He was an omen. A dark rider appearing out of the mist.
An old woman, her hands gnarled like tree roots, crossed herself as he passed. A shutter slammed closed nearby. Alen ignored them. He wasn't here for their souls; he was here for their memories.
At the center of the village, slightly apart from the cottages, stood a building that defied the decay. It was a small library, built of heavy stone, seemingly anchoring the village to the earth. Alen pushed the heavy oak door open. A bell chimed—a sharp, cheerful sound that felt horribly out of place.
The Keeper of Stories
The interior smelled of dust, damp paper, and centuries of stagnation. Shelves packed with rotting books lined the walls. Behind a desk stacked with ancient ledgers sat the librarian—a man so old he looked as if he had been carved from the peat bog itself. His hands were knotted with arthritis, resting on a cane.
He didn't flinch when the dark figure entered. He didn't look at the gun print under the coat or the high-tech comms gear. He just smiled. A dry, crackling smile.
"Well now," the old man rasped, his voice thick with the lilt of old Donegal. "Fancy seein' a newcomer walkin' into a village the world's already buried."
Alen said nothing at first. He closed the door, shutting out the wind. He walked to the wooden chair opposite the desk and sat, keeping his hood up.
"Yeah," Alen replied, his voice calm and leveled. "Guess I picked the right place for a burial."
The librarian's eyes, milky but sharp, studied him. "Judgin' by the way you walk… quiet, like a cat on wet moss… you've seen things this village tries to forget."
Alen leaned back, the leather of his coat creaking. "You've been here a long time."
"Aye," the old man nodded. "Long enough to know the difference between a tourist and a hunter. And you, son, are huntin'."
Alen didn't blink. "I want to know about Teach Mharcus."
The atmosphere in the room changed instantly. The temperature seemed to drop. The librarian's smile vanished. The color drained from his face, leaving it the color of ash.
"That name," he muttered, his grip tightening on his cane. "That family was a blight on this land. Not the lady—God rest her soul. She was kind. But the men… the blood was bad."
He looked at Alen, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. "I knew him. James Marcus. The Doctor."
Alen leaned forward. "Tell me."
"He came here often," the old man said, looking past Alen, into the past. "Late fifties. Early sixties. Always alone. He was a cold man. Tall. Never smiled. He looked at us like we were… cattle. We never asked questions. We learned better."
"What was he doing here?" Alen asked. "This is nowhere."
"He was digging," the librarian whispered.
"Digging?"
"Aye. Mining. Drilling. Deep beneath the cliffs. At night, the trucks would come. Big ones. Military grade, but no markings. They'd rumble through the village in the dead of night, shaking the foundations. They carried heavy equipment in, and they carried… boxes out."
Alen's mind raced. 1950s. Before the Mansion Incident. Before Zero. Marcus was extracting something.
"What was in the boxes?" Alen asked.
"We don't know," the librarian admitted. "But they were heavy. And sometimes… sometimes the drivers wore masks. Gas masks."
"And his mother?"
"A tragedy," the old man sighed, shaking his head. "She died alone in that big house. The Doctor… he never came back. Not even for the funeral. We buried her ourselves, in the pauper's plot. Took pity on her."
The librarian raised a trembling finger, pointing toward the window that faced the towering cliffs.
"At the edge stands Teach Mharcus. An Anglo-Gaelic manor. Built in the late 1600s. It once belonged to scholars, monks… men who studied the natural world before science had a name. James's mother was the last heir."
He leaned in closer, his voice barely audible. "Behind the house lies a pond. Fed by underground springs. It's not like the other water here. It's black as oil. Still as death. No birds land on it. No wind stirs it. We call it An Fuilchiúin."
Alen's Gaelic was rusty, but the translation came to him. "The Silent Blood."
"Aye," the librarian nodded grimly. "That's where James went. Fishing was his excuse. But you don't bring drilling equipment to catch trout. There's something beneath that water, stranger. Something old. Something… waiting."
Alen stood up. The intel was solid. Marcus hadn't just found the Progenitor Virus in Africa; he had found something here, in his ancestral home, that connected to his obsession with leeches.
"Thank you," Alen said.
The librarian met his gaze, his eyes filled with a profound sadness. "You're welcome… though I don't expect I'll see you again. Those who go to An Fuilchiúin… they tend to stay."
The Black Water
Alen walked to the edge of the village. The road dissolved into a sheep track, winding up the cliff face. And there it stood.
Teach Mharcus.
It was a gothic nightmare carved from local stone. Weathered limestone walls were cracked but unyielding, wrapped in ivy that looked more like constricting veins than plants. The slate roof was jagged, silhouetted against the stormy sky.
Alen stopped at the iron gates. They were rusted shut, fused by fifty years of salt spray. He activated his Reality-Lens.
* Structure: Compromised but stable.
* Life Signs: Negative.
* Geothermal Reading: Abnormal heat signature detected 50 meters below the rear garden (approx. 18°C above baseline peat temperature).
"Trinity," Alen commanded softly. "Scan the water."
He walked around the perimeter to the rear of the estate. There lay the pond. An Fuilchiúin.
It was exactly as the old man had described. A perfect circle of black water, surrounded by dead peat bog. The Atlantic Ocean roared just a hundred feet away, crashing against the cliffs, but the surface of this pool was glass-smooth. It looked unnatural. It looked viscous.
Alen stood at the edge, the wind whipping his coat around his legs. He looked at the black water, and for a moment, he thought he saw something ripple beneath the surface. Not a fish. Something… elongated.
"So this is it," he murmured. "The origin."
Mining. Unmarked trucks. Gas masks. Marcus had found a local species here—some ancient, regenerative leech thriving in this unique chemical environment—and he had harvested them. He had taken them to Africa. To the Training Facility.
"What are you hiding down there, Marcus?" Alen whispered, his hand resting on the grip of his Samurai Edge. "What did you pull from the dark?"
He stepped forward, crossing the threshold onto the cursed earth of the estate. The hunt was over. The excavation was about to begin.