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I pushed Novikov's corpse off the console and used his sleeve to wipe up the blood. The console wouldn't have downloaded the worm just like every other device onsite. I promptly fixed that before long and checked to make sure everyone was still down here. No one had called in sick or gone back home, so everyone who knew the full scope of the situation was stuck down here. I locked down the elevators as soon as I got that confirmed. Killed the wifi too.

No one could leave alive and enable the research here to continue.

The program I set up queued the entire facility's storage onto a router I hooked into the ethernet lines in a storage closet. My timing was deliberate as the surveillance camera footage only backed up every two hours--standard procedure for black sites. Can't allow a continuous stream of information to compromise the operation. The program would be wiping that right now.

The two security guards had stashed their Wolverine carbines in a weapons closet. It required a thumbprint to open up, and not wanting to give anything away should they recover this device's logs, I grabbed Stefan's paw and pressed it against the scanner.

Shit, they need to move past fingerprint sensors.

It opened without incident, leaving me with four carbines, several high capacity magazines, foregrips, IR sights, and suppressors. I loaded it up, checked that it was cycling, and darted across the hall after checking to make sure no one was looking.

Shelving filled with labeled containers made a horseshoe shape along the edges of the walls. Below the western shelf was a seamless floor panel. Propping that up gave way to a small crawl space, likely for conduit and utilities access. Instead, it contained a black duffle bag. A side pouch contained the polycarbonate mask that I was looking for as well as black gloves and a different pair of shoes. All of them were on my person in half a minute before I walked out of the closet with the duffle bag over my shoulder and the carbine in my arms.

I kept quiet as I made my way down the hallway towards the center of the party. One of the technicians in the musculoskeletal division got double-tapped in the head when he came out from a perpendicular corridor.

Two other technicians crossed my path, reflexively jumping back just moments before they fell lifeless to the ground. One bullet in between the eyes to take them down, one in the back of the head once they are down to stay down.

I reloaded and grabbed a flashbang from the duffle while walking. Upon approaching the mezzanine and heart of the party, I activated the grenade and tossed it around the corner. 3D printed and of Caskyan design just in case they find it. Once I heard the bang and slight ringing, I rounded the corner, gun up, and started burst firing into the crowd.

As the Nova Security officers are more heavily geared towards keeping the peace than actively seeking out the enemy, they were fitted with hollow-point rounds instead of armor piercing. That decision worked in my favor, easily taking down anyone who was shot in the head or body with a single round. It also helps that no one here is wearing kevlar or ballistic helmets.

The magazine I was using had a capacity for fifty rounds, add one for the loaded chamber. When the number of rounds left depleted to only one, I grabbed the magazine, placed it in its holster while grabbing the one adjacent to it, popped it in and kept firing. The idea was to keep my downtime to a minimum.

After forty or so had been killed, those not completely frozen ducked down behind desks and workstations screaming.

The ones fleeing were my top priority. It would be easier for me over the next ten minutes if I was able to take down as many people in this room as possible. Keeping people from getting away was really just a matter of conserving ammo and alternating between exits.

Seeing the fear, the chaos, the number of lifeless bodies strewn across the floor; it was hard not to compare it to the SRG. As soon as that crossed my mind, I regretted it.

These people deserve it. The pain, the suffering they have inflicted on him. It would be different if they were regretful--there were those who were hesitant, yet they shut up as soon as they heard "significant compensation." Here they were, celebrating the complete destruction of his personality, of his humanity. No, these imperialists are happy to give up all of their morals if it means a bigger paycheck.

I'm not the SRG.

The easiest way for me to stay focused was to just keep moving forward. Once I started walking over bodies, I made sure they were dead by, again, shooting them in the back of the head. The twenty-second that got such a treatment wasn't actually shot, just lying in the heap of bodies in an attempt to escape my attention. Their body jumped a bit when I shot them too.

Some person halfway down a hallway leading from the workstations was frantically pulling a fire alarm in vain. Under normal circumstances, such an action might have been heralded as heroic, but I had disabled them like any sensible person with the ability to do so. Even then, paramilitary terrorists storming in with high-tech equipment, training, and the willingness to use it would likely be thinking along the same lines.

Fuck, stop thinking like this. Just move and shoot so you can burn this place.

If my memory serves me right, twenty-six fled down other corridors, and I've kit a little more than seventy, so there are thirty-one people I still need to eliminate. Five must have been scattered throughout, ones that I didn't see or haven't crossed yet.

I passed by a bathroom and quietly opened the door. Someone was trying to keep their breathing as quiet as possible, but it was just enough for me to pinpoint them. I fired into the stalls, all six of them. Eight bodies fell from standing on the seats. Kazemir was among them.

I reloaded and moved on.

There were several individuals trying to pry the elevator doors open, others were trying to just stay away from me. After another four minutes, I had racked up a kill count of ninety-five including Declan, Alexi, Vladimir, Dmitri, Vasili, Jérôme, Sandrine, and Svobodová. Bernard was still on my list somehow. I had swept through all of the facility except for Casey's holding area and the mezzanine, placing several plastic explosives of Taurian design on specific weak points such as gas lines. I found some stragglers hiding in dark corners below tarps, behind metal containers, and one even in an air shaft.

The body count rose to one hundred and four, again just leaving Bernard. Most likely, he would be in his office seeing as I hadn't encountered him yet. He would have had to get in there between the time I swiped his phone and the time I shut down all of the doors in the security office, but it wouldn't surprise me.

Going up the stairs, I kept the Wolverine up in my right paw and used my left to open the door to his office via his phone. He was right behind his desk standing over his desktop, keeping his eyes locked to the screen. I readied my gun at his head.

"Good to see you too, Pascal. I'm glad I could see you once more"

I'm half surprised that he actually identified me, probably the only one out of the entire bunch here. He didn't glance up, but he wasn't running either. Wasn't defending himself. He wouldn't find anything of use through his computer seeing as the worm would lock him out.

"Who are you, really? Taurian? Mahraqesh? No, you're Aelmerian, aren't you? You don't have to admit to it. The signs were there, actually--I'm surprised I didn't see it sooner; it kind of makes sense now. I'm not exactly sure what you hope to get out of this, but I won't stand in your way. Not much I would be able to do anyway."

I tightened my grip on the carbine.

"Fuck, eighteen months." He finally looked at me, his back erected. "You know, Ariane is pregnant. Just found out last night, in fact. I was going to tell you later tonight once we were alone and the festivities had died down, but I guess this moment fits such parameters.

"I spent eighteen months working with you, and now you just shot it all up like some psychopath with no remorse, and now I am going to guess that I have only a minute left if that. God fucking damn it, you Aelmerians really are as bad as they make you out to be--"

I put a bullet in between his eyes and moved on. There was no use in hearing what he had to say anymore. He was just getting vindictive, irrational.

He didn't have anything else of use on his person.

I placed another explosive in his office and left his body pooling in his own blood. The command from my phone opened the door to my office as easily as it did for Bernard's.

Perhaps out of arrogance, I think of myself as rather adept with programming. I'm no savant, but I have a fairly good grasp, even more so than the one I let on, but it's on days like these when I appreciate the neural networks being used to rid programmers from this world. Ones turning their profession into irrelevance, or at least in several more years down the road once it's commercially viable. Primanus and, therefore, its contractor, Nova, have rightfully invested heavily in adaptive firewalls. Antivirus software that routinely modifies its own programming while comparing previously archived versions of its software to the most recent and doing a hard-wired rewrite if any discrepancies are found. I'm good, just not that good. Using neural networks to copy the firewall, simulate its reaction to hundreds of thousands of virus forms, and then reworking its software until it becomes perfectly suited to rebuff the firewall's software.

It was odd going through my office knowing it was the last time. Cannot say that I will miss the gaudy, upholstered and sheep's skin furniture to say nothing of the morally repugnant and bourgeois emails I've sent in a ten thousand solar chair. I placed one of the remaining explosives on my desk. Just to the right of it was my laptop. I put it into the duffle after thinking about all that was on it in addition to taking out its global positioning locator chip and its sim card. Best if no one can track it.

Once on route, I went on autopilot after making this route dozens of time. It was much easier to forget all of the coworkers strewn across the floor, though that was more of a side effect than a justification. Seven minutes had elapsed, nearing on my self-imposed timer of twelve just in case someone got curious and noticed no one was coming out of the facility.

The airlock stood opposite, wistfully scolding me. Last time I was here, I acted resolute in the face of guilt, but that was far from a confrontation. I didn't have to stand in front of him and defend myself, empathise with him, endure him. He just stood there lifelessly, doing exactly what Bernard told the technicians to input as commands. His mind was still there, but it was locked away and obstructed from me. Instead of empathy, all I felt was pity. It was easy to hold power over him without repercussions, and now I have to deal with what I've done.

It opened in the same way as it has before as if nothing was awry. The room itself hadn't changed much since last week. Personally, though? In my own eyes? I felt sick to my stomach--ironically more so than the past couple of minutes. The last two times I had passed through here were not memories I reflected upon positively; the first, inducing unimaginable pain and grief to...well, someone I have bonded with against all instructions. His enthusiasm, his curiosity and insatiable desire to learn, his reverence of me--me of all people! Shit, if my fur hadn't been modified to be red instead of my normal white, black, and gray coat, if his fur and hair weren't highlighted with a bright blond, there wouldn't be much of a visual difference at all. Chalk it up to my pride in the design phase.

He was curled up in a corner, knees hugging his chest, his muzzle buried between them. When he heard the door opening, his face jerked up to level those mechanical, golden eyes right at my own, stretched as wide as they would go. The patches of fur around them were matted and crusting over from tearing up. Then came the whimpering.

Five years ago, first daughter of the Federation, Casdy Itsuko. Thirteen years old at the time. She and her elder sister, Kent, were extracted by Mahraqesh nationalists--amazingly not SRG, though the groups had worked together in the past--en route to the Sentinial Residence from school. Ten Sentry agents were killed execution-style during the grab. The nationalists sought to have several terror cell leaders released from black sites. Two days later, when Casdy's left ear and Kent's right paw's fingers were sent to a Space Corps Captain, Taliya almost went through with releasing them. Five hours later, their locations were identified: Kent in a semi on the move heading towards Light Haven; Casdy already in a warehouse in Eglitia. A Spectre team was sent after Kent in two helos, I was sent alone to extract Casdy. She was curled up the corner of a dark room in a hidden sublevel, chained to the wall bloodied, dehydrated, and malnourished. Twenty-five nationals guarded the warehouse. I got her out, but not two minutes before the team failed when the nationals in the truck detected them and detonated suicide charges. Kent, eight Spectres, and all but one of her captors were killed that early morning. Casdy had to be carried out on my back under fire into a transport helo, a heavy machine gun firing from its bay doors while the little girl and I were connected via a makeshift transfusion tube. I still have the scars of two bullet wounds--one in the left thigh, one in my lower right abdomen. Casdy got out without any bullet wounds and recovered thanks to an Air Force combat medic named K--

I can't.

"Casey, look at me," I spoke as gently as my voice allowed in an attempt to calm him down.

His arms were stretched out now, no longer pulling his knees up. Instead, they pressed against the walls on either side. A normal arm would only let out a light thump; his let out a metallic clank. I could see him wince at the sound. His legs were similarly outstretched across the floor, letting out their own artificial noise. He looked more like a cornered animal than the bubbly adolescent he had shown himself to be.

"Casey." Taking off my mask might help. There is the emotional connection, the year we've built up, but also the trauma I've induced. First, his body and mind, then I come in and remove all autonomy he has over himself. His mind, body, and spirit, all crushed. I said fuck it and removed the mask. "Casey, it's me. I'm here to get you out of here. Everything is ok."

His arms and legs were rattling against the walls and floor now, spasming. The noise they produced was not helping things from the look of it. He shook his head sporadically. "Rrrrr-rrrrr-hhhhhn-li-li-li-liar." He could barely get a word out. "Li-li-la--" he wheezed heavily. Fucking hell.

"Casey, nobody is going to hurt you. Those people can't hurt you now, ok?" He wheezed again and interrupted his labored breathing. I started walking forward with my hands out, palms facing up. Each step I took furthered his spasming as he pressed himself further and further into the corner.

"N-n-nnnnh-naw. G-gut a-w-w-way-ay." He started whining more and more loudly, building towards a feral howl.

This is taking too much time.

"Casey, I am not going to hurt you. I'm sorry. I need you to trust me." He wasn't responding well. If anything, I was actively harming the situation.

"Fuck it," I said as I reached down to grab Bernard's phone. There was an app I had installed using a similar set of technology to what we had used earlier

I'm never going to forgive myself for this.

As soon as it opened, I sent out a similar set of instructions to what we had sent out when I had come in earlier. His eyes became golden flashlights--a safeguard I had installed--to indicate the processor taking over. His body calmed down: arms and legs stopped shaking, his face relaxed, and his eyes were no longer clawing out of their sockets.

"Get up," I instructed. He did, revealing his towering body in all its...nakedness. Gold lines running the length of his organic body divided his white chest, neck, and face from the dark gray that blanketed his back. Normally, they would have run the length of his legs too, but they stopped at the metal plates held in place by industrial screws and rivets. His inner thighs were exposed, and while it wasn't facing me, the pattern would be inverted on the rear of his legs as the dark gray fur split apart right above his tail, flowing along the side of his original legs. The tail: dark gray on top, ivory white on bottom, and the gold streaks divided the two on either side, coalescing into a solid gold tip just like his original front and rear paws. His tail was also fucking huge, curling down at the root and up at the tip just like my own. Most Caniseans only had the former.

His head continued the aurelian lines from his chest, running up his neck and tapering off right below his cuneate ears. His eyebrows and hair were similarly colored blond as were the tips of his ears. I fucking hate the color. Caskyans fucking love it. Their royal family had naturally gilded hair, a supposed carry-over from their family tree going all the way back to Caskya's perfect, benevolent lie. In my book, calling yourself the direct descendants of a god makes you the paragon of arrogance and insanity. So now, even after three decades of the imperial family signing away absolute sovereignty over Caskya and their empire, the nation's color had infected all symbols. White and gold...imagine the joy and jubilation I felt when some executive had the bright idea of modeling the program's "specimen" after that very god himself. The Caskyans, ever beholden to their arrogance, even went as far to call their prophet Eidolon; it quite literally translates to idealized being.

Damn, I had been holding that back...

His face, right. Shit. White front, golden highlights, dark gray back. That gray flowed over his head, forming two small streaks that lined the first crest of his muzzle, terminating at his eyes. Funnily enough--if you are some sort of sadist--his eyes had been blue. A bright, beautiful blue, more brilliant than the ones I had before the cosmetic surgery I endured leading into this, replacing my own with green. No, his eyes had escaped that Midas touch until I ripped them out and cursed him with ones of marigold. And that hair: a forward-sweeping tidal wave building up from the nape of his neck, crashing out from between those radar dish ears.

I gathered my breath, pushing off as many vengeful, vindictive thoughts as I could. "We are getting out of here right now. Follow me." His face didn't betray whether or not he understood what I was saying. It was non-reactive, but his body lumbered forward. Even his stride was inhumanly efficient.

"Casey," I began. His head twisted to meet my gaze. His eyes were not that of a mortal. They didn't convey any emotion, any feeling. I averted meeting them and moved with relative haste to the airlock. Casey or the computer controlling his body followed me through it, cementing the first time he would be out of his cordoned off part of the facility as a slave in his own body.

We walked the halls towards the mezzanine, unfazed by the corpses still littering the floor. Upon reaching a utility door on the right, I ordered Casey to stop and darted in, placing the remaining charges I had on liquid hydrogen tanks that were used by the labs. I exited the maintenance room and resumed our walk, making good time on our way over.

Mezzanine, west corridor, left, left, storage closet on the right. I have no idea what the architects were on, but one of them had a thing for storage closets. There had to be seventeen storage closets in the entire facility. Storage closet.

Stop thinking about fucking storage closets.

This one had the router that had been downloading and wiping the facility and program's data spliced into the LiFI web in the walls. It was best to take it to ensure no unintended trace was left, even if all of the data was being streamed to several devices on my person. However, this storage closet had a structural weakness in its northern wall. The original plans were destroyed or overwritten, and I am sure no one here had taken the time to isolate every civil engineering plan within a mile of the facility, memorize them, and then prepare for multiple exit routes, so I could be pretty sure that no one would anticipate someone taking detonation tape to the wall and blasting a hole into a sewage maintenance tunnel.

It was muscle memory to take it from the duffle and measure it to the necessary lengths that I had been on autopilot until I backed up, detonator in hand.

I turned around to Casey with the intention of telling him to stand back, but his tail was sandwiched between his thighs and wrapped around his right calf. His radar dishes for ears had flattened back as well as his eyes fixated on a corpse leaning against the wall with two red holes on its face. Mathias Ivanovich I think. I hadn't even noticed him as I walked the length of the hallway. Casey shouldn't have cared, or, at least in this state, he shouldn't have.

"He can't hurt you, Casey." He remained agitated and honed in until I rested a paw on his shoulder. He began again and composed himself like a Sergeant standing at attention. I turned back to the closet, raising my left forearm over my face and pressed the button. A light shockwave and a cloud of dust came our way, but the blast had been directed into the wall, cutting through a foot of concrete and opening up the pitch-black tunnel. Casey hadn't flinched or blinked.

I led forth, making light splashes was my hind paws hit the low standing water. Casey trailed behind me emotionlessly without fail. Digging out a glow stick from the bag, I cracked it and let some red light fill up the space around us.

We made good time. A minute of jogging down and I blew all of the charges. The ground shook--

The world is flipped and drags me to the side as my balance falters. Mission specialists and AEGIS senior officers are pulled from their seats. Exiting the trailer, the source of the earthquake shows itself in a snowglobe megastructure as fractals spread out across the glass box, all because of me.

A fireball entered the tunnel from where we jumped down, about half a click back. It dissipated, but the wind it generated and a fraction of its heat rushed over us after one breath. The gas, flammable materials, and stacks of explosives burn at twenty-two hundred degrees Kelvin. Any bodies are burned and charred to the bone, all forensic evidence is erased, the explosions and structural collapse of the facility fragment bodies. No one will be able to identify the bodies, and if I'm lucky, they won't even know how many are down there.

I was so focused on getting out and not fucking this up now that I had gotten the hardest parts out of the way. I wasn't thinking about anything else. Had I opened my mind up to everything else...I'm glad I didn't.

It was another three hundred meters until the designated rendezvous point I had planned out. Just had to keep moving. Casey--or, well, that chip controlling his brain would follow without protest. I can't imagine what it was like, being conscious through--

No. Stop. He'd be dead or worse in a couple weeks without you. You're saving him. Just keep moving.

So I kept moving.