I stood in the laboratory, staring at the screen where red lines pulsed like living veins, their rhythm echoing in my head like the beat of a distant drum. The rain outside grew stronger, its pounding on the wooden boards louder, sharper, as if someone were hammering a fist against the door, demanding an answer. The air in the room was heavy, saturated with the smell of chemicals, rust, and dampness, while the old fan in the corner hummed like a dying beast, stirring dust in circles. Ellis sat at the table, her fingers—dry, with cracked skin—gripping a pencil, which she used to sketch something on a sheet of paper covered in formulas that looked like a spider's web. Lily slept in the corner, her breathing faint but steady, her thin braids resting on a rolled-up sweater like black threads on a gray canvas.
"Evolution," I repeated, my voice sounding hollow, bouncing off the cracked walls like a map of a shattered world. "Are you sure?"
Ellis looked up, her glasses glinting in the lamplight, reflecting the red lines from the screen. She tapped the pencil on the table, leaving a faint scratch on the wood, and her lips twitched into a crooked smirk.
"Sure," she said, her voice creaking like old hinges, but there was a hardness in it, like steel tempered in fire. "I've seen it. The first samples. The people we cured are changing. Their bones are getting denser, their muscles stronger, their reflexes faster. One of them, a boy from Oklahoma, lifted a car to pull his sister out from under debris. He's twelve." She paused, her fingers tightening around the pencil until the wood cracked, leaving a splinter in her skin. "They're not just surviving, Brandon. They're becoming… like you. But not like you. Weaker, but I don't know how far the changes can go. We need tests…"
I turned to the window, where the rain left dark streaks on the boards, and a bolt of lightning split the sky, briefly illuminating the desert beyond the lab—the sand, mixed with ash, gleamed like glass, and the distant hills stood like tombstones. I could feel them—millions whose bodies were changing because of my blood. It was a faint, almost imperceptible pressure, like a light breeze brushing against my skin, but it was growing, becoming denser, like a shadow creeping across the ground before sunset. They were alive because of me. But what would they become? Saved or enemies? Or something greater than I could imagine?
My soldiers.
Was it worth it?
"You said you wanted to save them," Ellis continued, her voice quieter but sharper, like a knife sliding across glass. "But you didn't ask if they wanted to be_saved. Not like this. They look at you like a god, but gods don't ask for permission. They decide. And now you'll have to decide what to do with this army of superhumans that's emerging. The changes aren't fast, but time's a lousy measure."
"Army," I repeated, clenching my fist, feeling the skin tighten over my knuckles as the veins stood out like rivers on a map. The word tasted bitter, like ash on my tongue. I didn't want an army. I wanted peace. From the moment I arrived in this world, I wanted to live a peaceful, quiet life. But the world I was building was cracking at the seams, like ice under a weight it couldn't bear. Enemies were coming, and vampires were just fleas compared to the visitors from space. I needed allies. But an army of superhumans was better.
Ellis leaned back in her chair, which creaked under her weight, and removed her glasses, wiping them with the edge of her faded shirt. Her eyes—gray, with red veins—looked at me with a weary mix of curiosity and stubbornness.
"You can't solve everything with strength," she said, tapping her nail on the table, leaving another scratch. "Not even you. They're already waking up, Brandon. And they're asking questions. Who are you? Why you? And what happens when they realize they don't need you? A lot of questions that'll put you in a position that's hard to get out of."
I stepped toward the window, my boots leaving muddy tracks on the floor littered with glass shards and scraps of wire. We need to move. The rain streamed down the boards, drops falling onto the windowsill, ringing like coins tossed into an empty tin. I could feel them—not just their bodies, but their thoughts, faint like whispers but growing stronger. It was as if they were watching me, waiting, fearing. Some were already beginning to understand that their strength was not only a gift but also a curse. They saw dreams—vivid, like lightning—where their hands broke walls, their eyes burned shadows, their voices roared like thunder. They were becoming like me. A hundredth of my strength. But even that was too much for ordinary people. I didn't know if I wanted them to be like me. I didn't know what to do with them.
"Then I'll find them," I said, my voice cold as steel sharpened by the wind. "I'll talk to them. If they become a threat, I'll stop them."
Ellis snorted, her lips twitching into a crooked smirk, revealing yellowish teeth.
"You sound like a judge," she said, as always repeating similar words, turning back to the screen. "Or an executioner. I hope you know the difference."
I didn't answer. I stepped outside, where the rain hit my face, cold and sharp, washing the dust and ash from my skin. The wind threw a handful of sand mixed with water into my face, and I breathed in the air—heavy, laced with the smell of smoke and wet concrete. My shadow fell on the ground, long and dark, like the road I had chosen.
---
That night, I flew to Oklahoma, where the boy Ellis mentioned lived in a refugee camp. The sky was black as oil, with only a few stars piercing through the clouds, trembling like dying candles. I landed on the edge of the camp, sand swirling in a vortex from the impact, coating my boots and crunching between my teeth. Tents stood in uneven rows, their fabric torn, patched with pieces of plastic and old blankets, while fires burned in tin barrels, their flames reflecting in puddles mixed with mud and blood. People sat by the fires, their faces—gaunt, with hollow cheeks—glowed with faint warmth, their voices blending into a low hum, like the sound of a distant sea.
The boy was there, by one of the tents, his thin hands gripping a metal beam, which he bent like wire to reinforce the roof. His sister, a girl of about seven, sat nearby, her eyes—large, brown, with red veins—watching him with a mix of fear and awe. She held a doll stitched from scraps, its thread hair tangled, one button eye dangling by a thread. The boy noticed me first—his gaze darted to me, quick as lightning, and I felt his strength, weak but sharp, like a needle pricking my skin. His irises had changed; a quarter of them were now stained a vivid purple, bright, almost artificial. So that's what it looks like…
"You're the one who saved us," he said, his voice hoarse, as if his throat were dry from dust. He straightened, his shoulders tensing, his hands clenching into fists, leaving red marks on his palms. "I saw you in my dreams. You were flying. Your eyes were burning."
So it wasn't my imagination. They're getting something from me. Not just strength.
I stepped closer, my boots leaving deep prints in the mud mixed with ash. The air between us hummed, like a taut string, and I felt him—his strength, his fear, his questions. He was like me, but not like me. His skin was clean, without scars, but his eyes—dark, with a purple glow—shone like those of a beast ready to leap.
"You've changed," I said, my voice quiet but firm, like a stone falling into an abyss. "You feel it. The strength. What will you do with it?"
He fell silent, his fingers unclenching, leaving red streaks on his palms. His sister looked at me, her doll falling into the mud, unnoticed. Her eyes gleamed like mirrors, reflecting the firelight and my shadow, long and dark, like a knife.
"I don't know," he said finally, his voice trembling like a leaf in the wind. "I want to protect her." He nodded at his sister, her thin braids shifting as she turned her head. "But I'm scared. I see dreams. In them, I break everything. Walls. People. I don't want to be like that."
Does he have fragments of my memories? That's dangerous…
I looked at him, feeling his fear echo within me. I saw myself in him—a boy who didn't know how to stop, how not to become a monster. I stepped closer, the air between us thickening, humming with tension, and placed a hand on his shoulder. His skin was hot, like molten metal, and I felt his strength—weak but growing, like a fire consuming dry grass. In a microsecond, I could snap his neck. Eliminate the threat. Eliminate the danger.
But I'm not a monster.
"You don't have to be like that," I said, my voice cold as steel sharpened by the wind. "But you have to choose. Strength isn't a curse if you know how to use it. I'll help you. But if you choose destruction, I'll stop you."
He looked at me, his eyes glowing like embers ready to ignite. His sister crawled closer, her fingers gripping my jacket, leaving muddy streaks on the fabric soaked with dust and blood. Her voice was faint, like a whisper, but sharp, like a knife sliding across glass.
"Don't hurt him," she said, her eyes gleaming like mirrors, reflecting my shadow. "He's good. He saved me."
I looked at her, feeling her fear and hope blend like paints on a palette. I didn't want to be a judge. But I knew there was no choice. I flew away, leaving them in the firelight, their shadows trembling on the ground, long and dark, like the roads they would choose. Their first task was to reach the laboratory without killing anyone. If Amara and Alexander succeeded, I would believe in this race. Believe in the first of the new humans.
Believe they wouldn't become monsters.
---
Time flowed like molten lead—slowly but relentlessly, leaving burns on everything it touched. The rich had exhausted their hideouts: bunkers under Greenland's ice cracked under my pressure, their steel doors bending like foil, the air inside thick with the smell of rust and fear. Another group of worms who thought money would save them. Far from others, with enough food to feed an entire city, a hundred people sat.
Their corpses, with burned-out eyes, served as a stark sign for all in this dark hour.
I'm coming.
In Tokyo, I demolished a media mogul's glass tower—its shards fell with a scream, like a rain of knives, while the screens that fed lies to millions hissed and went dark, releasing the acrid smell of burnt wiring. His archives—terabytes of propaganda and blackmail—I erased with a single pulse, leaving him standing on the rooftop, staring at a city that no longer belonged to him. The wind howled, carrying away his screams until he fell silent, broken by the quiet. A pancake, not a man.
The Japanese wasn't a vampire, but to my surprise, his entourage included many creatures. And they weren't always red-eyed. That's how I first encountered a werewolf. A disgusting, crazed beast that, even in its human form, devoured human flesh. A abomination worthy of a slow death under my hands.
Trying to intimidate me, it transformed from an ordinary woman into a massive, two-and-a-half-meter creature with hypertrophied muscles and a huge wolf's head. But all it earned was my contempt and a laser shot to the brain, which fried its head. First the eye, then the skull, then the brain. Quite durable.
These creatures had regeneration at an extraordinary level. The second one, leaping from a high vantage point to catch me off guard after the first's death, regrew its leg in mere seconds after I severed it with a swipe of my hand. Unfortunately for it, without a brain, it couldn't snarl, and like the first, it died with a scorched head from my gaze. An uninteresting creature, just a rabid dog, only a hundred times more dangerous.
Nothing special.
---