They fired her on her last shift. Minutes later, two helicopters landed outside — and the crews rushed toward her with a message that changed everything: “We’ve been looking for you!”
Rothschild’s expression shifted, becoming something almost like sympathy. «Eight weeks ago, a biological weapon was deployed in Seoul. Nobody reported it, because nobody who saw it survived unchanged. The entire district, 4,000 people, transformed into something that wasn’t quite human anymore. South Korea contained it, barely, but the message was clear. The age of biological warfare has begun.»
«Who deployed it?»
«We don’t know. That’s the problem with biological weapons. They don’t leave fingerprints. Could have been North Korea, China, Russia, or someone else entirely. But every major power saw what happened and started accelerating their own programs. We have maybe six months before someone deploys something worse.»
«And you think the solution is to transform our own soldiers?»
«I think the solution is to evolve before we’re forced to. Your blood, Valkyrie, is the key. You survived. You survived and adapted naturally. That makes you invaluable.»
Waverly looked at the serum, at Knox and his transformed team, at Hayes bleeding on the floor, at Maddox still restrained but watching with calculating eyes. Everyone wanted her blood, her evolution, her impossible survival, but none of them were asking the right question.
«What if the transformation isn’t a weapon?» she said quietly.
«What else could it be?»
«The next step. Not for war, but for survival. Not as weapons, but as something new.» She picked up the first syringe of serum, holding it up to the emergency lighting where it glowed like liquid fire. «What if we’re not becoming soldiers but something beyond the need for soldiers?»
«That’s naive.»
«That’s evolution. It doesn’t care about our wars or our weapons. It just wants to survive. And maybe if we stop trying to weaponize it and start trying to understand it, we might survive too.»
Rothschild’s rainbow eyes narrowed. «You’re going to inject them regardless of what I say, aren’t you?»
«I’m going to save them. What they become after that is their choice, not yours, not mine.» Waverly turned to Knox. «Ready?»
«We’ve been ready since Kandahar,» he replied, and 47 voices harmonized in his words.
Waverly moved to the first operator, Beckett, still conscious despite vitals that suggested he should be dead. The syringe found his vein easily, her transformed precision making the injection perfect. The serum entered his bloodstream and immediately began its work, not fighting the transformation but guiding it, giving it structure and purpose.
Beckett’s eyes shifted from human blue to that oil-slick rainbow. But unlike the chaotic transformation before, this was controlled. His breathing steadied. His muscles stopped their violent spasming. He looked at Waverly with eyes that held awareness, intelligence, self.
«I can feel them all,» he whispered. «Every operator. We’re connected but still ourselves.»
«Is this what you feel?»
«Every day,» Waverly admitted, moving to the next operator. «The connection to something larger, the awareness that you are part of an evolution you don’t fully understand.»
One by one, she injected the serum. Each transformation was unique but controlled. Each operator retained their sense of self while gaining something more. The networked consciousness that Knox had described became stronger with each injection, creating not a hive mind but a collective awareness: 47 individuals who could function as one when needed.
«This is incredible,» Hayes said from the floor, watching the transformations with the eye of a commander, seeing his troops become something beyond his imagination. «They’re not losing themselves. They’re becoming more.»
«That was always the possibility,» Maddox said. «I just thought it needed to be controlled, directed. I was wrong. Evolution doesn’t follow orders.»
Rothschild watched in silence as Waverly worked, her transformed eyes taking in every detail. When the last injection was complete, when 47 operators stood transformed but stable, she finally spoke.
«You’ve just changed the nature of warfare forever.»
«No,» Waverly corrected, setting down the empty syringe. «I’ve made warfare irrelevant. Why fight when you can evolve? Why destroy when you can transform? These operators aren’t weapons, General. They’re the future. And that future doesn’t need your wars.»
The laboratory fell silent except for the hum of machinery and the synchronized breathing of 47 transformed soldiers. The emergency lighting cast everything in shades of red and shadow, making the scene look like something from the end of the world—or perhaps the beginning of a new one.
If you’re still watching up to this point, you’re witnessing Waverly face an impossible choice: save the man who betrayed her or let justice take its course. Drop a scorpion emoji if you understand why revenge isn’t always the answer.
General Rothschild’s transformed eyes swept across the 47 operators, calculating odds and outcomes with inhuman precision. The silence stretched until it became a living thing, pressing against eardrums with the weight of unspoken threats.
«You think you’ve won something here,» she finally said. «You think you’ve created peace through evolution, but you’ve just painted targets on all their backs. Every government, every military, every corporation that learns about this will want them dissected, studied, replicated.»
«Then they’ll have to go through me,» Waverly replied, and her voice carried harmonics she hadn’t possessed an hour ago. The blood loss and stress had accelerated her own transformation, pushing her further from human baseline. «I’m not just Subject Zero anymore. I’m their template, their guide, their protector.»
«You’re one person.»
«No.» Knox stepped forward, and 46 operators moved with him in perfect synchronization. «She’s 48 people. We’re networked now, General. Not controlled, not commanded, but connected. What one knows, all know. What one feels, all feel. Try to take one of us, you take all of us.»
Rothschild’s hand moved to her sidearm with speed that normal eyes couldn’t track, but Knox was faster. His transformed hand caught her wrist before the weapon cleared its holster, his grip gentle but inexorable.
«That’s not gonna work anymore,» he said softly. «We’re beyond weapons now.»
«You’re beyond human,» Rothschild corrected, but there was something in her voice that sounded almost like envy. «Do you understand what that means? You can’t go home. You can’t return to normal life. You can’t pretend to be what you were.»
«We weren’t planning to,» Operator Beckett said, his newly transformed voice creating resonances with Knox’s. «We knew when we entered Purgatory that we might not come back the same. We just didn’t know we’d come back as something better.»
«Better?» Rothschild laughed, a sound that had too many tones to be human. «You’re weapons that refuse to be wielded, tools that think they have choice, evolution that believes it has conscience.»
«We’re the future,» Waverly said simply, «and you’re either part of it or you’re in the way.»
The general’s rainbow eyes fixed on her with an intensity that felt like being dissected. «You really don’t understand what you’ve done. The transformation isn’t just physical; it’s psychological, neurological, existential. These operators will never be able to integrate with normal society. They’ll always be others, always be apart.»
«Like you’ve been for how long?» Waverly asked. «How many years have you been hiding your transformation, General? How many years have you been pretending to be human while knowing you’re something else?»
Rothschild’s composure cracked slightly, a micro-expression that lasted nanoseconds but was visible to transformed eyes.
«Twelve years,» she said. «Twelve years since the first experiment. Twelve years of being the only one, of knowing I was the future but having no one to share it with.»
«And that’s why you created this program. Not for weapons, but for company.»
«Don’t psychoanalyze me, Subject Zero. I created this program because humanity needs to evolve or die. The biological weapons being developed worldwide aren’t just for killing. They’re for transformation, for rewriting the human genome in real time. In five years, maybe less, baseline humans won’t be able to survive on a modern battlefield.»
«Then why not transform everyone?» Hayes asked from where he lay, his wounds stabilized but his face pale from blood loss. «Why the secrecy, the black sites, the classification?»
«Because evolution is terrifying to those being evolved past,» Maddox answered, still restrained but following the conversation with keen interest. «Tell the world that humanity needs to change or die and they’ll choose death out of fear of change.»
«So you chose for them,» Waverly said. «Decided who would evolve and who wouldn’t, who deserved transformation and who would be left behind.»
«Someone had to,» Rothschild replied. «And now you’ve complicated everything by proving the transformation can be stable, networked, and voluntary. Do you know what happens when that information gets out?»
«People get a choice,» Waverly said. «Real choice. Evolve or don’t, but at least they know what’s coming.»
An alarm suddenly pierced the air, different from the previous warnings. This was an external breach—someone entering Purgatory from outside, multiple someones, based on the cascading alerts appearing on every screen in the laboratory.
«That would be my backup,» Rothschild said calmly. «Two full companies. If I don’t report in five minutes, they’re authorized to sterilize the entire facility.»
«Sterilize?» Hayes struggled to sit up. «There are people here, soldiers. There are transformed assets here.»
«By protocol, that makes this a containment situation. Either I walk out with control of the situation, or nobody walks out.»
Knox’s grip on Rothschild’s wrist tightened slightly. «You’d kill everyone, your own people.»
«I’d contain a biological breach that could destabilize global power structures. The needs of the many, Operator Knox.»
«The needs of the few who want to stay in power, you mean,» Waverly said, moving to the communication console. Her fingers flew across the controls with inhuman speed, accessing systems she shouldn’t know about, using clearances that had been revoked six years ago but somehow still worked. «Interesting. Your sterilization protocol requires confirmation from three sources. You, the facility commander, and the Secretary of Defense.»
«Who will absolutely provide it when informed of the situation.»
«Will he?» Waverly pulled up a secure channel, one that connected directly to Pentagon crisis management. «Let’s ask him.»
Before Rothschild could object, Waverly had activated the connection. The screen filled with the face of a man in his sixties, gray-haired and stern, sitting in what looked like a situation room.
«General Rothschild,» he said, then paused, seeing the scene in the laboratory. «What the hell is going on in Purgatory?»
«Mr. Secretary,» Waverly spoke before Rothschild could. «This is Subject Zero, also known as Waverly Thorne, former combat medic, current whistleblower. General Rothschild has been running an illegal transformation program, turning American soldiers into biological weapons without oversight or authorization.»
«That’s not—» Rothschild started.
«I have 47 witnesses,» Waverly continued, gesturing to the transformed operators, «all of whom were exposed to a biological agent without informed consent, transformed against their will, and are now being threatened with sterilization to cover up the program.»
The secretary’s face had gone pale. «General Rothschild, is this true?»
«It’s complicated, sir. The transformation was accidental. We were trying to contain…»
«She’s lying,» Maddox interrupted, speaking for the first time in minutes. «I have documentation, sir. Orders signed by General Rothschild authorizing the release of Tsar toxin. The whole thing was planned.»
«Maddox, you son of a…»
«I’m a lot of things, General, but I’m not going down for your program.» Maddox looked at the screen. «Mr. Secretary, I’ll provide full documentation in exchange for immunity. Everything about Project Prometheus, the transformation experiments, the plans for wider deployment.»
The situation room was filled with other figures, military and civilian, all watching the feed from Purgatory with expressions of growing alarm. Waverly recognized some of them from news broadcasts, others from classified briefings she wasn’t supposed to remember.
«Stand down all forces,» the secretary ordered. «No one enters or leaves Purgatory until I have a full understanding of the situation. General Rothschild, you are relieved of command pending investigation.»
«Sir, you don’t understand what’s at stake.»
«I understand that you’ve been experimenting on American soldiers. That’s enough for now.» His attention turned to Waverly. «Subject Zero, are the transformed operators stable?»
«Yes, sir. The transformation is complete and controlled. They retain full cognitive function and individual identity while gaining enhanced capabilities. They’re not weapons, Mr. Secretary. They’re evolved humans.»
«And what do they want?»
Waverly looked at Knox, who spoke for all of them. «We want to go home, sir. Different than we left, but still ourselves. Still soldiers if you’ll have us, but not weapons. Never weapons.»
The secretary was quiet for a long moment, processing implications that would reshape military doctrine for decades to come. «Can the transformation be reversed?»
«No,» Waverly answered honestly. «But it can be managed. They’ll need specialized medical support, psychological adjustment assistance, and gradual reintegration protocols, but they can have lives, careers, futures.»
«Lives as what?»
«As the bridge between what humanity was and what it’s becoming. They’re living proof that evolution doesn’t mean losing ourselves. It means becoming more than we were.»
