|| Prologue ||
The DedSec engineer known as Wrench walked into Gary's Games & Glory, a small game store located just west of Mission Dolores Park, tucked away right in the middle of San Francisco, California, with a sleek silver laptop tucked under his arm.
His unique mask, spiked with a visual LED heads-up display for eyes, held a dull expression as he slipped somewhat unnoticed by the patrons of the store into the back, where the Hackerspace resided.
DedSec San Francisco's main base of operations.
Upon entering the Hackerspace, Wrench scanned the basement finding it exactly the same as it was when he left—walls covering every single inch of available space with Sitara's art, computers and technology and random computing parts scattered around like it was a free-for-all.
The first thing he noticed was Sitara and Marcus hovering over Josh's shoulders, who was sitting at the table on his laptop, furiously typing up string after string of code.
Raymond was sitting across from Josh, also hacking away at the ctOS 2.0 interface, the big bad guy DedSec was trying to take down for the betterment of the people.
They were probably going over some more of Marcus's ideas for dealing with Blume.
Everyone was present right in front of Wrench, all except for one person. Wrench's little brother, Spectre.
Walking over to his friends, Wrench's display switched to question marks as he looked around the Hackerspace, looking to spot Spectre.
"Wrench's back! How'd it go, man?" Marcus asked, his voice catching Wrench's eye. Noticing that his best friend had returned, he stood up and walked over to the spiked male, pulling him into a hug, which Wrench graciously accepted.
"Easy as pie, M." Wrench replied in his iconic, high-pitched, robotc-toned voice, holding the computer he had stolen out in front of Marcus's face.
"Hell yeah! This is perfect!" Marcus beamed, reaching for the laptop. Before he grabbed it, however, Wrench pulled it back out of Marcus's reach, his eyes flipping to exclamation points.
"Nu-uh!" Wrench barked, "We can't debrief 'till we're all here."
Marcus pulled back with a nod. "You right, you right."
"So, where's Spec?" Wrench asked, his kaomojis question marks. Josh perked up from his laptop, which was completely covered in hundreds of lines of code.
With a gesture of his thumb, he pointed to the desk Spectre started using when working on something, the one that used to be Horatio's.
Following where Josh was pointing to, Wrench saw his younger brother hunched over the desk, head buried in his tattooed arms, completely passed out.
"He fell asleep roughly an hour after you left." Sitara said. Wrench let out a hum, getting a mischievous idea as he sauntered over to his brother's sleeping figure.
Without warning, Wrench slammed his fist onto the desk, right next to Spectre's head, starting the young man awake. Spectre jolted up, his own display of red LEDs as exclamation points. Blinking, he turned to Wrench, his display slanting to an unamused picture.
"Hello, Wrench." He said with a hint of slurred venom, obviously not at all amused by his older brother's antics.
"Mornin' Little Bro! Sleep well?" Wrench coaxed.
Spectre yawned, "The fuck you think?" He replied in a similar, yet slightly deeper, modified voice to Wrench.
Wrench and Spectre were of a different breed. The two were similar in many ways, yet they were also as different as night was to day. It caused them to clash at times, a lot of times, but the bond they had as siblings was far too aged and strong to be damaged by petty bickering.
Wrench beamed brightly [^ ^]. "Good. Come on, it's time to brief!"
Spectre rolled his eyes under his mask, the LED kaomojis picking up the movement and mimicking it to the best of the ability they were programmed to do.
Spectre's mask was in the same wheelhouse as his brother's, regarding the fact it covered his face and used LED kaomojis to represent emotions, but instead of all the spikes that made up Wrench's mask, Spectre's design was more so that of a compact gas mask.
And, yes, the filters also worked as a gas mask would.
Following Wrench, the two brothers joined the others at the table. Once everyone was present, Wrench took the computer out from under his arm and slid it over to Sitara.
Sitara took a seat next to Josh, flipping the computer open in one fluid movement. She logged her way into the laptop, and in response it lit up with all the data Wrench had stolen from Blume.
"What do you see?" Raymond asked, looking up from his own laptop and downing the beer he had sitting on the table next to him.
Sitara's eyes scanned through the data, searching for anything incriminating she could put to use for DedSec's mission to end Blume and its ctOS 2.0. Suddenly, she stopped scrolling, her eyes wide.
"What is it?" Marcus questioned, being the one to first notice Sitara's surprise.
"Rempart," she said carefully, tasting the name she read off of Dušan Nemec's stolen files, "who's Rempart?"
"Are you referring to the jerk Thomas Rempart or his shitty company?" Spectre piped up.
He was sitting across from Raymond, not really paying attention as he was still trying to fully wake himself up. His LED "X's" blinked in sync with his real eyes, his blank gaze mirroring his absentminded presence.
"Uh, both." Sitara answered. "It goes on for quite some time about some kind of... Omega?" Sitara recoiled a bit, confusion ever so present on her face.
The word "Omega" caused Spectre to jump up straight, now fully alert. His head shot to Sitara, his display a mix between anger and shock. "Hold up, did you say Omega? Rempart has Omega?!"
Sitara, Josh, Marcus, Wrench, and Raymond all shared confused looks with one another before they all turned back to Spectre. "What is Omega? What do you know about it, Spec?" Marcus wondered, tilting his head.
Spectre seethed. "Omega was my work! My project! My tech! Rempart fucking stole from me?! Are you fucking with me?!" He shouted, enraged.
"Now just you hold on a fucking minute—what the hell are you going on about, Kid?" Raymond spoke.
Spectre took a breather, yet his fists were still tightly clenched in anger. Even though his hands were covered with a pair of black, fingerless gloves, it was obvious that Spectre's knuckles were whiter than a ghost judging on how his arms shook. With a sigh, he eased back into the chair, his display switching back to the neutral "X" kaomoji design.
"Omega was a project I was developing back before I even came to San Francisco—back when I still used to hang about London. Look, the semantics aren't important. What is, is that Omega was highly unstable. Hell, it still is! I just recently fixed the issue to where it would work without... y'know... eviscerating anything that came into mere contact with it." Spectre said with a sheepish wave of his hand.
"Shit," Sitara added, having gone back to go through the rest of the data. "It says in one of the dickwad's personal notes that he made a deal with Rempart—Project ANUBIS. They're planning to use Omega to mass produce something labelled... DISC?"
Both Wrench and Spectre shot up at the mention of DISC, their displays a pair of matching exclamation points. "No! No, no, no, no, no! He can't be fucking serious!" The two brothers shouted at the same time, surprising the other DedSec members.
Spectre then started pacing, nearly tripping over the chair he had been sitting in, looking as if he were about to have another one of his episodes. Wrench shook his head, having a hard time believing Sitara's words.
"Wrench? Spec? What's wrong? What's DISC?" Marcus asked, reaching out and placing his hand on his spiked mate's shoulder.
"DISC is a nightmare. A fucking insane dream that tried to turn people into these walking, overpowered, super-soldier-robot-death-machine things. DISC forcefully embeds itself into your spine, then connects itself to your nervous system. Over the course of eight or so years, it begins to slowly replace every single molecule of your DNA with its nanobots. The bots can then change your molecular structure into fucking anything. It was supposed to be a limitless improvement to the human race!" Wrench began explaining.
Raymond narrowed his eyes at the older masked engineer. "Supposed to?" He prompted for an explanation.
Wrench sighed, glancing back to Spectre who was still pacing, muttering something under his breath as his mask kept cycling through its kaomojis, reflecting the young hacker's conflicting thoughts.
"There was just one price to pay that turned the project on its head, and caused it to be cut from funding... never ending tormenting pain that consistently comes in the forms of episodes, progressively getting worse depending on how many modifications one has made to themselves using DISC. There's no way to predict the episodes, nor is there a way to stop them." Wrench continued in a tone so serious it concerned the others, as they rarely heard the sporadic masked anarchist speak like that.
"Jesus," Raymond growled, turning his attention back to his beer, trying to drown the many possible images that began invading his mind.
"Nanobots don't seem all that cool anymore..." Josh muttered uncomfortably.
Sitara put her hand on his back, patting it in condolence. "Wrench," she began softly, trying her best to soothe Josh, "how do you know so much about this DISC?"
Wrench looked down, his mask playing his sombre expression. "...Personal experience." He said, no emotion in his voice. He looked back to Spectre again as he said so, a brief overwhelming feeling of shame washing over him.
He remembered the day like it was yesterday. Watching his parents using his newborn baby brother as a science experiment made him feel sick. He had to become the only sane thing in Spectre's life. Maybe that was where most of Spectre's... colourful personality developed.
When you had a shitty pair of parents like the ones Wrench and Spectre had, sanity was stripped away at such an early age—almost like it never even existed in the first place.
Marcus's eyes widened in horror as he looked over to Spectre. The red-eyed male was still pacing, one of his gloved hands was fidgeting with the small, dangling black cross earring that hung from his right ear as the other played with the seam of his black ripped jeans.
His mask continued to cycle through its kaomojis, the lights around the rims of the gas filters flowed like a glowing river of blood.
"You don't mean..." Marcus stopped himself, the thought was too sickening for him.
Wrench shook his head, burying his emotions like he normally did, another trait he and his brother shared—at least when Spectre wasn't having an episode.
"We can't let Dušan and Rempart get away with this. They'll ruin thousands of more lives a million times faster than they could with ctOS. I don't know much about Spec's Omega, but I know enough about DISC to know we can't let them go through with this."
Marcus nodded. "You're right, so what do we do?"
"We go and we destroy Tommy's knockoff of my Omega—we burn DISC to the ground! Or blow it up! Or! O-Or we smash it into itty-bitty pieces and throw them in the ocean! Then we fucking nuke the servers an-a-and delete everything!" Spectre panicked.
"You know that's not possible. With tech like this, Blume's definitely made backups or clones of the servers or something." Josh replied quietly.
He never liked it when either of DedSec's anarchist pair yelled in outburst about one thing or another.
"Kid's right. The only thing you'd accomplish is barely a setback." Raymond added.
"I-I... I don't fucking care!!" Spectre shouted, right on the verge of panic. Wrench then walked over to his brother, pulling the smaller male into a comforting hug.
He could feel Spectre trembling, his emotions getting the better of him.
He never was able to teach Spectre how to deal with them properly, so he taught Spectre the only thing he could—how to suppress them. It worked, sort of, but Wrench knew it wasn't healthy for either of them.
He hated how many times he'd seen Spectre fall into panic, or how many times he had to deal with DISC acting up the way it just loved to do.
He hated having to see his little brother like this, but at least he knew how to ease a tiny bit of Spectre's burden. That was about the only part he was good at at the big brother job.
After a moment or so, Spectre eventually calmed down. He pulled away from Wrench, but didn't push back too far, just in case.
"I know it won't accomplish much, or it may not even do a damn thing. But it does give us time. It should. More time to come up with a plan to stop Blume, to take this Project ANUBIS down, put DISC in the dirt for good. When we stop Blume, hopefully Rempart dies alongside it and Dušan and ctOS. If not, then that's who DedSec will go after next. Just... trust me on this. Please." Spectre begged.
Marcus went over, giving his good friend a reassuring pat on the back. "We do trust you, Spec. That's why the two of us are gonna light up this ANUBIS party. We're gonna burn it to ash, my friend."
Spectre's mask held a hopeful look. "You mean it, M?"
"Of course he means it! We all want to burn Blume to the ground and send Hipster Dick to hell. This just gives us the perfect reason to rough him up—another reason to do what we do best." Sitara hummed. Josh and Raymond nodded in agreement.
Spectre smiled under his mask, his kaomojis mirroring his cheered-up gaze. "Now, c'mon," Marcus mused, his arm flinging across Spectre's shoulders, "let's go blow some Blume shit up!"
──── 𖤐 ────
It was Marcus and Spectre out in the field, stalking outside a main Blume interface building. Ever since Marcus joined the Bay Area DedSec a few months ago, the missions became more fun and far more active to Spectre.
With Marucs's help, DedSec was actually able to make a difference. So now, it was pretty common for Spectre to tag along with Marcus, the two blowing up all that they could and sabotaging Blume and the other corrupt corporations of San Francisco, whilst also getting to spread awareness of DedSec and allowing its name to reach the stars.
Although, for now, they decided to keep the situation with Omega and DISC, Project ANUBIS, out of the public eye.
It wasn't something that they should even be poking at in the first place, let alone sending San Francisco into panic or inspiring someone else to try and revive DISC.
"This is the place?" Marcus asked quietly as Spectre pulled the WKZ-TV news station van Wrench had "borrowed" a few days ago around the side of the building.
Spectre shrugged. "These are the coordinated Sitara sent to my Optik." He replied.
Despite it being relatively dark out, the presence of the van hadn't caught the attention of Blume security. They probably thought the station was just grabbing footage for some story about the company or something, which meant that it gave the two DedSec operatives the element of surprise.
Perfect.
Spectre parked the red van, shifting in his seat so that he was facing the windscreen Marcus sat in front of. Marcus could practically see the anxiety radiating off him, a striking contrast to his charmingly anarchic personality.
"Hey, Spec, it's gonna be alright." Marcus said, briefly taking Spectre's attention away from the mission at hand. "We've done worse things. Besides, doing this is going to save hundreds—maybe even thousands—of lives."
Spectre gave a weary nod, not meeting Marcus's amber eyes. He then let out a shaky breath, his words trying to reassure him just like Marcus. "You're right M. This is—it'll all be over soon."
Marcus smiled, chuckling heartily. "That's the spirit! Hey, how 'bout this, after we go in there and fuck up all we can on Project ANUBIS, you and me go out for a drink.
Spectre's display lit up with a coy wink [~ ^]. "Is that a drinking contest you're challenging me to, Sir Holloway?" Spectre teased, Marcus's plan on distracting him being a welcoming success.
Marcus playfully punched Spectre in the arm. "Hey, I'm gonna kick your ass this time, Sir Spectre." He copied.
Spectre just laughed. No one in DedSec had been able to outdrink him before Raymond joined—he was the only one who could not only keep up with Spectre, but could easily beat him in any drinking game or contest. It was honestly impressive.
DISC prevented Spectre from getting completely shit-faced pissed, but he was thankfully not entirely immune to the wondrous effects of alcohol.
"Are you two done spatting? We have a job to do." Sitara voiced over the DedSec Channel.
Marcus rolled his eyes, turning back around in his seat to observe the Blume building that sat in front of him. There was barely any form of security around the outside of the building—in fact it was as empty as the desert. It made an uneasy feeling bubble in Marcus's gut.
"See anything?" He asked. Spectre leaned forward, looking out of the same windscreen as Marcus.
Reaching up to his temple, he tapped the side of his Optik, and then a small, holographic display popped up over the right eye of his mask. He then brought up his left arm as this blue holographic computer-like gauntlet shimmered to life around his arm, displaying the camera feed Spectre hacked his Optik into.
He called the device Gauntlet, because of course he did.
"That's... odd..." Spectre mumbled. According to the security cameras, there weren't any guards inside the building either.
"What do you see?" Wrench asked over the DedSec Channel. He was in the Hackerspace with Josh, Sitara, and Raymond, being the backup and information sources for Marcus and Spectre.
"I see about maybe... five guards on the cameras—none of which are human." Spectre answered.
Marcus pulled his handgun out of his bag, checking to make sure it was loaded and ready. "Guess we're doing this the hard way then."
Spectre tapped his Optik again, dispersing the overlay and shutting off Gauntlet. As he did, Marcus reached back to the seat behind him, grabbing Spectre's trusty sledgehammer, being careful to not prick himself on any of the sledgehammer's spikes that sparked with crimson-red electricity as he handed Sir Shatter the sledgehammer to Spectre.
Spectre took Sir Shatter from Marcus's hand with a knowing smirk toying at his lips. "Oh, M, you've just made my day."
Marcus chuckled. "Let's go kick some ass."
The two DedSec operatives stealthily broke their way into the Blume building. Due to the lack of a silencer on Marcus's gun, it was up to Spectre to silently take down the opposing robotic forces that got in their way. They only came across two of Rempart's robotic security bots before they made it to the main server room where the information on Project ANUBIS was undoubtedly being kept.
"Did that seem easy to anyone else?" Marcus commented, kneeling down and getting straight to work on hacking the main ctOS terminal for the Project ANUBIS data. "Don't jinx us, man!" Spectre snapped, keeping watch with Sir Shatter at the ready.
Just as Marcus was finished uploading the data-grabbing virus, the terminal suddenly shut down. But it wasn't just the terminal Marcus was using, it was all of them. The techy maze of servers fell into a dark, barely illuminated void.
"Marcus - happen - you - okay-?" Sitara tried, but her voice came out as glitchy and incomprehensible, like someone was jamming any incoming transmissions.
Spectre's display automatically dimmed so as to not give away their position. He also lowered Sir Shatter, as the red sparks that flew off of the mallet was being a bit of a giveaway. The initial blackout caused his kaomojis to flash to exclamation points before they cycled to question marks as he looked to where Marcus should still be at his side, although he wasn't entirely sure since it was impossible to see anything.
"What happened? Did you do something??" Spectre whisper-shouted.
Marcus pushed himself away from the terminal, making sure his mask was still in place as he jumped to his feet. "I didn't do anything! I've done this hundreds of times before! I think it's a set-up!" He quietly barked back.
Then, the building's overhead lights suddenly switched on, temporarily blinding the two. Marcus grabbed his gun, standing back-to-back with Spectre. The two operatives were on high alert, preparing themselves for anything and everything.
As they tried to find the reason behind the blackout - since things were beginning to play out like a cheesy action movie revealing the big plot twist - Marcus felt a swift, sudden prick to the side of his neck, like a mosquito bite. He let out a shallow, surprised hiss, his hand clasping around the "bite."
"Marcus?" He heard Spectre call his name as the world around him started going trippy. He felt dizzy and very close to passing out. With Spectre distracted over his concern for Marcus, Marcus could only vaguely make out the hulking figure that stalked behind his masked, sledgehammer-wielding partner.
Marcus tried to warn him, but the words refused to flow out. The figure wrapped his massive arms around Spectre's neck and waist, surprising Spectre into a panic. He thrashed around in the figure's arms, yet nothing he did even phased the figure, for he was just far too strong.
Marcus saw blacks spots in his vision, finally realising what had happened to him. He'd been drugged! He forced himself to stay conscious, however it seemed like the more he struggled, the faster his body began to fail him.
The last thing he saw before succumbing to the darkness around him was Spectre falling limp in their attacker's arms.
────𖤐────
THUD.
Marcus felt something impact with the ground, although he could tell that it wasn't him. He felt his heartbeat quicken, beating against his chest as he remembered what had happened.
"Gah!"
He heard someone spat out in pain, someone familiar to Marcus. The memory of Spectre's attacker flooded back into his mind, filling Marcus with worry.
Although, the worry of the figure wasn't the reason behind his immediate concern.
He couldn't see.
He couldn't breathe.
He couldn't move.
It was freaking him out.
As quick as the feelings came, a rush of air bloomed in Marcus's lungs, clawing at his throat. It felt as if he had almost drowned. He gasped, falling into a coughing fit that he did his best to silence. There was a bright light above him, and the ground beneath him felt cold, like he was laying on metal.
"Must you do this now, Rempart? Why couldn't you have gotten that brute of yours to do this for you instead?" Marcus heard the voice of the biggest dickhead in San Francisco - Dušan Nemec himself.
"I know, I know - but this is personal, Dušan. You see that look on his pathetic face? Fucking priceless." A new voice that Marcus couldn't recall replied. Judging by Dušan's words, it was most likely the Thomas Rempart character Spectre loathed so much.
"This could get us into a lot of trouble. It could jeopardise ANUBIS as a whole." Dušan said back. His tone was unsettlingly cold, lacking its usual annoying cockiness. Marcus then heard what sounded like a fist colliding with a body, followed by the supposed body hitting the ground.
"Why do you even care if a punk like this dies anyway, Dušan?" Rempart retorted. Dušan scoffed, "I don't. But he is DedSec. And that other one? He's DedSec too."
Rempart let out a hum. "DedSec? Oh, that group of Hacktivists you can't get to fuck off your ass? The ones also fucking about HAUM and Nudle?"
Dušan nodded. "Ones that won't hesitate coming after you if you kill two of their operatives."
"You're talking like you know them." Rempart accused. "You're the one insisting on beating a young man to death - I'm just using my common sense here." Dušan countered.
Rempart laughed. "Man, what they say about you is true, isn't it? You have a thing with words... but, fine, fuck it. This is your city anyway. Can we begin yet? You don't know how long I've been waiting to stick it to this masked freak."
"Soon, Rempart. Patience is a virtue," Dušan said. He then walked over to Marcus, who felt the Blume CEO standing above him. Dušan kneeled down, poking Marcus in the ribs. "Wakey wakey, Holloway. I know you're faking it."
Marcus pulled away from Dušan, sitting up. He was tightly bound by the wrists and legs, and he was missing all of his gear. Marcus's amber eyes locked with Dušan's grey-blue ones. The ravenette with a man bun held a smile as he stood, waving Marcus's handgun in front of his face, toying with him.
"Welcome, Mr. Holloway. So glad you could finally join us. Now it's a party." He said. Marcus glanced around the room with his eyes, not moving his head. He was in some sort of large laboratory, the walls covered in blinking lights and exposed parts. It looked sort of like a giant testing chamber of sorts, or the lair of a Bond Villain.
"Maybe you'll be more cooperative than your partner was?" Rempart's voice stole Marcus's attention. He snapped his head over, taking in Rempart's profile. He looked like another stuck-up businessman, despite the few droplets of crimson blood that spotted his cheek.
Unlike Dušan - who liked to look more like a creepy hipster than the businessman of one of the most powerful corporations in America with his black hair pulled back in a man bun and the fact he was always wearing some sort of tracksuit or yoga outfit - Rempart was really good at pulling off the manchild who stole all of Daddy's money look, especially in that grey pinstripe suit he was wearing.
His hair was a darkish brown colour, neatly gelled in place. His skin was tan, although it was more of a natural one than some fake spray tan or an augmented one. He had a coy smirk on his face, not seemingly bothered by the blood droplets that kissed his lips as he stared at Marcus with these brown eyes that were just full of malicious intent.
As Marcus observed Rempart's character, he noticed something in his bloodied hands, which were raw at the knuckles, like he had been punching something hard relentlessly. Rempart easily realised where Marcus's gaze was lingering, so he decided to take the opportunity to try and... persuade the young hacker.
Rempart waved Spectre's lifeless, crimson-stained mask in front of Marcus. Marcus's eyes widened in shock before he glared at Rempart, seething in anger. "Like I said - care to be more cooperative?" Rempart repeated, gesturing to something on the ground near the three of them.
Marcus reluctantly followed Rempart's gesture, his heart dropping at what he saw. It was Spectre, curled up in a ball, trying to hide himself from the gaze of the two tech CEOs and Marcus. His figure was shaking, his arms covered in blood that obscured the tattoos of his arms, staining his pale skin. There was also a small puddle of blood that started pooling under him.
Marcus felt his anger boil up inside of him. "What the fuck did you do to him?!" Marcus growled at Rempart. Rempart shrugged toyingly, tossing Spectre's mask to the ground. The life of the mask was missing with the lack of expressive kaomojis and the river-like glow around the rims of the filters. Spectre winced at the sound of his mask hitting the ground, flinching once again as he felt the mask brush up against his arm, expecting another punch or kick to follow.
"I'm just simply teaching an old colleague of mine what happens when you fuck me over." Rempart mused fondly.
Marcus tried to untie his bondings, wanting nothing more than to pound Rempart's face into mush. As he tried to hook his thumbs into the knot of the rope around his wrists, it felt as if his body was lagging behind what his mind was telling it to do, like a slow-responding computer.
"Don't push yourself, Holloway," Dušan piped up from the terminal up ahead that was hooked up to the massive portal-like thingy that Marcus didn't notice before. It looked ominous and opposing, then again so was everything else in this red-tinted, futuristic-esque Bond Villain laboratory thing. "Your body is still processing the ATP out of your system. With it still in your bloodstream, you risk the chance of it killing you when you struggle." Dušan continued.
Marcus stopped struggling against the bonds, unwillingly taking Dušan's advice to stop the dizziness. He looked back to Spectre, who looked to be even weaker now than he did a moment ago. He still kept his head buried in his bloodied, scarred, pale tattooed arms, but his body seemed to be too weak to be as tense as it was before.
"What the fuck is wrong with you?!" Marcus demanded.
"This is just how life is, Holloway. When bugs get in your way, well, everyone knows that you just have to squash 'em. That's what your "friend" here is. An insect just begging to get squashed." Rempart replied, as if he were stating a fact.
He then walked over to Spectre, kicking him in the ribs. Spectre silently hissed out, his voice failing him as he rolled onto his back. Rempart stood over him, unintentionally kicking Spectre's mask over to Marcus as he grabbed Spectre by the collar of black and red DedSec hoodie, forcing Spectre to look into Rempar's greedy, bloodlust-filled brown eyes.
Marcus hadn't ever seen Spectre's face before - he respected his friend too much to be pushy. Spectre looked practically identical to how Wrench does, from what Marcus remembered Wrench looking like under the mask after the incident with Dusan and the FBI, which Marcus should've expected considering Spectre and Wrench were related by blood.
Spectre's face was a lot softer than Wrench's as his facial shapes weren't as defined like the ones his brother had. However, Spectre definitely shared very similar characteristics. Like Wrench, Spectre also had a large wine-red birthmark / scar along the left side of his face, although it was positioned a bit differently. It crept up from his neck, cupping his jaw and crawled up his cheek until it kissed the edge of his emerald green eye.
There was a newfound bleeding gash across the bridge of his nose along with a matching one on his right temple, dripping blood into his eye. His lip was busted, the blood trickling down his jaw, swimming down his neck and staining his chest red.
Rempart smirked, shoving Spectre back to the ground as he stood back up, walking over to Dušan's side. Spectre let out a soft hiss as his head smacked the ground thanks to Rempart's shove. "We could've accomplished this together! But you just had to be selfish, didn't you, Seth?"
Spectre visily tensed at the mention of his name. He looked away from Rempart, unable to bring himself to make eye contact with anyone present. He felt too ashamed of himself to even look at Marcus.
He then sighed, forcing himself to look at Rempart and Dušan. As he did, Marcus silently grabbed Spectre's mask, hiding it behind his back. Spectre then exhaled shakily, staggeredly getting himself to sit up. Marcus could see the pain in Spectre's eyes, hiding behind a glossy facade of forced bravery. Marcus could see right through it, though.
Spectre was terrified.
"Y-You can't go through with this, Rempart!" Spectre then spoke, his real voice, the one he hid away with his voice modulator, took Marcus by surprise. It was a lot deeper than Marcus would have ever guessed, yet it fit Spectre's appearance far too well. He sounded like someone who had just woken up with that groggy morning voice, one that also sounded strong and fierce like a soldier.
"Your tech isn't stable! Omega won't react well with DISC - it barely reacts well to itself! You have to stop before you kill us all!"
"See, that's where you're wrong. We took all the necessary precautions. We improved upon your shitty design, especially with the unwilling participation from one Miss Skye Larsen of BrocaTech. Isn't that right, Bagley?" Dušan announced, activating his unstable version of Omega.
The room shook violently as the sci-fi movie portal thing began powering up. "All systems are functional, Mr. Nemec, sir." The voice of Larsen's AI Bagley replied from the laboratory's PA system.
Rempart smirked devilishly. "It works! YES! We're one step closer to achieving the power of Project ANU-" he was suddenly silenced by the shaking of the laboratory growing far more violent, plus the alarms started wailing.
"System failure. Something's wrong." Bagley warned.
Using Spectre's mask, Marcus freed himself from the ropes and rushed over to his friend, helping Spectre up by supporting him as he stood. He was leaning heavily on Marcus, not having the strength to support himself on his own.
"Marcus? What are you doing?! You need to get the hell out of here!" Spectre hissed out. Marcus hastily handed Spectre back his mask. "What?! No, fuck that - we're leaving together!"
Spectre shook his head, hooking his mask back onto his face. Sensing his features, the mask flared to life, cycling through its kaomojis before settling on the default "X's," the rest of the lights flaring up as well.
"There's no time, Marcus," Spectre began, his voice once again altered, "I have to finish this. Besides, if it does end up exploding, I have a better chance of surviving it than you do, so just go, Marcus!"
Marcus swore as he turned to leave, noticing his things as well as Spectre's sledgehammer and his DedSec crossbody that had all of his gear, his battle bag as he called it, resting by the exit. It was definitely a stupid move on Dušan and Rempart's part to leave the belongings of the hacker pair nearby.
Grabbing his things, he pulled his own mask over his nose as he grabbed Sir Shatter from the wall. "Spec!" Marcus called, catching Spectre's attention. Spectre looked over just as Marcus kicked Sir Shatter and his battle bag over to him.
Spectre beamed. "Thanks, M! Now get the fuck outta here already!"
"Kick some ass, Spectre!" Marcus cheered on before rushing out of the building to get to safety. He didn't want to leave Spectre alone back there in the state he was in, but if it was true that Spectre really did have DISC, then he'd have a much better chance at holding his own against an explosion than Marcus would've.
"Care for a dance, Sir Shatter?" Spectre quipped, bouncing his sledgehammer in his hands.
As he charged forward through Dušan's gunfire, ANUBIS reached critical. Just when he brought Sir Shatter down onto the stolen Bagley mainframe connected to the sci-fi portal thingy after pushing past Dušan and Rempart, everything went bright as the Blume building exploded due to Omega's unstable nature.
Marcus had just exited the building as it caved, the shockwave sending him flying into the side of the WKZ-TV van. His body collided harshly with the side of the van, his head spinning from the impact. His ears were ringing as he tried his best to grasp his bearings.
His eyes widened in horror as he looked over and saw the Blume building up in flames, smoke billowing up into the heavens above.
"SPECTRE!! NO!!!"