Dylo wasn't exactly sure what he'd woken up to.
The white, shimmering lights above momentarily blinded him as his line of vision staggered into focus. A legion of faint, muffled voices surfaced from all sides, but Dylo couldn't manage to pinpoint their locations. A vibrant layer of sweat cascaded from his ruffled, dirty mop of blond hair and down onto his freckled face. Impatiently, he waited for the consciousness to lethargically weave itself back into his body.
Slowly but surely, the numbness retreated from his limp muscles as his nerves began to wake up. His muddled mind followed in their footsteps, the harrowing memories cementing themselves into his fragmented psyche. The rate of his breaths quickened as he began to remember everything.
The Genodium explosion. The soldiers. Lance Porter.
Ajax.
His rapidly-beating heart now felt as if it would soon burst through his chest and onto his stomach. As he attempted to rub his sore temple, he was greatly displeased to find that his range of motion was inhibited. His bolstering blue eyes very nearly popped out of their sockets as they anchored themselves onto the thick, black leather straps restraining his limbs. They coiled around his arms and legs, preventing him from getting off of the hospital bed he was currently laying on.
At light speed, he cut his eyes over to the bearded man sporting a white lab coat.
"Where am I?" the boy asked rapidly, his words emerging from his lips so fast that it would be a miracle if the man could understand him. "Who the hell are you people?"
"This one's pretty jumpy. We might need to sedate him again." said a woman clutching a needle in one hand and a thin, small rectangular object in the other as she inches towards him. As she swiped a finger across the silver object, it expanded into a holographic, semi-transparent clipboard, emitting a low, mesmerizing hum. It looked like something out of a sci-fi movie.
"Sedate?!" Dylo shrieked as his eyes got even wider as he shook his head in protest. "Yeah, no. I don't know what that word means, but I don't like it."
The man closest to the hospital bed swiftly turned to him, putting his hands up non-threateningly. A scraggly, gray beard clung to his bony jawline as his silver, faded irises met those of the blond. "Dylo, just calm down. You're safe now-"
"Really? Because I don't feel safe. What hospital is this? Am I still in Colorado?" Dylo nervously spat out, narrowing his eyes at the man. The beeping heart rate monitor to the right of his bed only seemed to add on to his stress.
"Yes, Dylo, you're still in Colorado." the man chuckled, scratching his gruff beard. "I'm Elliott, by the way. Elliott Matthews. You can call me Dr. Matthews, Doc, or whatever you prefer to call me, really. Furthermore, this isn't a hospital, it's The Hall. Genesis Industries' central headquarters."
"Genesis?" Dylo snorted. "What, like the museum?"
"Well, not exactly." Matthews replied. "Think of the whole biotechnology thing as an outer layer. The tip of the iceberg, if you will. Underneath that iceberg is a global peacekeeping organization partnered with the United States government. We specialize in exterminating global threats that normal branches of the military can't handle, like the band of mercenaries responsible for abducting you and your friends."
Billions of thoughts plagued Dylo's overactive brain. The gears shifted inside his muddled mind as he struggled to make sense of it all. Before he could solve the puzzle fueling his train of thought, the gray door to the room was flung open. A stoic-looking man clad in a navy-blue business suit sauntered through the doorway, adjusting his charcoal-black tie as he made his way over to Dylo's bed. A cluster of neatened, dark stubble clung to his face.
Squinting, he could see the letter 'G' encapsulated within a small, silver circle on the left pectoral area of the man's suit.
"Nice to finally meet you, Dylo. Some of the researchers didn't think you'd wake up." the second man chuckled, ceasing motion at the foot of his bed as he flashed the blond a reassuring, welcoming grin. "My name is Elijah Callan, the current CEO of Genesis Industries. But you can call me Director Callan if that's more your speed. Anyways, you're probably wondering what in the world happened on that field trip of yours."
"Yeah, no kidding." Dylo replied, his mind beginning to settle down-but not by much. "How long have I been out?"
"You were in a coma for a little over two months."
Dylo blanched. Two months?
His shoulders slumped. Though school was the absolute last thing he was worried about, two months worth of missing assignments wasn't good for anybody-even if he did already have an 'F' in most of his classes. His uncle was surely going to have his head when he got back home.
Well, if he got back home.
"Well, why am I in these straps?" Dylo asked in an accusatory tone. "What happened to the others?"
"You'll be relieved to know that all of your friends made it out fine. Some haven't woken up yet, though." Callan chuckled as he eyes the straps restraining the boy. "And as for those straps on your bed, we thought they were a necessity to prevent you from moving around in your sleep-and we were right. You tend to do that a lot."
"You guys watched me while I was sleeping? How comforting." Dylo sarcastically stated. "So what, was I sleepwalking or something?"
"Eh, more so... sleep-running." Director Callan smirked, see-sawed his hand. "After our squadron of agents extracted you and your friends from Ajax's soldiers, we put you to bed at about ten o'clock. About five minutes later, though, we sent a nurse back to your room to monitor your vitals, and you were gone. We ended up finding you three wings over on the other side of the facility."
"But how's that possible?" Dylo asked, bewildered.
"After some extensive DNA tests and blood samples, when my researchers reported that Genodium was present in your systems, I had a pretty good feeling of what happened." Callan explained. "Genodium is a relatively new element, and according to it's molecular structure, it doesn't seem to be native to this planet. If exposed to abnormally high amounts of heat, it's molecular structure will compromise and become extremely unstable. In it's unstable state, the element seems to alter the genetic makeup of whatever living organism it comes into contact with."
"It seems that your changes occurred instantaneously when you were struck by the wave of Genodium. Your ACTN3 gene was mutated into a more... complex... variant. It now seems to produce vastly higher amounts of alpha-actinin-3-a protein that controls and fuels fast-twitch muscle fibers-than the average person's would."
"I'm just gonna pretend like I know what any of that means." Dylo replied, scratching his had as the nurses continued to unbuckle the straps on his bed.
As he got off the table, he felt much lighter than before, moving his body with ease. However, he still didn't believe what the doctor was saying. While he'd always been hyperactive, he'd never really been interested in sports or exercise, besides Parkour. While he wasn't skinny, he definitely was much more lean and slimmer when compared to his classmates. Though, whatever mutation he'd undergone had seems to put a little bit more muscle on him.
He followed him down the hallway, looking through the foggy windows, unable to make out what was on the other side of them. Eventually traveling down a dark, steep set of stairs, in which Dylo could barely see.
After the pair got down what seemed like an endless set of stairs, Dylo followed Dr. Matthews into a thin room, kind of like a hallway. It looked like it extended about five miles long. Within the room resided a long rubber track, which Dylo was obviously expected to run on.
"Take off your shoes, and put these on." Dr. Matthew said as he handed Dylo a pair of black shoes with yellow seams on them.
"Wait, hold on, you were actually serious about the running?" Dylo asked.
The doctor just stared at him with a blank expression plastered onto his face, which Dylo took as a sign to shut the hell up.
After he finally got the shoes on, Dylo then walked over to the pair of starting blocks set at the starting line.
As he got into a starting stance, ready to take off, Dr. Matthews gave him a pair of goggles with yellow lenses to protect the wind from getting into his eyes. Unknown to him, they also contained a tracker that would track his speed.
He strapped them on, ready to run.
"Ok, Dylo. What you're going to do for me, is sprint all the way to the other end of the hallway as fast as you can."
"You want me to sprint five miles? This is gonna take a while." Dylo sighed to himself as took a deep breath. As hyper as he was, the boy wasn't looking forward to this.
"On your mark, get set, go!"
Dylo took off.
The shockwave from his immense speed propelled the doctor onto his back as the boy accelerated down the track at hundreds of miles per hour.
Feeling the force of the wind rushing past him as he was running hundreds of miles per hour, Dylo's heart began beating incredibly fast as he realized that he was now moving at a breakneck velocity, and still accelerating.
The sound of his feet hitting the ground was warped as he began to travel so fast that the external world sounded like a high pitch scream. The world blurred around him as he kicked it up a notch, he himself becoming a blur of motion not long after.
But it still wasn't enough for him. He could go faster, and he knew it. So he did.
He could barely feel the contact between his feet and the ground as he began to become imperceptible, too fast for the doctor's eyes to perceive.
And then he felt it. He felt the heat. His body began moving too fast for the air molecules to get out of the way. As they rapidly rubbed against his body, they began to generate friction, which turned into heat, lighting Dylo's clothes on fire.
Panicking, he tried to slow down, but his momentum wouldn't let him. Speeding past the end of the hallway and through the wall, he tripped and fell, rolling a good distance before he completely decelerated.
Laying face up in the mound of concrete and wood, groaning in pain, Dylo's mind was still running, almost faster than he had been. Slowly getting up, he looked down at his ankle-which was now bent at an excruciating angle. He would've been screaming if not for the adrenaline suppressing the pain.
The doctor looked at his device in utter amazement.
"600! 600 miles per hour!" The doctor called in excitement, holding his speed-tracking device up in the air.
"Awesome." Dylo weakly replied, clearly injured as his broken ankle already began to heal. "Can I get a stretcher, please?"
#
About half an hour later, Dylo limped down the hallway, his broken ankle having partially healed. He opened the door to the lounge, as he saw the others in the room.
Kai ran up and gave him a hug. "Bro!" Kai exclaimed.
"Ow!" Dylo screamed as he felt his bones crush inside of his body. A burning pain flared up in his back as he tried his best to ignore it.
"Shit, sorry. Still trying to used to the super strength."
Dr. Matthews sat a tray on the table, with cups of water and sandwiches on top of it.
"Super strength?" Dylo asked, looking around the room. "You guys have powers too?"
"I do." Adam raised his hand. "I can...read minds, and apparently do some other things according to Dr. Matthews."
"This is awesome!" Dylo gushed as he held his head with his hands, a huge smile flashing across his freckled face.
"That Genodium affected you too, huh?" Kai asked.
"Yep. Hey guys, watch this!" Dylo zipped out of the room at over 200 miles per hour, returning to the other side of the door in just under a second, flying through the doorway. He would've gone faster, but his ankle was still healing.
"Holy shit." Amber said, astonished by Dylo's incredible speed.
"I just ran around the entire wing in under a second, and I was jogging." Dylo bragged, posting himself up against a wall as he smirked. "So, what can you two do?" He asked, pointing at Leo and Amber, eager to witness what powers they'd been given.
"We don't know yet." Amber murmured, "We don't even know if we have any abilities. I just want to get out of this weird place and go home."
"Hear anything about the others?" Kai asked,
"I saw Troy, on the table beside me. Fortunately, he was unconscious and locked in some kinda chamber so I couldn't smell his waffle breath." Dylo chuckled, holding his nose.
"Wait, what was that last part?" Adam asked.
"What? About his waffle breath?" Dylo asked.
"No, Dylo, about the chamber." Kai said, walking over to his friend, "What did it look like?"
"It was blue, and made of glass. It looked kinda thick, too, so I don't think he'd be able to get out. Thank god for that, am I right?"
"Dylo, this is serious. Can you remember what room you were in?" Kai sternly asked the boy.
"Yeah. It was room 133. Why?"
"Because I'm gonna break in and get him out of there."
"I'm sorry, I think my ears deceived me for a second there." Dylo said as he arched an eyebrow and rubbed his ears, thinking he'd heard his friend wrong. "Cause I could've sworn that I just heard you say you were gonna save Troy."
"You can't just go anywhere you want in this place." Leo stuttered out, getting up off of the couch. "It's crawling with agents."
"I've seen the agents up close before, and they're not all that. I can lift a truck. Plus, my skin can stop a bullet."
"Who cares? That still sounds like one hell of a risk, man. What if they have some kinda super-weapon that scrambles our brains?" Dylo advised. Kai shook his head. He never thought he'd hear the word "risk" from a person who acted solely on impulse.
"Well if they're coming for brains, you won't have anything to worry about." Kai jabbed, smirking slyly.
Dylo scowled. "I'm telling you, you're not thinking straight, dude. It's Troy." He remarked, thinking his friend was beginning to go crazy inside these walls.
As much as Leo hated Troy, he had to agree with Kai on this one. But there had to be another way to go about it. A less violent solution.
"Sure, he may be an asshole, but he doesn't deserve to get experimented on or die because of it." Kai said.
"Eh, that's debatable." Dylo whispered to himself, see-sawing his hand as Adam elbowed him in his shoulder. This new guy was really starting to get on his nerves.
Right at that moment, Dr. Matthews walked through the door with Troy and Bianca.
"Troy." Kai said, walking over to him. "You're alive."
Even though Troy was a dick most of the time, Kai was still relieved to know that he was still alive.
"Brandson?" He replied, furrowing his brow at the unfamiliar scenery. "Where the heck are we?"
"Genesis Industries, according to Dr. Phil over here." Dylo quipped, pointing at Dr. Matthews.
Parched, Amber walked over as she grabbed a cup of water from the tray, taking a huge gulp.
Dr. Matthews clapped his hands together. "Ah! At last, all of you are in the same room! Now I can tell you what's going on here. Well, partially."
"And who the hell are you, exactly?" Bianca asked, putting her hand on her hip. She wasn't exactly a fan of strange old men.
Dylo rolled his eyes. He didn't know what Kai saw in her, but eventually he'd realize that she was a complete asshole.
"Forgive me, Bianca and Troy. My name is Dr. Eliott Matthews, and welcome to Genesis Industries." He said. "Now, I know you have a lot of questions, and I'll answer them of course, but first, I need to tell you what happened last night, and why my team and I brought you here."
"Thank god. It's about time." Dylo exclaimed with relief as he sped over to the couch, materializing a millisecond later clasping his hands behind his head and laying down on the couch.
"It's only been five minutes, dude." Adam corrected.
"Wait, for real?" Dylo rapidly recoiled, his words spewing out of his mouth at lightning speed before the doctor interrupted him.
"Last night, the 7 of you were struck by a wave of Genodium, which in turn, altered your molecular structures in various different ways. For instance, Kai here has developed superhuman levels of strength, while Adam here has the ability to tap into other peoples brains, thus reading their minds."
"Hold up." Bianca rudely interrupted, "You actually expect me to believe that new kid here can read my-"
"Why are you thinking about Kai so much?" Adam asked, triggering a quiet snicker from Dylo.
Bianca turned around, wide-eyed and stunned at Adam's powers as her face began to blush. Everyone was looking at her, slyly smiling-even the doctor. She'd never thought that this kind of superhero stuff could be real, nor had it ever concerned her before today. "What the hell? Are you saying I'm some kind of freak?"
"Not a freak, an enhanced human." Dr. Matthews explained. "All of you have abilities that redefine what is humanly possible."
"Is there a reason for any of this? Like, why are we here, instead of any other hospital? When are we gonna see our families again?" Amber asked, beginning to panic, her heartbeat speeding up.
She was usually calm in these circumstances, but after she began thinking about her family-and whether she'd ever see them again-her mind began to slowly regress into crisis mode.
"All of your parents have been notified. This is where you'll be for the next few months, under our protection. I'll explain in due time-" The doctor tried to continue, but Amber cut him off.
"How do I know you're not lying?" Amber blurted out, raising her voice.
"Amber, calm down." Leo said, trying to comfort his newfound friend. He knew that look. The girl was having a panic attack. They'd learned about them in health class a few years ago, and he'd memorized all the symptoms. She was sweating, and had chills.
Naturally, he presumed that it had something to do with Bianca.
"I don't need to calm down, Leo!" Amber yelled, pushing the guy off her. "What I need are answers!"
Everyone froze, eyeing Amber as she went quiet.
"What? What the hell are all of you looking at me for?!" Amber asked angrily.
Leo pointed at Amber, his finger shaking in astonishment. "Uh, Amber?"
Amber looked down at what was originally the cup of water she was holding, which had now been frozen solid.
She dropped the cup in panic as she breathed heavily, witnessing the frozen object fall to the ground and smash into a plethora of fragments. Looking at her hands, she now noticed frost emulating from her fingertips. Her eyes turned from a dark blue appearance to a light bluish, almost glowing state.
Her body slowly growing heavy, and her skin growing cold, she began to fall to the ground as her eyes closed shut. Her head hit the ground with a thud as she fainted from disbelief, and Leo and the others rushed over to her.