//------------------------------// // Chapter Three // Story: Mismatched // by Paradox Wolf //------------------------------// 'Shit!' I yell mentally as I run my hands through my brown hair and sprint down the white and metallic hallways. 'I'm fuckin' late!' Be me, Alan Vincent, head of Recon and Intelligence of corporation forces late for a rare and extremely important with my colleagues and most importantly the director. 'Bro is gonna have my ass for this!' Rushing past both scientists, guards and displaced civilians to the deeper parts of the facility where less and less people were found. Soon the metal walls turned gray as cement went to full on bunker material as I traveled deeper and deeper. To mock me, the intercom came on with a message straight from the director himself. However it wasn't the director who spoke. "Mr. Vincent, would you be so kind as to get YOUR ASS IN HERE!" "Fuck you Willis!" Even though I knew he didn't hear me, It felt good to tell him to stfu. But as fate would have it, he somehow managed to hear me. "NO FUCK YOU!" "No You!" "ARRRGGGHHHHHH!" He lets out a battle cry but relents as the intercoms go silent. He was a fuckin' prick, Willis was. Always screaming and talking about how we should take are jobs more seriously. Fuck man, I know we're trying to save the world but take a chill pill bro. The large metal gate with black and yellow warning markers on it came into view. This gate standing almost eighteen feet high with a thickness of twelve inches. Two automatic A.I. controlled machine guns sit in front of the door. These guns reminiscent of the old world guns shot .50 cal bullets lined with unstable chemical X to stop most experiments in their tracks. And regular humans would be ripped to shreds. I quickly whip out my key card as the guns lock on to me. Luckily they would not attack humans but I always have my key card ready just in case they ever had a reason too. The doors begin there slow opening as I pull out a pocket mirror to check my appearance. A yellow sweater with the official Corporation badge of a green shooting star and some basic khaki's. God I hate them, why won't they just let me wear my regular cargo pants. My hair is a little disarrayed but its short so it shouldn't be too much of a problem. The holster at my side contains no handgun as I forgot it again. I should be fine. Hopefully. As I begin to walk through the now open gate with a wooden door behind it a familiar voice yells out to me. "Mr. Vincent hold the gate please!" I turn around and see Doc, the head of medical research and the hospitals here. He wore your standard egg head lab coat and had a pair of reading glasses on his face despite not needing them. His black hair and blue eyes did manage to catch the eyes of many ladies but most would turn away when they talked to him. He uses a lot of big words when talking to people he doesn't know."Thank you, I see I wasn't the only one who had important things to attend to but if I may ask, what held you up?" "Recon Strategy Analysis..." I blurt out as memories of what I really was doing fill my head. I sit in my room on the bed staring into the TV with a controller in my hands. I carefully aim my gun at a man about to spot me but right as the sleeping dart hits him he lets out the iconic alert noise that I love oh so much. "Man I love the metal gear games even though its pre-world stuff." "Yes... Recon Strategy Analysis, I was taking into consideration new stealth tactics." "Oh I see, tell me one of these new tactics you came up with." "Classified... But I can tell you it involves boxes." "Boxes?" "Well we should probably start heading in, don't won't to make Willis any more mad than he already is." I brace myself as I grab the knob to the wooded door and open to see... That everyone was not here yet. Well, director Zigmal and adviser Willis were in here but besides that everyone had not shown up yet. "Wait where is everyone?" Willis was quick to answer my question in a very disgruntled tone. "They will arrive soon when the meeting officially starts." Steve Willis was a blonde haired man who was both strong and smart. He was clever and rarely made a bad tactical decision. "What?" "It starts in an about half an hour; I just told you the wrong time because I knew you would do this." "Hey I'm early if what you're saying is true!" "You were suppose arrive an hour ago!" "Fuck you!" "No FUCK YOU!" "SILENCE! You two really shouldn't be bickering in front of the director like this. Act like the respectable adult I know you can be Willis." "Hey what about me?" "I rather not tell lies if I have too." "Oh fu-" The wooden door slams open and a middle aged brown haired woman walks in with a golden retainer behind her. Dr. Moria Brown, a short tempered woman who ran most of the corporations chemical x development alongside being the head of research for the experiments. "Ah, I see you have taken initiative in arriving early for once Mr. Vincent. I'm sure your brother will be pleased to hear of this when he arrives." She walks past everyone to a seat in front of the directors desk leaving the retainer looking around kinda confused. This retainer was golden yellow with a white underbelly and a small red heart on the left side of his chest. One eye is blood red while the other is a blinding yellow if stared into for too long. He stood about as tall as half a normal human height. "Mr, Everest come sit next to me." The director finally spoke as the retainer took an awkward seat on a chair across from the director. "Ahh, so this him I presume Dr. Brown?" "Yes Director, I beli-" "Please wait for all of the others of the inner circle to show up before explaining. I hate hearing things twice." "Yes Director." With the Director going back to his silent stage all of the others followed suit and went about waiting for the others to show up. But curiousness kicked in as glances and curious stares were made towards the nervous retainer that stayed silent and moved around uncomfortbly. Luckily the retainer was given a break as three new occupants entered the room, two of which being retainer Captains. Mark Johnson, Head of the recovery team who was currently over tasked with amount of escapees they had to track down. Tall and strong with a buzz cut to boot. His eyes blood red from Chemical X contamination at a young age and extreme pale skin with constant chemical X decay coating his left making him stronger in the substance but weakening the rest of his body. He was a strange man who was both deadly and effective at his job. Such job making sure that any and all experiments make their way back home to the corporation. At his side were the experiments Z-002 and B-008, two out of the four current retainer captains who were loyal to the corporation for some reason or another. Z-002, otherwise known as Privolva was of the Lupus variant of the experiments. A near complete black coat of fur cover her with the end of her tail being red and green. Her eyes immediately fall onto the other experiment in the room before returning to a neutral, straight forward stare. The other experiment, B-008, known to his own kind as Ember. Was the more dangerous of the two suited more for combat. Ember being of the Vulpine variant and a good bit taller than Privolva nearing human height. He is a bright orange with several traces of green along his coat; his eyes are also green. "Dr. Moria, care to explain why there's a unknown experiment in here with us?" Asked Mark as he stared down the experiment who instinctively flinched back from the man. "I'll explain once everyone is here Mr. Johnson, as ordered by our grand Director." B-008 had now taken notice to the other experiment and unlike Z-002 made his way over to the strange retainer. "You're certainly different from the others." He spoke as he sniffed near the other retainer. "Your scent is almost entirely human. Strange." "B-008, please refrain from approaching him. He is rather jumpy in this state." "Yes ma'am." He quickly responded as he retreated into an corner of the room near Alan. "Well I might as well get this out of the way but the others won't be joining us as recent complications have come up." The director spoke in his nonchalant tone. "Both Dr. Alan and Dr. Heart are caught up making sure the facility doesn't explode. While Anderson and the other Vincent try and set up defenses from large scale attacks." "Large scale attacks sir?" Asked Mark. "Base defenses should be enough, what else is there besides a few unorganized experiments running around." "As observant as always Mr. Johnson, as of today we face a great many threats." Answered Willis as he started to hand out papers with a new strange creature on it. "The portal worked some what despite being tampered with during the escape." "What do you mean somewhat?" Dr. Moria chipped in finally doing away with her papers for the new ones. "Everyone's here right?" "Out of the three billion humans left on earth, only 982,232 survived. More than half that number is currently suffering from heavy Chemical X poisoning." The room immediately went silent as they flipped through the papers with horrified looks; even the normally calm Privolva was shocked at the mass loss of life. Ember couldn't care less. "Not only that but Z-001 has managed to rally her forces against us creating a rather dangerous threat." "We still outnumber them and have the firepower to counteract their powers. If we somehow re contain Z-001 they'll fall apart and it will be easy pickings. All we need to do is send in A-001 to weaken her down." "That brings up another problem, Aether is in critical condition with his wounds healing very slowly." "What happened to Aether?!" Yelled Privolva still shocked at the news. "If he goes down we have nothing that can keep her at bay!" "But Z-001 doesn't know that. And it will stay that way until A-001 manages to recover." The director chimes in. "But they are not the main concern." "Then what is?" "The small horses and other races of this world are our main concern." "..." (Literally everyone in the room) "Uh, I could run a medical exam on you Director if you're feeling a bit ill." Doc was the first to speak as the room stared at the director with dumbfounded looks. "It wouldn't take long at all sir." "I assure you that I am in sound health both mentally and physically despite my age." The director motions to Willis. "Explain the small horses please." "Forward operation teams led by Nevin Vincent have discovered a few sapient species. These species being small mythical horses, were wolf looking things and a weird collaboration of different animals that refers to itself as Discord." "Are you two sure you don't need a mental examination?" Asked Doc looking through the papers at the several mentioned species. "This can't possibly be real can it?" "I assure you, It is." The director tone hardened as his hand raised once more for Willis to continue. "Go ahead Mr. Willis." "Not only do we have the previous threats to worry about but now we also have infected colonies poping up all around the forest from what we assume to be the remaining humans that didn't make it through the portal with us. However the wildlife, another immediate threat, have been able to keep them in check as well as picking off any stray retainers and lost humans." "What about this Discord character? What have we found out from it?" Mark asked as he began to show a hint of worry in his blood red eyes. "Absolutely Bull shit." Responded Willis rubbing his forehead. "It is extremely annoying and works around all of our questions, in fact we don't even know how to keep it contained as if left alone for a few seconds he will begin to wonder the hallways after somehow escaping his containment. Luckily all we need to do is politely ask him to go back." "Have you tried stronger methods of interrogation, I'm sure Dr. Heart could get him to talk." "Another problem, even if we wanted to kill him I'm pretty sure we couldn't." Willis eyes showed fear as he remembered the interrogation of the strange chimera. "When we... When we tried those methods he laughed at us and thanked us for the gifts. He used each and every one of them with that damn cocky grin on his face." "The hell did we get ourselves into when we opened that portal?" "A chance to become more than what we were Mr. Johnson." "What do you mean Doc?" "During the transition between worlds we managed acquire a rare material that was then used to give a permanent immunity or great resistance to Chemical X at a cost. It has thus been named chemical Y." The room once more fell into silence as they all listened closely, even the retainers did not have complete immunity to the elaborate chemical. "Doc and I have managed to test it on both five humans and five retainers. Doc did the humans and I tested it out on my experiments." "As it would seem, only three of the humans survived the initial transformation with the other two passing at a later date." Doc spoke in a disheartened tone. "But one survived." Moria continued on where Doc left off. "All five of the retainers were to weak to survive the stress suggesting that Delta class and above are the only retainers/experiments capable of surviving the strain." "Where's the surviving human? Is he still alive?" Asked Alan as he donned his much more serious look. "How soon can we refine this stuff for higher chances of survival?" "The human is... Well no longer human." "Yes, as Doc says he transformed into a... Lupus variant experiment." "What the hell?!" Mark Johnson started. "How?" Privolva chimed in. "Science is some bullshit!" Alan Vincent yelled. "I knew his scent was off." Ember added on. "So that's who it is?" Steve Willis asked. "Intriguing isn't it?" Director Zigmal finalized. The room remained in an uproar of both surprise and shocked anger. "Yes, as far as we know the only way to continue on the survival of our race is too transition to a new one. But this is not without reward. Not only has Jack here gained a great resistance to Chemical X, he now has his own unique power as he can wield Chemical X relatively safely to form electrical occurrences." "But as far as Moria and I have researched we have discover one flaw besides the whole transformation thing. Being in a different body Jack here has trouble figuring out how to work his new body with the primary example being his vocal cords that he hasn't figured out how to use." Suddenly a beeping noise fills the room before Willis takes out a walkie talkie with a strange crystal embedded in it. He mutters into it before looking surprised. "Sir, Aether has awakened." 'I feel like shit.' It wasn't often I cursed, it wasn't often that I suffered a near mortal wound. Hell, It wasn't often I suffered any wounds. But the battle for the portal was different. I was forced to fight, forced to kill for those who couldn't fight back. 'I wonder if the others are okay?' I stared at my gray fur with black and white ends covered in multiple bandages that held back my blood. 'I look like shit.' I sit up on my haunches and look around the white room I've come to known as my own. 'At least I didn't get blood on my bed.' I carefully get up and limp towards the door before it opens and reveals a human who looks up to me. "Y-you're awake!" The small orange haired human male looked up to me wearing the standard black suit he was oh so familiar to see. 'Well I guess all humans are small to me seeing how big I am.' He immediately picks up his radio and speaks to someone on the other end before quickly getting off and reverting all of his attention back to me. "You really shouldn't be getting up, your injuries were pretty severe compared to the others." "So they are alive?" "Most..." His tone turned sour. "Equinox and her lackeys came through killing both retainers and humans, civilians included." "Most? Equinox?" I was dumbfounded, 'She wouldn't do that? She would never kill anyone who didn't deserve it. Right?', I had to know more. "What do you mean? Equinox would never do that, let alone try to kill me." "When the portals started opening she went berserk with most of the retainers that followed her religiously. They tore threw everything including you and the other Corporation loyal retainers. Together they were subjugated but the other experiment factions took this chance to either escape or lead the fight against us." "But why? She's childish and rarely ever takes anything seriously so why would she do this suddenly? I refuse to believe this!" I growled out making him flinch away as if I would pounce. "What did they do to her to make this happen?" "Nothing! S-she just went berserk and killed everyone who didn't follow her!" He smelled of fear but no lies. Even his heart believed the words he spouted. 'The Corporation did something to instigate her and he's been sent here with lies to persuade me into thinking this.' The man once more spoke up. "I swear she killed innocents. She killed a few friends of mine I swear!" 'I'll humor them for now.' Backing away from the human I found myself staring around the room trying to think of a response. "I'm going on a walk." "Y-you can't go anywhere in your current condition!" "Oh really? Whose going to stop me, that one retainer. Mr. Doesn't Exist I think his name was?" Responded Aether in a joking tone. "Or was it Micheal Mc Doesn't exist? I wouldn't know since he doesn't exist after all." "They'll be angry!" "And?" "They'll... They'll..." "Hold that thought till I come back, I have to go think now." "Wait please!" The human tailed me the best he could as I sprinted through the enlarged hallways meant for something of my size. Finally I lost him and found my way outside to the new forest surrounding the facility. 'A whole new world to explore... A whole new world to track you down again.' "Equinox, I'm gonna bring you back. And this time, you won't be able to leave." I sprinted off into the forest ignoring my aching wounds. I knew I wouldn't be able to find her yet but it still didn't hurt to look. 'Plus a new world means new prey, I wonder what I can find to eat.'