Amelia's mood was getting worse and worse lately. She wasn't the only one, the other higher ups from the Volari Company were the same.
Everyday would new reports all around the world shock them to the bones.
Amelia watched Professor Krychowiak showing them new images on the screen.
The old Professor didn't look that energetic anymore, his hair was unusual messy and he had eye bags. He had obviously seen better days...
He pushed the button on the remote showing another image on the screen.
The people inside reacted shocked, one of them stood even up.
Professor Krychowiak sighed, "This is the latest sighting from the Atlantic Ocean further away from the american east coast."
The image showed a humongous animal swimming through the ocean. What shocked them all was its size and species...
It was without a doubt a shark but...it looked like it was...at least 60 meters long...
"That thing can't possibly exist!" Shouted a man shaking his head.
Professor Krychowiak looked at the man and could understand his feelings, he himself found it hard to belief how such a thing could exist...
"I fear it is real, look..." Professor Krychowiak showed the next image.
"It was made 2 days ago from one of our our drones, look closely!"
Everyone inside the meeting room focused on the new image, it showed the humongous shark clearer, it had just surfaced...
One of the higher ups squinted his eyes when he noticed something, "It has a big red crystal horn on its head..."
The others gasped and stared again at the image, everyone saw it too now.
Professor Krychowiak continued, "This with our newest reports all around the world about other species." He showed them images of different animals, all of them looked a bit different then the form they were familiar with but they recognized most of them. There was one thing that they all had incommon, it was that they had a red crystal horn growing out on a part of their bodies.
"Our soldiers lost their lives when they tried to secure some of them for us to study...We decided to call off any capture mission related to species that show such a characteristic." The Professor hinted towards the horns on the bodies.
Some of them couldn't help but shoot a glance at Amelia's horn on her hand.
"But the most concerning thing is this..." The Professor showed an image shot from space.
Now it was Amelia who stood up completely shaken.
The others saw the same thing but they weren't sure what to think about it.
"What is that?" Asked a woman.
"Cloud, that is an incredible big cloud..." Answered Amelia before the old Professor could.
He didn't mind it and continued, "Just like Professor Volari said, it is a cloud."
"But it's red!" Exclaimed another higher up.
They saw a big red cloud looming above half of the entire Asian Continent...
"It is red, yes. And the rain pouring down from it is red too, we don't know yet what the consequences are but...our people stationed in the affected regions are looking into it 24/7." Spoke the old Professor with a grave expression.
A man hit the table with his fist, "How is this all possible?"
Professor Krychowiak sighed again, "We confirmed that the clouds and the rain contain small but highly concentrated amount of Substance 001..." Admitted the old Professor.
"Are you telling us that it is the fault of the Paradise Virus we created?" Asked the man upset.
"It's not the virus, it's only Substance 001..." Spoke Amelia absent minded.
"That's correct..." Confirmed Professor Krychowiak.
"Can you explain it to us how all of this even possible? I'm slowly getting the feeling that we are losing control of the whole situation and "Project Doomsday Paradise" is becoming impossible to achieve."
Professor Krychowiak's face turned unsightly, it was exactly that question that gave him a headache, bringing him sleepless nights.
"This..." He had no answer to that question.
"From everything we know and observed I can tell that...it seems like we were fooled..." It was Amelia who spoke, still staring at the image on the screen...
"Fooled? Impossible, no human could pull something like this off. We had total control over the Paradise Virus!" Refuted Professor Krychowiak resolutely.
"It wasn't human, it never was..." Muttered Amelia.
Professor Krychowiak's eyes widened, "Are you now completely mad? That's impossible!!!"
Amelia moved her head, her eyes meeting the brown eyes from the old Professor.
"Think about it Carl, we developed the virus for so long and everything went perfect until we set it free. It was only waiting for it and as soon it was free it did what it wanted..." She paused for a moment, her eyes lit up, realizing something.
"It's doing what we wanted, but its following its own agenda! Manipulating its own aggregate state thus slipping past the restrictions we created...It spread and...its Terraforming Earth!" The more she spoke the more she was sure that her theory was right!
Not everyone inside the room could follow her but those that did, discolored instantly.
And Professor Krychowiak was one of those that understood her.
He couldn't refute her now that he thought about it, it made sense and everything that happened, is happening and will happen will make sense...
"But that could only be possible if Substance 001..." Muttered the old Professor to himself.
"Only if Substance 001 is sentient, is alive, is intelligent...call it how you want but I'm 100% that that is the case. It fooled us all, pretending to be something crucial to reach our goal...how did it know what we wanted and needed?" Amelia became confused now.
Professor Krychowiak sat down on his chair, his eyes widened to the extreme! His brain felt like it would explode at any second.
"We found Substance 001 by sheer luck on the remains of a fallen meteorite 12 years ago! What you are saying suggests that the little puddle of liquid we took, was an actual intelligent life form, from an unknown place in the universe!" Said the old Professor in disbelief, he didn't want to believe what he just said but his entire being told him that he was right.
Amelia nodded, "Yes...we started "Project Doomsday" to cleanse the world from most of humanity to start a new era under our rule. A world without war, because we would stop them. A world without illness, because we would cure them. A world without hunger, because we would feed them. A true Paradise after the Doomsday..." Amelia spoke with hope and desire, her emotional words about such a world filled the room.
Everyone saw such a world in front of them for a brief moment...until reality brought them back.
"What can we do then? Can we stop it?" Asked a higher up exhausted.
"It's too late for that, we can only watch and adapt to whatever Substance 001 terraforms the world.." Sighed the old Professor in defeat.
Amelia reacted stunned at his words, "Carl you.."
He lifted his hand, stopping her from speaking.
"We let the tiger out, now we need to ride on it or it will eat us. The world is changing!"