Scarlett's grip tightened as she brought the boy, Masashi, face-to-face with her. Her voice was low and lethal.
"Are you seriously standing here giving me incomplete information about my son?"
Masashi clawed at her hand, gasping for air, his legs kicking helplessly as he choked out his plea.
"N-no! I'm not lying!" he sputtered. "Danny is safe—he has no injuries. I swear it!"
"Safe?" Scarlett spat, her grip tightening for a moment, as though she was debating whether to end his life then and there.
Masashi's face turned a shade closer to blue as he stammered, "I—I have more information! Please, just give me a chance to explain!"
Scarlett held him suspended for a moment longer before abruptly releasing her grip.
Masashi crumpled to the floor with a heavy thud, coughing violently as he gasped for air.
"Speak," Scarlett ordered, her voice cutting through his wheezing breaths.
Masashi, still trembling, scrambled to his knees, speaking as quickly as his breathless state allowed.
"I saw sentinels—sentinels from Valthar. They're here in Vargath."
Scarlett's eyes burned with intensity as she motioned for him to continue.
"They… they seemed to be looking for the kids," Masashi added hurriedly, his voice barely above a whisper, afraid of what her reaction might be.
Scarlett fell silent, her gaze distant as she processed the information. Her artificial eye glowed brighter for a moment, and a faint hum emanated from it.
Finally, she spoke, her tone calm but dangerous. "Come back tomorrow," she commanded. "I have a job for you."
Masashi didn't need to be told twice. He scrambled to his feet, nodded frantically, and bolted from the laboratory without daring to look back.
As the sound of his retreating footsteps faded, Scarlett remained standing in the dim light, her expression hard but tinged with something deeper—worry, regret, and a mother's love buried beneath the layers of her ruthless exterior.
"Danny…" she whispered to herself, her voice barely audible.
Scarlett stepped further into the sprawling laboratory, a dimly lit, cavernous space bathed in a strange orange glow emanating from various machines and light fixtures.
The air was thick with an unnatural stillness, broken only by the occasional hum of machinery and the faint gurgle of water.
The atmosphere reeked of sterile chemicals and faint traces of decay.
All around, animals were confined in transparent containment units. Cats with strange glowing eyes, dogs with unnatural musculature, rats scuttling nervously, and even a massive dead whale preserved in a separate glass tank.
Some were motionless, others stirred faintly, their movements lethargic. Amid the menagerie, one sight stood out: a massive aquarium dominating the room.
Inside swam a colossal whale, over 200 feet long, gliding through the water with an eerie grace. It was a surreal sight—proof of the unimaginable power of whoever controlled this place.
'Not even the sentinels of Valthar would dare to venture into the treacherous Hudson River, let alone capture and showcase such a creature.'
Scarlett's gaze swept across the room as she addressed the shadows. "How is the experiment progressing, Mrs. Walsh?"
From the shadows emerged a woman in her late forties or early fifties. She was thin, her skin pale and marred with blemishes, her face partially obscured by an eye patch covering her left eye. Her remaining green eye gleamed with a cold, calculating intelligence.
This was Doctor Walsh, a name whispered in Vargath's underbelly with fear and reverence. Few had seen her in person, and those who had rarely lived to describe her.
"It's going well," Mrs. Walsh replied as a matter-of-fact.
Scarlett's expression hardened. "You need to move faster. I've adjusted the timeline. We're improvising now."
Mrs. Walsh hesitated, glancing at a small container in her hand. It was filled with a viscous orange liquid, glowing faintly.
"It's almost ready," she muttered.
Scarlett clasped her hands behind her back, her steps deliberate as she closed the distance between them.
"Show me," she ordered.
Mrs. Walsh nodded, as she led Scarlett to one of the larger transparent containers.
Inside was a small dog, its mouth and legs restrained by metal leashes.
The animal's eyes burned with an unnatural glow—it was no ordinary puppy but the offspring of a radioactive beast, bred for resilience and ferocity. Despite its young age, its strength was comparable to a teenage human at peak physical condition.
The containment unit was split into two chambers by a solid black iron partition.
Walsh carefully released the restraints on the dog with a series of button presses, and the creature growled softly, its muscles tensing as it sensed movement.
From another container, Mrs. Walsh retrieved a small, ordinary rat.
Unlike the dog, this was no enhanced specimen—just a plain, unassuming rodent. She carefully placed the rat into the opposite side of the container, separated from the dog by a thick, black iron partition and she inserted a tube into the rat's section of the container,.
Satisfied, Mrs. Walsh reached for the control panel. The iron partition separating the two creatures began to lift with a mechanical groan, revealing the now-open space between the dog and the rat.
The dog's glowing eyes locked onto its new prey, its muscles rippling with barely restrained power.