The red lights flashed frantically as Ethan ran through the hallways of Sector 12, his labored breathing echoing in the narrow corridor. The alarm continued to wail, but above that mechanical sound, another more unsettling noise imposed itself: the distant echo of hurried footsteps and agitated voices that seemed to multiply with every passing second.
"Intruder detected in Sector 12! Block all exits!" The robotic voice reverberated again through the speakers.
Ethan turned abruptly around a corner, his muscles tense like piano strings. He had been avoiding guards for the past few minutes, slipping between shadows and taking advantage of any blind spots he could find. But now, after seeing that blurry figure following him, his paranoia had reached feverish levels.
Just as he thought he had found a moment of respite behind a column, he caught sight of a familiar figure: one of the scientists who had been in the hologram room. He was alone, reviewing documents on a digital tablet while walking distractedly.
"I don't have time for this," Ethan muttered to himself, but he knew he needed that magnetic pass. He watched as the scientist momentarily stopped in front of a window, illuminated by the emergency light. His chance had arrived.
With precise and silent movements, Ethan approached from behind. The scientist barely had time to turn his head before Ethan grabbed him by the neck with one arm, applying strategic pressure to nerve points until the man collapsed unconscious in his arms.
"I'm sorry," Ethan whispered as he quickly searched the scientist's pockets, finding the coveted magnetic pass. "I didn't want to do this."
The sound of military boots approaching made him leap into the shadows just in time. A security team came running down the hallway, their weapons ready.
"There!" one of them shouted, pointing in his direction.
Ethan didn't wait. Using the magnetic pass, he opened a nearby door and dove inside, closing it just as the first shots hit the metal.
The room was a small laboratory, filled with delicate equipment that Ethan knocked over as he ran toward the opposite exit. The shots continued through the door, shattering glass and destroying scientific instruments.
"Stop!" an authoritative voice shouted. "Don't damage the equipment!"
But Ethan was already in the next hallway, zigzagging between bullets ricocheting off the walls. He pulled out his own pistol and returned fire, forcing the guards to take cover.
"Cover the exits!" another guard shouted.
Ethan smirked ironically as he activated another magnetic pass, opening a door that led to a service staircase. "Too late," he muttered as he descended the steps three at a time.
When he finally reached the ground floor, he found himself in a chaotic scene. Scientists and employees were running in all directions, some carrying folders, others simply trying to escape. The alarms kept blaring, but now they mixed with panicked screams and contradictory orders.
"What's happening?" one technician asked another as Ethan ran past.
"I don't know, something big," the other replied. "They're evacuating the entire complex."
Ethan took advantage of the confusion, blending into the crowd flowing toward the main exit. As he approached, he noticed that it indeed seemed to be a complete evacuation. Security guards directed people toward the exits, but they didn't seem to be actively searching for an intruder.
Upon crossing the main doors, Ethan felt a wave of relief that quickly turned into confusion. The parking lot was full of vehicles starting up hastily, but all of them were heading in the same direction: out of Geneva.
"What the hell...?" Ethan observed as entire families loaded into cars, some even abandoning luggage in their rush to escape. The roads to the south were congested with vehicles, while the road toward the city was completely empty.
A dark premonition settled in his chest as he climbed into an abandoned SUV with the keys still in the ignition. When he started the engine, he noticed something strange on the horizon of Geneva: a faint but perceptible mist had begun to envelop the city.
As he drove toward the city, the traffic in the opposite direction became denser and more chaotic. People were shouting inside their cars, some crying, others honking their horns desperately. In the back seats, small children cried while their parents tried to calm them down.
"It's the end of the world!" someone shouted from an open window as they passed Ethan.
When he reached the outskirts of Geneva, the air changed. The mist was thicker here, almost palpable, and carried with it a metallic smell that Ethan immediately recognized: blood.
It was then that he saw the first bodies.
A soldier lay in the middle of the street, his uniform identifying him as part of the special forces of New Philippines. His limbs were twisted at impossible angles, and his face... Ethan had to look away when he noticed that important parts of his anatomy were missing.
Further ahead, a group of civilians lay next to their abandoned cars. Some still held their mobile phones, as if they had been trying to document whatever had attacked them. Others carried improvised weapons or kitchen knives.
But what truly froze Ethan's blood were the bodies in combat gear. He recognized logos of organizations he had studied: Erebus, Obsidian Veil, and even some insignias he couldn't identify. They all shared one thing in common: they had been brutally massacred.
"This can't be real," Ethan whispered as he slowly backed away toward his vehicle. "This can't be happening."
Ethan gripped the steering wheel tightly as he drove through the growing chaos. "I have to get to the hotel," he muttered to himself, his voice trembling but determined. "The documents... the laptop... years of research. I can't leave them behind. Not now."
The streets became more dangerous with every kilometer he advanced. In a nearby square, Ethan witnessed a scene that left him paralyzed for a moment. A group of twenty soldiers, equipped with heavy armor and modified weaponry, was facing six deformed creatures and an aberration.
The creatures attacked first, moving like living shadows among the abandoned vehicles. The soldiers responded with coordinated fire, their special bullets hitting the malformed limbs of the creatures. But these seemed to regenerate quickly, their twisted bodies reassembling as if they were liquid solid.
The aberration watched from the shadows, its floating eyes glowing with a sickly light. When the soldiers managed to reduce three creatures, the aberration finally moved. With impossible speed, it tore through the defenses as if they didn't exist, its claws effortlessly shredding armor and flesh.
"Threshold grenades!" one of the officers shouted, throwing devices that emitted pulses of blue energy. The remaining creatures screamed, their bodies disintegrating under the intensity of the energy. But the aberration barely seemed affected, absorbing the energy as if it were a delicacy.
One by one, the soldiers fell. Ethan watched as the last soldier tried to escape, only to be struck by a claw that split him in two with a casual motion. The aberration tilted its head toward the sky and emitted a scream that resonated in Ethan's bones, as if a thousand voices were whispering at the same time.
Ethan's SUV skidded as he hit the accelerator, trying to get away from the massacre. His mind was a whirlwind of thoughts as he zigzagged between abandoned vehicles. "The hotel is only five blocks away. I can do this. I have to do this."
But before he could complete the thought, a dark shape emerged in front of him. The aberration appeared out of nowhere, its floating eyes fixed on the vehicle. Ethan instinctively turned the steering wheel, but it was too late. An invisible claw struck the SUV, sending it flying through the air like a toy.
Ethan's world became a chaos of twisted metal and shattered glass. The vehicle landed on its side, and though the seatbelt kept him in place, his head slammed against the window. Dazed and disoriented, Ethan felt an unbearable pressure in his skull, as if something were trying to crush his mind from within.
"I'm going to die here," he thought, his vision blurring. But then, something changed.
Six figures clad in black combat uniforms burst onto the scene. Their suits bore the silver-embroidered logo of Erebus, glowing even under the dim light of the mist. Each carried modified weapons that Ethan immediately recognized: threshold plasma rifles, technology only the most powerful organizations could afford.
The leader of the team, a woman with short, electric blue hair, raised a hand and pointed at the aberration. "Crossfire," she commanded, her voice clear and authoritative despite the chaos.
The six agents moved as a perfectly synchronized unit. Two of them launched threshold pulse grenades, forcing the aberration to retreat momentarily. The other four opened fire simultaneously, their shots forming a precise pattern that covered every possible angle of attack from the creature.
The aberration roared, extending its claws toward the intruders, but the agents were too fast. One of them, a tall man with visible tribal tattoos on his neck, activated a device on his wrist that generated a temporary force field, blocking a direct attack.
"Now!" shouted the leader.
In one fluid motion, three agents switched their rifles for swords charged with threshold energy. The leader leapt onto a nearby vehicle, using the height to propel herself directly toward the throat of the aberration. Her sword pierced the mass of floating eyes with surgical precision.
The creature convulsed violently, its screams resonating like shattering glass. But before it could counterattack, the other agents seized the opportunity. Concentrated shots hit specific points on the aberration's body, as if they knew exactly where to strike.
With a final wheeze, the creature collapsed, its body slowly disintegrating into black particles that dissolved into the air. But the agents didn't waste time celebrating their victory.
Ethan watched, still trapped in the overturned SUV, as one of the agents pulled out a surgical device and extracted something from the disintegrating body of the aberration. It looked like a pulsating organ, glowing with a sickly violet light.
"Package secured," said the agent, placing the organ in a special container.
Without even glancing toward where Ethan was trapped, the team disappeared as quickly as they had arrived, moving like ghosts through the thickening mist. Ethan was left alone, his body trembling as the pressure in his head finally began to subside.
Ethan managed to crawl out of the overturned SUV with his last ounce of strength, each movement sending sharp jolts of pain through his body. His head still throbbed with unbearable pressure, but he knew he couldn't stay there. With the distant sound of screams and explosions echoing through the city, he limped toward the hotel where he had been staying before entering CERN. The scene that greeted him was one of devastation: dismembered bodies scattered across the streets, abandoned vehicles, and fresh blood staining the pavement like a macabre work of art.
"This can't be real," Ethan muttered again to himself as he staggered toward the hotel's main entrance. The lobby was deserted, illuminated only by the flickering fluorescent lights that still worked. The furniture was overturned, and papers and personal belongings covered the floor as if the occupants had fled in absolute panic. He climbed the stairs slowly, each step a struggle against exhaustion and pain. Finally reaching his room, he kicked open the door and began gathering everything he needed: his laptop, documents, some small weapons, and supplies. There was no time for anything else.
Just as he was closing his backpack, his phone vibrated. It was a call from Spectro, the hacker who had helped him for so long. Without preamble, Spectro's digitally altered voice broke through the speaker:
—Ethan, you need to get out of Geneva. Now. The roads are congested, and the aberrations are spreading faster than we expected. I've given you access to military radio frequencies; use them to stay informed about how to move. But I warn you: this is out of control. No one knows what the hell is happening out there.
"How bad is it?" Ethan asked.
"Worse than you can imagine. Listen to this," Spectro replied before sending him a live intercepted transmission.
Ethan activated the device Spectro had provided and tuned into the military frequencies. What he heard froze him:
"...Containment failed in Sector 7. Repeat, containment failed. Aberrations have breached the defensive perimeter. We request immediate reinforcements, but I doubt they'll arrive in time..."
"...Protocol Omega activated. Repeat, Protocol Omega activated. All units must evacuate or neutralize priority threats. Use of threshold weaponry authorized without restrictions..."
"...Anomalous dimensional activity detected at multiple points in the city. This is not a normal invasion. Repeat, this is not a normal invasion. Something big is emerging..."
The transmission continued with fragmented, desperate orders and confirmations of massive casualties. Ethan felt a chill run down his spine as he heard the phrase "Protocol Omega." He knew what it meant: it was the last-resort plan to contain catastrophic threshold events. It involved the total destruction of entire areas, sacrificing everything and everyone within the impact radius.
"Spectro, what the hell does 'Protocol Omega' mean?" Ethan asked, though he feared the answer.
"It means they're considering using tactical nuclear weapons or threshold collapse devices. If they can't stop whatever is happening, they're going to erase Geneva from the map. Literally. You have a few hours, maybe less, before they act. Get out of there, Ethan. And do it fast."
Ethan clenched his teeth, his mind racing. He looked out the window at the city engulfed in chaos. The mist had grown thicker, almost palpable, and he could see flashes of explosions in the distance. Dozens of deformed creatures roamed the streets, hunting survivors. On the horizon, something much larger seemed to be emerging, something that made even the aberrations seem insignificant.
"Just a few hours," Ethan thought as he adjusted the straps on his backpack. "I need to find a way out."
He gathered his gear and left the room, making sure to take everything he might need. As he descended the hotel stairs, he heard another fragment of the military transmission:
"...Primary target located in the city center. Confirm presence of superior-class entity. Origin unknown, but it appears to be coordinating the lesser aberrations. Absolute priority: elimination or capture..."
Ethan stopped for a moment, processing the information. A superior-class entity. That explained the oppressive feeling that had been growing in the air, as if something ancient and terrible were watching everything from the shadows.
"I don't have time for this," he muttered, forcing himself to keep moving. "I just need to get out of here."
But deep down, he knew escaping wouldn't be so simple. Geneva was no longer just a city; it was a battlefield, and he was caught in the middle.