The door opened.
Ye Mo didn't push it away; it slid open a crack on its own, as if it couldn't bear the lingering warmth of his fingertips. He leaned against the wall, managing to push himself up in one breath to avoid kneeling on the spot. His head was buzzing, like an electric drill was drilling a hole in the inner wall of his skull, throbbing with pain. Most of his Steel Bone Transformation arm had receded, leaving only the elbow still stiff, feeling like a cold, heavy iron pipe to the touch.
He took off his goggles and tossed them into his pocket. The thermal imaging was completely ruined; all he could see was static. The emergency light cast a green glow, dim but sufficient. He shuffled forward along the wall, testing the ground with his toes before each step, afraid of stepping on any alarm. The air was thick with the smell of disinfectant mixed with metallic rust; inhaling it for too long made his throat dry.
The lab was larger than I'd imagined. A circular workbench surrounded the central area, upon which sat centrifuges, culture chambers, and arrays of IV tubing, the cables as dense as a spiderweb. Along the walls stood rows of sealed cabinets, their glass enclosures holding shapeless tissue samples, a greenish-blue hue that gleamed faintly in the shadows. In one corner stood a large piece of equipment, its screen black, its interfaces exposed, as if it had been roughly dismantled.
"High-risk biological testing area... no doubt about it." He muttered to himself, his fingers tracing the edge of the control panel, gathering a layer of dust. "Even rats wouldn't dare come to this place."
He paused for two seconds, then pulled a pen-shaped flashlight from his tactical belt, turned it on, and shone it on the main control panel. The screen didn't respond, but there was a data card in the slot below, labeled " Extremis-7 ". He pulled it out and flipped it over. On the back, a countdown was scribbled with a marker; the numbers were blurry, but he estimated there were less than six hours left.
" Killian really isn't afraid of death." He put the card away and was about to continue checking when the alarm above his head suddenly beeped.
The red light began to turn.
It wasn't all loud; just one of the speakers in one corner flickered a few times, as if the power was unstable. But he knew that once this thing was turned on, it could reach full volume within three seconds and attract all the guards in the base.
He immediately ducked behind a centrifuge, leaning against the metal casing, his ears perked up, listening intently. Footsteps hadn't come yet, but they were sure they would soon.
Sure enough, ten seconds later, a side door on the right popped open with a "click," and three people dressed in black combat uniforms rushed in, carrying stun batons. Their helmets and visors reflected a green light, making them look like three nocturnal cockroaches.
"B-7 tunnel intrusion confirmed. Target in the core area. Capture alive as a priority." The leader said in a low voice, sweeping his gun across the control panel. "Don't let him touch the main console. The boss wants him."
Ye Mo held his breath and quietly reached his left hand towards the outside of his thigh—there was the activation point for Lightning Control, which the system had indicated had just finished its cooldown.
The three men formed a fan shape to encircle the area, their movements quite professional, sparks crackling from the tips of their stun guns. The one in the middle headed straight for the main control panel, while the two on either side circled around to the equipment area, clearly intending to surround the console.
Ye Mo had been waiting for this moment.
He suddenly leaped out from behind the centrifuge, not backward, but forward, crashing into a lab table and overturning it. Test tube racks shattered, glass broke everywhere, and liquid splashed all over the floor. The two men were startled and instinctively retreated, their stun guns held horizontally in front of their chests.
But the ground is made of metal.
He slammed his right palm on the ground, instantly releasing the Lightning Control. The high-voltage current spread along the conductive floor with a "whoosh," surging outwards like ripples in water.
"Ah!"
"Holy shit--!"
The two men's legs buckled, and they collapsed to their knees, their bodies convulsing, the stun guns flying from their hands. Ye Mo didn't stop; he flipped over and leaped up, using the momentum to rush towards the third one—the man had just pressed the communication button to report when he looked up and saw Ye Mo descending from the sky.
He raised his leg to block, Ye Mo's left shoulder sank, the remaining hardness of the Steel Bone still present, and it slammed directly into his chest. The man crashed into the control panel with a "thud," his mask cracked, his eyes rolled back, and before he passed out, his finger was still pressed on the shutdown program button.
Ye Mo landed unsteadily, his knees buckled, and he only managed to avoid falling by bracing himself with one hand. His headache worsened, his vision blurred, and his ears rang incessantly. Panting, he crawled over, pried the man's hand off the button, and casually removed the communicator from his waist, stuffing it into his own pocket.
"System, if you have any conscience, give me a bottle of electrolyte water right now." He wiped his face and looked up at the central area.
Then he froze.
There stood a huge cylindrical container, as tall as a three-story building, made entirely of reinforced composite glass, with pressure monitoring lines engraved on the inner wall. It was filled with a green liquid, as viscous as engine oil, slowly swirling. Suspended in the center of the liquid was a clump of tissue, indistinguishable as an organ or an embryo, its surface covered with vascular-like patterns, pulsating gently from time to time.
"This thing... is moving?" he murmured.
Before he could finish speaking, the wall behind him suddenly exploded.
Cement chunks and steel bars flew everywhere as a steel figure crashed through the wall, a large dent in the shoulder of its armored vehicle, and smoke billowing from its thrusters. Tony slammed on the brakes, lifted his mask to reveal a face covered in dust and a slight smile, "Oh, you're still alive? I thought you'd been electrocuted into a charcoal grill."
"Thank you for your concern, but I prefer milder flavors." Ye Mo stood up, leaning on the lab bench, and pointed to the central container. "That big thing over there, can you tell what it's for?"
Tony walked over, brought up the scanning interface with his gloves, and scanned the outer wall of the container. "Composite reinforced glass, internal pressure exceeding the standard, temperature constant at 38.5℃, abnormal conductivity... If this thing explodes, half the base will be dyed green, and the fluorescent kind at that."
"This doesn't sound like good news."
"Never." Tony retracted the scanner, squinting at the pulsating tissue. "This thing is self-powered; the network of blood vessels is alive. It's not a storage tank, it's an incubator."
Ye Mo didn't speak, but took a few steps closer and looked at the lump of matter through the glass. The green liquid flowed slowly, and the texture on the surface of the tissue seemed to breathe, with each rise and fall causing the light inside the container to change slightly. He suddenly felt a tightness in his stomach, as if something had squeezed it.
"Killian used Pepper in his experiments and this is what happened?" he asked.
"More than that," Tony said, pointing to a row of connectors at the bottom of the container. "Those pipes are connected to an external power system, but right now it's a reverse transfusion—it's absorbing electricity, not consuming it. If the power goes out, it will actually accelerate its metabolism."
"So the more dangerous it is, the less you should turn off the power?"
"Smart." Tony nodded. "And look here—" He pointed to a line of small print on the side of the container, almost obscured by grime, "Serial number: E-07-Alpha. This is the seventh prototype. What about the previous six? Were they scrapped? Or... did they escape?"
Ye Mo stared at the line of words without saying a word.
He suddenly remembered the abandoned culture chambers he had seen at the old site in Atlanta, the charred handprints on the walls, and the carbonized residue on the ground. At the time, he had thought they were traces of failed experiments.
Looking back now, it seems more like... a hit-and-run scene.
" Tony," he said, his voice lowering, "Aren't we too late?"
"No." Tony patted him on the shoulder, the armor whirring as it scraped against the metal. "We were just one second before the detonation. I know this kind of scenario all too well."
Ye Mo twitched the corner of his mouth, but didn't laugh. He reached out and touched the outer wall of the container; it was cold, but he could feel a faint vibration inside, like some kind of heartbeat.
"What is it waiting for?" he asked.
"Signal." Tony brought up the wrist projector, displaying the base's power graph. "The entire system is set to synchronized trigger mode; once a remote command is received, all containers will activate simultaneously. Only one is running now, which means... someone is testing stability."
" Killian is testing its reaction threshold," Ye Mo continued. "Once it adapts to the environment, we can start mass production."
"And then? Let these things incubate underground in the city for a while, and then suddenly hatch?" Tony whistled. "This script is even more outrageous than the last time I was kidnapped."
Ye Mo didn't reply. He stared at the mass of tissue and suddenly noticed that its pulsation frequency had changed, from once every ten seconds to once every seven seconds. The green liquid spun faster, and tiny bubbles appeared on its surface.
"It's accelerating," he said.
Tony immediately rescanned. "Vital signs fluctuation increased by 12%, metabolic rate increased, internal pressure continues to rise... Ye Mo, this thing is about to wake up."
Ye Mo took a half step back, his right hand already resting on the activation point for Lightning Control. He knew this move wouldn't be very effective against such a behemoth, but at least it gave him some psychological comfort.
"Can you turn it off?" he asked.
"A power outage will put it in a stress state, potentially causing it to explode." Tony shook his head. "Forcibly damaging the outer wall will also trigger a chain reaction. The only way is... to wait for it to stop on its own, or—"
"Or someone will press the pause button." Ye Mo finished speaking and glanced towards the door.
Empty.
There was no movement in the corridor.
But the tissue inside the container stirred again.
This time, it turned its attention to them.
It was as if it sensed something.
Ye Mo's breath hitched, and he instinctively stepped in front of Tony. His hands were still trembling, not from exhaustion, but from the oppressive feeling emanating from the container, as if he were being watched by something.
" Tony," he whispered, "Are we now considered living alarm clock batteries?"
Tony didn't answer. He stared at the scanner, his face gradually darkening.
" Ye Mo," he finally spoke, "It's not waiting for a signal."
"It's waiting for us."