The horizon.

The deep blue waves rippled and surged as they stretched into the line of infinity.

The terminator line between the darkness of space and the sunlit ocean.

The waves rolled in perfect synchronization, spaced equally and perfectly in all directions.

Serene.

A lone island covered in sand.

A boy sat on the beach, caressing his feet with the wind and sand while listening to the waves crash in perfect intervals.

The brown sand flitted and formed barely visible images, like dust twirls in the wind.

A red flower.

The five red petals swayed gently in the wind, as the boy watched the flower intently, his eyes unrelenting.

He had been doing so for a few minutes. Or was it a few hours? A few days? Years?

Everything was perfect here for the boy.

No hunger, no thirst, no desire.

There was no local star irradiating the surface with its harsh flares, but the sunlit ocean was clear as day.

It was not night, but the stars in the sky were shining brilliantly in all their splendour.

The boy smiled, and all was well… till he glanced upwards and frowned.

As he looked up to the night sky, he did not see any more stars. Instead, he saw -

Chaos.

Devastation.

Millions of lives lost into the void of space as red energy beams lanced across unimaginable distances and blew out the frail metal walls that kept their precious air in.

Their faces froze and locked in expressions of shock, anger, fear and disgust.

Despite how far the bodies were, the boy could clearly see their eyes mysteriously turned to look right into him.

The expulsion of debris and gas murked the night sky like a black plague, surging across till it reach the horizon.

The boy could no longer see the night sky and the stars, only watching as dark fog formed all around him in every direction, assaulting his senses.

Hatred so intense it pricked every pore of his skin.

Despair so deep that he nearly lost himself.

Fear so pervasive that he shivered violently.

He tried to roar out in defiance, but forgot how to speak.

The dark fog gathered above him in a roiling fashion, with slow-falling waterfalls of black goo starting to fall from above, staining the ocean.

The boy turned to protect the flower, but he was no longer on the island.

A street lined with skyscrapers.

The burning windows, vehicles and screams of untold billions of beings wormed their way into the boy’s heart through his skin, almost crushing it in despair.

Pulses of emotions overwhelmed him, his nerves and blood vessels burning like liquid fire.

He doubled over in pain as he tried to scream, but he had no voice, to begin with.

Pits of black goo dotted the road in front of him, seeping out and covering the street.

From the sky, the waterfalls of black goo continued to pour onto the streets and the city.

Brilliant explosions seared the boy’s eyes as he watched countless missiles and plasma beams sear the surface of the city.

A dull banging sound could be heard.

He shielded his eyes, cowering in fear from the heat reaching him.

But suddenly a nostalgic smell hit him, reminding him of something.

The boy opened his eyes to see a workshop.

A white box.

Hovering in the middle.

The banging got louder and could be heard on all the walls.

The boy could barely make out the muffled voices screaming from outside the workshop.

He looked at the white box, to see a countdown timer.

A minute was left.

Sixty seconds to go.

The boy walked forward, holding the box, and inspecting the timer. He knew this box.

Fifty.

He watched humans surround him intently in an unknown palace.

They stared at him with piercing glares and hostile glances, dressed in an alien fashion, unlike anything he had seen.

YOU DON’T BELONG HERE.

The boy could not stare back and closed his eyes in fear.

Forty.

A dusty classroom with empty tables and chairs.

The writing on the chalkboard could not be seen nor read., but instead screamed into his ear directly.

FORGET EVERYTHING YOU KNOW.

The boy clasped his ears in pain.

Thirty.

A crowded open space, with people holding banners with words that meant gibberish to the boy.

They shouted at him, asking him to speak up. Putting him as their hope.

MARTYR – OUR SALVATION.

The boy tried, but his neck was seared with intense pain.

Twenty.

A banquet, a hard light table of food and every delicacy known to man.

A thousand servants lined up, waiting to be called upon by the boy.

CONQUERER OF THE GALAXY AND BEYOND

The boy instead turned his head away, refusing to call on them.

Ten.

A narrow dirty metal corridor, riddled with blood stains and scars from energy beams.

A thousand corpses lay along the path, the meat on their bones flayed. Their faces stared at the boy in failed hope.

THE SINS OF THOSE WHO BETRAYED US.

The boy’s anger soared.

Nine.

The planets and stars aligned in conjunction.

THE STARS ARE BUT TOYS.

The boy smiled at the wonderful sight.

Eight.

A planet, withered. The surface cracked beyond comprehension; all forms of life eradicated.

THE END OF ALL THINGS.

The boy stared in fascination.

Seven.

The black goo crawled from his ear to his fingers, seeping beneath his nails and skin, crawling deep into every crevice.

REVENGE FOR THE ROGUE PLANET.

The boy no longer felt hatred; only comfort.

Six.

On a battlefield with thousands of combatants, mechsuits and atmospheric warships. They clashed in fury, explosions rattling the air.

DOMINATOR OF THE BATTLEFIELD.

The boy trembled with excitement.

Five.

Rolling fields of grass and dew stretched to the horizon.

THE END OF DAYS.

The boy peered into the distance, curious.

Four.

Lava burst from within, the planet’s primordial energy swelling and surging.

THE SURGE OF POWER AND GLORY.

The boy felt his own blood pumping.

Three.

A prison, with the bodies of those like him hanged upside down, their ribs exposed for the world to see.

YOU FAILED US! WHY DID YOU NOT SAVE US?!

The boy gritted his teeth in rage.

Two.

A council, filled with ignorant old men and condescending women. They laughed and looked down at him.

SELFISH AND APATHETIC – NARROW-MINDED TO THE CORE. LOOK AT WHAT YOU’VE DONE.

The boy only had pride in his heart.

One.

An arena, with two combatants facing each other in a life-or-death battle as the crowd roared around them.

YOU DID NOT FAIL – YOU WERE BETRAYED

The boy suddenly felt a hint of deja-vu.

Zero.

A dumpling store, where five others sat at a table.

The boy recognized them.

The banging on the wall was louder than before.

Before he could call out to them, they turned to face him.

But they had no face.

Instead, a black smile appeared on the featureless faces of his friends, as the black goo spread from the table, creeping along the floor towards him.

The faces mouth the same word that rang in his ear.

revenge

The black goo lunged out and grabbed his legs again, seeping into his pores.

The boy struggled to get back to the entrance door.

The banging was clearer than ever, rattling the entire door.

And the muffled voice finally shouted clearly enough for the boy to hear.

***

“WAKE UP!”

Ceres woke up, his eyes wide open. His heart was racing, the blood thumping in his ear as he quickly took in his surroundings.

“Shit, what did Chad do to me? Where’s my weapon?” Wasn’t he still fighting Chad?

He tried to move his arm, but he soon realized he was floating in a glass vat filled with viscous green liquid. The viscosity of the liquid restrict his movements heavily, but he could still slightly wiggle. Was this part of the arena fight?

Beyond the glass, he watched as more than twenty soldiers in standard combat armour were gearing up for a battle, while at the bottom of the glass vat, a white-masked man was staring directly at him.

The young man was wearing the same standard combat armour as well but had noticeably fairer skin than the rest of the soldiers, who had the same characteristic tan as Ceres. None of them had an exosuit on, only basic combat armour.

“Sir White Fang, how much longer until he wakes up?” One of the soldiers turned back to ask the young man. Ceres was shocked to see that the soldier was an old man of about 70 years old.

Why was someone that old fighting? And who were they fighting against? Were they the ones who put him in the vat?

Ceres tried to move his body, but the viscosity of the green liquid seem to increase, creating such a restrictive force on him that even if he exerted all his strength he could not move.

Looking around, he noticed that the vat was placed in some sort of a research lab, where a few other vats were present too. Messy tables and large monitors decorated the space, and yet there were no scientists or researchers around.

He was not the only one in a vat – the other nine vats too had someone floating peacefully in them, though none of them was awake like him. Some of them were clearly dead and disembodied, while other humans were heavily disfigured.

Ceres was not able to see his own reflection, though it was not something to worry about now. He turned his attention back to the White Fang, who seemed to be the white-masked young man that previously shouted at him.

Who was this ‘White Fang’? He seemed to be the leader of this ragtag group of soldiers, but Ceres could somehow sense indescribable fear and agitation among them. For the first time in his life, Ceres somehow felt they were like a swirl of dark yellow and red instinctively.

Their ages varied wildly and it looked like someone had jumbled them together for no apparent reason other than skin colour.

The young man noticed that Ceres’s eyes were already open. “He’s already awake! Can you hear me?”

Turning to a nearby computer terminal hidden behind the vat, he yelled towards the old soldier:

“Buy me time! I need a few minutes to remove the restrictions and drain the special liquid… If we can release him, he can help us fight them off.”

“Are you crazy?! We don’t have a few minutes - The Keepers will be here any minute!” Another soldier yelled from the front as sounds of explosions and screams started to become audible from beyond the lab. A series of rumbles rippled through the lab, causing sand and dust to shake loose from the ceiling, drifting.

They had stacked equipment boxes and sturdy tables to serve as cover, mounting their rifles on the surface and aiming at the square hydraulic door that led into the room.

Ceres could not wrap his head around what was happening. Where was he? Why was he in the vat? What happened to the graduation competition? Who the fuck were all these soldiers and what were they preparing against?

Before he could answer any of his own questions, he was interrupted by a rapid knocking pattern on the glass of the vat.

“Nod your head if you can hear me and for yes. Shake your head for no. Do you remember who you are?” The ‘White Fang’ asked.

But before Ceres could think or answer any further, the hydraulic door was suddenly blasted open from the outside.

“Shit, OPEN FIRE!”

A volley of kinetic bullets and energy beams rushed from the soldier’s rifles and converged into the newly formed ‘hole’, slamming into the pitch-black darkness beyond. Yet no screams nor impact were heard, only silence.

However, the soldiers didn’t stop firing despite not seeing a target, free-firing into the ‘hole’ with impunity.

Suddenly, Ceres felt intense sadness enter the room. He could not tell how he knew or why he could even feel it in the vat, but he felt a connection, as though he had reunited with a long-lost friend. In fact, he could somehow visually see it, a mass of grey entering the room through the exploded hydraulic doors.

Out from the ‘hole’, an exosuit stepped forward. Ceres immediately recognized it as an Athen Defender, but the colours were all wrong.

Instead of the standard enforcer design, it was pitch black for everything other than the three red stripes that seemed carved from the face to the body.

A single red neon line was horizontally placed on the helmet, and it carried no weapons. A set of brawler gloves were attached to its fists.

Despite the significant amount of weapon fire landing on the exosuit, not a single dent could be seen at all, the exosuit standing there stoically and blocking most of the shots. The shots that landed on the exosuit made a weird sound as they deflected, as though they never touched the exosuit at all.

“Fuck, it’s ‘KIER’! TAKE HIM DOWN!” The soldiers increased their rate of fire, slamming the black exosuit as much as they could with all the ammunition they had at hand. A few explosives were launched at it too but to no effect.

‘KIER’ stood strong at the hole, slowly advancing forward.

However, two more white Athen Defender exosuits emerged from behind, dashing into the room by using ‘KIER’ as a distraction.

Some of the soldiers tried to issue commands, but instead a hole was carved into their heads as the two Athen Defenders began to shoot back at the soldiers with uncanny precision.

How could the soldiers do anything against the exosuit with such standard small weapons fire?

Within a short three seconds, almost all the soldiers had perished, their faces locked in either despair or surprise or completely disfigured by the explosions. The cover proved to be useless as the exosuits had armour-piercing rounds that could easily penetrate it.

Ceres stared in horror as he watched the old soldier’s body crumple to the floor. Despite having been through military orphanage training, this was the first time he had witnessed a real firefight and death in person himself. This was nothing like the VR game he played!

He struggled against the restrictive liquid, while the ‘White Fang’ cowered behind the computer terminal, working furiously out of sight typing on a keyboard. “Come on, just a few more seconds…”

The two Athen Defenders scanned the room, holding their rifles at the ready as they slowly stepped forward, looking for the last soldier and the young man.

“WAIT, DON’T SHOOT! I SURRENDER!” The last soldier came out from behind the barricade, throwing his rifle on the ground and raising both of his hands in resignation. His face held a terrified expression as he had just witnessed most of his friends slaughtered in less than a few seconds.

The two white Athen Defenders surrounded the soldier, their rifles trained at him. Out from the ‘hole’, another three exosuits emerged with their rifles, though their motions were noticeably less professional and clumsier.

The design this time was vastly different. Ceres had never seen the model before, but it bore some similarities to the Athen Defender. Each of them had a simple number label on them: 6, 23 and 16.

Ceres surmised that they were the Keepers that the soldiers were talking about before.

He noticed that ‘KIER’ and the first two exosuits were noticeably different from the numbered exosuits, as though the numbered exosuits were more human and organic in their movement. “Are there even humans inside the first two exosuits?” Ceres thought to himself.

The last soldier noticed that the three clumsy exosuits probably had more authority than the two holding rifles at his face, and instead pleaded with them.

“Please, let me go. I’ll be your informant! I know all the secret bases on Athen. Even ‘Sliver Ring’!” He secretly glanced at Ceres and the vat, obviously buying time for the young man behind the vat.

The three Keepers stopped at the mention of this, staring at each other in silence, while the last soldier assumed they were communicating with each other on another channel.

The rifles were no longer aimed at the last soldier. Keeper 23 walked up to him, a female voice echoing on its exosuit speakers.

[“Where’s the research subject, Drone C?”]

“Drone C? I don’t know anything about Drone C. I only know where to find the name list of miners who are part of the rebellion...” The last soldier gave a visible air of confusion.

The Keepers looked towards each other, silently discussing with each other. ‘KIER’ stood like a rock next to Keeper 23, with no sign of it breathing at all. Ceres began to suspect that the exosuits were somehow automated, which gave him a sense of deja-vu.

Since when did the enforcers had fully functioning automated exosuits?

[“Okay, show us. Don’t you try anything funny.”] Keeper 23 motioned with her rifle, keeping it at the ready.

“Well, it’s right here on this monitor…” The soldier directed them to a nearby terminal. However, instead of any of the Keepers stepping forward, the two Athen Defenders moved instead towards the terminal in perfect synchronization. ‘KIER’ remained behind to protect the Keepers in case of any problems.

Ceres was shocked at how professional the two Athen Defenders and ‘KIER’ were, it was as though they had practised this countless times before. But why were they following the motions of the Keepers?

[Restrictions unlocked – Commencing purge]

Suddenly the green liquid finally relaxed in the vat that Ceres was in, allowing him to finally wriggle his finger. However, the voice echoed through the research lab, prompting the Keepers and the Athen Defenders to quickly aim their rifles towards Ceres. [What’s that in the vat?]

Without warning, the terminal where the last soldier was suddenly exploded. The force threw the soldier and the two Athen Defenders sprawling onto the floor, with the soldier’s limbs blown off and his face seared by the heat. He screamed in pain as he rolled on the floor.

The Athen Defenders suffered as well, where both of them were knocked out and broken into pieces, unable to operate any longer. The Keepers did not fare any better, being knocked off their feet.

The shockwave in the enclosed research lab was much larger, causing the glass vat to shatter from the sound waves. The ‘White Fang’ tried to hide behind the vat to avoid the explosion but was also knocked over by the sheer force. Sprinklers in the lab activated, while the lighting in the lab went dark, only illuminated by the red flashing light of the alarms.

Ceres took the chance to escape the vat, stepping out on the floor. Yet his body did not feel quite right, as though his limbs and muscles were all a notch longer and larger. He coughed up the same viscous green liquid, which somehow had filled his lungs without choking him.

As he coughed, he instinctively used his hand to cover his mouth, but realized that his hand was covered in some form of black scale armour!

“What the fuck?! Is this even my real body!” Ceres gasped, staring at his arm and body that were coated in the stuff. The soldier noticed Ceres exit the vat, and a wide grin appeared on his face.

“HAHA FOOLS, THE REBELLION WILL ALWAYS BE VICTORIOUS! DOWN WITH THE INNERS! OUR MARTYR HAS RETURNED!” The soldier laughed even though his face was still charred from the explosion, the blood cauterizing around his eyes and eventually blinding him.

[Warning – Collapse in five minutes!] A voice echoed through the hall.

[“Fuck, he initiated the self-destruct sequence. Switch to night vision. Where’s the human in the vat?”] Keeper 23 did not turn off her speakers.

The three Keepers ignored the squirming dying soldier on the floor while they stared at the young man who collapsed on the floor and Ceres who came out from the vat. They immediately raised their rifles in a shooting position, aiming squarely at the two of them.

The sight shocked them. From the Keepers’ point of view, they only saw a fully armoured human that looked like he was wearing a black exosuit, but the design was extremely exotic, as though it was alien in nature. It looked more like a humanoid warrior!

They could have sworn that the man in the vat was originally human, how did he transform into such a monstrosity?

Only the face was visible, but none of the Keepers could really recognize Ceres, distracted by the appearance of the black-scale armour.

[“What the fuck is that?! Is that the research subject ‘Drone C’?”] Keeper 23 yelled.

The three Keepers quickly formed an encirclement with ‘KIER’ slowing advancing towards Ceres.

Keeper 6 moved along the left flank, while Ceres watched them warily.

Ceres tried to speak, but his voice only came out hoarsely, causing him to choke on more green liquid that spurted out from his mouth.

The moment Ceres lifted his hand intending to cover his mouth, the three Keepers suddenly shot at Ceres and the ‘White Fang’.

The ‘White Fang’ tried to get up from behind the computer terminal and reach for a rifle but was immediately hit by a stun shot from Keeper 6. His body fell to the ground, spasming from the stun shot before falling unconscious.

Numerous stun shots landed on Ceres, the pulses travelling through his body, causing him to start to lose consciousness again.

Suddenly, he felt something rising from within, as though there was a hidden organ in his body. An encompassing feeling of ‘hunger’ rapidly overwhelmed him, causing him to struggle as he tried to fight against it.

His black scale armour on his skin began to pulsate in rhythm with his heartbeat, as though it had always been a part of him, making Ceres far more aware of the ‘foreign’ object in his body.

The veins on his face began to be dyed in black, surging towards his eyes as the whites of his eyes became as dark as night, contrasting his tanned skin.

The world in front of Ceres suddenly shifted to monochrome, the environment painted greyscale.

What stood out like a sore thumb was the brilliant red colours emitting from the three Keepers, with Keeper 6 having the brightest magnitude of them all. ‘KIER’ too exhibit a slight red tinge but was dominated by a grey blob that he somehow had already seen before.

Ceres glanced around quickly, noticing the same grey blob on the White Fang, while the rest of the objects and dead bodies in the room did not have any perceivable colours and he could not even make out the outline of them.

Ceres didn’t have time to question what was happening, noticing a flare of red at the corner of his eye.

His body instinctively moved as Keeper 6 shot three stun shots at him. He ducked and rolled out of the way hiding behind a barricade, trying to get a grip on his new vision.

Somehow, he could see the enemies as clearly as day despite the pitch-black lighting that only had the intermittent red flashes from the alarms.

“What the fuck is going on?” Ceres thought to himself. However, he knew he had to fight back to survive, and fast!

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