บท 44: Descendant

"That rail will lead us straight to Luther," Ada states as she looks at her gps, the others looking out the window at the railroad switch, one rail going straight, and the other curving to the left into the woods. They stopped the train a couple yards before the turn. A small junction box sits nearby, a large pile of snow sitting on top like a hat.

"I'll get it," Jacob states as he heads for the door leading to the outer walkway. He steps out into the frigid air, a low breeze attacking his face. He doesn't bother pulling up his hoodie since he knows it won't do much good. Walking to the edge of the walkway, he jumps down to the ground, a loud crunch as his feet land in a feet of snow. With every step he makes the snow tries to get into his shoes, but fails thanks to them being tied very tightly. The others watch as he trudges through the snow to the box, opening it up and pulling a switch, the railroad switch changing to the left track.

Jacob comes back to the train and they start the train back up, heading into the woods which quickly block the view of the other tracks, secluding them from the rest of the world. After a few minutes of weaving through the trees, the path becomes straight, a large building off in the distance. Getting closer they see a wire-fence surrounding the infrastructure, signs warning of it being electrified on it. This was where Luther's end, began, all those months back when he had revived Derek.

They slow the train down as they approach a large garage on the side of the building, only the front of the train fitting inside, leaving the cars full of corpses outside in the snow. The train at a full stop, they exit the train, stepping off the walkway onto a cement floor, their footsteps echoing in the large open room, some lights hanging from the ceiling siting overhead. A single pair of heavy metal double doors lie at the far end of the room in front of the train.

"He's somewhere in the center of the building," Ada states before putting her phone away and grabbing her handgun, "Don't forget out deal Jacob, he's to stay alive until I get what I need from him,"

"Can't promise that he won't have a few broken bones if I find him first," Jacob replies.

"Just don't kill him,"

The group pushes open the doors, leading to a long empty hallway. A blood trail is connected to one of the doors halfway through. As they walk up to the door, Page goes to open it.

"The trail started here," Jacob states as he kneels down by the blood. He takes a glove off and presses two fingers against the blood stained tile, bringing his fingers up and examining the blood, "It's still fresh," He notices traces of green mixed in with the red, "And infected, that would explain the smell," He comments as he wipes his fingers on his pants before putting his glove back on.

"You can smell the blood?" Derek asks skeptically as Jacob stands up.

"When it was on my fingers, yes," Jacob responds, "Me and Page were trained on knowing the different smells rotting corpses had, so we could have a better chance of knowing what kind of virus to expect, this blood however is hard to pin, a mixture like the others used on the island for sure," Derek glances over to Page, who notices him staring at her.

"It's hard to tell, but there's a difference," Page states, "And it has helped every once in awhile,"

The group follows the trail as it goes from the right side of the the hall to the left, whoever was bleeding needed to use the wall as support, and should be be dead from all the blood spilled. They reach an intersection in the hall, which continues in all four directions, the trail going to the left. Ada, Jacob, and Page all stop in their tracks as they realize Derek has stopped walking. They turn to him to see him looking around the room.

"I know where we are now," He states before rejoining them, "That leads to the training room," He states as he points to the pair of double doors the blood trail goes to.

Walking up to the pair of grey, windowless, double doors, they ready their weapons before bursting through them. The giant room, which is the size of the main labs back at the island, seems much larger since it's open with nothing but some sports and workout equipment strewn about. A single man stands in the center of the room, blood covering his clothes and skin. Hearing them enter, the man turns around, revealing himself to be Norton.

"P-Page," Norton says hoarsely as his body and head twitches unnaturally, "I see, you finally found-" Before he can finish Page shoots him in the head, causing it to fall back, his neck looking like it might split apart from the weight. He grabs his head with one of his hands, and pulls his head back up. Before any of them can aim to shoot him again though, his body starts to convulse uncontrollably. His upper body suddenly starts to grow longer and bigger as they stand there and watch, hearing his bones breaking as they shift and grow. They can hear Norton's groans of pain as sharp bones erupt from his jaws, his mouth almost opening inside out as it becomes a hole where a large yellow eye grows. Two massive pray mantis like arms emerge from his growing back as he soon reaches over six and a half feet tall. Both his hands swell up as his fingers become massive claws of bone. The clothes he had on are long gone along with anything resembling a human. Large veins can be seen on his now skinless body, pulsing as they pump blood through him.

"Can't any of these things die in one shot?" Derek asks as he aims at the inhuman creature that stands before them.

"Just shoot it," Jacob responds before unloading his clip at Norton. One of the bullets hit him in the eye, causing him to flinch a bit, but then he lets out an inhuman roar of anger. He suddenly jumps up into the air towards them. Jacob and Page dive to the left as Derek and Ada dive to the right. Norton comes crashing down, slamming his claws and mantis arms into the ground. They all fire at him as he pulls his claws out from the ground, seemingly unaffected by their bullets. He turns to Page and Jacob, giving them a chance to shoot at his eye. Their clips run out and they have top grab more ammo from their bags.

Norton dashes at them almost inhumanely fast, slashing at them with his right limbs. They both manage to barely avoid getting cut in half as they run to the left. As Jacob opens his bag to get ammo he remembers he has a magnum. He stuffs his handgun away in the bag and pulls it out. As Norton turns to them he shoots him dead in the eye in his mouth, causing the creature to stumble back. He falls down onto his back. Jacob takes the chance to run up to Norton, stepping on his throat and putting the gun against the eye in his mouth. As he shoots it with the last five bullets in the clip Norton roars in pain. As he flails about, one of his limbs on his back rear up, getting ready to plunge down into Jacob.

The limb is stopped when Derek shoots at it, causing the blade end to fall off. Suddenly a frothy yellow liquid starts to sputter out from Norton's mouth. Jacob quickly steps away before any of it can get on him. Norton's flailing body soon goes limp. He doesn't appear to be mutating in anyway.

"What a disappointing combination," Luther states as he enters the room from the other side. Everyone turns to him, seeing his skin is all cracked, separated like pieces of plating.

"Good thing he was just given the last vial from the suitcase and not the real Descendant Virus,"

"You crazy son of a bitch, you put it in yourself," Jacob states, reaching into his bag for more magnum ammo.

"Well of course," Luther chuckles, "How else could I accurately record the results?" He brings up one of his hands, and he examines it, "Using Derek's virus as the base seems to be working just as I hoped, I don't have to worry about being stuck looking like Norton over there. Let's see how well-" Luther stops when an arrow lands in the side of his head.

"I don't, have time for this bullshit," Ada states as she holds up a crossbow, "Tell me where Leon is!"

Luther grabs onto the arrow, and pulls it out from his head, breaking it and dropping the shattered pieces.

"He was somewhere safe," Luther irritably as he reaches into his coat pocket, pulling out a small device with a red button "But not for long," Sirens start blaring as all the lights turn red.

"Warning: Self-Destruct System activated. Fifteen Minutes until detonation,"

An automated voice says.

"You guys go find Leon, this is a fight between me and Luther," Jacob states as he unloads his magnum.

"This is my fight too," Page states as she puts her handgun away and grabs a tmp, "I won't let him get away with everything he's done to you,"

"Guess I don't have much of a choice then," Derek states as he grabs a grenade launcher from his bag. Jacob glances to Ada.

"Go get him, we'll be fine," Jacob states. Ada nods in response.

"Don't die until I get back," She states before running out through the doors they came from.

The group turns back to Luther, who has a devilish smile on his face. His skin splits aparts and his body suddenly goes inside out. He starts to grow rapidly in size, taking the shape of a saber-tooth tiger, but noticeably larger than Derek had been. Several tentacles with scythes jutt out from Luther's back. Eyes on his front shoulders open up and look towards the them. Luther lets out a beastly roar, before he starts to charge at them. Derek shoots a grenade at Luther which hits him head on, the force not enough to stop him.

They all jump out of the way as he comes charging through, almost getting cut up by the limbs on his back. They all shoot at Luther as he turns around to them. He flinches when one of Derek's grenades shoots one of his shoulder eyes and Jacob shoots the other with his magnum. Luther falls forward for a second before getting back up.

"Page, shoot the tentacles, see if you can cut them off," Jacob says as he continues to shoot at Luther.

"On it,"

Before they can continue to shoot Luther comes charging at them. The dive to the sides, splitting apart as he runs past. Page reloads her tmp as she gets up, then shoots at the tentacles. A couple are torn apart by the spread of bullets, but soon start to grow back.

"They're regenerating too fast!" Page replies as she reloads her gun.

"I got it!" Derek states as Luther starts to charge once more. He shoots a grenade at Luther, hitting him dead in the back at the base of all the tentacles. They all fall off as Luther comes to a halt, roaring in pain. He suddenly shrinks in size as he turns back to human.

"Warning: Self-Destruct System activated. Ten Minutes until detonation,"

Jacob takes the chance to shoot Luther in the head, causing him to stumble back a bit. Jacob runs up to Luther, tackling him to the ground. He shoots Luther in the head again before he starts punching him in the face. However, Luther's right arm starts to mutate.

"Jacob!" Page and Derek exclaim before he's suddenly grabbed by a large hand. Luther's right arm is now massive compared to the rest of his body, the skin now gone, a giant eye forming on his shoulder. Jacob manages to free his arm with the gun and shoots the eye, causing Luther to drop him. Jacob quickly gets up and backs away from Luther as he continues to mutate further. His skin once more splits apart and his body turns inside out as he becomes an even more twisted and inhuman version of the thing that was on the train back on the island.

His head splits open and an eye takes its place as bones grow around forming almost a second skull. He walks over to Norton's corpse and uses his four limbs to pick it up. He turns to Page and hurls it at her.

"Page!" Jacob and Derek exclaim. Jacob goes to run, but sees Derek is already doing that. Derek tackles Page to the side, the two of them barely avoiding getting hit. Jacob turns his attention back to Luther and shoots at him with the last four bullets in the clip.

"You alright?" Derek asks as they lay on the ground.

"Yeah, thanks," Page replies.

Derek sits there on top of her, just staring at her.

"Derek, can you get off me? Before Luther throws something else at us?" Page asks.

"Right," Derek says as he quickly gets off her.

Page moves towards Jacob as she shoots at Luther, whose picking up a nearby weight rack. He chucks it at Jacob who ducks under it, crashing into and indenting the wall behind him.

"That all you got?" Jacob asks as he reloads his magnum.

…

Ada runs through a destroyed lab and enters a room full of test tubes holding various dead creatures. She runs through a door to the left and enters a small hallway, several doors on the left side. She runs to the first door, looking through the window to see its empty. She checks the next one, it's empty too. She hurries to the last one, and sees Leon standing on the other side. His expression is one of surprise. He says something but the glass and door are sound-proof. She goes to open the door but its locked.

She kneels down, pulling out her lockpick and starting her attack on it.

"Warning: Self-Destruct System activated. Ten Minutes until detonation,"

Click.

She opens up the door, seeing Leon's in a plain white shirt and pants. Leon goes to say something but she cuts him off.

"No time to explain," She grabs his hand and pulls him out of the room, "Come on!" And the two run out of the room.

…

Derek, Jacob, and Page all continue to shoot at Luther, who finally falls to his knees as something inside him bursts, the eye on his shoulder bursting open. Before any of them can even wonder if he's dead, he starts to mutate. He starts rising to his feet as his chest suddenly breaks open, a hive of eyes forming in it. Derek switches his grenade to incendiary rounds, and shoots one at Luther, who screams in agony as his body becomes engulfed in flames. A spray of blood suddenly jets out from one of Luther's arm, flying toward them.

As it moves through the air, it catches fire. They all jump back, there clothes getting singed from some of the blood droplets. Luther's left arm is now a bloody-black as it pulsates likes its made of a group of worms stuck together. He grabs his arm with his claw hand.

"Run!" Jacob exclaims as he runs to the right, Page and Derek quickly following. Luther rips open the side of his arm, spraying igniting blood where they had stood. All the flames ignite the floor of the place, setting off the sprinklers.

"Warning: Self-Destruct System activated. Five Minutes until detonation,"

"Damnit, we don't have time!" Jacob mutters to himself. He runs over to Derek, taking his grenade launcher and pulling out the grenades.

"What are you doing?!" Derek asks as Jacob runs towards Luther. He avoids another spray of blood and a slash from Luther's claw. He plunges the grenades into the hive of eyes in Luther's chest, but before he can move away, gets grabbed. His left arm is pinned but his right hand is free, however his magnum is on the ground by Luther's feet. Luther starts to tighten his grip on Jacob. Derek aims at Luther to try and break him free, but Page stops him.

"You'll set off the grenades!" She exclaims.

Page and Derek turn to Luther and Jacob when they hear Luther scream in pain. They see Jacob has broken off one of Luther's claws. He jams it into Luther's arm, causing him to let him go. Jacob falls to the floor, quickly getting up and running to page and Derek.

"Shoot it!" Jacob exclaims. Without hesitation, Derek pulls the rigger, the grenade flying at Luther. It hits his chest, exploding and setting off the incendiary rounds which all go off. Luther steps back as his chest implodes from the explosions, fire scorching his insides. They take the chance to run out of the room, Luther falling to the ground. Outside in the hall they see Ada and Leon turning the corner towards them.

"The train!" Jacob exclaims as they all run towards Ada and Leon who are at the intersection that connects to the hall leading to the garage. They all head down the hall, bursting through the metal doors into the garage. Jumping on the train, they run into the conductor's car and start up the train, heading in reverse.

"Come on, come on," They all mutter as they slowly start to pick up speed. The distance between them and the lab starts to grow, but it doesn't seem like enough. Suddenly the whole place starts to explode, the explosion running down the tracks towards them. They all stare into the flames as they come within yards of the train, but they start to slow down as the train picks up speed. They watch as the flames fall back as the train outruns them. They're suddenly thrown to the side as the train reaches the turn back onto the straight-away, almost going too fast for it. They keep going and come to a stop once they see the explosion die off.

They all sit there, finally able to breath.

"Simmons?" Leon asks as he stares at him in disbelief.

"That name died alongside the old me in China" Derek responds, "And I prefer just Derek now," Leon looks to Ada.

"Don't worry, he's changed," Ada states. Everyone turns to the door leading outside as Jacob opens it.

"Where are you going?" Page asks.

"To switch the tracks, unless you all just wanna sit here all day," And with that he exits the train, jumping down into the snow to change the tracks back.

"Who are the new friends?" Leon asks Ada.

"That, charming man," Ada says sarcastically, "Was Jacob, and this is Page. She's an agent for Terrasave,"

"Ex, Terrasave agent," Page comments, "At least once I get back to headquarters and get all this stuff straightened out,"

"Then you'll need these," Ada states as she pulls an sd card out from her phone, handing it to Page.

"Am I going to have to go too?" Derek asks with some concern.

"As far as the world's concerned, you died in China," Jacob enters the train.

"What about all of Luther's files about me?"

"What files?" Jacob asks as he walks past them and to the controls. He glances over to Page with a smile who smiles back before he starts up the train, slowly picking up speed as it heads to the next station.

"I'd like to know of Simmons-Derek's whereabouts," Leon states, "I can't just let him walk around freely,"

"You do that with me," Ada states, "Or are you just that bad at finding me?"

"I've had other things to do," Leon replies irritably, looking away from Ada.

"What'd I tell you Ada?" Jacob asks, "Now where's my ten bucks?" Ada let's out an annoyed sigh before walking over to him, pulling out her wallet and handing him a ten.

"Ten bucks? What did you two bet on?" Page asks.

"That Leon wouldn't ask me out on a date after I saved him," Ada says, annoyed and a bit embarrassed.

"What?" Leon asks.

"Don't forget my offer Ada," Jacob states as he turns to her, giving her a suggestive wink, "I make a hell of a breakfast, just ask Page,"

"Are you saying what I think you're saying?" Leon asks as he walks over to Jacob, who just laughs.

"What? You got a problem with it?"

"Yeah I do,"

"Then be a man and ask her," Leon just glares at him angrily, at a loss of words, and unable to think of how to respond.

"Ada," Leon finally says as he backs down, "Can I speak to you, privately?"

"Of course," She responds, glancing at Jacob who glances back before turning to the front of the train. The two head into the passenger car, leaving Derek and Page alone with Jacob. Derek looks at the door Leon and Ada walked through, feeling himself feeling hot and his heart starting to beat in his chest.

"P-Page," Derek says a bit high-pitched, catching Page a bit off guard. He lets out a cough before he speaks again, "I know I haven't done, the best things in my past life, but, I was wondering, if you'd help me, create my new one?" He asks genuinely. She seems a bit hesitant to answer.

"...I think that's a bit much for someone you've only met a few days ago...Why don't we start with a date, after everything's straightened out at Terrasave?"

"Y-yeah, that'd be great," Derek says, unable to stop himself from smiling.

…

A dark room, a large capsule laying on a table in the middle of the room hooked up to other machines by several tubes.

"Signal Lost. Transferring Memories. Administering Phoenix" A robotic, monotone, voice says as lights start to come on. The lights reveal a person that looks like Luther, the serum flowing through his veins. The top of the tube opens up and Luther sits up right, gasping for air. He looks at his new body.

"Memory Transfer Complete," The voice states.

…