Everything exploded.
Monitors shattered. Nurses bled from their ears. One man flew across the room without being touched. Another dropped to the floor, spine snapped clean through.
Then, without warning, the boy vanished. Blinked out of existence with a pulse of white light.
"Where'd he go?" Max asked.
"We don't know. He teleported. Broke space. We've never recreated the effect."
"You said he was a success."
"He's still alive. Somewhere. We've had reports—glimpses of him across the country. A boy glowing in alleyways. Stopping a flood in Missouri. Leveling a drug ring in Philly. Always gone before anyone can approach."
"He's on the run."
"Or on a mission of his own. We made a god and let him loose."
Max shook his head.
"You made a scared kid into a bomb. And now you want more of them?"
"We want stability. You, Marvelo, are stable. That's why we need you. To understand what made you different. What made you work."
"You're not studying me," Max said. "You're comparing me. Trying to figure out how to mass-produce me."
"Isn't that what you want? To help people? You can't save everyone alone."
"No," Max muttered. "But I won't let you keep burning kids to light your damn torch."
He turned away.
In the back of his mind, he saw the boy again—Patient Zero. Afraid. Unstable. Powerful.
If he was still out there, he wasn't just a ghost.
He was a fuse.
And one day, he might light the world on fire.
Max frowned. "That doesn't make this place right."
The doctor's face didn't move. "It makes it necessary."
---
They suited him up. Not a costume. A field uniform—dark blue, armored plates, no cape. Just utility.
They gave him missions. Controlled tests.
One: apprehend a test subject who had escaped into the city. The man was strong—blood from Batch 14—but unstable. Max found him in a warehouse,