Artificial Human (9)

Edited by: Kuro and Lille

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"It was a failed product." Dr. Linus had watched the scene of the rampaged Ability User from the comfort of his hideout. He had a good view of the plaza, but he couldn't see how Adam 1 was able to help the mutated monster he had created. 

"It's such a loss. I was this close to achieving something greater than Adam 1." 

He thought that creating Adam 1 more human-like was such a waste. Adam 1 craved emotions and human contact, but what he wanted was something emotionless, something that would heed all of his commands. That was why he was trying to create mindless weapons that would allow him to rule the world. After those weapons were created, he wanted to create something that would make him the most powerful being on this planet. He deserved this much at least, was what he thought. 

"Back to the drawing board." Dr. Linus yawned before going back to the basement. 

It was a good thing that Dr. Langley was preoccupied… Once the serum was safe to use, Dr. Langley would be the first one to die. 

He turned one of the rooms in his area into a chamber. It was dark at all times, but there were muffled cries that could only be heard from outside the door.

There was a man chained to the chair. This time, it was a regular human with no powers. He wanted to see if there was any difference between giving his serum to an Ability User versus a normal human being. Would their reactions be the same? Or would it be different? 

He wanted to change it a little bit before he administered it to this one. He felt that there needed to be something more... 

It needed to be perfect, much more perfect than Adam 1. 

"Shut up. Your cries are useless." He kicked the door to scare the man inside.

The man trembled as he heard the angry Dr. Linus. He had tear-stained cheeks and dried-up mucus around his nose and mouth. He was gagged with a piece of cloth, so his mouth was slightly open, making it kind of dry after a while. His skin was wounded from the friction caused by struggling in the ropes. 

Actually, this man didn't even know where he was or who Dr. Linus was. He had been walking home from the public canteen one day, felt a pain at the back of his head, and he woke up here. It was completely dark and his mouth was gagged. After a while, he couldn't tell how long he had been there. 

Unfortunately, he had no friends or family that would notice that he was gone. Well, a lot of people lost their friends and family during the apocalypse. 

Dr. Linus walked away from the door and went back to his desk. He wanted to modify the formula just a bit before administering it to his guinea pig. 

If he could create something that could take away the pain completely, it would truly create a monster. 

"I will not rest until I finally become the most powerful being on this planet." His evil chuckles echoed throughout his room. Only the man locked up in the room could hear his laughter, shivering at the thought of his demise. 

***** 

"You seem normal besides the half of your face and the extra arm coming out of your back..." One of the other researchers, named Paul, looked at the mutated Ability User in front of him. "How are you feeling? Are you still in pain?" 

The mutated Ability User, Jeremiah, shook his head. "I feel better now. The pain that was coursing through my body is gone." He had gone back to his original height as well, so he was quite happy that he was almost back to normal.

"I see... Can you control your extra arm?" 

Jeremiah had to concentrate on the third arm but it moved as he wanted it to. He picked up the glass of water that was on the table next to him and then proceeded to drink from the cup. 

"I just have to concentrate a bit. It feels weird because I am not used to having an extra arm though." 

"That's normal enough..." To get used to an extra limb that came out of nowhere was pretty tough, at least the man could control the said extra arm. 

The vitals were lower than average, but other than that, everything in his blood seemed okay. Interestingly enough, he had antibodies that fought both the normal Z-virus and the mutated version of it. 

All the researchers and Adam 1 knew that they were both man-made. 

After he was cleared to go, he stopped by the waiting room where Adam 1 was. He wanted to thank Adam 1 for saving his life, but he also wanted to know if he could join their squad. No one would want to be around him after that incident. Now that he had three arms, he was sure no one wanted to even see him nonetheless go near him. Maybe Adam 1 would accept him. 

"Ah, Jeremiah, did everything go well?" Adam 1 asked as soon as Jeremiah came over. 

Morgan and Cooper were busy with the base's politics and maintenance, so they didn't come with Adam 1. Jerald, William, and Lily stayed with Adam 1 at all times, which was normal. 

Jeremiah was a little nervous. He wanted to ask Adam 1, but he didn't know where to start. "They said everything is fine," He answered back, but soon turned quiet. 

"Do you want to join my squad?" Adam 1 could tell what Jeremiah wanted to say. It was probably because he was mutated and closely related to the trio, but when thoughts were strong enough, they could transmit them to him without him asking. He kept hearing, "I wonder if Adam 1 will let me join him?" and "What happens if Adam 1 thinks I am ugly and won't allow me to join his squad?" 

Hearing those thoughts, Adam 1 didn't have to heart to reject Jeremiah, well, he wasn't planning to in the first place. 

Jeremiah was incomplete compared to Jerald, William, and Lily, so he could not use telepathy as they could. Adam 1 knew that the man would have a hard time integrating into society once more without him.

"Yes! I would love to join. Please allow me to!" Jeremiah felt like he was at a job interview trying to appeal to the company. 

"Don't be nervous. We were planning on asking you to join us anyway." Adam 1 smiled as he patted Jeremiah's head. 

He felt a little at fault for what happened. If he could find Dr. Linus, this wouldn't have been a problem. But for some reason, Dr. Linus was hiding from him like a sewer rat. Or the Villain System was preventing him and System 225 from finding him even with a radar… Still, he just didn't expect that the man would be so evil through and through. 

Was this how it was going to be from now on? Villains and protagonists, who were dead set in their ways? The other worlds were easier as they weren't influenced by the world's plots as much. Those plots were not important, but it seems in the higher worlds, they were important to the point innocent bystanders would get caught in the turmoil. It was as though the worlds relied on those plots to keep them running. But who wanted to live the same thing over and over and over again?

The more deadset the world was, the harder it would be to change, but he felt it was more of a challenge than an impossibility. His competitiveness was starting to shine through. 

After introducing Jeremiah to the group, he led them back to the military headquarters where they slept. He assigned Jeremiah a room near Jerald and William and then went to the practice grounds with them.

"We are going to test your abilities. I want to see how well you can fight with your third arm and we will work from there." 

Jeremiah was a level 2 Ability User before this crazy situation started. He wanted to test how much he had leveled and to what degree. 

The man didn't have any formal training and he was originally just a simple Fire Ability User. Actually, before the apocalypse, he was an office worker for a small company that dealt with marketing products online. 

After watching Jeremiah fight with Jerald who was also an office worker, he could already see that Jeremiah had a hard time fighting with his newly made third arm. Sometimes, he forgot it was there and it got in the way of his fighting. 

"Okay, that's enough." Adam 1 signaled the fighting to stop. It was best to train Jeremiah to use the third arm because that would become his biggest asset. 

Jeremiah and Jerald stopped fighting. Jerald was silent as usual but he didn't even break a sweat, unlike Jeremiah. Jerald was going through training with Adam 1 so it made sense that he was pretty strong. 

"I already have the perfect training regime for you, Jeremiah. Sleep well tonight and be prepared." Adam 1 smiled but to everyone else, it looked like a smile that came straight out of hell. 

Jeremiah felt a chill go down his back but he could only nod. If he wanted to be stronger, he might as well train with the strongest there is! He had blind, almost hysterical, faith in Adam 1 but it was justifiable. 

After that, let's just say Jeremiah wished he was dead instead of training with Adam 1. 

***** 

After Jeremiah's mutation, mutated humans (or zombies?) came out almost weekly out of nowhere. Some speculated that zombies were mutating, but they couldn't explain Jeremiah's existence who was living evidence of being a mutated Ability User. His third arm was practically screaming at them, sometimes accidentally hitting them when they passed by on the streets. 

Adam 1 was in charge of taking down the mutated creatures, but after Jeremiah, even his serum to turn zombies into almost human-like creatures could not save the mutated beings. It was unfortunate that many innocent people ended up dying because he could not save them.

Dr. Linus was still nowhere to be found. There wasn't even a shadow of the man. That was why he wasn't sure if this was really the work of Dr. Linus or if zombies were just mutating. 

Still, he had a gut feeling that these were definitely not natural mutations. How could each one be more and more different from the last? 

It seemed like Dr. Linus was going down an extremely dark path. Why he was doing this was something Adam 1 could not understand but one thing was for sure. 

Dr. Linus was not going to stop until he was satisfied… 

"Adam 1, you shouldn't be upset that you couldn't save them." Cooper sighed as he looked at the liquid that was left from the mutated creature. "Sometimes, it's better to put them out of their misery." 

"Sadly, that's the only way we can think about it." Morgan patted Adam 1's shoulder. "We have more humans to save, we can only do what we can." 

They all thought that Adam 1 was sad since he was looking at the ground without saying anything, but Adam 1 was thinking more than anything. 

"Thank you, both." He didn't say much and no one really knew what he was thinking. 

Dr. Linus… Keep hiding because if I find you, I'll avenge all of those who were killed by your hands.