SPARK

The girl's reaction had been exceptional, he had to give her credit. The queen would be dead otherwise. A red stain spread quickly from her right shoulder, as her entire body convulsed. She opened her mouth as if to scream, but her organism seemed to shut down in response to pain, limiting the movements of her limbs and facial muscles. By her side, the girl with glasses yelled in distress.

"Over there!!"

A rain of bullets fell on his surroundings, forcing him to take cover behind a ventilation unit. The military had taken positions around the helipad access point, and they wouldn't be making questions until he was either dead or incapacitated.

They outnumbered him. Balancing the scales was a necessity.

He took off his sweater, revealing a protective vest with several pockets. After checking the wind's direction, he extracted a small, metallic object from one of them, pulled the pin, and threw it overhead, towards the location where the soldiers were gathered.

"Grenade!!!"

"Take cover!!"

Barely a second after the grenade hit the floor, a soft burst shook the rooftop. He took a quick glance at the enemy positions. A gas cloud, of a sickly yellowish color, had enveloped the area. A strong wind swept the heights, scattering it rapidly towards the opposite side of the roof.

He readied his pistol, peeked from behind cover cover, and spotted the soldiers. At least four of them in sight, either on their knees or crawling on all fours, coughing. One of them clawed at his neck, struggling to breathe. Another one tried to cover his mouth and nose, in vain.

*Bang!* *Bang!* *Bang!* *Bang!*

Their movements ceased.

Among the corpses, oblivious to the gunshots, several civilians wandered aimlessly. The vast majority of them had fled towards the other side of the rooftop as soon as the shooting began, precisely where the wind had taken the gas. They stumbled around, overcome with powerful coughing fits. He didn't even bother opening fire on them.

He turned on his radio. "This is Prometheus. Cleanup initiated. Over."

"This is [ZEUS]. Understood, Prometheus." answered a voice on the other side. "Hades is on its way."

'…'

He could've formulated the question he had in mind, but he chose not to do so. The absence of new orders was unsettling, and PT-01 could guess the reason.

Something caught his attention. The queen stood on her feet and ran towards the stairwell. The girl with glasses followed her closely, dragging a small child with her. He raised his weapon, intending to finish the job, when a new volley of bullets forced him to take cover once again.

'Where is it coming from!?'

He looked up. In the helipad platform, two figures had taken positions on the floor. One of them was an arbitrary private. He recognized the other one: Colonel Rowan.

He glanced at the stairwell door again. The girls had managed to slip away.

'With a wound like that, the Convergence signal must be spreading like the plague. Even so, I'd rather finish what I started…'

Following the girls, other survivors who managed to escape the gas ran for the stairs, seeking refuge. Among them was a handcuffed man, dressed in a ragged suit.

'Julien…'

They had monitored him so much over his stay at Saint Marie that he ended up being too predictable. Selfish, impulsive, obsessive. PT-01 wouldn't be able to reach the stairs without catching a bullet or two, but maybe he didn't have to. With his left hand, he reached for the left side of his vest and pulled an unusual pistol out of its holster.

He only needed a single instant. With his ordinary pistol ready, he emerged from his cover and opened suppressing fire on the helipad, forcing the military to hunker down. In that brief moment of respite, he aimed the other gun, and pulled the trigger.

*Tac!*

A second before Julien disappeared into the inner darkness of the building, a dart sank deeply into his back. PT-01 watched him fold in pain and attempt to reach the dart, although his handcuffs prevented him from doing so. PT-01 retreated behind the machinery again, just in time to avoid a new rain of bullets.

'Done.'

Concentrated inhibitor serum, designed for praetorian suppression. Although harmless for stingers, ZEUS' tests proved its toxicity for human beings. Cognitive degradation, which caused a lack of rationality and self-control, and the strengthening of impulsive behaviors. With such a high dose, the effects would be immediate.

If Julien didn't kill the queen, he'd at least wreak havoc.

He watched as another two soldiers stepped out onto the rooftop, quick on their feet, and took positions close to the door.

'Reinforcements, huh? Clever dog.'

Those privates didn't worry him too much, but Rowan did. The colonel's reputation preceded him. It was well known he had ample years of experience before climbing the ranks. He wouldn't be an easy opponent.

PT-01 waited patiently until the enemy made the first move. That crisis was too big for them. They were nervous, and more cornered than he was. After all, their stakes were much higher.

There were some long minutes of calmness, but not silence. The thunderous rumble coming from down below was a permanent reminder of the countdown reaching its end. The spark had been lit, and it propagated faster than anyone could handle.

******

The red-haired woman collapsed in Isaac's arms as soon as he bumped into her in the stairwell landing. She was out of breath and caked in dirt. He recognized her instantly: Nora, the pseudo-queen.

"Hey! Are you okay!? What happened!?" asked Isaac.

"A-Ah… I d-don't know…" *cough* *cough* "An explosion… L-Lilian…!"

"Where's the queen!? Where's the girl!?" the girl's absence was alarming.

"S-She went up… Scared…" *cough* "H-Help…"

"Jameson!"

"Yes, sir!?"

"Escort her to the rooftop, and look for the girl! If you find more civilians along the way, take care of them! And keep your eyes open, you heard the colonel's transmission! There's trouble up there!"

"Understood, sir!" Jameson approached Nora and offered her his shoulder as support. "Come on, miss! We need to move!"

"Head for the stairs on the other side of the building! I don't know what happened down there, but I get the feeling this side is compromised…!"

"Yes, sir!"

'Damn it, Charlie, where are you guys…!?'

"Come on, everyone else with me! Stay alert!"

Isaac plunged downstairs, with the rest of the squad after him. With every flight of stairs he descended, a new gust of smoke blew in his face, and a new bad omen assaulted his mind.

An unknown enemy had started a fight on the rooftop. There were casualties and wounded, but nobody knew exactly who was okay and who wasn't. They had lost track of the queen. Charlie and Foxtrot weren't responding. Something had exploded on the street and shaken up the entire building. The screams of a furious crowd could be heard coming from below… In a matter of minutes, the situation had gone out of control.

Isaac was taken aback by a suffocating feeling all the way up to his brain, and he held his breath when an abyss opened up by his feet. In front of him, half the stairway had collapsed along with the outer façade, offering an unwelcome view of the city. The other half was covered with rubble, from which protruded a human arm. Military, judging by the clothes.

"Fuck…! Hey, hey!! Hang on!!"

Isaac went down to the pile of debris and began unearthing the soldier, throwing concrete and steel fragments into the abyss. He managed to partially uncover the body, although both torso and head were trapped under a bulky boulder. No matter how much he pushed, it didn't budge an inch.

His teammates observed him, sharing uncomfortable glances among themselves.

"C-Captain…" murmured one of them.

"I know. Fuck, I know! Damn it…!!"

 'Charlie… Foxtrot…'

He rummaged inside the corpse's pocket, and retrieved an ID badge. It'd probably be the only one he'd manage to recover.

'Private Quinn Bennett…'

He punched the wall and let out a frustrated scream.

Taking a look outside, he assessed the extent of the structural damage. The façade of that entire side of the building had plummeted down, and a flaming inferno consumed the lower levels, generating a column of smoke and hot air soaring upwards through the building. Below his feet, the stairwell was unusable, it had fallen apart almost in its entirety.

Isaac stood up. He knew they had to leave as soon as possible, every second they stayed there was an unnecessary risk. However, he couldn't take his eyes away from the streets down below. He knew what he was witnessing. He had seen it before.

He felt his heart sinking.

In contrast to the intense orange light emanating from the tower, the city pulsated with that sickening blue color he so well knew. Thousands upon thousands of bright dots sped through streets and alleyways, climbing buildings and throwing themselves off rooftops and windows, in a frenzied dash on a beeline towards Kurtis Tower.

"Dear god…"

He had found the crowd letting out all those screams. But it wasn't a mere crowd: it was the entire city.

"Shit…! Shit, shit, shit! Come on, we need to stop them from coming up!! To the other stairwell, hurry!!!"

******

"Uh… This is Lucky-02. We're seeing unusual activity on the ground. Are you guys seeing it too?"

"This is Lucky-03. Affirmative, 02."

"This is Lucky-01! We see it!"

The pilot switched frequencies. "HQ, this is Lucky-02. We've got visual on the evacuation point, estimated contact in less than five minutes, but we're detecting unusual activity levels on the stingers…! Do we have any information on the status of our comrades down there?"

"This is HQ. We've received a report about an active conflict at the tower, but the details are unknown. Lucky, what's the scope of the stinger activity?"

"The whole city is bright blue, sir… Do you think…?"

"Acknowledged, Lucky. We'll try to re-establish contact with Colonel Rowan and his men, and obtain a situation report. It looks like we might be up against a new Convergence event. We'll proceed to mobilize all aerial assets in the region to bring you additional support. Hurry up, Lucky."

"U-Understood, sir!"

"This is Jay-01!" said another voice on the radio. The pilot glanced at the combat helicopter following them on the left flank. "Did I get that right!? Shit…! A fucking Convergence!? Seriously!?"

"This is Lucky-01! Isn't this a golden opportunity!? The boys won't believe it if we actually survive this crap and end up saving the world!"

"This is Lucky-03. Try not to shit yourself from the excitement, 01."

"This is Jay-02. Stop with the nonsense and focus on the mission. Contact in three minutes. Jay-01, keep your eyes on the ground, those damn monsters must be climbing the building's walls. Lucky, get ready to—"

"This is Jay-01! Unidentified objects approaching from the east!! Evasive maneuvers—!!"

The radar hadn't detected a thing. Guided only by his senses, the pilot looked at the left flank, in time to spot several brilliant objects drawing closer at high speeds. Jay-01 plummeted down, leaving behind a cloud of decoy flares. The pilot imitated them with sweaty hands, initiating a vertiginous descent.

One of the objects collided directly with Lucky-01. Through the front window, he observed the transport helicopter getting devoured by a fireball. Shards and metal fragments flew in all directions, impacting his own Lucky-02 aircraft and destabilizing it.

"Aaaagh…!!" his teeth were grinding as he tried to keep the vehicle under control.

"This is Lucky-03!! We've been hit!! I repeat, we've be—!!"

As the helicopter spun around over and over, the pilot saw a new explosion over one of the nearby buildings. The Lucky-03 helicopter's propellers scattered like a shrapnel bomb, annihilating a large portion of the street, and burning debris fell onto the stinger flood sprinting restlessly down the road.

"This is Jay-01!! HQ, we're being attacked with missiles by an unidentified aircraft!!"

"This is Jay-02!! Lucky-02!! Are you okay!!?"

"This is Lucky-02…!!" the helicopter began stabilizing, dangerously close to the buildings. "We're stable!"

"Take cover among the buildings and head to the evacuation point!! Take a detour, stay out of the enemy's reach!!"

"Understood, Jay!!"

******

"This is Hades. Enemy contact, initiating combat. Over."