"No. You don"t have time to wait for another body." Xiao slowly moved forward, his cold gaze projected a chilling frostiness that saturated the room. The force of it swept over Valentin like a storm.
"What are you talking about." Valentin frowned, an unmistakable hint of uneasiness stretched across his eyes.
"You don"t seem to know Jane all that well. Even if I failed, he won...in his own way."
Valentin"s body suddenly stiffened as a sharp pain shot from his brain and down his spine. Every cells in his body felt as though it were imploding.
Blood seeped through his vessels as his muscles tore and detached. His skin couldn"t handle the pressure and began to strain and crack.
Valentin lowered his head, an incredulous expression twisting his face. He struggled to lift his hand and watched as layers of his flesh peeled off, blood dripping from the open wound.
"What is going on here... this is impossible... impossible..."
"When you transplant a brain, even if the people have the same DNA, you need to use a drug called Pandorane to stop the synapse of the nerves. That way when you implant your brain you can avoid the pain running down the spinal chord. Casey and I created a virus that is activated by this drug, it quickly replicates and attacks the hosts body, causing rapid cell degeneration."
"Lies. You are lying. This is all an illusion. You are still in my mind!"
Valentin"s eyes were bloodshot with disbelief.
"You said that you entered my mind when I was unconscious. Other than my X-2 studies, didn"t you see how I made the virus "Jane"? You are doomed, Valentin. You will die."
Valentin frantically made his way to the main control station. He shakily removed a terminal and put it on.
"There are many Jane clones here...I can use any one of them..."
"Not possible. From the moment your brain was implanted in Jane"s body, it was infected. No matter which body you choose, you will be unable to escape your fate."
Xioa Yan"s cold voice rang through the microphone, painfully piercing Valentin"s ears.
"Shut up! Shut up! I can"t die! I won"t..."
As Valentin shrieked in anger, his arm fell off and landed onto the ground with a splat. His muscles sloughed off his body, revealing white bone beneath.
"You...have destroyed...what...is"
Valentin stumbled toward Xiao Yan, leaving a trail of blood behind him. The flesh on his chest disintegrated until all that was visible was his sternum. Xiao could see his heart getting weaker and weaker. His face began to distort, twisting his expression horribly, he resembled more zombie than man.
"What I destroyed is the delusion of something that should never have existed."
Valentin pitched forward and his forehead smacked against the gla.s.s. His skull broke open and his brain slid out, landing heavily on the ground.
Xiao pressed his palm against the gla.s.s of the capsule. Slowly his hand pa.s.sed through the material and his body followed. He looked down at the bits of flesh on the ground. Lifting his foot, he did not hesitate to crush Valentin"s brain.
"In your mind...I have killed you."
Suddenly the scene shifted and faded. The thick coating of tissue and blood on the ground disappeared and instead an old man sat at the control seat of the main terminal.
Xiao moved in front of him and pressed his blade against his throat.
"I was sure that I had avoided any traps...How did you do it? When did it start? When did I enter your world?" Valentin lifted his gaze and the wrinkles above his eyes dragged his brows down. His eyelids settled so heavily it was a wonder he could see the person in front of him.
"I was never in your brain nor did I lure you into mine. When Casey invaded the system to control the channel nodes, we knew that you would definitely enter his mind and try to kill him. I only needed to invade Casey"s mind. The real battlefield between us was neither of our minds but Casey"s...and since it is Casey, he will cooperate with me without hesitation. We allowed you to satisfy you desires, allowed you this body. Then when your thoughts were confined to that body, all we had to do was kill it. The beginning of the trap was when Casey decided to stay behind. Everything else was an illusion. It doesn"t matter if you killed Mark or Winn, because it never happened. I never left."
Valentin lowered his head and laughed, the creases by his eyes deepened and unwilling tears of self deprecation ran down his face.
"You really are fire. There were so many times I could have killed you, but I had hoped to get a hold of that mind. You are too smart...no matter the problem, you will discover the solution. Through you I looked forward to taking my own thoughts to a higher plane...but you always far surpa.s.s my expectations. This is the reason I failed."
"You still don"t get it? You failure was certain. It would occur just like the moment I created for you. Even if you had succeeded in the implantation, the virus in Jane"s body would have destroyed you. You had already lost."
Valentin"s laughter becomes increasingly hysterical.
"Haha...so...I spent all that energy making thousands of closes...to finally achieve the perfect match in Jane...only instead of immortality... He is the weapon that finally kills me! HAHA!"
Heine stood behind Xiao Yan. He entered a code into the display and a capsule rose from the floor. Jane was lying peacefully inside.
Valentin attempted to get up, Xiao instantly pierced the skin on his neck, blood dripped along the sharp blade.
"Don"t move. This is reality. Death will only occur once."
Xiao an used the wireless terminal to invade the system and interrupted the nerve suppression placed on Jane. After only a few seconds, Jane opened his eyes and sat up. He touched the back of his head and shifted his eyes toward Xiao.
Eventually Jane flashed a wide grin and walked up to Valentin.
"I didn"t expect I would have another day in this body."
Valentin"s strength was rapidly waning. He struggled to remain standing, His vitality, disintegrating more each second.
"I know...I failed...Xiao Yan...your existence was not something I expected...I can go now...Everything with you has been beyond my ability to antic.i.p.ate."
The distance between a cla.s.s b student-an ordinary person ready to spend his life under the dome-- and a soldier taking on the Surge...Valentin knows that Xiao has taken a gigantic leap in life.
It was Heine Burton who made him who he is today.
"Are you going to remove my brain and place it in a lab to a.n.a.lyze it?"
Xiao Yan shook his head and spoke firmly and resolutely.
"I have finished the research on the Sharon virus, humans no longer have to fear zombies. I have completed the x-2 which will change the direction of mankind. I have also prevented your regeneration. No matter what angle you look at it, I am much smarter than you. No matter my fears and doubts in this world ,or how difficult a problem is to solve, I will use my own mind to figure it out. I will not rely on yours. I believe that there are countless people ready to rely on their own strength to better the world. Such ideas are true immortality. All your mind provides is an illusion of eternal life...what is the use in keeping it?"
"Are you going to kill me?" Valentin sneered and locked eyes with Xiao, "You will regret it child."
"Yes, I am going to kill you."
I can kill you because I understand that your existence hurts everyone I care about. I will not spare a grain of guilt for you. I will not hesitate, no matter how stained my hands are with your blood!
Xiao raised his arms high. Heine and Jane watched from behind as he slashed downward. His swing was powerful and determined, the cold flash of steel seemed to spit the world, etching its trajectory on the eye. The speed of his sword instantly renders the strike to no more than a persistent memory.
Valentin"s head rolled to Jane"s feet and he did not hesitate to lift his heel and crush his skull. Jane"s expression relaxed into a sly jovial expression once more.
Xiao turned to look at Heien. He widened his gaze, pressuring him to meet his eyes.
Yes, this man is still here, just as he had promised.
Xiao took a deep breath and went to Hiene.
Suddenly the entire hull trembled violently, shaking from its depths as if all the metal was suddenly resonating. Xiao almost fell and Heine grabbed his shoulder to steady him.
"What happened?"
Jane fell to the ground, before quickly scrambling up. His eyes and voice were cold. "We have to get out of here. Valentin must have sent someone to destroy the ship!"
Without a word, Heine picked up Xiao Yan and ran frantically through the pa.s.sage.
"This is all Valentin"s plan. If he can"t get his rebirth they he will turn this whole ship into his grave."
s.h.i.t! Burying this madman might be the most tragic even in his life!
"Warning! Warning! The g zone fails - the engine have stopped working!"
"Warning! Warning! F zone failure - all nodes will close in two minutes!"
They ran along the pa.s.sage as the ship slowly sank and the sound of the rushing sea water was audible.
The made it back to the door where the clones had been closed off. The hull was warping and Casey slid down the wall. Winn grabbed him and tried to thrust his blade into the wall, but it only sparked at the contact. Stumbling around, together they headed toward Xiao Yan.
Jane stepped off the wall and slid toward Xiao Yan to grab a hold of Casey. Suddenly Mark fell as the pa.s.sage tilted 45 degrees, which meant the hull was breached near the tail end of the ship.
Vasey watched Jane for a moment and finally began to relax in relief, a.s.sured that he was really alright. He clung tightly to Jane"s shoulders. "I am so glad you are still alive. You are alive!"
Makr yelled out. "Valentin is a f.u.c.king madman! The ship is sinking, don"t tell me that b.a.s.t.a.r.d is still alive?!"
"Valentin is dead!" Xiao said firmly as he tried to steady himself against the wall of the warped pa.s.sage. "Right now we have to concentrate on staying alive. This ship is going down."
"What are we going to do? The pa.s.sage is blocked." Winn couldn"t help but yell out. "Although I am glad that Valentin is taken care of, I am not dying here. Dying along with Valentin, that is so wrong."
Xiao Yan could not steady his center of gravity and he continued to slide down the pa.s.sage until he ran into Heine. Heine tightened his hold on his body, bearing the body weight of two people.
"We are not going to die here. Go over there!" Xiao Yan activated the terminal and invaded the system, trying to find a way out. "We have to jump down and swim to the c zone of the ship. Once we reached the node at the end of the channel, I can open it."
"What? We have to swim again!" Mark revealed a forlorn expression.
"It is better to swim in the ocean than that thick nutrient solution." Liv chastised him.
Suddenly the ship tilted further. Heine did not hesitate to release Xiao"s hand and hold him close as they tumbled with the sinking ship. The cold water filled the hall and they were submerged underneath. Heine led him to zone c and Jane and Casey followed closely behind. Before they reached the node, the door slid closed. The rapid tilting disoriented the group, making it increasingly difficult to navigate.
Xiao Yan used the terminal to open the pa.s.sage and a strong current of water rushed over them. Heine seized the safety latch of the door and his other hand clamped tightly around Xiao. Mark and Winn grabbed at his legs and Xiao felt like he was being torn apart. Jane and Casey safely entered the pa.s.sage and just when they managed to enter, the scene became even more tenuous.
Over a dozen a.s.sa.s.sins fill the hall and the end of the channel is everyone"s target. Their blades slash through the air as their attacks close in on Xiao and the group.