How did it come to this?

  The question reminds Grant of the woodpecker that lived on his family's ranch, back when things were simple.

  Its pecking was almost constant, but stopped just often enough for it to never become undisruptive, never fading away into background noise.

  It drove the young Grant crazy, distracted him from his homework, his chores. He’d imagine it pecking into his head, pulling his brain out like a worm, and then he started dreaming it.

  When he finally tired of it, finally hit square in the chest with a rock, he thought the same thing. How did it come to this?

  “Well, that could’ve gone much worse, all things considered.” Vergil removes his helmet, his bonded Utahraptor stalking behind him. “I like the name the kid gave him, Phantasmaraptor, unique.” He chuckles.

  “Glad you’re having such a good time.” Grant straightens his back and adjusts his tie, watching as technicians repair cells that Raymond Parker scorched.

  “Ah don’t be such a stick in the mud boss, our visitors will be here soon enough, don’t wanna rub them the wrong way.”

  Grant snorts, and as if on queue, a flurry of feathers appears beside him. White and jagged like glass, they match the shining mosaic of wings that obscure all but the black masked face of a young girl.

  She tilts her head, listening to everything around her, and then the bright wings vanish, making the cellar of anomalies seem all the more darker.

  “The Director will not be pleased by this, Doctor Connors.”

  “It’s a good thing I don’t answer to him then, Dove.” Grant turns and looks down on the girl.

  She’s so damn young.

  “Scalpel will not be pleased by this, Doctor Connors.” Dove tilts her head, then spins to face all the destruction, her white and black trench coat fluttering behind her. “Losing a source anomaly, twice, is bad enough, but the loss of Raymond Parker? There’s only so many resources to go around.”

  “Did your Director tell you to say that?”

  “Nah,” Vergil waves his hand,” she’s just showing off, using her time out of the coup to its fullest, hey Dove?”

  “Tsk.” Dove shoots Vergil a glare, then looks back to Grant. “It’s my own observation, things are proceeding as planned on the other fronts, but this?”

  “I don’t need to hear your observations, child, I’m well aware of what’s at stake. It’d be best if you watched your mouth, and remember your place.”

  “My place?” Dove scoffs, “It's more secure than yours at the moment, Doctor, despite you having Scalpel’s favor.”

  “Yeah! What would we do without our favorite taxi?” Vergil grins at her.

  “I’m not a taxi.”

  “Could’ve fooled me, little bird.”

  Dove takes a step forward, and then back as the raptors snaps at her, letting out a low hiss.

  “Ah ah ah.” Vergil waggles his finger at her.

  “Tsk.” Dove glares at the dinosaur, then looks to Grant, “The Director does have a message for you,” She sprouts her wings and brings them down around her, only showing half her mask. “Get your house in order, or he will.” Then she disappears in a shatter of glass.

  “Pffffthahaha.” Vergil pats Grant’s shoulder, “She thinks she’s so cool.”

  “Must you antagonize the living weapon Vergil?” Grant turns and walks off, gesturing for him to follow.

  “Eh, can’t help it, she’s just too serious, gotta get her to lighten up! Now, PK, I could get a drink with that kid.”

  “Wonderful.”

  “Don’t worry, I’d get him a juice.”

  How did it come to this?

  As far as Vergil goes, maybe the question is a bit too dramatic. Ex-special forces, ex- mercenary, Grant and Larry ran into him in Mongolia, high out of his mind on opioids, and with powers. They paid off a handful or hefty debts, got him clean, and hired him. The fact that he was able to so easily bond with the first of their clones to experience the silver and purple flash just made him all the more valuable.

  Virgil scratches under the raptors chin and sends it away to get its cybernetics repaired before the two of them make their way into a passenger elevator. Vergil leans against the back wall and crosses his arms as the door closes.

  “The counter vibrations on?”

  “In this elevator? Always.” Grant answers.

  “Good, where’s Larry Lobster?”

  “Don’t call him that.” Grant scowls at him, “He’s waiting for us in the safe room.”

  “Good, I want to go over our next steps.”

  The elevator slows to a stop and they step into a labyrinth of halls, all decorated with paintings and illustrations of prehistoric landscapes and replica fossils. They take turn after turn until they come to a stop by yet another wall, same as any other. Grant puts his hand on it, and hidden bio scanners pick up his genetic code, and reveal a panel. He punches in a code, and the wall shifts away, like a chameleon changing its skin color, revealing a set of blast doors.

  They slowly open, too slow for Grant’s taste, and as soon as they can he and Vergil slip in. They head down a long staircase until they reach a study. Its walls are essentially book shelves, and they’re filled to the brim with any and every book on Grant’s expertise that he could get his hands on.

  His vision lingers on a stack set neatly on his desk, written by Ophelia, the tower ending just below a stuffed woodpecker. Grant looks into the fake eyes of the taxidermied clone, and then moves from the study into a lab.

  Larry is in there, sitting at a table, watching a screen blink red. Grant approaches from behind, and puts a hand on his human shoulder.

  Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

  “Another failure?”

  “Any changes the CRISPR makes reverts. Without more data on how transforming works Grant, I—”

  “We’ll get it soon enough.”

  “None of the anomalies that psychopath freed could even hurt the boy, no meaningful samples left behind.” Larry looks down at his abominable hand, opening and closing it, sending a shudder of pain up his arm. “Maybe, maybe if we just tell Scalpel, ask for his help—”

  “No,” Grant says firmly, “if we bring him in, Timothy Chapman is as good as dead.”

  “Well, as good as a petri dish.” Vergil shrugs, “If you ever want out from under his thumb, claw? Better to have Prehistoric Kid as a free agent.”

  How did it come to this? Lying to the press about his and his companies scientific achievements? To hoarding super powered creatures in his basement, driving them insane thanks to poor conditions? To leeching power from a man to power his facility? To sending his forces to capture a boy just trying to rise above his circumstances?

  It all started with a fateful meeting with Doctor Felix Hammer, Scalpel.

  Years ago, before Arch, hell before his doctorate, Grant and Larry sat together in his inherited kitchen, looking at piles of overdue bills. Utilities, tuition, credit cards, the mortgage Grant had taken out on the ranch, strewn out across the dining room table.

  “I knew we shouldn’t have done this.” Larry shook his head, hand trembling on his cup of coffee.

  “You said it yourself, everything worked on paper.” Grant looked through his notes, his blue prints.

  Genetic splicing, sequencing, an incubator to bypass the need for surrogates for cloned mammals, and so much more. They had come up with so many perfect plans and designs, so many that should have worked.

  In theory.

  As it turned out, Grant and Larry were basically hacks. All this money, all this sacrifice, just to prove that they weren’t as smart as they thought they were.

  “We’re never going to recover.” Larry sniffled, “We’re going to be thrown out of school, you’re going to lose the ranch, we’re going to be homeless.

  Grant remembers the despair in his best friend's voice well, and how angry it made him.

  Grant brought his fist down, slammed it on the table. Larry jumped, dropped his coffee mug, and jumped even higher as it shattered on the floor.

  “God damn it!” Grant grinder his teeth, “Great, add another few dollars to the debt to replace that.”

  “Don’t… That wasn’t… Grant I—“

  “Just clean your damn mess up, then help me look these over again.”

  “I—“

  “Hurry up Larry, for both our sakes.”

  Not that it’d matter, what they thought was perfect was nowhere near, they were doomed. That is, until there was a knock at their door.

  Grant remembers how his heart jumped out of his chest. Who was it? Debt collectors to harass him? Someone serving him legal papers?

  He didn’t realize it was the Devil until far, far later.

  Grant stepped over Larry hunched over the floor as he wiped away his spill, and answered the door. He was ready to get into a yelling match, ready to grab his shotgun by the door, but he was stunned by the man waiting for him.

  “Guten tag young man!” The shrill, jovial, German accent didn’t match the imposing figure that stood on the porch. Tall, a thick, black jacket that gobbled up the daylight, it's like his very presence forced the world to be just a little darker than it already was. “Are you Herr Grant Connors?”

  “I... Yes, I am!” Grant stammered out, staring at the man’s face. Its lower half was covered by the jacket, the only skin that showed looked burnt and loose, and his eyes, hidden behind black spectacles that looked embedded into his face.

  “Wunderbar wunderbar!” He laughed and grabbed up Grant’s hand, shook it furiously, then made his way past him.

  “A beautiful home you have, I’ve always had a respect for farmers, er, ranchers! Don’t worry, Herr Connors, I know the difference.” He chuckled.

  “I, excuse me.” He remembers glancing at the shotgun, and the man stepping directly into his line of sight.

  “Yes my boy?”

  “Who are you? What do you—”

  “Mein got! Forgive me! I’ve gotten ahead of myself! So rude, I have such a terrible habit of...” He spun his hand around as he thought of the phrase, “Getting carried away.”

  “I—”

  “My name is Doctor Felix Hammer, and I am here to save you, elevate you, ascend you. Now,” Felix clapped his hands, “is that coffee I smell? I’d love a cup as we discuss business.”

  The next thing Grant knew, Doctor Felix Hamer was sitting at his table, going through his bills, his research. He’d give a long, drawn out hmmm as he read, would nod, shake his head, tsk tsk as he went through paper after paper, until he laid the last one down onto the stack.

  “So, um, Doctor Hammer, about the money?”

  “Why haven’t I ever heard of you?” Grant interrupted Larry. “You go through my- our research, shaking your head in disapproval, who—”

  “Disapproval!” He put his hand over his chest, “Hardly! This is amazing work! Especially for men such as yourselves!””

  “And what’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Heh.” Felix picked up his mug, and pulled down his jacket from his face.

  There was no mouth, no skin, just a hard, angular metal jaw, that slid open and revealed a black abyss. He pours coffee down it, without even a hint of a swallow, and then it slams shut. Then, he set his mug down, and held his hand up to the two young men. First, he took off his glove and revealed his grotesquely burnt hand. Then, he slid that off too, spider leg-like, mechanical bones stretched far, casting a shadow over the flies already caught in the web.

  Larry screamed and shot up, knocked his chair over as he backed away into the counter. Larry had some sense, but Grant? Back then, he was awestruck as the legs came down to wrap him in a cocoon. The tip of one of the legs pricked his finger, drew a single drop of blood, and then brought it to Felix’s face. Those all black spectacles moved, extended like a microscope, and peered into all the information Grant’s DNA held.

  “Normal men, Herr Connors, Herr Carsus, that is what I mean.” Felix finally answered, and flicked the blood away. “You’ve never heard of me, because my work for the German government a few decades ago was buried, by myself, for the sake of a greater plan. You’ve never heard of me, because my work is far too great for the average man, for the world, as it is. You’ve never heard of me, because I work with the blood, the genetics, of Gods and Monsters, such as which normal men can’t comprehend. But worry not, Herr Connors, Herr Carsus, the time for hiding in the shadows will soon be over, and as such, I am in the market for apprentices.”

  “I... why me? Us? I don’t understand Doctor Hammer.”

  “You will, and please, let's do away with formalities Grant. Doctor is just a title, Felix Hammer is a relic. My friends? They call me Scalpel.”

  He gave them everything, paid off their debts, paid for their schooling, hell, even paid for vocal coaching for Grant, needed to make sure he could command a crowd, become famous. He gave them all the answers to everything they ever wanted to do with their lives, but only taught them just enough, so that they’d remain reliant on him.

  Well those days are over, the discovery of the Tyrannosaurus anomaly, of Prehistoric Kid, changed everything. The company went from being totally reliant on Scalpel’s tech, to heading in a direction that is all founded on Grant’s and Larry’s own research. But that isn’t enough to escape, after all, using Raymond Parker like a battery is the least of the atrocities Scalpel had the men commit.

  “The game isn’t all laid out, not yet.” Vergil says, “But Tim’s psyche profile, power level, is perfect for finally getting you out of this mess, just you wait and see Docs.”

  “Oh god.” Larry holds his head with his good hand, “This is really happening? We’re really doing this? We’ll be lucky if the Director just sends Vanguard for us, Grant, Scalpel is going to kill us.”

  “Probably have that arm with a side of butter too! Oh! I’d do garlic butter!”

  “This isn’t funny damn it!” Larry slams said arm down, leaving a dent in the table. “We’re lucky Scalpel isn’t here already, cutting us down just for losing Raymond! What happens when the power stores start to run out?”

  “Relax Larry, it's under control.” Grant tries to comfort his friend.

  “How could it possibly be—”

  “Don’t you worry Carsus, give it a few days, and a whole lot of your concerns are going to be dealt with.” Vergil winks, “All part of the plan.”