Earlier, shortly after the group had left Mythos Labs…
“Doctor Mythos, we’ve finished checking through the building and have not found any actual fire or smoke residue.”
Dr. Julius Mythos stood with his back to the company’s response team as he looked out the window across the cityscape.
“Did you find the source of the alarm? And who pulled it?”
“Yes and no…” responded one of the team members. “It was… in Zeta Lab… we haven’t discovered who it was that activated the alarm yet…”
Mythos turned his head to finally look at the woman speaking.
“Did I hear you correctly? I almost thought I heard you say that the alarm came from inside the most secure area in this facility… and that you don’t know who started it.”
A man took a step forward from next to her.
“We did already review the security footage though… we just haven’t gone far enough back to completely identify the people responsible.”
Mythos turned on the spot to fully face the response team.
“Are you saying that the responsible parties are not on staff here? We have a system in place specifically to quickly track the comings and goings of everyone in this building.”
“We believe they were part of the New Atlantis University group that Dr. Reed had given a tour to,” said the man. “That’s as far as we’ve been able to go so far. We just wanted to keep you informed…”
“I don’t want to hear another word until I have every iota of detail of whoever broke into Zeta Lab dragged back in here on a silver platter!” shouted Mythos.
“Name, date of birth, hell… their shoe sizes! They’ve compromised our security and are meddling with something that cannot be disturbed!”
The response team members gave a quick nod and urgently shuffled out of the office. Julius let out a long angry sigh and sank into his oversized office chair behind his desk. Removing his glasses and setting them aside, he massaged his temples in frustration as he mulled over the ramifications of what he assumed to have happened: he assumed that either the Ouroboros or the mysterious vigilantes who had been spotted around the city were responsible. His own ‘employer’ had made sure that he had resources to be sure that the Ouroboros were compensated for their services. It was more likely the latter party trying to uncover this involvement and bring it to light. He needed to examine the system himself… while he had top-of-the-line staff members who were deemed among the most brilliant and talented individuals in their fields, he still only fully trusted his own mind and talents to come to any viable conclusions.
He set his glasses back on his face and left his office. Taking the personal elevator that was in the entry before his office, he entered his biometrics that granted access to any area of the facility. It was a short ride, but to him, every moment felt like lost seconds before someone barged into his office with some supposed news article about corruption within his company and he could not let that happen.
As the elevator neared the floor to Zeta Lab, he heard a familiar beeping and checked his phone. Upon reading the message, his eyes widened. As soon as the doors opened he rushed out to the secret lab. He scanned in his ID at a door near the end of the hall and found a sharply dressed man in a pin-stripe suit on the other side of the last set of doors waiting for him. His “sponsor”.
"Oh, sir..." he stammered. "I wasn't expecting you to be here today..."
The man turned and looked at him, a grave demeanor about him.
"Julius, you should always be expecting me," he stated coldly. "I am not always going to give you a notice. I am too busy of a man for such formalities."
The man turned back away from the door and walked towards the displays in the room behind him.
“It has come to my attention that someone was meddling in this lab today,” he said.
“Is there any reason you haven’t dealt with the matter yet?”
“I was coming down to verify the identity of the intruders myself,” stated Dr. Mythos.
“The facility’s response team was working on the situation, but they seem to be taking their time…”
“And time is in short supply right now,” said the man as motioned his subordinate to the console.
Dr. Mythos typed in a string of commands to the computer and adjusted his glasses nervously. On the displays in front of them, the readouts of the mythology-based creatures moved to the side of the holographic displays, and a feed of information scrolled by. Dr. Mythos leaned forward to try to keep up with the stream of text while the man behind him stood impassively.
“It seems they somehow managed to get deep enough into the system to copy most of the research notes regarding the acquirement and usage of the Zeta compound…” he noted. “Which regrettably also mentions the involvement of the Ouroboros as we had previously tested smaller samples we had synthesized…”
“And what of their identities?”
Dr. Mythos typed another command and a set of visual feeds appeared in front of them. He set the timestamp to the moment the fire alarm had gone off and saw the two figures in casual civilian jackets set off the alarm just as they were discovered by one of the scientists. Playing it in reverse, they followed the duo to the console they were currently working on, then back towards the main entrance of Zeta Lab, all the while their faces being mostly obscured as if the two had been specifically trained to avoid their visage being seen.
“Still unclear…”
He continued to backtrack the recording to see if their features were ever seen by the cameras, but it appeared that they would be out of luck. Suddenly there was a movement made by one of the individuals and he paused the recording. He slowly stepped the video forward and stopped as the shaggy blonde briefly turned his head to look behind him.
“I’ve seen this person before…” he stated.
The man behind him nodded.
“Just as I presumed.”
Dr. Mythos zoomed in on the image and studied the face.
“He is definitely a student from New Atlantis University, that much is certain,” he said.
“It only stands to reason that his accomplice is also a student as well considering they both came in with this group.”
“Then it seems that we need to show them what happens when they meddle in our affairs,” the man said in an uncaring tone.
“I think it’s time to test the next batch of experiments out.”
Dr. Mythos stroked his chin in thought.
“I suppose they have passed the more vital tests… what of collateral damage? We still don’t have a way to directly control them.”
“I’ll have my agent acquire a sample to use as a focus for a pair of subject KRB to go after the infiltrators,” the man said, ignoring the question. “Have them ready to release by the time I call it in. I’d also like a trial with the latest variants of MNS and GRP to pay your ‘competition’ a visit.”
Dr. Mythos paused from typing on the console and turned to the man.
“Are you sure? Beyond their R&D being a tier beyond that of Mythos Labs, they haven’t technically been causing any problems with our… your… plans.”
“Did I stutter?” the man asked sternly.
“As you wish…”
The man turned back away from Dr. Mythos, leaving him to fulfill his commands. Frustrated and anxious, Julius took off his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose. A little while later, the doors cycled behind him and a woman entered the room. He glanced over his shoulder to see that it was Dr. Alexandra Basil.
“Alex… has our… guest… left the premises?”
She nodded.
“Yes, sir. I watched him leave through the rear entrance.”
Julius let out an exasperated sigh.
“While he may be funding the very research he commissioned, I'm getting rather tired of his abrupt and unannounced visits and his… demands…”
“He has unrestricted access to the facility,” noted the woman as she smoothed her lab coat. “There isn’t much that can be done about when he shows up.”
“I just would like a little more of a heads-up…” said Julius. “Perhaps we could have security adjust his badge profile so we get an alert when he is on site. I also have reason to believe that he has someone on staff here feeding him information more directly… so we need to be more careful about who is involved in these experiments.”
Alex nodded and typed in some notes on the data pad she carried.
“What of this ‘trial run’ he wants us to execute?” she asked. “Won’t people…”
“Get hurt?” Julius finished coldly. “It’s all part of the grand scheme of things. Combining the DNA sequences of real-world species to create mythological-tier creatures is just the beginning…”
He finished typing a string of commands and hit the enter key.
“We can do… we could be… so much more…”
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