Three nurses at my hospital became pregnant after caring for the same man—a patient who had supposedly been in a coma for nearly ten years. At first, I told myself it had to be coincidence. Then one night, I stood beside his bed, whispered, “Marcus, can you hear me?” and watched the face of an unconscious man almost smile.

“Get away from her!” I screamed, stepping toward the table, every muscle in my body coiled to strike.

“Adrian!” Lila sobbed from the table, her voice cracked, her body convulsing as another violent contraction tore through her abdomen. “Adrian, help me! They’re killing me!”

Vance reached beneath the sterile tray, pulling out a compact, black nine-millimeter semi-automatic pistol. His hands were trembling, but the barrel was aimed directly at my chest.

“Step back, Adrian!” Vance yelled, his voice cracking with hysterical tension. “Drop the wrench! Drop it or I swear to God I’ll put a bullet through your heart!”

I stopped. The heavy steel tool hung limp in my grip.

“You’re an administrator, Paul,” I said, keeping my eyes locked on his. “You’re a bureaucrat who moves numbers on a spreadsheet. You’ve never pulled a trigger in your life. You don't have the stomach for it.”

“Try me!” Vance shrieked. “Everything I built—this entire hospital—I won't let you tear it down for some moral crusade!”

“He’s right, Paul,” Mercer said, his voice smooth, entirely unbothered by the gun or the confrontation.

Mercer reached out with lightning speed, his gloved hand catching Vance’s wrist. With a casual twist of his forearm, Mercer applied pressure to Vance’s median nerve.

Vance screamed in agony, his fingers opening involuntarily.

The pistol clattered against the epoxy floor. Mercer kicked it aside with his foot; it slid across the polished surface, disappearing under a stainless-steel storage cabinet.

“Julian!” Vance choked out, clutching his bruised wrist. “What are you doing?!”

“You’re panicking, Paul,” Mercer said, turning his back on the hospital director as if he were nothing more than a piece of discarded furniture. “Panic is a symptom of genetic inferiority. You’ve outlived your usefulness.”

Mercer picked up the scalpel from the tray.

He looked at me, tilting his head with academic curiosity.

“You came back for her,” Mercer said, gesturing toward Lila. “Why? She isn't your wife. She isn't your sister. From an evolutionary perspective, risking your life for non-kin genetic material is an act of absolute biological insanity.”

“It’s called humanity, Mercer,” I breathed, taking a slow step to the left, putting myself between him and Lila. “Something you cut out of yourself a long time ago.”

Mercer smiled beneath his mask.

“Humanity is a beta test, Dr. Miller. I am the stable release.”

He lunged.

He didn't swing wildly like an untrained street fighter. He moved with the precision of a master martial artist, driving the scalpel toward my carotid artery in a tight, lethal arc.

I raised the heavy oxygen wrench, blocking the blade.

*CLANG.*

The surgical steel of the scalpel snapped against the forged carbon steel of the tool.

The impact drove me back two steps, the sheer force of Mercer’s blow sending a shockwave of pain through my wrists. Before I could recover, Mercer drove a knee into my ribs.

I heard the sickening *crack* of cartilage. Air exploded from my lungs.

I dropped to one knee, the wrench slipping from my numb fingers. Mercer grabbed me by the hair, yanking my head back, his fingers digging into my scalp like steel claws. He reached down to the tray with his free hand, picking up a twelve-gauge spinal tap needle.

A six-inch spike of hollow steel.

“A shame, Adrian,” Mercer whispered into my ear. “You had exceptional diagnostic instincts. But in the new world, there is only room for the creators.”

He raised the needle, aiming for the base of my skull—the foramen magnum. A single thrust would sever my brainstem.

*BANG.*

The gunshot was deafening in the enclosed, tiled room.

Mercer’s body jerked.

The needle stopped an inch from my eye.

A blossom of dark, arterial blood erupted through the front of Mercer’s surgical gown, right over his left lung.

He staggered backward, his gray-blue eyes widening in genuine, uncomprehending shock. He looked down at his chest, then across the room.

Standing by the storage cabinet, holding the nine-millimeter pistol with both hands, was Director Paul Vance.

Vance’s face was covered in tears, his suit soaked in cold sweat, his entire body shaking uncontrollably.

“You said... you said I outlived my usefulness,” Vance sobbed, his finger pulling the trigger again.

*BANG.*

The second shot caught Mercer in the shoulder. The force threw the geneticist against the fetal monitoring console, shattering the glass screen into a spiderweb of sparks and liquid crystal.

Mercer fell to the floor, gasping, blood bubbling at the corner of his lips.

Even with two hollow-point rounds in his torso, he didn't scream. He looked at Vance, his eyes burning with an icy, terrifying contempt.

“You... parasite,” Mercer whispered, blood staining his perfect white teeth.

Vance lowered the gun, his chest heaving. He looked at me, then at Mercer, then down at the weapon in his hands.

The sound of distant sirens—dozens of them, screaming through the Chicago streets above—cut through the hum of the air filters.

Sarah Lin had come through.

The FBI had arrived.

Vance looked toward the blast doors, panic seizing him like an electric shock. He dropped the gun, turned on his heel, and fled into the dark utility tunnels, his frantic footsteps echoing into the bowels of the hospital.

I didn't chase him.

I scrambled across the floor to the surgical table.

“Lila,” I gasped, clutching my broken ribs as agony flared through my chest. “Lila, look at me!”

She was fading. Her skin was gray, her lips blue. The monitor behind her was screaming: *BP 60/40. HR 145.*

I grabbed the surgical shears from the tray, cutting the leather restraints from her wrists. I ripped the oxytocin line from her IV port, flushing it with normal saline from a fresh bag.

“Stay with me, Lila!” I shouted, slapping her cheek gently. “Stay with me! The sirens—help is here!”

She opened her eyes weakly, looking at me through a haze of agony.

“My baby...” she whispered, her fingers weakly curling around my coat sleeve. “Save... my baby...”

I looked down at the floor where Mercer had fallen.

The blood trail was there. A thick smear of dark, crimson fluid leading across the white epoxy toward the emergency fire exit that led directly to the riverfront service docks.