DD 302 Ch 36

My mind reeled at the implications of what I had just overheard. Somebody within the UG facilities was demanding the doctor release the worms, and the doctor muttering about Threadspawn. Suddenly, the doctor’s baggy, sleepless eyes took on a far more sinister context.

“Let’s see…” he muttered, walking over to Penny and casting several abilities on her in quick succession. “Alright. Up you go. I assume you already know what to do.”

He said the words to Penny, but we all needed to act. And now I knew that we were in this deeper than expected.

I had planned on breaking into a UG facility. I had not planned on breaking into one that appeared to have been taken over by the very creatures it was built to contain.

Activating [Shadow Ambush] immediately, I melted back into the body bag and slipped out behind the doctor. I grabbed him by the shoulder and set a knife gently, not at all the pressure for lethal force as any adventurer would know, against the side of his neck.

But apparently this man did not know the difference of what instituted a direct threat. His whole body shook under my hand.

“Wh-what are you doing?” he stuttered. “I’m just releasing you. There’s no need to get violent.”

“I’d feel a whole lot less violent if you were actually doing your job, doc.” I activated [Eyes of Wisdom], a very important question forming on the tip of my mind. Blue light reflected faintly off the back of his head, and I now knew that this man was not infected.

My brows furrowed into a scowl. “Why are you releasing the Threadspawn if you aren’t even infected?”

He did a double-take as Charlotte crawled out of her own bag and Penny swung her legs off her table, fully awake.

“What’s the plan now?” Penny asked as Charlotte cast heals about to all three of us.

“The plan’s the same as before,” I said, turning back to the doctor. “Is there a cure for the Threadspawn? Can you take them out of someone without killing them?”

The doctor blinked. “That’s… that’s why you’re here?”

“Yeah. The president of the UG got upset at Crimson and I. He cut us off from all information. Now I know someone who’s infected, and the only way to get the cure is to come here and take it myself.” I gestured around the room. “Which is now seeming far more difficult than expected.”

The doctor shook his head. “You’re with Crimson? Then hopefully…look, you can ask me questions later..” He started to get excited.

I moved the knife just enough to remind him it was still there. “No. I’m finishing my line of questioning first.”

He nodded so fast he nearly cut himself. “Sure. Yeah. Anything you want.”

“You seem more agreeable than I expected,” I said slowly, turning him to face me.

“Why wouldn’t I be? I don’t want to be here.” He swallowed. “You have to understand that the Threadspawn want a layer of actual humans between them and whatever they’re doing near the dungeon entrance.”

“How are they keeping you compliant?” I asked.

“Because they’re so freaking strong! I saw what they did to some of the UG security. They held them down and forced worms into their chests. If they can do that to them, then the threat of doing it to me is real enough. I wouldn’t wish one of those worms being shoved in my worst enemy.” He shuddered.

I scowled and opened a portal.

Crimson, Felin, Des and Bellaire stepped through immediately. My team was getting bigger by the minute.

“Alright, let’s do this.” Crimson cracked her knuckles.

“This just got a little more complicated,” I told her with a look that said ‘calm your horses’.

Her enthusiasm dimmed like I’d taken a toy away. “What did the doctor tell you? Some sob story?”

I shook my head. “Just that a Threadspawn is giving orders here and threatening him. The infiltration seems to be big enough that we need to change our plans. This isn’t a UG facility anymore.”

Crimson turned to the doctor, her own eyes glowing blue. I knew she was also checking if he’s been infected. “He’s not infected,” she confirmed. “So why would he work with them?”

“Because he’s being threatened,” I said. “And they’ve taken over this entire research site.”

The doctor collapsed to his knees in front of Crimson. “Please help us. I don’t know what happened or why you stopped coming, but as soon as you did, the Threadspawn took over. They got inside a bunch of the internal security. The weak ones you brought, the ones we thought we could try procedures where they were awake, suddenly had the strength to overpower level fifties and toss them around.” His eyes went wide with remembered fear. “They pulled the worms out of old hosts, put them into security officers, and pretended everything was normal while they sent people into the dungeon.”

“This happened as soon as I stopped coming?” Crimson frowned, pinching the bridge of her nose and shifted towards me. “Do you think the president of the UG is infected? Cutting us out and keeping us away…was that a Threadspawn tactic to stop us from noticing?”

I shrugged. “Your guess is as good as mine. But the doc says they like having a layer of humans between them and exposure.”

The doctor nodded rapidly. “Yes. That’s why they didn’t infect me. They need someone to file reports while they hold a gun to my head.” His voice cracked.

“And they brought in… one of them that’s breeding them.” He shuddered violently. “It’s disgusting. Now everyone we bring in here is being infected. Even the extra party members you dropped off for safekeeping are now hosts too.”

Crimson rubbed at her brow. “Damn it. Now I’m the bad guy. Ken, you know how much I hate being the bad guy.”

I held up my hands. “We had to come here to get the information we needed, and at least now we know.” I turned to the doctor. “You said there’s a breeder. They’re multiplying. How bad is it?” My thoughts went to the woman we’d seen in the penthouse. She’d been too strong for us to handle.

His face went pale. “Bad.”

I exhaled slowly and looked at Crimson. “Do I bring in demons?”

Des immediately shook her head. “Are you kidding? They’d burn this place to the ground, with everyone in it. They aren’t even looking for a cure. They just want containment.”

The doctor perked up quickly. “We were close to a cure! If I can get a few more test subjects, ones I can actually work on, I could probably do it. I swear.”

I frowned, the frown depending as I worked through what he had told me. His story was convincing. He might be telling the truth. But he could also be some mix of desperate, lying, and weak. But weak was the part I knew I could work with.

I grabbed him by the hair and forced him to meet my gaze, not a hint of subtlety left. “How many test subjects? And how fast can you finish?”

“Two…no, three subjects to be sure. And I’ll have it solved. I promise you.” He told me.

I glanced at Crimson. She gave a grin that belonged more on a shark than a human.

“Oh, don’t worry. He’ll help us,” she said.

He shivered. “Of course.”

“So.” Crimson tapped her lips. “A few test subjects. We can grab a few and get out of here.”

“And the surgical center,” he said quickly. “What I need to do is delicate. I need the surgical suite here with all of our specialized tools if you want a high chance of success.”

“Fine,” I said. “Just tell us where it is and what you need. I want you to do a few extractions safely before we try it on the person we actually want to save.” I pushed away guilt at choosing who to give the best chance. While it sucked, it was still a choice that had to be made.

“And be careful,” he warned. “As we were studying them, they were studying us.”

We paused for him to continue.

“Whatever they’re doing now, the worms secrete some kind of chemical cocktail into the hosts. It’s incredibly destructive to the host, those that I’ve seen use it wear themselves down within weeks. Between that and however they’re controlling the host, the natural limiters in the brain, the ones that stop us from tearing our own muscles apart are completely gone.” He swallowed.

“People are stronger and faster than they have any right to be. For all I know, there’s some dungeon ability involved. It makes no sense how powerful some of the hosts are.” He reported.

“Well, you sit tight, doc,” I said, gesturing to the others. “We’ll handle that part. Crimson, you know what this place looks like?”

“Not a clue. They kept me out of the back rooms even before we pissed off Scaredy Cat.” She said.

The doctor mouthed the nickname in confusion.

I smirked. “She means the president of the UG.”

“I thought he was a powerful Summoner,” the man murmured as we opened the door and slipped into the hallway.

I was prepared for an attack, but none came. If the Threadspawn were concerned about intruders, they weren’t showing it. In fact, the hallways were concerningly empty. As we moved down the corridor, the doc must’ve noticed my frown.

“Anyone that’s gone deep in here just gets grabbed and turned,” he said, explaining the lack of security. “I don’t think they’re that concerned that anyone’s going to break in considering they are subduing level 50’s.”

I grunted in agreement. He was probably right. I just didn’t want him to be right. “Which way?” I asked as we reached a T-junction.

He gestured left, his mouth continuing to run like some nervous idiot who didn’t know how to shut up.

“It’s actually quite interesting,” he said. “Whatever they’re doing to break through the limits of human physiology…well, it might even be replicable. Something we could use to let adventurers grow even stronger.”

He sounded excited. I understood the academic temptation, but Crimson reacted first.

She slammed a hand against the wall right next to his head. Had she been an inch over, he wouldn’t have a head. It’d be a red pancake smeared into the concrete.

“When this is all done,” Crimson said slowly, “I don’t want to hear some story about a doctor who came up with a miracle drug to make adventurers stronger. Because that would mean you were playing with things you shouldn’t have touched. It would mean you have live worms, which we shouldn’t mess with for any advantage.”

The man swallowed audibly, pinned by her glare.

“Nod if you understand.” She stated.

His head bobbed a mile a minute.

“Good.” She leaned back. “Don’t make me come check on you.”

“I—I wouldn’t. No, you’re… you’re right.” He stumbled over his words. “Nothing good will come out of continuing to dabble with the Threadspawn. These things are…” He paused, shuddering. “Far too dangerous.”

“I’m glad we understand each other,” Crimson said pointedly.

As she spoke, two figures turned the corner ahead and spotted us. There was only the briefest pause to assess us before they flew down the hallway at breakneck speed.

Crimson reacted first, catching one of their fists and frowning with the effort it took to stop the hit.

I backed her up a second later, my dagger punching into the adventurer’s spine. I winced. “We can heal that later, right, Charlotte?”

An elemental shield popped into existence in front of me, only to shatter a second later as the second Threadspawn-possessed adventurer punched through the shield.

“We should be able to,” Charlotte told me, already shifting her stance. “As long as we don’t, you know, brutalize their corpses too much. Besides, we needed two test subjects for the doc, right?”

Lightning fried the one with the injured spine until he stopped trying to move.

I grimaced at how callous we were being, but kept my focus on the attackers. I wove around the second attacker’s blows as Crimson came up behind them and shattered their hip with a brutal kick.

Penny winced. “Remind me not to upset Crimson anytime soon,” she muttered, staring at the two downed adventurers, one of whom tried to scream through Crimson’s boot in his mouth.

“Alright, what condition do you need them in, doc?” Crimson asked, turning casually toward the man in the lab coat, who looked like he was about to piss himself as he stared down at the poor man beneath Crimson.

“I, uh… just need them immobile. And preferably alive.” He answered.

The downed man with the broken hip grabbed Crimson by the ankle and tried to crush her foot in his grip. The move was a poor choice.

Crimson looked down at him with pure disdain and kicked her foot hard enough that I was surprised his jaw didn’t end up across the room. It did however distort enough that he wasn’t going to be making much noise.

“Oof,” Des said. “That’s gotta hurt.”

“They’re the enemy,” Crimson replied with a shrug, daring Des to argue as she neatly used a sword to trim their tendons.

Des raised her hands in surrender. “Just sympathizing with the poor bastard getting knocked around by you. That’s probably worse than your training.”

Crimson grinned. “My training’s worse than this. And if you don’t think so, we can work on it until we get there.”

There was no right answer to Crimson’s statement, so Des wisely kept her mouth shut.

Penny’s greatsword flashed, severing the other man’s spine with a single stroke.

“We’re done playing around. Let’s get these two to the surgical suite. The less time we’re here, the better.” Penny sniffed and looked around, uneasy. I agreed with her. The entire place felt wrong.

Des gave me a look.

“What?” I asked, hooking a thumb at Penny behind me.

Crimson grabbed both unconscious adventurers by their collars and began dragging them. “Ken, you need to be careful. If a lady didn’t know better, she’d think you agreeing with other women was something to get jealous about.”

“Thankfully you know better than to get jealous,” I said, raising an eyebrow at her.

“What about—” the doctor started, only for Crimson to spin and shut him up with a look.

“If you need a third, we’ll get you a third later. Right now, my priority, and yours,” she jabbed a finger at his chest “is testing your theories and getting a stable, viable solution for removing the Threadspawn.”

Her eyes narrowed dangerously. “The only way any of us are getting out of here alive and keeping this facility from becoming humanity’s downfall is if we clear this place. None of us are leaving until the Threadspawn threat is eliminated.” She emphasized the last word like a death sentence.

The doctor ducked his head quickly and pointed down the hall. “Th-that way… to the surgical center.”

Crimson flashed another terrifying smile.

The smile reminded me very clearly of why I was so damn happy she was on my side. No matter how much I trusted her, Crimson was still terrifying. And that barely changed even when she was fighting alongside me.