Just outside the main building of Facility:Null, the helicopter touches down. The remaining members of the newly established unit 24: Sawyer, Richard and Jericho exit the aircraft and are greeted by the director, Vincent Campbell.
Director Campbell waits by the lot of helipads, noticing Sawyer holding the metal box as the group exits the helicopter.
"So I see the mission was a success." Campbell says after the men had taken the metal box away.
Sawyer scoffs, "Sure, if you're not considering the fact that half of my unit's dead."
"Right, I'm sorry to hear that, their bodies are being recovered as we speak. Though nonetheless you managed to contain such an anomaly. If I knew what that cryptid was capable of I wouldn't have sent only one unit." Campbell is interrupted by a group of researchers coming out.
"Excuse me, could Richard come down with us?" Asks one of the researchers among them, the lady who was originally tasked with overseeing Richard in his cell.
Campbell nods.
Sawyer turns to Richard and Jericho, "Jericho, go down with him."
"Oh, and… the box please." Another researcher says to Sawyer. Sawyer hands him the box before walking into the facility with Campbell.
"Nevertheless, unit 24's debut was still a success. I'll replace the fallen members of your unit as soon as possible." Campbell says to Sawyer as they walk through the halls of the facility's first floor.
"I don't want you to send me more guys that'll die so easily." Sawyer responds.
"Of course not."
They reach Director Campbell's office, with his bodyguard waiting for him. Campbell turns around to Sawyer before leaving him to go inside the office. "I've sent Dawn to privately escort your new unit member to the facility. Now, I must attend to other things."
Campbell shuts the door after he enters his office.
On a road in the west of Pennsylvania, Dawn drives with a single passenger - a man around her age with dreadlocks that hang below his ears obscuring his face, a short beard on his chin and jaw and a flat gold piercing on his a single eyebrow and ears. He pulls his light blue dress shirt to the side to scratch his chest, a brown fur coat worn over.
A call rings on Dawn's phone and she answers.
"Hello."
The voice on the other side of the phone was Director Campbell.
"Hello Dawn. Just checking in, will you be here as scheduled?"
"We're almost out of Pennsylvania, there was some heavy traffic in New York but we should still be there fairly soon." Dawn replies.
"Alright then. Bye." Campbell hangs up.
After the phone call, the man in the passenger seat takes out a packet of cigarettes, but is stopped by Dawn before he can take one out.
"I don't want the smoke stinking up the car, I'll stop for a break." She says before pulling over.
They get out of the car and the man turns to her, "Got a lighter?"
"Yeah." Dawn's already holding her own pack of cigarettes, and she reaches into her pocket to grab her lighter, lighting her own cigarette before handing the lighter to the man.
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"Access to underground layer 2… granted." The elevator mechanism announces, before opening up to let Professor Lavender in.
The second underground layer of the facility was only open to high ranking researchers, a place of dangerous practicality rather than observation.
Professor Lavender heads towards a large door. Upon reaching it he scans his keycard on the lock and enters a ten digit number code. The door clicks open, and as he enters the room he is met with four other researchers, all with face masks and rubber gloves on, chatting amongst themselves. When the researchers see Lavender enter the room they stop talking.
"Could you bring me the scans of the nerves, please?" The professor asks a nearby researcher as he walks in
The researcher nods, and she goes over to a desk in the far end of the room to sort through several printed out sheets.
The room was very clean, and dimly lit. There were two tables on each end of the room, one with the sheets on it and another with scalpels and several medical supplies. What all this was centered around…
Was an unconscious young woman in the middle, being lifted up by her limbs strapped to a large metal board.
She was completely naked, a large steel bucket lay under her, filled with blood and even a bit of flesh. The most prominent feature of her imprisonment was the spatula - like object keeping her skull completely open, tearing aside skin and bone to make a small opening to her brain.
Professor Lavender observes the small opening with great interest. He stops his gaze as the female researcher returns to him with the scans.
Without looking up from the sheets, Lavender says to the researchers, "Alright, you may leave now."
They all look amongst each other, but start to leave the room. A little while after Lavender was left in the room alone with the female subject, he starts to read something outloud.
"Claudia Welsie, Age 22. A fourth year student at the University of Exeter in England. It's only been a few days since you arrived here, and now we know exactly who you are, yet… no clue how you are. It'd be so much simpler if I could wake you up and ask you what led up to the nerves of an unknown cryptid becoming entangled in your brain. You're a miracle mystery, a human who can infinitely regenerate. I hope they haven't made you suffer."
He walks around the large metal board the girl was strapped to. Her motionless body didn't move an inch, yet he continued to speak to her.
"You're far from home. I know how that feels. Though I doubt relating to me would lift your spirits if you could hear me."
Professor Lavender reaches into a container on one of the tables. Next to various pieces of cloth he finds a cross necklace and lifts it up.
"I could never quite believe in a God, after all working in a wretched place like this would make one chuckle at the idea."
He once again turns to the unconscious girl.
"Wether there is a God or fate, it's like something brought you here…"
"Just to torment me."
"After all, my daughter would've been close to your age by now."
Lavender returns the necklace to the container, taking a second to look around. He then kneels down, grabs the table with one hand and leans his head on it. His eyes wide open facing the floor.
"It's all too intricately cruel."
Later in the day, Professor Lavender heads up to the surface level of the facility for a scheduled meeting. As he walks away from the entrance to the lower floors, a soldier approaches him.
"Hey, excuse me." The soldier stops him to talk. A young man with a scar across his cheek and platinum eyes that look ever - focused. Lavender didn't know this man personally, but believed he recognised him.
"Got any ideas where my men might be? Two members of unit 24 went down with some researchers about twenty minutes ago."
Professor Lavender shakes his head, "No, sorry. I haven't heard anything about it."
"Alright, thanks anyway." The young soldier continues walking past him in search of his unit members.
When Lavender makes it to the office, he walks in and stops in surprise. Sitting across the table from the man Lavender was here to meet was Professor Dahlberg. He smiled at his fellow senior researcher as he walked in, although the smile was clearly professionally soulless.
Lavender shakes off the feeling that this meeting may be to discuss how he covered up the death of a junior researcher. He sits down at the seat at the table with both men at each side, he turns left to the man he's here to meet.
"Good evening, sir." Lavender says.
He's met with a returned "Good evening." The man who this office belongs to is one of the managers of the facility who oversee the funding and therefore make decisions in the best interest of the investors. A chubby man in a suit and blonde hair slick to the side, he puts his hand on the table and begins talking to Professor Lavender.
"I'll try to make this quick. Professor Dahlberg will be put in charge of the affected girl in room 056."
Lavender furrows his brows in confusion. "Wha- why?"
"Simply, your research is yielding no results." The manager responds.
"That can't be right, it's only been a few days since she arrived here. We've confirmed that she can heal from anything as long as her brain is undamaged, if you wanted something more then we should've been given more time."
"My people want you to emulate the subject's ability in another person. We can't wait forever."
"It doesn't matter how long you wait for that, it's impossible!" Professor Lavender begins to get more nervous now, not understanding why managers of the facility are so insistent on Claudia's regeneration ability to be recreated and given to another human.
Even though Lavender missed out a key detail in his reports about Claudia, the fact that her regeneration ability comes from the nerves of an unknown cryptid planted inside her head, nobody knew how it had happened, so Lavender went on allowing the facility's managers to believe her ability was natural.
The manager shook his head, "That's exactly why we're giving somebody else the position to lead the research. You believe it's impossible, so why should we keep you around if you won't even try?"
Lavender stops talking, clearly in disbelief.
"That'll be all for today, thank you." The manager says as he takes his briefcase and leaves the office.
Professor Dahlberg also heads out of the room, looking back at Lavender with one last soulless smile.