I stretched as the hospital gown given to me by my own employee’s fell away. I heard a few startled gasps escape the newer researchers as they caught sight of my body. The head researcher of Augur Initiative rushing over to help several other lead engineers and scientists set up the maintenance apparatus.

I marvelled at my own reflection. I was part machine after-all. Or was I more machine now? The skeletal framework designed so long ago by Devin Trent was still within good repair. But I had my people working on upgrades. My thought’s processing the memory of Devin Trent. He and his son were so alike.

There was something different about Rhys though, that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. My secretary had informed me, that Rhys had received our messages. Yet he hadn’t reply. I wanted to repay him for what his father had done to me. Done for me.

“How long until we’re ready to go global?” I asked Joseph the head researcher. The wiry old man scratched the bridge of his nose in thought.

“A month at least,” he muttered, and I cocked an eyebrow at him. The gesture made worse when the skin on the left side of my face slid down with a depressurised hiss to expose the shiny skeletal plating and a very organic eyeball. Joseph nodded firmly, even as a few others stepped back in shock. “We’ve got all the parts we needed to begin, and the government has accepted our contract of permanency within the city. We just need to be ready to respond if a revolt happens, Robert.”

I nodded, “if it happens, it happens. I’ll not cry over spilled milk, even if that spilled milk is Humanity and the Awakened rising up, augmented by our tech. If the people want to stand side by side with the Gifted and not under their heel. They’ll pay to be augmented by us,” I shrug. “What of our strike team? How went the bank?” I asked Joseph.

“Went off without a hitch,” Joseph smiled. “Our target, even helped the strike team by giving them the location of the owners.”

“He did, did he?” I asked with a frown, outstretching my arms to either side as a scanner past over me.

“Yes. Our intelligence has found a few discrepancy within his bank account as well. Recent transactions and credits appearing in his account with no discernible trace. He also quit his job this morning.”

“What’re you up to kid?” I asked to myself and rubbed at my chin in thought.

“Please don’t move sir,” one of the engineer’s told me and I nodded.

“I believe we should move onto our secondary target. The first is clearly not responsive to us … But his sister…” Joseph’s voice trailed off suggestively.

“Move on it tomorrow,” I told him with a firm nod. My own thought’s trailing away to the night I became as I’m now. “Maybe even use his sister as a bait. Red’s after all, have a greater margin of success than the others.”

Devin Trent had changed me all those thirty years ago. He among others trying to combine artificial intelligence and cybernetics with Awakened organic flesh. I didn’t even know the original owner of the Awakened half of my body. Any and all traces of the facility I had awoken in had been wiped out long ago. The first thing I saw being the bright flash of the red gateway that lasted seven long years and the dull paralysing ache my Awaken half was experiencing.

Now I understood what happened to me. The dead Awakened half of me had experienced a second awakening as the two frameworks of my being melded together as one.

I was a unique entity. Alone in a whole full of prejudice.

Which is why I’m going to balance the scales. Give Humans and Awaken a chance to rise up, even if it starts a war in the city. I looked to the stacks and rows of cybernetic and prosthetic augmentations displayed before me and couldn’t help but grin.

Maybe with enough chaos in the city, it’ll draw another Red Gateway.

“Joseph,” I called to the man as he started to turn away.

“Yes, Robert?” He replied turning back.

“Lets’ also advance the timeframe on those Void Mana Emitter’s.”

Yes. The streets were likely to be painted red in the coming months.

This novel is the work of Rhys Thomas. If you are reading this and it has not been published by Rhys Thomas, then this work has been stolen. Please report this to Amazon and me at email: [email protected]