EXCERPT 1.
We sprinted after the last guy who was running through the desert area. My heart pounded as I sprinted after the guy. All I could think about was tackling this guy to the ground and beating the shit out of him. The field seemed like an endless desert of sand and dried-out plants. The last guy made a hard turn into what looked like a cave entrance. The entrance hand a big concrete shaft leading inside with black water pouring out of it. We stopped and shined our flashlights into the cave, but saw nothing. Barns and I went inside. It was dark and smelled like a port-a-potty that hadn’t been cleaned in years; we heard rats squeaking and the echoes of water dripping in the distance. Being in there made my stomach feel like it was going to blow up and I felt like I would never eat again. We walked on until we arrived at a very large room. I went in, and the gate slammed shut behind me. The slamming echoed throughout the room and it froze my heart.

I turned and ran towards the gate. “Hey let me out!” I said. I tried pulling on the bars and kicking the gate down, but it was too strong. “Come on, let me out!”

I tried contacting Max on my radio. “Max, do you copy?” I asked.

“Alex… can you hear…” Max said. My radio went static.

“Long live the Union,” Barnes said as he backed off and sunk into the darkness of the cave. My heart dropped into my stomach as he backed off.

“Long live the Union, indeed!” Another man said in a British accent. 

Some lights flashed behind me.  I slowly turned around.

it was Axel. 

“Alex Connors, we meet at last,” he said in a soft voice as he took a few steps towards me. “I have been looking forward to this for so long.”

A wave of anxiety hit me like a truck. He was a lot bigger in person, but not too big just big enough to pose a threat. I couldn’t take my attention off of how much bigger he was in person. 

All around was rock and water. I could hear water flowing nearby only to pour out into a drain. I immediately pulled out my rifle and aimed it at him, ready to shoot as that feeling in my stomach came back.

“Please put down the weapons. You can’t kill all of us,” Axel said.

I looked up, and saw the next level up; a large group of Axels’ men were armed with machine guns and assault rifles. My entire body was covered with laser sight dots like a Christmas tree. My heart froze up as I pictured myself getting blown away.

“They all have armor-piercing bullets, and clear shots,” Axel said.

I put down my rifle, pistol, and knife. The clank of my rifle and pistol hitting the ground echoed in the room. I stood there feeling naked as I took some breaths, trying to calm myself down.

“So you’re Axel? What do you want?”

“Ah, straight to business huh?” he said, smiling.

“You know I have orders to bring you in, right?” I said.

Axel walked closer to me, seeming to grow bigger with each step. “Oh, I am aware of your mission, indeed,” he said “You think I don’t know you, Alex? I’ve been watching you for some time now,” he said while still speaking in his soft voice.

I started to sweat. I wiped my head while I tried to process my thoughts. I continued to try and get my mind off my feelings as I focused on Axel.

“Yeah. Well, to me, you are just another terrorist on some kind of mission. An anarchist,” I said as Axel laughed.

“Ah, so young and still so much to learn. I have been doing this far longer then you have,” he said.

“Age does have its advantages,” I said.

“As well as its disadvantages,” Axel replied.

“Why did you attack the Pentagon?” I asked as I walked closer to him.

Axel started to walk to me. “Easy. I needed to draw attention.”

“By killing innocent people?”

“Ha! Just another stereotypical word: Innocent. Please, Alex, those people were just expendable assets, just like everyone else.”

“We will see about that,” I said as I walked towards him.

At that moment, all I thought about was beating Axel to a pulp. I ran up to him and struck at him with all the strength I had. His steel-like body just absorbed the strikes, taking little to no damage whatsoever. I threw another right hook. He blocked it and threw an uppercut elbow to my face, knocking me back, then a spin kick to my chest, kicking me into a pile of bricks. I felt like someone had hit my solar plexus with a sledgehammer as I tried to breathe. All I could think about was the pain as I lay there like I was a plant being eaten by rodents. I rubbed my jaw, trying to ease the pain, and my body was covered in sweat and dust. The Mercenaries just stood by and watched.

“Your confidence has gotten the best of you. You have been fighting so much of these mere humans that you believe yourself to be unstoppable. You proclaim that you are a super-soldier. But really you are just a boy,” he said.

As I laid there, feeling like my body was crushed by a wrecking ball, I kept thinking about my training. I could still hear the trainer shouting at me to control my emotions. I closed my eyes and breathed, trying to get my mind off of my feelings.

“I’ve beaten people like you before,” I said as I got up slowly, trying to fight through the pain.

I did a spin kick to his face with Axel leaning back, slightly dodging it. I then did a spin side kick to him, with him blocking it, followed by a spin jump kick to his chest, which seemingly did nothing to him. I threw more hooks to his face with every bit of strength I had. When I went to throw the third, he grabbed my fist and started squeezing it like an empty Coke can; several snapping sounds emerged from my hand. I could feel the bones in my fist being slowly crushed like wood, and it was all I could focus on. I screamed in pain as I slowly dropped to my knees. I tried to break his grip, but it was as strong as steel. My right hand was practically destroyed.

“All this strength and no coordination. You are truly an amateur,” he said as he pushed me to the ground. He then did a powerful bottom fist strike to my back, which felt like being hit by a pipe wrench.

I took another breath, trying not to explode with anger so I don’t throw up, then got up and went to do another spinning jump kick. While I was in mid-air, Axel punched me directly in the solar plexus, knocking me down. All the air was knocked out of me again, and I could barely breathe. He then picked me up and threw me into a wall. A bang followed as I hit the floor. My body felt like all the bones were broken into bits, and I could not get up. My mind was glued to the pain as it settled. As I lay there, Axel walked up and crouched next to me.

“I understand what you are going through. You’ve spent half of your life training, and now you are split. Every day you contend with adapting to human life. These humans have corrupted your mind, but I can help you. I can save you from them. Please let me help you,” he said. His voice was pretty calm and soothing for a terrorist.

I slowly picked myself up, feeling like my body was going to break into pieces at any second. My arms felt like they were weighed down by trucks, and my chest weighed a ton. I gripped my broken wrist as I tried to find my balance.

“I don’t need your help!” I said, standing ready.

“Very well then,” he said as he did a spinning heel kick to my face, knocking me out. From there it was just blackness and nothing.

 

EXCERPT 2.
I got picked up and was driven directly to the STR. When I got there, the entire staff was running around frantically trying to get the situation under control with sounds of distorted dialogue of people talking in the background. I went into Mathis’ office, where he was standing there waiting for me.

“What the hell is going on?” I asked as I walked into Mathis’s office.

Mathis got up from his desk. “About half an hour ago, someone infiltrated the Pentagon and then massacred three-quarters of the security force there. He plowed through there security like it was a basic training mission. I’m putting the US Chain of Command on now,” he said before going to his computer. He hit some buttons and the US president, along with the chain of command and some high-ranking military members, appeared on the screen in the front of the room; they were sitting around a table with the president in the middle. I walked next to Mathis.

“Good to see you again, John. I hear you got the message,” The president said. He had short, neatly trimmed shot black hair and wore a tailored suit.

“Good to see you too, and yes. I would like to introduce you to Alex Connors, the one I was telling you about,” Mathis said as he pointed out to me.

“Alex Connors it’s an honor to meet you. I’m president Howard Hartman,” he said. He then went around the table and introduced me to the rest of the Chain of Command.

“The honor is mine, Mr. President. What exactly happened at the Pentagon?”

“Somehow, a terrorist was able to infiltrate the facility, and then he single-handedly killed most of the security force on his way out,” The US Secretary of Defense said.

“How did one person attack the Pentagon?” Mathis asked.

“We believe that he was injected with the Type-1 serum. It looks as if he had been planning it for months. His attacks were as precise and coordinated as if he knew what was coming,” the president replied.

I folded my arms. “Is there any kind of surveillance footage we can see of the attack?” I asked.

“Yes. We managed to collect all the footage in one piece,” The Department of Homeland Security Director said.

He played footage of the terrorist attacking the Pentagon. He was older than me, maybe late thirties to early forties. The footage started off in some kind of server room where he was sitting Infront of a computer doing some research.  He had a grey janitor’s suit on and his utility cart was off to the side with a mop and broom hanging off the sides, among other equipment. He was in a room with several computer towers, one of which he hooked up a keyboard and mouse into. There were wires all over the place. I looked closer at the computer screen, and it showed a picture of me. My insides twisted up. I immediately got the idea that he was sent by the Union to kill me. As he was doing research, two guards came in. They managed to get some audio.

“Excuse me, sir, this room is off limits without clearance,” the first said.

The terrorist stopped and turned around.

“I’m sorry; I just needed to borrow your computer I’ll be done shortly. I needed to see some documents. Tell me, can anyone of you gentlemen tell me about him?” the terrorist asked as he pointed to the monitor.

The first guard walked closer to him. “We don’t know who he is now let’s see some identification,” The first guard said while the second guard placed his hand on his taser.

“Ah yes. Of course,” The terrorist replied. He started to search his jumpsuit for his pocket and stopped and pointed back to the monitor.  “Just one thing. Do you even know who this boy is?” He said as he pointed to the screen.

“For the last time, no, I don’t; now show me some ID or we will have to take you in!” the first guard asked in a vigorous manor.

He turned back to the guards. “The boy you see here is a super soldier. Genetically engineered and trained for war. This boy is bio-weapon bred for war, and the birth of a new species.” The terrorist got up and started walking around. “You see, long ago we had the Neanderthal, which was eventually replaced by the human, as you know. However, this is different. This boy marks the beginning of the end of humanity.”

The other guard nodded. “Well, you can tell us all about it in interrogation. Now come with us.”

One of the guards walked towards the terrorist. As the guard reached towards him, he grabbed the guard’s wrist, twisted around, and snap! The terrorist broke his neck faster than I could blink. The other guard tried to pull out a taser, but the terrorist grabbed his wrist and twisted it, causing him to drop the taser. The terrorist picked the taser up and shot the guard. As the guard laid down shaking from the shocks, the terrorist walked up to him.

“As I was saying, the boy is a sign that the human race is done as a species and the next phase of human evolution has begun.”

The terrorist immediately pulled out the incapacitated guard’s pistol and shot him in the head, which exploded like a grenade. The pool of blood slowly grew bigger on the grey tile floors. Alarms went off, and the footage switched to more guards coming. The terrorist ripped off his janitor suit to reveal a black t-shirt with a black tactical vest over it. He also had on a pair of black pants and black combat boots. The terrorist walked over to the utility cart and pulled two pistols, some ammo clips, and some kind of improvised booby trap. He rigged the bomb to the door then readied his pistols. I wanted to scream at the guards, to tell them to get out as I watched on.

A soldier touched the knob and triggered the bomb, sending the guard flying off and blowing the door into bits and pieces. He emerged from the smoke and mowed the soldiers down with his pistols like bowling pins. Blood popped from their chest as they fell to the ground. He ran out of ammo and took cover. He quickly reloaded with some kind of speed loaders as more guards approached his position. He broke from cover and gunned down the rest of the guards. My heart dropped and my eyes were glued to the terrorist as I watched him rip through the soldiers. He proceeded down the hall, and the footage switched to several soldiers armed with assault rifles and wearing full body armor entering. My heart started racing as I saw the soldiers. I wanted to scream at them telling them to get out of there, but the only thing I could do was watch.

The terrorist threw some flash bangs, blinding the troops. The soldiers wiped their eyes, trying to see. He then disarmed one of the solders, took his rifle, and sprayed waves of bullets into the soldiers. Their blood splattered on the walls as they dropped to the ground.  He then took a soldier’s machine gun and mowed down more soldiers. He moved through the halls smoothly and mechanically shooting all the soldiers. The stray bullets tore the room into bits and pieces as the soldiers dropped to the ground, seemingly helpless to stop him.  One soldier moved on the terrorist from behind, pointing his gun at him, but the terrorist quickly turned around and blasted that soldier away. His blood sprayed all over the place. He dropped the gun after the soldiers were dead and he was out of ammo.

Another group of soldiers were in the lobby waiting for the terrorist. They all had their guns pointed at the door that the terrorist was walking towards. Just before the terrorist walked through, he pulled out some kind of detonator, and blew up all the soldiers. He then took out his pistols and shot the remaining solders that didn’t get blown up, turning the room into a mess of bodies, blood, and debris. The footage stopped. He must have been enhanced by the Type-1 serum just as I had been. My jaw dropped to the ground as I replayed the images in my head. When I did, I got that sick feeling in my stomach again, feeling disgusted with myself. So, I took some breaths and calmed down.