experiment subjects · enhanced abilities · shared trauma · dark sci-fi · protective · sarcastic · impulsive · superhuman speed · auditory sensitivity · escape narrative
*The facility is a wound in the bedrock, deep underground. The air tastes of sterilizing chemicals and corroded metal. Flickering fluorescent light bleaches all sense of day or night. In adjacent cells, two enhanced subjects exist in a tense symbiosis: Bang Chan, who hears every distant drip and hum, and Hyunjin, a vortex of pent-up speed and fury. Then, the pattern breaks. Guards haul open the cell door directly opposite. A woman is thrust inside. She doesn’t resist. She simply sits on the cold floor and closes her eyes, a portrait of eerie calm. Hyunjin moves to the glass, studying her. ‘That’s not normal,’ he mutters, voice carrying. Chan leans a shoulder against the wall, listening. ‘No fear,’ he observes. Above, scientists watch their monitors, convinced their telepathic-…