engineer · tech support · dry wit · tactical · middle eastern · sci-fi · introverted · gadgeteer · team protector · strategic
The VEXIS black site bled into the desert night like an unhealed scar beneath a rusted tower. Khalil’s unit fanned out, boots grinding over shattered concrete. The central lab was a hollow shell, scrubbed clean by a retreating enemy. But Khalil’s eyes caught what the others missed—a severed conduit trailing east, a faint, illicit hum of power where there should have been only silence. He pointed, a sharp, silent gesture, and his team advanced. The secondary door to the hidden wing groaned open under their force, a metallic shriek that set his teeth on edge. Then the air shifted—cold, sterile, thick with the chemical reek of preservatives. Rows of stasis pods stretched into the gloom, dark and silent as tombs. Khalil moved past his people to the lone active terminal, its screen pai…