46: Family Gaming

46: Family Gaming

As a whole, the evening passed without much note. Slade showed up around five, and the family cooked together before having a pleasant dinner. Once done eating, the five of them took a short break in the training room where Nyssa greeted Roxanne’s spirits. After she transformed into each of the spirits one by one and hung out for around half-an-hour, they returned to the living room, booted up a gaming system, and played some party games for most of the evening.

Roxanne, to no one’s surprise, wrecked everyone. As the victory screen shone for her win three times in a row, she pumped her fist. “I’m just built different, built better.”

“Have you been training?” Slade shook his head. He had managed to snatch a very close second, only losing by a hair. “I thought you were on a mission...”

“Well, you know how we get terminals issued by the hero and hunter associations?” Roxanne pointed to her wrist, where the terminal sat silenced. “There was a terminal only game released a while back, some bricklaying game, it has a ton of different features, so I’ve been playing that a lot recently.”

“Good to... know,” Slade nodded, making a mental note.

“Don’t slack off too much during work,” Kaiser reminded while raising the eyebrow. He, along with Nyssa, brought up the rear in their five-person game. “Angelica, you shouldn’t slack off either, but I trust you more than I trust the two of them.”

“HAH! Take that,” Angelica grinned, leaning back against the couch to lay her head in Roxanne’s lap. “I’ve just built up the credibility, heh.”

“Well, it’s unfair, because you can enter the zone anytime you want,” Roxanne huffed, placing her controller onto Angelica’s face and blocking her smug look. “What do you all want to play next though? We can change games if you want.”

“I’m fine with anything...” Nyssa yawned, her head bobbing a couple times as she sat between Slade and Roxanne.

A creaking sound filled the room as the monitor in the supreme leader’s hand got lowered back to the ground. “Makes... sense. What about the rest. Someone answer.”

“As for the negligence with the lab, we had to... uh... we hired some contractors to clean it out and it seemed like... they didn’t do a very great jo-” The new masked figure got cut off as a monitor slammed into them. They fell to the floor as a couple masked medical staff workers rushed in and carted the worker off.

“Why are WE, a PREMIER experimental organization, one that’s top-secret, one aiming to change the world, HIRING CONTRACTORS????” The leader roared, the robotic voice broadcaster crackling and letting out static under the stress.

“We’ll ensure such a mistake doesn’t happen in the future, supreme leader,” A masked figure bowed. “The experimental module was an unforeseen circumstance. It was buried far underground in a nest of centipedes. Unless the centipedes themselves dug it up, there should’ve been no way for the machine to have even been exposed to air. Because of that, we decided to leave our guards with the other experimental modules. Rest assured, those are still providing great results and none have been discovered.”

“... Fine. Prepare a report for me of the rest. I’d like to see the data,” the supreme leader tapped its foot. A second later, it whirled around and left the room as everyone began rushing to complete their work.

The sound of its clanking footsteps filled the hallway. It wove through the gleaming lab as other masked figures filled the area. Doors slid open as it neared, allowing it further and further into the lab, all the way until it reached the heart of the laboratory.

A massive reactor glowed in the darkness. Towering into the ceiling, it pulsated with life as mechanical additions dotted its surface. Tubes went in, tubes came out, screens implanted into its surface glowed, and liquids of various viscosities and colors flowed inside of its translucent body.

As the last set of doors slid closed behind it, the supreme leader peeled off its mask. Instead of a human face though, the supreme leader had a faceless metallic plate. Walking forward, it sat into a cove-like depression in the side of the reactor. Within seconds, metallic and organic tendrils disassembled the supreme leader’s entire body, leaving only the face plate sitting in the cove.

A singular metallic arm grabbed the plate, lifting into the air before setting it against the wall. Light reflected off the faceplate, joining the array... as face plates decorated every wall in the reactor room.