AutumnXd
patreon
XGO CHAPTER 34
🕑 Added 2025-04-11 11:03:08 +0000 UTCThey kept me in a cell barely large enough to lie down in—three concrete walls and one made of thick, transparent material that allowed them to observe me at all times. The suppressant collar remained around my neck, removed only during "testing sessions" when they wanted to measure my abilities.
Those sessions were hell on earth. They would place me in a large, circular chamber with reinforced walls and force me to produce fire until I collapsed from exhaustion. They injected me with stimulants to push me beyond my limits, attached electrodes to my brain to monitor neural activity during manifestation, cut tissue samples from my arms and legs while I was conscious to observe healing rates.
Sometimes, they would put other "subjects" in the chamber with me—people like me, with abilities they couldn't explain or control. They would remove both our suppressant collars and order us to fight. If we refused, the consequences were severe.
I met Marcus, who could generate electrical currents with his mind; Eliza, who could manipulate the density of objects; Tomas, who could heal almost any injury with a touch. We formed fragile bonds in that terrible place, whispering to each other through the vents between our cells at night when the guards were less vigilant.
One by one, I watched them die—pushed too far in an experiment, or executed when they were deemed no longer useful. Tomas lasted the longest. His healing ability made him particularly valuable to the researchers. But even he couldn't survive having his organs harvested while conscious, his body kept alive artificially so they could observe how his regenerative abilities responded.
His screams still echo in my memory—not as nightmares, but as fuel for the hatred that kept me alive.
By the time I turned twenty-three, I was the longest-surviving subject in my block. My body was a roadmap of scars from countless procedures, and I had lost track of how many bones had been broken and allowed to heal improperly. The researchers had discovered that extreme stress amplified my pyrokinetic abilities, so they found increasingly creative ways to traumatize me.
Dr. Voss supervised it all with the same detached interest she'd shown that first day. Sometimes, I thought I saw a flicker of something like regret in her eyes when the experiments went too far, but it never lasted. Science was her god, and she served it faithfully.
I stopped fighting eventually. What was the point? There was no escape from this place, no rescue coming. The outside world either didn't know we existed or didn't care. My only hope was that death would come quickly when they finally decided I had outlived my usefulness.
Then came the day everything changed.
I was lying on my narrow cot, staring at the ceiling, counting the cracks in the concrete for the thousandth time. My latest session had been particularly brutal—they had submerged me in ice water repeatedly, measuring how long it took my core temperature to return to normal, seeing if I could generate fire while underwater. I had failed most of their tests, earning myself a beating from the guards and no food for two days.
The facility's alarm system suddenly blared to life—a shrill, pulsing sound I'd never heard before. Red emergency lights began flashing in the corridor outside my cell. I sat up, wincing at the pain in my ribs, and moved to the transparent wall to see what was happening.
Guards were running past, weapons drawn. Scientists hustled in the opposite direction, clutching tablets and hard drives. No one spared me a glance.
And then I felt it—a rumble beneath my feet, like distant thunder. The concrete floor trembled, dust sifting down from the ceiling. Another explosion, closer this time, powerful enough to crack the floor. The lights flickered, went out, then came back on running on emergency power.
Something was very wrong.
In the seven years I'd been imprisoned here, there had been escape attempts, power outages, even a small fire in one of the labs. But nothing like this. Nothing that caused this level of panic among my captors.
A massive explosion rocked the facility, close enough that I was thrown against the back wall of my cell. My ears rang from the concussive force. When I looked up, I saw that the transparent front of my cell had cracked—a spiderweb of fractures spreading across the surface.
Hope, a sensation I'd thought long dead, stirred feebly in my chest. I staggered to my feet and pressed my hands against the damaged barrier. It held firm despite the cracks. Still too strong to break through.
The corridor outside was chaos now—alarms blaring, sprinklers activating as smoke began to fill the air. I could hear screaming in the distance, punctuated by what sounded like gunfire. Whatever was happening, it wasn't a simple malfunction or accident.
Someone was attacking Facility Six.
I pounded on the cracked barrier, shouting for help, though I wasn't sure who I expected to respond. The guards had abandoned their posts, the scientists had fled, and the other subjects in nearby cells were doing the same thing I was—desperately trying to attract attention from whoever or whatever was causing this destruction.
The smoke in the corridor grew thicker, and I began to cough. If the fire reached our cellblock with us still locked inside... well, I might survive, but the others wouldn't be so lucky.
Just as I was about to give up hope, a figure emerged from the smoke—a silhouette that seemed to shimmer and waver in the heat. As it drew closer, I realized why: the figure was composed entirely of flames.
It stood before my cell, studying me through the cracked barrier. I couldn't make out a face, just a vaguely humanoid shape wreathed in fire that burned so intensely it appeared white at its core, with what looked like charcoal or some other heat-resistant material forming its body structure. The heat emanating from it was palpable even through the barrier.
Then it spoke—a voice like crackling wood in a furnace.
"Samuel Mercer?"
I nodded, too stunned to speak.
"Stand back," the figure commanded.
I scrambled to the rear of my cell. The fiery entity placed what might have been hands against the cracked barrier and poured itself into the material. The barrier glowed red, then white, then began to melt, dripping to the floor in molten rivulets.
When a hole big enough for me to fit through had formed, the figure stepped back. "Quickly," it said. "Others are freeing the rest. This place burns in ten minutes."
I hesitated only for a moment before climbing through the opening, careful to avoid the still-molten edges. The heat in the corridor was intense, but after years of cold concrete and sterile examination rooms, it felt welcoming—like coming home.
"Who are you?" I asked, staring at my rescuer.
"Later," it replied. "The collar first."
I had almost forgotten the suppressant collar that had been my constant companion for seven years. The fiery being reached toward my neck, and I instinctively flinched away.
"It will hurt," it warned. "But only for a moment."
Before I could respond, it placed burning fingers on the collar. I gritted my teeth, preparing for pain, but what I felt instead was a sudden rush of power as the device short-circuited. The collar fell away, clattering to the floor.
For the first time in seven years, I could feel my ability flowing freely through me. It was like taking a full breath after drowning—a rush of sensation that made me dizzy. Fire bloomed in my palms, dancing eagerly across my fingers, responding to the rage and pain that had festered inside me for so long.
I looked around at the burning facility—at the place that had stripped me of my humanity, that had reduced me to a number, that had tortured me for the crime of being different.
And I laughed.
Not a sound of joy or relief, but something darker—the laugh of someone who has seen the bottom of the abyss and decided to make it his home. After years of helplessness, of pain, of watching others like me die while I survived only to suffer more, the sight of Facility Six in flames filled me with savage pleasure.
The fiery entity watched me, its featureless face somehow conveying approval. "Come," it said. "Others need help."
As we moved through the burning facility, I saw more beings like my rescuer—some composed of fire, others of earth or ice or pure energy. They were systematically destroying the complex, setting charges in key structural areas while others freed the imprisoned subjects.
I helped where I could, using my rekindled abilities to melt locks and create diversions. Most of the guards had fled, but a few tried to maintain control, firing weapons that seemed pathetically inadequate against our liberators.
And me? I burned everything in my path. Every lab where I'd been cut open. Every observation room where scientists had taken notes while I screamed. Every guard station where men had laughed while beating me senseless.
The flames responded to my rage, growing hotter, wilder, more destructive than I'd ever been able to produce before. It was as if my power had been dormant all these years, building beneath the surface, waiting for this moment of liberation.
In the main laboratory—the room where I had endured countless tortures—I found Dr. Voss. She was frantically gathering research materials, loading them into a reinforced case. When she saw me standing in the doorway, her eyes widened with fear.
"Subject 247," she said, trying to maintain her clinical detachment even now. "This is a catastrophic mistake. The world isn't ready for beings like you. You don't understand the danger you represent."
I stepped closer, flames wreathing my arms. For years I had fantasized about this moment—about making her suffer as she had made me suffer. I had imagined burning the flesh from her bones inch by inch, hearing her beg for mercy that wouldn't come.
Now, standing before her, seeing the fear in her eyes, those fantasies seemed inadequate. Too quick. Too merciful.
"My name," I said quietly, "is Sam. And I'm exactly what you made me."
I raised my hand, and a stream of fire shot forth, not at her but at the case of research she was trying to save. It ignited instantly, years of data and samples reduced to ash in seconds.
"No!" she cried, lunging forward as if to save it. "You don't understand! That research could have helped others like you!"
"Helped us?" I laughed, the sound echoing off the laboratory walls. "Like you helped Tomas? Or Marcus? Or Eliza? Or the dozens of others who died in your care?"
I stepped closer, and she scrambled backward, her composure finally cracking. "Please, I was just following protocols. I never wanted to hurt anyone. It was for the greater good, for scientific advancement—"
"Science," I spat. "You hide behind that word like it absolves you. Like it justifies what you did to us."
The fire around my hands intensified, turning white-hot. Dr. Voss pressed herself against the wall, nowhere left to run.
"I'm sorry," she whispered. "God help me, I'm sorry."
"God isn't here," I replied. "And neither is mercy."
The flames leapt from my hands, engulfing her. Her screams joined the cacophony of alarms and explosions echoing through the facility. I watched, unmoved, as she writhed and flailed. This woman who had caused so much suffering, reduced to ash and bone.
And I felt... nothing. No satisfaction. No closure. Just a hollow emptiness where I'd expected triumph.
That should have frightened me—that lack of feeling as I watched another human being burn to death. Instead, it cemented something within me. The final death of whatever normal human being I might have been.
Outside, the night air was cool against my skin. Dozens of former subjects were gathered there, many seeing the stars for the first time in years. Some were weeping. Others stood in shocked silence. A few were already demonstrating their abilities, free of suppression and fear.
The being who had rescued me approached, still burning brightly in the darkness.
"Why?" I asked. "Why now? Why me?"
"Because you survived," it said simply. "Because your spark refused to die, even here.
Great! Based on where your last scene left off—with Sam nodding to Alex, agreeing to leave the destroyed lab and follow him as survivors are loaded into vehicles
The ruins still crackled with faint embers as Sam followed behind Alex, his footsteps slow but deliberate. The once-sterile facility now lay in smoldering ruin—bodies, steel, and ash strewn in chaotic testament to everything that had happened.
Around them, rescued mutants were being carefully helped into armored SHIELD transports. Children clung to their older siblings. Some stared at Sam with fear, others with hesitant curiosity. No one spoke to him.
Alex walked with purpose ahead of him, giving quiet orders to the X-Men, coordinating the survivors. The World Tree's influence was already stirring the edges of reality—the air around Alex shimmered faintly with that otherworldly stillness.
Sam felt out of place. Like he didn't belong.
Then it happened.
A subtle pulse of warmth tickled the base of his spine. He stiffened—nobody noticed.
A red glow—no larger than a firefly—floated through the smoke behind the convoy. It pulsed once. Twice.
Then it shot forward.
Too fast for anyone to track. Too quiet to trigger alarms. Like a ghost with intent.
It slammed into Sam's back—and disappeared.
His breath caught. His heart skipped.
The world blurred for a second. He staggered, but caught himself.
No one saw it. No one turned.
But inside him, something ignited.
His veins flashed crimson beneath his skin for just a moment. His eyes flickered red—then returned to normal.
Alex turned his head, sensing something—but Sam was already upright again, shaking it off. He nodded silently when Alex gestured toward the transport. Just a flash of confusion crossed Alex's face, but he let it go.
As Sam stepped into the armored vehicle, he placed his hand on the metal wall—and for a brief second, the steel sizzled beneath his touch, leaving behind the faintest black scorch mark in the shape of a claw.
His eyes narrowed.
Something had entered him. Something watching. Breathing.
A voice whispered, just at the edge of his mind.
"I see you, little spark…"
But when he blinked—it was gone.
And the red glow with it.
The door sealed shut.
Engines roared.
The convoy rolled away into the snow.
Fade to black
