Alex picked up the small device, no larger than a fountain pen, loaded with a single vial of pale amber liquid. "This is the actual reason I asked you here. I've been working on a counter-formula since I finished analyzing the Specimen 15 data. A compound designed to destabilize forced genetic mutation and force cellular reversion to baseline."
"You made a cure. Already."
"A prototype. Untested on anything living larger than a mouse, and the mouse trial only ran three days ago." Alex met Peter's eyes. "It's not perfect. But it's the only chance Connors has of walking away from this as a person instead of a specimen for the military to study."
Peter took the injector carefully, studying the mechanism. "How do I use it?"
"Spring-loaded, single trigger, delivers the full dose on contact regardless of angle. You'll need direct skin contact, which means getting close enough during the fight to actually touch him. Not ideal circumstances for precision work."
"Understatement of the century." Peter clipped the injector to his belt, right next to where his phone usually sat. "What's the comm for?"
"Direct line to me. Encrypted, won't show up on any military scanning frequencies in the tunnels." Alex handed him the small earpiece. "I'll be with the extraction team. I can warn you about their positioning, buy you time, redirect their attention if things get complicated."
Peter fitted the earpiece and grinned. "This is actually so cool. I mean, terrifying situation, obviously, but the gear is incredible."
"Function over aesthetics. Try not to break it."
"No promises." Peter's grin faded slightly. "Alex. What if the cure doesn't work? What if it hurts him instead of helping?"
Alex considered the question honestly. "There's risk. I calculated somewhere around seventy percent probability of successful reversion based on the mouse data extrapolated to human biology. Thirty percent chance of no effect, or a negative reaction."
"That's not great odds."
"It's the only shot he has. This unit isn't going in there to rescue Connors. They're going in to capture or eliminate a bio-threat." Alex closed the empty case. "You're the only variable that gives him any chance of coming out of this as himself."
Peter nodded slowly, the weight of it settling over him. "Okay. I'll get him alone if I can. Try to talk to him first, see if there's anything left in there that recognizes his own name."
"There might be. The transformation likely leaves cognitive function intact even as instinct dominates behavior. Speaking to him as Connors, not as a monster, could help."
"Got it." Peter stood up, testing the new web shooters against his wrist. "When's this happening?"
"Unit moves out at nine tonight. You'll need to already be in position before we descend, following from above until I signal you're needed."
"I'll be ready."
Alex left Peter's apartment as the sun started setting behind Queens, the sky bruising into orange and purple. He walked toward the subway thinking through contingencies, adjustments, everything that could go wrong in the tunnels beneath the city.
'Seventy percent isn't good enough,' he thought. 'But it's what we have.'
...
The sewer entrance sat behind a maintenance gate on Delancey Street, unremarkable to anyone passing by. Torres and his five-man unit gathered equipment while Alex waited near their vehicle, dressed in borrowed tactical gear that felt stiff and unfamiliar compared to his own clothes.
"Stay behind the formation," Torres told him, checking his rifle's tranquilizer cartridge. "Mr. Osborn says you know the research. Good. That's your job tonight, consultation only. Anything goes wrong, you get to the rear and stay there."
"Understood."
They descended through the maintenance access, flashlight beams cutting through darkness thick with the smell of stagnant water and decay. The tunnels stretched in every direction, brick and concrete slick with moisture, water dripping somewhere in the distance with a steady rhythm.
Alex's enhanced hearing picked up everything. The unit's breathing, six distinct patterns. Water flowing through side channels. And underneath all of it, something else. Something large moving through connected tunnels a quarter mile east.
"Movement detected," Torres said, checking a handheld sensor. "Heat signature, southwest tunnel."
Alex knew that was wrong. The actual signature, the one his own senses tracked clearly, moved northeast.
"Sensor might be picking up interference," Alex said carefully. "These old pipes carry a lot of thermal noise from the steam system above."
Torres frowned at his device. "Could be. We'll sweep southwest first, rule it out."
'Good. Buys Peter time to get into position.'
They moved through the tunnels for twenty minutes, Torres directing his unit through junction points while Alex quietly steered them away from the actual creature's path. His earpiece stayed silent, Peter presumably still tracking from street level, waiting for the signal.
Then the radio crackled. Not Alex's private channel, the unit's shared frequency.
"Contact! Contact, main tunnel, forty meters ahead!"
Alex's enhanced senses caught it a half second before the team's flashlights did. Something massive detached itself from the shadows along the tunnel wall, scaled hide the color of old moss, powerful hind legs coiling before launching forward.
ROOOAAAR!
The Lizard hit the front two soldiers like a freight train. One man slammed into the brick wall hard enough that Alex heard bone crack even over the chaos. The second was thrown backward into the water, submerged and struggling.
"Fire! Fire!" Torres shouted, rifle already up.
Fwip! Fwip! Fwip!
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