The team. The word hung in the air, heavy with implication. For three weeks, it had been about me. My survival. My body. Now, suddenly, there were others. My mind raced through the possibilities. Other survivors from the program? A squad of handlers?
"Team?" I asked, my voice sharper than I intended. "I thought I was the only one."
"You're the only complete success," Cecil corrected, turning and walking toward the door. "The only one who got the full package. But you're not the only one who walked out of that room. Follow me."
He led me out of the medical wing, our footsteps echoing in the sterile corridor. We passed through another security checkpoint, this one manned by soldiers in actual GDA tactical gear. They watched me, a flicker of recognition—or maybe fear—in their eyes as I passed in the grey and green suit.
Cecil stopped at a large, reinforced door. "They're waiting," he said, stepping aside.
I placed my hand on the scanner. A green light flashed, and the door hissed open into a massive, high-tech training gym. It was a cavernous space with a reinforced ceiling, walls lined with impact craters, and a floating holographic display in the center. And in the middle of it all, four people were in the middle of what looked like a sparring session.
A woman in a bright emerald suit hovered a few feet off the ground, moving with an impossible grace, dodging swings from a mountain of a man in slate-grey armor. He was all business, his movements efficient and powerful, but he was too slow for her. She zipped around him, laughing.
"You're too predictable, Tank!" she chirped, tapping him on the back of his helmet before zipping away again. "You keep telegraphing your right!"
"My name is Marcus," the big man grumbled, his voice a low growl as he swung again, hitting nothing but air.
A third man, this one in a dark grey suite with a jacket, was just standing off to the side, watching. "Come on, tank, lighten up!" he called out, a wide grin on his face. "She's not even hitting you. You're just making yourself dizzy!" " or are you trying to hit nothing but air." He then casually picked up a solid steel barbell from a nearby rack, bent it into a pretzel, and tossed it over his shoulder. It clattered to the floor with a sound that should have cracked the concrete. "See? No stress."
The fourth member, a woman in a dark green suit, didn't engage. She was perched on a catwalk above them, observing everything with a quiet, focused intensity. She moved like a predator, economical and precise.
As we entered, the woman in emerald—Maya—noticed us first. Her face lit up, and she shot down from the air, landing lightly on her feet a few feet in front of me. "Oh, he's awake! He's awake!" she exclaimed, her eyes sparkling with genuine excitement. "Hi! I'm Maya! You must be the new guy! We've been waiting forever for you to join the party!"
Before I could even process her energy, the jokester from before was at my side, throwing a friendly arm around my shoulders. The sheer force of it felt like it was pushing my through the floor. "Don't mind her, she's just excited to have another person who won't break when she hugs them," he said, his voice booming. "the names Samuel. but my code name is bunker. or just sam is fine. hey by the way, when you got a moment i wanna see who is more durable, you or me haha, but Cecil gets mad when we dent the walls."
Marcus, the tank, stomped over, his helmet retracted with a hiss, revealing a grim, square-jawed face. He ignored Samuel completely and fixed his gaze on me. "Marcus," he said, his voice a low rumble. He gave me a single, curt nod. "Welcome to the unit." He said it like a duty, not a greeting.
The woman in dark green and grey, Lena, dropped silently from the catwalk, landing without a sound. She approached slowly, her eyes scanning me from head to toe. "His vitals are stable," she noted, her voice soft but clear. "Muscle density is significantly higher than baseline. No signs of rejection. He's the real deal." She extended a hand. "Lena. It's good to have you, Michael."
I took her hand. Her grip was like iron. "Thanks," I managed, trying to take it all in. The joy, the jokes, the seriousness, the quiet competence. They weren't a cohesive unit. They were a collection of dysfunctional personalities. That wouldn't be around each other unless they had to.
Cecil stepped forward, his presence silencing the room instantly. "As you can see, they are your team. Your brothers and sisters in arms. They've been training for months, learning to work with what they got. They are what project savior has produced up to this point."
He looked from them to me. "You are our best shot at standing some sort of chance when the big bads decide to show up. and you going to be in charge of them corporal."
Suddenly, I heard Tank scoff in irritation. "Why does he get to be the leader anyway? If anyone, it should be me. I've served in more shitholes than I care to count. So what if he is supposedly considered a success by the coats? The leader should be the one who has the most experience and is the strongest in the group."
Suddenly, Sam interjected. "Oh, calm down, Tank. Who cares who's the leader? We're all on the same team anyway. Besides," Sam said, placing his hand on Tank's shoulder, "just because they say he's better than you doesn't mean you have to get so emotional." Suddenly, Tank punched Sam in the face so hard out of nowhere that it sent him flying directly into the wall, leaving a small crater.
"Goddamnit, Jarkovski!" Cecil stepped in. "How many times do I gotta fucking tell you to stop causing structural damage! You know how expensive that shit is?" Suddenly, another voice could be heard; it was Sam, casually walking out of the small crater. "It's alright, boss man. Big man just doesn't like it when his feelings are hurt. I gotta give it to you, Tank. That almost tickled! Haha!"
Cecil then sighed. "Fine, better we squash this right here and now versus you two getting into a pissing contest when out in the field. Go get prepped and meet in training hall A1, Tank. I'll bring the corporal down in a moment." Tank scoffed before walking away; the frustration was clear on his face.
"What the heck is his deal?" I asked.
"Oh, don't mind him," Maya said, landing in front of me. "He's just a little overly serious. He's probably just worried that he won't be the strongest on the team anymore."
I looked at her in confusion. "What do you mean?"
Sam quickly chimed in. "Didn't they tell you? We're all fuck-ups, my guy. We each only got one slice of the pie. I'm the most durable out of everyone. Shit, they test me more and more every day. I think tomorrow they're gonna dump me into a volcano." He turns his head. "And our ray of sunshine, Maya, over here, is the only one of us who can fly. And well, Lena, she got a little slice of everything. But for some reason, she got enhanced senses. Though I don't know if that affected her personality or if she was always no fun at all."
I looked over and saw Lena raising a middle finger.
I sighed. "And let me guess, Mr. Goliath got the muscle."
Cecil stepped in. "That's right. He's the strongest. Everyone here can stop a moving bus going ninety miles an hour, whereas Jarkovski can hold up an entire building. Now we gotta see what you got, Corporal."
Cecil led me toward the far side of the facility, toward a set of reinforced blast doors thicker than bank vaults. The others followed behind us at varying speeds.
Tank marched like he was heading to an execution.
Maya floated backwards through the air, hands behind her head like she didn't have a care in the world.
Sam was still laughing to himself about getting punched through a wall.
Lena stayed quiet.
Training Hall A1 opened with a deep mechanical groan.
The room inside was enormous. Bigger than the gym from before. Circular. Multi-layered. Reinforced steel plating covered the walls and floor in overlapping sections scarred by scorch marks, dents, and deep claw-like grooves. Massive drones hung dormant from ceiling rails like sleeping predators.
At the center of the room stood something that looked halfway between a military obstacle course and a war crime.
Cecil noticed my expression. "Adaptive combat environment," he explained. "Built after Omni-Man."
"That sentence alone is terrifying," I muttered.
Sam snorted.
Tank didn't.
Cecil walked toward the observation deck overlooking the arena floor. "This room measures strength output, speed, durability, reaction time, flight control, environmental resistance, combat adaptability, and stress response."
"Stress response?" I asked.
"That means pain," Sam translated helpfully.
"Thank you, Samuel," Cecil deadpanned.
A loud metallic clang echoed through the chamber as several enormous reinforced doors along the walls sealed shut behind us.
Maya winced. "He always does the dramatic prison-door thing."
"It builds atmosphere," Cecil replied without missing a beat.
Tank stepped into the center of the arena and cracked his neck. "So what's the test?"
Cecil pressed a button on a tablet. A holographic display flickered to life overhead.
SUBJECT: S-17STATUS: STABLE
DNA INTEGRATION: 41%
combat evaluation commencing
My stomach tightened.
Cecil seemed surprised for a moment
"Jarkovski," he said. "You wanted to know why Ferris is leading."
Tank crossed his arms.
"Then hit him."
The room went quiet.
Sam's grin vanished instantly. "Cecil…"
"I'm serious," Cecil said calmly. "Controlled environment. Medical staff on standby."
Maya floated down to the floor. "You're joking, right? He literally woke up today."
Tank looked more interested than concerned.
Lena's eyes narrowed at the screen above me. "His vitals are accelerating."
I could feel it too.
My heartbeat slowed instead of speeding up. Every sound in the room sharpened. I could hear the hum of electricity behind the walls. The shifting gears inside the observation deck. Maya's fingers were tapping nervously against her arm.
And Tank's footsteps.
Heavy.
Measured.
Coming toward me.
He stopped a few feet away. Towering over me.
"I don't care what some scientist says," he rumbled. "Leadership isn't given. It's earned."
Before I could answer, he swung.
Fast.
Way faster than a man his size should've been able to move.
I barely got my arms up before the punch connected with my jaw, slamming my entire body into the ground, leaving cracks on the floor where i was standing.
The impact sounded like a car crash.
The force launched me backward across the arena floor. Steel screamed beneath my boots as I skidded nearly thirty feet before crashing through a reinforced barricade.
Dust exploded outward.
Somewhere above, warning alarms immediately started blaring.
"Jesus Christ," Sam muttered.
I sat there for a second inside the wreckage.
Not because I was hurt.
Because I wasn't.
I slowly looked down at my arms.
No bruising.
No broken bones.
Not even pain.
Just pressure.
Tank stared at me from across the arena.
Then, for the first time since meeting him, he smiled.
"Okay," he said. "Now we're talking."
He charged.
The arena shook underneath each step.
I barely had time to react before he slammed into me like a freight train. We crashed through another steel barrier together, rolling across the floor in a blur of fists and concrete dust.
Instinct took over.
Not training.
Not technique.
Something deeper.
My hand caught his next punch.
The shockwave cracked the floor beneath us.
Tank's eyes widened.
Mine probably did too.
Because I realized something in that moment.
He was trying.
And somehow…
I was stronger.
Not by a little.
By a lot.
The realization hit both of us at the exact same time.
Tank roared and swung again with everything he had.
I reacted without thinking.
I punched back.
The instant my fist connected with his chest, the air detonated.
A thunderous boom ripped through the chamber. Tank launched backward like he'd been hit by artillery, smashing through three reinforced walls before finally crashing into the far end of the arena hard enough to crater the steel.
Silence.
Total silence.
Even the alarms seemed quieter.
"Oh," Maya whispered.
"Oh shit," Sam corrected.
Dust slowly settled across the arena floor.
Tank pulled himself out of the crater, coughing violently, one hand pressed against his ribs.
Then he started laughing.
Not angry laughing.
Excited laughing.
The kind soldiers get when something insane happens and survival instincts haven't caught up yet.
He pointed at me from across the ruined arena.
"Not bad. Finally, someone who can throw a punch!" he shouted before launching himself at me, using the strength in his legs to propel himself forward like a cannonball.
We clashed.
I managed to catch both his fists, though not before he forced me backward several feet across the steel floor. The metal beneath my boots screeched under the pressure. Tank grinned suddenly before grabbing my arm and hurling me toward the ceiling.
I hit hard enough to dent the reinforced plating overhead.
Before I could even recover, Tank jumped after me.
Not jumped.
Launched.
The guy practically turned gravity into a suggestion.
He grabbed me midair and drove me back down toward the arena floor like a meteor.
The impact exploded beneath us.
Dust and chunks of broken steel burst outward across the chamber. Warning alarms immediately began flashing red.
"Jesus Christ," Sam laughed somewhere through the smoke. "I give it ten more minutes before Cecil starts charging us rent."
Tank stood first, rolling one shoulder as he looked down at me through the crater.
"You holding back?" he asked.
I shoved myself upright, spitting dust out of my mouth. "I literally woke up today."
"Good," he said.
Then he punched me again.
This time I was ready.
I caught the hit square in my palm.
The shockwave blasted outward, rattling the walls and knocking loose debris from the ceiling. Tank's grin widened when he realized I hadn't moved an inch.
Then I pushed back.
Tank's boots carved trenches through the steel floor as I forced him backward for the first time.
The room suddenly got very quiet.
"Ohhhh," Maya whispered from the sidelines. "He does not like losing."
Tank barked out a laugh and swung harder, faster, each punch like getting hit with a speeding truck. I blocked what I could, but every impact still rattled through my arms. The scary part wasn't the strength.
It was how natural this was starting to feel.
Like my body already knew what to do.
Tank lunged again, trying to grab me around the waist.
Instinct kicked in.
I moved before I thought.
One second he was reaching for me.
The next, I was above him.
High above him.
The arena floor dropped away so suddenly my stomach flipped. Wind rushed around me as I shot upward toward the ceiling.
I froze.
So did everyone else.
Tank slowly tilted his head upward.
Maya's eyes practically lit up like fireworks.
"No way," Sam said.
I wasn't falling.
I was hovering.
Thirty feet above the arena floor.
My heartbeat thundered in my chest as panic immediately replaced adrenaline.
"How the hell am I doing this?" I yelled.
"Don't ask us!" Sam shouted back. "You're the flying guy now!"
"That's my thing!" Maya complained, though she sounded more excited than upset.
The second panic hit, I lost control.
The invisible force holding me up vanished instantly.
"Oh shit."
I dropped like a rock.
Tank barely had time to move before I crashed directly into him, both of us slamming through the arena floor hard enough to rupture a pipe beneath the plating. Steam exploded upward around us.
For a second there was nothing but silence.
Then Tank started laughing again from underneath me.
Deep. Loud. Completely unhinged.
Cecil pinched the bridge of his nose from the observation deck. "I knew today was going to cost me millions."