Pandora's box had been opened; there was no shutting it now.
When it came down to it, Eddie bore some of the blame—he and Mrs. Britney kept firing off data packets and text messages to Kaplan, driving the poor man so berserk he was practically levitating. That he hadn't been institutionalized already proved his nerves were forged of titanium.
No man could stomach that level of humiliation. Life could be forfeited, but dignity had to be defended.
Piers was out of options. "I'll follow you every day until you change your mind."
Meanwhile, at Mysterious Pharmaceutical's Mediterranean HQ, Claire had settled her sister-in-law and the kids in the dormitory just down the corridor.
Hide in plain sight—Chris's family would never be found that way.
Claire didn't hesitate to help her brother. If you wouldn't aid family, were you supposed to help strangers?
Eddie sat in his office, puffing away; the latest experiment had been a roaring success.
As Carla finalized the tail-end protocols for Stage Two, Eddie had already glimpsed the threshold of Stage Three.
Nature was a gold mine—why not siphon energy straight from it?
Gorging daily was simply a waste of hours.
Find another way to top up energy and you could fight at full throttle forever; turning into Magneto wasn't fantasy anymore.
At its core it was an endurance issue—crack that, and you became a god.
Carla's ultimate enhancement protocol would let humans survive any extreme environment.
Thirteen thousand meters down in the Mariana Trench, you could still move freely, see through the pitch-black, and stay completely rational.
In a volcano where the air is 99 % gun-smoke you'd breathe normally. You wouldn't swim in lava, but if you slipped in and scrambled out fast, you'd walk away unharmed.
All of that was Carla's work, and the C-Virus's unique pupation was the key to those miracles.
Unlike classic surgical augmentation, pupation delegated the remodelling to the cells themselves, following a preset blueprint—step by step. That's what separates top-tier biologists from the rest.
Eddie toyed with the device in his hand, blowing smoke rings while the cigarette slowly burned down.
The office door opened; Excella click-clacked in on crystal peep-toe stilettos. "Hubby, the materials you ordered are here. Since when did you fancy yourself an engineer?"
"Gotta put food on the table for you lot!" Eddie beckoned her over.
Excella meekly poured him a coffee and perched beside him, chin propped on one delicate hand. "Who's supporting whom is still up for debate, you hands-off boss! Heh, but Kailie's brilliant—she's juggling the whole conglomerate like a pro."
"Biotech terror attacks in the Middle East, Eastern Europe, and the Western Federation—any impact on our bottom line?" Eddie unfolded a digital map dotted with trade routes.
"A ripple here and there, nothing major. Takes magic to beat magic; Kailie handled it so well I'm almost jealous. Jill wasn't that sharp, was she?" Excella explained with a playful smile.
The remark was a veiled hint that Kailie was resorting to less-than-legal tactics in business.
Business is business; everyone keeps a few extra cards up their sleeve—so long as nothing blows up, all is well.
"No worries. As her aunt, guide her when she's green. She's still a kid." Eddie chuckled, sounding wistful.
As the eldest daughter, Kailie was only seven years old, yet in appearance a twenty-five-year-old bombshell whose growth had frozen—her beauty locked in time.
Chapter 596: Deborah's Arrival
"Lazy is lazy—don't shove the blame onto your daughter, smart move!" Eddie smirked, eyes gleaming as if hatching a scheme.
Excella wasn't fazed in the least; she smiled sweetly. "I'm not planning a second baby—stash your dirty ideas away and behave yourself."
Their bantering couple-time flew by, and lunch hour arrived in a blink.
A little after three p.m. Eddie was at the international airport, sitting in a Helicopter and waiting.
Deborah stepped off the plane with three girlfriends. After meeting the greeters holding welcome placards, they were led through a separate security lane back to the helipad.
"Eddie's loaded? I thought we'd get an SUV—he sent a Helicopter! My God, this is amazing!" gushed a fair-skinned beauty.
"He really is rich, and he's solved our internship problem—we owe him big time," Deborah added cheerfully, counting herself lucky to have met such a benefactor.
Helena's call came through minutes later; only after confirming her little sister was safe did she breathe easy.
As one of the President's bodyguards, Helena had precious little time for personal matters.
Unable to stop worrying about her naïve sibling, she'd entrusted her to Big-Bad-Wolf Eddie. Whether innocent Deborah would end up eaten remained to be seen.
President Benford had been on a non-stop speaking tour; the entire protection detail was swamped. Helena was run off her feet, Leon equally busy, leaving no bandwidth to tail Kevin.
Only Hunnigan, the logistics and comms officer, had time to spare—she'd been half-idle for ages.
In the Helicopter, pilot Jessica sat stone-faced, while beside her, post-partum Lisa occupied the co-pilot seat, equally frosty—neither ever cracked a smile outside prescribed windows.
Deborah waved frantically from afar. "Eddie, I'm here!"
Eddie nodded. "Welcome aboard, ladies. Climb in—we're heading home."
First-time flyers, the college girls buzzed with excitement, craning their necks and poking around like curious toddlers.
Back at headquarters, Eddie shared a meal with Deborah and company, then left Excella to settle them in.
From the moment they set foot here, turning back probably ceased to be an option.
Daniel had released the C-Virus worldwide: Kevin oversaw Eastern Europe, Patrick the Middle East, Nikolai the Americas.
He'd assigned the man who hated the region most to the most chaotic cash-cow of all—the Middle East. Nobody knew what history lay between Daniel and Patrick.
Brandon's death had left Daniel seething at the Western Federation. That single shell—one ton of steel—had blasted Brandon straight into the next life.
Beneath the Indian Ocean oil rigs off South India, Daniel flipped open his pocket watch: inside, an elderly man—Brandon—stared back.
"Father, I swear I'll avenge you," Daniel hissed, eyes blazing with hatred. Pushing sixty, he looked barely forty—thanks to viral enhancement.
Yet the process carried a fatal flaw: it sterilized the host, man or woman—turning them into Eunuchs.
Had it not been for that price, Eddie wouldn't have needed secret tests in Raccoon City; he'd have gone full-throttle long ago.
Become a Eunuch and life loses all flavor—better to be dead.
The doorbell rang. "Supervisor, Advisor Simmons is here and wants you immediately."
In the lobby, Simmons sat tapping the table with one hand, cigar in the other. "Explain to me why the entire planet is now awash in Pupa Virus."
"No one can trace the virus back to us. Using terrorists as lab rats keeps our hands clean—what's not to like?" Daniel replied, unflinching.
"So you're proud of yourself?" Simmons slammed the desk, sloshing water out of the glass.
Daniel kept his head bowed. "My job is to perfect the virus. If the Vadoren test works, we'll be able to use Pupa Virus for partial enhancement—retaining human form and sanity, just like Brandon."