And the beast which I saw was like unto a leopard, and his feet were as of a bear, and his mouth as the mouth of a lion: and the dragon gave him his power, and his throne, and great authority
— Revelation 13:2 (KJV)
"Fire again!"
Damien's hand twitched toward a sidearm that wasn't there. He wasn't the only one. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the security officers along the wall do the same — a reflex, pure instinct.
Such was the power of that command.
Even as a recording, even played back through static and interference, it carried the same weight it had on Thor's bridge. Authority compressed into sound.
The log had been preserved automatically through the ship's uplink to the S.W.O.R.D. network — the last transmission before contact was lost.
The file ended there, on that single phrase. But everyone knew what came after.
The Vril-ya mothership — that living monument of despair — had been destroyed. Despair itself had been transmuted into hope.
And yet, there were doubts.
"He's so calm," someone whispered — or tried to. In the silence that followed, the words rang too loud, too human. "Even as the ship burns around him."
Damien did not look up to see who had spoken.
He allowed the person the illusion of privacy. But it was only that—an illusion. This boardroom, like everything else in the Enrichment Centre, was under complete surveillance.
Still, he made a note. It would count against them. After all, these were the elite of the elite—people selected and vetted precisely because they were meant to remain composed, to make decisions that mattered.
Yet it would not be a serious mark. There were mitigating circumstances.
The last two days had burned out everyone.
Even Damien, with his mastery of biofeedback and the constant support of Hive, was teetering on the edge of exhaustion. It had been almost forty-eight hours since he last slept, and while the outward mask still held, he knew he would soon have to crash or risk long-term complications — and an even longer recovery.
When the Master had passed him command of Earth-side operations — to activate Project Thor — it had almost felt as if Atlas himself had casually dropped the sky onto his shoulders. Trevor had helped him keep it aloft, but it was still the sky.
Still, that abrupt transfer had made the transition easier in one respect: he had already been the de facto commander when the Master disappeared.
For now, everyone was too busy to test his leadership, to probe the edges of his authority. That would come later — not from ambition or malice, but because every part of Aperture was designed to be tested constantly. And the most critical parts, like the CEO's role, had to be tested most rigorously of all.
Once he finally slept, he might even look forward to it.
"He was always like this, even as a child," Dr. Jane Smith said, her voice carrying the sombre cadence appropriate for a eulogy. She would know — she had been Ace Johnson's paediatrician when he was still a boy.
But the Master had been more than just Ace Johnson.
"We don't have a body," Damien said, more harshly than he intended. "So he's missing — not confirmed dead."
The looks he received were a mixture of pity and disbelief.
It didn't matter. Damien knew better. He was one of the Master's chosen — initiated into the deeper Mysteries. He understood this was not the end of the Master.
The Master was not dead. He had simply been consumed by his journey across the multiverse. And the Master had foreseen it. He had prepared Damien for it.
And perhaps they would meet again. If the Master returned—or if Damien reached out. If he spread Aperture across the universe, colonized every star in sight, and then even those unseen. If he conquered space known and unknown to man—
Damien drew a long, deliberate breath, guiding his thoughts through the pathways of trained biofeedback. The chemical balance of his body obeyed; serotonin production rose, the edges of fatigue dulled, the illusion of calm restored.
He really did need sleep. But this meeting was important. One last thing to finish before he rested.
"We publish some of it," Joseph interrupted Damien's spiraling thoughts. "We desperately need the morale boost. Things are hanging by a thread. We need people outside Aperture to start working—and living—again."
Joseph had no military rank anymore; he hadn't for longer than Damien had been alive. After being cashiered from the American military for his orientation, he had joined Aperture Security and climbed to its very top, eventually becoming its Chief.
He had the bearing of a general nonetheless—though now it was the bearing of one who had led campaigns through Russian winters: patient, unyielding, cold in a way that came from endurance, not cruelty.
Damien had been on first-name terms with him ever since the two had taken part in the Great Heist—when the Master had stolen the Nazi superweapon that was later retrofitted into Project Thor. Damien had thought it lost to Xen, so when it reappeared, it had been a surprise bordering on awe.
But while Damien was privy to many of the Master's secrets, he was not privy to all. And that was how it should be.
"Not some," Damien replied. "All of it. Untampered. Keeping obvious secrets now would only backfire on us."
"That would reveal the existence of the Moon Nazis," Dr. Smith said. She scrolled through the recording and played a short clip where the Master spoke:
"The Fourth Reich, led by their Chancellor, Wolfgang Kortzfleisch—also known as the Serpent of Eden, or Regin, and probably a host of other names we have yet to trace. The exiled Vril-ya, hated and hunted by his own kind."
"See?" she finished quietly.
"That might be inevitable," Joseph added. "Now that the first shock has passed, people are starting to ask the questions. Where did Thor come from? And why did Aperture have a city-sized spaceship—one massive enough to make its own tides? One that makes the ship we built for the American government look like a cheap plastic toy?"
"The government won't like it," Dr. Smith warned.
"I think," Damien said evenly, "that under the circumstances, the value of the American government's favor has sharply declined. Besides, in this crisis, politicians might be tempted to once again delay revealing the existence of our charming lunar neighbors. That we cannot allow. We need them for the Moon Gold Rush project—for the helium-3 that will feed the fusion plants, restart the economy, and give people hope again. We need it to help mankind finally take its first permanent step beyond Earth."
He paused, voice settling into calm finality. "We're publishing everything. Uncut."
******
"My crash-consequence model has been updated accordingly. While one or several hits from our main weapon would be survivable by the Enrichment Centre, a full impact from the Thor itself is not. And Zach is still there."
As the clip played on the wide screen in their shared apartment in the Enrichment Centre, Will held Zach, who was quietly sobbing. His partner was not a pretty crier. Zach cried messily, with tears and snot.
Will supposed that being a bit uncharitable was allowed, even as he gently massaged Zach's shoulders and back. After all, this was supposed to be a brief respite for them — a way to recharge their batteries, so to speak.
Because it had been one thing after another. First the exploding iPhones and the revelation that Steve Jobs was a man-eating lizard. Then the alien plot to exterminate humanity. Then the Vril-ya spaceship being destroyed — but not without cost.
And with every new event came another riot. People outside Aperture simply had no discipline. After saving people from the exploding phones, he'd had to save some fool in a polo shirt from being lynched by other angry fools, all because they'd unknowingly supported a genocidal alien.
Then it got worse. Some decided that the end of the world meant license to indulge every insane impulse — that if everything was ending, morality didn't matter. Will could hardly understand such thinking. How did that help? And if there really was no hope, one should meet their end with dignity, after trying everything to delay it — if not for oneself, then for everyone else.
It made people outside Aperture seem less like people and more like some other species — wild, dangerous animals. Will knew that thought was wrong, but he was too tired to police it.
Fortunately, management had noticed his exhaustion and assigned them a brief period of rest and recuperation back in the Enrichment Centre. Will had accepted with almost guilty relief, but he knew the guilt was misplaced. Yes, lives might be lost while he rested, but far more would be lost if he was too tired to think clearly.
He was also looking forward to spending time with Zach. Aperture policy required partners' recuperation schedules to be synced, maximizing emotional restoration — another triumph of empirically validated compassion.
But not only was Zach exhausted. He was grieving.
For among the costs of ending the alien menace was that GLaDOS was gone.
"She cared. I mean, of course she cared about me. I never doubted it for a second," Zach mumbled through his sobs. "But why did I have to hear her say it out loud just now? It's not like I needed it before. I'm not needy."
"Shh," Will murmured, hugging him tight and feeling the warmth and steady heartbeat of his partner. "You are worth being cared for."
"You're biased. You and my therapist," Zach said, raising his head to meet Will's eyes. His eyes were red from crying, his cheeks wet with tears, but there was a hint of a smile when he said it. And that, at least, made Will feel a little better.
"She saved me. No—let's be honest—she bought me," Zach continued, his voice raw. "My parents sold me for booze and drug money. I guess I was lucky it was her and not some Armenian traffickers. Or cannibals looking for a snack. And then she brought me here and helped me become something more than I ever hoped to be."
"You would have made something of yourself anyway," Will said softly. "You have talent."
"What? A petty criminal? An utter waste," Zach countered. "Talent isn't enough. You need a place—and the opportunity to truly flourish. She gave me that. And love. It might not have been conventional, but it was nurturing enough. And now… she's gone."
"I still can't believe she's gone," Will said, trying to be comforting. But it was true. For half his life here, GLaDOS had been an omnipresent force in the Enrichment Centre—like the air, or a benevolent god. Only this god also guided you when you were lost, arranged your meal plans, and helped you choose your subjects.
And she had already been replaced by a new AI. The new core was not GLaDOS. There was friction where once there had been harmony. Will couldn't tell if it was inexperience, the pressure of the current crisis, or simply lesser talent. Time would tell.
"But she wouldn't want you to be sad," Will continued, gently kissing a tear from Zach's cheek.
"Of course not," Zach said with a wet chuckle. "She'd call it an 'inefficient human way of processing data.' She'd want me to help the new core settle in—to make sure the Enrichment Centre doesn't fail in her absence."
*****
"I don't have time for people who don't matter at the moment."
Was this how democracy truly died? Not with wailing nor applause, but with the quiet, firm dismissal of its relevance.
Owens hoped it was not so. Hoped it was not too late. But feared it was.
He took another sip of coffee from a cheap plastic cup. He had been awake for too long, and worse, he had little to show for it.
After evacuating the President, the first priority had been to re-establish communications and have him address the nation. But when it happened, the first cracks in their authority showed. People stopped paying attention halfway through the speech.
Because everything the President was saying, Aperture had already announced—in greater detail. Everything he urged the public to do, Aperture had already organized: volunteer fire brigades, neighborhood watches, food and shelter distribution, medical care. They even had Aperture-affiliated Boy and Girl Scouts going door-to-door, keeping people calm and identifying urgent problems.
And those Scouts were already earning pre-printed "I Helped in the Apocalypse!" merit badges.
When the President tried to issue orders, they discovered that too many links in the chain of command had already been severed. Not only was much of the Senate gone in the explosion, but so were the key personnel needed to relay and enforce those orders.
When the administration reached out to lesser offices on the President's behalf—to organize relief, coordinate response, or simply maintain order—they found those officials had either been killed by the exploding phones, abandoned their posts, been quietly sidelined, or—in a growing number of cases—were already taking direction from Aperture.
Thus, the President's orders became worse than useless. They didn't resolve the crisis; they deepened the confusion.
It couldn't really be called treason—or a coup. Aperture had merely stepped into the void, offering desperate officials a plan and a functioning communications network in the middle of chaos. It wasn't something anyone could complain about, really. What would they say? That they had waited for official orders while people were dying?
Aperture's plans were competent. Brutally efficient. Followed to the letter, their effects bordered on the miraculous: entire regions pacified and brought back to order within hours.
And then came the mothership. An event that broke hope just as it was emerging; a darkness that came after a brief glimpse of dawn.
The desperate launch of the Enterprise. The desperate attempts to contact Johnson, to coordinate at the highest level. Only to be snubbed. Rumors spread that Johnson had fled the Earth entirely. Then came the casual, effortless destruction of the Enterprise.
All of it was a never-ending nightmare.
And then, at the darkest moment, the mothership was destroyed. But it was destroyed by a weapon so secret the government had no idea it existed; a weapon so powerful it made the entire American armed forces look like a tribe waving sticks.
And just as the questions began to mount—about who held this power and what they would do with it—Aperture released this video.
The final nail in their coffin.
It proved the highest office in the land was not only run by incompetent liars, but was utterly irrelevant. And it made Aperture nearly invulnerable.
Jesus might have died for man's sins, but that was long ago. In the here and now, Alexander Johnson had died so mankind might live another day. Already, the same Catholic voices who had named him a great sinner, a possible emissary of Satan on Earth, had changed their tune. They were preparing to beatify Johnson, or at least put him on that track, stopped only by the inconvenient fact that the Pope and most of the College of Cardinals were dead.
Aperture now had the organizational, military, and moral power. There was no one left who could stand against them.
Some feared that, having seized power in a crisis, Aperture would never let it go.
Owens knew it would be worse than that.
He knew Damien, the heir apparent and new CEO, well enough to know he would not be so crude. No, Aperture would gladly relinquish power, just to make a point. They would let the people remember the chaos. And then, craving the safety they had been given, the people would eagerly hand that power right back.
There would be no reason to rig an election. Because for the next decade, no politician who spoke against Aperture—indeed, no politician who did not speak explicitly for Aperture—would have any chance of being elected.
Like the devil, Aperture had offered the world salvation, for the low, low price of its soul.
and they worshipped the dragon, because he gave his authority unto the beast; and they worshipped the beast, saying, Who is like unto the beast? And who is able to war with him?
— Revelation 13:4 (KJV)