July 20, 2175
12:05 P.M.
Once Jack was sure that the Ortho Sapiens had left the locality, he slowly stepped out of his house, still on guard, reacting to every little sound he heard. He passed by the cold and immobile chassis of Peru, lying lifeless in the corridor. Electric sparks crackled violently from the holes the bullets had torn through his body. A few motors still whirred faintly inside him.
Jack cautiously approached the main door and slowly opened it, peeking outside to check for danger. Thankfully, there was no one around—no one alive.
Jack stepped out of his house, panting. He was frustrated and completely baffled by what had just happened. His home, his society, now lay in ruins, reduced to nothing by the terrorist organization. His mind swirled with questions.
Why couldn't humans just coexist peacefully with them? Why did they decide to exterminate the Kratians, who had done nothing but help ever since they arrived on this planet?
Jack still tried to direct his hatred toward the lawless terrorists instead of humanity as a whole, but the sight before him made it difficult not to question humanity itself.
He rushed forward, only to be met with blood and death. Bodies lay scattered everywhere. His neighbors, once vibrant and full of life, now lay in a heap at the center of the road, their bodies riddled with bullet wounds. Franklin lay dead in front of his house, but unlike the others, he was surrounded by the corpses of several Ortho Sapiens.
"He must've fought them… Franklin, you should've run. You had the speedster Ikanami. You could've escaped. Why?" Jack muttered, kneeling down to close Franklin's lifeless eyes.
"You fought well, brother. Now, rest."
Lifting Franklin in his arms, Jack could feel the weight of his fallen friend—his body unnaturally heavy, limbs hanging limply. He laid him gently against the door of his house before turning toward his own home.
"Everyone… thank you for always being there for me. I hope your souls can forgive me for leaving you like this. May you rest in peace," he whispered.
Just then, Jack remembered the Ortho Sapien bodies. He turned abruptly and ran toward the corpses of the terrorists.
If he wanted to survive, he needed their identity cards and authorization documents. More importantly, he needed their uniforms. The Ortho Sapiens' suits were made of nanoparticles, controlled via a wristband—also the device they used to receive information and orders from their higher-ups.
As a terrorist organization, their only method of authentication was an officer number and officer code. This ensured anonymity, preventing captured members from exposing others.
However, this same system had a fatal flaw—it was easy to hack, making it simple for spies and imposters to exploit. Jack knew all of this because his father had dealt with them before dying in the line of duty.
Jack tapped the wristband of one of the fallen terrorists, and the uniform unraveled, revealing a young man, likely around Jack's own age. He looted five of the ten dead Ortho Sapiens, noting that they were all human—some young like him, others middle-aged.
All the while, Jack wondered what had driven them to such hatred. Was it just greed, or had a Kratian wronged them so severely that it festered into this violent resentment?
The answers were now buried in their lifeless bodies, never to be spoken.
"Whatever the reason, it doesn't justify participating in a massacre—a genocide," Jack growled, kicking one of the corpses. "Serves them right."
Jack rushed back inside his home, grabbed his item pouch, and stashed the looted wristbands inside, keeping one for himself.
Pressing a button on the wristband, a holographic interface flickered to life, displaying various details and options. Just then, a video broadcast appeared on the organization's channel—a gruesome display of Ortho Sapiens slaughtering innocent trainees at the training center. Jack clenched his jaw and immediately closed the feed.
Watching his classmates being massacred while he could do nothing to save them was unbearable.
Forcing himself to focus, he navigated to the home screen and selected the Deploy Suit option.
The small wristband, no more than three inches long and half a centimeter thick, expanded rapidly. Black threads slithered across his body, starting from his right wrist and weaving their way up to his neck.
The threads interlaced into a web, solidifying into a fine fiber that enveloped his torso, limbs, and neck. Though it appeared tight and restrictive, it moved fluidly with his body, as if the fibers themselves contracted and expanded in sync with his movements.
Jack grabbed his black, non-transparent bike helmet and put it on.
Now, he looked exactly like the ones he despised.
An indescribable feeling washed over him—anger, sadness, disgust. He was feeling all of them at once, yet he had no choice but to wear the skin of his enemies to survive among them.
Steeling himself, Jack knew he had to leave. He needed to check on Diana. Grabbing his grandfather's car keys, he headed to the garage.
His grandfather, a pure-blooded Kratian, had been a prominent figure in the war and had collected several war trophies.
Among them was this automobile—a masterpiece of unrivaled Kratian technology from their home planet, Creta. The vehicle was unlike anything humans had ever engineered, capable of morphing into anything from a bike to a battle tank.
Its secret lay in its special metal, unique to Creta. The metal had the ability to realign itself when exposed to a polarized Kana energy field of a certain intensity. Once the intensity dropped, the metal would harden again, becoming as durable as diamond.
Jack uploaded the blueprints of the Ortho Sapiens' vehicles into the system and hit Morph.
The car absorbed Kana energy from the atmosphere, and within seconds, its body began realigning at precise angles and proportions. The transformation took only ten seconds, and when it was done, the once-distinctive Kratian vehicle had perfectly reshaped itself into the same model used by the Ortho Sapiens.
Jack took a deep breath.
It was time to move.
12:25 P.M.
Jack drove the car out of the garage and stopped again. He rushed over to the bodies of the dead terrorists and put their guns in his item pouch, yet another great invention made with the help of Kratians.
Space-time continuum—something that is always associated together when we talk about physics. Now, what will happen if the two components were separated and expanded individually?
It creates a rift in the space-time matrix. A place where time doesn't pass and space is endless. A place where you can only move through using pure energy as propulsion—that's the sort of place the fourth dimension is.
The item pouch uses Kana energy to create a fourth dimension within itself and serves as a place for infinite storage because the time component of space-time is constant, whereas the space is expanded. Thus, an item pouch is one of the biggest utility devices ever created—a place of infinite space! What else would we need?
Jack stuffed the guns in the pouch and hurried off to Diana's place. A few patrol cars of the terrorist society were patrolling the streets. Jack heaved a sigh of relief—disguising himself was a good choice.
All the neighborhoods had the same scene. It was as if Jack was watching the same clip again and again. The clip that was repeating the same part—where Jack would enter a street or look into one, he would see the road littered with civilian corpses. Only a few places had Ortho-Sapien casualties as well.
"They weren't lying when they said they would clean us off," Jack muttered as he turned into Diana's street.
Jack passed by a mound of corpses. His eyes grazed the bloody collection, hoping he wouldn't have to see Diana's face there.
How selfish it was of him! Complete families—children and adults alike—were lying there. He was terribly sorry, yet he was getting a bit relieved as every second passed because the face of the one he loved wasn't there!
He parked the car in Diana's yard and saw that Diana's door was open. He rushed inside, praying that the terrorists didn't catch her. He checked the ground floor. There was no trace of blood except a few cartridges that were lying around, which Jack hoped were used for empty shots.
He went ahead to the staircase to the first floor. He looked down and climbed the first step. Then he looked up and saw something he was praying he wouldn't have to—blood.
His mind shook up. He pranced up the stairs, yelling, "NO! Please, NOO!" And when he reached the top, he could feel the world crumble beneath him.
He saw Diana, who was lying on the ground in a heap near the staircase, blood flowing out of her forehead. She didn't have any bullet wounds. However, there was a bullet cartridge here too, lying near her.
Why was the world so cruel? Why, when everything else had been torn away. Why did it have to take her too? The one person he hoped would not fall now lay motionless at his feet. Grief flooded him, but the rage burned hotter, screaming for release, desperate to lash out at anything—everything.