Consciousness did not return like a sunrise; it arrived with the sudden, violent clarity of a breaker switch being thrown.
There was no grogginess, no lingering fog of dreams. One moment, there was nothingness—a void darker than the darkest contract—and the next, there was sensory data.
Absolute. Precise. Overwhelming.
The subject, designated in this facility as Asset 47, opened his eyes.
He was submerged in a viscous, amber fluid. The suspension medium pressed against his skin, warm and smelling faintly of copper and ozone.
His first instinct was not panic, but assessment.
He tested the boundaries of his containment.
His limbs felt heavy, not from atrophy, but from a density that felt unfamiliar yet entirely correct. He flexed his fingers.
The resistance of the fluid told him everything he needed to know about his current viscosity and the strength required to breach it.
Heart rate: 48 BPM. Rising controlled to 60. Adrenaline synthesis: Optimal.
He looked out through the curved, reinforced glass of the tank. The room beyond was sterile, bathed in the harsh, clinical hum of fluorescent lights.
The architecture was brutalist, heavy concrete and steel, painted in drab greens and grays.
It didn't look like the pristine, white-walled laboratories of Ort-Meyer's asylum in Romania, nor the high-tech sheen of the ICA facilities. This was older. Dirtier. Industrial.
Cyrillic text was stenciled on the wall opposite him: КРАСНАЯ КОМНАТА — СЕКТОР 4.
Red Room. Sector 4.
The knowledge of the language was instant, a file retrieved from a deep, well-organized archive in his mind.
But as for the Red Room. He remembered nothing connected to it.
Then suddenly, his mind was bombarded with information.
The last contract. Diana. Providence. The Constant.
He remembered dying—or the sensation of an end—and now, he was here.
A door hissed open pneumatically. Two men walked in. They wore white lab coats over gray military fatigues, carrying tablets.
They spoke in Russian, their voices muffled by the glass and fluid.
"Vitals are spiking," the taller one said, looking at a monitor attached to the tank's base. "I thought the sedation cycle was set for another week. Dreykov wants him dormant until the Widow protocol is fully integrated."
"The serum is metabolizing too fast," the second scientist replied, tapping frantically on his screen. "Look at these readings. His muscle density... it's increasing in real-time. It's fighting the suppression agents. It's like his biology is... cleaning itself."
"Well, what's the use of those if right here—" The taller man said as he raised his finger to point at his head. "There's nothing." He added with a mocking gesture.
"Well, those were defectives. So, don't expect anything."
47 watched them. He didn't just see two men; he saw geometry.
He saw the carotid artery pulsing in the taller man's neck. He saw the slight limp in the second man's left leg, indicating a weakness in the knee joint.
He saw the heavy, magnetic keycard dangling from the taller man's belt. He saw the emergency drainage valve release lever three feet to his right, inside the tank.
He didn't need to think. He needed to act.
47 rotated his body in the suspension fluid, the movement smooth and aquatic. He braced his bare feet against the back of the tank and gripped the emergency lever.
It was designed to be operated from the outside, locked in place.
For a normal man, it was an immovable object.
For 47, it was simply a matter of applied leverage and the peak efficiency of muscle exertion.
He pulled. The metal groaned, a sound that vibrated through the water, and then snapped. The seal broke.
The pressure release was explosive. The front glass of the tank didn't just crack; it shattered outward under the force of the pressurized fluid expelling into the room.
47 rode the wave, his body coiled.
He landed on the wet concrete floor in a crouch, naked.
The two scientists were knocked back by the deluge of amber fluid and glass shards. The taller one was scrambling to his feet, reaching for a panic button on the wall.
47 moved.
It wasn't a run; it was a blur of motion. He covered the fifteen feet between them in less than a second.
His hand, wet and slick, shot out and wrapped around the scientist's throat. The man's eyes went wide, terror eclipsing his confusion.
47 squeezed.
It wasn't a crush; it was a precise collapse of the windpipe, applying exactly enough pounds of pressure to induce immediate unconsciousness without death—yet.
He needed information.
He slammed the man against the wall, pinning him there with one hand. The scientist clawed at 47's arm, but it was like clawing at a steel beam.
47's eyes, icy blue and devoid of empathy, scanned the room.
The second scientist was fumbling for a sidearm—a Makarov PM—dropped in the flood.
47 didn't turn his head. He calculated the trajectory, snatched a shard of thick glass from the floor with his free hand, and threw it with the snap of a whip.
The glass shard embedded itself in the second scientist's hand, severing the extensor tendons.
The man screamed and dropped the gun.
"Quiet," 47 said.
His voice was a low, gravelly rumble, unused for god knows how long, but perfectly steady. He spoke flawless Russian. "Where am I?"
The scientist in his grip gasped, face turning purple. "S-Sector 4... Siberian facility... Gener—"
"The date," 47 demanded.
"December... 24th... 2009."
'2009?' 47 furrowed his eyebrows.
In his memories, technology was further ahead.
Here, the monitors were bulky, the interface analog.
He was in the past.
"Who's the general?"
"Dreykov... the Headmaster..." the scientist choked out. "You are Asset 47. The Wolf Spider prototype. You... you aren't supposed to be awake... or speaking, or standing, or talking, or even supposed to blink...how..."
"I am always awake," 47 stated.
He shifted his grip, snapping the man's neck with a clean, efficient twist.
No wasted movement. No cruelty.
Just the end of a transaction.
The body went limp, and 47 let it slide to the floor.
He turned to the second man, who was cradling his bleeding hand, whimpering in the corner. 47 approached him.
The man looked up, seeing the barcode tattooed on the back of 47's bald head.
"Please," the scientist begged. "I just monitor the stats. I didn't—"
47 silenced him with a swift kick to the temple. The man slumped into unconsciousness.
47 needed clothes.
He stripped the taller scientist. The pants were slightly short, the lab coat tight across the shoulders, but it would serve as a disguise.
He found the keycard. Level 4 Access. He checked the Makarov on the floor. Eight rounds in the magazine, one in the chamber.
He checked the safety, racked the slide to ensure the feed ramp was clean, and tucked it into the waistband of the stolen trousers at the small of his back.
He walked to the polished steel surface of a medical cabinet and looked at his reflection.
The face was the same. High cheekbones, sharp jawline, the predator's stare. But he looked younger.
Revitalized.
The scars from a lifetime of wetwork were gone, healed by whatever genetic cocktail they had pumped him full of.
He felt like he was in his peak... no... he was more.
The hunger in his metabolism was a roaring fire, burning through the sedatives in seconds.
He picked up a tablet from the wet floor. It was cracked but functional. He bypassed the biometric lock using the dead scientist's fingerprint.
He scrolled through the files rapidly, his eyes processing text faster than most men could read headlines.
Project: BLACK WIDOW. Status: Active | Defector
Project: Wolf Spider. Status: Experimental | Medically Induced Coma
Source: Recovered DNA, Unknown Origin.
Objective: Re/create the perfect assassin.
Result: Subject displays no mental stimuli of any kind. No thoughts, consciousness. A husk. Therefore cannot be programmed. But the Physical potential is tremendous.
Recommendation: Look for an alternative use. Collect extensive samples, then proceed to termination.
Termination.
47 almost smiled... almost. It was a familiar standing order.
He dropped the tablet and stepped over the bodies. He paused at the door, listening. He could hear footsteps in the corridor beyond. Two sets. Heavy boots. Rhythmic cadence. Guards.
Enhanced senses flared.
He could visualize them through the heavy steel door. He could smell the cheap tobacco on one of them, the gun oil on their rifles.
They were stopping outside the door, likely alerted by the sound of the tank shattering.
47 looked around the room. He needed a distraction. He needed a tool.
He spotted a canister of compressed liquid nitrogen near the medical supply rack. He picked it up.
It was heavy, but in his hands, it felt like a toy. He placed it near the door, loosened the valve just enough to hiss, and retreated into the shadows of the ceiling pipes, leaping upward with an agility that defied gravity.
He grabbed a conduit and held himself there, inverted, waiting.
The door swiped open.
"Check the tank," a guard shouted in Russian, rushing in, rifle raised.
The two guards entered, their boots splashing in the fluid. They saw the bodies. They saw the hissing canister.
"Clear the room! Leak!"
As they stepped further in, turning their backs to the door, 47 dropped.
He landed silently behind the rear guard. Before the man could turn, 47 had the fiber wire—improvised from a length of medical tubing he'd snagged from the ceiling—wrapped around his throat.
He pulled tight, using the guard's struggling body as a human shield as the lead guard turned.
The lead guard hesitated, seeing his comrade.
And that hesitation caused his defeat.
47 snapped the first guard's neck, shoved the body forward into the second man, and in the same motion, drew the Makarov.
Pop. Pop.
Two shots. Center mass. The second guard went down.
47 stood amidst the carnage.
Four bodies.
Forty-five seconds since awakening.
He stripped the nearest guard of his tactical belt. He took the combat knife, a radio, and an extra magazine.
He adjusted his lab coat, buttoning it to hide the bloodstains on the fatigues underneath.
He tapped the radio earpiece. "Sector 4, report," a voice crackled. "We heard glass breaking."
47 pitched his voice perfectly to mimic the taller scientist he had killed. The tone, the cadence, the slight breathless arrogance were identical. "Sector 4 clear. We had a pressure rupture in the auxiliary tank. Requesting a maintenance crew."
"Copy that, Sector 4. Maintenance is ten minutes out."
Ten minutes. For him, an eternity.
47 holstered the weapon and stepped out into the corridor.
He adjusted his collar.
It was time to get back to work.