Raindrops drummed on the metal planks as Shadow pressed himself against a towering container. The storm lashed around them; thunder growled from the icy clouds above. He could almost taste the salt and oil of the ocean on his lips.
From the shadows, Marcus signaled – two guards ahead, kicking at a dented drum. "Quiet," Shadow hissed. Ingrid had already vanished up the first crate's scaffolding, ghostlike. The team moved as one.
The first guard went down silently – a quick choke hold, and he slumped against the crate. The second guard realized too late. Jade's blade flashed in the stormlight, and the man's eyes rolled back. Shadow took a knee to scan beyond, eyes adapting to the interplay of darkness and the grenade flare.
Inside the hull, fluorescent lights buzzed. The air smelled of chemical sterilizer and fear. Lab equipment and sealed containment chambers lined the corridors. Digital screens flickered with lines of code above metal racks.
Shadow peered around the corner of a wide hallway and swept with his holotablet. Nearly all cameras and sensors were offline – something blindfolded the ship's eyes. "Anyone see the main feeds?" he whispered.
Jack's voice crackled in the comms. "Cameras and alarms offline. Something yanked their network."
Eve stepped forward. Her gloved fingers brushed against a white coat caught on a floor grate. "This used to be the med lab," she murmured. "We should check it. Maybe files, maybe survivors." Her tone was gentle, professional – exactly as he remembered.
Shadow nodded and gestured. The team veered down a side corridor.
They arrived inside a dimly lit infirmary – one wall was thick glass. Beneath it, two figures lay strapped to tables, eyes glazed and veins tinted blue-green. Their skin rippled under unknown chemicals. The serum had been tested on humans.
"Ignite their sleeping gas," Ingrid whispered, pulling out syringes. "We're leaving them."
Shadow shook his head. His jaw tightened. "We need evidence." He scanned the room. Data pads, medical charts strewn over a lab bench.
He found what he was looking for: a folder labeled Project Helix, tagged with dates and test numbers. Ingrid eyed the strapped subjects with pity, but Shadow tore a page anyway. It listed experiments on pain response and memory distortion – anything that could break a mind.
Ingrid closed her eyes. "The nightmares we saved them from…" she said.
"Then forget them now," Shadow growled softly. "We've got what we came for."
A hiss slithered through the vents. Guards were coming.
"Gunfight!" Marcus yelled, slamming his fist through the glass with his prowling axe. Shards sprayed like ice into the lab air.
Within seconds, chaos erupted. Jade and Marcus flanked from the left while Ingrid and Jack pinned from the right. Bullets hissed through vapor-coated corridors. Blue gas from a ruptured containment cabinet sprayed in.
Mirrors on the lab walls started warping; one reflection wasn't theirs. A tall silhouette in a tattered lab coat drifted through the chaos. No face was visible, as if it were darkness incarnate.
Shadow glimpsed one mirror where two Shadows stood – one giving orders, one taking them. A whisper crawled at the edge of his hearing.
He shot at the silhouette, but his rounds phased through it like smoke.
It was a specter – the ghost of Orlov's worst nightmares.
"Mirage!" he realized, heart hammering.
The figure didn't need to speak. Tendrils of memory latched onto the team.
Marcus doubled over, vision twisting. He dropped and curled, eyes shut tight. Jade let out a strangled sob, falling to her knees. She swore she heard the whispers of a childhood promise broken by death.
Jack and Ingrid fired blind into the glass walls; even shadows of fear flickered from the cracks.
Shadow's stomach lurched. The lab around him shifted into a frozen tundra he'd yet to cross – a mirror of their own world. In the reflection, he saw his own grave in the snow. He was sprawled with blood frozen beneath him.
Suddenly, Ingrid's voice was there. "Shadow, focus!" she shouted.
With effort, he shook his head and snarled back. "Mirage!" he yelled, spinning and firing his pistol into what should have been empty air.
Everything snapped back. Jack's ear-splitting shot had shattered the mirror into jagged pieces. The phantom scrawled across his vision faded like mist.
The room was eerily silent now, but not for long. A digital countdown blared on the central console – someone had reset it during the chaos.
Shadow grabbed Jade's arm and they bolted. "Move!" he screamed.
In the corridor, alarms flashed red. The whole ship was on lockdown.
An icy hiss escaped vents above them. The serum's sleeping gas poured out in blue clouds. In the panic, a door burst open. Shadow only saw a rifle barrel pointed at their backs.
"Drop them!" a guard barked in accented English.
They froze.
Then something familiar smiled behind the guard – Eve, the team's medic, the face of reason. But her eyes were cold.
A sick realization hit Shadow as Evelyn's voice squeaked, "Sorry."