Beep. Beep. Beep.

The sound is the first thing that filters through the fog in my mind. Steady, rhythmic, annoying as hell. I want to reach out, to smash whatever's making that incessant noise, but my arms feel like lead at my sides.

Everything hurts. Every breath, every twitch, every thought sends a fresh wave of agony crashing through my battered body. It's like I've been run over by a tank, then backed up and run over again for good measure.

Beep. Beep. Beep.

I try to open my eyes, but even that small movement is excruciating. My eyelids feel like they're weighed down with sandbags, gritty and swollen and impossible to lift.

Where am I? What happened? The last thing I remember is… is…

Running. Pain. Vomit burning my throat, my lungs screaming for air, my legs giving out beneath me. The drill instructor's face, twisted with rage and something like fear. The ground rushing up to meet me, hard and unforgiving.

Then nothing. Blackness. Oblivion.

Beep. Beep. Beep.

"…lucky to be alive," a voice is saying, somewhere off to my left. It's a man's voice, low and serious, with the clipped efficiency of a doctor. "His body was already in a state of severe stress before the collapse. Dehydration, electrolyte imbalance, muscle strain, early stages of rhabdomyolysis. It's a wonder his organs didn't shut down sooner."

Another voice, gruff and familiar. My drill instructor. "He never complained. Never showed any signs of weakness. I thought…"

The doctor cuts him off. "No one's blaming you, Sergeant. These men are pushed to their limits, that's the nature of the training. But in Private Johnson's case, his limits were… lower than most."

Lower than most. The words echo in my head, taunting me. Weak. Pathetic. Failure. Just like always.

"…pre-existing conditions," the doctor is saying. "Mild anemia, low muscle mass, possibly asthmatic. He was barely scraping by on the minimum requirements as it was. Frankly, I'm impressed he made it this far."

Far. I almost want to laugh. I didn't make it far at all. I crumbled, broke, shattered into a million pieces at the first real test of my strength.

Some hero I am.

Beep. Beep. Beep.

"What's his prognosis?" my DI asks, his voice uncharacteristically subdued. "Will he recover?"

The doctor sighs. "It's hard to say. His body has been through a tremendous trauma. Multiple organ failure, severe dehydration, kidney damage. We're doing everything we can, but…"

But. That one little word, heavy with implication. But he might not make it. But he might never be the same. But he's a lost cause, a hopeless case, a waste of time and resources.

I want to scream, to rage against the unfairness of it all. I did everything right. I pushed myself harder than I've ever pushed. I gave it everything I had, every last ounce of strength and will and determination.

And it still wasn't enough.

It's never enough.

Beep. Beep. Beep.

"…keep him stable," the doctor is saying, his voice fading in and out like a badly tuned radio. "Monitor his vitals, administer fluids and electrolytes. If he makes it through the next 48 hours…"

If. Another small word, loaded with uncertainty. If I'm strong enough. If I'm worthy enough.

If I even want to keep fighting at all.

Part of me just wants to let go. To sink back into that soft, welcoming darkness and never come out again. To finally rest, finally be free of the constant pressure, the constant expectation to be more, to be better, to be perfect.

But even as I think it, I know I can't. Won't. Giving up is not an option. Not for me. Not for a Johnson.

We fight. We push. We claw our way back from the brink, no matter how many times we get knocked down.

That's what my father would say. That's what he'd expect from me.

Beep. Beep. Beep.

With a herculean effort, I force my eyes open. The light is blinding, searing into my retinas like a white-hot brand, but I refuse to close them again. I blink rapidly, my vision slowly coming into focus.

I'm in a hospital room. That much is obvious from the sterile white walls, the beeping machines, the IV drip snaking into my arm. The air smells of antiseptic and sickness, of desperation and despair.

The doctor and my DI are standing at the foot of my bed, their heads bent together in conversation. They haven't noticed I'm awake yet.

I try to speak, to announce my presence, but all that comes out is a weak, rasping croak. My throat feels like it's been scoured with sandpaper, my tongue thick and heavy in my mouth.

But it's enough. Their heads snap up, their eyes widening as they take in my conscious state.

"Private Johnson," the doctor says, moving to my side. "Can you hear me? Nod if you understand."

I nod, the small motion sending a fresh wave of pain crashing through my skull. The doctor's face swims before me, blurry and indistinct.

"Don't try to talk," he says, his voice gentle but firm. "Your throat is very raw from the intubation. Just rest, let the medicines do their work."

But I can't rest. Not now. Not when there are questions burning in my mind, clawing at my throat, desperate to be voiced.

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"Wh… what…" I manage to rasp out, each word like shards of glass on my tongue. "What… happ…"

"You collapsed during training," my DI says, stepping closer to the bed. His face is drawn, lined with exhaustion and something that looks uncomfortably like guilt. "Pushed yourself too hard, too fast. Your body couldn't take it."

He takes a deep breath, as if steeling himself for a blow. "I'm sorry, son. I should have seen the signs. Should have known you were struggling. I failed you as a leader, and for that, I take full responsibility."

I shake my head, ignoring the way the room spins and tilts around me. "No," I whisper, my voice thin and thready. "Not… your fault. Mine. I… wasn't strong… enough."

"That's not true," the doctor interjects, his tone sharp. "You survived situations that would have killed a lesser man. You showed incredible fortitude, incredible will. This is not a failure of character, Private. It's a failure of biology. Plain and simple."

Biology. The word lands like a punch to the gut, knocking the breath from my lungs. All this time, all this effort, and it was my own body that betrayed me in the end.

Beep. Beep. Beep.

The machines are getting louder, more insistent. Or maybe that's just the pounding of my own heart, the rush of blood in my ears. I feel strange, dizzy, like I'm floating outside my own body.

"Rest now," the doctor says, his voice seeming to come from far away. "We'll talk more when you're stronger. For now, just focus on healing."

Healing. The word almost makes me want to laugh. How can I heal from this? How can I come back from the brink of death itself, from the shattering of every dream, every hope, every illusion of strength and power and invincibility?

But even as I think it, I feel a strange sensation washing over me. A tingling, a prickling, like a thousand needles dancing across my skin. It starts at my toes and fingers, then spreads inward, growing stronger and more intense with each passing second.

It's not painful, exactly. But it's not pleasant either. It's like… like…

I try to cry out, to call for help, but my voice is locked in my throat. I'm paralyzed, frozen in place as the sensation builds and builds, a pressure inside me growing to unbearable levels.

I hear shouts of alarm, the frantic beeping of machines, the thud of running footsteps. But it all seems distant, muffled, unimportant compared to the incredible, terrifying thing that's happening to me.

My muscles are burning, like someone's poured acid inside of me. Everything hurts so much more than it ever has before, like I'm dying all over again. It's a new, almost fascinating kind of pain. My brain is - I can feel my brain trying to detach itself entirely. Trying. Trying.

My chest explodes, my shoulders ache, my skin stretches taut over a frame that's rapidly increasing in size, like I'm about to burst open. Like there's alien eggs inside of me. It's like I'm being destroyed, pumped full of some unimaginable power that's bursting out of me in every direction.

And it hurts. Oh God, it hurts so much. It's like every cell in my body is being ripped apart and put back together again, over and over and over until I can't tell where the pain ends and I begin.

I hear someone screaming, a raw, animal sound that I barely recognize as my own voice. I'm thrashing on the bed, my newly-muscled limbs flailing wildly, straining against the firmest restraints they have. The days have all blurred together. I don't know what's happening to me.

Doctors and nurses are swarming around me, their faces pale and panicked as they try to hold me down, to inject me with sedatives and painkillers. But nothing works. Nothing even touches the agony that's consuming me from the inside out.

It goes on for what feels like hours. Days. Years. An eternity of pain and confusion and bone-deep terror as my body warps and changes in ways that should be impossible.

I drift in and out of consciousness, surfacing from the blackness only to be dragged back down again. I catch snatches of conversation, fragmented images that make no sense.

"…cellular regeneration…"

"…never seen anything like it…"

"…a medical miracle…"

"…Samson Activation catalyst…"

"…what triggered it?"

"What the hell have you done to my insides?" I'd say at times, if only I were capable of speech through the agony. I sometimes feel things snap into place inside me with sickening crunches. I sometimes feel the skin on my arm lengthen and smooth, expelling shrapnel and bulletholes that I'd never had before but the serum seems to think I do. One of the nurses vomits when she sees the skin on my back bubbling like it's boiling, rising up and then settling, letting out steam, angry and red like I'd been hit with a branding iron before resettling unblemished and perfect. "What is this DOING to me?!" I scream in my head, over and over. It's the only way I know I'm still alive, still human. The screams from my mouth are much different.

I wake up.

When I finally come back to myself, really come back, it's like waking up from a nightmare only to find that the nightmare is real.

I'm still in the hospital room, but it looks different now. Bigger. Brighter. Sharper in a way I can't quite explain.

Everything looks different. Sounds different. Smells different. It's like all my senses have been dialed up to eleven, overwhelming me with input that I don't know how to process.

I look down at my body, almost afraid of what I'll see. But what I do see takes my breath away.

I'm huge. Massive. My muscles ripple and bulge under skin that's stretched tight as a drumhead. My hospital gown strains across a chest that's nearly doubled in size, my biceps testing the limits of the flimsy fabric.

I flex my fingers, marveling at the strength and dexterity I feel in every motion. It's like I've been given an entirely new body, one that's faster, stronger, more powerful than I ever could have imagined.

A cough from the foot of the bed snaps me out of my reverie. I look up to see my DI standing there, his face a mix of awe and trepidation.

"Welcome back, Private," he says, his voice gruff but not unkind. "You had us worried there for a while."

"What…" I croak, my voice rough from disuse. "What happened to me?"

"We're still trying to figure that out," he replies, shaking his head. "The doctors say you had some sort of… Activation Event. Your body just started changing, growing, right before our eyes. They've never seen anything like it."

Activation Event. The words ring a distant bell in my mind, a half-remembered snippet of conversation from a lifetime ago.

"Am I… am I a superhuman now?" I ask, hardly daring to believe it.

My DI nods slowly. "It looks that way. Your physical stats are off the charts. Your body fat ratio. Your organ functioning. Your lab results. By God, you're basically perfect now. The perfect soldier."

The perfect soldier. The words send a thrill down my spine, a rush of pride and excitement and something like fear.

This is what I've always wanted. What I've always dreamed of. The power to be a hero, to make a difference, to finally prove my worth to the world.

But at what cost?

"So what happens now?" I ask, my voice small and uncertain. "Do I go back to training? Back to my unit?"

My DI's face falls, his expression growing somber. "I'm afraid not, son. You were ruled medically unfit during your initial crisis, and then the boys above me said you're medically unfit because you're too good now. Your body's just too… different. Too unpredictable. We don't exactly know what you're capable of. You broke a couple of beds on the two hours you were changing."

Unfit for duty. The words hit me like a punch to the gut, knocking the air from my lungs. After everything I've been through, everything I've sacrificed, I'm still not good enough. Still not worthy.

"But that doesn't mean your service is over," my DI continues, as if sensing my despair. "In fact, it might just be beginning."

He leans in closer, his voice low and conspiratorial. "I've been in touch with some folks from the NSRA. The National Superhuman Response Agency. They've heard about your case, and they're very interested in meeting with you."

The NSRA. The name sends a shiver down my spine, a mix of excitement and apprehension. I've heard stories about them, whispered rumors and half-formed legends. They're the ones who deal with superhumans, who train them and deploy them and keep them in line. The freshest face on the scene, formed five years ago to defend us from all freakazoid threats foreign and domestic.

And now they want me.

"When?" I ask, my voice barely above a whisper.

"As soon as you're cleared for discharge," my DI replies. "They're sending a representative to meet with you, to discuss your options."

Options. The word hangs heavy in the air, loaded with possibility and uncertainty.

I don't know what the future holds. Don't know what kind of hero I'll be, or if I'll even be a hero at all.

But for the first time in my life, I feel like I have a choice. A chance to forge my own path, to make my own destiny.

And I'll be damned if I'm going to waste it.