The moment Marcia was dead, I hurried over to Sandra. When I saw she was still breathing, I sighed in relief. Theodor was still standing over Marcia’s body, unsure of what to do next.

“What now?”

“I’ve got to make sure Sandra’s all right,” I answered.

I knew I didn’t have time to fuck around, but I could see that she was getting worse. If we were lucky, Marcia had kept this little exploit of hers a secret from Headquarters and we might have some time on our hand. Theodor followed me inside and went straight to the storage room. It took him a moment before he found what he’d been looking for: a memory contraption. He promptly swallowed it.

“You all right?” I asked while I was busy hooking Sandra back up. “Did that bitch fuck with your mind, after all?”

As he joined me, he shook his head, but I saw the serious expression on his face.

“No, there’s something else, though.”

I stared at him wide eyed.

“You’re saying it’s-?”

“I don’t know. My brain’s been acting weird for a while. God knows what it is. Might as well get my hand on a few more of those.”

With that, he made his way back to the storage room. Once I was done taking care of Sandra, I joined him. We had no time to lose. As fast as I could, I stocked up on all the things I’d need to keep us alive, or at least give us a chance. Weapons, grenades, protection, drones, and a few other handy gadgets. Turns out, I didn’t need any of that, or wouldn’t because only a few minutes after we’d taken down Marcia, one of Headquarters’ heavily armed support squads stormed the building. Before I could even react, half a dozen guns were pointed at me.

“Well shit,” I cursed. “You guys got here quicker than I imagined.”

A man in a plain, dark suit stepped forward.

“We set out the moment you made contact with Exterminator 2A00114. Unfortunately, her actions weren’t within our calculations as well as the result.”

“Well, what now? You’re going to execute us?”

A smile showed on the man’s face.

“That would be a bit too crude, wouldn’t you agree? No, we’re here to make sure you stay in line for a little interrogation.”

Then he turned from me to Theodor.

“And to learn more about that theory of yours.”

Theodor’s face turned into a grin.

“You think we’re just coming along?”

I could see him ball his fists as he stared at the armed men in front of him. Their faces were hard, not showing the slightest hint of emotions, and I was sure they’d been briefed about his abilities.

“Should you decide not to follow orders, we’re authorized to shoot. So why don’t we all calm down and-“

“And become one of your damned lab rats?” Theodor spat at the man.

“Theodor, don’t. Those guys are the real deal. They won’t hesitate.”

For a moment, my eyes met his. I saw the anger in them and I knew he wouldn’t listen to me. Then he focused on the group in front of us again. Before I could even react, he rushed them. To my surprise, they didn’t gun him down. Instead, they shot him with what I assumed to be a high-voltage taser. Theodor convulsed and crashed to the floor. He wasn’t out yet, and I watched as he tried to get up. At that moment, he was pushed to the ground and injected with some sort of substance. His body went limp instantly. The guy in the suit stood there, undeterred, his eyes resting on me.

“Well now, Exterminator 7D11087, are you going to give us as much trouble as your... friend here?”

I could guess why they’d only incapacitated Theodor. His strange symbiosis made him valuable to Headquarters. I, however, was nothing but a low-level exterminator, not worth a damn, and replaceable. I grinned at the guy and relaxed.

“Nope, I’m all yours.”

With that, two of the men came forward, put my hands behind my back, and apprehended me. While they handcuffed me, I watched as they put a variety of restraints on Theodor. He still wasn’t out, was still mumbling and cursing at his captors.

“Hit him again,” the man in the suit said.

I watched in anger as they hit Theodor with another injection. Before I could so much as say a thing, however, the two men pushed me into another room. A chair was shoved towards me and they commanded me to sit down.

“What’s this-“ I started, but was hit with the back of a gun. My head exploded in pain and I tumbled to the ground.

“Fucking hell,” I cursed, pushed myself back up and sat down.

My head was throbbing and I could feel warm, sticky blood running down the back of my head and neck. Once they’d strapped me to the chair, the two men left. I don’t know for how long I sat there by myself. Outside, people were busy, most likely stripping the place and securing the data we’d gathered. Not that any of it mattered. Eventually, exhaustion and stress took their toll on me and I drifted off to sleep.

I jerked awake when the door was thrown open. A plain-looking woman with hard eyes stepped inside. She brought a chair into the room and took a seat opposite me.

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“Well, Exterminator 7D11087 looks like things have gone awry here.”

“You guess so, Adjudicator?”

For a moment, an emotion that might have been anger washed over her face. It was gone as soon as it had appeared.

“I’m sure you’re well aware of what happens to people who go against the organization’s orders, aren’t you?”

“Sure am. What are you waiting for, then?”

“You know, Exterminator 7D11087, she started and got up.

She took a few steps towards me and stared down at me with a condescending expression on her face.

“All in due time.”

“What’s the hold up? You want to catch up on old times? Maybe a little small talk about-?”

The force of her slap made my head jerk to the right. Because of the restraints, my neck was painfully twisted, and I grimaced.

“Now then,” she said, without the slightest difference to her voice. “Let’s talk.”

“Why’d you want to talk to a lowly exterminator like me? Aren’t you dissecting Theodor as we speak? Shouldn’t that give you all the information you need?”

“That was the idea, but it seems the higher-ups have other plans.”

“I thought you adjudicators were the higher-ups?” I asked tauntingly.

She gave a short, empty laugh, but didn’t comment on it.

“Given its abilities and performance records, this symbiotic organism proves to be highly valuable to the organization. However, for now, we have more pressing issues at hand. We need to know more about that incident that’s supposed to occur here.”

“So, why are you talking to me? Theodor’s the one who saw it.”

“I’m interested in your thoughts on the matter, Exterminator 7D11087.”

“And why do the thoughts of a lowly exterminator like myself matter to you?”

This time the slap came with such force the inside of my mouth was cut and I tasted blood.

“Fuck,” I cursed in pain. “All right, I’ll tell you. I’ve got no fucking clue what he saw. He tried to explain it and talked about some horrible, interdimensional creature, but it was all too damn vague. In his words, this creature wants to order all of existence and that it’s coming here to order this very reality. He said the creature’s so high above A-class, it would fall into S-class.”

The Adjudicator shook her head.

“That’s not possible. Even if S-class organisms exist, our research proves it would be impossible for them to enter a different reality.”

“Isn’t all that research theoretical? And even if, don’t you think a being such as this wouldn’t be able to break the rules?”

She was quiet for a moment and seemed to regard my words.

“If what you say is true, why haven’t you-?”

“Because of Exterminator 2A00114! She was too fucking busy trying to get rid of us, presumably on your fucking orders!”

Once more, she regarded me before she sighed.

“I guess there’s no more need to talk.”

I couldn’t help but grin as she took out a communication device. She only spoke two words into it.

“It’s time.”

“Figures,” I spat at her as two men entered the room.

This was it. They were going to get rid of me right here, right now. The adjudicator, however, seemed to read my thoughts.

“As I said, in due time, Exterminator 7D11087.”

A moment later, one of the men rammed a syringe into my neck and before I passed out, they connected me to some sort of advanced computer terminal.

I don’t know for how long I was out, but whatever they’d injected me with plunged me into a surreal hell. It must’ve been some sort of mind breaker to analyze everything I’d seen and experienced over the past weeks. They laid my mind open, invaded my deepest thoughts and leafed through them like a fucking book using that damned terminal. The worst, however, was while they analyzed my memories, I lived through every event all over again. Once more, I saw the terrible destructive visions, and once more I felt the overwhelming power of the A-class organism. It was my own personal hell, and I could do nothing to escape it.

As I was subjugated to our last clash with the creature repeatedly, I felt that strange emotion once more. When Theodor destroyed the creature, there’d been fear and anger, but behind it all, I’d felt something else. A hint of a different emotion had reached me. In each iteration, I pushed the anger and fear aside and probed deeper. Eventually, I realized what it had been: satisfaction.

I didn’t understand. Was this coming from Sandra or, hell, Theodor? No, it felt too different, too alien. In this perpetual nightmare, I focused on it, taking it all in and eventually, another memory returned from the back of my mind. It was a vision I’d seen before. It depicted a wasteland, upside down mountains, and behind it all lingered an unfathomable existence. I cringed, tried to banish the vision, but I felt myself being drawn toward it, almost as if I was pulled forward. Tentacles spread through the sky and out toward stars and entire galaxies. For a mere moment, I felt a mind so vast and powerful it shook the entirety of a universe. A silent scream reverberated inside my head as my consciousness was almost torn asunder from laying eyes on it.

Then I was back and felt the restraints digging into my flesh. It took me long moments to realize where I even was. I was still strapped to the same chair and still in the same small room in the apartment. I thought they’d kill me right after they were done with the analysis of my mind, but here I was. My head was pounding, and I felt sick to my stomach. For a moment, I retched and spit on the ground.

It was only then that I caught on to the noise outside. I heard screaming and shouting. At first, I thought Theodor had freed himself, but then I heard the blaring of Sandra’s alarms.

“Hey, what the hell’s going on?” I screamed at the top of my lungs.

After a while, my screams were noticed. One of the heavily armed men entered the room and cut the restraints. For a second, I just stared at him without understanding what the hell was going on. I opened my mouth to ask, but he cut me off right away.

“Out!” he screamed at me, pushed me from the room and back into the main part of the apartment.

The adjudicator was on the phone, screaming into it over the sound of the blaring alarms. I looked around, but didn’t know what was going on. Theodor was in the back of the room. He was still restrained, but he was shaking and cursing to himself. When he noticed me, his face distorted. At first I thought he was in pain, but then I realized it was pure and utter terror. He opened his mouth to say something, but under all the noise in the room, I couldn’t make out a single word he was saying. I didn’t need to, though, because I realized what was going on.

“...how long until they are,” I heard part of the adjudicator’s words.

It was here. Whatever we’d thought would happen finally had.

Almost in a trance, I stepped past the adjudicator and to the computer where the man in the suit was trying to make sense of what he was looking at.

“Fucking move,” I screamed at him and without waiting for an answer, pushed him aside.

I opened Sandra’s programs, looked through the data, and saw that the numbers were through the roof, but still kept rising. When I opened a map of the city, I saw a multitude of emerging signatures, but only focused on one of them. It was a giant signature that had appeared right in the center of the city and was spreading at an alarming rate. Within seconds, it encompassed the inner city, but with each passing moment, it spread faster. Soon it engulfed the entire city, but it didn’t slow down. Then the alarms stopped and Sandra’s entire software shut down, unable to keep up with the magnitude of the incident. As I stared at the screen and the error messages flooding it, I finally heard Theodor. He was in hysterics.

“It’s here,” he called out from the back. “It’s here and we’re all fucked!”

As I turned around, I met the eyes of the adjudicator and saw the raw terror on her face, the incomprehension as she screamed into the phone in her hand.

And then it hit us. It was a wave of energy, a presence. It was nothing but the smallest of efforts, only the slightest brush, but sweat broke out all over my body. My heart was pounding in my chest. I staggered and almost crashed to the floor before the immeasurable power was gone again.

This was it.

Fuck monsters and fuck our entire reality.