38 Cover Up! (1/2)
Zed fell asleep unworried about his actions as Kiba, but the same couldn't be said for the top echelons of Delta City. The golden lightning and the slaughter in the slum has taken away the sleep of many...
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The Wasteland outside Delta City.
It was deep in the night and usually, at such time there would be no source of light beside the moon and stars. But currently, the wasteland was filled with balloon lights and headlights of vehicles.
On the ground, there were trucks and cranes along with rescue operators from the government. They were having a difficult time treading the path for there was no path. As far as they could see the land was a deep crater.
In the sky, there were around dozens of helicopters. The shock the people riding in the helicopters faced was far more severe than the difficulty faced by the people on the ground. How could they not be shocked to see a crater so vast that it occupied the entire wasteland!? No! The entire wasteland has turned into a giant crater!
There were no more barren mountains and plateaus or the yellow soil. Now, there was just a crater with solid land mass. In some places, even the groundwater was seeping through.
One of the helicopters landed on the ground where a temporary camp was made. Few injured people were being given emergency treatment by mutants specialized in healing. Next to them, dozens of mutant soldiers were on guard.
A middle-aged man with brown hairs departed from the helicopter.The soldiers on the ground gave a salute but the man ignored their presence and arrived in front of the medical team.
”Sir Sylvan, we are sorry but 90% of the team is dead,” A female medical officer directly reported what the man in front of her wanted to know.
The expression on Sylvan's face was unsightly but he tried his best to control his emotions. After a moment he spoke, ”When I left the office to arrive here, I was informed that we have lost half of the team's life signals but now you are saying that 90% team is dead! You better give me a convincing explanation otherwise you will join the departed.”
The female officer felt a chill down her spine. She hastily replied, ” When we arrived here the surviving members were on brink of death. Their internal organs were ruined and even though we used the healing serum it wasn't effective...”
”The healing serum didn't work?Does that mean my team was attacked by a chemical attack similar to the one used by those terrorists?” Sylvan asked.
”No, sir. The chemical bombs used by the terrorists target the cells and making them resistant to treatment or the powers of mutants.While the damage from such attack makes it impossible for one to recover even with the cloning technology, the life can still be saved. But in the current case...the very source of life has been severed.No matter what we do it is proving useless. I have never seen or heard of such a thing, ” the female officer replied.
Sylvan took in a breath of air to calm himself.He was regretting his earlier action of sending a team to investigate the golden lightning phenomenon when it began.
He thought he could find what Castor Damon was seeking for but in the end...
”Damn,” Sylvan cursed thinking about the loss of S class vehicles and dozens of personnel. Those assets belonged to world government and as the chief supervisor of the city he couldn't escape the responsibility for the current damage
”Sir...there is one more thing,” the female officer said.
”What?”Sylvan asked.
”The abilities of those who survived have been erased. There is no difference between them and ordinary humans,” the female officer answered.
”What did you say?!” Sylvan couldn't believe her words.
”Every sign of mutation inside the survivors have been erased,” the female officer explained again. She knew how shocking her words were.When she checked the conditions of the survivors, she was shocked in disbelief as well. There do exist multiple ways to neutralize the abilities but ways to erase the abilities is unheard of.
Of course, there are cases of mutants losing their powers due to serious injuries like Kiba's 'caretaker' but that is different from the erasure of abilities!
”I am afraid the survivors won't live for long.At most they would live for an hour,” the female officer concluded.
Sylvan gritted his teeth in frustration. He walked towards the survivors. There were four survivors in total who were in a sorry state with their entire bodies covered in wounds.
”How did your comrades die and you lost your abilities? Tell me everything from start,” Sylvan said. His current mood made it impossible for him to care about the emotions of survivors.
”After your order was passed, forty members of the team left for the wasteland in the S class vehicles. As soon as we entered the wasteland covered by the golden lightning...we felt an extremely strong pressure on us.In the start, the pressure was strong but bearable thanks to the military grade vehicles. But the more we traveled inside the wasteland, the pressure became stronger. We have barely covered a distance of half a mile when our vehicles lost power.We thought there was an EMP wave or something but a moment later, the vehicles started disintegrating into dust and ultimately turned into nothingness,” one of the survivors said.
”Nothingness?” Sylvan asked in disbelief.
”Yes, sir,” the survivor said with his voice containing traces of fear.
Sylvan thought of the crater after hearing about the pressure. He thought it made sense if the pressure disintegrated the earlier landmass into nothingness otherwise there should be dust or soil outside the crater.But how can something be turned into nothingness?
”Continue.”
”We didn't even get time to process after the vehicles disintegrated. With the loss of vehicles, the pressure was directly faced by us. Team captain transformed into a bird and flew away, but within a second he fell down. The pressure in the sky was far too high due to the golden lightning. We all tried to use our abilities to return but failed. It was as if by every passing moment our abilities were being erased. Not only our abilities but our bodies were being erased. Some of the weaker members turned into nothingness in a second and for others, it took 5-6 seconds.We would have died as well but we were lucky...” the survivor said in a self-mocking smile.He thought there was nothing lucky seeing they have lost his abilities and many of those who survived died later. Perhaps they would die as well.
”Lucky?” Sylvan asked.
”Yes, at least that's what we thought earlier. Just when we thought the pressure has become unbearable and would turn us into nothingness, the golden lightning disappeared.The sky was no longer covered with the dark clouds. We thought we were lucky enough to survive long enough for the golden lightning to disappear.If it has existed for another moment, we would have been dead,” the survivor said bitterly.
”The rescue team came later and gave us treatment. But more died even after the treatment,”another survivor continued.
”You didn't saw any other person in the wasteland during the golden lightning phenomenon?” Sylvan asked.
”No, sir.”
”Did you find anything which could have been the source of the phenomenon?” Sylvan once again asked.
”No, sir.”
”Then you are useless trash deserving your fate,” Sylvan's eyes released blue laser light aimed at the survivors. They released a horrifying scream before burning into ashes.
The female medical officer and the soldiers nearby felt a chill down their spines.Sylvan ignored their reactions and moved towards the helicopter while thinking of today's events.
”I can burn someone into ashes but not into nothingness!” He then thought of Castor Damon - the Level IX scientist from World Government, ”Castor, just what is this power which can turn anything into nothingness? Are you alive? Or did you died four years ago when the golden lightning phenomenon occurred first? ”
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Sylvan took a seat inside the helicopter. A junior office beside him explained their findings.
”Sir, we have sent our team throughout the wasteland and I think we have found a possible point from where the golden lightning first originated.”
”Oh? How did you do it?”
”Sir, some two hundred miles from here there is a point where the crater is somewhat strange.”
”Strange?”
”Yes, sir.In a radius of some miles from that point, the crater is different from the surrounding.In that radius, the damage caused by the pressure from golden lightning is very low compared to the surrounding. I believe an important event occurred in that radius even if that radius is not the source of golden lightning,”
”Good job. Have you found anything from that area then?” Sylvan has a bit of expectation.
”Sadly no, sir. We used all types of scans but found nothing,” the officer replied.
”Every single one of you is a fucking useless trash,”Sylvan cursed.He thought the junior officer has found something useful but it was nothing but empty words.