Massive Disaster III-16

“Major Victory.”

The footage replayed on the wall-mounted screen, the reporter’s voice hovering somewhere between awe and skepticism after he said the name of Caleb’s armored identity.

Amateur footage showed a blur of royal blue and white soaring between shattered buildings. Zedd’s head lolled back against the couch, neck cricked at an angle that would hurt later, but whatever. His lake house felt too empty, too quiet except for the drone of the extranet broadcast filling the space.

The room was dim except for the glow of the holo-screen mounted across from him, cycling through the latest news on Nova Kasiopea, the aftermath of the attack, interviews, expert analyses, all the post-violence noise that happened when the people who weren’t there got to talk the loudest.

On-screen, his own face stared back at him—bruised, blood still crusted at his temple from where a round clipped his helmet too close, jaw tight as he answered some reporter’s rapid-fire questions. The bruise along his jawline now had already vanished after an application of Panacea to a vein, barely visible in the harsh lighting of the impromptu press conference they’d corralled him into after the dust settled.

“Yes, Victory Innovations has been spending the last quarter developing specialized gear security personnel…”

Zedd snorted, almost impressed by how smooth the words had come out. Hadn’t even planned that one. Even better that he wasn’t even lying at all, really. The best lies are the truth.

He just opened his mouth and the truth flowed like water. Was it a concussion… no, I didn’t throw up so can’t be. His fingers tapped an uneven rhythm against the leather armrest, catching on a seam that hadn’t been there before. When had that happened? Whatever.

The sound of the door sliding open barely registered until Dev’s bulky frame filled the doorway, the big man moving with the carefulness of someone trying not to jostle fresh injuries. Bandages peeked out from beneath his loose tank top, wrapped tight around his chest and right shoulder, stark white against dark skin.

“How you doing, bro?” Zedd asked, not moving, not even tilting his head to look directly at Dev.

Dev made a noise that was somewhere between a scoff and a groan as he slumped onto the couch opposite him, moving like a man with two days’ worth of bruises stacked on top of each other. Even after Adele dosed up her boyfriend with at least one of the sixteen emergency vials he had given him, he had been hurt a bit too much for the hyper-regenerative substance to fully fix him up, at least all the way. “I got blown the fuck up.” He gestured vaguely at the bandages with his good arm. “You keep asking me, but the answer’s still I got blown the fuck up.”

Zedd nodded slowly, gaze still fixed on the screen where aerial footage now showed the devastation at Nova Kasiopea University. Half the cultural district reduced to rubble, scorched trees, emergency vehicles still on scene even two days later. “How was your suit?”

Dev hissed as he adjusted his position on the couch, body settling with the careful deliberation of someone who’d learned exactly which movements hurt and which didn’t. 

“Fucking stellar.” His face lit up despite the pain, eyes brightening with genuine enthusiasm. “Shit’s the best shell I’ve ever fucking touched, bro. Straight nova.” He made a gesture with his good hand, palm flat like he was smoothing something in the air. “Like, I don’t think the Alliance could match this…”

“…yeah,” Zedd managed, thoughts already drifting, calculating replacement materials, running through upgrade schematics. The modified Mark 3 had performed above spec, but not enough. 

Not nearly enough.

“Nah, bro. A straight blast and I’m fucking still in one piece.” Dev’s hand formed a fist, then exploded outward, mimicking the missile impact. “Like, bro…”

“Yeah,” Zedd repeated, eyes tracking a new piece of footage—shaky, handheld, someone recording from behind a fallen column as Major Victory redirected a barrage of enemy fire with that ridiculous shield.

Dev’s eyebrows mashed together in that way that told Zedd either the braincells were at work or his ass was itchy. Either one. “You gonna say anything other than yeah?”

Zedd pulled himself up, ignoring the crick in his neck as much he could, making a loud annoying noise as he did so that Dev was kind enough to ignore. “Yeah…” His gaze swept the room, as if just now noticing how alone he was in the place. “Where’s Caleb at? I wanna run some more tests on the guy before the day’s over.”

“I don’t know, man.” Dev rolled his good shoulder in a half-shrug that looked like it still hurt just as much as the other one. “Probably running to town and back after doing five hundred pushups, whatever the fuck he’s doing, whatever…”

The memory of Caleb’s flushed face after yesterday’s improvised “training session” with Kai Leng flashed through Zedd’s mind—purple eyes too bright, movements too fluid, the kind of physical confidence that came from knowing exactly what your body could do now. The guy had been pushing it even harder since they got back from Nova Kasiopea, testing limits, finding edges, and going hard in the way he never could before.

“Bro, whatever you did to him, can you give me some of that?” Dev leaned forward slightly, wincing as the movement pulled at his bandages. His dark eyes held a mix of fascination and envy, almost salivating at the idea of it. “Like, I know genetic shit is illegal but I’ll keep it quiet. Shit’s fuckin’ overclocked.”

Zedd’s jaw tightened, words catching before they could form. It was exactly that sort of eagerness that made him pause with Dev and even for his own upgrading. The Rebirth Serum wasn’t anywhere near a joke. He wasn’t joking when he’d told ADAM it enhanced everything about you, everything. 

Down to the genetic level. 

And genetic level meant a lot.

Genetics affected IQ, physical traits, psychology.

Caleb… Well, at the very least there, he’d had some kind of assurance. 

The weird sort of Voight-Kampff test he’d run had been as much to test his psionic potential as it did his morality. The guy was just… genuinely decent.

But for that same reason, Zedd wasn’t sure about using it on himself. I’m already a fucking cold bastard, and I can get weird. If weird meant obsessive and addictive, sure, then yeah, he was definitely a weird one. It’s one thing if that addictive personality and obsession was turned toward work, but what if he became obsessed with more power? And he knew he had no problem killing already.

Galactic dictator Lord Victors. He hated how cool that sounded, and it sounded very very cool. Is it wrong to want to cackle evilly?  “I would, man…” And he actually meant that when it came down to Dev, “I really would juice you up. It’s just that… it… it …needs more testing, man,” he continued, scrubbing a hand across his face, voice rough from too many hours running on fumes. “Caleb was… Let’s just say he was a real special case.”

“Well, damn.” Dev shrugged, his expression falling slightly before he pushed himself up from the couch with a grimace, his disappointment immediately forgotten. “I’mma go raid your fridge.”

“You do that, bro,” Zedd replied, attention already drawn back to the screen.

The footage had shifted while he was talking. His interview was already long over, the camera drones now showing the actual disaster area directly from a dozen different angles and long shots. 

The real aftermath of it all; the smoking wreckage, shattered glass, emergency teams still pulling bodies from the debris. Chyron scrolling beneath like some fucked-up leaderboard, 37 dead, 182 injured, millions of credits in property damage.

Zedd sat up ramrod straight all of a sudden, something cold settling in his chest as the camera panned across a makeshift medical station. Faces streaked with dust and blood, some crying, some completely quiet. He wasn’t looking at bodies anymore. Not wreckage, not some abstract casualty report. Not numbers scrolling by like the fucking stock market.

This was people.

Then the camera lingered and Zedd’s eyes widened.

A young man sat stiffly on a cot, bandages wrapped tight around his eyes. His face was cut up, bruising creeping across his jaw. Beside him, a figure wrapped near-entirely in bandages and slathered in medigel was being transferred from the cot at his side to an ambulance. From the half-burnt green varsity jacket that fell from her stretcher, Zedd’s mind made the connection immediately.

Maddy.

Which made the blind kid Scot Winters.

His fingers twitched again, jaw going tight, an involuntary reaction he couldn’t suppress. They were targeting me and people got caught in the crossfire. He wasn’t responsible, not directly, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t do something about it.

Maybe not Rebirth… but I can do something.

He reached for his tablet, already pulling up medical records, scanning for details. His fingers flew across the surface, bypassing security protocols, working their way through the Nova Kasiopea hospital system. 

Scot Winters, Severe facial trauma. Corneal damage. Optic nerve trauma.

Provisional diagnosis: permanent blindness.

Madelyn Ronan Grey, fourth-degree burns over 70% of body, third-degree burns on right arm, smoke inhalation, broken clavicle and shattered ribs.

Two names amid hundreds of injured and dead.

Two names he knew, though. They weren’t even supposed to be there. He thought they had gotten out of the killzone, out of the range of all the chaos and explosions and fire.

Clearly, the fight had gone on where he wasn’t. 

He almost couldn’t believe it. That autistic guy who’d asked him all those questions just a couple days ago, who’d been more interested in his work than his hype. The girlfriend who stuck close, calm, grounded… they got caught up in his mess.

And the sick fucks that wanted him dead… just didn’t care.

He leaned back on the couch again. More to fix. 

Behind him, he heard Dev rummaging through the kitchen, the clatter of plates and the hiss of the refrigerator door breaking the silence. Zedd barely registered it, mind already racing ahead, pulling up schematics, adjusting parameters.

He knew for a fact that Scot had kept his head in the fight. The guy had been prioritizing others, staying sharp when anybody else would have beenlosing his shit. That was the kind of thing Zedd was looking for, right? Good instincts? A good mind?

Maybe Scot was the next one to deserve the full upgrade.

No, Zedd shook his head, almost slapping his cheeks to avoid going down some stupid fucking path of juicing up anyone he felt bad for and didn’t hate. God, no. Don’t let emotions affect the facts. Hell, even if it was a good idea, the Rebirth Serum would be overkill in the worst way, especially without proper testing, and he was in no way interested in risking that. But targeted modifications? Neural interfaces? Specialized ocular implants with enhanced sensory capabilities? 

Hell, simple regrowth or cloning of new eyes?

All within reach. All doable, even without crossing the full enhancement threshold.

But… Zedd thought back to Scot’s actions during the chaos, recalling how he prioritized others and kept his head in a fight. Why not go for the enhancement?  

His omnitool pinged—ADAM alerting him to an incoming priority call. David Shen-Abraham, the name flashing in glowing orange across the display.

Zedd ignored it, attention fixed on the screen as it shifted again where the extranet channel reporter was in the middle of interviewing a doctor now, the woman’s face tired and hollow-eyed, explaining the damage, the aftermath. “Many of these young people will face lifelong challenges,” she was saying, voice clipped, too professional to be completely steady. “The university is establishing a fund for ongoing care, but some damage simply can’t be reversed with current medical technology.”

Zedd’s mouth pulled, something humorless at the edges.

He almost laughed.

Not really.

Because she was right.

Current medical technology couldn’t fix this.

But mine could.

The sound of cabinets opening and closing echoed from the kitchen, followed by increasingly frustrated muttering, forcing Zedd to pull himself out of his own thoughts as Dev poked his head out of the kitchen and shot him a look. “Yo, why the fuck do you have six different brands of nutrient bars?”

Zedd exhaled, rubbing his temple. “Testing caloric efficiency.”

The face Dev made his way looked like what you’d get from an Asari maiden if you tried to introduce her to the concept of condoms. “Bro, eat a fucking sandwich.”

Zedd smirked, finally turning his head. “I had one.”

Dev squinted at him. “When?”

Zedd made a vague motion, trying to get back into what he was planning before Dev’s interruption. “Dunno. Yesterday?”

The musclehead raiding his fridge let out a sharp  laugh that was almost downright mocking from the sound of it. “That does not count.” There was a pause as Dev continued rummaging, muttering under his breath about “goddamn nerds and their engineered food paste.”

There was beautiful silence for almost a good minute, then Dev broke it again with a loud, “Ayy, jackpot.”

Zedd raised an eyebrow as Dev walked out of his kitchen with something cradled in his hands like it was a national treasure. “Why do you look so excited?”

Dev didn’t say anything as he simply held up a white container and opened it. Inside: a single, half-eaten burger.

Zedd blinked, pulling a face of his own. “That’s… been in there a while.”

Dev was already putting a hand around it.

Zedd’s face dove from incredulousness right into the depths of disgust. “You don’t wanna eat that.”

Dev took a bite.

Zedd watched in vague horror. “…You are actually disgusting.”

Dev just chewed, unbothered. “Still good,” he said, mouth full. “You’re just too rich now.”

The omnitool pinged again, more insistent this time. With a sigh, Zedd flicked his wrist as he pulled his eyes away from the impending case of food poisoning, accepting the call as blue light flickered up on his modified device.

“Zedd.” David’s voice was tight, controlled in that specific way that meant something was happening. “We need to talk. There’s an Alliance official who’s making inroads, trying to get a chance to speak with you.”

Something in David’s tone made Zedd go still. The man was rarely off his game and kept a smile on his face, something Zedd respected, but to see the man even slight in his tone was usually a bad sign. “Who?”

A pause, almost imperceptible, but Zedd caught it anyway. “Captain David Anderson.”

The name registered immediately. Alliance N7, decorated combat veteran, with enough battlefield experience to make even Kai Leng respectful. Someone who was supposedly in line to be Humanity’s first Spectre, till… something happened. 

What that was, no one really knew.

But the man was that good at his job.

More importantly, the guy was the personal representative of Admiral Steven Hackett. Not the kind of man who made social calls to colony entrepreneurs.

“Tell him I’m off-world,” Zedd replied automatically, mind already calculating angles, motives, potential threats.

David’s quiet laugh told him everything. “He knew you were off-world two days ago. He stayed planetside. He’s still here and knows your ship arrived.”

Shit. Zedd let out a hiss.

“Tell him I’m busy now, getting medical treatment from… well, you know what,” Zedd said, already standing, television forgotten as he moved toward his workshop. “Stall him for a day or two.”

“Of course,” David replied, voice smooth and unfazed. “I’m very good at that, as you know.”

The call ended, but Zedd barely noticed, mind already racing ahead to the next problem, the next solution as he headed toward his basement steps. Anderson’s appearance wasn’t a coincidence—Alliance brass didn’t waste resources on random check-ins, and they certainly didn’t send decorated N7s as messengers, captains especially, unless the message mattered.

Apparently, they weren’t happy with the way he was brushing off their normal reps and decided to send someone it’d be harder to ignore. They’d noticed him. Noticed his tech. Noticed what he was building.

The question was: what were they going to do about it?

Zedd paused at the top of the stairs, looking down at the workshop he hadn’t been in since he got back, gaze flicking back to the screen where Scot and Maddy’s faces were still visible in the background of the hospital footage. A decision crystallized, sharp and clear amid the chaos of his racing thoughts.

He’d deal with Anderson. He’d handle whatever political game the Alliance was playing.

But after that—those guys needed help. 

His help. 

And unlike the Alliance, Zedd Victors delivered exactly what he promised.

5k Words (100 FP)


ROLL: Enhanced I.C. Chip (200 FP) [Mega Man Classic] {Crafting – Technological}: “You know how to create stronger I.C. chips, the core of a robot’s personality, memory, and more. Stronger chips are less fragile and less susceptible to reprogramming. Any sapient machine you make will retain their own personality, even through virus attacks. As long as the chip remains intact, they can outlive their body.”


Forge Points: 100