Underground memory
The ventilation ducts in the police station's basement were narrower than Du Siling had imagined. The rust on the metal walls scraped against his cheeks, and every breath carried the smell of years of dust. The countdown timer on his wrist showed 64:37:12, each tick of the number feeling like a hammer blow to his temple.
The sounds of hurried footsteps and radio conversations could be heard coming from below the pipe.
"Area B cleared; proceed towards the archives."
It was Chen Yan's voice. Du Siling stopped what she was doing and looked down through the gap in the louvers of the ventilation vent. Five fully armed SWAT officers were advancing in tactical formation. Chen Yan was at the rear, and in his hand, instead of a standard service pistol, he was holding a strangely shaped silver weapon—the barrel was transparent, and blue liquid was flowing inside.
Du Siling's genetic marker suddenly stung, as if warning him to stay away from the weapon. He held his breath and waited until the group had passed before continuing to crawl forward. The branching points of the ventilation ducts were covered in dust, except for the right-hand duct, which showed fresh friction marks—someone had passed through there not long ago.
"Han Beimo..." Du Siling moved her lips silently and turned towards the passage.
At the end of the pipe was an abandoned archive room, the vent covers already removed. Du Siling landed lightly, her military boots making no sound on the dusty floor. Moonlight streamed in through the high-mounted skylight, illuminating a conspicuous blue porcelain flowerpot in the center of the room—the azaleas inside were long since withered.
Clues from Linghua's memory.
Du Siling knelt on one knee in front of the flowerpot, his fingers tracing the surface of the porcelain. Under the moonlight, the gold threads hidden within the glaze gradually became visible, forming a DNA double helix pattern. He tried rotating the flowerpot, and when the pattern aligned at a certain angle, a "click" sound came from the bottom of the pot.
Lifting the liner revealed a miniature biometric panel. Du Siling pressed her thumb on it, and the panel lit up green: "Beta Permission Confirmed."
The entire filing cabinet suddenly slid open to both sides, revealing a hidden elevator door. Du Siling stepped inside, and the elevator immediately began to descend automatically. The interior of the car was entirely made of metal, reflecting his face covered in golden lines—his genetic collapse was accelerating.
The elevator stopped. When the doors opened, Du Siling was already holding his sidearm.
Before them was a circular laboratory with three culture chambers in the center. The two chambers on the left and right were empty, while the one in the middle, submerged in a pale blue liquid, contained a pale human body—its face bore a seven-tenths resemblance to Du Siling and Han Beimo, with a clear Ω mark on its forehead.
"Third-generation Omega sample." Du Siling approached the culture chamber, where a label read "Omega-3, Culture Date: 2005.05.09." This was a full twenty years later than Omega-1 in the underwater facility.
The control panel in the laboratory suddenly activated automatically, and a holographic projector projected Ling Hua's image into the air. She looked much older than Du Siling remembered, with heavy shadows around her eyes.
"If you see this record, it means Huo Mingyuan has already initiated the 'Harvest Plan'," the holographic Linghua's voice, tinged with electronic noise, continued. "All individuals carrying the RH-0 gene will experience genetic collapse within 72 hours, except for the Alphas and Betas who have completed fusion."
Du Siling quickly browsed the files on the console. Most of the data was encrypted, but one diagram caught his attention—two DNA double helices intertwined by a golden bridging material, labeled "Diagram of Complete Fusion".
"What conditions are needed for fusion?" he asked the holographic image, knowing he could not get a response.
Unexpectedly, the holographic Linghua paused, as if you could actually hear his question: "Maintain clinical death status for 88 seconds, allowing the Ω gene bridging material to reconstruct your sequence." The image switched to a surgical diagram, "Warning: Individuals cannot survive alone."
Du Siling's back was covered in cold sweat. The idea that he and Han Beimo had to "die" at the same time for almost a minute and a half was simply a fantasy.
The control panel suddenly sounded an alarm, and the surveillance footage showed that Chen Yan's men had found the hidden elevator. The countdown timer showed 63:15:09, with very little time remaining.
Du Siling quickly flipped through the other documents and found one labeled "Grave Keeper Agreement." It contained only one line: "When the azaleas bloom, give it to the person who took the blue porcelain shard."
A sudden flashback occurred to his memory—on his twelfth birthday, Ling Hua had indeed given him a small piece of blue porcelain, which was later made into a dog tag and hung around his neck. Du Siling took out the dog tag and, as if possessed, pressed it against the observation window of the Omega culture chamber.
The liquid inside the chamber suddenly boiled, and the Ω sample's eyes snapped open—pure gold, without pupils. A beam of light shot from its forehead, forming a new hologram in front of Du Siling: a floor plan of the police station, with a corner marked in red and labeled "Serum Storage Room."
"Du Siling!"
Chen Yan's voice came from the direction of the elevator. When Du Siling turned around, Chen Yan had already walked into the laboratory, holding that strange silver gun, with no other team members behind him.
"Don't move." Chen Yan pointed his gun at him. "I know what you're thinking, but General Huo's 'cleaning squad' has already surrounded the police station."
Du Siling noticed Chen Yan's gaze constantly drifting towards the Omega incubation chamber, and her hand gripping the gun trembled slightly: "Are you Ling Hua's 'gravekeeper'?"
Chen Yan's expression changed. He suddenly turned his gun and fired a shot at the ceiling. The blue liquid vaporized into mist in the air, forming a temporary visual barrier.
"Hurry!" Chen Yan lowered his voice, pulled a small metal box from his tactical pouch, and tossed it to him. "Frozen serum; it can temporarily stabilize genetic collapse. The storage room marked in red has what you need!"
Du Siling caught the metal box; it was icy cold to the touch. "Why did you help me?"
"Because I've seen twenty pairs of 'twins' die at Huo Mingyuan's hands." Chen Yan's eyes gleamed in the blue mist. "You are the only ones who came close to success."
A tremor came from the elevator shaft; more people were about to descend. Chen Yan suddenly raised his voice: "Target escapes to the B-sector corridor!" At the same time, he mouthed to Du Siling: "Ventilation ducts, now!"
Du Siling leaped onto the lab bench, pushed open the ceiling panel, and crawled into the ventilation system. Behind him came the deliberately staged gunshots and shouts from Chen Yan: "Stop him!"
The ventilation ducts were intricate and complex. Du Siling crawled towards the serum storage room according to the holographic map provided by Ω. The frozen serum in the metal box began to work, and the golden lines on her wrist temporarily stopped expanding, but the countdown continued: 62:48:33.
A conversation came from below the ventilation vent at the corner. Du Siling stopped and looked through the blinds to see Huo Mingyuan standing in front of the monitor with his back to him. The screen showed a live feed of the safe house—Han Beimo was restrained to a chair by four members of the "cleaning team" with special shackles, and the golden lines on his face had spread to his neck.
"Alpha, you've disappointed me greatly," Huo Mingyuan's voice came through the speaker. "I gave you the best genes, the most perfect training, and yet you chose to defect to a Beta sequence?"
In the image, Han Beimo raises his head, his golden pupils like two burning flames in the dim light: "You never wanted to cure RH-0, did you? All these years you've just been selecting the most powerful carriers."
Huo Mingyuan chuckled and pulled a document from his suit pocket: "Do you know what this is? Our paternity test report. Why do you think Linghua chose you as the Alpha sequence? Because you're my biological son."
Du Siling's breath hitched. Even Han Beimo himself didn't know this.
Han Beimo's expression froze in the video. Suddenly, the genetic marker on his lower back burst into a blinding golden light, and some ancient symbol appeared on his skin—the same mark as the one on the forehead of the Ω sample.
Huo Mingyuan suddenly stood up: "So that's how it is... Ω chose you as its host!" His voice trembled with excitement, "I knew that bitch Ling Hua had a trick up her sleeve..."
Du Siling couldn't wait any longer. He gently moved the vent cover, preparing to ambush Huo Mingyuan, but then he heard a metallic bending sound coming from the pipe behind him—someone was approaching from the other end.
"Don't move, Officer Du." Yang Zhiming's voice came from the darkness, a gun pressed against his back. "Hand over the serum."
Du Siling slowly turned around. Yang Zhiming, wearing a bulletproof vest with the "Cleaning Team" badge on it, wore a smug, confident smile.
"You're also one of Huo Mingyuan's men?"
"It always has been." Yang Zhiming beckoned with his finger. "Now, give me that metal box. Unless you want to watch Han Beimo's genes collapse in front of you?"
Du Siling's gaze passed over Yang Zhiming's shoulder, and suddenly her pupils contracted slightly: "Chen Yan?"
Yang Zhiming instinctively turned around, and Du Siling seized the opportunity to kick his wrist. A gunshot rang out, the bullet whizzing past Du Siling's ear, ricocheting sharply in the ventilation duct. The two wrestled in the confined space, the metal walls dented from their impact.
Yang Zhiming grabbed Du Siling by the throat, his other hand reaching for the metal box: "General Huo was right, the Beta sequences are indeed all useless..."
Du Siling slammed his knee into Yang Zhiming's abdomen, simultaneously pressing a hidden button on the metal box with his thumb. The lid popped open, spraying frozen serum onto Yang's face. The man screamed in agony, white smoke immediately rising from where the serum touched his skin—this serum was a strong acid to ordinary people.
After breaking free of his restraints, Du Siling crawled towards the serum storage room without looking back. Behind him came Yang Zhiming's painful curses and another gunshot; a bullet pierced Du Siling's calf muscle. The excruciating pain made his vision blur, but the instinct for survival drove him to continue forward.
After rounding the last bend, the target ventilation vent was right below. Du Siling kicked open the cover and jumped down, landing right in front of a small refrigerator. The biometric lock on the door sensed his genetic marker and opened automatically.
As the cold mist dissipated, three syringes were neatly arranged in the cabinet: red, blue, and transparent.
"Three options..." Du Siling recalled Ω's words in the underwater facility. Without hesitation, he picked up the transparent syringe, the label of which read: "Final Agreement - Alpha & Beta Only".
The storage room door was suddenly kicked open. Du Siling turned around, gun raised, only to see Han Beimo, covered in blood, leaning against the doorframe, his face half-covered in gold markings. He clutched the paternity test report he had snatched from Huo Mingyuan, a maniacal smile playing on his lips.
"Guess what I just discovered?" Han Beimo's voice carried an unnatural resonance, "Our genes..."
He didn't finish his sentence. The entire wall suddenly exploded, the blast wave sending both of them flying. In the last second before losing consciousness, Du Siling saw Huo Mingyuan standing in the ruins, holding an exaggeratedly designed genetic weapon, the muzzle pointed at Han Beimo's heart.
The countdown flashed in Du Siling's blurry vision: 61:59:59.
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com