Humanity 2.0, Year 012, Day 098

The four ignored me completely as the orgy progressed into true, carnal, animal fucking. I then noticed something nicer – on the discarded vest of one of the two men were a pair of tear gas grenades, as well as some spare clips and other gear. I took the vest and donned it. I glanced through the doorway the men had been guarding – it went down another hallway, this one totally cement, like a real military base.

There were patrols, but I had plenty of time to just stand in my doorway and watch them. For some reason, nobody came to respond to the soldier's report on the radio for a while; I just stood at the doorway and stared out, until I felt like I knew what was going out in the immediate area. It was night, I figured, and they were at minimal staff. I guess I didn't rate the full-blown Area 51 treatment. Not yet, anyway.

I stole out into the hallway, poking my head through each doorway. I found an elevator, and looked at the floor numbers – sure enough, they went in reverse order. This was a basement. Pain in my ass. I heard the door to the other elevator chime and darted inside the one I was in, to hide.

"... the fuck does that mean, an HR problem?" Someone sounded testy. One pair of flat, clapping strides – someone wearing dress shoes? – and two pairs of heavy boots flanking him. It must have been that medical division head and some more Foot Clan guys. I looked at the buttons; there were about ten, mostly lit red - only three were lit up in green. I tapped a red one, but nothing happened. I noticed there was a place to swipe a key card at the base of the panel. In a rush, I slapped one of the green buttons; I realized a second later that it was for one floor down. I groaned inwardly. Great plan, Ben – go further down into the underground base, surely the path to escape.

It dinged down a floor, then another. The doors opened to what appeared to be an underground garage; it was simple grey concrete, supported by regularly space columns. About a third of the spaces were occupied, by a variety of cars – some jeeps and vans of various makes, a few sedans and town cars, and what looked like a small flatbed. I looked to either side, and cursed myself.

Naturally, this entrance was flanked on either side by two armed guards. One glanced inward casually toward me, and his eyes suddenly went wide. He reached for his radio, opening his mouth to shout something. My hand shot out, but I was just too far away to strike him in time. For an instant, my thoughts were in a panic. He'd bring down a whole platoon on me.

Some instinctual reaction kicked in – before I could even consider it, the field was focusing on him, and I dumped an enormous surge of neural power directly into him. I instantly felt an awful headache making itself known. I blinked, hard, involuntarily, and lost my balance for a moment as I reeled in pain. Looking up a moment later, the guard who'd been reaching for his radio was slumped down on the floor, clutching his dick – as if someone had kicked him in the nuts.

No... that's not quite right. I peered for another moment and listened to his repeating groans of pleasure, and saw his bucking hips, as if he was fucking some imaginary woman spoon-style. He was coming inside his pants.

Before I could think through the implications, I felt my mind go into combat mode again as the other guy – just as shocked at his co-worker's behavior as I was – seemed to notice my presence, and swung his rifle around. I threw myself at him bodily, my right arm lunging forward in a chopping motion to the side of his neck. It put him out cold. I looked again at his companion, whose orgasm appeared to be ongoing.

It probably was as hard as he had ever come in his life; his cock was coating the inside of his underwear with every single drop of semen it could squeeze out of him. I wondered if it might cause some kind of injury. Shrugging, I bent down and gave him the same chop on the neck, putting him out before he even realized what else was going on aside from the incredible orgasm.

I fished through either man's pockets. Two wallets, some credit cards and IDs, and what appeared to be base key cards – which I pocketed. One had a set of keys, including a car key for a Toyota. I hoped for the best and beeped it – and heard the noise, from one of the far rows. Finally, some good luck. I started over toward the car, then began to think about my situation a little more clearly as the pain and fog in my head at least partly cleared.

When I considered everything, now was just about the best chance I'd ever get. I had the element of surprise; after this, they'd be clued in on my new power, and this was one of the rare times where we'd actually knew where they were operating from. I grimaced, looking away for a time; Nina would have my head, but I had to do it. The girls couldn't keep living like this. Hell, I couldn't. What if they'd busted Hannah or Melody in the hotel room instead of me? Neither of them would have been able to bust out like I just had. Who knows what they'd be doing to her by this point?

I pocketed the keys and ran back to the elevator. Neither of the guys had clothes that would fit me, but I managed to make it somewhat work; the black pants only came halfway down my shins, and I still had no shoes, but the turtleneck fit – if it was a bit tight. If anyone saw me from above the waist they might not look twice. I got back in the elevator and swiped one of the key cards; the buttons all lit up. Unfortunately, they weren't labeled with anything other than a floor number. Shrugging, I slapped the top button.

The elevator began to gently ride upward. There was no music, thankfully. I checked my rifle – a full magazine, twenty-eight rounds and one in the chamber. I glanced upward, and couldn't see a camera pointing at me – not that that meant there wasn't one. I focused my thoughts, readying another blast of pure neural pleasure – though I couldn't quite convince myself that I had another in me so soon. I was craving sugar, for some reason; I wondered if that was what powered it? In any case, I certainly wasn't going to be able to down a team of trained soldiers with only my super power, particularly if they were waiting for me. Any elevator system, I knew, had to have some machinery at both its top and bottom – which I would have to count on at this point.

I hunched over and briefly read the instructions on the grenades as a few more floors ticked by – trying to hide them just in case there was a hidden camera. I pulled their pins with one hand and began to count as I then reached up and pushed aside one of the ceiling panels and tossed the rifle up ahead of me. I climbed up within moments – thanks again to training with Nina – and heard the elevator drag to a halt. My head had mere inches of clearance above it, huge grinding gears and pulleys on either side of me as it came to rest. I looked around, and saw it – a small access panel, for maintenance... I wasn't even sure if I could fit through it. It was certainly not going to be comfortable. I heard the chime and the door opening below. Groaning to myself, I committed to the plan.

With two seconds to spare on the grenades, I dropped them down into the elevator and kicked hard at the panel. It broke and swung open, and I tossed my rifle through and dove inside. Sure enough, I heard grunts and barked orders as a team of men below hustled to check the inside of the elevator – but I was already through the access hatch to the elevator's machinery room. It was a small space, which I had to turn sideways a little to get inside – but I rushed down the gangway and up a half-set of stairs, and found a metal door with a sign – 'Authorized Access Only'. I heard shouting and yelling from below me as a glance backward confirmed the gas coming out of the elevator's roof.

A swift strike with the butt of the rifle to the handle and the lock mechanism on the door broke, and I kicked it open. My eyes suddenly were blinded with shining light; it must have been the middle of the day, still. I had no way of knowing how long I had been out before I woke up inside the place, though given my experience with 15226's incarnation, I didn't think it was more than a few hours. I let them adjust for a few moments – another nice bonus of being hominus, that took about five times longer for the old species – then rushed outside. The roof was wide open, with no guard rails. There were heavy HVAC units a few yards away on either side, and... oh, excellent. A nice, big skylight.

I rushed over toward it, looking down. I saw what appeared to be an executive office, spacious and well-appointed, with a smaller desk nearer the elevator. Probably the assistant or receptionist's. The squad of armed men – I couldn't get a count with the gas blocking my view – were shouting at each other, staggering out of the gas. I knew they'd recover quickly. Looking around, by the door I'd accessed the roof from, I saw a fire hose rolled up inside a small red metal cabinet.

I broke it open and rolled it out, guessing where I'd need to hold onto it for me to swing clear of the floor just below the skylight. With a few shots and one well-placed kick, the skylight shattered, and I dove through a moment later. It was only about nine feet down, and the hose caught about halfway down, swinging me hard toward the elevator as I released it.

One of the men was still aiming upward at the skylight. I rushed in, taking him out with a quick punch to the temple, and, before they could recover from the gas, I rushed in and disabled all five of them as quickly as I could. Two with hard strikes to the solar plexus, probably breaking some ribs, and two more with light blows to the head. Looking over at the executive desk, I saw exactly what I was looking for – a laptop, still online by the looks of it.

I ran over, grabbed it and unplugged it, slapped it shut, and looked around again. The gas wasn't clear yet, but under the exec desk I could see a little flashing red light. A panic button, I assumed. Whoever occupied the desk had long since cleared out, maybe because of that light. Likely, more men were coming.

I tested the hose, finding it sturdy. I eyeballed the height, then, hoping it was built well, tossed the laptop upward, and heard a crunch as it landed on the pebble-bed of the roof nearby. I grabbed the hose with both hands and hustled upward – slicing up my palm as I gripped the skylight's ruined edge to pull myself up. I grabbed the laptop – which was now partly open and didn't seem to close right. I frowned, and looked around again. The nearest other building with a roof lower than the one I was on was a good sixty feet away, and three floors lower.

It was also the only option.

Nina was going to murder me. I ran to the opposite edge, as far back as I dared to get to the edge, bent down into a runner's starting crouch, the laptop gripped tightly in the other hand. I shouted aloud – for no real reason, maybe just angry at how stupid my plan was – and bolted forward at full speed.

I surprised myself again – I'd tested my physical limits occasionally after that encounter in Venezuela, but it hadn't occurred to me that 15226 might have also increased the body's proportional amount of adrenaline in males as well. The surge of power I had at that moment propelled me forward much more rapidly than I expected; I only got about five steps in before, in a panic, I realized the next step would be in empty air.

I shouted again and gave a clumsy one-footed launch at the last instant, and then suddenly felt both exhilaration and sheer panic. I was flying, and ten stories of air were below me, then the pavement. The wind blasted past me in all directions. The other building was approaching rapidly – sort of. It was coming horizontally fast enough, but not vertically... I had overshot.

I cursed my own dumb ass again. I had been worried I wouldn't have enough power, not that I had too much. There was no way to change it, though. I felt my heart sink as I sailed right past the building I'd intended to land on, and found myself hurtling toward another, smaller tenement opposite it. It was a tall, grey, ramshackle-looking structure, with numerous open windows. I saw a fire escape running down one side. Desperate, trying to judge my velocity again, I reached out hard to my right.

The jolt to my whole body as I smacked into the building was staggering. I was suddenly wracked with pain for the third time of the day; I felt some inner creaking and cracking. I broke a few ribs right then, I knew, but I'd done that before without too many issues. 15226 built us men to last. I shook my head, coming to as I realized I'd been saved by my own instinct again. My right hand was gripping hard onto one part of the fire escape.

I took a moment to recover – barely – and swung myself back and forth a few times, then caught one leg on the opposite side of the below handrail on the fire escape. I then caught the other, grimaced as I tossed the laptop down onto the rusty steel lattice of the gangway – then gripped the next section upward, brachiating myself until I finally, once again, had both feet on a surface.

I glanced to myself to see an older woman staring at me, flabberghasted, through her window. She had some soap opera on her TV, and was just staring at me open-mouthed. I grabbed the laptop and hustled down the stairs, two at a time, going down five stories and kicking down the ladder. Below me was – of course – a dumpster. I had enough clearance to jump and land next to it, then rush off down the alleys.

I won't bore you with my stupid little adventure in the city after that, and the rather depressing tale which follows of how I came into the infamous "Silver Shoes". I understand those awful things are now on display at the Vault Museum, in a hermetically sealed container so that my shame can be known to future generations for thousands of years. Should any of you wish to edify yourselves about that whole mess, feel free to visit the museum. I'm about done telling that story.

The data on that hard drive ended up buying us more time than I would have expected. We weren't able to stay put for very long in any given place, but with that data, Hannah was able to tap into the same channesl by which they hired local thugs to tail or attempt to kidnap us – which gave us lots of leeway in avoiding them, but unfortunately, we never found a way out.

Every time we thought we were safe, when we risked settling down in one spot or gathering a few of us together, right on cue they'd show up in one form or another. They were always third parties, always proxies and mercenaries, never the real enemy, and they were deviously hard to learn anything about. However, between my new power and Hannah always having advance warning, we were never in quite as much danger, though we could never really settle down long either.

There was a two-year lull about three years after I got my new power where they didn't send much our way at all – but suddenly, afterward, we were on the run again – our enemies had redoubled their efforts. I don't know for sure, but I think it was right about then that somebody there managed to figure out that no, we weren't drug-fueled intelligence agents, we were something else entirely. Fortunately, they didn't catch onto Hannah's method of listening in on them for a very long time. We managed to elude capture for nearly twenty years, and by time of my fiftieth birthday, we all considered ourselves outright professionals.

Well, so we thought. I'll skip ahead to St. Petersburg, 2042 – when my luck finally ran out.