*Side Character: Solomon the Cook*
Solomon's real name was Dr. Eugene Solomon, but nobody in Boz's organization knew that. To them, he was just the strung-out chemist who could cook anything from bathtub meth to designer psychedelics. The Chance formula had been like Christmas morning for him.
"It's elegant," he told his lab assistant—a kid named RJ who thought cooking drugs was like Breaking Bad. "Whoever designed this understood biochemistry on a level most professors never reach."
"Yeah, but can you make it better?" RJ bounced on his toes, pupils dilated. Sampling the product again. Idiot.
Solomon could make it better. He'd already created three stable variants. Strain A was the original, baseline Chance. Six hours of standard enhancement. But Strain B, with its modified protein chains, lasted eight hours and provided a 15% strength increase.
Strain C was where things got interesting.
"Pass me the vampire blood sample," he ordered, not looking up from his microscope. "The fresh one."
The original formula used lycanthrope blood exclusively. But Solomon had theorized that different supernatural sources would yield different effects. Vampire blood created a strain that enhanced speed and reflexes more than strength. Users reported feeling "floaty" and "invincible."
It also made them incredibly aggressive.
"Yo, Solomon," RJ said. "What about mixing them? Like, werewolf and vampire together?"
"That would be incredibly stupid," Solomon replied, already calculating the possibilities. "The protein structures are incompatible. You'd likely cause immediate organ failure or—"
"Or create something amazing." Boz's voice filled the lab. Solomon hadn't heard him enter. The man moved like smoke when he wanted to. "I pay you to push boundaries, not play it safe."
Solomon turned to face his employer. "Mr. Parsons, I understand the desire for innovation, but—"
"Three of my dealers are dead." Boz's calm tone was more terrifying than shouting. "Someone's hunting anyone who sells Chance. We need an edge. Something that makes our people untouchable."
"Enhanced humans killing enhanced dealers?" Solomon frowned. "That doesn't make sense. The power differential—"
"Unless they're not using regular Chance." Boz set a vial on the table. Clear liquid with threads of silver running through it. "This was in the last dealer's apartment. Neptune found it."
Solomon held the vial to the light. The silver threads moved, almost alive. His hands started shaking—not from fear, but excitement.
"This is impossible."
"What is it?"
"Someone's created a synthetic base. No blood required. But the molecular structure..." He grabbed a dropper, prepared a slide. "Give me an hour."
Boz nodded and left. RJ peered over Solomon's shoulder as he worked, chattering about profit margins and territory expansion. Solomon tuned him out. This was beyond street drugs now. Someone had revolutionized the formula, created something that shouldn't exist.
Forty minutes later, he had his answer.
"Fucking hell," he breathed.
"What?" RJ crowded closer. "What is it?"
"It's Chance, but bonded with human stem cells. Self-replicating. One dose and your body starts producing its own enhancement proteins." Solomon's mind raced. "The effects would be permanent after enough doses. Actual human evolution, not temporary enhancement."
"That's awesome!"
"That's terrifying." Solomon thought of Dr. Dergors' original research, how careful she'd been about safety. This was her nightmare scenario. "The human body isn't designed for supernatural strength. The strain on organs, bones, neural pathways... Users would burn out. Maybe in months, maybe in years, but they'd burn."
"So? Not our problem if customers—"
Solomon grabbed RJ by the throat, moving faster than any unenhanced human should. The kid's eyes widened as Solomon's hand began to glow with a faint amber light.
"I've been micro-dosing for three months," Solomon said quietly. "Testing my own modifications. Want to know what I've learned?"
RJ shook his head frantically.
"The drug doesn't just enhance your body. It changes how you think. Makes you hungrier. More violent. Less human." He released the kid, who stumbled back gasping. "Now imagine that permanently etched into your DNA."
His phone rang. Boz.
"Can you replicate it?"
Solomon looked at the silver-threaded sample. He could. The question was whether he should. But that wasn't really a question at all. Boz didn't hire him for his ethics.
"Give me three days."
"You have two. And Solomon? Start working on something to counter it. If someone's trying to start a war, we need shields as well as swords."
The line went dead. Solomon turned back to his equipment, RJ forgotten in the corner. Somewhere in the city, people were taking a drug that could rewrite the human genome. And he was about to make it worse.
God help them all.
---
### Chapter 10: Convergence
*Multiple Perspectives*
**5:17 AM - Chris**
The community center's windows exploded outward as Chris threw the third cop through them. Regular cops, not supernatural enforcement. They went down easy.
"Please!" A woman cowered behind an overturned table. "We didn't do anything!"
She was right. They'd just been in the wrong place when the hunger hit. When Chris had seen the lycanthrope youth group meeting and felt nothing but rage. They were born strong. He'd had to fight for it.
"Stand down!" A new voice. Female. Authoritative.
Chris turned. Blonde detective, weapon drawn but aimed low. He could smell her fear under the confidence.
"You're on Chance," she said. Not a question. "I'm Detective Hyatt. Let me help you."
"Help?" Chris laughed, feeling his enhanced muscles coil. "Where was help when I was nobody? When I was weak?"
"You're not weak now. You're sick. The drug is changing you."
"Evolving me." But even as he said it, he caught his reflection in a broken window. Eyes shot with amber veins, skin too tight, expression he didn't recognize. "I'm becoming better."
"You're becoming a killer. Is that what you want?"
The hunger said yes. But somewhere underneath, drowning in the chemical flood, the real Chris screamed no.
**5:19 AM - Kathleen**
The enhanced human—she recognized him from the DMV database as Christopher Jergenson—looked like he was fighting himself. Classic Chance overdose symptoms, but worse. His eyes weren't just dilated; they were changing color.
"Christopher," she kept her voice calm, hand steady on her weapon. "I know it feels good. The power. The strength. But it's not real."
"Feels real." He flexed his hands, and she could hear tendons creaking. "Feels like what I should have always been."
Movement in her peripheral vision. SWAT setting up positions. If they used supernatural officers, this would escalate. But regular humans couldn't match his current strength.
"Tell me about the strain you're using. Who sold it to you?"
His face contorted. "Neptune. But it's different now. Strain C. Makes me..." He clutched his head. "Makes me hungry."
Strain C. She filed that away. "Hungry for what?"
"Violence. Blood. Proving I'm not prey anymore." He looked at her with those impossible eyes. "You ever been prey, Detective?"
Every day since the Disclosure. But she didn't say that. "Let me bring you in. We have treatments, ways to—"
He moved. Faster than any human should, even enhanced. Kathleen fired twice, center mass. The bullets hit but didn't slow him. His hand closed on her throat.
"No more weakness," he growled.
Then his expression changed. Confusion. Fear. Blood ran from his nose, amber-tinged.
"What's... what's happening to..."
He collapsed, convulsing. Kathleen rolled clear, gasping. Foam poured from his mouth, mixed with blood and that amber substance she'd seen at the crime scenes.
"Medical! Now!" she shouted.
But by the time the paramedics reached him, Christopher Jergenson was dead.
**5:31 AM - Karen**
The call came as Karen was pretending to sleep, curled next to David who'd spent the night asking questions she couldn't answer.
"There's been an incident." Boz's voice was neutral. "One of our customers went rabid. Strain C. I need you at the lab."
"It's five in the morning."
"And a man is dead. Your formula killed him, Doctor. The least you can do is figure out why."
The line went dead. Karen stared at the ceiling. Her formula. Her life's work, perverted into poison.
"Who was that?" David asked.
"Work emergency." The lie tasted bitter. "I have to go."
"Karen..." He caught her hand. "Whatever's happening, we can face it together."
But they couldn't. He didn't know she'd sold her soul to keep them safe. Didn't know that her noble dream of species equality was now killing people in the streets.
"I love you," she said instead. "Take Melissa to school. Normal day. Please."
Solomon's lab was in a warehouse that officially produced energy drinks. The irony wasn't lost on her. She found the chemist bent over a microscope, muttering to himself.
"Dr. Dergors." He didn't look up. "Your timing is perfect. Come see what your formula has become."
On the slide was impossible. Proteins that shouldn't exist, structures that defied basic biochemistry.
"This isn't my formula."
"No, it's evolution. Someone took your work and made it self-replicating. Look at the bonding sites."
She looked. And felt her world tilt. "Human stem cells. But that would mean..."
"Permanent enhancement. Eventually. If the host survives the transformation." Solomon finally met her eyes. His pupils were ringed with amber. "I've been experimenting on myself. Small doses. The changes are... remarkable."
"You're insane."
"I'm adapted. But this," he gestured to another sample, "this is insanity. Strain C. Vampire blood base. It's causing massive organ failure in users. Your boy Christopher lasted six hours. Most don't make it past three."
"We have to stop production."
"We have to improve it." Boz entered, Marcus flanking him. "Someone's flooding the market with lethal strains. We need to counter with something safer."
"There is no safe version!" Karen slammed her hand on the table. "The human body isn't meant for this kind of enhancement. Every strain is killing people, just at different speeds."
"Then we make one that doesn't." Boz's tone brooked no argument. "You created this, Doctor. You'll fix it."
"Or what? You'll kill my family?"
"No. I'll let you watch as the death toll mounts. As the government declares martial law. As humans and supernaturals tear each other apart." He stepped closer. "Your name will be in history books. The woman who ended coexistence."
Karen wanted to argue. But outside, sirens wailed. Another incident. Another death.
Another step toward war.
**6:45 AM - Kathleen**
The briefing room was chaos. DEA, local police, supernatural enforcement, even some military advisors. Everyone talking over each other about containment, about control, about blame.
"Enough!" Captain Morrison's voice cut through. "Agent Chen has the floor."
Sarah Chen looked exhausted. "As of 0600, we have seventeen confirmed deaths from Chance overdose. All within the last twelve hours. The drug has mutated. Multiple strains, each more dangerous than the last."
"It's terrorism," someone called out. "Biological warfare against supernaturals."
"The victims are human," Kathleen corrected. "Enhanced humans attacking both natural humans and supernaturals. This isn't us versus them. It's us versus us."
"Detective Hyatt has been leading the investigation," Chen continued. "She'll brief you on the patterns."
Kathleen stood, pulling up crime scene photos. "Four dealers dead, all supernatural. Killed by someone enhanced but controlled. Professional. Then this morning, three separate incidents of Chance users going, for lack of a better word, feral."
"The dealer murders?" Morrison prompted.
"Connected. The killer's been leaving clues, leading us to this. They wanted us to see what Chance could do. Wanted us afraid."
"Mission accomplished," someone muttered.
"The real question," Kathleen continued, "is whether they're trying to stop Chance or perfect it. The latest strain we've identified causes permanent genetic changes. Actual evolution, not temporary enhancement."
Silence fell like a hammer.
"That's impossible," a supernatural enforcement officer said. "Humans can't just become—"
"Become like you?" Kathleen met his eyes. "That's exactly what's happening. And someone out there is either trying to save us from it or make sure it spreads to everyone."
"So what do we do?"
She thought of Christopher Jergenson, dying in his own poisoned blood. Of Derek Chen, crying over his murdered boyfriend. Of four dealers carved up like lab experiments.
"We find the source. The real manufacturer. And we stop them before this city becomes a battlefield."
But even as she said it, Kathleen knew they were already too late. The war had started the moment the first human took Chance and felt what it was like to be strong.
Now they just had to survive it.
---