ISLAND

Alarms sounded, red lights flashing.Justin looked at the cameras. Another breach.A calm voice came through the intercom. "This is not a drill, all guards to holding cell C. I repeat, this is not a drill."It was Oscar, captain of the mercenaries stationed here. Not that his name meant much. Names stopped mattering down here, away from friends and families. Justin doubted anyone even knew his name. All he had was numbers. 143rd to be hired, 5th breach this week, if he died tonight he'd be the 56th casualty.Just another number.When he had agreed to work in this God-forsaken compound it had been with the understanding that he could leave when things got ugly. But now he understood the truth. He could never leave. Not when he knew so much. And the pay wouldn't be much use then.He stood, reaching for his gun, as though it'd do any good if things went sour. He knew the drill, laughing gas and more sedatives. Thicker walls of stronger metal. What happened when it stopped working?He too

Focused.That's not a word you'd expect to describe someone who had just crash landed on an isolated island after watching a shuttle with 85 passengers still inside get destroyed by terrorists. But focused was the word to describe Carter as he climbed out of the escape pod and took stock of his surroundings.They had landed on the beach of the island about 500 yards from the shore. To his right nothing but empty ocean, to his left a densely overgrown forest. It was warm, humid. But there was a breeze. The air tasted of salt, but there was a faint putrid scent. As though an animal had died somewhere deeper in the forest. They should be careful, there may be predators.Carter watched as the others filed out of the pod and wandered in circles in shock. If they were going to survive they'd need to work together. Carter sighed. And that meant dealing with people. First things first, he needed to get everyone to function. It was so much easier with machines. He didn't know how humans worked

Carter lay awake in his cot, replaying the day over and over in his head. He kept imagining Kevin's body hanging lifeless from the tree, he couldn't get the image out of his head. The worst part to consider was how he died.He wished he didn't know, he wished he could be blissfully ignorant and believe it had been a quick death, but he knew better. The way he'd been impaled he had to have been alive up there for hours before he finally bled out. Whatever had killed him didn't even have the mercy to finish the job.Carter hadn't liked Kevin but he certainly didn't deserve that. He came back to the same thought he kept having; what were these creatures? Where had they come from? He wasn't sure he wanted to find out.His thoughts shifted to the moment they'd found him, the way he'd held Emily. He hoped he hadn't overstepped. Emily seemed to trust him and he certainly didn't want to breach that, his protective nature had just broken through, but he hoped he hadn't done the wrong thing. Ev

The mess hall was a complete disaster. Some people had been in the middle of a meal when the breach had happened. There was rotten food and bodies everywhere, tables were flipped and broken, smashed dishes littered the floor. The storage wasn't in much better shape, they didn't even have the stomach to look look in the fridges and large chest freezers. There were rotten fruits and vegetables and moldy bread on the shelves. Searching the room they found some freeze dried nutrient bars, dried fruit, and jerky. Grabbing as much as they could as quickly as possible they stuffed it all into backpacks they had salvaged from a few of the guards.Moving on from the mess hall Angela followed Carter who had memorized the path to the armory. They had hardly spoken since looking through the archives. Carter knew manufacturing supersoldiers was a very real and achievable concept but he didn't think anyone would actually be working on things like that. Not since...His thought was interrupted as th