COVELENT: XenoTrait

Victor had spent most of his life making decisions that other people would never understand.

He had authorised experiments that would have destroyed the careers of ordinary researchers, concealed information that could have dismantled the Foundation, and watched people suffer because he believed the results would eventually justify the cost.

He had never considered himself cruel. Cruelty, in his understanding, was the unnecessary infliction of suffering, while his decisions had always served a purpose. Whether other people agreed with that distinction had never mattered to him.

Now, sitting alone in his office before sunrise, he was beginning to understand how little those distinctions mattered when the consequences reached him personally.

The blue mark beneath his wrist had spread during the night.

He had conducted another examination several hours earlier, using equipment that was not connected to the Foundation’s central medical network.

The results were worse than the previous readings. The crystalline growth had extended beyond the initial cluster, following the narrow structures beneath his skin.

His hand remained functional, and there was no obvious change in his strength, but the progression was undeniable.

He had found no reliable treatment in the restricted records. The experiments involving similar cases were incomplete, and the few instances in which the infection had been contained involved circumstances that did not match his own. Some subjects had survived for days. Others had deteriorated far more quickly.

Victor closed the report and rested his hands on the desk.

He could not afford to become careless. If the medical department discovered the infection, the Foundation’s internal protocols would restrict his movements and place him under observation.

Even if he retained his position, he would lose the freedom to investigate the condition privately. Worse, the information would eventually reach Markus.

That possibility bothered him more than he wanted to admit.

Markus had already begun questioning the principles that had governed his upbringing. His visit to the lower levels had exposed him to information that Victor had deliberately withheld, and the death of the researcher had introduced a complication that could not be resolved by simply explaining the necessity of the decision.

Markus had returned from the restricted chamber with questions Victor could not answer without revealing more than he intended.

If his son discovered that Mark 8 was now spreading through his father’s body, he would not see a scientific problem.

He would see another secret, another example of the Foundation concealing the truth until there was no longer any choice but to confront it.

Victor was not prepared to give him that advantage.

He pulled his sleeve down and opened the day’s schedule.

The Foundation’s senior researchers were expecting him to review the latest reports from the lower laboratories. There were questions regarding the security breach, the damage caused by Subject 014, and the death of the researcher in the collapsed passage.

Markus’s actions had already attracted attention, and Victor needed to ensure that the incident did not become an excuse for other departments to investigate the restricted levels.

He began working.

For several hours, the routine helped him ignore the growing discomfort in his hand. He reviewed reports, rejected two requests for expanded access to the lower laboratories, and instructed the security department to recover every surviving record associated with Subject 014. His responses were precise, his voice steady, and his expression unchanged.

Only when he reached for a document and found that his fingers would not close properly did the illusion break.

Victor stared at his hand beneath the desk. The crystalline pattern had spread into the base of his thumb, forming a faint blue network beneath the skin. He flexed his fingers once, then again, until they responded with a stiffness that had not been present that morning.

He immediately dismissed the researchers waiting outside his office and locked the door.

The diagnostic equipment confirmed what he already suspected. The infection had progressed beyond the area where he first detected it, and the rate of spread had increased.

He compared the latest readings with the earlier results, searching for some indication that the process had stabilised, but the numbers offered no reassurance.

He could have contacted the medical department. He could have ordered the laboratories to investigate the crystal fragment and identify a method of stopping the infection. Instead, he erased the latest examination and placed the sample container inside a concealed compartment.

He would investigate the condition himself.

The decision was not entirely rational. Victor understood that involving more researchers would give him access to additional expertise, and he knew that secrecy could cost him valuable time.

Yet the thought of surrendering control over his own condition was unacceptable. He had spent years ensuring that the Foundation’s discoveries remained under his authority, and he could not bring himself to become another subject awaiting a verdict from people he had trained to obey him.

By the time he returned to his office, the discomfort had subsided enough for him to continue working.

He told himself that the improvement was encouraging.

Markus found Ash in one of the Foundation’s equipment rooms later that afternoon.

Ash was sitting on a metal bench while a technician examined the tubes connecting his mask to the compartment at his hip.

His coat had been folded beside him, leaving the fitted equipment around his chest exposed. Every few seconds, the mask released a mechanical breath, and the technician paused whenever the sound changed.

Markus waited until the examination ended before approaching.

”You look terrible,” Ash said.

”Good to see you too.” Markus smiled.

”I mean it. You look like you haven’t slept.” Ashell continued.

”I haven’t.”

Ash adjusted the edge of his mask. ”Then either you’re thinking too much or you’ve found something you shouldn’t have.”

”Both, probably.”

The answer made Ash look at him more carefully.

Markus pulled a chair away from the wall and sat opposite him, unsure how to begin. He had intended to explain everything about the crystal, but the words seemed inadequate when he tried to arrange them into a coherent account.

”My father showed me something yesterday,” he finally said. ”The complete Mark 8 crystal.”

Ash’s hands stopped moving, ”The complete thing?”

”An enormous structure beneath the Foundation. It fills an entire chamber, plus the fumes n heat it generates... I don’t know how else to describe it.”

”And Victor just decided to show you?”

”He said I was going to find it eventually, so he would rather I saw it with him.”

Ash gave a quiet, mechanical exhale. ”That sounds like him.”

Markus looked towards the door before continuing. ”He admitted that the records are incomplete. There are experiments that were never documented, incidents that were concealed, and people who died without being properly recorded. He knows more than he’s telling me.”

”That’s hardly a revelation.” Ash added.

”I know but seeing the crystal changed something. Everything I’ve been reading suddenly feels smaller than it should.

The records describe individual subjects, individual experiments, individual failures. That thing makes all of it seem like parts of something much larger.”

Ash studied him. ”And what do you think it means?”

Markus lowered his gaze to his crystalline hand. ”I don’t know yet.”

It was the first time he had admitted that without immediately following it with an explanation.

Ash leaned back against the bench. ”Then don’t force yourself to decide what it means before you understand it.”

Markus almost dismissed the advice, but he stopped himself.

It was exactly what he would have told someone else a few days earlier, and he disliked discovering that the same words sounded different when directed at him.

”What about the researcher?” he asked.

Ash’s expression changed. ”What about him?”

”I keep thinking about the moment the passage collapsed. I had a choice. I could have gone back for him, or I could have followed Subject 014.”

”And you chose to follow him.” Ash said.

”Yes.”

”Would going back have saved the researcher?” Ash continued.

”I don’t know.”

”Would you have caught Subject 014 if you’d turned around?”

”I don’t know that either.” Markus replied.

Ash remained silent for a moment. ”Then you made a decision without knowing what either outcome would be.

You can examine why you made it, but you can’t pretend you knew what would happen.”

Markus looked at him sharply. ”Are you saying I made the right choice?”

”I’m saying I don’t know. Neither do you.” Ash’s mechanical breathing filled the room for a few seconds before he continued. ”You wanted answers, and you believed that man might have them. That explains your decision. It doesn’t tell you whether you were right.”

The distinction stayed with Markus long after the conversation ended.

He left the equipment room without finding the reassurance he had wanted, but he felt strangely relieved that Ash had refused to give it to him.

The death remained a consequence of his decision, regardless of whether he could justify it. For now, that was something he would have to live with.

Victor’s condition worsened over the following days.

He concealed the change by adjusting his schedule and refusing unnecessary meetings.

When the stiffness in his hand became noticeable, he wore a darker jacket that concealed the faint blue discolouration beneath his cuff.

He began working alone more frequently, and when researchers asked about his absence from the lower laboratories, he told them he was reviewing the security failures associated with Subject 014.

No one questioned him for long.

The Foundation had been built around Victor’s authority. People had grown accustomed to accepting his explanations, partly because they trusted his judgement and partly because challenging him had rarely produced anything useful.

Even Markus, who had begun questioning him more openly, found it difficult to imagine his father concealing something that threatened his own life.

Victor continued investigating the infection in secret.

The results grew increasingly troubling, the crystalline growth was not merely spreading across the surface of his tissues....It was interfering with the normal function of his hand, affecting the small movements he had always performed without conscious thought.

On two occasions, he had lost control of his fingers for several seconds. Each time, he waited for the sensation to return before continuing his work.

He refused to record those episodes in the central system.

Instead, he studied the crystal fragment recovered from his sleeve. Its composition matched the material he had encountered in the underground chamber, although he could not determine whether it had been responsible for the infection or merely carried it.

The distinction mattered, but he had no reliable method of establishing it without exposing himself to further risk.

He considered informing Markus.

The thought came to him late one evening, while he stood alone before the window of his office. He imagined telling his son that the infection had reached him, explaining what he had discovered, and allowing Markus to help investigate the condition.

It would have been the logical decision if his priority were simply to maximise the chances of survival.

But Victor’s priority had never been survival alone.

He wanted to understand the infection before anyone else did, he wanted to preserve his authority, protect the work that had consumed his life, and ensure that the Foundation would continue operating regardless of what happened to him.

Markus was not ready to inherit the organisation, not in Victor’s eyes, and the prospect of transferring control under these circumstances was unacceptable.

He returned to his desk and opened a secure file.

The document contained instructions for maintaining the Foundation’s operations if he became unavailable.

He had prepared it years earlier, expecting that illness, injury, or an internal challenge might eventually prevent him from performing his duties. At the time, the file had seemed like a routine precaution.

Now he read it with a different understanding.

He revised several sections, changed the authorisation requirements for restricted laboratories, and added a final instruction concerning Markus.

The wording was brief, directing senior personnel to provide his son with access to the Foundation’s administrative systems if Victor could no longer oversee them personally.

He did not write a farewell message, he did not explain the infection, he did not tell Markus that the document existed.

When he finished, he secured the file and leaned back in his chair.

For the first time since discovering the infection, Victor allowed himself to consider the possibility that he might not recover.

The thought did not make him sentimental. It made him angry.

He had spent his life ensuring that events unfolded according to plans he understood, yet he could not control what was happening inside his own body.

Mark 8 had become the one variable he could neither command nor reliably predict, and the irony was difficult to ignore.

He looked towards the door, where Markus had stood during their last argument.

His son was changing, Victor had seen it in the questions he asked, in the hesitation that followed his decisions, and in the way he had begun listening to people he once would have dismissed.

Victor had intended to prepare Markus for the Foundation gradually, teaching him to distinguish weakness from necessity and emotion from judgement.

Instead, Markus was learning those lessons from the consequences of Victor’s own decisions.

Victor lowered his eyes to his hand. Beneath the sleeve, the blue pattern had spread almost to his elbow.

He pulled the fabric into place and returned to work.

He would tell no one until he understood what was happening.

And if he could not understand it in time, he would make certain that the Foundation continued without him.

For now, that was the only plan he could still control.