Project Prometheus Underground Complex
Neo-Riga
Raphael lay inside the medical capsule.
Cold laboratory lights burned above the glass. Sensors covered his chest, arms, and head, each connected to machines surrounding the chamber.
He hated everything about this place.
The smell.
The light.
The constant mechanical hum.
Most of all, he hated the people in white coats watching him as if he were an equation waiting to be solved.
Professor Helena Velde stood behind the main terminal.
"Heart rate?"
"Sixty-eight."
"Blood pressure stable."
"Neural activity within normal parameters."
Velde looked through the glass at Raphael.
"Are you ready?"
Raphael stared back at her.
"Would my answer change anything?"
Velde remained silent.
A faint smile appeared on his face.
"That's what I thought."
The glass cover slowly began to close.
For a moment, Raphael saw his reflection.
Sixteen years old.
Shoulder-length dark hair.
Green eyes.
A young face that still belonged to a student, despite the name and expectations attached to it.
Raphael Ralfs Kaštanovs.
Son of Emperor Artjoms Kaštanovs.
Twin brother of the future Empress.
And, apparently, Subject 01.
He did not know it yet, but this would be the last time he ever saw that face.
PROMETHEUS: HUMAN PHASE
The screens around the laboratory changed.
SUBJECT 01
RAPHAEL RALFS KAŠTANOVS
INITIATE PROCEDURE?
Velde placed her finger against the terminal.
AUTHORIZED
A quiet mechanical click came from inside the capsule.
Raphael felt something cold enter his left arm.
He looked toward it.
"Compound administered," one of the doctors announced.
Five seconds passed.
Nothing happened.
Ten seconds.
Still nothing.
Raphael looked through the glass at Velde.
"So this is the part where I'm supposed to start feeling special?"
His heart suddenly struck his chest.
THUMP.
Raphael fell silent.
Another beat.
Harder.
THUMP.
The monitor began accelerating.
68
82
103
129
Raphael clenched his fingers.
"Heart rate increasing."
Another scientist turned toward the temperature readings.
"Body temperature rising."
38.7°C
39.4°C
40.8°C
Velde immediately looked toward the technicians.
"Maximum cooling."
The capsule's cooling systems activated.
Cold air circulated around Raphael.
It did almost nothing.
Something inside his body had begun to change.
It was not ordinary pain.
It felt more like pressure.
Every muscle.
Every nerve.
Every cell seemed to have received the same command.
Adapt.
Raphael closed his eyes.
His breathing became heavier.
"Professor…"
"I see it."
His shoulders slowly began to change.
His muscles tightened and developed.
His skeletal structure shifted with them.
It was not the exaggerated transformation of some laboratory monster.
It was far stranger than that.
His body was maturing.
One of the researchers stared at the readings.
"Muscular activity is two hundred and twenty percent above baseline."
"That isn't in the projection," Velde said.
"No."
Raphael opened his eyes again.
"What exactly… did you give me?"
Nobody answered.
His face was changing now.
The softer features of adolescence were disappearing.
His jaw became more defined.
His cheekbones sharper.
His shoulders broadened.
The proportions of his body continued changing.
A doctor suddenly stepped closer to the screen.
"Professor."
"What?"
"His skeletal maturation markers are changing."
Velde turned.
"Explain."
The doctor switched between several readings.
"His biological development is accelerating."
"How far?"
The doctor hesitated.
Velde's expression hardened.
"How far?"
He finally looked at her.
"His biological profile is approaching approximately twenty-six years."
Silence spread across the laboratory.
Velde looked through the glass.
"He's sixteen."
"I know."
Behind the observation window, Emperor Artjoms Kaštanovs stood motionless.
He had approved Project Prometheus.
He had signed the authorization himself.
He had known what the project was supposed to do.
Regeneration.
Enhanced physical performance.
Accelerated neural processing.
Improved reflexes.
Human adaptation beyond natural limits.
But this was not in the plan.
Kiryuu Aoi stood several steps behind him.
Her eyes remained fixed on Raphael.
"Did you expect this?"
"No."
It was the first time Aoi had heard uncertainty in the Emperor's voice.
"Stop the procedure."
Artjoms did not move.
"Emperor."
"If they stop it now…"
He fell silent.
Aoi understood.
Nobody knew whether Raphael would survive an interruption.
She turned back toward the glass.
The sixteen-year-old boy who had entered the capsule was disappearing before their eyes.
An alarm sounded.
NEURAL ACTIVITY: 287%
318%
401%
"Four hundred percent!"
Velde rushed toward the terminal.
"That's impossible."
"It's still increasing."
Raphael could hear them.
But now he could hear something else.
The ventilation system inside the walls.
Electric current moving through nearby equipment.
Footsteps outside the laboratory.
Breathing.
Heartbeats.
Dozens of them.
Each sound separated itself from the others.
His brain processed them before he could even consciously understand what he was hearing.
Too much.
Far too much.
Raphael squeezed his eyes shut.
"Quiet…"
Velde activated the capsule microphone.
"Raphael?"
He opened his eyes.
"I said…"
His voice had changed.
It was deeper.
Calmer.
"…quiet."
Then the heart monitor stopped.
A single continuous tone filled the room.
Every scientist froze.
"Open the capsule!"
The glass cover lifted.
Medical personnel rushed toward Raphael.
He did not move.
Velde stared at the monitors.
Then one of the doctors noticed something.
"Professor…"
A thin stream of white vapor rose from Raphael's neck.
Another appeared around his arm.
Then his chest.
Within seconds, steam began rolling from his body.
"What is happening?"
Velde turned toward the biological readings.
Her expression changed.
CELLULAR ACTIVITY: 491%
REGENERATION PROCESS: ACTIVE
One of the doctors stared at the display.
"But his heart stopped."
Then came a sound.
THUMP.
The monitor registered a heartbeat.
Everyone froze.
THUMP.
A second.
Then another.
THUMP. THUMP. THUMP.
Raphael suddenly inhaled.
His eyes opened.
For several seconds, his green eyes appeared unnaturally bright beneath the laboratory lights.
He stared at the ceiling.
He could hear everything.
A ventilation fan several rooms away.
A doctor breathing beside him.
Electrical equipment behind the wall.
A heartbeat beyond the observation glass.
Raphael slowly sat up.
Steam continued rising from his skin.
"Raphael?" Velde said carefully.
His eyes moved toward her.
No joke came.
No sarcastic remark.
He simply watched her.
"I can hear you."
Something about his voice made Velde hesitate.
It was not merely deeper.
It was the way he spoke.
Controlled.
Detached.
Almost unnaturally calm.
Raphael looked down at his hand.
He gripped the metal edge of the capsule to pull himself upright.
Metal creaked.
He immediately released it.
A visible indentation remained beneath his fingers.
Raphael stared at it.
"I barely touched that."
Nobody answered.
Velde looked toward the monitors.
REGENERATION: CONFIRMED
MUSCULAR ENHANCEMENT: UNDEFINED
REFLEX ENHANCEMENT: UNDEFINED
NEURAL ACTIVITY: STABILIZING
ADAPTATION STATUS: SUCCESSFUL
Then another line appeared.
Velde had never seen it before.
SECONDARY ADAPTATION: ACTIVE
Her eyes narrowed.
"What is secondary adaptation?"
Silence.
Nobody in the room knew.
Nine Hours Later
Raphael stood in front of a mirror.
For several minutes, he said nothing.
The person staring back at him was a stranger.
His dark hair still reached his shoulders.
His eyes were still green.
But almost everything else had changed.
His face had matured considerably.
His jaw was sharper.
His shoulders broader.
His entire physical appearance resembled that of a man in his mid-twenties rather than a sixteen-year-old student.
And beneath his eyes, dark circles had begun to form.
They made him look exhausted.
Older.
As though the procedure had not merely changed his body, but stolen years of sleep that he had never lived.
Raphael raised a hand and touched his face.
His fingers moved across his jaw.
Then beneath his eyes.
"Twenty-six."
Velde stood several meters behind him.
"Approximately."
Raphael continued looking at himself.
"I'm sixteen."
"Chronologically, yes."
He looked at her through the mirror.
"How comforting."
The sarcasm was still there.
But before the procedure, he would have smiled.
Now his expression barely moved.
Velde noticed.
"How do you feel?"
"Different."
"Be specific."
Raphael closed his eyes.
He could hear the guard standing outside the room.
Two researchers speaking somewhere farther down the corridor.
The elevator machinery.
The ventilation system.
Someone typing.
Rain.
He opened his eyes.
That last sound should have been impossible.
They were dozens of meters underground.
Yet somehow he could distinguish the faint rhythm of rainfall somewhere far above the complex.
"Faster."
Velde looked up from her tablet.
"What?"
"I think faster."
"How much faster?"
Raphael turned toward her.
"Fast enough for that question to feel very slow."
She began writing.
"Stop."
Velde looked up.
"Stop what?"
"Looking at me like that."
"Like what?"
"Like your experiment worked."
Velde lowered the tablet.
Neither of them spoke.
Raphael walked past her.
Karina was waiting outside.
She immediately stood when the door opened.
Then froze.
Raphael stopped several meters away.
For a moment, his twin sister simply stared at him.
"Raphael?"
"Yes."
She slowly approached.
"What…"
She could not finish the sentence.
Raphael understood anyway.
"I look older."
"You…"
Karina studied his face.
His hair.
His eyes.
The dark circles beneath them.
"You look like you're almost thirty."
"Twenty-six, apparently."
She stared at him.
"How can you talk about this so calmly?"
Raphael did not answer.
He did not know.
Before Prometheus, he would have been furious.
He would have shouted at Velde.
Argued with his father.
Probably broken several academy regulations simply out of spite.
The anger was still there.
He could feel it.
But it had changed.
It no longer exploded.
It waited.
Cold.
Controlled.
As though the procedure had built a wall between emotion and reaction.
"Raphael?"
He looked at his sister.
"I'm here."
Karina took his hand.
"You talk differently."
"Maybe."
"That isn't a maybe."
She searched his face.
"You even look at people differently."
Raphael remained silent.
Then Karina noticed a small scratch on his palm.
A thin stream of steam rose from it.
She watched.
Within seconds, the mark disappeared.
Karina slowly released his hand.
"What did they do to you?"
Raphael looked at his palm.
The skin was flawless.
"I don't know yet."
The doors at the end of the corridor opened.
Artjoms entered.
Raphael looked toward him.
The Emperor stopped.
For perhaps the first time that day, Artjoms failed to hide his reaction.
The boy he had seen that morning was gone.
Physically, his son now looked like an adult.
Shoulder-length dark hair framed a mature face.
Dark circles rested beneath tired green eyes.
His posture was different.
His expression was different.
Even the way he stood was different.
Still.
Controlled.
Observant.
"Raphael…"
"Emperor."
Karina immediately looked at her brother.
Artjoms noticed it too.
Raphael almost always called him Father in private.
Not anymore.
"How do you feel?" Artjoms asked.
Raphael watched him.
"Do you actually want the medical answer?"
"I'm asking about you."
"Project Prometheus succeeded."
"That isn't what I asked."
"But it is what you care about."
Artjoms took a step toward him.
"Raphael."
"How long?"
Artjoms stopped.
Raphael's voice remained almost disturbingly calm.
"How long did you know this would happen to me?"
"We didn't know."
"You knew enough."
"The aging effect wasn't predicted."
Raphael looked directly into his father's eyes.
"But everything else was."
Artjoms said nothing.
That was an answer.
Raphael walked past him.
Artjoms reached out and placed a hand on his shoulder.
Raphael stopped.
His eyes moved toward the hand.
Then back toward his father.
"Let go."
No anger.
No raised voice.
That somehow made the words worse.
Artjoms released him.
Raphael continued walking.
Karina watched her brother disappear down the corridor.
Then she looked at her father.
"What did you do?"
Artjoms had no answer that would make it better.
Aoi stood near the end of the corridor.
Unlike everyone else, she did not visibly react when she saw Raphael.
He stopped beside her.
Aoi studied the dark circles beneath his eyes.
"You look terrible."
"Thank you."
"That wasn't an insult."
"Then you need more practice."
Aoi remained silent for a moment.
"At least something survived."
Raphael looked at her.
"What?"
"The sarcasm."
He looked away.
"Unfortunately."
Aoi watched him carefully.
His eyes were the same.
Yet the person behind them seemed older than sixteen.
Perhaps even older than the body Prometheus had given him.
"Are you afraid?" she asked.
Raphael did not answer immediately.
He looked down at his hands.
A tiny scratch crossed one finger.
Steam appeared.
The skin closed.
Raphael watched until there was nothing left.
"I don't know."
For the first time since he had awakened, Aoi heard the sixteen-year-old boy beneath the changed voice.
Only for a moment.
Then he looked back at her.
"And not knowing worries me more than being afraid."
He walked away.
Aoi remained where she was.
She had seen soldiers return from battle changed.
She had seen people learn to hide fear.
This was different.
Prometheus had not simply made Raphael stronger.
It had changed the way his mind responded to the world.
And she suspected the scientists had not intended that.
Prometheus Observation Laboratory
Velde sat alone in front of the main terminal.
Raphael's latest results covered the screen.
SUBJECT: RAPHAEL RALFS KAŠTANOVS
CHRONOLOGICAL AGE: 16
ESTIMATED BIOLOGICAL PROFILE: 26
REGENERATION: ACTIVE
PHYSICAL STRENGTH: UNCLASSIFIED
REFLEX PERFORMANCE: 612% OF BASELINE
NEURAL PROCESSING: 487% OF BASELINE
SENSORY PERCEPTION: ENHANCED
She opened the psychological assessment.
EMOTIONAL REACTIVITY: REDUCED
IMPULSE CONTROL: INCREASED
STRESS RESPONSE: ABNORMALLY LOW
PERSONALITY ALTERATION: OBSERVED
Velde stared at the final line.
Then typed:
It is currently unknown whether these changes are temporary.
She saved the report.
Another window appeared.
SECONDARY ADAPTATION: 1.3%
Velde frowned.
That should not have been possible.
The primary transformation was complete.
His body had stabilized.
Regeneration was functioning.
Neural activity had fallen to sustainable levels.
The process should have ended.
The number changed.
1.4%
Velde leaned closer.
"No…"
1.5%
She opened the diagnostic system.
No error.
No damaged sensor.
No corrupted data.
Raphael's body was still changing.
Not aging.
Not visibly.
Something deeper was happening.
His cells were continuing to adapt without external stimulation.
Prometheus was no longer controlling the process.
Raphael's own body was.
Velde slowly leaned back in her chair.
For sixteen years, the project had been designed around one objective:
Create a human organism capable of adapting beyond its natural limits.
They had succeeded.
That was the problem.
They had not created a finished weapon.
They had created an organism that did not appear to have a final form.
The monitor updated one final time.
SECONDARY ADAPTATION: 1.6%
A warning appeared beneath it.
PROJECTED ADAPTATION LIMIT: UNKNOWN
Velde stared at the screen.
For the first time since Project Prometheus began, she understood the flaw in their ambition.
They had spent sixteen years asking whether they could change Raphael.
Nobody had seriously considered what would happen if, after they were finished...
Raphael continued changing himself.