Falling into the Abyss

Samuel’s house was very small, with two narrow rooms, one of which was clearly inhabited, and a neatly laid bedding was placed on top of an unfolded sweater. There is a plate and a pair of forks and knives in the kitchen sink that have not yet been cleaned. On the dining table, there are already cool teas with tea bags quietly steeped in them. The room was fairly tidy, and there were no signs of struggle, but there was no response to the call to the portable capsule. Ethan discussed with Samuel and decided to wait at home, maybe Samuel's father just came back later when something happened.

Ethan walked across the damp and moldy floor and heard a creak. He asked Samuel, "You grew up here?"

Samus walked to the cabinet where the TV set was placed, picked up a rare electronic photo frame, and looked at the photos inside which were rotated every ten seconds, "Yes."

Although it is clean and tidy, it can be seen that it is very old, as if frozen by time many centuries ago. Even the thick antique TV sets that were obsolete long ago are still standing proudly on the cabinet. Ethan crouched in front of the TV and studied for a while, found the switch and turned it on. The remote control also surprised him and pressed it randomly. Most of the stations are a snowflake with no signal, but a few stations are connected to the current TV broadcasting system and can actually watch the news.

The broadcast above is calling everyone to report anyone who has symptoms of cold and fever around them, especially relatives or friends. The advertisement shows the clean corridors and wards in the quarantine area. The patients are lying on the dazzling white beds with smiles. The doctors and nurses all have cordial smiles on their faces like the patients saying hello, and there are flowers on the table next to them. , The food is also plentiful to be like breakfast in a restaurant. No one showed any negative expressions, as if they were not in hospital, but on vacation.

"The quarantine area is absolutely safe and comfortable. Even if you are not sick, you will want to live here~" said the sweet smiling female Beta in the advertisement, but it was all ironic in Ethan's ears. Would anyone really believe such an embarrassing lie?

But even if you don't believe it, there is no way. There are robotic police officers everywhere on the road that scan the temperature of the human body. Once they find that the temperature exceeds the normal range, they will take blood for testing.

Samus was obviously a little disturbed, pacing the room anxiously. It was getting late, and it was already past dinner, even if his father was out to work, he should be back. Seeing him like this, Ethan saw a scarf on the armrest of the sofa, so he went to pick it up and put it between his nose and sniffed. The scarf was stained with a lot of Samuel's father's smell, a slightly astringent hormonal smell, some like the smell of persimmon.

Samuel noticed his movements and asked, "What are you doing?"

"Identify the smell of your dad." Ethan put down his scarf, then closed his eyes, and from the back of his neck appeared a few thin black tentacles, the tips of which were like the nose of a star-nosed mole The small tentacles are open in the air like the petals of an anemone. Those tentacles are densely growing with pinpoint-sized bumps, which seem to be some kind of organs for sensing something. These thin tentacles stretched out so long that they almost filled the entire apartment. They floated leisurely in the air like ribbons, while Ethan in the center stood silently in place, like a statue. Even if Samus talked to him, he didn't seem to hear it.

Ethan concentrated his attention and felt his sense of smell leave his body, floating above the chaotic and crowded seventh space station. This huge cosmic city is mixed with various smells, such as the smell of sweat, the smell of fish, the smell of rotting rats in the sewage, the smell of rotting wood, the smell of rusty iron, and the rust from the hot water pipe during the bath. The smell, the smell of pungent cheap perfume, the smell of inferior artificial leather... Those smells converged into a huge river, flowing slowly around Ethan.

Among these smells, Ethan sensitively grasped a smell similar to the one he just smelled. The line of smell that has almost drifted away, leading him in a direction full of death and decay.

Ethan opened his eyes, and his green pupils faintly looked at Samuel, who was staring at him anxiously.

"The situation is not very optimistic," Ethan said. "Your father is in the quarantine area."

Samuel changed his face. "Is he infected?"

"Not necessarily. It may also be that the Earth Alliance government guessed that you might change your mind not to reveal my whereabouts to them, so it temporarily controlled him." Ethan slowly retracted his tentacles and paced to the narrow fan in the living room. In front of the window, looking at the criss-crossed sky building on the opposite side, the chaotic lights stained the outer atmosphere with blood, "I always feel that there is like a trap."

Samuel clenched his fist, grabbed the coat on the back of the chair and put it on him, and walked out the door, "I'll go by myself, don't follow."

However, Ethan did not intend to listen to him. He picked up his jacket, put on his hood, and covered his face with a higher collar, "I'll go with you."

"Didn't you say it's a trap? Then didn't you send it to the door?" Samuel pushed him back a bit, and deliberately frightened him with a vicious voice, "Don't you come to the earth to find your father? Don't wait for me Let’s leave it alone.”

Samuel always thought that the father Ethan was looking for was Adrian Eldridge. And Ethan didn't correct him either, after all, he really wanted to find Adrian to ask for understanding. Ethan was no longer afraid of Samuel's bluffing and took a step forward firmly, "Maybe it is not a bad thing to be found by the government. Since they will catch your father, it is hard to guarantee that they did not put my father under house arrest."

"Do you think you can see your father in their hands?" Samus blocked the door irritably, "They will only dismember you right away, try to use your serum to make an antidote or something, is it interesting to die for nothing? ?"

Ethan laughed, as if he heard Samuel tell a joke, "Do you really think they can catch me so easily?"

Samuel was taken aback. Although he didn't know what happened in the Ophiuchus Alliance, he also heard the words between the guards. They seemed to be saying that an immortal monster that had come down from the Starwind could not be shut down, and it was carrying a terrible plague seed, which made the entire military base panic. He guessed it was Ethan at the time, after all, he still remembered the terrible appearance of Ethan when he mutated.

Even if he thinks about it now, there is an urge to stay away from the harmless Beta in front of him. But the other half of him couldn't help being attracted by the man in front of him who had taken on a subtle evil after coming out of the medical room. His feelings for Ethan are hard to say clearly. At first, he was tempted to him because he was somewhat similar to his beloved love in the first half of his life, but then he learned about his relationship with the priest and gradually transformed into friendship. This friendship was shaken after Mu Shenxing saw Ethan's mutation, but it was still strong.

Later, after Schneider's death, everything changed. The hatred made him just want to destroy all the root causes of his pain, even using Ethan to take care of it. But Ethan said that he had discovered...

Obviously found out, but still treated himself as usual. Even after clarifying, forgave him almost effortlessly.

Samus couldn't let go, couldn't forgive his betrayal, but couldn't let go of the hatred.

He needs Ethan to complete that ritual and he needs him to destroy this dirty galaxy. Even if it is to bring yourself together.

Seeing Samuel's look uncertain, Ethan stretched out his hand comfortably and gently pressed the back of Samuel's neck, and said to him with a seemingly innocent smile, "Don't worry, I know what I'm doing."

**********

The quarantine zone set up by the seventh space station is on the opposite side of the area where they are located. A nanoplastic wall is built to separate the struggling and surviving lives on the outside, and the dead zone shrouded by death inside. All the usable rooms in the buildings behind the wall have been transformed into temporary wards, but many so-called wards are more appropriately called "cages". Many patients in the early stages of infection were kept in it like wild animals, giving them a small amount of food and water every day, waiting for them to mutate into a black worm with tentacles dripping mucus, and then burn them to death with fire. Only those who have not yet become ill can get a little humane care, but sooner or later they will be locked up in those dirty cages full of blood and mucus, and sooner or later they will be warped and curled up in the fire to no longer humanoid bodies.

There are not many medical personnel inside, and almost 70% of the caretakers are soldiers transferred in emergency. There is always a burning smell in the city, except for the medical car and the people on patrol, no people walking on the street.

Ethan and Samuel have no fever, so naturally it is impossible to get in like this. The way they thought was to hide some of the supply vehicles from the quarantine area while they were parked at a nearby hospital.

The entry process was fairly smooth, but there were some twists and turns when the other party suddenly decided to conduct an interior inspection. Ethan must use some of the needles at the top of his tentacles to secrete some temporarily paralyzed neurotoxins and put them down. Those people in the dark couldn't even see what attacked them in the car. They just felt that something like a whip whizzed past, and lost consciousness when the back of their neck hurt.

The two got out of the carriage and found a gloomy abandoned city spread out in front of them. I can occasionally hear a beast-like hiss in the silent air, taking advantage of the dilapidated high-rise building, it looks terrifying and gloomy.

At this time, most of the nursing staff had already left work, and there were not too many patrol staff. Even if there were, they were detected by the olfactory tentacles spreading from the back of Ethan's neck in time, allowing them to have enough time to escape.

Here is the center of the plague, even the air is muddy and smelly.

There are often large sealed bags stacked on both sides of the wide but dirty road, and inside are some dark objects with no visible shape. It seems to be a semi-gelatinous object. I thought it was rubbish, but in some bags, I vaguely saw the structure similar to the human head. The scorched skin was dry and sticked to the skull, but the rest of the body was melted together, and the dense and dense growth appeared. His tentacles look like worms.

The nightmare on the red earth has appeared in front of him again on a large scale.

Samuel glanced at it and turned around, his heart churned. He silently begged his father not to be in these bags, but he didn't know who he was praying to.

If his father really died, would he hate Ethan?

But Ethan mutated into that way to save him and Schneider, didn't he?

He stopped thinking about it anymore, just wanting to speed up and find his father. But as soon as he turned his head, Ethan did not follow.

I saw Beta squatting next to the corpse, with some pity and sadness, reaching out through the transparent body bag to touch the disgusting head.

"What are you doing! Time is running out, those who are brought down will be discovered soon!"

Ethan stood up, extended the thin tentacles used to detect the smell from the back of his neck, and continued to search for the smell to walk through the dilapidated buildings. The smell led him to an exceptionally tall building, and the empty window looked down on them both from a high level. In the silent night, the cry of pain came out from some windows, which made people sweat.

"It seems... here." Ethan murmured. For some reason, those howlings made him feel strange. He didn't feel scary, he even felt a little kind.

He remembered the patient in the early stage of the infection in the hotel, and the fearful look when he looked up at him. There is a subtle expectation.

I don't know if it was echoing his feelings, when they stepped on the steps, the terrifying howling from the depths of the building suddenly became several times louder than before, like ten thousand beasts crying. Samuel was startled and he seemed to be considering whether to retreat temporarily. But when I saw Ethan wrinkled his nose, his expression turned out to be a bit displeased by a beast, and a very thick tentacle suddenly stretched out behind him, and the top of what seemed to be a mouth suddenly opened, spinning sharply in circles. His teeth opened and closed, and from the "throat" of the black hole, there was a roar that no one could hear, and the buzzing infrasound waves quickly spread through the air.

The roars of those infected were magically and quickly returned to silence, leaving only one or two trembling whimpers.

Samuel stared at Ethan beside him dumbfounded, watching the thick tentacles quickly retract into the flesh of Beta's shoulders, and the wounds that should have been left healed quickly under the surge of many black things. And Ethan looked at him and shrugged, with a casual expression: I don't know what's going on.

However, what he didn't know was that even more incredible things were yet to come.