RWD: 3.06

3.06

“Try looking into that place where you dare not look! You'll find me there, staring out at you!”

—NA-BARON FEYD-RAUTHA HARKONNEN

The silence in the vast warehouse stretched taut, electric. Rachel remained on her hands and knees, her chest heaving, her glare fixed on Paul with an intensity that bordered on the psychotic. The only sound was Brutus’s low, guttural growl, a resonant threat that vibrated in the still air. Paul held her gaze, his own expression an unyielding mask of cold observation. He had presented the challenge; the choice of response was hers.

Then, without warning, Rachel’s head snapped towards Brutus. A single, sharp command, more a bark than a word, tore from her throat. "Attack!"

Lisa screamed, a raw sound of alarm. "Rachel! No!"

But it was too late. Brutus, unleashed, became a blur of muscle and fury, launching himself across the intervening space, jaws agape, aiming to maul. Paul moved with the deceptive quickness born of the Weirding Way. He didn’t meet the charge head-on; instead, he pivoted, a subtle shift of weight, and delivered a contemptuous backhand strike to the side of the attacking rottweiler’s head. The impact was solid, a meaty thud, sending the dog tumbling end over end, yelping in surprise and pain, to land in a heap several feet away. Paul, in the same fluid motion, began to advance slowly, deliberately, towards Rachel.

As Brutus scrambled to his feet behind Paul, the dog’s skin rippled. Its form began to distort, to swell. Bone, muscle, and bony, chitinous growths erupted outwards, a grotesque, instantaneous augmentation. Flesh rippled and reformed, joints cracking, a low, wet tearing sound accompanying the transformation. In seconds, the rottweiler was gone, replaced by a monstrous parody, a biological war-machine of nightmare proportions, its eyes burning with an unnatural, red light. Rachel’s power, unleashed.

Paul didn’t look away from Rachel but his eyes narrowed further, a dangerous glint flickering within their depths. He had specifically proscribed the use of her power within the confines of the warehouse. Her defiance was… noted. "Did I not instruct you," he asked, his voice dropping to an ominous, almost subsonic register that promised retribution, "that your animal’s… enhancements were forbidden here?"

Rachel, emboldened by her creature’s transformation, merely snarled, her face a mask of feral defiance. She gestured again. "Kill him, Brutus!"

The augmented beast, now easily twice its original size, its augmented limbs ending in razor-sharp talons, launched itself at Paul’s back. He didn’t turn. Instead, he dropped, rolling forward with an impossible, fluid grace, the monstrous dog soaring over him, its shadow briefly eclipsing the fluorescent lights. As he came up from the roll, his hand blurred towards the machete at his waist. The blade sang free of its scabbard, a whisper of steel in the sudden silence. He didn’t aim for the creature's armored hide; his strike was precise, targeting the exposed, softer tissue of the augmented beast’s left foreleg, at the vulnerable juncture of its newly formed elbow joint. The sharpened edge sliced through sinew and connecting tissue with surgical precision.

The horrific, pain-filled howl echoing through the warehouse did not come; Instead, the monstrous Brutus crashed to the ground without a whimper, its enhanced limb buckling, its momentum sending it tumbling into one of the concrete support pillars with a worrying crunch. The creature lay there, momentarily disorientated.

Calmly, Paul rose to his full height. He retrieved the grenade from his rig, the one he had selected earlier. With a deliberate motion, he pulled the pin. The grenade arced through the air, landing beside the struggling, wounded Brutus. Instead of shrapnel or flame, it erupted with a sharp hiss, spraying a thick, rapidly expanding mass of yellow-grey containment foam. In seconds, the struggling beast was mostly encased, its movements restricted, its monstrous form immobilized.

The dog neutralized, Paul turned his attention back to Rachel. He flicked his wrist, a single, sharp motion sending a spray of Brutus’s dark, viscous blood arcing from the machete’s blade onto the pristine concrete floor. Then, he began to walk towards her, his steps measured, unhurried, the machete held loosely at his side, its tip angled towards the ground. Taylor’s wasps darted in then, stinging his exposed neck and hands in a desperate bid to dissuade him from his next course of action, but he gave no sign that he even noticed, his focus entirely on the terrified, defiant girl before him.

He reached her in three strides. His free hand shot out, faster than she could react, closing around her throat. He lifted her effortlessly, her feet dangling inches above the floor, her struggles weak, ineffectual against his unyielding grip. He brought her face close to his, the tip of the machete now resting lightly against the bottom of her neck, the cold steel a silent promise.

Staring deep into her wide, frightened eyes, he allowed the mask of Greg Veder to slip entirely, revealing the predatory intensity beneath. He didn’t speak, given the fact that spoken language was wasted on the wild girl. Instead, his teeth bared in a silent, canine snarl, a primal display of dominance. It was something older, colder, a resonant growl that seemed to emanate from the very depths of ancestral memory, an infernal cadence that bypassed reason and struck directly at the core of her fear.

Rachel, despite her terror, despite the pressure constricting her airway, attempted a defiant growl of her own. But it was a thin, reedy sound, instantly swallowed by the suffocating weight of his presence. The fear in her eyes was stark now, absolute. He saw the flicker of her will breaking, the dawning recognition of a power, a ruthlessness, that dwarfed her own feral aggression. She would not disobey him again.

Satisfied, he released his grip. Rachel collapsed to the floor, gasping, clutching at her bruised throat, her gaze fixed on him with a new, terrified understanding. Paul sheathed his machete, the click of the blade returning to its scabbard unnaturally loud in the sudden silence. He turned, addressing Tattletale, who stood frozen, her face pale, her usual composure shattered.

"There is a canister of containment foam solvent in the weapons locker," he stated, his voice returning to its usual calm, neutral tone. "Cleaning supplies are in the locker beside that. Free the animal. Clean this area." He gestured vaguely at the bloodstains and the foamed Brutus. "When you are finished, we will continue with the evaluations." He then turned and walked towards the entrance of the warehouse, his posture once again that of the unassuming Greg Veder. A few meters away, he paused, glancing back at the stunned and silent Undersiders. "I will be waiting in the truck. You have fifteen minutes."