Gerald had forgotten how long he had been trapped inside the laboratory.
At first, he had counted the days.
Then the hours.
Eventually, he stopped counting altogether.
There was no sunlight in the underground facility, no clock on the walls, and no one who ever bothered to tell him what day it was. The only thing that remained constant was the cold metal bed beneath his body and the machines surrounding him.
He couldn't even remember the last time he had stood on his own feet.
Gerald slowly opened his eyes and stared at the ceiling.
A faint mechanical hum filled the room.
It was always there.
Even when the machines weren't actively doing anything to him, they continued operating in the background, processing data, monitoring his body, and occasionally injecting something into his veins.
He had once been an ordinary survivor.
That was the part Gerald remembered most clearly.
