Everyone suddenly remembered a line from Dr. Wheeler's diary:
> "S041-B30-000 was originally built to house a long-term project: the construction of Hughes' fictional amplifier."
Only then did it click.
The long-term project was just beginning now.
But for Dr. Hughes and his colleagues… this was nothing less than a death sentence.
---
Sure enough, Hughes's face darkened as the realization hit him.
> "Now? No… I… I have doubts."
The Overseer in charge tried to reassure him.
> "Your team is volunteer-based. I personally oversee them. They're good people."
Hughes let out a bitter laugh, his face pale.
> "Like ghosts…" He clenched his fists, then demanded, "Am I volunteering for this?"
Dr. Wheeler's eyes softened in visible pain.
> "Hughes…"
But Hughes pressed on, his voice breaking:
> "Anyone who agreed to this before was a goddamn idiot, and I'm overruling him. This isn't volunteering—it's a prison sentence! I don't want to spend twenty years in the dark. I don't want to be buried alive by my own work. I… I have—"
His voice cut off. His eyes drifted, unfocused, across the table.
He almost said I have a family.
But he stopped himself.
Instead, he tried another angle.
> "This has a low chance of success. The timing is terrible. It's 2008. SCP-3125 won't even arrive until the late 2010s—"
---
The live broadcast room exploded.
> "Wait! Did he just say 2008?"
They quickly connected this with the timeline Leon Lake had revealed earlier.
It matched.
That was it.
Dr. Hughes's hesitation suddenly made sense.
Because after this… he vanished from history.
From the time he joined the project until the fall of the entire Antimemetics Division, Hughes never appeared again.
He was… forgotten.
---
On the screen.
The Overseer countered Hughes's doubts.
> "The success rate is very encouraging."
"Encouraging?" Hughes snapped. "Define 'encouraging'!"
> "More than 50%. If it's you."
The Overseer slid a thick stack of reports toward him.
Hughes skimmed the cover—his name was printed right across it.
He muttered under his breath.
> "Damn… fifty percent is actually pretty good…"
The Overseer pressed on.
> "You convinced us this had to be done. You insisted you would be the center of it. You were ready to sacrifice."
Hughes flipped to the last page, his eyes scanning rapidly until he froze on a highlighted passage.
The Overseer read aloud:
> "SCP-3125 represents a threat on an omni-universal scale. It threatens realities adjacent to our own. It threatens micro-universes within our macro-universe. It threatens universes embedded in our own as fictions—"
"Enough!" Hughes barked, snapping the file shut. His face twisted with anguish.
> "I remember now…"
He turned toward O5-8.
> "What's the cover story? What excuse are you using?"
The Overseer answered calmly.
> "A helium leak in Sector 167-B03-312. The leak will be real. There's already a decoy body placed inside—indistinguishable from the real thing. We also doctored your public schedule. It puts you in that room, not here. As for—"
> "He's stalling," O5-8 cut him off, glaring at the Director.
Then Overseer Lee leaned forward, his voice oddly sharp.
> "Name others. Tell me—who else in the world, besides you, has even a chance of solving this problem? Who else can we send?"
Hughes stayed silent.
Lee pressed harder.
> "Anyone at all? Even if they refuse, who else has the technical ability? Someone outside the field?"
---
S.H.I.E.L.D.
Nick Fury narrowed his eyes.
> "Something's wrong with him…"
Natasha turned toward him.
> "What do you mean?"
Fury shook his head, uneasy.
> "His behavior's… off. Too different from before."
Before anyone could reply—
---
Something snapped on the screen.
Fury's pupils shrank to pinpoints.
In the light curtain, Overseer Lee suddenly stood up.
Dr. Wheeler's instincts flared—she gripped her chair tightly, one hand wrapped around a fountain pen like a weapon.
It was as if she'd just remembered something terrible.
O5-8 frowned, confused.
> "Why is Wheeler reacting to thin air…?"
Hughes noticed nothing.
He muttered quietly:
> "It's just me. Only me."
Lee's voice dropped, almost affectionate.
> "Only you… are good enough for me."
Then—he pulled out a pistol.
---
Bang! Bang!
Two shots tore through Hughes's chest.
The first shredded his lung.
The second hit as he fell, skimming across his computer screen. The bullet ricocheted off the reinforced glass and struck the conference wall.
---
For one frozen moment, time itself seemed to stop.
This wasn't part of any plan. Everyone—both on-screen and watching—knew it.
Then, chaos erupted.
---
Live Broadcast Room.
The silence shattered.
> "WTF! WTF! WTF!!!"
"Why?! Why kill your own man?!"
"Is Lee a spy? Don't tell me the Foundation's been infiltrated this badly!"
---
S.H.I.E.L.D.
The agents were in shock.
Nick Fury's jaw clenched.
> "Damn it… I knew something was wrong with Lee. But this… this is worse than I imagined."
He stared at the screen, trembling.
> "SCP-3125…"
Natasha gasped.
> "You mean… he's controlled by 3125?"
Fury didn't answer. His eyes were locked on Hughes, bleeding out on the floor.
> "Damn it. You're the only one who could finish this mission. You can't die now…"
---
On the screen.
Lee turned his pistol toward O5-8.
Two more shots erupted—each releasing a shriek of static and a burst of green light.
O5-8 didn't fall.
One of the Overseers explained quickly.
> "His guardian talisman absorbed it!"
But the danger wasn't over.
Because Wheeler—frail, middle-aged, and shaking—suddenly lunged forward.
With nothing but a capped fountain pen in her hand…
She hurled herself at Lee's gun arm.
---
To Be Continued…
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