Chapter 37: The Bob Decision
POV: Adam
Bob reaches the breaker room with RadioShack determination, his fingers flying over keyboards with expertise that comes from years of solving technical problems for confused customers. Through the security camera feed, Adam watches this gentle man work miracles with circuit boards and electrical systems, resetting the facility's lockdown protocols while death stalks the corridors outside.
The system unlocks. Doors throughout the lab begin opening with electronic precision. Bob's done it—he's saved everyone.
Through Scout's enhanced senses, Adam tracks the Demodog pack rounding the corner toward the computer room, their flower-faces unfurling with predatory anticipation. Bob turns from the terminal with satisfied smile, sees freedom waiting in unlocked corridors, and begins his run back toward the control room where Joyce pounds on reinforced glass and screams his name.
Three seconds. Maybe four before the pack reaches him.
One command. Just one mental directive, and Scout could intercept them. Alpha Demodog could engage from the opposite angle. Bob lives, the family stays whole, and all it costs is everything.
Adam's hand trembles on the control room door handle while his system provides tactical analysis with clinical precision. The room is full of Dr. Owens' people, security cameras recording everything, government witnesses who would immediately understand what they're seeing when interdimensional creatures respond to a twelve-year-old's mental commands.
[CRITICAL DECISION POINT]
[SAVE BOB NEWBY: FULL POWER REVELATION REQUIRED]
[CONSEQUENCES: GOVERNMENT OVERSIGHT, POTENTIAL CAPTURE]
[ALTERNATIVE: ACCEPT CASUALTY, MAINTAIN OPERATIONAL SECURITY]
He's going to die. Bob Newby—RadioShack employee, terrible joke enthusiast, the closest thing to a father I've ever had—is going to die because I'm too scared to expose my secrets.
Joyce's scream cuts through the control room's soundproofing like a blade made of maternal anguish. "BOB! RUN!"
He can't run fast enough. He's not a soldier or an athlete or a superhero. He's just a good man who chose to save everyone else first.
The Demodog pack closes distance with predatory efficiency, their movements coordinated by Hive Mind intelligence that recognizes fleeing prey. Bob stumbles slightly, his RadioShack uniform no protection against creatures designed for maximum lethality.
Now. I have to choose now.
Adam makes his choice.
He throws open the control room door and runs toward the corridor where Bob faces certain death, his voice erupting in clicks and growls that shouldn't come from any human throat—Upside Down language learned through psychic bonds and dimensional contamination.
"ENGAGE! PROTECT THE HUMAN! ALL UNITS, CONVERGE!"
The effect is immediate and terrifying. Scout explodes from the shadows with loyalty that transcends species, slamming into the lead Demodog with enough force to shatter concrete walls. Alpha Demodog bursts through a side passage, flower-face unfurling as it tackles two pack members away from Bob's path.
Monsters fighting monsters. My creatures defending human life against their own kind.
Bob staggers backward in shock, his analytical mind struggling to process the impossibility of what he's witnessing. Demodogs tear into each other with evolutionary fury while a twelve-year-old boy runs toward him speaking in languages that don't exist.
"RUN!" Adam screams in English, grabbing Bob's arm with desperate strength. "GET TO THE OTHERS!"
Behind them, creatures battle with loyalty and love on one side, Hive Mind compulsion on the other.
They sprint through corridors that echo with inhuman violence, Adam's enhanced hearing tracking the battle through psychic bonds that carry pain and determination in equal measure. Scout takes a vicious wound across his flank—loyalty at ninety-five percent means the creature would die before letting harm reach his master's chosen father.
He's bleeding. Scout's bleeding to protect Bob because that's what pack means.
When they reach the control room, Hopper and Joyce stare through the reinforced glass with expressions that cycle through horror, recognition, and growing understanding. Dr. Owens' face goes white as scientific theory becomes dangerous reality.
"Subject 017," Dr. Owens breathes with the kind of recognition that comes from reading classified files. "He can control them."
Control. Such a simple word for something so complex.
They flee the lab together—Joyce clutching Bob like he might disappear, Hopper providing tactical cover, Adam's creatures fighting a rear-guard action that costs them blood and lives. The Alpha Demodog falls during their escape, its essence preserved by the Arise ability while its body becomes another casualty in the war between dimensions.
One more friend dead protecting family. One more loyal soldier who'll never see home again.
In Hopper's car, racing away from the facility while emergency vehicles converge on the chaos they're leaving behind, Adam collapses across the back seat. Black blood pours from his nose while veins become visible under skin pushed past its limits by controlling creatures through dimensional barriers.
The cost. There's always a cost for using power beyond normal parameters.
Bob holds him with trembling hands, alive and terrified and trying to process what just happened in corridors that smell like ozone and interdimensional violence.
"What are you?" Bob whispers, the question carrying more wonder than fear.
I'm your son. The monster tamer who saved your life because you called me family.
"I'm Adam," Adam gasps through exhaustion that feels like drowning. "I'm your kid. That's all that matters."
Family. The truth that transcends everything else.
Joyce's voice from the front seat carries fierce protectiveness that doesn't accept alternatives. "He's my son. Our son. And he just saved your life."
Our son. Both of them claiming me despite everything.
[BOB NEWBY: SAVED]
[MAJOR TIMELINE ALTERATION: +10000 XP]
[SCOUT: CRITICALLY INJURED (HP: 50/250)]
[ALPHA DEMODOG: DECEASED (ESSENCE PRESERVED)]
[POWER REVELATION: COMPLETE]
[GOVERNMENT AWARENESS: CONFIRMED]
[LEVEL ADVANCEMENT: 28 → 32]
[HIVE CONNECTION: 35% (EXTREME EXERTION)]
[PHYSICAL STATUS: SEVERE MP DEPLETION]
Hours later in the hospital waiting room, Adam sleeps across several plastic chairs while Bob holds vigil with the dedication of someone who's learned that family means choosing to love the incomprehensible.
"What is he?" Bob asks again, his voice softer now, tinged with gratitude and growing understanding.
He's power constrained by love. He's a weapon that chooses to heal.
"He's my son," Joyce replies with maternal certainty that doesn't require explanation. "And he saved you. That's all I need to know."
But they all know everything has changed. The secret is out, and there's no going back.
Only forward, into whatever consequences love and revelation bring.
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