Chapter Four: Rainbow Plague

By the Central Park fountain, Leila used Dior lipstick to draw base pairs on her silk scarf. When the seventh rainbow appeared above the shattered coffee cup, the screams of joggers suddenly shifted into French accents.

"Get down!" Spider Shadow's spider leg grazed her earlobe, catching a flying Chanel sunglasses mid-air. The lenses exploded into countless prisms under the sunlight, each fragment reflecting their mutating pupils.

The blonde woman's haute couture suit suddenly sprouted scales. Leila yanked off her pearl necklace and flung it into the air. "Count to three!" The pearls collided with the bus stop sign, creating ripples of magnetic waves that froze three melting homeless men into statues.

"Nice," Spider Shadow shoved a little girl into the Hermès window display. "But you should take a look at this." He lifted his suit lining to reveal fluorescent patterns on his skin, mirroring the rainbows in the clouds.

Leila suddenly grabbed his wrist. "Seven o'clock, Saks' Christmas window!" On the glass reflecting the rainbow, the eyelash flutter frequency of the mannequins matched the access code to Aidan's lab.

As they smashed through the window, all the lights on Fifth Avenue suddenly went out. Leila's high heels sank into the silk wedding dress as Grey's whimpers echoed in the darkness. The moment her phone flashlight flickered on, she saw the mutated beast tenderly licking crushed macarons.

"He wants these!" The little girl emerged from under the wedding dress skirt, holding up a blood-dripping blue rose. The barcode on the stem revealed Sample No. 13's genetic sequence under the emergency light.

Alarms blared from all directions. Spider Shadow abruptly tore open her collar. Just as Leila was about to elbow him, she noticed he was using the tip of his spider leg to collect the glowing sweat from her collarbone, quickly sketching equations on a mirror.

"The answer is at the end of the rainbow," he said, picking up the little girl and leaping onto a web strand. "Follow the flashing frequency of my tie clip, and..." Before he could finish, the cornflowers on his lapel bloomed, their pollen forming an escape route map in the air.