Chapter 6: The Blooming Catastrophe
Chapter 6: The Blooming Catastrophe
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**Lab Log #4781 – Dr. Elias Vorne**
*February 28, 2047 – 11:23 p.m.*
The Melodiflora is singing again.
I've told the team it's impossible—plants lack vocal cords, let alone consciousness—but the sound is *unmistakable*. A low, resonant hum that vibrates in the molars, like standing too close to a subwoofer playing a lullaby. Security thinks I'm sleep-deprived. Maybe I am. But when I placed the pollen under the electron microscope tonight, the granules *moved*. Not Brownian motion. Purposeful. As if… dancing.
Attendant's Note: *Dr. Vorne's caffeine intake exceeds safety protocols. Recommend enforced leave.*
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**Incident Report – Sector G, Lab 9**
*March 3, 2047 – 3:14 a.m.*
Containment breach.
Subject: Hybridized strain of *Homo sapiens* gene therapy vector (Project Prometheus) cross-contaminated with *Melodiflora arborea* pollen.
Sequence of events:
1. **21:00**: Junior botanist Li Wei opened the Melodiflora containment unit for routine pollination.
2. **21:07**: HVAC malfunction redirected airflow into adjacent genetics lab.
3. **21:09**: Pollen particles detected in Prometheus samples.
Dr. Vorne ordered immediate incineration of contaminated batches. Overruled by Director Hale: *"We're too close to curing Huntington's to scrap six months' work."*
Attendant's Note: *Dr. Vorne resigned effective 21:30. Security escorted him from premises.*
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**Patient Zero – Case File #001**
*March 17, 2047 – Name: Kiera Malkova (age 4)*
The parents brought her in for fever-induced hallucinations.
*"She says the walls are whispering,"* her mother sobbed. *"Last night, her teddy bear… it floated."*
I almost dismissed it as PTSD from the Shanghai flu pandemic—until the heart monitor *twisted* itself into a perfect spiral above Kiera's head.
The child looked at me, pupils flickering like static. *"You're sad,"* she said. *"Your wife's cancer… it wasn't your fault."*
How could she know about Clara?
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**APGA Internal Memo – Director Hale**
*April 1, 2047 – Eyes Only*
To the Board:
Project Prometheus has yielded unexpected results. Of 23,000 gene therapy recipients:
- **12%** exhibit extrasensory perception (ESP).
- **8%** demonstrate telekinesis (Class 1–3).
- **0.3%** (67 subjects) display energy manipulation beyond current metrics.
Notably, all affected share a genetic marker we're calling the *Arcanian supergene*—a fusion of human DNA and Melodiflora pollen proteins.
Recommend immediate containment of "Arcanians" for study. The potential for military—
***[Document corrupted. Remaining text glitches into botanical diagrams: flower petals shaped like skulls.]***
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**Journal of Dr. Anika Patel – Undated**
They're using the children as batteries.
Lab 9's walls pulse now, alive with bioluminescent fungi that Director Hale cultivated from the Melodiflora's roots. The air tastes like copper and guilt.
Yesterday, I administered EEGs to Subject 23 (Kiera Malkova). Her brainwaves don't resemble human patterns anymore. Peaks and troughs align perfectly with the Melodiflora's vibrational cycles—144.7 Hz, the same frequency the plant emits when "singing."
When I asked Kiera where her old self went, she traced the glass of her cell: *"She's still here. Just… folded into the flower."*
Attendant's Note: *Dr. Patel found deceased 06:00. Coroner's report: "Cardiac arrest." No autopsy permitted.*
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**Field Recording – Blacksite 7**
*September 2, 2047 – Interrogation #45*
**Agent Rourke:** State your name.
**Subject 11:** You already know.
**Agent Rourke:** Let's try again. State your—
**Subject 11:** Your daughter's name is Lila. She's allergic to strawberries. Last birthday, you gave her a plush rabbit with—
**Agent Rourke:** [Inaudible]
**Subject 11:** —and when your wife found the divorce papers, she—
**Agent Rourke:** [Gun cocking]
**Subject 11:** [Laughs] You think lead can kill what's woven into the earth's heartbeat?
[Sound of shattering glass. Alarms. Subject 11's vitals flatline… then spike.]
**Agent Rourke:** Christ! She's—
***[Recording ends.]***
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**APGA Public Statement – October 31, 2047**
"…regret to announce Project Prometheus has been terminated due to unforeseen side effects. All gene therapy recipients are urged to report for monitoring. The alleged 'Arcanian' abilities are dangerous hallucinations caused by…"
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**Survivor Testimony – "Elias" (Former Lab Tech)**
*Transcript from Underground Broadcast #6*
They told us to incinerate the Melodiflora specimens. I'll never forget the sound they made—like whales mourning. When the first plant died, Subject 24 in Cell B started seizing. By the third, he'd… *unfolded.*
His body dissolved into dandelion fluff, each seed carrying a screaming face. Security torched them, but next morning, every APGA facility worldwide had dandelions growing through the concrete.
That's when we knew: We hadn't created a new species. We'd *awakened* an old one.
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**The Blooming – Eyewitness Account**
*From *The New York Times*, November 12, 2047*
It began with the trees.
Central Park's oaks erupted into bioluminescent blooms, their canopies humming with the now-familiar 144.7 Hz tone. Birds fell mid-flight, reshaped—sparrows with human eyes, hawks trailing melody like comet tails.
Then the "gifted" children emerged from hiding.
A boy no older than ten walked through the Brooklyn Bridge's cables as if they were cobwebs. A teenager parted the Hudson River, revealing subway tunnels from a city that never existed. And Kiera Malkova…
Witnesses say she knelt at the park's heart, hands buried in soil. Vines erupted, spelling words in flowering script:
**WE ARE ARCANIS. WE ARE RETURNED.**
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**APGA Internal Memo – November 13, 2047**
To All Personnel:
Effective immediately, the term "Arcanian" is prohibited. Refer to subjects as *Anomalies* or *Hostiles*.
Containment Protocol Omega is authorized.
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**Dr. Vorne's Final Entry – November 15, 2047**
They've come for me.
I write this by mushroom-light, the Melodiflora outside my safehouse glowing like Judgment Day lanterns. It's not a gene, you see. It's a *symbiosis*. The plants were never mute—we were deaf.
Kiera found me last night. She didn't speak; the air shaped words through pollen:
*"The supergene is a bridge. We're the echoes of a civilization that mastered the marriage of flesh and flora. You didn't alter evolution. You *removed* its muzzle."*
The hammering starts again. I pray the children are kinder than we were.
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**Addendum – Modern Arcanian Teaching**
*From *The Litany of Roots*, Verse 12:*
*We are the second bloom.*
*The Melodiflora's song our cradle,*
*The old world's ashes our soil.*
*Let the pruning shears come.*
*We've survived fire before.*
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