Chapter3 The Heruka
The chapterbegins with Steppenwolf and Meg speaking back at the monastery, recuperatingfrom the events of the last chapter. Steppenwolf explains to her why Donovangot her mixed up in the X-creatures project, and what the X-creatures projectis. He tells her how old Edward Donovan had started the project in pursuit ofan extended lifespan, though he's been dead for years. His son, Reggie,however, took interest in the project, and there has been trouble since. Theproject itself deals with the science of cryptozoology, or the study ofcreatures that seem to outlive their own species, and the project leader, Dr.Shelley Thompson, believed the X-creatures had some sort of longevity gene. Megexpresses a desire to talk to her, but Steppenwolf explains that she died in aplane crash. Steppenwolf then explains that the Donovan Corporation had shutdown the X-creatures project, but Reggie started it back up again, and hewondered why. Meg then has the idea of asking McAlistair.
Meg, back in thecompany, confronts McAlistair about the X-Creatures Project, and he revealsthat he was forced by Donovan to do so. She demands that he tells hereverything he knows, and he agrees, but while they're in an elevator heading tohis office, the Albino, Donovan's personal hitman, takes out the power to theelevator and shoots into the elevator, wounding McAlistair. Meg gets them bothout of the elevator, and McAlistair painfully tells Meg that everything sheneeds to know is in the red drawer of his office. Meg then takes a key off ofhis body and goes to his office, being hunted by the Albino the whole time, andfinds a tape in the red drawer. After incapacitating the Albino byelectrocuting him and stealing his keycard, she finds out (From the tape) thatMcAlistair hid all his records about the X-creatures project in a safe, whichshe finds and opens. She finds therein a roster of the scientists working onthe X-creatures project and a mini disc. Meanwhile, Steppenwolf is going to theAntarctic base where the research end of the X-creatures project was situated.
Steppenwolf hasa friend fly him nearby, and commandeers a frost jet (like a jet-poweredsnowmobile) to get the rest of the way. He proceeds to break into the lab,where he runs into a beast which is discovered to be an ape named Eruka, one ofShelley Thompson's experiments. He traps the beast in a box and dumps it into avat, finding a tape soon thereafter, wherein he discovers that Shelley hadfigured out a way for the human body to absorb the 5 mutagenic genes they hadisolated so far in a process she called OSIRIS, which stands for Osmosis ofIrregular Inner Systems, which would be further explained in a tape labeled8/05. But when Steppenwolf found the case, there was no tape inside!
While this ishappening, Meg is visiting what appears to be the only surviving scientist thatworked on the X-creatures project, Octavio Sanchez. He tells her that the minidisc she found is the code key to the archive vault in Donovan Corporation's Houston base. Afterbreaking through the layers of security therein, she finds the computer room,where she inserts the disc and, through a clever use of the 2 computers thereand the tic-tac-toe program they have installed, she finds out about the natureof the X-creatures project, about the "Heruka Incident," and aboutShelley Thompson Kane, wife of Alen Kane a.k.a. Steppenwolf, reported missingsince the Heruka incident. It is then revealed that Donovan knows she was thereas a wall moves to reveal Donovan's office, inside of which is the Albino and abloodied Dr. Sanchez. Donovan says that he's surprised she'd made it that far,as few had, and said that Dr. Kane chooses his associates well. She says thatthe public must know of his actions, and he replies that they will, in duetime, but he could do without media hype at the moment, and says that he coulduse her skills as a reporter to report on one "X-creatures project"and that he'd make her an offer she, "...just cannot afford torefuse."
Meanwhile,Steppenwolf delves deeper into the base, looking for clues as to what happened.After smashing through a door, he finds that a white beast similar to the apebeast from before had killed and was eating all of the scientists. Aftertrapping it and stunning it with light, he manages to tranquilize it with atranquilizer gun one of the corpses had. Donovan then appears with Meg in towand a couple of guards and greets Steppenwolf, discussing how the beast wasShelley Thompson, which Steppenwolf had figured out upon examining the body andfinding her wedding ring on its finger. Steppenwolf asks about the plane crashthing, and Reggie explains that his father had wanted to save him the shock.Steppenwolf then brings up the missing tape, which Donovan says he has, and,while it's not pretty, it did entail an antidote to the "change,"which Shelley had recorded before she injected herself with the mutagenicserum, but didn't have time to prepare before her brain degraded too far. Hefurther explains how she then became violent, wrecking the whole place,including the X-creature blood samples needed for the antidote, which is heronly chance at "redemption."