The scent of blood filled the air of the smart-farm's main living room. Tabitha stood over the grotesque, decaying remains of the last Jawal. Six-year-old Rebecca, perched on the kitchen counter, giggled at the automated drone sweeping glass. Tabitha made sure it distracted her in the opposite direction of the corpse. 

“Mommy, you were so strong! Like Dad!” Tabitha wiped a bead of sweat from her brow, her Southern accent thick with relief. “Well now, sugar, sometimes a lady just has to be just as strong as Daddy to protect her home and her little bean,” she said, her voice soft despite the recent fight. Suddenly, the door opened.

Jake strode into the house, his brow furrowed immediately at the carnage. He immediately inspected his family. Tabitha offered a sweet, slightly tired smile, pulling him into a gentle embrace that only momentarily threatened to crack his ribs. 

“We’re fine, ‘darlin. I took care of them. Now, why don't help me figure out how to get this mess out of my living room?” Jake nodded, the effort of keeping his face calm making his jaw tight. His analytical mind was already calculating a million ways he could destroy the Jawal threat entirely.

“I… I will, sweetie. Let me just check on the lab, there may be something that can get the blood out of the couch.” She smiled gratefully and started cleaning, hauling the beast out with one shoulder.

Jake stalked to the elevator that led down to his laboratory, knowing he was about to concoct something much more elaborate than a stain-remover.

Jake’s laboratory, was biochemist’s dream. The profit from his farm allowed him to buy the most advanced tools and materials. He didn't waste any time.

A mixture of fear and anger drove him, fear for his family and anger that they had come so close to his home while he was so far away working as an interceptor. He pulled up the data from Dr. Heissman’s lab. Then he pulled up his wife’s data. The only reprieve he took from his work was to clean up the mess upstairs and put Rebecca to bed.

He blazed through his work with many sleep-deprived nights. He used data on Tabitha’s strengthened cells alongside the data from the immune testers to synthesize a compound. He stared at his completed formula, conflicted. 

It was an immunity booster, but the pill was both a blessing and a curse. It would only work right before a Jawal infection, otherwise, it would cause immense sickness. 

Better sick than dead.

He immediately thought of Tabitha, who had explained that morning's Jawal attack.

She had been with Rebecca on the farmland when a scream alerted her that something was amiss. Tabitha was quick to leave Rebecca in a secure bunker, before flying over to where an employee was chased by a Jawal. The hunt was ended as Tabitha used her brute strength to crush internal organs. After washing off the blood in a river, she had flown home holding her daughter, not realizing she’d been followed by a third beast.

In time, it met the same fate as its brethren.

This was the same story he told his colleagues at I.T. once he was back to work. Some eyebrows were lifted in amazement. Jake had just presented the compound he created, calling it the Blue Pill.

Lame, but that’s not the point! 

“It’s not the cure.” He was careful to explain, “it temporarily boost the immune system to stop the infection, so it can only be used right before a Jawal infects you. Otherwise, it cripples the immune system.”

“So imminent death is a requirement to take the pill? Okay…” Jamie said.

After much discussion, and the nuances of the invention were looked over by I.T.'s medical and research staff, it was sent to the FDA for approval. 

I.T. started trials and prepared for mass distribution.

Jake insisted that his name be kept out of the proceedings to keep his family out of the spotlight.

The rest of the world tried to create their own solutions.

'Breaking news' headlines circled twenty-four-seven on a global scale, where failed vaccines and medicines had catastrophic results. The PREP Act, granting immunity to manufactures and distributors during public health emergencies, meant that companies were cutting corners. 

Lives were lost. People were more hopeless than ever.

I.T., in contrast, were careful to follow every procedure and regulation, testing and retesting. 

The culture Kiera had created, as a person who valued structure, order, and rules, meant that she would not tolerate any shortcuts or hasty decisions. She would not even let employees walk in the research halls walk quickly.

Her mother had died for reasons still unbeknown to her. She couldn’t rule out that carelessness and neglect were part of that failing equation, and was unwilling to take any more chances with any life at I.T.

“Someone leaked our blue pill.” Jake slapped a newspaper down on Kiera’s desk. He too had earned the right to walk into her office in the past months. She was regretting allowing her high-ranked employees so much liberty.

Kiera read the headline, JAKE JOHNSON LEADS THE WORLD TO A TEMPORARY CURE.

Things went uphill and downhill from there.

I.T. saw it’s stocks rise.

Jake and his family were harassed on the streets. Other governments approached I.T. to supply them with pills. The pill supply, called simply Blue by mainstream media, were scarce as the demand was high. Interceptor companies placed bidding wars. The U.S. government had to continuously remind the population that Blue wasn’t an immunity pill. Many got sick from misusing it.

Kiera was particularly happy that Dr. Heissman’s Immunity Testing Centers were being deserted as a result of Blue on the market. No one needed to test their immunity if they could pop a pill that would keep them from turning. 

Still, many had forgotten bleeding out from a Jawal assault was possible. The population that remembered such dangers were the relatives of those still missing family members. The missing persons that disappeared after going to Dr. Heissman’s testing centers.

“The only people that haven’t gone missing after visiting the centers are the ones that weren't immune.” Jake observed. He’d been in a lab coat more often than his Synthesis suit lately. He stood before a large screen in his office on the research floor.

They managed to cross-reference the missing persons in Dr. Heissman’s systems with their immunity results. The individuals who disappeared were mysteriously flagged as ‘approved’. They all commonly had bone marrow that produced the antidotes needed for passive immunity.

An alarm suddenly rang out. A Hole had dropped a swarm of mid-sized Jawal and a colossal Jawal. It was at Time Square during the busiest part of the day.

Kiera chose Jamie for the mission. She brought Void along too.

Time to test her training.