Blood seeped from the bullet holes of the corpses scattered in the hotel lobby. The horrified expressions they wielded were filled with both surprise and confusion. The lone survivor of the massacre was the hotel receptionist, cowering behind his desk. Standing around him were armed men, wearing leather jackets with assorted tactical gear. All were aiming their weapons at the unlucky victim. One of the men that was in front of the group un-holstered a katana and pointed it right between the receptionist's frantic eyes. "Now, I'm not going to go through this again, like your unfortunate colleague over here," He said while motioning to the impaled corpse of the other receptionist. As the man spoke, there was gruffness to his voice that caused even the most courageous men to piss themselves. "Where. Is. Jason?"

The hotel receptionist's breathing was erratic. The sweat poured from his face as if he was in a pit of fire. "I swear, I don't know who you're talking about! If that person was here we would have him in our database--" The hotel receptionist barely managed to snivel out before the man with the katana moved with maddening speed. He grabbed the receptionist by the neck, choking him with a vise-like grip. The receptionist's eyes nearly bulged out his head as he dangled helplessly in the air, struggling to scream.

"Then, I'm afraid that your usefulness is--," As he spoke, there was movement on his sleeve. Like a swarm of insects, the movement began migrating from the man's arm onto the struggling receptionist. "Expired."

"No, please!" the receptionist attempted to whisper out.

"You know what these are?" he said as the swarm of objects spread all over the man's writhing body. "These are nanobots, specifically designed to tear into your flesh on the cellular level and consume everything. I can promise you that it will be both quick and efficient." At this point he let the man fall to the floor. He managed to scream one last time before the nanobots began consuming his body cell by cell.

"Plague," one of the armed men tapped him on the shoulder. "The boys upstairs just radioed in said that they heard someone scream. They said they're gonna check it out."

Plague motioned for his team to move out. "If it's him, make sure they know to use extreme caution. Just because the boss wants him alive doesn't mean he's not going to put up a fight." As he began to tread away from the desk he extended his arm and made a slight hand motion. Immediately, the nanobots heeded their master's summoning and swarmed in an arching motion back onto his arm and disappeared back into his suit. When the nanobots left the receptionist's body, all that was left of him was a faded skeleton that instantly disintegrated into dust.

"Sweep the building for potential witnesses. We can't have any of those now, can we?"

"Jason! You need to refrain from making any sounds!" Feedback's voice was like a pounding drum against Jason's ear. His head was swimming from the pain, which was growing worse by the second. He bared his teeth in frustration at Feedback's near impossible requests.

"You try having your bloody head being ripped apart from the inside out!" He nearly yelled. His arms' veins were still throbbing their black color. Almost immediately after shaking uncontrollably for another few seconds, everything stopped. The pain subsided. Jason's shaking stopped. It was all gone. What replaced the pain was a leery peace and a sudden focus on Jason's surroundings.

Everything was clear.

He had somehow made his way down a flight of stairs in his writhing agony. "Feedback, what the heck was that?"

"Because you're a deltarian, you've been altered with the substance called Ichor."

Feedback's voice flowed back into Jason's ear a little more smoothly now, "After being infused with Ichor, subjects have been known to inhibit signs of insanity and intense hostility. In addition, your initial Ichor levels are unbalanced and nearly uncontrollable which can cause epilepsy and sudden, intense pain. To counter this, deltarian producers install a neuro-implant into the participant's spinal cord. This implant, a CRN, doubles as both a suppressant to unsafe levels of Ichor in the user and a mental barrier from insanity." Feedback's voice fell away, leaving Jason in silence as he made his way to the next hallway.

"Okay, and--?" Jason said while peering from behind a corner.

"Your designers didn't give you a CRN, hence your recent period of pain."

"I guess I should be dying to know why then." Jason darted toward the nearest door and rushed into the room within.

"Your particular ability set is: unique to say the least--" Feedback stopped mid-sentence." What are you doing?"

Jason walked up to the nearest window and began fumbling with the locks. "You said that there was a death squad below me, right?"

"Correct."

"There's no point in making my way downstairs, so I might as well climb down undetected." Jason undid the window's latch and began to poke his head outside.

"Clever plan, but you will be detected because--" The sound of a rifle crack split the silence, as a chunk of the wall was blown apart right next to Jason's head.

"They have snipers all around the building."

Jason threw himself backward, narrowly dodging a series of bullets shattering various parts of the inner room. Jason swore as he scrambled out of the room, heart pounding, and pulse racing. He threw himself outside the door, barely missing around to the back of his head. Using his elbows and knees he crawled to the side of the doorway out of the sniper's view. Quickly he stood up and dusted off bits and pieces of rubble from the blown-up wall off his jacket.

"Okay! New plan! I'm heading back downstairs--" As he began making his way back to the staircase, the hallway door burst open. Leather-clad men with weapons entered the room and began shouting simultaneously. "On your knees!"

Jason froze. "Or not."

"Jason," Feedback's voice was the calmest Jason had heard. The world stood still as he listened intently, waiting for his inevitable death at the hand of these thugs.

"Concentrate and use your powers."

Well, that bullshit came out of nowhere, Jason thought. The men began to draw closer. "Put your hands on your head! Get on your knees!"

"You have to trust me, Jason. Allow your circumstances to fuel your rage. Concentrate and let your instincts take over.

"It's the only path to survival."

The men surrounded Jason putting him up against the wall, their guns poised at his head. Jason sank to his knees. Everything was a blur. His vision. His hearing. Everything. The only thing he could focus on was his heavily, palpitating heart. For the first time in his life, he didn't know what to do.

As the men approached him, Jason just remained in this state. He felt unmoved and uncaring at his predicament. The world slowed around him, mirroring his state of confusion. What had he done to deserve any of this? Any explanations or reasons were meaningless at this point. This world—whatever it was—was not what he wanted. He tried to remember anything that happened before, but all that came to mind was nothing but shadows. Shadows, with no meaning or purpose. Something had been taken from Jason.

No. Not something. Everything.

No matter how hard he tried, Jason couldn't remember any memories of his past life. If Feedback was indeed telling the truth, that he had been altered; whoever was responsible would burn. His memories were gone. His old life, whatever that was, was gone. These people had left him with nothing.

Rage. The word echoed in his mind. Rage. Unquenchable Rage. He could feel himself slipping away as if something else was seeping through. He didn't even care that the armed men were standing over him now, shouting indistinguishable commands. He didn't care.

Rage. He looked down at his trembling hands. Something stirred. Rage.

To his amazement, a darkness began to envelop his hands. It was as if layer upon layer of shadows began to create a tangible surface upon them. He watched as his shadow-encased fingers slowly lengthened into terrible claws. Rage. He could feel his anger growing. He would not die like this. He flexed his claws of darkness. He could feel a power seething through him. His veins echoed with inhuman strength.

This must be what power feels like. He thought. He looked up at the armed men. A cruel smile escaped from his lips. Rage. I am Rage, he thought as his seething irises glowed silver.

Plague listened to the sounds of screaming over his com system. He let out a small sigh. Don't send incompetents to do a man's work. He began storming toward the elevator, his jacket's entrails flowing behind his tall figure. As he entered the elevator and pushed the up button, he grinned. Looks like I have a fight on my hands.

Jason was a flurry of movement, leaving behind blood and broken limbs in his wake. He grabbed one of the nearest man's legs and sent him hurtling toward the wall. He was rewarded with the sound of a large crack, followed by a thud as the man fell to the floor, lifeless. One of his assailants lunged at him with a stun baton, which flickered and surged with electricity. Jason barely had to put much effort to dodge the attack and countered with a shadow-claw swipe to the assailant's chest. A grunt emitted from the man, followed by entrails of blood.

Another man attempted to use the butt-end of his assault rifle to bash Jason's head with it. Jason grabbed the man's arms, and using his own momentum, flipped the man onto the floor with a crashing thud, all the while relieving him of his weapon. It was at this point that Jason had noticed that some of the men had fallen back. He brought the weapon's stock to his shoulder and aimed down the reflex sight. He began pulling the trigger in short, concise bursts of fire. The flashes from the weapon's fire filled the hallway, as Jason simultaneously gunned down two of the fleeing men.

Jason snarled. Everything was on fire. For the first time in his life, he never felt so alive. By allowing his instincts to take over, he was utilizing training that he had never known that he previously possessed. The prowess that he exhibited was unnatural. Brute strength, inhuman reflexes, and an unholy power. Whatever had happened to him was certainly intriguing, to say the least. But Jason's mind was much too active and preoccupied for trivial things, such as questions. Right now, he was focused on killing anything he saw that moved.

After kicking down the stairway door, he was greeted with flashes of gunfire. With his reflexes, he dodged the incoming bullets, fired back, with his rifle blazing. He blasted apart on one of the men's chest and put gaping holes in another. As he continued down the staircase, he was greeted by an assailant with a stun baton. Without so much as flinching, Jason used his leg to send the man hurdling down to the stairway-bottom.

"My, my... You're even better than I previously thought, my boy," Feedback's voice once again sounded within Jason's earpiece.

"Where've you been this whole time?" Jason muttered.

"I've been here, as always. I decided that you didn't need my assistance during your...tantrum," it almost sounded as if Feedback was chuckling.

Jason continued down the stairwell. "How much longer until I reach the bottom?"

"You're almost half-way there. Keep on your current course."

"Should I use the elevator?"

"No," Feedback said in a monotone manner. "My sensors indicate that there are guards stationed at each elevator entrance. You're better off using the stairwells."

Jason cursed, "That's a lot of walking."

"Get used to it."

As Jason rounded another corner of the stairwell, he nearly tripped at the sight he beheld. Below his level, the lower staircase and floor were covered with innumerable amounts of tiny moving particles. "Feedback, what is this? There are millions of these things!"

"Oh...Jason, get out of there," Feedbacks' voice was grave. "Those are nanobots. I cannot pinpoint their function, but I'm sure that you don't want to stick around to find out."

Jason was about to head back up the stairs when he heard a blood-curdling scream from below. He snapped his head just in time to see a young woman burst through the bottom stairwell door. She screeched to a halt as soon as she stepped into the mass of nanobots. Almost instantaneously they enveloped her entire body. Jason could barely distinguish the whites of her eyes as she fell to her knees, convulsing. She attempted to crawl up the stairs, but it was no use. Jason could only stand in shock as he watched her suffer. The woman tried to reach up to him, but her hand began to wither, along with the rest of her body. It only took 10 seconds for the nanobots to strip the young woman of her flesh and clothes, leaving behind a withered skeleton, which dissipated into the mass of nanobots. In only 20 seconds, the nanobots had consumed the woman, leaving nothing behind, but the swarming machines.

Jason swore. "I think I found their function!"

The half-way opened door burst once again, revealing the –now—deceased woman's assailants. The men spotted Jason and shouted, "We found him!" The lake of nanobots moved out of the men's way as they began making their way up the stairs. They didn't get far. Jason saw to that with two well-placed bullet holes in their chests.

"Jason, make your way to the opposite stairwell across the hallway. You can't cross this way," As he finished speaking, the nanobots resumed their original positions, baring the way from Jason once more. "I think I may have some intel on who might be responsible for this, but I'm not certain. Proceed with caution."

"Yeah, no kidding," Jason heeded Feedback's advice and began back-tracking. He opened the door to the hallway almost a level up from him. He was running out of options. Escape is looking rather grim for me, he thought. Between the snipers, the guarded elevators, and the nanobot infested stairwells, I might as well have some unbeatable enemy come out and challenge me to a dual. Seriously though, how can it get any worse?

As he began to sprint across the hallway, he heard an elevator door open. Ten yards to his left, he saw an armored man exit the hallway's elevator. As the man turned to face him, Jason noticed that there was something different about this enemy. Not only was he armored and equipped with a leather coat draping down from him, but he had an advanced-looking katana attached to his back. His silver-tinted hair had a disheveled look to it, with a few stray strands coming down to his amber eyes. There was something different about his demeanor as well. His form boasted of confidence and a look of spite.

As he spoke, his voice was firm and intimidating. "Finally. I thought that elevator ride would never end." He smiled.

Jason froze in his tracks. Shit.