“Every god retires eventually; willingly or not,” it said. “But not every world survives it.”

Requested by @LADYPICKLE08

Have fun!

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NATO Distress Frequency — 09.828 MHz

"...Facility Seven going dark. Repeat: containment breach at Sublevel Delta. Non-human hostiles. We’re not alone down—[SCREAMING, GUNFIRE]... God have mercy."

[END TRANSMISSION]

The wind screamed like a dying thing.

Snow whipped across the shattered helipad, slicing sideways in sheets of white fury. The transport chopper was half-submerged in a crater of black ice, the tail rotor spinning uselessly as the last of its fuel burned away. There were no signs of life—no patrols, no security posts. Just static over the radio and a facility that should’ve been bustling with the best minds NATO could throw at an extinction-level threat.

Price led the charge through the ruined entrance, his breath misting behind the filter of his mask.

“Keep it tight,” he ordered. “This place went dark for a reason.”

They descended through corridors lit only by flickering emergency strobes. Blood painted the walls in desperate streaks. Doors were sealed shut by biometric locks—some smashed open, others twisted into unnatural angles, like the metal had tried to flee what came for it.

Soap’s voice crackled over comms. “This was a research lab, right? What the hell were they researching?”

Ghost didn't answer. He just moved like a shadow, quiet, controlled, checking corners, watching for movement.

Then they reached the lower level—Sector Theta. The air was wrong down there. Too still. Too warm.

The vault door lay open.

The squad moved deeper, past shattered containment cells and arcane symbols carved into steel and stone. Soap rubbed one. “This ain’t science, mate. This is bloody witchcraft.”

At the end there was a massive circular chamber, concrete and steel infused with arcane carvings, ancient symbols etched over NATO logos like graffiti.

And in the center... a human ?

It sat in silence, cross-legged in the middle of a containment circle. White hair down to it's shoulders, lean frame draped in a torn hospital gown. Shackles of molten black iron wrapped around it's wrists and ankles, anchored to pillars marked in Greek, Latin, and Sumerian.

It looked up as the team entered, it's eyes like burned-out stars.

“I was wondering when someone competent would show up,” it said, voice smooth as wind over tombstones. “The last group tried to siphon my essence into a serum. I warned them. They didn’t listen.”

Price raised his rifle. “Identify yourself.”

The human smiled, something wistful in it. “Honnestly your kind has many names for me. Death is one I find quite fitting but call me what you will.”

Ghost scoffed. “Right. And I’m the bloody Easter Bunny.”

“No your not... but you are dying slowly. All of you are. Just slower than most.”

The team froze. Gaz muttered, “Cap... I think he’s not kidding.”

Price approached slowly. “You’re saying you’re the reason this started?”

“No.” The human *?* looked up, the circles under it's eyes dark as funeral cloth. “I was the reason it didn’t start sooner.”

It nodded to a broken conduit nearby. Glass tubes spilled ancient, glowing ichor onto the floor, pulsing faintly. “They took pieces of me. Bottled death and realised it. They thought they could control mortality. Instead, they broke the system. They broke the cycle. Made Death obsolete. Now, you deal with the consequences."

Outside, alarms began to blare. Movement on the motion sensors. Dozens—no, hundreds—of shambling signals converging on the site.

It leaned back, exhaling a breath that smelled faintly of burning incense and decay.

“Every god retires eventually, willingly

or not,” it said. “But not every world survives it.”