“As for the mysterious ‘black hole’ that appeared in Phaeacian forest, or ‘Deep Black’, as we call it,” The person talking, a man in a purple, glamorous suit, took a seat, while revising the documents he brought with him, it wasn’t needed, though, he had already memorized the contents of them “we found nothing worthwhile, it’s as if it’s avoiding all attempts we make at understanding it, the only theory that still holds up on its creation is that it was made by some sort of power.”

  They were in a well kept room, a chandelier hung from above them, giving light to the entire room, and paintings adorned the dark wood walls.

  What was inside the room, though, made it feel wasted: a wooden desk, and a few chairs.

  On one of those chairs, sat the man who was speaking.

  Behind the desk, on the other hand, sat a man in his sixties with white hair, a well kept white beard and blue eyes, wearing a red suit.

  He seemed laid back, but his expression expressed the opposite: a strong will, fit for someone in his place.

  He was the head of the Doves, their boss, and the man before him a treasured member of the agency.

  “I see,” he sighed before continuing “there’s no use in struggling over this further, Deep Black is and will always be an alien concept to us, for now we better stop experimentation, and keep it guarded.”

  The man on the other side of the table seemed let down by this, but the speaker continued “This isn’t to be seen as a loss, we have complete control over it, and as long as we keep it secure it will stay so, think of this as a small, needed break for our scientists.”

  The man understood, and, with a nod of the head and a bow, left the room.

  ***

  Max had been outfitted with an oversized “costume”, if it could be called that: it was normal clothes, arranged to cover his identity as best as possible, he had been given a simple black hoodie, where the hood had to be kept on at all times, the thing was at least twice Max’s size, it didn’t fit his slim frame at all, and it was a miracle it held on, the sweatpants that came with it had to be tightly tied, but other than that they were fine, the weirdest part of his outfit was, surely, the venetian mask he had been given to hide his face, it was white with gold accents, and it represented an animal of some kind, whether the animal was a bear or a cat was…debatable.

  After that, he was brought out of the building, where a beat up company car was waiting, Head Honcho on the driver’s seat…and he was promptly put inside the trunk.

  “Isn’t this illegal to do?” He asked, sticking his head out and towards the others.

  “Nah, we’re in a government vehicle! We decide what’s legal and what’s not! Oh, and also…” Ignicus answered his question, before reaching towards the driver’s seat, and pressing a button next to the radio, which made lights above the car light up and emit a high pitched sound “We got the police lights! Now other cars will have to make us pass!”

  A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  Max braced up for every bump the car would hit, Head Honcho was a terrible, terrible driver, he had no idea how he even got to be the team’s driver in the first place.

  Finally, he felt the car come to a stop, and he dared raise his head above the headrests to see what was happening: they had stopped right in front of a scrapyard.

  As they walked through heaps of junk metal and old, broken appliances, the others seemed a bit too…calm, for a job where they could die.

  “Soooo, whaddya think of the job so far?” Ignicus wrapped his right arm around Max’s neck.

  “Uhhh…cool, I guess? I really didn’t get to experience much of-” Something caught his attention, a few booming clanks of metal on metal, then a tap on his feet.

  He looked down, to see a small radio had fallen to his feet.

  “Ooooooh, that’s a nice looking radio! Now if you don’t mind…” Ignicus bowed down to grab the radio, but Max didn’t even turn towards him, his eyes instead focused to the top of the trash heap it fell from “Ah, damnit, this thing’s totally busted! I don’t think I could fix it, and Medela said that next time I bring them something to fix they’ll perform invasive exploratory surgery on me, whatever that means.”

  Max didn’t bother saying anything, while the others continued onwards, he put his foot firmly on the base of the trash heap, and started climbing.

  Once over it, he took a quick glance around: it was all trash, but at least it had a nice view over the rest of the town.

  He sighed, before speaking

  “What am I even doing here? This hero thing was already a mistake, now I’m climbing trash heaps? I shouldn’t have gotten out of bed this morning…I hate this, I hate all of this!” The uncertainties building up in his mind had finally come out, and in frustration, he kicked a nearby piece of trash.

  But it didn’t budge.

  Instead, it let out an “Ow”.

  “What in the…?” Max inspected the piece of trash, it was hairy…no wait… is that…someone’s head?

  Before he even got the chance to react, the trash around him started moving on its own, he got down just in time to see it: the trash had formed together into a singular creature!

  “WHA-” Max was grabbed, and brought away by Snakesbane.

  “We can’t fight this one with you here, we need to gather up and flee the scene.” He explained with an unreal calm.

  Max was too stunned to answer, as he took a glimpse of the creature they were fighting, he saw Ignicus throw flames at it, the metal got red hot under the heat.

  “What are you doing you moron?! You’re making it STRONGER!” Head Honcho had joined in on the action, although he couldn’t catch a good glimpse of him.

  Snakesbane dropped off Max relatively away from the danger, onto another trash heap, with him were Medela and Miss. Goldilocks.

  “You hurt?” Medela greeted him with a cold tone and a question.

  “I’m fine…” Max got up, eyes fixated on the scene.

  “Allright, guess I gotta get there and help too.” Miss. Goldilocks stepped in front of Max, and brought her left arm back: in the blink of an eye, her small arm turned into the enormous paw of a bear, followed by her other arm, and her legs.

  With a single leap, her entire body was sent up a few meters, and then she came down, without as much of a stumble, and kicked herself back up.

  “If you ain’t hurt, then I don’t have anything to do here.” Medela started walking towards the metal creature too.

  “W-WAIT! We need to get out! Not-” Max’s attempt at making them come back got no answer.

  He stared, at a loss for words, at the scene unfolding right before his eyes.

  He wanted to run.

  His body didn’t follow.

  He just stared.

  He couldn’t do it.