PROJECT: CAYRO

Andrew Clark:

October 19, 2025

16:08 MHT

S.A.F. Autumn

Fleet Base East

Sydney Australia

The past month had been long and grueling. Everyone was running on a dangerous cocktail of minimum sleep and maximum coffee—something that did no one’s temper any favors. I’d been sitting in the crew lounge for the better part of the day, glued to my tablet, reviewing the endless list of repairs and upgrades in progress. I would’ve preferred the quiet of my office, but after the damage from the rough landing, it was in worse shape than I was.

Half the Autumn’s upper deck had to be dismantled to fix the buckling in the substructure, and my office had been torn apart to get access to the damaged support pilings. If the ship’s honeycomb airframe hadn’t distributed the forces so perfectly, the Autumn would have been a total loss. Dr. Zaraki and the team of engineers were adamant—we were damn lucky. Any warping in the main structure would’ve meant scrapping the ship altogether and waiting over a year for SkyTeam to build us a new one. Not that we had the luxury of time.

I scrolled through the specs for the new hydrogen production system we were installing. The old system, built decades ago, had finally given out after years of use and the hell we’d put it through during the battle. Seawater corrosion had taken its toll, and with SkyTeam no longer manufacturing parts for such an outdated model, we were left with few options.

The new system, thankfully, had arrived yesterday—a prototype unit from Japan. It was a miracle we didn’t have to pay for the equipment itself, but shipping alone set us back ninety grand. Still, the benefits were huge: the new production plant was lighter, faster, and twice as efficient as the old one. Tiffany and I had spent all morning poring over the specs and running tests. The system would be critical in getting the Autumn back to full operational capacity.

But even as the upgrades were underway, the atmosphere aboard the ship was far from calm. Despite the improvements, we all knew the Autumn wasn’t designed for full-scale warfare. Sure, it was tough and packed a punch, but against the U.S. military’s newest ships? We’d be lucky to hold our own. That reality had become painfully clear after our encounter with the Death Reckoning and the Orion orbital station.

Dr. Zaraki was working on enhancing the ship’s defenses, turning the Autumn into something more than just a cruiser built for stealth. We were all anticipating a fight. Whispers had been circulating about the U.S. military’s movements, suggesting they were preparing for an offensive. And with the Autumn sitting in port, vulnerable, we needed to be ready.

But even with all the focus on upgrades and preparations, there was something else gnawing at me. Zaraki.

The man had been acting strange—more erratic and short-tempered than usual. I’d known him for years, long enough to recognize when something was off, and whatever had been eating at him wasn’t just the stress of the repairs. He was distracted, dodging questions, and the more I tried to get answers out of him, the more he clammed up.

It had started after he’d repaired that old coffee machine in the galley. I still couldn’t figure out why he’d spent hours tinkering with that damn thing, especially with everything else we had going on. But ever since, he’d been… different. Like whatever he’d discovered had shaken him to his core. I could see it in his eyes, the way he carried himself—there was something weighing on him, and it was starting to make me nervous.

I took a deep breath, swiping through more schematics on the tablet. No matter how much I tried to focus on the work, my thoughts kept drifting back to Zaraki. What had he found? And why the hell wouldn’t he tell me?

I glanced at the clock. It was just past 16:00, and the day was dragging. Maybe I needed to have another talk with him, see if I could pry more information loose. If he was hiding something critical, something that could impact the ship or the crew, it wasn’t just his problem anymore.

Briefly looking up from my tablet, I saw Tiffany standing in front of me, holding two cups of coffee. She looked just as exhausted as I felt, but there was something comforting in the way she smiled, even if it was faint.

She reached out, offering me one of the cups. I carefully took it, the warmth seeping into my fingers. "Thanks, honey. Are you okay?" I asked.

"Just tired," she replied with a small sigh. "Can I join you?"

I slid over, making room on the couch. She sank down next to me, the weariness clear in the way her shoulders drooped as she set her coffee on the small table in front of us. I could smell the familiar aroma as I took a sip—French Vanilla creamer, the way I liked it. One tablespoon of sugar, just enough to take the edge off the bitterness. A small smile tugged at the corners of my lips.

Tiffany didn’t say much after that. She leaned her head into my lap, her eyes fluttering shut almost immediately. I looked down at her, watching the way her breathing slowed and deepened, soft snores escaping her lips. A sigh escaped me—looks like I’d be stuck here for a while.

But that was fine.

Taking another sip of my coffee, I let my mind drift. I thought back to when we’d first met—Pine Mountain, Georgia. It had been Thanksgiving, and I was visiting Captain Bracton and his wife. That was when I’d met Tiffany, a friend of Diana’s. I swore to this day it had been a setup; Bracton and Diana had mysteriously disappeared halfway through dinner, leaving Tiffany and me alone to "get to know each other." By the time they’d returned from their so-called walk, we had hit it off.

Two years later, we were married in a small chapel in Callaway Gardens. I smiled, running my hand through her soft hair, memories swirling. It was funny how life could change so much and still feel the same in small, intimate moments like this.

A few hours later, I was startled awake by a sharp knock. I blinked groggily and saw Dr. Zaraki standing over me. The look on his face had my heart dropping.

“What’s wrong, Doc?” I asked, my voice hushed but thick with concern.

"Andrew, I need to talk to you privately," Zaraki replied, his tone unusually grim.

I gently shifted, careful not to wake Tiffany as I placed her head on the couch. She needed the sleep, more than I did. I followed Zaraki into his office, and as the door closed behind us, I was hit by the sight of complete chaos. If it was bad before, it was worse now—computer components were scattered everywhere, papers thrown across desks, cables tangled like the web of confusion I was about to walk into.

"You and a computer had a disagreement?" I asked, raising an eyebrow at the scene.

"You could say that," Zaraki muttered. "I needed more computing power while the Autumn’s mainframe is down."

He didn’t waste time with pleasantries. "For the last several days, I’ve been combing through every bit of data on the C. Drive and the ship’s programming. And you’re not going to believe this, but the coffee maker? That was the final piece to the puzzle."

I blinked, processing that bizarre statement. "The coffee maker?" I repeated, trying to keep the incredulity out of my voice. "How does a coffee maker tie into all of this?"

He gave a humorless chuckle, the kind that told me he wasn’t joking. "Where else would you hide critical information? No one would ever think to look there. It was brilliantly hidden—Jacob knew exactly what he was doing."

"You're telling me that key data—about Project Cayro, no less—was stashed in the coffee maker’s programming?" My voice rose slightly, disbelief thick in the air. "Come on, Doc. There are hundreds of better places to hide information like that."

Zaraki leaned back in his chair, crossing his arms. His eyes had that familiar calculating glint, the one that made me realize he was dead serious. "Think about it. The three of us—me, Jacob, and Stephan—we live on coffee. It would be the one thing that’s always around, the last thing we’d ever think of getting rid of. In plain sight, but completely invisible."

When he explained it like that, it kind of made sense—well, as much sense as any of this was making right now. “Then why sabotage the ship’s coffee maker?” I asked, more out of frustration than genuine curiosity at this point.

“I don’t think it was sabotaged,” Zaraki said, shaking his head. “I think it was coded with a combination of button presses that would make the coffee maker work. I just don’t think he ever got the chance to tell us.”

I frowned, leaning forward in my chair. “But why hide it there? Eventually, someone would want to fix the damn thing.”

Zaraki gave me a wry smile, the kind that spoke of too many late nights and too many secrets. “Ah, see, I think Jacob was either banking on your penny-pinching habits or my insatiable need to fix things. When we designed and built the ship, he picked one of the most expensive commercial coffee makers on the market. He knew that I’d either fix the infernal contraption or you would deem it too expensive to repair and just ignore it. Remember who we’re talking about here. Jacob was a master at reading people. Manipulating them.”

I sighed. "Fair point…"

The Doctor leaned back, his expression darkening again. “I’ve gone over the data more times than I care to count. Every time, it adds up to the same conclusion.”

“Alright, Doc, get to the point,” I grumbled, starting to lose patience.

“Andrew, there are things that Jacob and I didn’t tell you about when it came to developing the augmentation for Star and Cayro. Things I didn’t want anyone to know about,” Zaraki said, his voice dropping to that ominous, serious tone he rarely used unless the situation was dire.

I arched an eyebrow, my interest piqued despite myself. “Doctor, I’m well aware that you live in a world of shadows and mystery. Hell, several of us on the Autumn have figured that much out by now. We all know you’ve got your secrets, and frankly, no one’s prying as long as they stay where they belong.”

He met my gaze, his expression deadly serious. “Andrew… we’re rapidly approaching a point where those secrets are no longer going to stay hidden. In fact, I believe we’ve reached that point already. The world you know and the world of shadows—as you’ve called it—are about to collide.”

A chill ran down my spine at the weight of his words. I knew Zaraki well enough to understand that when he said things like that, they weren’t hyperbole.

“What are you getting at, Doctor?” I asked, trying to keep my voice steady, though unease was beginning to creep in.

“There was a very specific reason why Jacob and I made it clear that no one could get their hands on Star, Cayro, or this ship,” Zaraki continued. “What the three of us did all those years ago was nothing short of a miracle. A dark, terrible miracle—but a miracle nonetheless. We combined the shadow world and the human world to create two beings that could exist in both.”

I blinked at him, trying to process what he was saying. "You’re not making any sense. What do you mean by ‘shadow world’?”

He paused, eyes narrowing slightly. “What do you know of the supernatural world?”

I blinked again, not sure where he was going with this. "What do you mean?"

“Do you believe there are things that go bump in the night? Creatures people fear without even knowing why?” Zaraki asked, his voice low, almost conspiratorial.

“I mean, sure, everyone feels that sometimes,” I admitted. “That primal fear when you see a silhouette in the dark, or when you feel like something’s watching you. That’s just… human instinct, isn’t it?”

Zaraki gave a small, humorless chuckle. “And why do you think that instinct exists, Andrew? If humans are so powerful and smart, why is it that they instinctively fear something that looks like them?”

I hesitated. “I… I don’t know.”

He leaned forward, eyes locking onto mine with an intensity that sent a chill through me. "I do. There’s a world that exists in the shadows. A world that’s been hidden since the dawn of mankind. Beings that have hunted humans, beings that created that very instinct—the fear of the dark. The fear of what’s just out of sight. It’s the world I’ve been living in. The world I’ve kept from humankind for a very long time.”

I stared at him, half convinced my friend had lost his mind. “Doc… you’re starting to sound crazy.”

And then, without warning, it happened.

A wave of something—some kind of energy—washed over him, distorting the air around his body like heat waves rising off pavement. His skin shimmered, the color darkening as if it was melting away, leaving something else behind. Black, iridescent scales appeared where there had been human flesh, covering every inch of his body that wasn’t hidden by his clothes. Four long horns—six or eight inches at least—curved back from his head. His hair, once neatly combed, transformed into a wild mane of silver, cascading down his back.

Its face was sharp, angular, and unmistakably reptilian, with sleek scales catching the light in a way that made my skin crawl. The creature—no, the Doctor—had eyes that glowed a vivid amethyst, bright and piercing, looking right through me. I couldn’t tear my gaze away from them. Sharp white teeth gleamed menacingly as it smiled, a low growl rumbling from its throat, and those hands... they ended in long, jet-black talons that gleamed like polished obsidian. My foot caught on something behind me, and before I knew it, I was on my ass, staring up at the towering figure that used to be Dr. Zaraki.

I couldn't move. Couldn't speak. It crouched down with fluid grace, its movement almost hypnotic. For a second, I thought this was the end, that maybe I had misjudged the Doctor’s intent. But then he—it—extended a talon-tipped hand toward me, voice still carrying the familiar inflections of Zaraki, though now rough, gravelly, and soaked in a thick, unrecognizable accent.

"Not an unwarranted reaction, but I expected you to handle this better than most," it—he—said, voice almost amused. The hand stayed outstretched, waiting for me to take it.

I just stared. My brain scrambled to process what I was seeing, and my tongue stayed glued to the roof of my mouth. Words? What words? I had no words for this.

"Andrew, if I meant you harm, I would've done it long ago. Take my hand. I won't hurt you." His voice softened just slightly, though the deep growl behind it remained. "You reek of fear and adrenaline."

That snapped me out of it, but not in any way that made me more coherent. My mouth hung open, my limbs locked in place. The Doctor didn’t wait for me to act. Instead, he grabbed me by the arm with surprising gentleness and hauled me to my feet as though I weighed nothing. Once I was upright, he casually brushed off the back of my jacket like nothing bizarre was happening, like I hadn’t just watched him shed his human skin to reveal… this.

Now that I was on my feet, I took a better look at him. He still had the stance, the posture of the Doctor, but this… this creature was not human. What stood out most were his eyes. I knew those eyes. The shape, the color, the way they flared when emotions surged. Star’s eyes did the exact same thing.

"The eyes," I croaked out, my voice barely working. "That’s why Star’s eyes are purple."

Of all the things I could’ve said in that moment—like What the hell are you? or How did you do this?—I latched onto the weirdest observation. The eyes.

Zaraki, or whatever he was, nodded, a faint smile pulling at his lipless mouth. “Yep. She gets her amethyst eyes from me.”

I blinked. I still wasn’t sure how to process all this. "I don’t understand..."

“Welcome to my world, Andrew,” Zaraki said, straightening up fully, his gravelly voice taking on a more familiar tone. “I am one of those creatures that go bump in the night.”

It all clicked into place—the odd questions, the weird comments, the secrets he had been hinting at for years.

“What… what are you?” I finally managed to ask, voice steadier now, though I wasn’t sure I actually wanted the answer.

He tilted his head slightly. "We can discuss that later. The point of showing you all of this is to help you understand what’s happening with Cayro—and what’s coming."

I sucked in a sharp breath as the pieces fell into place. If he was like this, then what about Cayro? And Star?

“They’re like you, aren’t they?” I asked, dread curling around the edges of my mind. Zaraki shook his head slightly.

“Sort of...” He paused for a moment, considering his next words carefully. “They’re not quite the same. They’re hybridbytes.”

My brow furrowed. "Hybri—wha…?"

"Hybridbytes," he repeated, exasperation dripping from his tone. "They are hybrids of three distinct species. Canis lupus, Drakonisch, and Homo sapiens."

I stared at him blankly, the only thing that made sense in that sentence being “Homo sapiens.” The other two? No clue.

"Huh?" I managed, clearly not grasping the severity of what he was saying. He rolled his glowing eyes at me, clearly running out of patience.

"Fine. I’ll simplify it for you." His voice dropped, laden with sarcasm. "They’re changelings. Werewolf, human, and draconian DNA blended together. That’s what gives them their… unique abilities."

I stared at the creature doctor thing while I pieced everything he explained together. As much as I didn’t want to believe that supernatural creatures existed, I had one standing right in front of me. Taking a deep breath, I pinched the bridge of my nose.

“So, what you’re telling me is… We created a set of human hybrid creatures, and now they’re out in the world alone. They’re not entirely human, don’t belong in the human world, and have traits of two other species. No one’s around to train them or teach them what they’re capable of. And to top it all off, you’re only telling me this now?” I finally spat out, frustration flooding my voice.

“That about sums it up,” Zaraki responded coolly.

“Why?” I demanded, unable to keep the anger from boiling over.

“Why what?” he shot back, his voice as cold as mine was heated.

“Why did you and Jacob do this? What was the point? Was there even an end goal, or were you just trying to see if you could? For thirteen years, I’ve protected your daughter, this ship, and every secret tied to this project. And now, this? To find out there’s even more you’ve hidden from me—secrets that put Star and Cayro into a world they have no idea about?”

I stopped myself before the anger bled too far. The worry, though, was still there. Star and Cayro didn’t ask for this—they didn’t deserve to be thrown into something so… monstrous.

“Andrew…” Zaraki started, but I cut him off.

“Don’t ‘Andrew’ me, Zaraki. This is my ship. My home. You’re either going to tell me the whole truth now, or you can leave. I’ll find Star and Cayro myself and make sure they get the protection they deserve—from you, from this whole mess.”

My words were venomous, and I didn’t care. I crossed my arms, glaring at the creature in front of me. If I expected him to be unnerved, I was sorely disappointed. The Doctor let out a rough, gravelly huff, clearly irritated but not shaken.

With a sharp motion, he turned his laptop around to face me. The glow from the screen reflected off his iridescent black scales. He tapped a few keys with his talons and pulled up a simulation—something complex I didn’t fully understand at first. DNA strands, codes, sequences… it was all a blur of information, and I wasn’t sure how it all connected.

For the next fifteen minutes, he walked me through it, explaining every last detail.

I didn’t interrupt. I barely spoke, except for the occasional question. But by the time he finished explaining how Cayro had not only been augmented with werewolf DNA but also with his draconian DNA, the truth sank in.

Jacob had secretly used Zaraki’s DNA, without telling him. He’d hidden it from all of us. And that DNA—the part of Zaraki’s race that could assimilate other traits—was the key to the project's success. But it also explained Cayro’s aggression. The aggression that had been plaguing him, tearing him apart from the inside. Zaraki’s race, the draconians, had the ability to turn off their moral compass. It sounded almost sociopathic, the way Zaraki described it—like they could commit the most horrific acts without feeling a thing, if they chose to.

Zaraki then explained why he included Star in the project. That bombshell hit me harder than I expected. He’d been trying to save her. Star’s mixed heritage was killing her, and this was the only way. They both knew it was immoral and dangerous, but they’d done it anyway.

I took a deep breath, leaning back in my chair, trying to process it all.

“Alright, Doctor, you’ve explained what they are. You’ve explained why Cayro’s turning into a ticking time bomb. But what I don’t get is why this project was created in the first place.”

Zaraki looked at me for a long moment. Then, he stood up, walked over to a cabinet, and pulled out a bottle of vodka and two glasses. He poured us each a shot, taking a sip before he spoke again.

“I met Jacob a few years before the project was created. Whether he sought me out on purpose or it was pure coincidence, I can’t say. But it didn’t take long for me to realize he knew about the darker world I lived in,” the Doctor began, his voice low and measured, like he was unearthing buried memories. “Not long after that, I revealed myself to him—what I truly was. And, well, he didn’t take it quite as well as you have. Let’s just say his first instinct was to try and stab me.”

I didn’t say anything, just let the tension hang between us as he continued.

“Within a year or so of knowing each other, Jacob approached me with the idea for Project Cayro. The government was beginning to catch on to the fact that supernatural creatures existed, thanks to advancing technology. They wanted a countermeasure, something to protect against a possible supernatural threat. A group of black ops agents, loyal to the government, who could face down the monsters that go bump in the night,” he explained, taking a small sip of vodka. “Jacob’s background in genetics and bioengineering made him the perfect candidate for research and development. But he didn’t realize how deep the rabbit hole went.”

The Doctor’s gaze turned sharp, cold. He was reliving something I could only guess at.

“I’ve come to believe it was someone high up in the government who pulled the plug on the project when they realized we weren’t using the DNA sequence they’d proposed. What Jacob didn’t know—what we both failed to see—was that there were already supernatural creatures embedded in the government itself, steering decisions, influencing outcomes. They’d been there for years, originally helping to keep us hidden. But over the last few decades, there’s been a power shift. And it hasn’t been for the better.” He paused, letting that sink in.

“Jacob saw it, and that’s why he tried to pull out of the project. He wanted nothing more to do with it.” The Doctor’s voice grew quiet, somber. “But that was before the wreck.”

I felt my breath catch. This part of the story always led back to the wreck—the tragedy that changed everything. But something in his tone told me there was more to it than I’d ever been told.

“Why didn’t you two stop after the wreck?” I asked, genuinely curious.

“Because by that point, it was too late. There were already plans in motion that couldn’t be undone. We realized then that the world needed something else—a group that could exist in both worlds, yet remain separate from both. A way to balance the coming storm. We needed to prepare for what was happening, the forces that were trying to enslave humanity. Look at the U.S. now—the laws, the policies, everything being put into place. All of it is about control,” he said, his voice laced with an ominous edge.

I leaned against the bulkhead, trying to process it all. None of this was what I expected. Everything I thought I knew about Project Cayro, the Autumn, my life—it was suddenly so much bigger, so much darker than I could’ve imagined. I took a large gulp of my vodka, the burn doing little to clear the fog in my head.

“So… what do we do now?” I finally asked, my voice low, but filled with the weight of everything he’d just told me.

“We prepare,” the Doctor replied, setting his empty glass down with a soft clink. “The world is on the verge of a shift, and when that time comes, we need to be ready. That’s all we can do.”