The sun over the Sahara was a white-hot hammer, pounding the corrugated metal roof of "The Furnace" until the air inside tasted like scorched iron and stale sweat. Inside Cell 404, MAXIMUS VANE sat on the edge of a concrete slab, his hands cuffed behind a rusted pipe. He didn't look like a man hours away from a firing squad. He looked like a wolf waiting for the cage door to rot.
Max spat a thick glob of bloody phlegm onto the floor. His eyes, yellowed from years of liver-rotting liquor and cheap synthetic speed, tracked a centipede crawling across the cracked stone. He felt the familiar itch under his skin—the craving. He had killed for less than a fix, and he had raped for even less than that. To Max, the world was just a collection of things to be used, broken, and discarded.
The heavy steel door groaned open. Two guards in desert camo stepped in, their faces hidden behind gas masks. Behind them walked a woman in a lab coat that looked too white for this hellhole. She carried a silver briefcase.
"Maximus Vane," the woman said, her voice muffled but cold. "The state says you die at dawn. Science says you might be useful for another hour."
Max looked up, a jagged, yellow-toothed grin splitting his face. "If that briefcase is full of high-grade heaven, lady, you can stick me wherever you want. I'm bored of the sand."
The guards shoved him down onto the slab. They didn't use soft hands. They pinned his shoulders, the metal of the cuffs biting deep into his wrists until the skin broke. The doctor didn't flinch. She opened the case, revealing a single, oversized syringe filled with a thick, glowing violet fluid. Project Ares-9.
"This is going to burn," she whispered, leaning close. Max could smell her perfume—lilies. It made his stomach churn with a sudden, violent hunger. He didn't want the drug; he wanted to wrap his hands around her throat and see if her skin felt as soft as it looked.
The needle plunged into his bicep.
"FUCK!" Max roared. It wasn't a sting. It was like she had poured molten lead directly into his veins.
The violet liquid surged through his system. His heart hammered against his ribs like a frantic bird. Thump-thump. Thump-thump. His vision turned red, then purple, then a blinding, screaming white. His muscles began to twitch and bulge, tearing against the fabric of his orange jumpsuit.
"Vitals are spiking!" the doctor shouted, leaning over him. "His DNA is... it's unravelling!"
Suddenly, the world outside the room went insane.
A siren began to wail—not the prison alarm, but a global emergency broadcast. Through the small, barred window, Max saw one of the tower guards drop his rifle. The man clutched his throat, his skin turning a sickly, bruised black in seconds. He collapsed, his body liquefying, turning into a puddle of dark, foul-smelling sludge before he even hit the sand.
"What is happening?" the doctor screamed, turning toward the monitors.
On the screen, news feeds from London, New York, and Tokyo showed the same thing. Men—only men—were falling in the streets. They were vomiting blood, their muscles melting off their bones. The Y-Virus had arrived.
One of the guards in the room suddenly let out a choked wet sound. He tore off his mask, revealing eyes that were literally melting out of their sockets. He reached for the doctor, but his hand fell off at the wrist, splashing onto her white coat.
"No! Stay back!" she shrieked, stumbling toward Max.
Max wasn't dying. The Ares-9 was fighting the virus inside him. His blood was boiling, a war zone of violet chemicals and black viral death. He felt his bones snap and reset. He felt his lungs expand. The pain was so intense he wanted to scream, but his throat was full of thick, hot copper.
The second guard collapsed into a pile of gore. The doctor was the only one left standing, her face pale, her chest heaving as she stared at the piles of melted meat that used to be men. She looked at Max, her eyes wide with terror.
"You're... you're still alive?" she whispered.
Max's eyes snapped open. They weren't brown anymore. They were a glowing, predatory violet. He flexed his arms, and the rusted pipe he was cuffed to snapped like a dry twig. He stood up, towering over her. The jumpsuit tore away, revealing a body that was now a map of hard, jagged muscle.
He moved toward her, his breath coming in heavy, predatory growls. The virus was supposed to kill him, but it had made him something else. The Last Man. The Only Man.
"Max... wait..." the doctor pleaded, backing into the wall.
He didn't wait. He grabbed her by the hair, pulling her head back. He didn't care about the apocalypse. He didn't care that billions of men were turning to soup outside. He only cared about the heat between his legs and the terrified woman in his grip.
But before he could sink his teeth into her, the building shuddered. A massive explosion rocked The Furnace—the power plant failing. The ceiling cracked, and a ton of desert rock and concrete came crashing down.
Max felt the impact, a crushing weight that forced the air from his lungs. Darkness swamped him. His body, fueled by the Ares-9, went into a deep, chemical hibernation. The violet light in his eyes faded as the desert reclaimed the prison.
...
TEN YEARS LATER
The Sahara was silent, except for the whistling wind. The ruins of The Furnace were nothing more than a jagged tooth of concrete sticking out of a massive sand dune.
A group of scavengers moved across the dunes. There were four of them, all women. They wore leather wraps, goggles, and carried rusted spears and scrap-metal crossbows. They were lean, tanned, and hard-eyed.
The leader, SARA, stopped. She was a woman in her late thirties, a "MILF" who remembered what the world used to be like. She remembered the taste of chocolate and the sound of a man's voice. Now, she only knew the taste of sand and the sound of the wind.
"Look," Sara said, pointing. "The shifting sands uncovered a sub-level entrance."
"Is it worth the risk?" a younger girl asked. "The elders say this place was cursed."
"Everything is cursed, Mia," Sara snapped. "But that facility had medical supplies. If we find antibiotics, we can trade them to the City of Sirens for a month's worth of clean water."
They dug. For hours, they cleared the scorched debris until they reached a heavy, reinforced steel door with the number 404 barely visible under the grime.
Sara pried the door open with a crowbar. The air that hissed out was cold—unnaturally cold.
They stepped inside with their torches flickering. The room was a tomb. Sara's light hit a pile of bones in a white lab coat. She ignored it, searching the cabinets.
"Sara... look at the slab," Mia whispered, her voice trembling.
Sara turned her torch. In the center of the room, lying on a concrete block, was a man.
He was perfectly preserved. His skin was bronze, stretched tight over muscles that looked like they were carved from granite. He was completely naked, his massive frame dominating the room.
The women froze. They hadn't seen a male form in a decade. Mia dropped her spear, her hand drifting to her mouth. Her eyes went wide, fixed on the thick, heavy muscle between the man's legs. To a girl who grew up in the wasteland, this was a god. To Sara, it was a ghost.
"Is he... a statue?" Mia breathed, stepping closer, her face flushing a deep red despite the cold.
Sara reached out a trembling hand. She touched his chest. It was cold, but as her fingers pressed into the skin, she felt something that shouldn't exist.
Thump.
A heartbeat. Slow. Powerful.
"He's alive," Sara whispered, her breath hitching.
Suddenly, the man's chest heaved. A massive intake of air rattled in his throat. His eyes snapped open—burning violet orbs that pierced the darkness.
The women scrambled back, but the man was faster. Max sat up, the concrete slab cracking under his weight. He groaned, a sound that was deep, guttural, and vibrated in the very bones of the women standing before him.
He looked at his hands, then at the women. He could smell them. The scent was overwhelming—the musk of their sweat, the salt of their skin, the frantic pheromones of their fear and sudden, sharp arousal.
Max stood up, his massive height forcing the women to look up. He didn't say a word. He didn't need to.
He looked at Sara, his gaze raking over her mature, leather-clad curves. Then he looked at Mia, whose legs were literally shaking as she stared at his erection, which was rising like a weapon of war.
Max felt the Ares-9 screaming in his blood. He felt the hunger of ten years.
He stepped toward them, a predator finally released from his cage. The world belonged to the women now, but they were about to find out that a world without a king was just waiting for a monster to take the throne.
Max reached out and grabbed Mia by the throat, not to kill, but to pull her into his heat. The girl let out a whimpering moan, her eyes fluttering shut as the raw, masculine scent of him hit her brain like a drug.
"Man..." she gasped.
Max leaned down, his voice a rasp of gravel and death. "Not just a man, sweetheart. The only one you'll ever need."
He threw her onto the dusty floor and turned his violet eyes toward Sara. The hunt had begun.