| Type | Genetic Research |
| Featured in | Prototype Prototype 2 |
Gentek is a United States biological and genetic research company founded by Dr. Raymond McMullen on November 1, 1976. They would become pivotal in the events leading up to the infestation of Manhattan Island, New York with the Blacklight Virus.
History[]
Due to Dr. McMullen's expertise in genetics, the organization Blackwatch would contact him in 1989 for his aid in their continuation of viral biological weapons research; this could have to do with McMullen's moving of Elizabeth Greene to Gentek facilities.
Upon Gentek's recruitment, they officially became the professional face of Blackwatch. Hiring the top biological research scientists in the field, the company became key researchers for the Redlight Virus and later, the Blacklight. As one would suspect from a company of their type, their facilities are highly secure and go so far as to employ security measures that some may call "borderline paranoid". One of their employees were known to have described the company as a "network of need-to-know silos".
Because of their work for Blackwatch, most of the company's top secret research centers around Elizabeth Greene, the sole survivor of the Hope, Idaho incident who was held by the company in their headquarters in Manhattan, New York between January 1, 1989 and Day 3 of the First Manhattan Outbreak in 2008. The extensive studies performed on Greene revealed that she carried a grand total of 14 different strains of the Blacklight Virus within her, acting as a sort of incubator towards its evolution. Dr. McMullen agreed to carry out this research and was interested to know about the virus itself.
First Manhattan Outbreak[]
Despite their work for Blackwatch on Greene and the Blacklight Virus, the employees were kept in the dark about the intended use of their research in the field as a weapon. Unfortunately for millions, one scientist named Dr. Alexander J. Mercer, the lead scientists of Project BLACKLIGHT discovered the real source of the virus and the brutal and cruel history behind its existence.
Horrified at what they had been doing, Mercer attempted to turn into a whistleblower before these attempts were thwarted by Blacklight itself. Afraid for his life (which was correctly deduced), he absconded with a vial of of the virus as collateral, but was cornered in New York City's Penn Station and, knowing he was about to be killed, purposefully released the virus into the station, only to be immediately gunned down. Thinking he was dead, he was moved to the morgue but he had instead been transformed into the first of the Evolved. He inadvertently continued to make the infection worse as it covered the entirety of Manhattan Island over the course of a short period of time.
With the infection spreading, Gentek and Blackwatch attempted to stop the infection. Their first attempt involved developing a parasite that was used to incapacitate most of Mercer's superhuman abilities, but he eventually figured out a cure. With this plan thwarted, they next developed Bloodtox and Blacklight-infected Super Soldiers to support Blackwatch and the military's forces, only for Mercer to develop immunity over time to the toxin and gaining evolution that allowed him to easily overcome the Super Soldiers. However, their main focus was actually on Greene, and surprisingly they were secretly aided by Mercer himself. Once Greene was slain however, their focus moved on to Mercer.
Although the military nearly nuked the island, Mercer again stepped in and thwarted this plan, almost dying in the process. However he escaped, and disappeared. This gave Gentek and Blackwatch the time to clean up the city, using propaganda to appear more altruistic than their true intentions. This first outbreak also served as a form of twisted field test for Gentek, and encouraged them to move forward with more unethical and brutal tests into the future.
Second Manhattan Outbreak[]
Upon returning to New York City over a year later and having completely lost his faith in humanity as a force for good, the virus that considered itself Alex Mercer returned to Penn Station and once more purposefully released the virus once more. Again Gentek and Blackwatch were forced to step in to attempt to stop the outbreak. Unfortunately, the Gentek scientists had become addicted to human testing by this point, including caging civilians with Infected in order to deliberately contaminate them, and even went so far as to release infected amongst civilians to study the effects in the field. The scientists considered Manhattan's civilians as little more than petri dishes. At this stage they also secretly planned to utilize the outbreak itself as a large leap toward official Blacklight weaponization, with little intent towards curing its effects.
However, this may have been because Alex Mercer had developed numerous Evolved and used them to infiltrate both Gentek and Blackwatch to turn them into his unwitting puppets. It is these evolved who begin development on Whitelight before polluting the substance with Mercer's own blood culture in order to turn it into a bioweapon that would infect any human it came in contact with and allow him to control them. Luckily for humanity, the project was sabotaged before mass deployment by James Heller, another of Mercer's (unwilling) Evolved.
The company's controversial research as well as Blackwatch's openly cruel action led to some civilians to begin working against the two companies, becoming agitators against them. These included both Dana Mercer and Father Luis Guerra. While these agitators did not initially pose a real threat, the Evolved James Heller joined their cause and with many scientists and officers involved in their experiments then killed or consumed, effectively stunning the weaponization programs.
Eventual fate[]
With Alex Mercer deceased and James Heller effectively wiping out the entire infection, the fate of Gentek remains unknown.
Unfortunately, since the game company that developed the game went out of business, we are unlikely to ever know what would occur.
Known employees[]
Notable[]
- Dr. Raymond F. McMullen - Founder of Gentek.[Deceased]
- Dr. Anton Koenig - The lead virologist of Gentek.[Deceased]
- Dr. Alexander J. Mercer - Head of Project Blacklight.[Deceased]
- Karen Parker - Researcher in Genotyping.[Deceased]
- Sabrina Galloway - Chief Financial Officer of Gentek.[Deceased]
- Dr. Karen Archer - The lead virologist of Gentek, who took Anton Koenig's place after his disappearance.[Deceased]
- Dr. Harry Gutierrez - Dr. Karen Archer's Assistant.[Deceased]