The room on the other side looked like it did not belong to the same building.
The carpet was dark and clean. The walls had expensive wood paneling, abstract art, and screens showing charts, security cameras, and maps of the city. A massive window occupied the entire opposite side, with the city spread behind it like an illuminated model.
At the center, behind a desk too wide to be just a desk, Machine Head remained seated.
He wore an expensive suit without a single fold out of place. His metallic head reflected the cold light from the screens, smooth and artificial, with features too human to look like a machine and too machine-like to look like a person. A pen moved between his fingers, writing something on a sheet of paper as if the explosion in the corridor were nothing more than renovation noise.
Titan entered right behind Mark.
Machine Head finished the line he was writing.
Only then did he lift his gaze.
Mark had neither the patience nor the time for that calm.
"Get up. We're handing you over to the police."
Machine Head stared at the two of them for a second.
"Invincible. Titan."
His voice came out filtered, too clean, as if every syllable had gone through a program before existing.
Then he went back to the paper.
Mark flew to the desk in a short motion, fast enough to send sheets scattering. His fingers struck the surface, opening small cracks in the polished wood.
"Oh, come on. I'm late." He leaned in a little, his face only a few feet from the metallic head. "Let me spell it out for you. It's over. Do you even realize the kind of situation you're in right now?"
Machine Head set the pen down on the paper with almost offensive care.
The metallic head rose again, and the glow of the screens ran across the chrome surface of his face.
"I do." He looked at Mark without hurry. "In fact, I knew exactly when you and this pile of shit were going to come here and annoy me."
His gaze slid toward Titan.
Titan stayed motionless, but his jaw locked.
Machine Head turned his head toward the broken door, looking at the fallen guards in the corridor like someone judging a late delivery.
"Well..." His voice took on an almost amused tone. "There was supposed to be one more of you."
Mark narrowed his eyes.
Machine Head tilted his head, as if listening to music only he could hear.
"Ah. He must be arriving."
Mark reached across the desk.
"Looks like you got it wrong. He's not coming." His fingers came close to Machine Head's suit jacket. "I'm enough to take you out of here."
The air beside the desk split open with a sharp, purple pop.
Isotope appeared between Mark and Machine Head.
His hand touched his boss's shoulder before Mark could grab anything.
Mark clenched his teeth.
"Of course. The guy who teleports."
Isotope adjusted the collar of his own suit with a tired expression, as if that night was already becoming more work than it should have been.
Machine Head brushed a hand over the sleeve Mark had almost grabbed, dusting away nonexistent dirt.
"I like to think of him as life insurance."
Titan advanced one step.
"It's over, Machine Head."
"No." Machine Head raised a finger. "This is the exact opposite of over."
Another distortion opened in the corner of the room.
Then another.
And another.
The first to appear came surrounded by electricity.
The yellow suit covered his entire body, tight as a second skin. Over the eyes, orange shapes resembled lightning bolts pointing in opposite directions, and lines of the same color ran over his elbows and calves. At the top of his head, a thin crest, also shaped like lightning, completed the almost ridiculous silhouette—until the electric current started crackling between his fingers.
The office lights flickered.
Kursk smiled.
The second arrived with weight.
The brown armor struck the floor with a deep metallic sound, heavy, rounded around the torso, with the head almost fused to the chest plate. Orange slits glowed like eyes behind the visor's grille, and lines of the same color pulsed through the joints. Twin flamethrowers occupied the hands. On the back, a thick cannon fitted over the frame like a threat waiting for permission.
Inside the metal, something hotter than flesh moved.
Furnace released steam through his joints.
The carpet darkened near the third one's feet before he had even finished forming.
Magmaniac looked like he was made of living lava. His incandescent body breathed heat, cracks glowing beneath molten skin, every movement shifting his own structure as if bones were optional. A burning drop fell from his arm and opened a smoking hole in the floor.
Mark looked at the mark it left.
"This is going to be annoying."
Behind Titan, a man in ordinary gray clothes appeared without any grandeur at all.
That was what made him worse.
He looked out of place among monsters and armor—until his chest opened.
The flesh at the center of his body tore into a living, wet, pulsing slit. From inside, thick tentacles uncoiled like muscular tongues, striking the floor hard enough to crack the carpet and leaving a viscous trail behind.
Tether Tyrant smiled with his own teeth.
The thing in his chest seemed to smile too.
And then the last one arrived.
The room became smaller.
Not because of size.
Because of presence.
The alien who appeared behind the others was tall, broad, covered in white fur and muscles that looked carved for war. His leonine face carried predatory eyes and a calm with no humanity in it. His mane fell in thick braids on both sides of his head. The black outfit made it far too clear that the armor was not the main threat; the red shoulder pads, gloves, open-toed boots, and red-and-yellow checkered belt looked like decoration over something that needed no adornment at all.
In his hands, the heavy weapon rested as if it weighed nothing.
Battle Beast looked at Mark.
Then at Titan.
And he looked disappointed before the fight had even begun.
Machine Head opened his arms, satisfied with the silence that had taken over the room.
"See? Planning."
Mark placed himself between Titan and the new arrivals, his fists slowly closing.
Titan did not retreat, but his gaze moved over each of the hired thugs too quickly to pretend any of this had been expected.
Machine Head tapped the side of his own head with one metallic finger.
"The chip you brought me, Titan, shows all kinds of possibilities. Paths. Risks. Outcomes." He tilted his head, contempt dripping through his filtered voice. "But it's not worth explaining quantum probability to you idiots."
Titan took another step forward.
"You knew."
"I know many things."
Machine Head walked slowly behind the desk, protected by the line formed by the monsters he had bought.
"Of course I wouldn't be a match for you on my own." His metallic finger tapped lightly against his own temple. "But I have prediction."
His hand dropped, pointing toward Battle Beast, Furnace, Kursk, Magmaniac, and Tether Tyrant.
"And I have money."
Battle Beast spun his weapon once.
The sound cut through the air like a sentence.
Mark raised his fists.
"Titan..."
Titan let the rock cover more of his arms, climbing over his shoulders like armor closing around him.
"I know."
Machine Head sat back down in his chair, as if his part was already over.
"Now be good boys and try not to die too quickly."
Machine Head had barely finished settling into the chair when the office exploded into motion.
Kursk was first.
Electricity burst out of him in a yellow flash, ripping through the air with a crack so sharp it made every screen in the room flicker at once. Mark barely had time to turn his face before the discharge struck his chest and tore through his entire body like a sledgehammer made of voltage. His muscles locked. His uniform smoked in several places. The pain came sharp, brutal, deep enough to tear an involuntary grunt from him.
Furnace took advantage of the instant.
The flamethrowers in the armor's hands roared, pouring two incandescent torrents over Mark with explosive force. Heat invaded the room in a suffocating wave, making the window glass tremble and the carpet begin to blacken. Mark crossed his arms by reflex, his body being pushed backward by the continuous impact of the flames, the soles of his boots scraping against the polished floor.
From the left, Magmaniac dropped onto him like a living collapse.
The lava body crashed into his shoulder and flank, spreading heat and weight at the same time. The touch burned even through the uniform—not enough to pierce his skin, but enough to genuinely hurt. Mark twisted his torso and tried to answer with a punch, only to feel his fist sink into a half-melted body and the heat climb up his arm to the elbow.
"That's disgusting—"
Tether Tyrant's tentacles came before he could finish.
The creature in the villain's chest opened in raw flesh, and whips of wet muscle shot across the office. One wrapped around Mark's leg. Another around his arm. A third struck his torso like a living steel cable and yanked him sideways, throwing him off balance just as Kursk fired another electric blast.
This time the discharge caught him full on the side of the face.
The yellow mask cracked near the cheek.
Mark was hurled into a side table, tearing through wood, paper, and an entire monitor before landing on one knee, still bound by the tentacles.
Titan had no time to help him.
Battle Beast advanced in silence, with the calm of someone entering a ritual, not a brawl.
Titan hardened his arms until stone covered his fists completely and threw a blow heavy enough to flip a car. Battle Beast shifted his body only slightly, let the punch pass beside his white mane, and answered with the pommel of his short weapon against Titan's ribs.
The impact echoed through the room.
Titan was dragged several yards back, carving grooves into the floor until he struck the side of a wood-paneled column, which cracked completely at the point of collision. He tried to brace himself and charge again, but Battle Beast was already on him. One forearm strike crushed his guard. The second hit the side of his head. The third took him off the ground.
Titan crossed the room like a cannonball and disappeared into the wreckage of an interior partition.
On the other side, Mark was trying to free himself.
More tentacles wrapped around his chest, neck, and arms, tightening with growing force. The thing pulsed like living flesh, compressing his muscles while Furnace kept the flamethrowers active and Kursk charged electricity between his hands again. Magmaniac raised his molten arm and transformed it into an incandescent mass, ready to crush him into the floor.
Pain came from every side now.
Shock. Heat. Pressure. Impact.
None of it was enough to take him down completely.
But all of it was enough to piss him off.
A lot.
The tentacles kept tightening. The creature in Tether Tyrant's chest writhed, satisfied, as if it had already captured something that belonged to it. Furnace advanced one step. Kursk raised his hand. Magmaniac brought his arm down.
Mark slowly lifted his head.
With his mask in pieces, his face practically exposed, his eyes narrowed.
Mark threw his arms open with violence.
The tentacles burst.
"You're all fucking dead!" Mark shouted.
The living flesh tore apart in a viscous spray, whipping through the air in shredded strips. The floor trembled beneath his feet as he stood fully upright, his chest rising heavily, the mask already cracked and twisted on the right side.
The explosion of movement that followed seemed larger than the office itself.
Mark crossed the distance to Tether Tyrant before anyone could process the sentence. His fist sank into the villain's stomach without piercing through, but with enough force to lift his feet off the ground and fold his whole body around the impact. The creature in his chest shrieked and recoiled as the man was launched backward, smashing through a metal shelf and getting trapped between twisted steel and the wall.
Kursk fired lightning that never reached its target.
Mark appeared in front of him, grabbed the outstretched arm, and spun it together with the villain's own body. The discharge went crooked, striking the ceiling and blowing out an entire block of light fixtures. Before Kursk could recover his axis, Mark drove a knee into his abdomen and followed with a palm strike to the chest. The electric villain flew backward, bounced across Machine Head's central desk, and rolled over it, scattering papers and equipment until he slammed into the back wall.
Furnace opened fire again.
Mark went through the flames.
This time, he did not try to endure from a distance. He lowered his head, crossed the fire by brute force, and crashed into the brown armor like a missile. The impact lifted Furnace off the floor. Mark grabbed one of the metal arms, twisted his body, and threw the villain into the panoramic window. The glass did not give way completely, but it turned into a web of cracks. Before Furnace could slide off the wall, Mark was already on him, crushing the left flamethrower with his hands until he tore it from the socket and threw it away.
Magmaniac came from below, trying to grab him around the waist.
Mark turned just in time to take the charge against his side and be pushed back a few steps. The heat climbed up his uniform again, more violently, almost sticking the villain to him like living magma. Mark clenched his teeth, closed both hands around Magmaniac's incandescent head, and lifted him completely off the floor.
"Cool off."
He planted his foot against the villain's waist, using the leverage to twist him hard, then slammed him into the carpet with enough force to open a crater in the floor. The impact scattered lava fragments in every direction and left Magmaniac sunk at the center of the wreckage, the glow of his body flickering for a second like a lamp about to go out.
Tether Tyrant managed to free himself from the debris and tried again.
Three tentacles shot out like harpoons of flesh.
Mark caught two in midair, one in each hand, and pulled.
The villain came with them, stumbling in his own direction. Mark received him with a short punch to the face, dry and heavy, then used him as a living club against Kursk, who was still trying to get back up. The two of them hit the floor together and slid to the base of the main desk.
The room was chaos.
Fire. Burst cables. Cracked glass. Overturned furniture. Holes in the floor. The carpet smoked in several places. Machine Head had retreated with Isotope behind the line of destruction, watching with that disgusting calm of someone who still believed money could solve any problem.
Mark breathed hard at the center of the mess.
The mask hung torn from one side. His chest rose and fell. He was truly angry now, with no room for jokes, no patience for posing.
Furnace tried to get up first.
Mark went to him.
His hand was already coming down to rip away the rest of the armor when something crossed the space between them.
Not fast.
Inevitable.
Battle Beast.
The blow struck Mark from the side, across the ribs and shoulder, with the violence of a freight train thrown by a god. The world turned white for an instant. His body lost the floor and tore across half the office, smashing through an interior glass partition and crashing into the wreckage of a meeting area.
The conference table split in two.
Chairs flew.
Dust rose.
Mark shoved pieces of wood and metal away with a grimace, his body protesting in places he had not even properly felt until then. His ear rang. His left arm felt heavier than it should.
Battle Beast walked into the cloud of dust.
Unhurried.
The weapon was no longer in his hand. He did not seem to think he needed it.
Mark planted one knee on the floor and started to rise.
Battle Beast closed his fist.
The air around him seemed to shrink.
Across the office, Titan was still trying to crawl out of the debris, too slow, too hurt. The other villains were beginning to move among groans and smoke. Machine Head watched everything with the metallic shine of his face turned toward the exact spot where the leonine alien would finish the job.
Battle Beast brought his arm down.
THUD!
For one second, no one understood.
Not Mark.
Not the villains.
Not even Battle Beast.
Dust continued falling in thin threads between the two of them.
The alien's arm was frozen inches from Mark's face, held by a hand.
Kai.
He stood among the wreckage, arm steady, fingers closed around Battle Beast's fist. The mask hid his face, but the blue eyes behind it burned with an intensity too cold to belong in that room.
His gaze swept across the scene in a single motion.
Mark was fine.
Titan was on the other side among the debris, also fine.
The fallen villains were slowly getting back up, while Magmaniac reformed his molten body, broken a moment ago and now pulling itself back together.
The destroyed office.
And for one tiny instant, another image crossed his mind.
The day the Young Team ended.
The emptiness left in its place.
The blue eyes narrowed further.
"Looks like I made it in time this time." The sentence came low, almost to himself, but there was enough irritation in it to cut the air.
Battle Beast yanked his arm back with a short jerk, more curious than offended.
Before anything else could happen, another crash came from the opposite side of the office.
The already-destroyed entrance to the corridor gave way even more as new figures crossed through smoke and scraps of metal.
Robot came in front, red and metallic, his visor analyzing the entire field in microseconds. Beside him, Black Samson entered heavily, fists clenched, carrying the posture of someone who had already decided exactly where he would step first.
Rex appeared right behind them, energy sparking between his fingers.
"Seriously?" His gaze ran over Mark, Kai, the villains, and Battle Beast. "Do we ever get to fight normal people?"
Dupli-Kate entered while splitting in the same motion, two, four, eight versions of her spreading along the side of the room to gain angles.
Monster Girl did not wait for any instruction; she was already transforming on the way in, her body growing, her limbs thickening, her skin taking on a green tone before she had even finished crossing the debris.
Shrinking Rae appeared running across one of Kate's shoulders, jumped, and disappeared into the air, shrinking until she became a point almost impossible to track.
And Frost closed the formation.
Long blonde hair drawing attention, her white-and-light-blue suit making the cold that came with her stand out even more. The air around her arms turned to mist the moment she raised her hands. Ice began spreading across the floor beneath her feet in quick, silent veins, covering part of the burned carpet and making the room's temperature drop all at once.
The entire office stopped for a heartbeat.
Not in silence.
In recognition.
Now the sides were defined.
Battle Beast did not even look at the others.
His eyes remained locked on Kai.
Then slid to Mark.
A heavy breath left his feline nostrils, almost satisfied.
Mark fully stood beside his brother, brushing dust off his suit. Kai did not take his eyes off the leonine alien.
Behind them, the Guardians spread into formation in front of the other villains.
Battle Beast advanced. One instant, he was standing before the twins, feline eyes measuring Mark and Kai like someone evaluating two blades before an execution. The next, the floor under his feet burst apart, and his white body crossed the room in a brutal line.
Mark reacted on instinct.
Kai reacted first.
Thokk's fist came toward Mark's face with enough force to tear through reinforced concrete. Kai stepped into its path, forearm raised, his body twisting to deflect the impact off its axis. Even so, the blow ripped him off the floor and sent his boots scraping across ten feet of ruined carpet before he stopped.
Pain climbed up his arm like metal bending inside it.
Mark was already coming from the side.
The punch struck Battle Beast's jaw with a dry crack that knocked the alien's head a few inches aside.
Thokk smiled.
His elbow came back in the same motion and struck Mark in the chest.
The air left Mark's lungs in one blow. He tore through a broken desk, hit the wall, and landed on his feet out of pure stubbornness, ripping off what was left of his already-damaged mask.
Kai appeared in Battle Beast's blind spot.
The first strike hit the ribs.
The second went for the liver.
The third rose toward the throat.
Thokk blocked two with his forearm and let the last one land, as if he wanted to measure the force. The impact made the muscles in his neck tense. A thread of saliva slipped between his teeth.
The laugh came low.
Satisfied.
"Better."
Then he turned.
Even though Kai saw the strike, he still was not ready for the rhythm of the fight. The open palm hit the side of his face, and the world became white light for half a second. Kai's body slammed into the metal frame of a partition, denting the steel, but he pulled himself free before falling.
A metallic taste spread through his mouth.
Blood.
Mark saw it.
His expression changed.
He shot forward again, faster, flying low, fists ahead. Battle Beast waited until the last instant, shifted his torso, and drove his knee into Mark's abdomen.
The impact was sickening.
Mark folded in midair.
Thokk grabbed the back of his neck and hurled him toward the floor, but Kai arrived before the impact finished. His shoulder slammed into Battle Beast's arm, diverting the motion enough for Mark to roll across the floor instead of being crushed directly into it.
Thokk turned his eyes to Kai.
Behind the mask, Kai's blue eyes were too fixed.
There was no panic.
Battle Beast noticed something different.
And he liked it.
On the other side of the room, the Guardians' fight exploded across multiple fronts.
Robot hovered low, firing cables and energy pulses to keep Furnace away from the glass walls. Each burst of the flamethrower pulled orange reflections from the metallic armor, but Robot moved with surgical precision, dodging just enough and answering with concentrated shots at the suit's joints.
Rex ran through the debris, charging pieces of metal with blue energy before hurling them at Kursk. The electric villain answered with blasts that turned the air into a storm, forcing Rex to throw himself behind furniture, pillars, and anything still intact.
"Catch this, asshole!" Rex shouted, cutting through the smoke with a glowing piece of steel in his hand.
Dupli-Kate spread across the field, copies appearing behind Tether Tyrant to force him to split his tentacles. Two appendages grabbed one Kate and threw her against the wall, but three others were already on his back, pinning his arms, kicking his legs, distracting the living creature in his chest.
Shrinking Rae vanished and reappeared in impossible points, small enough to slip beneath debris, large enough at the right instant to strike joints, knees, and blind spots.
Frost faced Magmaniac head-on.
His heat made the air tremble. With every step, the floor melted in black marks. Frost raised both hands, and a layer of ice opened across the burned carpet, not trying to extinguish the fire all at once, but trapping the edges, hardening the floor, stealing space.
Magmaniac advanced.
Frost slid sideways along a frozen trail and closed her fingers.
Lances of ice rose from the floor like teeth, striking the lava body and bursting into vapor in the same instant. They did not stop the villain. But they delayed him. Weakened him. Gave the others time to breathe.
Black Samson collided with Furnace in the middle of the room, fists striking hot metal, while Monster Girl, already transformed, leapt onto Tether Tyrant with a roar that made the creature in his chest recoil by instinct.
The entire battle became noise.
But for Kai, the center remained Battle Beast.
Thokk came again.
This time, Kai did not try to block.
He read the shoulder.
The hip.
The distribution of weight.
The right arm was coming high for Mark. The left was preparing a second low blow to break the defense of whoever tried to help.
Kai moved before both strikes existed.
"Mark, left!"
Mark did not argue.
He dodged left at the exact moment Kai entered from the right.
Thokk's fist cut through the space where Mark's head would have been. Kai struck Battle Beast's forearm from below, not to hurt him, but to raise the line of the blow a few more inches. Mark took the opening and landed a straight punch to the alien's chest.
Thokk retreated half a step.
Half.
Kai came right after.
His fist struck the side of Battle Beast's ribs.
At the exact instant of impact, something invisible bent.
Not light.
Not a glow clear enough to give him away.
Only the air imploding into a point too small for ordinary eyes, pulling the struck area against the direction of the blow, as if reality had misplaced itself for a fraction of a second.
The Blue tore inward along with his fist.
Battle Beast felt it.
His laugh stopped halfway.
The leonine body actually tilted, and his feet carved two grooves into the floor.
Kai gave him no time to understand.
Mark entered with a strike to the chin. Thokk partially dodged, but still took enough for his head to turn. Kai spun underneath and hit the ribs on the other side, again using that point of negative attraction at the exact moment his knuckles met flesh and muscle.
The impact was different.
Deeper.
Wrong.
Battle Beast bared his teeth.
"Ah."
It was not only pain.
It was recognition.
Mark advanced from the front. Kai from the side. Thokk tried to crush Mark with his right arm, but Kai entered the trajectory and accepted half the blow on his shoulder, using the impact to spin his own body and return a punch to the alien's face. Battle Beast's head turned. Mark took the chance and struck the abdomen with both fists together.
Thokk roared in pleasure.
The sound filled the room.
He grabbed Mark by the front of his uniform and pulled him close. Kai saw the knee rise before the motion finished. He stepped between them, shoved Mark by the waist, and took the impact on his own thigh. Pain exploded all the way to his hip.
Shit.
His leg almost failed.
Kai clenched his teeth.
Mark noticed just enough to change his angle.
He came in from above, flying, and hit Battle Beast with a descending blow to the shoulder. Kai, still low, used his good leg to launch his body and struck the center of Thokk's chest with Blue hidden inside the impact.
The air caved in.
So did Thokk's chest.
For the first time, Battle Beast was thrown backward.
Not far.
But he was.
He crossed a cloud of dust and stopped on his feet near the cracked window, one hand on his chest, his eyes more alive than before.
A thin line of blood ran from the corner of his leonine mouth.
Thokk touched it with his thumb.
Looked at the blood.
Then at the two of them.
And smiled as if he had found an ancient prayer.
"Yes."
Mark was breathing heavily. His skin was marked by small cuts, and a thin trickle of blood ran down near his eyebrow. Kai was more intact despite the blows, his posture immaculate.
Both were standing.
Side by side.
Mark shot Kai a quick look.
He did not need to say anything.
Kai understood.
The two disappeared.
The sound came afterward.
A supersonic boom inside a closed office.
The pressure blasted papers, shards, and smoke in every direction. Mark struck Battle Beast from the front, too fast for most to follow. Thokk raised his arms and held part of the impact.
Kai came from behind.
Blue entered the punch when it struck the alien's back.
Thokk's body bent.
Mark hit again, this time in the abdomen.
Kai vanished upward and came down with his heel against the shoulder.
Battle Beast tried to grab him, but Mark collided with his arm, taking away his reach. Kai spun in the air, landed another blow to the flank, and space seemed to pull flesh against his fist for one invisible instant.
Thokk retaliated.
He hit Mark in the face with an uppercut that launched him into the ceiling. Mark broke through panels and structure, but came back in the same second, spitting blood to the side before driving both feet into Battle Beast's chest.
Kai came right after, fist closed, Blue compressed at the instant of contact.
Thokk retreated one step.
Then another.
Mark and Kai alternated without wasting movement.
When Battle Beast aimed for Mark, Kai entered the path, deflecting the strike or accepting the necessary part of it to open a breach. When Thokk turned toward Kai, Mark attacked without hesitation, even knowing the alien's counterattack would come faster than he could predict on his own.
They began to push him.
Not only through brute force.
Not just because they were two Viltrumites.
But because of synergy.
One reading.
The other trusting.
The stronger brother covering the weaker one's openings.
Mark struck the jaw.
Kai hit the sternum.
Mark hammered the ribs.
Kai sank a blow with Blue just below the shoulder.
Thokk tried to drive his fingers into Mark's throat. Kai caught his wrist with both hands and twisted the angle for half a second. Mark came in from below and hit the chin hard enough to send blood flying from the alien's mouth.
Battle Beast laughed through his own blood.
The laugh became a growl.
The growl became ecstasy.
On the other side, the Guardians fought not to be crushed by the chaos.
Monster Girl slammed Tether Tyrant into the floor and tried to tear the creature from his chest, but the tentacles wrapped around her arms and neck, dragging her downward. Dupli-Kate multiplied the pressure, copies grabbing every tentacle, every leg, every arm, until the creature was forced to choose between too many targets.
Frost slid behind Magmaniac and locked his legs inside a thick layer of white-blue ice. The ice burst almost immediately, vapor rising in dense clouds, but those two seconds were enough for Rex to charge a metal beam and throw it into the lava villain's chest.
"Special delivery!"
The beam exploded with energy against Magmaniac, scattering incandescent pieces across the floor.
Robot used the moment to attach cables to the cannon on Furnace's back. Black Samson came with him, grabbed the piece with both hands, and pulled. The metal groaned. Furnace tried to turn the flamethrowers toward him, but Shrinking Rae reappeared on the armor's wrist and grew at the right point, kicking the joint with enough force to divert the shot.
The fire went wide, burning part of the ceiling.
Robot tightened the traction.
Black Samson tore the cannon off Furnace's back.
"Now we're talking."
The armor answered with a blow that threw Samson backward, but Frost was already there, freezing the floor beneath Furnace's feet to lock his base.
The entire room was coming apart.
And at the center of it all, the twins kept pushing Battle Beast.
Kai felt the exhaustion coming before he accepted that it existed.
It was not ordinary fatigue.
It was the Void collecting its price.
Every Blue used at the moment of impact was small, controlled, too fast to be seen. But repeated. Repeated. Repeated. He had not trained that kind of application long enough to trust his own limit.
The pressure behind his eyes began to throb.
The top of his head felt hot beneath the mask.
I don't know how long I can keep this up, and...
I know where this leads.
Battle Beast came with an overhead strike.
Kai saw it.
Mark was already out of the angle.
Good.
Kai ducked underneath, struck the line of the waist with Blue in his fist, and felt Thokk's body leave its axis. Mark understood the opening and collided with the alien's chest at supersonic speed.
The three of them tore across the room.
Battle Beast struck a column, cracked the structure, and came back in the same instant, roaring. Kai appeared from the right. Mark from the left. The pressure from their flight made the air burst again, blowing flames, smoke, and dust away.
Punch.
Knee.
Elbow.
Shoulder.
Blue.
Impact.
Mark landed a blow that made Thokk's head snap to the side. Kai struck his chest with another hidden Blue and felt, for the first time, bone—or something close enough to bone—give slightly under the force.
Battle Beast was launched toward the center of the room.
He fell to his knees.
The impact opened a circle of cracks across the ruined floor, exactly between the Guardians and the villains they were fighting.
For one second, everyone looked.
Mark landed on one side, breathing hard.
Kai landed on the other, his fingers opening and closing as if he needed to remind his hands that they still obeyed him.
The two looked at each other.
They were in control.
It was too brief to be a celebration.
But it was there.
The feeling that they had actually pulled it off.
Battle Beast remained still, head lowered, blood dripping onto the floor in dark drops.
Then his shoulders began to tremble.
Not from weakness.
His leonine head slowly rose.
His eyes were shining.
"Finally."
He stood.
The ferocity that took over his face did not look like anger. It was pure joy. Savage. Ancient. The kind of joy that could only exist in someone who had spent too long searching for a worthy opponent.
Monster Girl was beside him and tried to grab him.
She advanced from behind, massive, green, arms spread to restrain him before he could regain his rhythm. Battle Beast did not even fully turn. His fist rose and struck her face with an impact so brutal that her monstrous body tore through the floor, slammed into a column, and collapsed unconscious.
"Monster Girl!" Robot turned toward her.
Black Samson stepped in the way, trying to keep Battle Beast from advancing any further.
Samson's blow struck the alien's chest.
Battle Beast looked at him.
That was all.
The answer came with a punch to the center of the armor.
The impact bent the metal, making Samson spit blood. A moment later, Battle Beast lifted him and slammed him back into the floor with brutality. He crashed into a pile of debris, an arm and a leg twisting in the opposite directions they should have, consciousness gone, the light of his suit flickering.
Mark and Kai shot forward together.
This time, Mark hesitated.
Only for a fraction.
But he saw Black Samson lying in the way. Saw the line of his own advance. Saw that if he went in with everything, the impact might crush the man along with the debris.
That fraction cost him dearly.
Battle Beast noticed before Mark even finished slowing down.
Disappointment passed over his face like a shadow.
Kai did not hesitate.
He came straight in, fist charged, aiming for the side of Thokk's face.
Battle Beast raised his arm and blocked.
The impact of Blue exploded against his forearm, making flesh and fur cave in. Thokk gritted his teeth, but used the block as support to twist his body and strike Mark with his other hand.
Mark tried to block too late.
The blow went through him.
He flew to the other side of the room, smashing through what remained of an interior wall and disappearing into a cloud of dust, glass, and metal.
Kai did not look back.
He couldn't.
Thokk was already coming.
Kai stepped into his range and dodged with perfection, every particle, every trajectory of the blow...
Predictable.
Completely aligned with the rhythm of the fight.
His eyes sharpened as if he had never stopped using them.
He answered with the counterattack. The first punch hit Battle Beast's abdomen with Blue. The second struck a rib. The third, the clavicle. The fourth was blocked, so Kai shifted his axis, spun under the arm, and hit the side of the knee. Thokk lowered a hand to grab him, but Kai slid backward, flew half a meter above the floor, and returned with his heel in the alien's chest.
Battle Beast retreated.
Kai advanced with him.
Blue appeared only on contact.
Small implosions of negative space, invisible to anyone who was not feeling them. Every strike pulled the point of impact against the punch, increasing the transfer of force in a way that was wrong, cruel, perfect for breaking balance.
Thokk began defending more.
Not out of fear.
Out of respect.
His arms rose, deflected, blocked. Even so, some strikes got through. One to the face. Another to the liver. Another to the center of the chest.
Kai felt the Void burning inside.
His vision became too sharp.
The sound of the room fell away.
One more.
Battle Beast advanced with a straight punch.
Kai saw the line.
Instead of dodging outward, he stepped in.
Thokk's fist passed over his shoulder, scraping the mask and tearing another piece of it away. Kai planted his foot on the ruined floor, turned his hips, and concentrated the energy differently.
Not pull.
Push.
The Void answered with violence.
Red.
At the instant Kai's fist approached Battle Beast's chest, the Void collected the weight of exhaustion.
Kai's vision blurred in the final millisecond, his body weakened, and the blow missed the perfect target by very little—missing the center and landing higher, crushing part of the shoulder and clavicle.
Space...
Seemed to occupy the same place twice.
Reality corrected the mistake with an explosion.
The sound was not a punch.
It was pressure tearing the air.
An invisible wave came right after a red flash burst from the point of impact, denting the floor around Kai's feet, shattering the panes of glass that still held, and pushing even the nearest Guardians backward.
Battle Beast was launched through the office.
He tore through the already-cracked exterior wall, passed through metal, concrete, and glass, and vanished out the other side of the building in a rain of debris, leaving an open hole to the Chicago sky.
The wind screamed in through the opening.
The room lost its air for an instant.
Kai remained with his arm extended.
Then his body collected its due.
His knee almost gave out.
He slowly pulled his arm back, his chest rising and falling hard. His breathing came heavy inside the mask. His hand trembled. Not much. Just enough for him to close his fingers and hide it.
Shit... I overdid it and missed.
The world tilted by half a degree.
Kai held on.
Across the room, everyone looked at the damage.
Rex broke the silence.
"Holy shit! What kind of insane strength was that?"
Kai did not answer.
He was still staring at the hole.
Outside, something moved.
Climbing over the debris with one hand, then the other, as if the building had simply become a larger arena. White fur was marked with blood. There were cuts across his face, his chest, and a deep, ugly wound in his shoulder where Kai's punch had grazed him. One of his braids had come loose. His breathing came heavy, real, painful.
And he was in ecstasy.
He coughed blood.
The laugh came first, low, hoarse, broken, growing until it became a deep sound that crossed the entire floor.
"Worthy."
Thokk stepped back in through the opening, treading over broken concrete with some difficulty.
His eyes were fixed on Kai.
"Finally, this world offers me warriors."
He raised his arms in pain, muscles tightening beneath blood-stained fur.
Thokk was ready to kill.
And to die.
Kai tried to adjust his stance.
His body took half a second too long to obey.
That half second was what Machine Head saw.
At the back of the room, behind Isotope, Machine Head no longer looked so comfortable. The screens were broken. The office destroyed. His henchmen scattered, pressed by the Guardians. Infinity. A variable that had escaped his perfect calculations. Battle Beast, his most expensive investment, had stopped acting like hired muscle and started acting like something uncontrolled.
His metallic hand slipped inside his suit jacket.
When it came out, it held a compact weapon, white and silver, far too technological to look Earth-made.
The barrel aimed at Kai's back.
Machine Head made no speech.
He simply fired.
The beam cut across the room in a bluish line and struck Kai from behind.
The force did not pierce.
It did not truly burn.
But it hit his body at the worst possible moment.
The Void was still burning inside him, collecting its price. Kai's balance was already hanging by a thread. The technological impact was small compared to Battle Beast's blows, but it was the last straw.
Kai fell to his knees.
One hand touched the floor.
The other went to his chest by reflex, as if the air had vanished.
"Infinity!" Robot called. He had a laser charged in his chest to try and hit Battle Beast, but was interrupted by Tyrant.
Battle Beast stopped.
The ecstasy on his face died.
Not slowly.
All at once.
His feline eyes moved to Machine Head.
The entire room seemed to feel the change.
Machine Head lowered the weapon half a centimeter.
"It was just to keep the schedule."
Thokk turned completely.
The honor of the battle, which until then had seemed like something invisible, became a physical presence. Heavy. Ancient. Almost sacred.
His white fur was still stained with the blood the twins had drawn from him. His chest rose and fell, wounded, alive, satisfied until the instant before. Now, all of it had been contaminated.
By a shot in the back.
By a coward behind a desk.
Battle Beast closed his hand.
The floor beneath his feet cracked.
Machine Head took a step back, his calm finally failing.
Thokk looked one last time toward the debris where Mark had been thrown.
Then at Kai, kneeling on the other side, struggling to breathe.
Battle Beast's voice crossed the destroyed office, low enough not to sound like a shout and heavy enough to silence everything around him with the clear irritation in his tone.
"The honor of this battle has been stained by the cowardice of the one who hired me."
His gaze passed over Mark.
Then Kai.
"Survive."
Thokk spun the weapon in his hand and rested it on his shoulder, blood running down his arm.
"I will return so we can finish this."
No one tried to stop him.
Not Machine Head.
Not the Guardians.
Not the villains.
Battle Beast walked to the opening his own body had created in the side of the building. The Chicago wind struck his white mane, lifting dust, smoke, and scraps of burned paper around him.
For an instant, his silhouette filled the hole in the building like a statue of war.
Then he disappeared along with a portal that opened behind him.
Titan was the first to move.
Still covered by the thick layer of stone, half-buried among debris and dust, he slowly raised his head. His eyes found Isotope across the room.
Nothing was said.
Only a short tilt of the chin.
Isotope understood.
Kai was on his knees, trying to force air back into his lungs. Mark was rising among the wreckage. The Guardians were still trading blows with the remaining villains, and Machine Head held the technological weapon with the certainty of someone who did not seem to have calculated everything.
It was the perfect kind of mess.
Titan took advantage.
The stone form moved heavily, almost discreet for someone of that size. He passed through the debris, crossed the smoke, and vanished down the destroyed corridor before anyone had time to decide whether they should stop him.
In the next second, the floor shook with another kind of invasion.
GDA agents emerged through the corridor, special weapons raised, tactical visors lit, boots crushing glass and metal as they occupied the room in formation. Small drones entered right behind them, casting red lights over the targets still standing.
"Everyone on the ground!"
Isotope looked one last time at Machine Head.
Machine Head turned his metallic head toward him.
"No—"
The purple flash swallowed Isotope.
And he disappeared alone.
Mark launched himself at Furnace when the armor tried to reactivate its remaining flamethrower. Frost slid beside him at the same instant, spreading ice over the villain's metal arm. Mark completed the movement with a direct punch to the frozen joint.
The metal gave way.
Furnace fell to his knees.
On the other side, Robot immobilized Kursk with conductive cables, redirecting his electricity into rods driven into the floor. Dupli-Kate and Shrinking Rae helped the agents lock Tether Tyrant inside a reinforced capsule while the creature in his chest still writhed against the restraints. Mark quickly flew to the other side and held Magmaniac long enough for Frost to cover the floor around him with a thick layer of chemical ice that hissed into vapor, but held.
One by one, the villains stopped moving.
Machine Head was last.
He still tried to retreat toward his own desk, as if there were some hidden exit left among burned papers and broken screens. But two GDA agents immobilized him first, pinning Machine Head's arms behind his back and leading him to Cecil, who had just stepped out from behind the GDA strike team, calmly removing a chip from his head while others collected the defeated henchmen in special restraints.
Kai remained near the center of the room, now standing with difficulty, one hand braced against the broken wall.
Mark looked at him over his shoulder.
"You okay?"
Kai made a minimal gesture with his hand, as if saying he was still in one piece.
It did not look convincing.
But it was enough for now.
The paramedics arrived with stretchers, rushing to stabilize Monster Girl and remove a severely injured Black Samson to the ICU, as well as assisting the other heroes.
Outside, sirens rose through the city.
Inside the destroyed office, Machine Head's empire ended among ice, smoke, twisted metal, and GDA agents taking away what was left.
Grayson House — 7:22 PM
The water in the Graysons' sink was still pink when Mark turned off the faucet.
He stared at his own reflection for half a second, saw the eye beginning to darken, the cut on his lip, the mark on his jaw, and the clean shirt Debbie would probably ask why it was wrinkled before he had even left the house.
Behind him, Kai pressed a piece of gauze against the side of his abdomen. The wound was not deep. Not even close. But his body still felt heavy on the inside, as if every use of the Void had left a hidden weight between his ribs.
"That's crooked," Mark observed through the mirror.
Kai looked at the badly secured bandage, then at his brother.
"You're limping and you want to criticize my medical work? You should've stayed there with the GDA, then."
"I'm just saying it looks like you stuck that on in the dark."
"Close enough."
A few minutes later, they were in the sky again.
No uniforms.
No masks.
None of the absurd speed from before.
This time, they flew low enough to avoid attention, fast enough not to make the delay worse, and for the first time, Mark saw his brother still slightly breathless, struggling to keep up with him.
Beckwell Community Center — November 20th, 2015 — 7:38 PM
When they landed in an alley near the community center, the city looked completely normal.
Cars passed. People crossed the street carrying bags. A bus stopped at the corner, releasing a mechanical sigh before moving on. From inside the building came the muffled sound of voices, plates, hurried footsteps, and some low music playing through old speakers.
Mark ran his fingers through his hair, tugged the collar of his shirt a little higher, and looked at the strip of light spilling from the glass door. Kai simply followed him.
The two stood still for a moment.
Mark turned his face first.
Kai looked his brother up and down without the slightest mercy.
"You look like trash." His gaze stopped on Mark's face. "Your eye's black, by the way."
The corner of Mark's mouth lifted, even though the cut opened a little more.
"Same to you." He shoved Kai's shoulder lightly. "Asshole."
Kai returned the faint smile, small and tired.
"Be ready for the lecture."
Mark looked at the door.
His expression already carried the defeat of someone who would rather face Battle Beast again than explain this.
"Yeah. I know."
The two went inside.
The Beckwell Community Center was too warm inside, too crowded, too alive. The smell of simple food filled the hall: rice, sauce, vegetables, stewed meat, old coffee, and cheap cleaning product. Folding tables occupied almost the entire space, with families, elderly people, children, and volunteers moving between them.
Near the kitchen, Amber was carrying an empty tray with the rigid posture of someone holding her patience by the edges.
She saw them at once.
The fury came before any word.
Her face closed. Her shoulders rose. The tray was set down on the counter with enough force to draw the attention of an elderly woman sitting nearby.
Amber crossed half the hall toward them.
"Do you two have any idea how late you are?"
Mark opened his mouth.
Nothing came out.
Amber got close enough to continue, her finger already rising, the whole scolding ready in her throat.
Then she saw.
Really saw.
Mark's eye was black. The cut on his lip still had a red line near the corner.
Her gaze slid to Kai.
The anger disappeared from her face as if someone had switched off a light.
Kai was too pale. Not pale like someone who had lost a night's sleep. Pale like someone who had pushed his body to the limit and was still standing only out of stubbornness. There was a badly done bandage showing under his collar whenever he moved, and the cut on his lip matched Mark's far too well to look like a coincidence.
Amber lowered her finger.
"What happened?"
Mark ran a hand over the back of his neck.
"Yeah..."
Kai glanced sideways at him.
Mark looked back with the empty expression of someone who had forgotten every possible lie on the way there.
"It was..." Mark started, but the sentence died before taking shape.
Amber crossed her arms again, but now the gesture had no fury in it. It had worry trying to pretend it was control.
"Mark."
"Traffic accident," Kai cut in before his brother could make everything worse.
Amber turned to him at once.
Kai held her gaze with the most neutral face he could put together, even though his breathing was still a little heavy.
"It wasn't serious."
Amber looked at Mark's black eye. Then at Kai's crooked bandage. Then back at Mark.
"This is your version of not serious?"
Mark slowly raised both hands as if dealing with a bomb.
"We're fine."
"You're limping."
"Just a little."
"Mark."
Amber closed her eyes for a second, breathing in through her nose. When she opened them again, there was less anger and more fear.
Eve appeared behind her before the conversation could fully turn into an interrogation.
The tray in her hands was forgotten between her fingers.
Her eyes widened when she saw the two of them.
Not like Amber.
Amber saw injuries without context.
Eve saw what was behind them.
She knew.
Invincible and Infinity had just come back from something brutal.
And to injure both of them, she knew it had to be something bigger than a Flaxan alien invasion in the middle of the city.
Eve approached, forcing her expression to soften before Amber could notice her own reaction.
"You two look awful."
Kai looked at her.
"Thank you, Nancy Drew. I thought we were presentable."
Eve stared at his crooked bandage for half a second.
"You failed."
Amber looked between the three of them.
"So it was a traffic accident?"
The silence lasted just a little longer than it should have.
Eve stepped in with careful naturalness, setting the tray on the table beside her.
"Look, whatever it was, they're standing. And we need to finish here."
Mark gave her a weak smile.
Amber let out a breath, annoyed that she was still worried and too worried to stay properly angry.
"That's true."
Eve grabbed a clean towel from a nearby pile and tossed it to Mark. Then she picked up another and handed it to Kai with a look that said more than her expression showed.
"At least you got here before everything was over."
Amber began explaining where they needed help. The night still had dishes to wash, tables to clean, and excuses far too bad to survive for very long.
But for now, they were there.
Late.
Injured.
For the rest of the night, they were just two teenagers washing dishes, pretending the blood on their clothes came from nowhere, trying to hold onto a fragile normal life. But beneath that disguise, a new truth remained.
Somehow, they had shown that together, the Viltrumite duo was stronger than even one of the greatest warriors in space could imagine.
Interlude — Not Everything Is What It Seems
Later That Night — Machine Head's Commercial Building — 10:47 PM
The elevator opened on the upper floor with a sound far too clean to match the state of the place.
Titan stepped out first.
There was still dust in the air.
Machine Head's office, immaculate only hours earlier, now looked like the inside of a building hit by artillery. The side wall remained open to the Chicago night, letting the wind cut through the floor and drag burned papers across the ground. Broken glass cracked under shoes. Fire marks blackened the carpet. The twisted metal of desks, partitions, and expensive equipment formed uneven piles between craters opened in the floor.
Titan walked slowly through the middle of the destruction.
Isotope appeared beside him in a purple flash, hands in his pockets, his eyes running over the room with a mix of discomfort and admiration.
"The place is a wreck." He lightly kicked a deformed piece of metal, which slid a few inches before stopping. "Whatever you said to convince those two to help you, it worked."
Titan stopped near Machine Head's broken desk.
For a few seconds, he only looked at the city through the hole in the wall. Down below, Chicago remained lit, indifferent, noisy, full of people who would never know exactly what had changed that night.
Or who had changed.
"I told the truth." His voice came low, firm. "That I'm going to make this city better."
Isotope turned his face toward him, but found no ready joke to answer with.
Behind them, the elevator sounded again.
The doors opened.
Vanessa stepped out first, holding their daughter's hand. Two guards came right behind them, more attentive to the corridor than to the destroyed office.
The girl let go of her mother's hand the moment she saw her father.
"Daddy!"
She ran across the floor full of glass, dodging debris with the confidence of someone who still did not really understand danger. Titan turned at once, his hard expression giving way before he had even crouched.
His daughter threw herself against him.
Titan held her carefully, as if the whole weight of the world fit inside that small embrace.
She looked over his shoulder at the destroyed office, then at the enormous view of the city.
"Are we going to live here now?" Her eyes shone. "This building is huge."
Titan ran a hand over her head, brushing a strand of hair away from her small face.
"We are." He stood with her in his arms and looked at his wife for a moment, as if the answer was for her too. "I'll show you everything."
The girl pointed at the broken wall.
"What happened to this room?"
Titan followed the gesture, staring at the hole open to the night, the broken furniture, the scattered glass, the shattered throne of a man who had thought he could predict everything.
"This floor is going to be renovated."
Isotope let out a low laugh through his nose.
With his daughter in his arms and his wife beside him, Titan crossed the ruined office as if he already owned it.
And that night, he did.