The rain was back.
It fell in slow, deliberate sheets across the rooftops of Blüdhaven, turning rusted metal and cracked concrete into a glistening maze.
Zane crouched beside the shattered vending machine, Karen tucked into his waistband, his breath fogging in the chill air. He wasn't shivering from the cold.
"Round two," he muttered.
Last time he managed to survive for quite a while before being killed, which means he has some room to maneuver.
All around the rooftop and three buildings nearby, he'd spent two days prepping. Trash, scrap, and pure spite formed a network of crude but nasty traps. It wasn't elegant, but it was clever. Zane's kind of clever.
At least he thinks so.
A broken antenna wrapped in copper wire and rigged to a stolen car battery. A tripwire linked to a crate of bricks balanced on a rooftop ledge. An old fuse box spliced into a rooftop puddle with stripped wires. A swinging pipe strung on a pivot. Hell, he'd even sacrificed one of his only batteries to jury-rig a timed decoy with a heat pack and his hoodie.
Every inch of this hellhole had a purpose now.
'Watching those videos in my last life really came in clutch.'
---
Thud.
Zane felt it before he heard it.
The rooftop across the street trembled. Rain scattered off the broad, armored silhouette that rose through the mist.
KGBeast.
Steam hissed from vents in his back. His red visor glowed. The modular gun-arm rotated — a heavy round chambered with a dull clunk.
Zane didn't blink.
The optics locked onto a bundled hoodie resting behind a rusted vent — a heat pad wrapped inside. A raccoon shifted beneath it, tail flicking, eyes glowing in the dark.
General Crunch bared his teeth.
" Huh...!" He walked a little closer to inspect...
The instant his boot landed on the gravel — right on top of a pressure plate masked under rooftop grit — the trap sprung.
SNAP-THWACK!
A steel pipe, strung between two old AC units by tension wire, whipped across the rooftop like a pendulum. Reacting just in time, KGBeast raised his metal arm to block.
CRUNCH!
His armor sparked as he was sent flying, crashing into a chimney vent, crushing it. Concrete splintered under his weight.
Across the way, Zane raised a hand in salute.
"Say hi to General Crunch."
KGBeast's fingers twitched. He rose, groaning. The gun-arm clicked into a new mode.
"Decoy. Heat-trickery. Crude… but effective," he muttered, voice low and mechanical.
---
KGBeast got up, slower this time.
His right arm twitched. The impact had damaged something.
Zane moved fast, jumping across rooftops, circling to Trap Point Two.
Beast followed the decoy trail. His vision adjusted, algorithms adapting.
But he didn't expect the shock.
When his foot hit the rooftop puddle, the live wire beneath it snapped to life.
ZZZZT!
The jolt wasn't fatal, but it shorted one of his targeting systems and locked his left leg for three seconds.
Zane popped out from behind a vent, fired once with Karen.
BLAM!
It pinged off his raised arm, but that wasn't the point.
The echo drew Beast's attention—a flaming Molotov was thrown right at him.
CRASH!
The bottle broke and fire quickly spread across his body.
KGBeast snarled, his arm realeased a coolant gas, putting out the flames. Luckily his suit was flame resistant, so it didnt got through.
Using this brief window, Zane fired straight for his visor.
However, KGBeast was not someone to be trifelled with. He's one of the few that can fight batman hand to hand.
Ducking under the bullets, he moved with great speed. His free hand reaching into his pouch and grabing a small marble device, before throwing it at Zane.
It a blinding flash exploded mid air, stinging Zanes eyes.
BANG!
What followed were bullets right into his chest. Heart punctured.
"That's one," he hissed.
---
Death #2:
Zane tried to reset a trap mid-fight.
KGBeast cornered him on a stairwell.
"You improvise like a cornered animal," KGBeast said coldly. " Zhis ends now.".
"Target locked."
BOOM.
---
Respawn.
Zane gasped awake, rain still falling, heart pounding.
"Okay. Don't fix traps while the murder terminator is loose. Noted."
He moved quicker this time.
Adapt. That was the game.
---
Death #3:
He underestimated the grenade launcher module.
Zane turned a corner and was greeted with a concussive blast to the chest.
Ribs shattered. Organs failed. Lights out.
---
Respawn.
Zane wheezed on the rooftop.
"Gotta love checkpoints..."
The third time through, he moved like a ghost.
Each trap hit harder, each dodge more precise.
He was starting to see patterns—the timing, the lag between KGBeast's targeting updates, the micro-delays in his step when damaged.
And then, during one grapple on a fire escape, KGBeast caught him.
His metallic fingers clamped around Zane's chest, crushing him slowly.
"You've made this harder than it needed to be," he said. "Cadmus wants you breathing. I disagree."
Zane felt his vision blur.
But something inside pulsed.
Time slowed.
He saw every detail—every drop of water, every spark on the cybernetic wrist.
His veins glowed faint purple.
A whisper tickled his mind.
"You don't want to die yet."
Zane's arm jerked, twisting unnaturally. Fingers clawed into Beast's wrist and yanked. With a metalic crunch, he completley snapped off his metal hand.
Leaving them both staring in shock as he dropped three stories.
Blackness.
---
Respawn.
Zane stared at his arm.
"What the hell was that?"
It looked normal. But something was changing. Something deep.
He shook it off. No time.
---
He baited KGBeast into the final rooftop.
Three traps remained.
Tripwire. Shock plate. Water tower.
KGBeast took the bait. Even damaged, even furious, he charged.
"No backup. No extraction. No escape," he said, voice ragged.
Zane ran.
The tripwire tangled the beast's leg. He stumbled.
The shock plate locked his knee.
And then Zane turned, aimed Karen at the final trigger wire.
One bullet left.
"Let's make it count."
BLAM.
The wire snapped.
The rooftop water tower tipped.
CRASH!
Steel. Water. Gravity.
" Dammit!."
KGBeast was buried under thousands of gallons and several tons of debris.
As it hit, his last words barely escaped: "You damm American Rat."
Zane barely grabbed a ledge before he fell too.
He dangled, coughing.
"That... was too close. Fighting someone with intellegence that can adjust on the fly is really annoying."
You should know, that not all his traps worked. After all, after falling to one, he started taking things seriously....scanning his surroundings...not falling for the obvious ones.
So he had to be creative with how he hide the traps.
It was a tough fight.
---
Later
Rain cleared.
Zane stood over the wreckage.
KGBeast's body was twisted, his red visor flickering.
Zane stared looting the corpse, as a hobo, that was a requirement. Visor, grenades, flash bangs, even his arm.
He doubts there would be tracking implanted on his equipment. At least Cadmus couldn't.
He didnt work for Cadmus after all, he was just a hired gun. At least In the comics he was.
He stared at his reflection in a puddle.
His eyes flickered purple.
Just for a second.
He grinned.
"One day... hopefully i can beat guys like him without a plan.".
---
From a distant rooftop, the Cadmus drone locked in silently.
Target: Subject 069
Status: Active
Behavioral Pattern: Strategic Escalation
Neurological Activity: Elevated
Below, the alley was a mess of rubble and scorched concrete. KGBeast — mercenary, killer, and paid professional — lay sprawled in a heap of twisted metal and torn gear. His cybernetic arm sparked weakly, the optic visor shattered. He hadn't stood a chance.
Zane crouched beside the corpse, steam rising off his rain-soaked coat. With practiced hands, he stripped parts from the body — a power cell here, a reinforced lens there — whatever he could use.
Analysis: Subject anticipated KGBeast's approach
Likelihood of coincidence: <4%
Brain activity suggests high-tier strategic foresight
The drone's lens narrowed.
A scavenger shouldn't have been able to predict and execute an ambush that lethal — not against someone like KGBeast.
Conclusion: Subject 069 is evolving
Recommended Action: Escalation Approved
A new directive pulsed through Cadmus command channels.
Project KR ( Clone 13 ): Activation Authorized
Authorization: Active Retrieval or Termination
Target: Subject 69
------
Lightning flashed across the city skyline.
Zane stood, stowing the stolen gear in his coat. Somewhere beneath the surface, his expression twisted into something unreadable.
"Whats your next move?"