Viktor Kane stood in what used to be his underground research facility, breathing air that still tasted like melted steel and supernatural fire.
Twelve hours since the Montenegro girl had turned his life's work into abstract art. Twelve hours since she'd demonstrated exactly why the supernatural threat required more than private funding and government cooperation. Twelve hours since everything changed.
The elevator shaft was a twisted sculpture of metal and concrete, collapsed in patterns that defied conventional explosive damage. The laboratory levels had been reduced to slag and ash, every piece of equipment destroyed with surgical precision that spoke to power beyond human understanding.
Thirty-seven test subjects, gone. Decades of research data, vaporized. Twelve years of careful specimen collection and analysis, reduced to smoking ruins that would require environmental hazmat teams to make safe.
It should have been devastating.
