The Beach - Coast of Cuba
"Die!"
Wonder Woman could no longer bear the smirk on Ernst's face.
Her body moved like a phantom, a blur of red, blue, and gold. She closed the distance instantly and threw a devastating punch aimed squarely at Ernst's chest.
Ernst didn't evade. Instead, he braced himself, widening his stance.
He made a split-second decision. He refrained from using his energy absorption ability, and Diana, perhaps out of warrior's pride, had kept her sword sheathed.
They met force with force. Ernst threw a counter-punch, his fist colliding directly with hers.
BOOM!
A shockwave exploded outward from the point of impact, kicking up a massive cloud of sand.
Wonder Woman, a demigod and daughter of Zeus, possessed a formidable, naturally divine body.
However, Ernst's body had been artificially evolved, fortified over a decade by the energy converter.
The collision sent them both staggering backward.
Diana's boots dug trenches into the sand. She took three heavy steps back and halted, her balance perfect.
Ernst, however, was thrown back further. He retreated five or six steps, his boots sliding across the beach before he barely regained his footing.
The outcome did not surprise him.
He had been using his technological enhancements for only ten years, whereas Diana had been harnessing her divine blood for centuries.
He knew his raw durability lagged slightly behind hers, but his body strengthening was an ongoing, exponential process.
He was destined to surpass her eventually.
As Wonder Woman stabilized herself, she wasted no time.
She lunged forward, throwing another punch, faster this time.
This time, Ernst didn't meet her head-on. He skillfully evaded the full force of the blow, stepping back and moving with the wind like a willow branch.
Swiftly, he reached out, parried her strike, grabbed her armored forearm, and used her own momentum to swing her around, throwing her forcefully toward the tree line.
Without waiting for her to land, Ernst pursued her like a cyclone, aiming to capitalize on her momentary vulnerability.
However, Wonder Woman wasn't a novice.
Twisting acrobatically in mid-air, she landed in a half-kneel, her shield already raised to stabilize herself.
She then willingly engaged Ernst. They collided again, fighting and tearing through the air.
Rumbling sounds echoed sporadically, like rolling thunder, but their incredible speed made it impossible for the onlookers to decipher the specific martial arts being used.
The X-Men could only infer the intensity of the battle through the shockwaves and the displaced sand and stones that pelted the beach.
Both Wonder Woman and Ernst deliberately moved their skirmish away from the grounded submarine and the X-Jet wreckage, ensuring their god-like brawl wouldn't accidentally obliterate the bystanders.
Ernst's sheer physical combat prowess astonished the X-Men.
They nervously sweated at the prospect of having to face him.
Fortunately, the mysterious Amazon had managed to pull his aggro, preventing the young mutants from becoming his victims.
"Act quickly!" Charles's voice suddenly rang directly in the minds of the X-Men, spurring them out of their awe.
"I can sense Shaw's mind through the reactor's interference. He is transforming himself into a nuclear bomb by absorbing the submarine's core. We must stop him!"
The consequences of Shaw detonating a nuclear payload would be catastrophic.
They couldn't afford to hesitate.
Hank McCoy (Beast), Erik (Magneto), and Alex Summers (Havok) all broke into a sprint toward the grounded submarine.
Azazel and Riptide immediately moved to intercept.
Azazel, exhibiting incredible speed, teleported directly behind Beast, materializing with a crack of displaced air, and attempted a swift knife strike to the kidneys.
Hank, who had recently injected himself with a serum derived from Mystique's DNA in a desperate bid to cure his mutation, had instead become entirely beast-like.
Covered in blue fur, his primal instincts were hyperactive.
He sensed the shift in air pressure, twisted with feline agility to avoid the blade, and swiped at Azazel with his razor-sharp claws.
Surprised by the Beast's quick response, Azazel instantly triggered his Space Guardian technique.
He phased into his virtual form. Hank's claws swiped harmlessly through empty air, passing right through Azazel's chest without making contact.
Simultaneously, Havok unleashed a concentrated red shockwave of plasma toward the Red Devil.
But once again, the blast passed through him as if he were a hologram.
Unfazed, Azazel advanced toward Beast, completely ignoring Havok's continuous blasts, aiming to incapacitate the blue mutant with a downward knife strike to the shoulder.
Hank, perplexed by the lack of physical resistance, realized Azazel was projecting an illusion from a pocket dimension.
As the dagger approached, just thirty centimeters from his shoulder, a sudden, sharp surge of danger jolted his instincts.
Ignoring evasion, Hank lunged forward. He intended to take the hit and catch Azazel's arm the moment the demon solidified to make the kill.
Realizing the unfavorable situation and the trap Beast was setting, Azazel aborted the strike.
He couldn't maintain his absolute advantage if he had to trade blows with a creature that strong.
With a BAMF, he retreated to a safe distance.
Hank, bewildered by the sudden change in dynamics, quickly deduced the mechanics of the fight.
Despite his bestial appearance, Hank remained one of the world's top scientific minds.
"Alex, keep an eye on him!" Hank shouted over the din of battle.
"He's hiding in another dimension. He has to reveal his true physical form when he actually attacks us. That is our only window to counter!"
Understanding the plan, Havok stopped firing wildly.
He positioned himself back-to-back with Beast, preparing to thwart the teleporter's next move.
Undeterred, Azazel altered his tactics.
He teleported directly between them, appearing in a crouch, and thrust his knife upward at Beast's ribs.
Hank's reflexes were astonishingly swift. He reached down, grabbing Azazel's wrist just as Havok spun around to unleash a blast.
However, Azazel countered by whipping his prehensile, spiked tail around Havok's neck.
With a thought, he utilized teleportation to shift all three of them into the air, dropping them, and then teleporting again before they hit the ground.
They appeared and disappeared in a disorienting blur of red smoke, making it incredibly challenging for the two young X-Men to pin the demon down.
Conversely, an aerial battle unfolded higher up between Angel Salvadore and Banshee (Sean Cassidy).
Angel displayed lethal agility, buzzing through the air on her iridescent dragonfly wings, spitting globes of highly corrosive acid.
Banshee, relying on his specialized glider suit to fly, had to constantly emit sonic screams downward to stay airborne.
This made his flight path predictable.
Despite the airborne nature of their conflict, Banshee was far more adept at ground combat; relying on his vocal cords for both thrust and attack left him vulnerable.
Angel's acid attacks, however, became less accurate as she grew tired and dizzy from the sonic vibrations filling the air.
This allowed Banshee to dodge a volley of acid, angle his body, and unleash a concentrated ultrasonic blast that struck Angel squarely in the chest, knocking her backward and sending her into a tailspin.
The dynamic shifted rapidly as they took turns chasing each other through the clouds, adding a bizarre, high-stakes element of tag to the deadly confrontation.
Meanwhile, on the ground, Erik and Riptide renewed their violent clash.
In their previous encounter in Miami, Riptide fell victim to the X-Men's sheer numbers.
But here, with the submarine grounded, the terrain favored him.
Transforming his lower half into a localized tornado, Riptide surged toward Erik.
The winds whipped the sand into a blinding, flesh-tearing storm.
Erik responded by ripping a massive sheet of hull plating from the submarine and wielding it as a shield against the abrasive winds.
Erik sprinted relentlessly toward the submarine's airlock, his eyes fixed on his ultimate goal: Shaw, the man in the reactor room.
As Shaw continued to absorb the nuclear energy, Riptide increased the wind force to hurricane levels to prevent Erik from taking another step.
Despite Riptide's overwhelming gale, Erik's rage provided him with limitless focus.
He magnetically anchored himself to the iron ore deep beneath the sand, dragging himself forward step by agonizing step, using the massive iron shield to split the wind.
Despite the intensified storm, Erik pressed forward, reached the hull, and tore the heavy steel airlock door off its hinges, infiltrating the submarine.
Riptide found himself in a tactical dilemma. He was acutely aware of Erik's formidable magnetic abilities and recognized that his own wind powers were at a severe disadvantage inside the confined, metal corridors of the sub.
He hesitated at the airlock. However, letting Erik reach Shaw and disrupt the plan would undoubtedly bring Ernst's wrath down upon him.
After a brief internal debate, Riptide gritted his teeth, dismissed his reservations, and decided to follow Erik into the dark submarine.
Just as Riptide neared the gaping hole in the hull, Erik, anticipating the pursuit, magnetically ripped a jagged, two-ton piece of iron piping from the upper deck.
He hurled it backward out of the airlock.
The iron struck Riptide squarely in the chest, hurling him backward and pinning him to the ground.
Though the beach's soft sand spared him from having his spine snapped, the sheer weight of the metal temporarily immobilized him.
The storm died down.
The exterior battlefield had reached a stalemate, but the true crisis was just beginning inside the submarine.
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