"Whoa, you can still move!"
A moment later, Goku's eyes lit up as he watched X-24 crawl back out of the dirt. The clone's neck had snapped back into place with a sickening wet crunch, and the bruising from the elbow strike vanished as if it had never been there.
To Goku, this was exactly what he needed. A fight that ended with one blow was boring—it offered no chance for growth or self-reflection. To reach the level of the masters he read about, he needed an opponent who could push him.
"Uncle Logan was right, you're definitely tough to deal with!"
Goku dropped into a low, focused stance—the signature foundation of the Turtle School. His playful demeanor vanished, replaced by the sharp, piercing gaze of a true martial artist.
"Jan-Ken-Pon!"
"Crazy Fist!"
"Monkey Fist!"
"Phantom Star Fist!"
Goku unleashed a relentless barrage of techniques, transitioning seamlessly from one style to another. He became a blur of motion, hitting X-24 from angles that defied physics.
Under this tactical onslaught, X-24 had zero room to breathe. He was treated like a living punching bag, bounced around the desert floor by strikes that carried the weight of a ton of bricks.
Logan, Gabriela, and the others watched with a surge of hope. On the other side of the clearing, Donald Pierce and Dr. Rice were breaking out in a cold sweat.
Goku's raw power was so overwhelming that X-24 couldn't even form a counter-attack, and his speed was beginning to outpace the human eye's ability to track.
However, as the minutes ticked by, the mood began to shift. Logan's expression grew heavy with concern, while a flicker of relief appeared on Rice's face.
No matter how many times X-24 was downed, no matter how much physical trauma his organs and muscles sustained, he recovered almost instantly. He was like an unkillable cockroach, snarling and rising again and again to throw himself back into the fray.
Goku, meanwhile, was starting to show the first signs of exertion. His breathing wasn't as perfectly rhythmic as it had been at the start. While he was far from exhausted, a battle of attrition favored the one who didn't stay broken. If this continued until Goku ran out of energy, they were all dead.
"Give me the gun."
Logan whispered to Gabriela, taking the pistol she had confiscated from her boyfriend. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a single, heavy round—an Adamantium bullet.
It was the bullet he had saved for himself. He had planned to use it as his final exit once Charles was gone, a permanent solution for a man who couldn't die naturally.
Now, it was their only insurance policy. Only an Adamantium projectile had the density to pierce X-24's Adamantium skull and scramble his brain, ending the threat or at least erasing his persona.
But just as Logan loaded the chamber, the rhythm of the fight changed again.
Goku sent X-24 flying with a heavy roundhouse kick, then stopped and scratched his head.
"You aren't my match," Goku said seriously. "You should give up. If you don't, I'm going to have to use a much stronger move. If I do that, I can't promise you'll stay alive."
After ten minutes of fighting, Goku realized this "master" lacked any real martial spirit. He didn't learn, he didn't adapt; he just bled and recovered. The fight had lost its meaning. Goku decided it was time to end it.
"AARRGH!"
X-24 responded with a guttural, animalistic roar. He didn't understand the concept of surrender. He charged again, claws extended, a mindless engine of destruction.
Goku sighed, his posture shifting. He began to draw his hands back to his side, cupping them together. He was a martial artist, not an assassin. His late Grandpa Gohan and Master Roshi had taught him that life was precious.
Even against villains, he preferred to show mercy if there was a chance for redemption. When he had destroyed the SUVs earlier, he had aimed for the engines, not the drivers.
But X-24 was beyond reasoning. To honor the fight and protect his friends, Goku decided to show him his full power—a final mark of respect for a stubborn opponent.
"KA... ME... HA... ME..."
A terrifying aura began to swirl around Goku. Blue-white energy condensed between his palms, compressing into a high-density orb that emitted a blinding, heavenly light. The air around him began to hum and crackle with ozone.
"...HA!!!"
A massive pillar of energy erupted from Goku's hands, a roaring torrent of pure power that engulfed the charging X-24 completely.
"What... what is that?"
Logan and Rice stood paralyzed, their minds unable to process the spectacle. They had seen many things in the age of mutants, but they had never seen energy manipulated with such precision and raw magnitude.
"It's like Scott... or Alex," Professor X whispered from the car, his eyes wide.
He was referring to Scott Summers (Cyclops) and his brother Alex (Havok), who could both fire devastating energy beams. But this was different. Goku possessed god-like physical strength, illusionary speed, and now a destructive energy projection.
It was as if he had three high-level mutant gifts rolled into one body—a rarity even in the golden age of the X-Men.
The Professor knew that even Scott's beams struggled to kill a high-tier regenerator like Logan. Wolverine had once survived a nuclear blast and the molecular deconstruction of the Phoenix. He expected X-24 to emerge charred but healing.
A second later, his jaw dropped.
As the light of the Kamehameha faded, there was no screaming clone. There was no flesh. Standing in a smoldering crater was nothing but a gleaming, polished skeleton of Adamantium, the metal bones fused together in a silent, macabre statue. Every cell of organic matter had been vaporized instantly.
X-24 was dead.
The Professor couldn't tell if it was because the clone's healing factor was inferior to Logan's, or if Goku's energy was simply so powerful that it bypassed the concept of healing entirely by leaving nothing left to heal.
"No... it's impossible..." Dr. Rice collapsed to his knees, his face ashen. "My 24... destroyed by a brat? There must be a mistake... a calculation error..."
"Doctor, we have to go! Now!"
Donald Pierce was the first to snap out of the shock. He grabbed Rice by the collar, hauling him toward the command truck in a desperate bid to escape.
Logan's eyes snapped to the fleeing villains. "They're the ones responsible! Son, don't let them get away!"
"You bad guys aren't going anywhere!"
Goku remembered Gabriela's stories of the children suffering in the labs. His face hardened with a rare flash of anger. He didn't even need to move. He simply pointed a finger at the retreating truck.
"Dodon Ray!"
A thin, concentrated needle of yellow energy shot from his fingertip. It struck the truck's fuel tank with surgical precision. The vehicle erupted in a massive fireball, the shockwave tossing Pierce, Rice, and the remaining mercenaries through the air like ragdolls.
The Dodon Ray was a technique Goku had picked up after his battles with the assassin Tao Pai Pai. While it lacked the wide-scale destruction of the Kamehameha, it was faster to deploy and used far less Ki.
Seeing the villains incapacitated by the blast, Logan didn't hesitate. He unsheathed his claws and began to limp toward the wreckage. He was going to ensure that the Institute never bothered them again. He was going to end this cycle once and for all.