Ophelia sat at the edge of the bed, her fingers lightly resting beside Ethan's hand. Suddenly, she felt his fingers twitch.
Ophelia stood up instantly, her heart skipping a beat as she leaned over the young man. Ethan's brow was furrowed, his lips parting as a low, raspy murmur escaped his throat.
Ophelia lowered her ear inches from his mouth, listening intently.
"Mother... Father..." Ethan whimpered softly, as cold sweat beaded across his forehead.
Ophelia gently placed her palm against his cheek, brushing away the perspiration with a soft, soothing touch.
"Shh... rest now," Ophelia whispered into his ear, her voice dripping with warmth. "Don't worry, Ethan. Your father is safe... and he is coming for you."
As if her voice reached through the dark fog of his consciousness, Ethan's facial features gradually relaxed, his heavy breathing settling into a steady, peaceful rhythm once more.
Ophelia pulled back and sat in the couch beside the bed. She glanced down at her phone,
Damian..., she thought, staring at the blank screen. Ethan is waiting for you.
Meanwhile, inside Dr. Philip's Manor.
Who the hell is this guy? Scorpion thought, his eyes fixed on the unknown man standing calmly.
Cheetah's knuckles turned white as she flexed her mechanical claws. "Philip really thinks he can fool us with just one man?"
Without another word, Cheetah lunged forward, her claws tearing through the air in a lethal cross-pattern.
Damian didn't even shift his stance. With effortless, precision, he tilted his torso back, letting her razor-sharp blades pass a millimeter from his chest. Cheetah's eyes widened in sheer disbelief at his evasion speed.
Before she could recover her balance, Scorpion pulled the trigger of his custom high-caliber hand cannon. Damian ducked beneath the muzzle flash, the armor-piercing round obliterating the wall behind him. In the fraction of a second it took Scorpion to re-acquire his target, Damian was already gone.
Scorpion felt a sudden, freezing chill run down his spine. The air behind him grew heavy.
If I turn around right now... I'm dead...,Scorpion realized, his body completely locking up.
Damian raised his right fist, aiming a devastating blow directly at the base of Scorpion's skull. Scorpion squeezed his eyes shut, bracing for impact.
Instead of a fatal strike, Damian's hand shot past his ear, grabbing the heavy steel barrel of Scorpion's hand cannon. With a sickening crunch of warping Chromium metal, Damian crushed the reinforced frame in his bare palm, bending the high-grade barrel double like a piece of tin foil.
"You could hurt someone with this," Damian said mildly, releasing his grip.
Scorpion dropped the ruined firearm and back-flipped away, landing in a defensive stance next to Cheetah, his heart hammering against his ribs.
Who is this monster?!
Cheetah stared in utter horror at the twisted piece of metal lying on the floor.
That was a custom, anti-armor prototype frame... He bent it with pure grip strength?! Where on earth did Philip find someone like this?!
Scorpion tapped his comms, his voice cracking slightly. "We need reinforcements in the east corridor!"
Through the earpiece, static crackled violently before Stinger's pained voice cut through. "Scorpion... we're a little busy over here!"
Across the central courtyard, Stinger slammed back-first into a load-bearing concrete pillar, shattering the masonry into a web of deep cracks. Blood trickled from the corner of his mouth as he looked up.
Zero blurred forward, unleashing a supersonic barrage of palm strikes against a towering, broad-shouldered opponent clad in worn combat fatigues.
The man—Alexander—didn't even flinch. Moving with terrifying fluidity, Alexander caught Zero's lead wrist mid-strike, hoisted her airborne by her arm, and slammed her violently into the reinforced floor.
"You amateurs really thought you could breach this facility?" Alexander sneered, towering over her. "Do you even know who you're standing against?"
"Don't know, don't care," Zero spat, flipping back onto her feet and snapping her arm-mounted wrist-blade into position.
She charged again, but Alexander dodged her thrust with practiced ease, slipping behind her guard and landing a brutal double strike to her spine. The kinetic shockwave launched Zero twenty feet across the room, slamming her heavy into a three-centimeter-thick steel blast door.
Zero slid down to her knees, coughing up blood as she wiped her chin.
...should I...?
Back in the east corridor, Cheetah and Scorpion launched a simultaneous, pincer attack on Damian.
Damian sidestepped Scorpion's knife thrust, slipped under Cheetah's roaring claw arc, and found an opening in her stance. He delivered a straightforward, short-range knee directly into Cheetah's stomach.
BOOM!
A visible shockwave of compressed air detonated from the point of impact, blowing back the surrounding dust and debris.
Cheetah was lifted off her feet, crashing into the far wall and sliding down, her eyes rolling into the back of her head as she barely retained consciousness.
Damian lowered his knee, he looked at his knee as he felt something strange.
Tch... I'm still weaker than my normal self.
Scorpion charged from behind, his katana flashing in the dim light. Damian pivoted smoothly, dodging the incoming steel, reaching through the blade's path to lock his fingers around Scorpion's throat. Lifting the elite operative off his feet with one arm, Damian pulled back his right fist, winding up a knockout strike.
Meanwhile, T-Rex stood face-to-face with a massive, bald warrior whose upper body was covered in faded tattoos.
T-Rex narrowed his eyes to slits, his analytical instincts piecing the impossible puzzle together.
Wait... could it be... ?
Before T-Rex could finish the thought, the bald man lunged with blinding speed. T-Rex ducked backward by a hair's breadth, but a thin line of red burst open across his right cheek.
T-Rex thought, Now I understand....
Hearing the chaotic radio chatter of his squad getting systematically overwhelmed across all sectors, T-Rex keyed his open channel, his voice grave.
"DWO... do not lose your discipline!" T-Rex bellowed into the comms. "We are... we are against the former members of DWO Unit!"
Even Terminator froze for a second inside the laboratory, his glare sweeping toward Dr. Philip, who sat casually on the observation steps above.
"You... you absolute demon!," Terminator growled, his voice vibrating with pure rage.
Stinger struggled to his feet, shielding Zero as Alexander stepped forward. "What do you mean, Vice-Leader?! Old members?!"
"Philip... you should have let them rest in peace!" Terminator roared, his aura flaring so violently that the surrounding glass consoles shattered. "WHAT DID YOU DO TO THEM?!"
T-Rex's voice cut through the comms, somber and heavy. "They were once our brothers-in-arms... Aaron, known as Mr. Bald, and Alexander. We were told they died alongside our fallen battalion eighteen years ago."
A horrified silence fell over the entire DWO squad.
Over the manor's public address system, Dr. Philip broke into a hysterical, echoing laugh.
"HAHAHAHA! What's the matter, boys? Do you like my little resurrection surprise?!" Philip mocked, his voice echoing through every speaker.
"Don't flatter yourselves though—I only managed to recover Mr. Bald and Alexander! As for that man, Damian, he is someone else!"
Inside the east corridor, Damian's fist stopped an inch from Scorpion's face.
What? Damian thought, his mind racing as Philip's words echoed overhead.
...their former comrades...? Philip... is?
A cold wave of disgust washed over Damian.
Is this the man I just agreed to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with? Is this what he meant by protecting his family?
Damian's grip loosened, dropping the coughing Scorpion onto the floor.
What the hell am I doing? I should be finding Ethan. My Son, Ethan! Damian thought to himself, standing still amidst the chaos.
At that moment, inside the main laboratory:
Terminator drew his heavy tactical broadsword, blurring across the room toward Philip in a flash of raw, murderous intent.
"I will end you."
Philip didn't retreat. Reaching into the nearby table, Philip unholstered an experimental high-frequency blade and brought it up in a crisp, military parry.
CLANG!!
The collision of super-dense metal generated a violent shockwave that wiped out everything and server rack in the room.
The two men locked blades, sparks flying between their faces as they pushed against each other in a raw contest of strength.
"I will bury you today, Philip!" Terminator snarled, forcing his weight forward.
"We'll see who buries whom, old man," Philip sneered back, his eyes gleaming with mad ambition. "Do you think I am still the researcher you all knew?! I am your Death."