“Drive. Drive!” Zane slammed the car door behind him, breathless and wild-eyed.

Yamada didn’t ask. Tires screeched as the black car lurched forward, vanishing into the night.

Zane glanced into the side mirror—and his stomach dropped.

“No shot… no actual way—”

The veteran sprinted out of the apartment complex like something out of a nightmare, trench coat flaring, metal arm gleaming under the streetlights.

“Holy shit,” Zane muttered, pointing. “He’s running. On foot. That’s not a person; that’s a Terminator in cosplay.”

Yamada swerved around a corner.

“Did we lose him?” Zane asked, his voice halfway between a joke and a prayer.

Yamada didn’t answer.

Zane checked the mirror again. “Nope. No—WAIT.”

A hundred meters ahead, the veteran appeared in the road, standing dead center like a final boss cutscene come to life.

Zane gaped. “No. No. Absolutely not. Run him over. I’m giving you full permission, moral and legal—that thing is not human.”

Yamada hesitated—just a split second.

It was enough.

The veteran lunged forward, moving like a bullet wrapped in flesh. In one impossibly fluid motion, he vaulted over the hood, crashed through the windshield with his metal arm, and ripped Zane clean through the roof like a claw machine winning its prize.

Zane barely had time to scream.

The veteran leapt off the car, landing on a nearby rooftop with Zane slung over his shoulder like a duffel bag full of regret. In a blink, they were gone.

Yamada skidded to a halt. The silence that followed was deafening.

He stepped out slowly, looked at the mangled roof, then pulled out his phone and dialed.

It rang once.

Then came Kimiko’s voice, sharp and already suspicious. “Yamada?”

“Miss Kimiko…” Yamada said, choosing his words like defusing a bomb. “I believe I may have… lost Mr. Zane.”

A beat of silence.

Then: “You WHAT?”

Zane elbowed wildly, flailing against the iron grip around his torso.

“PUT ME DOWN—unless this is foreplay, in which case I need a safe word!”

The veteran hurled him like a sack of potatoes. Zane bounced across the concrete and rolled to his feet, barely staying upright.

“Dude,” Zane panted. “Be gentle?!”

The veteran landed a few steps away. “Your power’s nothing I have seen before—and I need to know why.”

“I don’t know why! I just shoot lightning when people stress me out. Like a taser. With trauma, I guess.”

“Enough.” The veteran’s tone sharpened. “No more talking.”

His fist crashed forward. Zane ducked, lightning pulsing along his forearm as he retaliated with a sharp jab to the ribs.

The veteran didn’t flinch.

He retaliated with a brutal kick that sent Zane flying into a nearby dumpster. It crumpled like paper on impact.

Zane groaned, staggering to his feet. “Alright… definitely internal bleeding. And maybe external.”

“Keep talking, boy. You’re just making this more pleasant.”

Zane’s eyes sparked, fury igniting his veins. “You think this is easy? I don’t know what the hell’s going on, who you are, or why this suddenly feels like a rejected Marvel origin story!”

They clashed.

Lightning met steel. Fist met flesh. Every strike was a storm, each blow echoing down the empty city blocks. Zane fought like a man possessed—sloppy, furious, alive. But the veteran? He moved with surgical calm, decades of violence in every motion.

Zane stumbled back, breath ragged. His shirt was torn, his knuckles split. “Alright, alright. I lied again. This is… definitely not my third time.”

The veteran raised his mechanical arm, aiming a punch that would’ve snapped bones.

Zane darted under it, charging forward with a final burst of lightning—and tackled the man straight off the rooftop.

They crashed into an alley below, Zane hitting first, wind knocked out of him.

The veteran rolled up, barely fazed.

Zane coughed, blood on his lip. “And you’re not even winded. What are you, made of spite and protein powder?”

The veteran stepped forward, drawing a dagger from inside his coat.

Zane’s brow furrowed. “Wait, you brought props?”

“You talked more than you fought, boy,” he said gruffly. “But this is the end. At least go out with dignity. Take the blade, and finish it like a true warrior.”

Zane looked at the blade, then back at the veteran. “Yeah, that’s not happening.”

The veteran sighed, drawing the long, gleaming sword attached to his back. The moonlight caught its edge, illuminating the cold steel.

“Have it your way,” he said, raising the blade high.

Just as the sword came down, Zane’s eyes lit up with realization as he shouted, “Screw dignity,” grabbing the small blade and deflecting the strike with a desperate burst of strength, the clash of metal ringing through the empty night.

Zane, charging himself with lightning once more. The dark energy surged around him as he dashed away from the veteran.

But in his haste, Zane failed to notice the junkyard ahead. He collided head-on with a stack of rusted metal, the impact sending him sprawling to the ground. The world around him dimmed as consciousness slipped away.

The veteran stopped, watching Zane’s trajectory as he disappeared into the junkyard. He shook his head, muttering, “This little one causes me so much trouble.”

Inside the junkyard, a faint light flickered in the window of a rundown house at its center.

A figure stepped out of the shadows.

Kira

She moved quietly, her silhouette sharp against the moonlight—jacket slung over one shoulder, her boots crunching softly over gravel. Her blonde hair was tied up messily, a few tight braids tucked into the style like an afterthought.

She spotted him immediately.

Zane lay crumpled in the dirt, electricity still faintly pulsing from his fingertips. Burn marks laced his clothes, and blood clung to one side of his face.

The woman knelt beside him.

“What happened to you?” She muttered, brushing the dirt off his cheek with surprising care.

She looked around, the junkyard dead silent, as if the night itself were holding its breath.

With a grunt, she slipped her arms beneath Zane’s back and knees, lifting him with a strength that didn’t match her lean frame. Sparks danced across his skin as their bodies touched, but she didn’t flinch.

“I’ll fix you. Just… don’t die on me.”