Chapter 4: Steel Beneath Flesh
Part 6: Breaking the Body to Rebuild the Man
Training Chamber – Three Days Later
The bunker gym smelled of sweat, iron, and old blood. The floor mats were stained from weeks of punishment. In the corner, an old boom box played a low instrumental loop—slow, rhythmic, pulsing like a heartbeat.
Tom stood in the centre of the mat, shirtless, body covered in bruises and tape. His ribs were taped. His right shoulder bore a welt from a baton strike earlier that morning.
He faced a row of five mannequins rigged with impact sensors.
Ø LAYLA (observing): “You sure you’re ready for this again?”
Tom didn’t respond.
He cracked his neck, stepped forward, and unleashed.
Punches. Elbows. Kicks. Every strike was real, timed between pain and muscle memory. His gauntlets struck the sensor pads like thunder, a drumbeat of punishment. Sweat flew with every motion.
Ø MANNERS (from the bench): “You break my sensors again, I swear—”
Ø TOM: “Charge me later.”
Ø LAYLA: “You’re leaking blood again.”
Tom didn’t stop.
His breathing got heavier, ragged. He rotated and struck a spinning elbow that left one dummy spinning.
His body wasn’t keeping up. His left leg buckled.
He pushed harder.
Minutes Later – Collapse
Tom fell forward, catching himself on the mat, chest heaving.
He lay there, forehead pressed to the cold rubber, blood dripping from a reopened cut on his brow.
Ø LAYLA (approaching): “That’s enough.”
Ø TOM (panting): “Not yet.”
Ø MANNERS (kneeling beside him): “You can’t outrun your limits by punching them in the face.”
Ø TOM: “It worked on that last guy.”
Layla smirked despite herself. She gently slid her hand under his arm. “Come on. Sit up.”
They helped him back against the wall. His arms hung limp, but his eyes stayed sharp.
Manners handed him a water bottle. “You’re building strength too fast. That armor’s designed for a peak-condition fighter. Not a broken one.”
Tom drank. Slowly.
Ø TOM: “Then I’ll fix the broken.”
Later – Workshop Lounge
Layla sat on the floor with her back against a wall, nursing tea from a chipped mug. Manners sat beside her, half-asleep, soldering something with one eye closed.
Ø LAYLA: “You ever sleep?”
Ø MANNERS: “Only on Tuesdays.”
Ø LAYLA (smiling): “It’s Thursday.”
Ø MANNERS: “Well, that explains everything.”
Layla set her mug down and looked at him.
Ø LAYLA: “You know what you’re doing for him, right?”
Ø MANNERS: “I’m keeping his lungs in his chest. His brain in his skull. Usual stuff.”
Ø LAYLA: “You’re giving him something to believe in.”
Ø MANNERS (quiet): “So are you.”
Their eyes met.
No jokes this time.
Just the weight of shared exhaustion. Shared responsibility. Shared care.
She leaned her head on his shoulder.
He didn’t flinch.
Ø LAYLA (softly): “You ever wonder if we’re in too deep?”
Ø MANNERS: “Only every time he suits up.”
Ø LAYLA: “And still we stay.”
Ø MANNERS: “Because we’re the ones who care. The world forgot him. We didn’t.”
Ø LAYLA (smiling faintly): “God help us.”
Back in the Gym – Midnight
Tom stood alone.
He faced the mirror. Shirt off. Arms shaking. Bruised. Raw.
And smiling.
Because for the first time in a long time, he felt closer.
Closer to the man he’d lost. Closer to the symbol he was becoming.
Behind him, the mask sat on the table.
Waiting.
Chapter 5
Part 1: The Son Who Builds
Interior – Lower Bunker, Midday
The smell of burned plastic and solder flux filled the lower floor of the bunker—affectionately nicknamed The Forge by Manners. Somewhere in the back, a 3D printer chirped, its heated nozzle moving with surgical grace.
Above it, seated cross-legged on a stool, hunched over a circuit schematic, was Manners’ son—a tall, awkwardly handsome teenager in his early twenties, glasses slightly fogged from the heat, fingers blackened with oil.
Ø Finn (muttering): “Armoured polymer reinforced with thermal-gel padding... okay, print that.”
His name was Finn Manners, but most people just called him “Manners Junior”—a title he loathed and secretly loved.
The console beeped. A piece of Tom’s upgraded mask rolled out—sleeker, narrower, with embedded AI-assisted breath filters and rebreather cycling tech.
He grinned.
Ø FINN: “Dad’s going to freak. But she’s gonna love it.”
Upstairs – Control Room
Tom sat hunched over a map, watching drone footage.
Layla paced nearby, holding a tablet.
Ø LAYLA: “Surveillance in Sector 6 just picked up a new player. No gang signs. No syndicate patches. Military posture. Who the hell recruits ex-SAS in Detroit?”
Ø TOM: “Someone planning to burn it all.”
Layla looked over. “You okay?”
Tom didn’t respond.
She walked behind him, placed a hand on his shoulder. “You haven’t talked about the alley yet.”
Ø TOM: “I lost control.”
Ø LAYLA: “You didn’t kill him.”
Ø TOM: “Doesn’t mean I didn’t want to.”
She squeezed his shoulder gently. “That’s why you wear the mask. Not to be more than you are—but to hold back what you could become.”
Interior – Workshop
Finn burst in.
Ø FINN: “Hey, hey, hey! Suit test time!”
Ø MANNERS (grumbling): “What did you break this time?”
Ø FINN: “Nothing. I improved something. Come on, come on—Remnant, you’re gonna love this.”
Tom raised an eyebrow.
Finn handed over the new mask. It was lighter, with sleeker contours. Inside: an expanded HUD interface, voice modulator, internal bone conduction mic, and something new—target tracking.
Ø TOM: “This is… impressive.”
Ø MANNERS: “You did this without my signoff?”
Ø FINN: “I made the design safer. More efficient. And cooler. Don’t pretend you don’t like it.”
Manners grunted. “He’s good.”
Ø LAYLA (smiling): “He’s better than good.”
Finn blushed a bit and gave her a small nod. “Also—new gloves. Steel alloy core. Triple-jointed. Shock pulse emitter now charges with kinetic movement. Basically, the more you hit, the more it hurts them.”
Ø TOM: “I like pain economics.”
Late Night – Simulation Room
Tom stood before a virtual opponent. This one was different.
Not Caleb. Not Harlan. Something built to overwhelm—its speed faster, reactions sharper.
Ø MANNERS (on intercom): “I upped the simulation. This thing’s called Vanta-9. Based off old strike team profiles, merged with AI predictive combat logic.”
Ø LAYLA: “You want him killed in there?”
Ø MANNERS: “I want him to fail. Because failure here means survival out there.”
Tom nodded inside the chamber.
The fight began.
Simulation Sequence – Vanta-9
The AI fighter struck like a phantom—slashing, sweeping, pinning.
Tom blocked high—got kicked in the ribs.
Countered low—punched in the jaw.
Dodged left—caught a blade to the arm.
The suit sparked, hissed, adjusted. But Tom wasn’t fast enough yet.
The room blinked red. Sim fail.
Tom hit the mat, breathing hard.
Ø MANNERS: “Again?”
Ø TOM: “Again.”
Ø LAYLA: “He’s been at this for two hours.”
Ø MANNERS: “Let him break.”
Ø LAYLA: “And if he doesn’t come back together?”
Ø MANNERS: “Then he was never whole to begin with.”
Part 2: The Pattern of Pain
Interior – Bunker Kitchen, Morning
A battered coffee pot hissed on the stove.
Layla sat at the counter, nursing a chipped mug, while Tom stood beside her in a half-zipped compression vest, bruises along his ribs still fresh.
Across from them, Finn shoveled cereal with the enthusiasm of someone who hadn’t been in a fight all week.
Ø LAYLA (softly): “You didn’t scream last night.”
Ø TOM: “Didn’t sleep.”
Ø FINN (mouth full): “You know, there are apps for that.”
Tom gave him a look.
Ø FINN: “What? Just saying. Meditation. White noise. Trauma recovery. It’s a thing.”
Layla smirked. “You ever lose a lung in a jungle with a cable around your ankle?”
Ø FINN (raising hands): “Alright, alright. Just trying to help.”
Interior – Caleb’s Hideout, Unknown Location
A dim room lit only by monitors.
Caleb stood at the window, shirtless, scars painting his back like jagged wings. In his hands: a combat staff, obsidian-black with modular extensions.
Behind him, a holographic projection cycled through facial recognition grids.
Tom’s face flickered—multiple angles, some from rooftops, some from body cams.
He stared at it. Unblinking.
Ø CALEB (murmuring): “Still breathing, brother. Still fighting the world that killed us.”
He turned, planting the staff beside him.
Ø CALEB: “Let’s see how long that lasts.”
Interior – Bunker, Training Room
Tom moved like a man trying to outrun death.
Every swing was faster. Every motion tighter. Layla circled him with padded gloves, testing his reflexes.
Ø LAYLA: “Left’s improving.”
Ø TOM: “I still lose in the sim.”
Ø LAYLA: “Sim doesn’t bleed. You do.”
He stopped, breathing hard.
She looked at him.
Ø LAYLA (softer): “You’re not just fighting Caleb, Tom. You’re fighting yourself.”
He lowered his hands.
Ø TOM: “And I’m losing both fights.”
Layla stepped closer.
Ø LAYLA: “Then let us fight with you.”
Interior – Manners’ Lab
Finn leaned over the katana’s blueprint. Manners stood behind him, silent for once.
Ø MANNERS: “You forged this?”
Ø FINN: “Steel-titanium fold. Hand-lathed hilt. Pressure-tested grip.”
Ø MANNERS (quietly impressed): “You even got the balance right.”
Ø FINN: “Been watching you.”
They both paused.
Ø FINN: “I want to help him too.”
Manners nodded. “Then we make him better than what broke him.”
He opened a cabinet—revealing a rack of AI memory cores.
Ø MANNERS: “We finish the simulation software. Let him fight ghosts until he becomes one.”
Comments (0)
See all