Micheal, Madison, Doug, and the others sat in The Resistance lounge. A TV played in the background as people communicated, played pool, argued, arm wrestled, and other activities that people would.
Doug sat lazily in the chair beside Micheal, feet propped up on the edge of the worn-out table. He flicked through channels with the remote, each one flashing past with the same dull static and low-budget programming. Micheal sat nearby, flipping through a wrinkled newspaper, his eyes glazed with half-interest.
Then Doug paused. His thumb hovered over the remote, he was frozen.
"Dude," he muttered, tapping Micheal on the shoulder without looking away. His voice was low, almost cautious.
Micheal sighed. "What is it?"
Doug didn't answer.
Micheal looked up, and saw it.
The screen showed a frantic news anchor sitting stiffly in front of footage of the mall. Smoke and rubble. Emergency responders pushing stretchers past collapsed walls. A caption blared across the bottom in red:
"REBEL ATTACK IN PARADISE MALL"
—Officials Confirm Civilian Damage and Structural Collapse—
The footage switched to surveillance clips: two blurry figures sprinting down an escalator. Then a shaky video of a fight against the police. Barley visible through the smoke and panic, but enough to catch shapes.
And then it cut to their faces. Shirley and Tucker.
Mugshot-style photos slapped next to the word "REBEL IDENTIFIED" in bold white letters.
The room went completely silent. Then Doug slowly lowered his feet off the table.
Around them, everyone else in the resistance lounge started reacting.
A woman near the wall let out a sharp gasp and dropped her drink, the can clattering to the floor. A guy playing cards at another table stood up, eyes wide. ZE210 muttered, "No way…" under his breath, staring at the screen.
Micheal clenched the paper in his hands without realizing it. "They put their faces on the news…"
"They're not hiding it anymore," Doug said quietly, eyes still glued to the screen. "They're calling them terrorists."
Another resistance member walked up and squinted at the screen. "Didn't they just leave for fun? What the hell happened?"
Madison in the back laughed under her breath.
AT THE UNDERPASS
Asura looked at Shirley and Tucker like pieces of trash. He walked up to them slowly. Their eyes were blood red with all the nerves in their body looking like they're about to pop out.
Their tounge stuck out like they were choking and trying to spit it out. Asura just looked at them in disgust. Out of nowhere Shirley and Tucker simultaneously snapped out of it.
They gasped for breath. Damn near clawing at the air. Asura then sent a low blow to Tucker sending him flying far from the underpass into a nearby river. Asura stared down at Shirley and said low and venomously, "Did you have a good laugh?"
Then suddenly, a blinding bolt of blue light shot down like a thunderstrike.
Cael dropped from the sky and met Asura's punch with his sword, the collision erupting in a violent shockwave that cracked the earth beneath them and blew trees apart in a 50-foot radius. Glass from windows blocks away shattered in a chorus of sharp pops.
The explosion of energy wasn't just raw power, it was pure chaos. Electrical arcs burst out in all directions, wild and feral. Cracks of lightning danced across the underpass.
From afar in the Land of Snow, CORE watched as the two battled it out. Their collisions striking lighting into the sky like fireworks.
Asura's fist trembled against Cael's. Sparks of energy crackled between them like stormfire trying to escape. The air became disoriented.
And then Asura spoke, voice low and purely bitter: "Why are you stopping me from finishing what you couldn't?"
Cael didn't flinch. Instead, he shoved forward and the two clashed again with a thunderous boom, louder and sharper than before. The shockwave shattered more of the ground beneath them, sending spiderweb cracks surging through the concrete. Bolts of electricity tore across the sky, turning day to strobe-lit chaos.
"I didn't fail," Cael growled through clenched teeth. "I let him go."
Cael stepped forward again, shoulders squared.
"All you do is prey on people weaker than you. Then you inflict strength presence on them. You're not fear. You're not power." His voice was cold, and sharp.
"You're a coward."
Then Asura's eyes narrowed into furious slits.
He didn't respond. Instead he crouched, growled like an animal, then launched himself back, charging power into his limbs. His fist howled through the air and unleashed a massive pressure wave, a roaring wall of force that ripped chunks of concrete out of the ground.
Cael was blasted backward, flipping mid-air but he didn't fall.
He caught himself mid-flight, aura flaring around him, Strength Presence snapped around his body, violent and barely restrained.
He raised his arm and swept it downward.
A blinding slash of electrical force screamed from the sky, carving straight toward Asura.
Asura raised one hand to block but the sheer weight of the attack shoved him backward, grinding his hooves into the earth, tearing up the pavement beneath him. His palm hissed and smoked, the outer layer of skin burned.
Asura and Cael then started moving faster than the human eye could see. Blowing up stuff. Small sparks of electricity and prensence flared. The sound of fist and sword clashing was sharp. They fought in blurs for about four minutes until they clashed again sending an energy that blew everything away and destroyed the underpass.
Shirley lay crumpled against the pavement, lungs burning, ears ringing from the last shockwave. The world was spinning.
He tried to sit up, but pain stabbed behind his eyes. Everything was blurry, concrete dust, flashes of light, and two figures trading blow
for blow.
Then a figure leapt from the river in a blur and was soaked. Tucker, his hair was drenched, feet cracking against the ground on impact, and dragging behind him a massive log like it weighed nothing.
"Shirley!" Tucker shouted, urgency cutting through the chaos. "Get up! Come on! This is our chance!"
Shirley groaned and staggered to his feet, clutching his head. "You… you swam here?!"
"No time," Tucker snapped. He shoved the log into Shirley's arms. "Take this. Beat him with it."
Shirley blinked. "What?"
Tucker leaned in, pressing his forehead to Shirley's as he whispered fast, "Go for the flank. Swing till it breaks. Once it does, I'll hit him with everything I've got."
Shirley didn't fully understand, but he didn't argue.
He took the log and staggered toward Asura, who stood in the middle of the broken underpass. Cael had vanished into the sky again, maybe regrouping, but the Crimson Warden was still standing, smoldering, half-burned and furious.
Shirley didn't hesitate at all, he ran full speed and swung the log over his shoulder like a sledgehammer.
The log shattered on contact with Asura's back. Splinters exploded into the air like fireworks.
Asura didn't flinch. He simply turned his head, those haunting yellow eyes locking on Shirley like prey.
But right then, Tucker blurred behind him.
Lightning-fast, his fist cocked back, glowing bright red with Presence—Strength Presence so dense it rippled the air around it.
Tucker shouted, voice echoing across the rubble:
"I GET THE LAST LAUGH! HAHAH!"
A surge of energy flared around him, his body momentarily glowing like it was igniting from the inside out. In a split second, all of his remaining stamina, every last drop, condensed into that strike.
He drove it into Asura's chest. Launched like a missile, the Crimson Warden rocketed through a concrete pillar, crashed through a pile of debris, and vanished into the haze.
Tucker staggered back, chest heaving, and collapsed to one knee. His arms trembled, his eyes glazed. That one attack had taken everything.
Shirley stared at him, stunned.
"…What the hell was that?"
Tucker gave a tired smile. "Quick Reset. Burn everything in the tank for one last hit."
He dropped to the ground, he was out cold.