With an uncharacteristic sense of unease, Logan flipped through the thick dossier Yashida had prepared for him...
As he pored over the photographs and documents, the floodgates of his memory began to loosen.
In 1845, an unprecedented murder took place in the Northwest Territories of Canada...
One night, a drunken gardener shot and killed the master of the estate with a double-barreled shotgun. The shock of witnessing this triggered the mutant gene in young James, the master's son, causing bone claws to erupt from his arms, which he used to kill the murderer, Logan.
But the truth was far more twisted...
The dead gardener was actually James' biological father. The terrified child fled the estate and survived alongside his half-brother, Victor Creed.
Both were mutants, blessed (or cursed) with unnaturally long lifespans.
The two brothers fought in the American Civil War, the Battle of Verdun in World War I, the Normandy landings in World War II, and even the Vietnam War.
They had lived through the entirety of American history, until they were eventually recruited by one Colonel William Stryker and inducted into a black-ops military unit.
After one particularly brutal massacre, Logan (still known as James Howlett at the time) grew weary of the endless killing.
He deserted Stryker's team and retreated to the Canadian Rockies, where he worked as a lumberjack. It was there that he adopted the name 'Logan' and fell in love with a woman named Kayla, building a life with her.
Had the story ended there, it would have been a simple tale of a lone wolf finding peace. But reality rarely offers fairy-tale endings.
Kayla, codenamed 'Silver Fox', was also a mutant... and she had approached Logan with ulterior motives.
Around the same time, his long-lost brother, Victor Creed (aka Sabretooth), resurfaced, bringing a storm of trouble in his wake.
Betrayal, murder, and a web of conspiracies followed. Eventually, Logan was convinced by Stryker to undergo the Weapon X procedure, where his skeleton was infused with liquid Adamantium, transforming his bones into an unbreakable metal frame and replacing his bone claws with indestructible blades...
"I expended vast resources to track down that lumber camp in Canada, to retrieve Stryker's classified files, to piece together your past, the memories you lost." Yashida's voice was hoarse but intense, "Logan, immortality is no blessing. And I can take it from you."
The revelation hit Logan like a physical blow...
He had never known he had a brother, a lover, that he had been a super-soldier who fought in two world wars, possibly even alongside Captain America himself in the Howling Commandos.
All those faded half-remembered moments were stolen from him by an Adamantium bullet.
Stryker had tried to kill him, but instead, he had only erased Logan's past.
"I am not ready to die, but you are." Yashida's voice dragged Logan back to the present, "You could return to a normal life. Fall in love, have children, grow old, and die peacefully when your time comes..."
Logan set the dossier down. Ravaged by cancer, the frail old man lying on the hospital bed stared at him with desperate hunger, like a starving beast eyeing its prey.
The Wolverine knew that look all too well.
"Listen, I'm glad we met again. But I only came here to say goodbye."
As Logan turned to leave, Yashida's skeletal hand shot out, gripping his wrist with surprising strength.
"Everything I've built… it cannot crumble! This country needs me, Wolverine!"
But Logan didn't look back. He needed time to process the storm of memories now swirling in his mind.
Ironically, the lone wolf had spent decades searching for his past. Now that he had found it, he felt no joy... only confusion.
Outside, the storm raged on, lightning slashed across the sky like frenzied serpents. The world was swallowed in wind and rain...
...
"I thought Tokyo was supposed to be hot..." Sean muttered as he descended the steps.
The red-clad woman escorting him didn't understand the lame joke. She silently held a black umbrella over them both as rain lashed down.
The two slid into the waiting car, the driver pretending not to notice how the legendary 'Black Sky', the sole ruler of the Hand who was worshipped by legions of ninja, nestled comfortably against the man's chest...
"This city is drowning in shadows," Elektra murmured, listening to the steady rhythm of Sean's heartbeat.
After severing the Hand's Five Fingers, she had (under Sean's guidance) turned Hell's Kitchen into her personal kingdom alongside Wesley.
Simultaneously, she had been consolidating the Hand's vast influence.
Far from collapsing after its restructuring, the Hand had grown even stronger under centralized leadership; acquiring Rand Enterprises, and forging business ties with Yashida Pharmaceuticals…
As Sean had said: A single fist strikes harder than five fingers.
"Wesley mentioned unusual activity here in Japan," Sean mused, "At the time, I dismissed it as Yashida's publicity stunt for some new product, cell rejuvenation and enhanced vitality, things Ambrella is also researching."
His voice was warm, carrying a reassuring strength that made Elektra relax.
"Tell me everything. Harry's disappearance, the urban legends of man-eating monsters, Yashida's secrets… I suspect they're all connected." He stroked her dark hair absently.
"The Yashida clan and the Hand have collaborated for centuries," Elektra explained, "Our ninja helped them control the shogunate during the Kamakura era. When the regime fell, both organizations went underground, only to re-emerge after Japan's defeat in WWII, rebuilding their empires with vast wealth..."
As the Hand's sole leader, Elektra knew more about its history than most.
Though the Five Fingers had spread across different nations, Japan remained its strongest stronghold.
"Murakami used the Dragon Bone elixir to bribe politicians and tycoons. Ichirō Yashida was among them. But when the Dragon Bones ran out, the cancer-stricken old man abandoned the Hand… and turned to another power."
"Hydra?" Sean raised an eyebrow.
Elektra nodded...
If the Hand ruled Japan's underworld, the Yashida family's influence was even more terrifying.
Post-WWII, they had invested aggressively, buying land and infiltrating every industry across the nation; pharmaceuticals, energy, military manufacturing.
Their roots ran deep, like an ancient tree strangling the country from within...
"What exactly are they developing?" Sean wondered aloud.
In the original timeline, the dying Ichirō Yashida had simply sought to steal Logan's healing factor to prolong his own life.
But now, thanks to the butterfly effect, the conspiracy seemed far more intricate. Given Hydra's technological prowess, their collaboration with Yashida was unlikely to be for humanitarian purposes.
Elektra's answer was a single, ominous phrase:
"The Progenitor Virus."