Inside the Private Jet
The private jet sliced through storm clouds like a blade through silk, its engines purring with the satisfaction of unlimited power. Inside the opulent cabin, crystalline light fractured through cut-glass decanters, casting prismatic shadows across polished mahogany that gleamed like fresh blood.
Nathaniel—M. Bison, Supreme Leader of Shadaloo—reclined in Italian leather that seemed to mold itself to his commanding frame. The classical music wasn't merely playing; it breathed through hidden speakers, each note calculated to stroke his megalomaniacal soul. Purple psycho energy crackled faintly around his fingertips as he lifted a wine glass filled with vintage that cost more than most people's lives.
"Exquisite..." he purred, savoring both the wine and the moment. His military cap sat perfectly positioned, its skull emblem seeming to watch everything with hollow, hungry eyes. "Power tastes sweetest when properly aged, wouldn't you agree, my brutish friend?"
Across from him, Balrog's massive frame threatened to snap the reinforced seat. Sweat beaded on his scarred knuckles as he gripped a beer bottle that looked like a toy in his boxing-glove-sized hands. The big man's presence filled the space like barely contained violence—a human wrecking ball held in check only by loyalty and fear.
"Yeah, boss, but this fancy music's putting me to sleep," Balrog growled, his voice like grinding concrete. "How about something with more... impact?" He punctuated the word by slamming his fist on the armrest, leaving a dent in the metal.
M. Bison's laughter rolled through the cabin like thunder before lightning. "Patience, my dear destroyer. When I reshape this pathetic world in my image, you'll have all the violence your heart desires." His eyes—windows to an abyss of ambition—shifted to the photographs scattered across the table like tarot cards predicting death.
Zero. The masked revolutionary stared back from a dozen angles, frozen in moments of rebellion that would soon become his epitaph.
"But first..." M. Bison's voice dropped to a whisper that somehow carried more menace than any shout. "We must dissect our prey." His finger traced Zero's outline with surgical precision. "178 centimeters of flesh wrapped around delusions of heroism. 56 kilograms of meat thinking it can challenge a god."
Balrog snorted, the sound like a bull preparing to charge. "Size don't matter when I'm crushing skulls, boss. This Zero punk'll be paste under my fists." He grabbed one of the photographs, and his grip alone was enough to make it scream as it crumpled.
"Magnificent brutality, my friend, but incomplete." M. Bison rose with fluid grace, his cape flowing like a liquid shadow. At the window, thirty thousand feet above the earth, he looked down at the world that would soon bow before him. "To truly destroy an enemy, you must first understand what makes them tick. Their fears, their loves, their pathetic human weaknesses."
Lightning illuminated his profile as he focused on one particular photograph—Zero reaching out to save Suzaku Kururugi, caught in a moment of vulnerability that most would call heroic. M. Bison saw something else entirely.
"Young Kururugi was branded a killer, accused of murdering my dear brother." The words dripped with false sentiment. "But Zero—our mysterious revolutionary—confessed instead. On the surface, a play for the masses. Underneath..." His smile was a predator recognizing wounded prey. "Something far more exploitable."
Balrog cracked his knuckles, the sound like bones breaking. "What's the intel on this Kururugi kid?"
Without looking away from the window, M. Bison gestured dismissively. Balrog fumbled with a folder, his massive fingers surprisingly gentle with the documents.
"Suzaku Kururugi," Balrog read, his voice struggling with the pronunciation. "Born July 10th, 2000. Father was Genbu Kururugi—former Prime Minister of Japan. File says daddy ate a bullet when the war went south. Kid's playing soldier now as an Honorary Britannian."
The name hit M. Bison like electricity, psycho power flaring involuntarily around his form. "Genbu Kururugi..." The memory surfaced like a body from deep water. "I remember that man. Steel wrapped in diplomat's silk. He would have faced a firing squad before surrendering to despair."
M. Bison turned, and the cabin temperature seemed to drop ten degrees. "Someone made him die, my dear Balrog. And I intend to discover who had that honor."
His voice became silk over razor wire. "I want Shadaloo's intelligence network to dissect the Kururugi family like a biology experiment. Every secret, every shame, every tender spot where pressure creates agony. Zero saved this boy not for publicity, but for personal reasons."
"How you figure that, boss?" Balrog asked, genuinely curious despite himself.
M. Bison's grin was a masterpiece of malevolence. "Elementary psychology, my concrete-headed companion. Heroes grandstand. They would have let the boy die and used his martyrdom as propaganda. But Zero risked everything to save one insignificant life." He began to pace, psycho energy leaving purple afterimages with each step. "Such behavior reveals the most exploitable weakness of all—emotion."
"And if they got history together?"
"Then we transform that history into a weapon." M. Bison raised his glass, and the wine seemed to glow with inner fire. "Perhaps young Kururugi can be... persuaded to assist with Operation Psycho Power."
Balrog's grin revealed teeth like broken tombstones. "Now you're talking my language, boss."
Their glasses met with a crystalline chime that somehow sounded like a death knell. "Long live Shadaloo!"
Capital Area 11
The Shadaloo aircraft descended through the night like a falling star, its engines screaming defiance at gravity itself. When it touched down, the landing shook the earth—a statement of power that needed no translation.
M. Bison emerged first, his cape snapping in the artificial wind created by cooling engines. Every step was calculated theater, each movement designed to remind observers they were in the presence of a force of nature wearing human skin. Shadaloo soldiers snapped to attention with military precision that would have made prussian generals weep with envy.
"Perfect," M. Bison breathed, psycho power radiating approval. "My warriors understand the meaning of respect."
Behind him, Balrog's footsteps sounded like minor earthquakes. The boxer's presence alone made nearby soldiers unconsciously step back, recognizing a predator when they saw one.
Their procession was interrupted by a Britannian officer stumbling toward them with the graceless urgency of a man about to step on a landmine. Sweat stained his uniform despite the cool air.
"It's an incredible honor to meet you, Prince—"
The temperature around M. Bison dropped to absolute zero. Psycho power began to swirl visibly, purple energy creating patterns in the air like smoke from funeral pyres.
"Prince?" The word left his lips like a curse. "I am M. Bison, Supreme Leader of Shadaloo, architect of the new world order, and the closest thing to a god this miserable planet has ever produced." His voice carried such concentrated malice that nearby soldiers felt their knees weaken. "Address me as such, or discover what happens to insects who displease me."
The officer's face went white as bone, then gray as ash. He nodded so frantically his neck might have snapped.
As they walked deeper into the compound, M. Bison's cape created its own wind system, drawing attention like a black hole draws light. The Britannian officer struggled to keep pace, his shorter legs working overtime.
"I must confess surprise that my sisters chose not to greet me personally," M. Bison observed, though his tone suggested he was already calculating punishment. "Where might they be conducting their... activities?"
"Princess Euphemia is engaged in diplomatic functions, and Princess Cornelia is currently pacifying rebellions in the ghetto district," the officer stammered.
M. Bison stopped walking.
The world seemed to stop with him. Psycho power began to emanate from his form like heat from a forge, creating visible distortions in the air. When he spoke, his voice carried the promise of apocalypse.
"What did you just tell me?"
The officer realized he had just signed his own death warrant.
Saitama Ghetto
Hell had come to the slums.
The ghetto burned with the intensity of concentrated hatred, smoke columns rising like funeral pyres for the innocent. Britannian forces moved through the maze of ramshackle buildings like antibodies attacking an infection, their weapons spitting death with methodical precision.
Civilians ran screaming through streets that had become rivers of blood. Children clutched at their parents while mothers pressed hands over their eyes, trying to shield them from horrors that would haunt their dreams forever.
In one narrow alley, cornered like rats in a maze, a small group of survivors pressed against a brick wall that offered no escape. Britannian soldiers approached with the casual confidence of predators who had already tasted blood.
"Take aim!" The command cracked through the air like a whip.
Rifle barrels rose like accusing fingers, each one promising death to the innocent. A mother pulled her son against her chest, her body the only shield she could offer against the coming storm.
"Please," she whispered to gods who seemed to have abandoned this place. "Not my baby."
"Fire!"
The alley exploded with muzzle flashes and thunderous noise—but the screams that should have followed never came.
Instead, the Britannian soldiers collapsed like marionettes with severed strings, their blood painting abstract art across the alley walls. Where they had stood, Shadaloo operatives materialized from shadows like demons emerging from hell itself.
The lead operative—a woman whose blonde hair seemed to glow with its own light—approached the terrified mother. Her movements were fluid grace wrapped around deadly purpose, every step a demonstration of power held carefully in check.
"Fear has no place here," she said, her voice carrying authority that transcended military rank. "You are under Shadaloo's protection now." Her extended hand wasn't a request—it was a promise.
The mother stared in shock, unable to process salvation arriving in such an unexpected form. "Who... who are you?"
"We are Shadaloo," the operative replied, helping them to their feet with surprising gentleness. "We serve the one who will reshape this broken world."
Three blocks away, the real carnage was unfolding.
Sutherland Knightmares—twenty-foot-tall death machines designed to crush rebellion—found themselves outmatched by technology that belonged in nightmares. Shadaloo's mecha units moved like liquid mercury, their psycho-enhanced weapons cutting through Britannian armor like heated knives through butter.
"What the hell are those things?" one pilot screamed into his radio as purple energy carved his squadmate's Sutherland in half. "We're on the same side! We're on the same—"
His transmission ended in a burst of psycho energy that turned his cockpit into a miniature star. For one brilliant moment, the alley was illuminated by power that human science couldn't explain.
On the ground, Britannian infantry discovered that their superior training meant nothing against enemies who fought with supernatural enhancement. Shadaloo soldiers moved like dancers through combat that should have been chaos, their weapons spitting psycho-charged rounds that didn't just kill—they obliterated.
A squad of Britannians took cover behind what had once been someone's home. Their return fire accomplished nothing except wasting ammunition on enemies who seemed to anticipate every shot.
"Fall back! Fall back!" Their sergeant's voice cracked with panic. "We need backup! We need—"
The building exploded in a shower of purple light and concrete dust. When the smoke cleared, there was nothing left but a crater and the echo of power that felt like the heartbeat of gods.
Cornelia's Headquarters
Princess Cornelia li Britannia sat in her command center like a queen on a throne of screens and blinking lights. Each monitor showed a different angle of what should have been a glorious victory—the systematic pacification of rebellious elements who dared challenge Britannian authority.
Her smile was sharp enough to cut glass. "Magnificent," she breathed, watching explosions bloom like deadly flowers across the ghetto. "Let them learn the price of defying the empire."
Then the reports started coming in.
"Delta Squad has gone silent," an operator announced, his voice tight with confusion.
"Probably radio trouble," Cornelia dismissed, but her smile began to falter.
"Rhino Team isn't responding either," another voice added. "And... Jesus Christ... Tango Company's Sutherlands just... they just disappeared from sensors."
The command center erupted into cacophony as reports flooded in like water through a cracking dam. Each update painted a picture that Cornelia's mind refused to accept.
"Half our forces are gone!" someone screamed. "They're not retreating—they're just gone!"
Cornelia shot to her feet, her command throne spinning empty behind her. "Impossible!" The word exploded from her lips. "We're fighting untrained terrorists with improvised weapons! They can't—"
The main screen flickered, then filled with a transmission that made her blood freeze in her veins.
"All Britannian forces are commanded to withdraw immediately. This is Supreme Leader M. Bison of Shadaloo. Continued resistance will result in total annihilation. You have been warned."
The voice carried a power that seemed to reach through the speakers and wrap around her throat. Cornelia knew that voice. She had grown up fearing it.
"Him," she whispered, the word barely audible over the chaos surrounding her.
When she looked at her staff, she saw her own terror reflected in their faces. These were professional soldiers who had faced rebels and terrorists without flinching. Now they looked like children afraid of monsters under the bed.
"Full retreat," she commanded, her voice hollow. "All units, immediate withdrawal. Now."
The Confrontation
Outside the command center, Cornelia watched the night sky burn with colors that shouldn't exist. In the distance, a mobile fortress approached like a mountain that had learned to walk. Its hull gleamed with psycho energy, and the Shadaloo skull emblem seemed to watch her with hungry anticipation.
When the fortress settled to earth, the impact sent tremors through her bones. Hydraulic systems hissed like giant serpents as the main ramp descended with ceremonial slowness.
M. Bison emerged from the metallic womb like a dark god taking physical form. His cape flowed around him in patterns that defied wind and physics, while psycho power created an aurora of purple light that painted everything in shades of nightmare.
Behind him, Balrog's massive frame filled the doorway. Each step the boxer took left cracks in the reinforced concrete, his presence a promise of violence barely contained.
"Brother," Cornelia began, trying to inject authority into her voice. "What do you think you're—"
The slap came faster than thought itself.
Psycho power enhanced the blow, lifting Cornelia from her feet and sending her sprawling across the tarmac. The sound echoed like thunder, and when she touched her face, her fingers came away bloody.
Gilbert and Andreas moved to help her, their hands instinctively reaching for weapons they suddenly realized were useless.
"You pathetic, incompetent fool!" M. Bison's voice carried such concentrated rage that nearby windows cracked. "I explicitly claimed Zero as my prey, and you—in your infinite stupidity—decided to conduct a massacre that has ruined everything!"
He grabbed her by the throat, lifting her effortlessly as psycho energy danced around his fingers. She felt the power that could crush buildings being held in check by nothing more than his momentary mercy.
"My strategy required subtlety," he continued his face inches from hers. "Infiltration. Manipulation. The slow corruption of everything they hold dear. But your crude butchery has turned potential assets into enemies!"
He released her, and she collapsed gasping to the ground. Each breath felt like swallowing broken glass.
"How dare you assault the Princess!" Gilbert shouted, his hand moving toward his sidearm.
Balrog stepped forward, knuckles cracking like gunshots. "That's real brave, pretty boy. Do you want to dance? I'll rearrange that face so your own mother won't recognize the pieces."
Cornelia struggled to her feet, pride warring with terror. "Our strategy was sound!" she gasped. "We recreated the Shinjuku incident to draw Zero into open combat!"
"And look how well that worked for our dear departed brother," M. Bison replied, his voice dropping to a whisper that somehow carried more menace than any scream. Psycho power began to swirl around him like smoke from funeral pyres.
"If you continue threatening the Princess—" Andreas began, but his voice died when M. Bison's gaze fell upon him.
"I am not threatening, knight. I am educating." M. Bison's smile was a work of art painted in malevolence. "Balrog, if he speaks again, demonstrates the fragility of human bone structure."
The casual way he said it made Andreas's face go white.
"That is a threat," M. Bison continued conversationally. "Learn the distinction."
He turned back to Cornelia, hands clasped behind his back in a pose of imperial authority. "You believe this conflict can be won through brute force alone. Howquaint. True victory requires the complete domination of mind, body, and spirit—concepts clearly beyond your limited understanding."
He began to pace, each step leaving small cracks in the concrete. "You may excel at conventional slaughter, but psychological warfare is an art form you couldn't comprehend if it came with illustrated instructions."
With theatrical flair, he turned his back on her—the ultimate dismissal. "And abandon that ridiculous title 'Goddess of Victory.' It makes you sound as delusional as you are incompetent."
Hours Later
M. Bison's mobile fortress had become a cathedral of shadows and power. He sat upon his throne like a dark emperor, psycho energy swirling around him in patterns that suggested galaxies being born and dying. The air itself seemed to bend around his presence.
"You were particularly... theatrical today, Master." The voice emerged from darkness itself. "Are you certain Princess Cornelia won't attempt retaliation?"
M. Bison's laughter was rich and dark as aged wine. "My dear sister possesses neither the power nor the intelligence to challenge me. Her forces are inferior, her strategies primitive, and her understanding of true warfare nonexistent."
He gestured casually, and shadows began to move. "Show yourself, Vega. Your vanity demands an audience."
A figure materialized from the darkness—tall, lithe, and deadly as a blade wrapped in silk. Vega's mask gleamed in the purple light, and his claws caught reflections that seemed to dance with their own malevolent life.
"You know," Vega purred, examining his claws with narcissistic appreciation, "if you desire it, I could arrange her death as a work of art. Something... aesthetically pleasing. No one would suspect Shadaloo's involvement."
M. Bison raised his hand, psycho power crackling between his fingers like contained lightning. "An appealing proposition, my beautiful killer, but premature. She still has uses before her inevitable... retirement."
He rose from his throne, cape flowing like a liquid shadow. "Are they prepared?"
Unknown Location
High in mountains that touched the clouds themselves, where ancient mists hid secrets themselves, where ancient mists hid secrets older than empires, stood a dojo that had witnessed the birth and death of warriors for a thousand years.
Inside, two figures moved through combat forms that transformed violence into poetry.
The first man wore simple white training clothes that somehow made him seem more dangerous than any armor. His movements flowed like water, each technique precise enough to cut atoms. When he struck the practice dummy, the impact sounded like controlled thunder.
Behind him, approaching with steps that made no sound, came another warrior. This one moved like a concentrated lightning, his presence filling the space with barely contained power. Without warning, he drew his weapon and attacked.
The first warrior spun, his own blade appearing in his hands as if materialized from thin air. When steel met steel, the clash sent shockwaves through the ancient building.
What followed was less a fight than a conversation conducted in the language of violence. Each strike carried perfect form, and every block demonstrated mastery that took lifetimes to achieve. They moved through combinations that would have killed lesser men, their brotherhood expressed through mutual attempts at beautiful destruction.
"Your technique remains flawless, Ken," the first man said, lowering his katana.
"As does yours, Ryu," came the reply. "We are ready to answer the call."
They moved to an ancient weapons rack where traditions older than nations waited in patient silence. Ryu donned his traditional white gi, while Ken secured his red combat gear. Each piece of equipment had been blessed by masters long dead, carrying the weight of honor and expectation.
When they turned toward the exit, they were no longer simply men. They had become something more—legends preparing to write new chapters in blood and victory.
The mountain wind carried whispers of destiny as two of the world's greatest warriors prepared to serve the dark ambitions of M. Bison. Their loyalty was bound by honor, sealed by brotherhood, and sharpened by the promise of battles that would reshape the world itself.
In the distance, lightning illuminated the peaks—as if the heavens themselves were taking notice of what was about to unfold.