[A/N]: You just had to do it, didn't you? Well, since you hit the goal, here's your bonus chapter, enjoy š
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The corridor leading to lab three was empty. Too empty.
Heavy footsteps echoed from behind them. Multiple sources and moving fast.
Domino turned, her weapons ready.
Four figures emerged from the shadows.
Barbarus was massive, easily eight feet tall, covered in thick scales, moving with predatory grace despite his bulk. His eyes glowed faintly yellow.
Amphibious had slick green skin, gills pulsing on his neck, eyes too large and too far apart, webbed hands ending in claws. He moved with amphibian fluidity.
Lupo was a humanoid wolf covered in matted grey fur, lips pulled back to show teeth like daggers. He moved on all fours, claws clicking on the concrete.
Brainchild was the smallest, but with a cranium expanded to twice normal size. His eyes glowed with malevolent intelligence, and the air around him crackled with telepathic energy.
The Savage Land Mutates. Sinister's enforcers were here.
"Well," Domino said. "They really are uglier than they looked on camera."
Jay stepped forward, putting himself between Domino and the approaching threats. His Vibranium form gleamed. "Dom, your normal bullets won't work on them. Remember your training and use that. Aim for Lupo. I'll handle the others."
"Got it."
Barbarus charged first.
The massive Mutate moved faster than something his size should be able to, closing thirty feet in seconds. The floor cracked under his footfalls. His fist came at Jay's head with enough force to crater concrete.
Jay caught it.
The kinetic energy absorbed into his Vibranium form. Barbarus's eyes widened in surprise.
Then Jay punched back.
The stored kinetic energy released in a focused blast. Barbarus flew backward, airborne for a moment, before crashing through the reinforced wall behind him. causing the concrete and rebar to explode outward. The Mutate disappeared into the room beyond.
The sound was deafening.
"One down."
Amphibious hissed. His throat swelled as he spat.
A stream of corrosive acid flew toward Jay's face, trailing vapor. The smell hit him as chemical burn and organic decay mixed together.
Jay formed a Darkforce shield. The stream splashed against it, sizzling. Where drops hit the floor, concrete bubbled and smoked.
On the far side Domino's probability field hummed. She needed an opening. A weakness.
And as luck would have it, she found it. A crack in the ceiling above Amphibious; the stress fractures from Barbarus's impact. The concrete was already compromised. It just needed the right push.
She fired at the ceiling.
The bullet struck perfectly. The crack widened. Spread like lightning across the surface. Then the concrete gave way.
Half a ton of debris came down on Amphibious. He tried to dive, but Domino's luck didn't miss. A chunk of concrete the size of a microwave caught him directly in the skull. The impact drove him into the floor. The rest of the debris buried him.
"Two down."
Lupo snarled. He launched himself at Domino, moving with speed that made him a grey blur, claws extended, jaws open wide.
Domino raised her dagger, laced in tacheyon filed to intercept, but Brainchild's telepathic assault hit her like a freight train.
Psychic claws dug into her mind. It wasn't subtle, just raw psychic violence.
Ā Domino felt her sense of self fragmenting. Was she Domino? Was she Neena? Was she anyone at all?
She dropped to one knee, screaming, the dagger clattering from nerveless fingers.
Lupo's jaws closed on empty air as Jay shadow-shifted just out of reach, pulling Domino with him. Lupo's momentum carried him into the wall instead, claws gouging deep scratches in the concrete.
They materialized three feet to the left. Jay had the Vibranium blade pressed against Lupo's throat before the Mutate could recover.
"Stay down."
Lupo's eyes blazed with feral rage. Intelligence warred with animal instinct behind those yellow eyes.
He lunged again.
Jay's blade took him across the throat. The Vibranium cut through enhanced hide, through muscle and cartilage and vertebrae. Blood sprayed in an arterial arc.
Lupo's body hit the ground still twitching. Then the twitching stopped.
"Three down."
Jay's danger sense spiked when he saw that Domino was still down, still writhing, and Brainchild's eyes were glowing brighter now.
Jay was on him in a heartbeat. His hand blade sang through the air.
One precise strike and Brainchild's head separated from his shoulders. Both parts hit the floor. The head rolled until it hit the wall. The eyes were still glowing when it stopped.
"Four down."
Jay dropped beside Domino, hands on her shoulders. "Domino, are you alright? I'm sorry I was lateā"
Domino blinked hard, consciousness returning in fragments. "No worries. It ain't my first rodeo against psychics." She huffed, accepting his hand to pull herself up.
But Jay's eyes had gone murderous, fixed on Brainchild's severed head. The glow was finally fading. Good. He wanted him dead. Really dead.
"We need to move on, Jay."
The corridor was silent except for their breathing. Barbarus groaning from somewhere in the rubble. The distant sound of alarms. The wet drip of Lupo's blood still running down the wall.
"I know." Jay moved back to the blast door leading to lab three
"Stand back."
The Vibranium blade cut through the reinforced blast door like it was made of paper. Jay carved a circle large enough to step through, sparks raining down as metal parted.
He kicked the cut section inward. It fell with a heavy clang.
Beyond it was a laboratory straight from a nightmare.
Cloning vats lined one wall, each containing a figure suspended in green liquid. Some were recognizable as humans or had been. Others were twisted chimeras, bodies that had too many arms or faces in the wrong places or organs visible through translucent skin.
On the ceiling, insect-like drones clung like mechanical spiders. Mister Sinister's data collectors, designed to harvest DNA from mutants without them ever knowing.
Surgical tables held restraints stained with old blood. Equipment for genetic manipulation hummed with power, displays showing DNA sequences that made even Jay's enhanced mind stagger.
Screens mounted on every wall displayed data of genetic code scrolling past too fast for normal human comprehension. Simulation results from experiments that should never have been attempted.
And in the center of it all, standing calm, was Nathaniel Essex.
Mr. Sinister.
He looked exactly as Jay remembered from the comics, but worse in person. Pale skin that glowed faintly. Black suit and cape. That iconic red diamond on his forehead, gleaming like a third eye, pulsing faintly.
When he smiled, it was the smile of a shark sizing up prey.
When he spoke, his voice carried the refined accent of someone who'd learned English in a different century. Victorian, proper and utterly devoid of empathy.
"Ah, Jay. You're finally here." The smile widened. "I'm really quite the fan of yours, you know. Your blood. Your genetics. No matter what I try, I am never able to decipher it properly. You are my biggest hurdle and rival."
His red eyes gleamed with admiration mixed with hunger.
"Thanks to the samples I obtained from Korea, I've been able to refine my work considerably. My skills, which had been growing rusty after centuries of the same experiments, are now sharper than ever." He gestured at the lab around him. "You've inspired me to reach new heights, Jay. I should thank you."
Domino had enough of this creep talking about her boyfriend's blood maniacally; she aimed her gun at his face without a word.
She fired.
The gunshot cracked through the lab. Sinister's head snapped back, a neat hole appearing in his forehead right below the red diamond. For a moment he stood there, frozen.
Domino looked at Jay. "What? He was being creepy about youā¦."
Then a laugh came as Sinister straightened his neck.
The wound closed. Flesh knitted together. The bullet pushed itself out of healing tissue and clinked on the floor.
"Yes, quite the spirited companion you have," Sinister said, still smiling. "But I'm afraid simple bullets won't suffice here, my dear."
More laughter echoed through the lab.
From the shadows behind the cloning vats, figures emerged. Not one. Not two. Footsteps synchronized. Breathing synchronized. They moved like a hive mind, and when they stepped into the light, Jay's danger sense exploded into screaming alarm.
And they all wore that same red diamond on their foreheads.
But they weren't normal clones.
They were chimeras.
Jay's comic book knowledge identified them instantly. One had Beast's blue fur and massive frame combined with Colossus's metallic skin. Another had Kate Pryde's intangibility merged with Angel's wings. A third had Wolverine's claws extending from hands that could fire Cyclops's optic blasts.
More emerged. Toad's agility combined with Nightcrawler's teleportation. Iceman's freeze powers merged with Pyro's fire manipulation. On and on, each one a horrific fusion of multiple mutants' powers.
Ten stable chimeras, each combining two or more X-Men into a single nightmare.
"You see?" Sinister's voice carried genuine pride. "Thanks to your blood, I was able to refine my chimera creation process significantly. I'd been attempting these combinations for decades, but the genetic compatibility was always problematic. Although I couldn't understand your unique DNA and powers, it inspired me to complete the missing piece."
He gestured at his creations.
"Look at them, Jay. My own X-Men. No, better than that. My Nasty Boys. My masterpieces. Each one stable, functional and utterly Loyal."
The chimeras moved as he spoke, surrounding Jay and Domino in a circle. Their breathing was synchronized. Even their heartbeats were synchronized.
"All thanks to you."
Jay's mind raced. Taskmaster's tactical analysis kicked in, processing the threat level. Sage's computational abilities catalogued each chimera's probable power set. His own danger sense was screaming warnings.
"You've been busy," Jay said quietly.
"I've had months." Sinister's red eyes gleamed. "Ever since Korea, I've been preparing for our inevitable confrontation. Did you really think I wouldn't account for you? Did you think I'd make the same mistake Kim made?"
His smile turned predatory.
"I know what you can do, Jay. I know about your power theft. Your adaptations. Your various transformations. I've studied you. Analyzed you. Planned for you." He spread his arms wide. "So I created an army specifically designed to counter everything you might try."
The chimeras moved forward as one.
"Now then," Sinister said softly. "Shall we begin? To me, my Nasty Boys!"
The chimeras attacked.
And Jay and Domino found themselves fighting for their lives against an army of monsters.
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