CHAPTER 98 – THE HUNT
The forest wrapped around Logan like an old friend. Damp earth, pine needles underfoot, the slow heartbeat of the land. Every breath filled him with scents layered thick—sap, wet moss, deer tracks hours old, a hawk nesting in the far treeline.
He crouched low, fingertips brushing the dirt.
"Tracks," he muttered. "Buck. Two days past his prime. Movin' east."
The others had long since veered off with their picnic baskets and laughter. Logan didn't need laughter. He needed silence. The silence of a world that never lied.
He padded deeper, boots barely stirring leaves. His body melted into the undergrowth, each motion deliberate, controlled. Not a hunter killing. A predator proving.
He slipped close enough to a doe grazing at the edge of the river. She lifted her head once, ears flicking. Logan froze. The wind shifted. She never saw him.
A ghost. A shadow.
He smiled faintly, letting her go. "Gotcha, darlin'. Game's yours."
He straightened, rolling the tension from his shoulders. The hunt was done. But his senses—the feral tangle of nose and ear and instinct—flared sudden, sharp.
The wind carried something else. Metal. Ozone. A heartbeat too steady to be human.
Logan's eyes narrowed.
He turned his head slowly. Across the clearing, past the trunks and shadows, stood a man. Not just a man—armored, gleaming, visor shining red across his faceplate. The white and orange of his suit caught the light, bright against the forest gloom.
Weapon Alpha.
The Canadian flag gleamed bold across his chest.
Logan's claws itched in their sheaths, his lip curling back from his teeth.
"Well, hell," he growled. "Guess the past found me."
Weapon Alpha raised a hand, energy flaring in his gauntlet. His voice cut through the trees like a blade.
"Logan. You're coming back with me. One way or another."
The forest held its breath.
Logan popped his claws, the sound sharp, final. Sparks of sunlight danced across the steel.
"Try me, Alpha. Let's see who bleeds first."
The birds scattered from the trees as the clearing snapped taut, predator against hunter, past against present—
—and the fight was about to begin.