Fury
"Sir, it's nothing like I've ever seen," a starstruck soldier prattled on the phone. "The way he's moving, cutting through them like they're nothing. It's unnatural, sir."
"Of course it fucking is," I snapped. "Haven't you forgotten who we're working with?" I huffed. I knew it was not his fault, but my temper was on a short fuse these days. The world had gone mad. Eldritch monsters in the north. Mutants were getting strung up all over America, and SHIELD didn't have an effective response for any of those problems.
It went far beyond Dante now. The World Council and the president were breathing down my neck, and there was even greater pressure to make Prometheus work, but there was something that wasn't clicking with the formula.
Dr. Ross swears that Bruce would know what to do. Hence, we had to pry him from the arms of the Octopus monster. Part of me suspected she could be stonewalling so that she could get what she wanted, but I wasn't mad at it.
What made me livid was how great Dante was at maneuvering events to his advantage. If he was to be believed, I basically funded some successful experiment that allowed him to create three enhanced individuals on a dime.
We've been at that for decades now!
I wasn't entirely convinced that he wasn't spying on me somehow. We had mental blockers around the most sensitive areas of the facility, and I tried to avoid Jean Grey in general. Still, I was beginning to think his Clairvoyance was far more targeted than he was leading us to believe. He seems only to know things that benefit him in some ways. If he hadn't been able to predict events before they happened somewhat accurately, I would've assumed he was a Telepath.
I froze…
That made a hell of a lot more sense than Clairvoyance. It would explain how he'd been able to manipulate us from the start. Granted, everything couldn't have gone his way, but it was plausible. How he was able to anticipate the invasions and guess the Cap was still alive was still a mystery, but it certainly made more sense than vague future sense.
"Damn it," I muttered. "He could be taking us all for a ride." Random incidents started to add up quickly. The meaningful looks with Jean Grey. Knowledge of our contingency programs.
My eyes went wide. The son of a bitch probably already knew about Prometheus.
Our secondary mission in Antarctica just became that much more important.
"Get me, Heller," I ordered one of the technicians on the job and stepped out of the room to talk to the agent on my phone.
"How is it looking," I asked. "Any trouble?"
"Closing in on the extraction point sir. The stealth tech is out of this world. We've flown through five hordes. Nothing has seen us."
I nodded. "You can thank Stark for that." The mining operation was always something we intended to start farther down the line, but new information had changed my mind.
Apparently, the boys down at the lab finally finished their analysis of the data the survey team sent back on the Vibranium they studied, and it was radically different from the one we already had. They were just as durable as Wakandan Vibranium but didn't absorb energy like it did. Instead, it dissolved metal, making it the ultimate counter for a weapon expert like Dante Sparda.
The second vital bit of information I received was in-depth scans of the outer limits of the desert. There were huge stores of Vibranium there with the least enemy concentration.
Stark had a stealth plane he'd been developing on the side for SHIELD that made our current best bombers look prehistoric.
So, I hatched a plan and was rapidly putting it into effect. All that was left was to make sure that nothing else leaked out to him or his girlfriend. I still had to test him just to be sure, but I had a feeling about these things.
And if I was right, that meant I couldn't trust another word out of his mouth, and I had to take a more proactive approach to containment.
---
Dante
Pietro and I exploded forward the moment our feet touched the snow and wrought untold havoc with all of the speed and lethality we could muster without drawing too much into our reserves.
I gave Pietro a pair of Twilight Adamantium shortswords I fashioned just for him and let him go buck wild. I wielded a remade version of Mercury, Severance, and Kurogiri, my new Uchigatana. I'd taken care to give it the same runes severance had. Only I'd emphasized Precision over sheer power.
I took on entire hordes by myself, parrying, cutting, stabbing, and letting off the occasional Smite.
Pietro and I got serious for the first time in the mission when I ran into a dead horde of emaciated wolves. Their bodies had been completely drained of Gamma radiation, and the culprit floated above us, chasing down an odd hybrid wolf who'd grown wings of all things, but it was not nearly fast enough. A tentacle pierced through its chest, and it dried up in real-time.
The monster that had destroyed him was familiar yet different. It had wings now, a well-muscled upper body and all of its tentacles migrated below its midsection. For balance, it had a pronounced tail sticking out of the forest of writhing tentacles. Most terrifying of all, however, was the large draconian wings adorning its body.
"Is that—?" Pietro spoke beside me with some trepidation in his voice.
"Yeah."
"You didn't say it had wings," he said.
"It didn't," I said, using Predator's gaze on the monster, though I had a feeling I already had my answer.
Modified Gamma Devourer
Formed from the amalgamation of human DNA, Kraken DNA, Snake DNA, and Pterosaur DNA
Weaknesses: Extreme heat
Strengths: Massive superhuman strength, massive explosive speed, vibranium skin, adaptive growth, gamma absorption, and massive superhuman regeneration. Blood of the Old.
Oh hell.
My eyes lingered on Adaptive Growth. It was most likely absorbing the abilities of other monsters it had consumed.
I summoned Severance in my right hand and activated Cloak: Fire. It'd been a while since I'd used it, but it was old, reliable, and, frankly, my most powerful offensive cloak technique.
"You might want to stay out of this one, Pietro," I warned. "It's fast."
And indeed, it was. It roared with its maw, unleashing all 20 of its tentacles at me, but I was not the same Dante that its brothers and sisters had fought a few hours ago. I had a few new tools to play with.
I used all 4 Arcane amplification and Precision II runes on my blade and swung, activating Burst at medium output, consuming 30 DE. The air screamed as a torrent of Black and Red flames flowed out. It reduced the approaching tentacles to ashes and climbed up its body before splitting it in half.
Pietro gaped.
"Where have you been hiding that!"
I laughed.
I hadn't used Arcane Amplification during our spar because none of my weapons had the new runes. Rin's attack power went through the roof when he started using the runes during our spar, and if it wasn't because of my parry, speed, and experience, it might've legitimately killed me.
Wanting to enjoy the power of the improved runes myself, I upgraded Severance while the other factions were organizing themselves. I could barely afford the 60,000 cost to upgrade the weapon and the runes, but it had been worth it.
Arcane Amplification granted a 30% increase in power on all techniques for one second for the low cost of 30 DE or AE, and my new Precision Runes granted a massive increase in cutting power for 10 AE. Stack all four of those together with my most potent element and a Cloak that improved my fire effectiveness by 80%, and I could basically one-shot an enemy that had me running a few short hours ago.
The falling remains of the monster swelled and twisted and bloomed to life with a surprising vigor. Gamma radiation gushed out in waves as the monster regenerated. New bones and muscles replaced charred ones, and black obsidian scales grew over them to give the re-emerging beast a meaner, sturdier look.
Its eyes glowed green, and I counted a few more tentacles than I previously did, and I noticed it had a distinctly wolfish snout.
There were several changes to its stat sheet when I scanned it. It now had Wolf DNA and ice manipulation and no longer had fire as a weakness. All of its physical stat went up an entire category except healing.
What I was looking at downright terrified me. If any of the team ran into one of these, it'd be game over if they couldn't strike it in the head and heart immediately.
Thankfully, this spontaneous growth didn't seemingly come without some concession. It had lost the ability to Adapt and absorb Gamma radiation, meaning this was the end of the road for it, and that warmed my heart.
I attacked first this time around, switching my fire Cloak for Density and activating Gust. I also summoned Osiris. I exploded forward with an enhanced Gust amplified by Arcane Amplification.
The Devourer roared and flapped its wings, sending forward a wave of Ice and debris, which I easily phased through and rematerialized in front of it, swinging with energy flowing into my blade. Two tentacles went flying, and another two joined them before it could recover. Its hands came down in a brutal crash, and I phased through them and split them from its shoulder with two swift, arcane-boosted wind blades. It howled in pain, and the snow started to whip around us, raising a small storm that was supposed to blind me.
My blade flashed out with unerring accuracy, splitting the never-ending tide of tentacles. The monster tried to regroup and fly out of the storm it'd raised, but I was prepared for it.
My new Uchigatana appeared in my free hand and sent a charged wind blade alongside Severance, taking its wings off.
For the first time in the fight, the monster used its tail, spinning around and whipping out to strike me. I stepped back from the attack with a skillful use of Burst, reappearing several feet away. The monster panted and glared at me, but it was mostly in one piece.
I summoned Ivory, packing her up with so much Angel energy the gun vibrated.
"That was fun."
The monster juked to the left when I pulled the trigger, but its bulky body worked against it. It was consumed by a storm of wind blades that slowly rose to a crescendo. The monster lasted longer than I expected, but by the end, only clumps of viscera and minced bones were left.
"We need to leave the hordes to the regular teams," I said to Pietro. "This new Modified Devourers have to be our focus or this expedition will be over before it's even begun."
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