Rage looked at the destroyed observatory, once a powerful spectacle reduced to rubbles. He took his time and looked around. He was still on the company's property only now realising how vast the space truly is – it was an observatory after all, he owned most of the land. Rage spotted the fence encircling the area. Agent spoke the truth. The sign said "Warning: No Trespassing" and another big sign right beside that said "Building Scheduled For Demolition." Turning to the road, he looked both ways. Rage noticed a small glistening speck as he squinted his eyes.
That must be York City. Agent should be headed there. Given his wealth, he might even have multiple properties to live on. Could the second headquarters be there? No, he said it was located far away from here.
Chat asked Rage with concern "Are you okay, Rage?" due to Rage standing in silence for a concernable long amount of time.
"Huh, oh, I'm fine Chat. Actually, I feel better than ever!" said Rage as he tested his body by performing some stretches.
"Good to hear. Somehow when you were about to run out of power, you re-energized yourself immediately."
"Yeah, I think I figured it out," said Rage.
"Oh?"
"I was able to piece together the puzzle using three clues. Hear me out. Remember how the database designated me as 'Rage?'"
"Yes."
"That is our first clue. Our second clue is the fact that we know they are conducting human and animal experiments. The third clue is the reactor, specifically, the energy that it contained."
"You suggest there is a link between these three things?"
"Yeah. Let's think about it carefully. We know that the energy from the reactor is safe for humans as you did not detect any harmful effects from it, right?"
"Correct."
"What if this energy gets amplified by emotion? It is the only reason why I was able to repower myself. Whenever I got mad, the energy levels replenished itself and the angrier I got the faster it charged!" exclaimed Rage. "Can't you check to see that whenever I get mad, my energy levels increase, by using your bioelectrical stimulation and neuromorphic chip stuff?"
"A bit off the mark, but I understand your proposal. Perhaps, I could look at your hormone profile and stress markers that are associated with anger to see if they match with the energy uptakes."
Chat paused for a moment as Rage waited.
"Am I right or not?" Rage asked after losing his patience.
"Excellent deduction skills, Rage, you should be a detective!"
"All in a day's work," said Rage, his smile turning into a frown. "Imagine an emotion-powered energy source. Had anyone else discovered it I wouldn't be so nervous, but Agent–"
"That is bad news."
"We got an idea of what he is capable of but what can we do now? The police in York City won't believe such a crazy theory. Even if they did, I wouldn't trust them. Agent hands have probably corrupted them anyway. Can't turn to the authorities and I don't know where the other headquarters are. At this point, I can't save her," Rage said with despair.
"I have an idea," said Chat.
"The observatory may be destroyed at the surface level but what about what is underground? There is an underground tunnel of interconnected rooms throughout this entire land. Maybe we can investigate the rest of the facility, we might find something useful. There might still be an operational computer. If you connect me to it, I can search for more clues."
"It's worth a shot, but Agent also mentioned his brother is stopping by." Is he part of a crime family? "He talked as if he was really strong," said Rage
"Then we should hurry and quickly assess the area before he arrives," said Chat.
"You have the map of the facility. Lead the way!" Rage said with grit.
Rage rushed across the landscape to the secret entrance located to the other outer side of the fenced area – he repeated his first visit unbeknownst to him. He punched through the door, and he sprinted down the hallway. He ran through the freezer room. He ran down the hallway checking every room for clues, finally making it to the hooks. He peered across the massive chasm seeing a railing and entrance on the other side; he jumped on the red cable and glided along with inhuman balance. Once he reached the opposite side, he punched the entrance and continued his search. Rage entered the next section of the facility, but unknown to him, there was a small rumble coming from the depths of the abyss.
Upon his search was a bunch of robots standing idly by grunting. They noticed Rage and charged, but it did not matter in the slightest bit as Rage ploughed through them like plants. His arm did not even glow blue from the punches with the exception of his feet making tiny bursts of energy.
Continuing his search, Rage encountered some robo-knights mixed with some robots in the hallways. The presence of the robo-knights did not make a difference as Rage continued mowing down the machines before him.
"Good news, not only has your body increased all its physical attributes, your energy reserves have increased by a tremendous amount – there's hardly a dent in your energy supply!" said Chat. Rage gave a wide eyed smile in response to the comment.
Rage made sure to enter and exit each room. In one of the computer rooms, he tried turning on the computer to no avail. He ran and ran until–
"Wait!" yelled Chat. Rage almost exited the room before he stopped himself. He waited as he turned his head to look around the room. "Nevermind," Chat nonchalantly said, annoying Rage. Rage burst out of the room to continue his tour of the complex.
Eventually, they reached a room that resisted the damage of the demolition. In the room attached to the walls were a bunch of moderators lined up next to each other. Rage managed to reboot the system, turning on the computer. The computer looked just like the computer Chat was trapped in.
"Rage, we have struck gold," said Chat.
"Great, we can extract some info from this computer," agreed Rage.
"Not just any computer, the computer behind the brains of all the robots. All the code exists here. Rage, I have an idea…"
Rage's eyes widened and he stepped forward to the panel and he stuck his hand on the hand scanner. Straight lines that turned in ninety degree angles glowed from Rage's arm as the computer panel made beeping sounds.
There was silence as the giant computer screen turned off.
"Chat? You good?" asked Rage with a worried expression.
Suddenly, the moderators all turned on and started to levitate around Rage. He was on guard, ready to fight.
"Rage! Don't attack! It's me!" answered Chat. "I took over the robots; the grunting robots, the substitutes and even the moderators, I took over all of them!"
"You mean?"
"You have your own personal army. They connected to your chip via my connection. As of right now, their old programming is being replaced with a new one – your neural architecture."
"My what?" exclaimed Rage.
"Your neural programming. I funnelled each model after you and I made sure they would be subservient to you."
"I don't think that is a good–" protested Rage but it was too late.
All the robots in the facility stood motionless, their heads facing down and their eyes flashing on and off, except for the moderators which lacked in that department, as they were making buzzing and humming sounds.
Rage heard footsteps coming from the hallway. In came the robots and robo-knights standing side by side waiting for their instructions. He turned around to whisper to chat, covering his mouth with his left arm. "You told me that you would take over the robots. You didn't mention anything about neural programming or whatever. Besides, what do you mean these guys are programmed from my mind?" scolded Rage.
One of the robots started… twerking? It was shaking its hips from side to side and gyrating.
"There are not many things in this world that I can say with one hundred percent certainty however, in this rare instance, I can definitively say with one hundred percent certainty these robots learned that from you," said Chat.
Rage stood rigid and silent, completely embarrassed, unable to speak a single word.
The robots began to chat with one another, grunting, and playing with each other except the robo-knights who stood stoically awaiting orders – until one of the robo-knights raised up his hand and stepped forward. "Greetings master. What tasks do you have for us today?"
"....." said Rage.
"Okay, explain to me what fuck is going on?" Rage said, as he turned to his side to whisper to Chat once more.
"That is simple Rage. Clearly there were three dominant personalities from your brain: the goofy clown, the stoic hard worker, and the calculating machine."
"Clearly, you should have told me before you pulled this off and I thought you said we lacked knowledge to decipher the mysteries of the brain!"
"Not quite. I can only apply knowledge to things I know that exist. I said brain signal to language deciphering is still in its infancy. I am not able to telepathically communicate with you as there is no scientific evidence or research that indicates that such a thing is possible in the first place. On the other hand, personality and brain structure have long been studied in the field of neuroscience. What I did was copy your neuronal structure and make a scaffold out of it for the robot's AI neural network. I ran through a bunch of variations of different connections and compared them to personalities associated with such connections sourced from neuroscience textbooks and voila. Simple."
"Does it look like I asked you to do all that!" screamed Rage at the top of his lungs.
"I do not understand Rage. I gave you your army. I copied some of my code into their programming so they should be obedient to you. By the way, close your right eye, I want to show you something."
Rage sighed nevertheless he obliged. A map of the underground facility with dots appeared on his AR vision. The dots had three colours: green, yellow, and red.
"The dots on the map are each an individual robot. The green are for the grunting robots, the yellow are for the substitutes and finally the red are for the moderators."
"Hold on… this is actually useful. Good work, Chat!"
"Naturally."
"But one problem…"
"What is it?"
"Those names are way too long. Hmmm. Let me think. How 'bout, green for grunts, yellow for subs, and red for mods?"
"If you desire, Rage."
"Great!"
Rage and Chat's celebration was cut short as some of the dots started to disappear off the screen.
"Hey Chat, why are the dots disappearing?" asked Rage, his smile from the celebration fading.
"It must mean the robots are offline or perhaps…"
"He's here" said Rage with a concerned look on his face.
Rage looked to his terror as the dots started disappearing faster and faster. He studied the dots carefully. The green and yellow dots flickered away, but the intruder did not encounter any red dots yet – the moderators.
"Robot army huh… Okay, send in two of the mods to the location where the robots are going offline – we can estimate our little intruders location from that. The first mod should stay back and focus on enhancing the rest of the robots in combat. I want the second mod to do a direct attack. The plan is to do a bait and rush," ordered Rage.
"A bait and rush?" asked Chat.
"I want the second mod to pretend to be destroyed and on the floor. When our intruder drops his guard, the second mod will blast tackle him down the hall. After that, the first mod will send the rest of the robots at the location to swarm and fight the intruder while it enhances the grunt's fighting abilities."
"Good thinking, Rage. Use Agent's "defeated" mod trick against him. Shall I send the instructions now?"
"Yeah, in the meantime I want to head over to the other side of this network of tunnels. We could go to the computer room in the upper left quadrant with the broken equipment. Chat, can you let the robots in this room know my location?"
"Sure but why?" responded Chat.
"Because I'm going to outrun most of them."
Rage walked to the exit of the room as the robots moved to their side to form a clear path. "Follow me!" he ordered. He ran out of the room with super speed but trailing behind him were the robots: mods, subs, and even grunts. They were not fast enough to run right behind him but they remotely knew his location so they could still follow him; the exception being the mods, which flew behind him giving him a meter of space.
"Why there?"
"It is the farthest away from this computer room. I don't want to lose the army we just acquired."
"Even if he destroys the hardware, the robots are connected to you. They can all work autonomously without you, if you wish," rebutted Chat.
"That's nice to know but there's more to it than that. We still haven't fully explored all the tunnels and rooms, and so far we mostly found junk. I'd prefer to fight our intruder in a place that's already destroyed. That way we can salvage whatever is intact in order to find out Agent's whereabouts."
They entered the destroyed and useless computer room; the giant monitor cracked and slanted to the side on the wall.
"Okay, I want to form three layers of defence: the outermost layer will have only grunts, the middle layer will have only subs, and the innermost one with some of the mods."
"Some of the mods?"
"Yeah. I want ten mods around me and the rest spread evenly across the base to power up the bots outside the formation."
"If my comprehension is correct, you are doing this to gauge the enemy's strength. Each inner layer is more powerful than the last. I wonder, did your intelligence attributes also increase along with your physical power?" bluntly asked Chat.
"What was that?" said an annoyed Rage.
"Nothing. Rage, the robots are in position for the bait and rush stratagem."
"And just in time to", as Rage looked at the dots disappearing off the map, he was about to reach the control room. "On my 'go.'"
Rage carefully watched as the green and occasional yellow dots blinked out of existence as the invisible figure slowly approached the idle red dot.
"Go!"
The red dot teleported to the end of the hall. Rage looked with suspense. The red dot disappeared just a second later, and the loss of the robots resumed as normal.
"Not good. Agent wasn't kidding when he said his brother was strong. AMP brothers. AMP. "Hey Chat, does your database say anything about AMP?"
"Nope."
"Just great…" Rage sarcastically said. At least I know that is one thing he didn't want Chat to know.
"Warning: The intruders are approaching the unexplored parts of the tunnels – he is about to reach the robot control room."
"Chat, it is time to commence the second phase of our plan."
"And that second phase is?"
"We lead him straight to us. We'll use the rest of the bots, the ones outside our formation, to gather as much data on him so we can form some simulations."
"How do you plan to achieve that?"
"I want you to flood as many robots as you can down the hallways leading a path straight to me. Make it seem believable. Make it seem like the robots are trying their hardest to protect something extremely valuable – me"
"Done."
Rage looked at the map, as a bunch of green and a few yellow dots clumped up together forming a path straight to him. The map looked like a glow-in-the-dark ants nest. As he predicted, the dots vanished as the intruder was lured onto the path.
"S***! How fast is this guy? Chat, do we have access to the cameras?" asked Rage.
"Yes," responded Chat, as he pulled up a camera feed of a hallway filled with robots. A black flash darted to the room and instantly the robots got shredded, Chat desperately switched cameras to keep up.
"I am sorry Rage. The shutter speeds of the cameras are too slow. I can only capture blurs."
"It's okay – don't bother. Let's inspect the wreckage…" Rage stated, as he examined the aftermath of the battle in the halls using the remaining functional cameras. The robots were turned into scraps. There were two types of marks left on the robots – an observation Rage noted, scratches and dents. Those look like giant claw marks. Carefully observing the dents, he noticed a small outline – a footprint encased in the metal. Footprints and they are all the same size. The indentations are practically identical too. It can't be one guy, can it?
"Rage" alerted Chat, interrupting his train of thought, "The intruders are approaching the first layer.
"Okay, ready yourselves! Do not let the intruder near me and do not hold back!" ordered Rage to his unit of robots surrounding him. Let's see if you can get past the mods. Immediately, the new wave of fighting commenced and all the dots slowly disappeared including the red dots.
Rage stood on guard in his fighting stance as the moderators released their electrifying tentacles bursting from around the air to protect him. He could hear the fighting get closer to the room.
A black blur darted into the room and one after the other, the mods fell and got shredded into scraps. He turned to the left holding out his metal arm ready to shoot an energy blast, he spotted something in the corner of his right eye. He turned to the right, then he spotted something left to see nothing there. He turned around. He turned left again, then right two more times. He was hopelessly slow.
All of the mods had been destroyed. He heard a thud from behind – squatting on top of the beaten moderator sat a man holding two robot heads – one belonging to a sub and one belonging to a grunt. He wore a black York City cap, an all-black tracksuit and shoes. He was a black man with medium sized dreads and a short build but exuded a menacing aura as he looked up at Rage.
It's just him. One guy. AMP. Agent's brother! It doesn't make sense… How can one guy… I was at least expecting a military group or something like that. Then it clicked to Rage. Of course! I'm one guy too. His brother must have some biomechanical augmentations enhancing his physical abilities – just like me! This is not good – Agent said his brothers were strong but then again he underestimated me. No, this is good, even better! My original plan still stands. I have Chat with me. All I need to do is fall back from the frontlines and collect as much data as I can and adapt to him, and since he is only one target, I can overwhelm him with my robot army. First I should stall and extract as much info I can get without personally getting involved in the fight. With this, I should be able to beat him… unless it is the worst case scenario…
"Glad you could visit," said Rage. The man sitting before him was not amused in the slightest as he stared back at him, almost looking down on him.
Kai stood up and looked to his right without a care in the world for Rage. "Your brother Agent mentioned you'd arrive. Let's start with the introductions: The name's Rage and yours–" said Rage, trying to create a false image of bravado.
"Kai – where is Agent?" abruptly asked Kai, turning his head to face Rage while his body remained turned to the right – his wide eyes had a wildness to them, almost staring into Rage's soul .
"I don't know – I wanted to ask you that–,'' retorted.
"Liar!" screamed Kai, as he kicked Rage under the chin as his entire body flew up a couple feet in the air. While in the air, Kai did a spinning back kick sending Rage flying off through the room, through the halls, and into another room.
Rage lay on the ground and on his back – his stomach and chin illuminated in the colour blue.
"Chat, send in reinforcements."
"Sending in reinforcements." A wave of incoming robots consisting of grunts and subs entered the room along with a single mod co-ordinating the attacks.
"Make sure to keep sending them. I want a steady supply of them."
"Understood."
Rage took the opportunity to analyse his foe by using his left eye.
The robots charged at Kai, with some of the subs flying in from the top for a downward attack. Kai with ease, in one leap, spun around and performed multiple kicks dismantling the flying robots to his left. The mod stayed in the corner of the building to maintain its distance. He carried on fighting, only using his legs – some form of taekwondo and kung fu. Once he eliminated all the grunts and subs in the room, the moderator blasted him at mach 10 speed. His right hand's fingernails turned into black sharp claws and without dodging to the side, he swiped at the moderator, cutting it horizontally into two pieces.
Kai turned to Rage. "You thought I was done with you," exclaimed Kai as he kicked Rage again through the room and into the hall. Rage crawling on fours tried to get up, but it was too late, Kai was already standing beside him. Kai stomped on his back. "Where is Agent, what did you do to him?" shouted Kai.
"Agent, well, I…" stalled Rage lowering Kai's guard as he listened to his response. Rage threw an uppercut. This time Rage reacted much faster and his arm and feet glowed blue in colour, surprising Kai. He used the thrusters of his feet to increase his speed as he launched a series of punches at Kai. Kai was still faster than him and was able to dodge all of the attacks and he jumped back.
Both stared at each other. Rage extended his metal arm as it turned into a canon and he shot an energy beam. Kai did a half-somersault in the air, and he performed an overhead kick knocking Rage through the floor.
Rage stood up and found himself in the sewers. They looked at each other through the newly constructed hole in the ground.
"Now you're on my home turf," Kai said as he jumped into the sewers to join Rage.
The fighting resumed as they both ran down through the tunnels. Rage was now faster and stronger but the battle was not in his favour due to Kai's overwhelming speed. Kai did not get tagged once in the fight and the blows on Rage kept mounting up. Kai was able to cling onto the bricked walls on all fours, evading and manoeuvring around the tunnels.
This is bad. It's the worst case scenario – this Kai guy is leagues ahead of me in strength and speed. My simulations are useless because there is such a huge power gap. My boxing moves are useless if I can't hurt him or even touch him to begin with! I have to fight him one on one and grow stronger and faster like when I fought the bots. Maybe I can try using my energy blasts to even the odds… but I can't use my energy blasts or I risk sinking the upper levels which could cause a collapse of the whole tunnel network. If I just had more space! I'm stuck in the sewers and the only place it leads me to is the water-purification zone. Water… that's it!
"Chat I want you to send more bots. Flood the tunnels with as many of them as possible. Make sure the robots do not damage the tunnels and only focus on Kai," ordered Rage.
A bunch of robots climbed down the ladders and some jumped through the hole Rage made when Kai kicked him to back him up. Once they arrived, Rage retreated down a tunnel and let the robots fight for a while. He ran through the tunnels at super speed to lose Kai.
"Chat, listen up, I have another plan…" said Rage, followed by an explanation of his new plan.
In another tunnel Kai screamed, "You can't run away from me forever!"
"Ready?" asked Rage.
"Yes," answered Chat.
"Go!"
Around a hundred grunts and some subs rushed into the sewers running through the tunnels. Kai stood at an intersection between four tunnels, and found himself surrounded by robots in all directions. Kai effortlessly beat up the robots but remained in the same spot.
"That's right, just stay right there," Rage muttered while crouching in a runner's position, his feet beginning to glow immensely with the hum of a car's engine.
Kai calmly clasped his hands together and a black energy spread out from underneath him. Then a burst of black, colourless rats emptied into all four directions of the sewer tunnels.
Rage watched the map as all dots were eliminated at once. Impossible. Rage had no time to spare, he shifted himself to the next position with haste. He determined Kai's position and made sure to avoid any important structural frames to avoid a tunnel collapse as he crashed through the bricked walls flying diagonally to Kai's position.
"This is getting boring. Come out and fight me–"Kai said before Rage ploughed through the tunnel wall tackling Kai as they both flew through the bricked wall, through regular soil and out into the open. They found themselves flying over the side of what looked like a canyon – the hydropower plant!
"HEEEEEEE" screamed Rage as they both fell down into the waterfall of the plant.
The water erupted into a huge blast and Rage popped out first flying in the sky backwards with his body facing the impact. Following Rage's exit, the burst of water slowly dropped due to gravity. Out came an array of black projectiles flying out at random directions through the water explosion. Thankfully none of the projectiles hit Rage. His legs were up to the sky and head was to the water below. All he could do was stare at the plume in astonishment.
Out popped Kai from the descending burst of water where the initial collision was and he ran and skittered across the water, his feet a blur. He ran under Rage and jumped propelling himself with a tremendous force off the water, creating a second water burst explosion to replace the first, soaring up and above Rage. Rage looked up with surprise and Kai just as quickly did a one eighty degree spin kick launching Rage underwater.
Rage was completely submerged under the water. Using this momentary peace to recover; closed both eyes and his face began to glow. He opened his eyes and his robotic eye shone like a star. He blasted out of the water and punched Kai which Kai in turn blocked with his leg. The fight has started.
Rage's improvements had become more noticeable as he could keep up with Kai's speed – trading blows with one another. Rage was able to levitate and glide on the water using his thrusters while Kai from sheer speed was able to run across it like it was land with bursts of water exploding from behind his feet.
Rage threw punches while Kai threw kicks. Both of the combatants were evenly matched. The cockiness on Rage's face grew as he began to realise the momentum of the battle swayed to his favour. Kai, on the other hand, began to grow more impatient.
Kai ran up to Rage, his right hand turned into a claw, and he swiped upwards. Rage evaded the attack by shooting an energy blast from his hand using the momentum of the force to propel his upper body backwards. Kai, not relenting, jumped at Rage to scratch with his claws again, but Rage countered by using his right foot's thruster to kick Kai several feet up in the air.
Kai spun in the air and Rage turned his metal arm in the cannon and fired multiple energy blasts. Kai dodged the blast, and landed back in the water where he immediately sprinted to Rage for another strike.
Rage was ready, he dodged Kai's claw attack and grabbed him by the dreads and spun around in a circle before tossing Kai at the left side of the canyon. Kai dug his claws in the cliff and that's when he felt a burning pain on the top of his head. He felt his head at where the burning pain was and then he looked up at Rage in surprise. Rage held up a detached dread dangling like a black rope with a smirk on his face. Kai responded by holding his hand up and the single dread turned into rats. This scared Rage and he countered by tossing the flailing rats to his side and eviscerated them with a proportional energy blast.
"That's it, I had it with you!" Kai said, he extended his hands out from his body aimed at Rage. His hands darkened and grew to a colourless pitch back and out came forward some round black projectiles. As Rage grew stronger his perception of time began to slow, an ability Chat mentioned to him, and he was able to see what became of Kai's arm.
Rats?
Using the vantage point to his advantage, he extended his arm again – only this time a flurry of rats flew out of his arm at Rage. Rage closed his right eye and used his left eye to analyse the situation. He then commenced evasive manoeuvres gliding across the water as the barrage of rat projectiles followed suit.
"Chat, what the heck is going on?!" Rage screamed as he got his bearings.
"I don't know. What he is doing is breaking the laws of physics and biology too," Chat said in wonderment.
"Yeah I kinda figured that part out already!" Was that how he got out of the last trap? Through damn rats?! Is it nanotechnology? I've seen nanotech demonstrations online. Materials can be made into stuff that have weird properties like waterproof shoes, but this? This is something else! No time to think – I just need to beat him and pry out the answers when this is all over.
The fight continued with Kai throwing a flurry of rats, kicks and scratches at incredible speeds. Rage was on the defensive dodging these attacks until he was beginning to see Kai's movements. He was beginning to adapt. At this moment is when the tides of battle began to shift in Rage's favour.
As the fighting continued, Chat decided to let Rage know of its findings.
"Rage, I sense large amounts of beta waves coming from Kai."
"Beta waves?"
"Yes, regular beta waves but what does not make sense is that you need to wrap a person's scalp with electrodes using a device called an electroencephalogram or EEG for short to make such measurements."
"Cool, so you are an AI with a built-in EEG monitor."
"But I do not have an EEG monitor. EEGs are only supposed to measure electrical activity in the brain and as I just said you need to wrap the electrodes across someone's scalp. What my sensors are picking up are energy signatures that mimic brain waves."
Rage continued flying around and fighting until he felt it. He adapted.
Rage stood still hovering over the waters, his back turned to Kai as he dropped to the water surface. He stayed there in place. Kai sprinted at Rage, prepared to strike his back, and as he threw his clawed strike – he disappeared, shocking Kai. Rage, seemingly teleported to his right side with a glowing arm and punched Kai at his side. Before Kai got launched from the impact he turned to take a glance at Rage who had a sinister smile. Kai, smacked on the left rocky side of the canyon – stuck to it. Has the fight come to an end?
"It's over. I've adapted – your speed and strength are nothing to me. I was able to determine how much force your body was able to exert and how durable it is. You are a lucky guy. I am able to precisely calculate and hit you with enough force to not kill you. If I didn't, well, you would've turned to mush long ago. I'm also used to your fighting style and moves," proclaimed Rage as he walked over to Kai's body on the wall. "I have some questions for you…" when out of nowhere Kai slashed his hand at Rage's face, only pretending to be unable to fight, cutting only a piece of his hair thanks to Rage's incredible reaction speed.
"You want more huh?" sneered Rage, as he grabbed Kai's face with his metal hand mushing it. Kai grabbed and scratched his metal arm but he couldn't damage it. Rage's feet thrusters turned on and he sped across the river of the canyon, dragging Kai's head across the canyon's rocky side – occasionally bursting some energy blast directly onto Kai's face from his metal arm. Rage slowed down. "You ready to talk now?"
"Gotta get stronger. Gotta get stronger. Gotta get stronger," Kai said repeatedly.
A white sphere of ontological importance hovered in a mysterious whitespace. It turned black along with the whitespace.
Kai's head began to morph and change right before a freaked out Rage – his body turning more like a werewolf as his hand grew into large claws and his teeth began to grow and protrude from his mouth.
"Do you see what I'm seeing?" asked Rage as he hovered sideways with his hands up in a fighting stance.
"Yes, I see it too. I am also detecting a surging energy signature: high-beta waves," alerted Chat.
Kai pounced on Rage, quickly countering with another strike, Rage punched Kai and he flew back onto the wall again. What's happening to him? The change in his anatomy did not cease. H-He's transforming! What is he? But more importantly he's getting stronger!
Kai did not stop, crouching on all fours against the side of the cliff, now more werewolf-like and bestial, he pounced at Rage. Each time Rage responded with a flurry of punches knocking him back against the cliff. This repeated again and again; Rage growing more and more concerned after each punch. How many times is he going to do this? At this rate, he is going to surpass me. I have to end this now! Rage cocked his left arm for a strike pushing Kai back onto the wall.
"Chat, ready up 50% of my energy. I don't wanna kill him but I have no choice. I have to blast him. At this rate he's gonna overtake us and we'll both be goners," ordered Rage.
"But Rage, your questions–" protested Chat.
"Nevermind that! Do it now, Chat!" Rage turned his right arm into a canon and shot an energy blast using fifty percent of his energy.
Most of the rock in the way of the energy blast, his biggest yet, got vaporised. Rage panted, exhausted from using the attack. Did I kill him? He walked across the vaporised path before him inspecting the wreckage. At the end of the wreckage he spotted Kai staring off at the distance. Rage, confused, turned his head to see what he was staring at – the destroyed observatory. Kai had a cool but determined look on his face and he inhaled slowly, he raised his hands and rubbed his face down to wipe away the tears from his eyes unbeknownst to Rage, and he exhaled slowly.
"Your experiments are all over! Where is my girl–" exclaimed Rage.
A shoe seemingly teleported in front of Rage's face before he could react. Kai kicked Rage as he crashed downward through the ground at an angle and went flying to the water. The underground path carved from Rage being kicked destabilised the surface as it came crashing down into the canyon forming a slope.
Rage fell hard into the water in between the canyon causing a huge explosion of water erupting upwards like a geyser.
Kai's eyes turned black and his pupils turned silvery white. Black lines extended from the side of his eyes and there was a black aura surrounding his body. The battle resumed. This time all the cockiness from Rage had vanished – he was trying to survive the attacks. Kai surpassed him in both strength and speed once again. Rage had no choice but to depend on his robotic eye for simulations. A bunch of phantom Kai's encircled him showing him different ways he could be attacked followed by the real Kai. The simulations only gave Rage a chance to defend and block the hits one after the other as Kai zipped around bouncing in between the left and right sides of the cliffs.
Rage was prepared to block another hit except this time Kai scooped up some water and splattered it at Rage's face obscuring his vision before kicking him away.
"Imma end this right," Kai placed his hands together and a shadow formed underneath Rage. Popped out of the shadow was a giant wolf head and it swallowed Rage full in one bite.
"Hah! That's what you get!" exclaimed Kai in victory.
Inside the wolf head, a bunch of rats spun around Rage scratching him like a shredder.
"No one messes with AM–"
A blue light glowed from inside the giant head. Out bursted Rage as he ran to Kai.
"Oh sh–"
Kai summoned a bunch of wolf heads each bigger than the last but Rage repeated what he did to the first wolf head. After each consecutive escape Rage got out with his clothes more shredded and his figure more maimed and bloodied than before. A wicked smile was on his face. He knew he was getting stronger and adapting again. When he got to Kai he kicked Kai and flung him away, skidding on the surface of the water like a pebble.
Kai felt this hit as he clutched his stomach and he ran back to Rage with his arm projecting rats going at supersonic speeds. "This is what you get for betraying Agent! For betraying AMP. After all he did for you and your girlfriend!" This made Rage very angry and his energy levels began to rise again.
"What?" exclaimed Rage.
"We helped your girlfriend! We helped you! Traitor!" screamed Kai. He gave up on the rat projectile move and rushed Rage with a right hand claw strike.
Rage did some energy blasts to hold him back, as Kai dodged the beams by doing flips and spins in the air. He used the extra time to calculate a plan of attack by using his left eye. When Kai reached him, he anticipated the strike, and leaned his head to the right, he grabbed Kai by the left arm, and he flung him to the side of the canyon.
Kai rebounded off the cliff, crouched in the air to enter a devastating spinning kick which directly hit Rage, sending him deep into the water. Was the fight over?
Kai ran around the water and looked in to see if he could spot Rage. There was a glow to his left as Rage darted through the water by using an energy blast. This distraction made Kai look to the left and Rage was able to position himself to Kai's right before bursting out. In an instant, Rage came underneath and punched him in the stomach with his glowing metal arm. He spun around with his rocket thrusters and his right shoulder exploded with a thruster too. The punch was so hard, Kai threw up some black liquid from his mouth, as he was sent flying into the air past the clouds.
It was clear Rage spent a lot of energy on that punch as he kneeled barely able to hover and rest above the water.
"You spent fifty percent of your energy on that attack," informed Chat.
Kai, drifted above the clouds and he looked at the Sun and the curvature of the Earth. Another momentary peace in the battle.
"No backing out – I'll put everything on the line," said Kai. He turned around to face the ground and focused on the canyon. Big black walls filled with rats enclosed the canyon trapping Rage as he looked up in horror.
The black sphere that represented Kai's core, something beyond his soul, something far more deeper and tethered to him began to emanate a black cloudy mist forming two funnels on the top and bottom of the sphere. The funnels eerily looked like two conjoined tornadoes.
Kai released his biggest attack ever. What shaped like a giant black watch descended onto the canyon.
Rage stared up in disbelief and then looked down. "Chat, put the rest of my energy into this attack…"
Chat did not respond.
Rage stuck his metal arm cannon straight up and shot a huge energy blast. The blast had no effect on the falling object. He flashed back to his past. He was arguing with his girlfriend. The argument was about something mundane but all that went through his mind was this particular memory.
"You know, you have got quite the temper… why don't you aim that rage at those who deserve it…why don't… you be… my rage?" said his girlfriend.
"That's right…they are trying to take you away from me…they took Creed…they took Angel…They probably tortured more lives than I can imagine," huffed and puffed Rage as he got angrier and angrier.
"Energy levels are rising. High-beta waves detected," stated Chat.
The white sphere and background within Rage – an unawakened power – turned red.
"I'm YourRage!" screamed Rage at the top of his lungs, his voice booming through the canyon, as the energy beam he fired expanded in size and power. The energy beam erupted from Rage's arm cannon and hit the centre of the black watch with writhing rats comprising it.
Just as Rage launched his attack, a blue shockwave spread from his arm across the rest of the land. Off in a far distance a second beam erupted for a split second with it also spreading a shockwave, only this shockwave distorted reality like ripples formed in still water. As the second shockwave passed by it hit Kai, a layer of 0s and 1s covered him. The binary sequence that was tattooed on Kai's body for a few seconds read "01100110 01101001 01101110 01100100 00100000 01101101 01100101." He turned his head to look at the source of the second beam; however, snapping his attention directly below him Rage's beam burst through Kai's attack and hit him, leaving a stunned look on his face as the energy illuminated his entire body in a white light.
Kai's attack had a hole in the middle of it from the energy beam as the rest of the attack collapsed into the canyon. Rats and black energy fell onto the canyon.
There was silence for a moment. The waves from the impact crashed and splashed in the canyon, finally calming down.
Out popped Kai, swimming to the cliff of the canyon. He looked around.
"I won! I wo–"
Out popped Rage, he grabbed Kai by the neck with his regular hand, with no energy in his body. He shoved Kai's head into the water. Kai screamed as air bubbles left his mouth. He kicked at Rage, hitting his body but it did not matter, he pushed through the pain. Kai slowly started to lose consciousness as he frantically flailed his body in the water.
Kai desperately clawed at Rage, he managed to get a scratch on his robotic eye revealing blue circuitry underneath the skin that resided over it. Rage pulled away and closed his eyes for a split second before he reapplied pressure on Kai's neck holding him down with an even firmer grip. Rage looked down at his opponent with an intense focus as air bubbles poured out of Kai's mouth as he screamed under the water.
Kai's flailing began to decrease in strength and the water above him started to calm down in response. Rage was able to see through the transparent water staring at Kai's face as Kai began to lose consciousness as well as his own reflection; the two images overlay on top of one another. Rage saw himself with a devilish grin. He gasped and began to calm down, his furrowed brows relaxed. In disbelief at what he was doing Rage was about to loosen his grip on Kai's neck.
It was already over before Rage realised what had happened. A bunch of slashes sliced through Rage's body. His body barely hanging together was torn to pieces: blood, guts, and wires sprouted out from his body. His broken body flew onto the ground where Rage once decimated the cliff with his beam attack. The blue energy that once filled Rage's body with life faded away from his mechanical parts including his robotic eye.
The tall man who slashed him was wearing a camouflage designed jacket and brown track pants. He turned to Kai. Smeared across his face and clothes were mud and possibly blood? He stared with a cold bug-eyed expression – a blank gaze that held within them horrors and tragedy no civil human should experience in their lifetime. Kai stared back at him in defeat as he clinged onto the cliff. The man uttered a few remarks at Kai.
The man emitted green energy. He pulled out a machete and held it up above his head, up to the heavens, as green energy began to pour out of the blade and into the surrounding environment. The energy moved upwards and enveloped the entire canyon in a dance of green hues and that's when the unknown man slashed his blade in the air. Emanating from the slash was a colossal energy blast hurling straight to Kai.
The impact totally destroyed Kai. All that was left was black sludge stuck to the cliff.
The man turned around to check his surroundings and observed Rage's destroyed body to be sure he was defeated. He turned back around and his body slowly turned invisible from the bottom up and he disappeared as quickly as he appeared. The waves settled and were completely calm; a destroyed cyborg on the ground and a black splatter on the wall – the battle was over.