Hookwolf aka Brad Meadows - POV

  The training yard was already loud, like all the little shite’s here punching below their weight.The thud of fists into bags, the wet crack of knuckles on bone, the barked orders from older recruits pushing the new initiates to their limits, their pathetic limits, but when the notification chimed on my burner, the world seemed to fall into a sudden, unnatural quiet.

  I didn’t stop the session for this, The men knew to keep working unless I said otherwise. Or my name isnt Brad Meadows, I simply stepped back from the circle of sparring bodies, the metal beneath my skin humming with a restless irritation I didn’t bother to try hiding,

  .The dust kicked up around me as two initiates slammed each other into the concrete, but my focus was on this video I receive entirely onto the video loading on my cheap broken cracked phone screen.

  I was expecting a report from Storm or Melody,. Maybe even a victory clip trashing those inferior race down to the ground and gain an inch closer into the docks territory.. Maybe Cricket carving someone up for entertainment mutilitating some asian face with a smile on his face twisting it withing the skin and flesh like she always does, or brag about getting a new scar. At worst, a stalemate. Capitol Hill wasn’t supposed to be complicated.

  The video began shakily, one of his idiots was filming while lying on the ground. Sounds fuzzy from the stereo vibrating from the Crickets' sonic attack. They tend to destroy any sound quality temporarily.

  The image tilted up just in time to see a massive, industrial mech pivoting on heavy metal legs, Blue paint markings smeared with dirt and impact scoring. Bright lights glared from its chest. Hydraulic pistons pumped like a heartbeat. A walking slab of steel and torque. Hi-tech industrial servos meant for heavy-duty military grade, he has seen one of those before on Tanks. Someone's being fancy with this.

  A construction rig? Something weaponised by a cape with more ego than sense. So a new cape. That’s why they are late?

  Storm Tiger lay embedded in the side of a ruined car like someone had slapped him there with casual contempt. Cricket staggered nearby, clutching her ribs in a way that suggested the mech hadn’t so much hit her as folded her. And the machine was this lumbering metal brute and just stood still over them as the two of them bumbled, fighting with not a single dent on it.

  What kind of fucking farce is this shite?!

  . The metal along his arms rippled.

  A new parahuman. A tinker, probably. And an industrial-class mech at that. Something skitters or back-alley tinker wannabes couldn’t build even on their best day. This wasn’t some cobbled-together scrap heap. Weight class alone made it a problem. And the operator clearly wasn’t afraid to use it. Probably weighs like a tank ,too. I’ve seen Storm lift an empty freight train. That thing is easily over 30 tonnes.

  He watched the mech tilt slightly, almost as if mocking them, before the feed cut out as the holder was kicked or thrown. The last frame was Storm Tiger struggling to pull free from the cratered car door.

  Storm Tiger had been humiliated.

  Cricket sonic attack didn't work on it.

  Two of his best fighters were made to look like rookies in front of half the goddamn bay.

  That wasn’t just disrespect. That was a declaration of war.

  I rolled my shoulders in with my rage held in. Metal clicked, slid, and sharpened along the skin as the sharp material rolled out from his core and changed him despite trying to be calm about it.. The recruits nearby glanced at him nervously, some stopping mid-spar, others too smart to break rhythm but clearly aware of the shift in the air.

  They all felt it. The temperature of the room had changed,

  Had to force my powers inside and let the metal calm. Fury was expected, but uncontrolled fury was beneath him. Rage was a weapon. Not a leash. He’s a warrior. Probably the only true Aryan warrior left on this god forsaken earth.

  So he breathed. In. Out. And let his thoughts sharpen.

  I stood in the middle of the training pit, boots planted in broken concrete, the stink of sweat and blood hanging in the air like a familiar fog. The recruits kept swinging, dodging, stumbling around me, but I wasn’t watching them anymore.

  A new player. A tinker with high-end hardware. Enough power to toss E88 capes like toys. Enough gall to do it publicly. My eyes were on the video still burning in the corner of my vision, Storm Tiger and Cricket tossed around by some smug tinker kid in a giant industrial mech.

  It wasn’t the loss that bothered me.

  Loss happens. Even to the strong.

  N, what twisted in my gut was what the whole thing represented.

  This era… It’s wrong. I’ve always known it, always felt it simmering under my skin like molten metal waiting to be shaped. I was born at the wrong age. In a time where men don’t train, they accessorise. Where fights aren’t fought for challenge or victory, but for clips and views. Where even Nazis show up to spar and then complain when their knuckles bruise.

  Everyone wants to be strong without earning a damn bit of it. Like this Tinker. Just build something to fight for you. No respect for the struggle and the tenacity needed to build warriors.

  A hundred years ago, fifty even… I would’ve been exactly where I belonged. In the arena. In the thick of a raid. In a world that understood what strength meant like Rome and the gladiators. Where bloodsport was an officially sanctioned sport, where a slave can rise into a champion and be s slave master.. You fought with your hands, your teeth, your rage. You proved your worth or died proving it. Clean. Simple. Honest. The strong live and the weak perish.

  But now?

  Now the world hands out power like party favours.

  Gadgets, guns, tinker toys are doing the fighting for people who’ve never felt a real hit in their lives. That kid in the fucking mech!!

  He didn’t win because he was strong. He won because he never had to feel the weight of the fight. Just pressed some buttons and let the machine do the work.

  And Storm Tiger… Cricket… for all their flaws, at least they fight. They understand the dance. The impact. The risk. They bleed for it. They breathe for it, and the fucker dare to humiliate my warriors?!

  The recruits around me now?

  Some of them can barely hold their stances. They think they’re warriors because they passed initiation and slapped a swastika on their chest. Kill a nigga, and they think they hot shit, Kill some asian chink and screw their eyeballs, and they think they mademan, Mafioso. Proper Peakly Blinders like it's in the roaring 20s. Those eras are dead.

  They want to look strong, not be strong.

  I rolled my shoulder, metal grinding pleasantly against itself again unsatisfied with my current situation. The sound grounded me. Reminded me of what I am what I’ve built myself into. Not through shortcuts. This pure fucking grit!

  Through pain.

  Through choice!

  I choose pain over convenience! Because the world is weak!

  This world doesn’t make warriors anymore. It makes dumb idiots with power and how to use it for power plays that hide behind Masks. Children play at rebellion because it makes them feel important.

  Fine.

  If the era won’t give me warriors, I’ll carve them out myself. Rip the weakness away layer by layer until what’s left is something worth calling a fighter.

  Storm Tiger and Cricket will crawl in soon, battered, humiliated, probably blaming everything except their own slip-ups. I’ll deal with that. I’ll deal with them. And then I’ll deal with this new mech-brat who thinks power is something you can manufacture in a garage. Then the man was going to learn very quickly what it meant to offend someone whose entire body was a weapon designed to tear steel into ribbons.

  And just so happens, they dragged their ass in as I mull things over.

  Storm Tiger limped into the training pit first, one arm around a bruised, wheezing lieutenant, the other clutching his ribs. Cricket followed behind him, her movements stiff, her mask tilted from a dent that wasn’t there this morning. The rest of their men trailed after them like a procession of shame. Fucking pathetic.

  Training stopped. Recruits stepped back as if weakness were contagious, like they should, just like real aryan warriors. I didn’t say a word, just stood there, arms folded, waiting.

  Storm Tiger met my eyes and winced before speaking.

  “Hookwolf… we, uh… ran into an unexpected problem.”

  Cricket lifted her hands, signing sharply, A joke. A literal joke. We got clowned.

  Storm Tiger grimaced. “We went to Capitol Hill to break up the ABB retreat, and hey..look, it wasn’t our fault. The guy showed up in this massive mech, like something out of a science fiction movie. Thing moved like a tank but hit like a truck.”

  Cricket slapped her hands together in frustration

  I clicked my tongue. “Get patched up. Both of you. Your men, too. Call Othala if you need to.”

  They began to move, but I stopped them with a look.

  “And later,” I added, “you’re going to tell me everything. Every movement, every angle, every mistake. Because if some cape with a glorified construction toy can humiliate the Empire’s frontliners…”

  Storm Tiger swallowed hard,

  “…then we have a bigger problem than the ABB.” Hopefully, they got the message. This doesn't need to be Kaiser’s problem just yet.

  Storm nodded and then looked to one of the corpses of a sacrificial body for the initiates that passed, the rot hadn't set in, probably died within an hour or so.

  He clenches his arm and forms an air claw, levitating as the wind keeps pumping in with more compression. Storm Tiger then compresses it and releases it at the corpse, blasting it into many pieces, scattering the flesh and skin matter and bones scattering about. One of the bones even nicked Cricken on the arm with a flesh wound, but she just stares at it.

  That was his best yet, and even I know it wasn't his fault. It was just a bad matchup. Still, he would have tried to find a weakness or something if he didn't lean into his anger. A fighter who gets ruled by anger isnt a very effective warrior.

  I turned to him and said, “Clean that up,” as I heard him mutter

  “So it wasn’t me…that fucker…When I find him, I’ll blow him up just like that corpse”

  I let my claws slide out with a slow, metallic rasp. I stared at them both, the bruises, the embarrassment, the bitterness under their words.

  A mech. A damn construction mech.

  Not even a proper weapon.

  —--

  Jason POV- Back at the Command Centre- time 7.00 pm

  I collapsed into the metal chair in the canteen with the kind of full-body sigh that only comes after a few hours of being interrogated politely, then less politely, then politely again. The PRT had that down to an art form

  Fucking smile, ask a question with a smile, ask harder and of course…with a damn fucking smile.. Miss Militia and Battery didn’t raise their voices once, but you’d swear they were trying to peel my armour plates off with their words alone judging by their need to know about my base and my SCVs.

  I’d slipped out before they could escalate to the“please step into this testing chamber phase. Fuck that. A man has limits.

  Now, finally back in the dim steel warmth of the Command Centre, I dug into the tray in front of me. “Zerg burger,” the label said, which had nearly made me drop the thing on sight if Monica didnt tell me it was made using a grass-like substance like tofu from the things they harvest around the base. Plant material bioengineering. Food chemistry for the 2251.

  . But the moment I bit into it, holy hell. Crunchy edges, soft interior, the savoury umami kick Monica somehow coaxed from grass and spices.

  Across from me, Trainwreck sat sprawled in a seat far too small for his current cybernetic frame, happily inhaling a second burger. His new body clicked and buzzed with minor servos adjusting as he ate. Every time he moved, little indicator lights blinked like he was perpetually in ‘diagnostic mode.’ The sight was oddly comforting.

  He gave me a thumbs-up with his metal hand, plating hissing faintly. “Burger made by an A.I adjutant. You’re really lucky, Jason,” he said through a full mouth. “High-protein, low-cost, low-morale damage. Perfect dinner. I could eat this forever.”

  I didn’t answer. I just chewed and let the exhaustion roll off me and just grunted “Mmhhmm” and nod as well.

  The Command Centre hummed with the low, steady sound of SCVs in the next bay welding something, new structures, repairs, the usual. I think they are installing the new armour upgrades. Decided to upgrade the Neosteel Mk1 to Mk2. Space-grade edition.

  A warm orange glow pulsed rhythmically along the far wall, where the Tech Reactor construction was underway behind reinforced glass outside at the barracks…I should check the place out later.

  For a moment, I stared at the reactors within the canteen room with a slow rise, the way scaffolding retracted smoothly as the top plating descended into place. A twenty-billion-dollar project in the real world, built here by a handful of drones in a few hours by recycling gas and steel. The world would kill for a tech like this.

  Meanwhile, the PRT nearly had a panic attack over one SCV I decided to give to Kidwin. Here’s hoping he can really add more stuff towards it. I kinda want to see dear ol Pigot get an aneurysm. Maybe I’ll accidentally drop by and accidentally heal her without her permission and feign ignorance about it, Kidney failure? Not in my timeline!

  Trainwreck didn’t notice my thoughts drifting until halfway through his burger. He wiped sauce from his chin with the back of his metal hand ineffective, as it only smeared more. But still happy since his disposable thumbs actually work unlike his previous bulky ones.

  “So,” he said. “You survive the cape trip?”

  I let my head tilt back. “Barely, mostly kids doing kids stuff. The wards are a mess..”

  This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

  He barked a laugh, metallic echo and all.

  “Wards seemed pretty nice,” he added. “Except the kid who thought your mech was gonna explode.”

  I groaned into my hands. “Cockblocker huh… Well, all of them got their own quirks and story behind those mask”

  “Educational. Did you really just dump her ass there? Are you sure you dont want her here?. ” he asked about Sophia.

  “Yep, a kid at her age should mingle around kids and get a semblance of a normal life, even if it's a superpowered one. Besides, I’m still guiding her, im monitoring her as we spea,k even when she doesn't wear that gear”

  Trainwreck just shakes his head,” Did you bug my body too? Tell me,” He questioned me about his new cybernetic frame. I shake my head “You’re an adult, I dont need to watch you and babysit you if that’s what you mean to ask”

  I returned to the burger, savouring the tangy, smoky flavour. Whoever named it “Zerg” anything deserved psychological review, but I couldn’t deny the taste. I'm a slow eater because I enjoy my meal. Im just really, really glad to have good food, even if it's alien and weird as fuck.

  Trainwreck leaned back, chair groaning under him. “You sticking with this ‘independent contractor’ thing?”

  “Until further notice,” I muttered.

  “Dont know bout you, but I think I’m getting antsy not punching anyone lately boss” " he munched thoughtfully. “Also, you get to come home with two gangs’ worth of bruised egos on your bumper. I kinda wish for some action too”

  I didn’t even bother denying it. Powers want to be used. That's just his broken shard, not sharding right. So all it can do is mess things around, even if things were pretty swell right now. Broken triggers are like that. Cauldron forces powers onto individuals by injecting them with a "shard". Unlike natural triggers, which happen during extreme stress,

  Cauldron's process is more like forcing the shards to adapt to the human body as quickly as possible. Case 53 is just a symptom of a worse design.

  Trainwreck was already halfway through a third burger, blissfully unaware of concepts like “full.”

  “Monica,” I called, leaning back in my chair.

  A hologram shimmered into existence above the table: her usual crisp military projection, UED uniform immaculate, expression neutral enough to make a tax auditor proud.

  “Yes, Commander?”

  I fished into my pocket and pulled out the cheap plastic card I’d snatched off an unlucky E88 grunt earlier. It was the most mundane thing imaginable, just a scratched magnetic stripe and a faded logo from a no-name credit union. Practically a fossil in my world, it was phased out entirely for better security measures, but this is 2010. Not 2050.

  “I want this topped up,” I said. “Not traced. Not flagged. Just… filled. Quietly.”

  Monica didn't respond yet or choose not to, the artificial eyelids moving with almost human annoyance. “Define filled.”

  “Enough for groceries, some supplies, maybe renting a truck if I need to move a barracks in disguise. Nothing insane.” I tapped the card against the table. “And I don’t want to steal from civilians. Or anything legit. Just criminals. Organised ones. You know the type.”

  Trainwreck mumbled around his food. “Guy wants Robin Hood funds.”

  I snapped my fingers at him. “Ayyy, my man! See? He gets it.”

  Monica didn’t sigh, but I could feel the digital equivalent emanating from her processors.

  “Commander,” she said, “UED cyberwarfare protocols are designed for interplanetary espionage, destabilising hostile governments, and collapsing enemy logistics chains. Using them to top up a low-security civilian magnetic-strip bank card is just…”

  “Monica.”

  She paused for a while.I held up the card between two fingers. “I’ve been fighting Neo Nazis and budget yakuza all day. Please. Humour me.”

  Another micro-glitch blink of the holographic eyes. Then she straightened from her holofeed. “Initiating low-profile financial siphon.”

  A soft ripple of blue code poured down the projection like rain. Trainwreck’s chewing slowed as he watched the display, mesmerised.

  Monica narrated as she worked her magic, not for us, but because her UED systems weren’t built to hide their own brilliance.

  “Accessing global illicit financial networks…bypassing sockpuppet, entering onion network, skimming sub-cent increments from organised criminal operations to minimise traceability… embedding transactions within layered shell corporations… rerouting through outdated SWIFT nodes with forged timestamps… synthesising false account histories… obfuscating trails with recursive laundering through darknet escrow markets…”

  I blinked. “Uh, Monica? How much did you just move?”

  The projection hesitated. “The operation is ongoing, Commander.”

  “How much so far?”

  She tilted her head, calculating. “Approximately one million thirty-two thousand, six hundred and fifty-two dollars.”

  Trainwreck choked on his burger.

  I sat upright. “Monica! I said small!”

  “Commander,” she replied, “this is small. A few cents from each organisation. Spread across hostile networks globally. Statistically invisible.” A faint pause. “Even the one known as ‘the Numbers Man’ will be unable to detect this pattern. It is beneath his threshold for analytical relevance.”

  I stared at the card.A cheap, flimsy piece of plastic. Now casually carrying enough funds to buy half a used car lot. Fuck no..I could buy the half of the real estate at the docks. She just made me a millionaire in a minute.

  “Is this… illegal? Fuck of course its illegal. What am I saying?I feel bad for taking this.” I asked weakly.

  Trainwreck laughed hard enough to rattle his new cybernetic ribs. “Bro, everything we do is illegal if you squint. You are living on government property and not paying tax and rent is illegal.”

  Monica nodded crisply. “All funds were sourced exclusively from criminal organisations. The PRT would classify this as ‘a morally ambiguous intervention.’”

  “I classify it,” Trainwreck said, raising his half-eaten burger, “as dinner and a movie. What's new this Summer? I saw an ad for Inception. A movie from Aleph. Want to rent it on pay-per-view?”

  I rubbed my temples.

  “Well sure. Here’s the card number,” I muttered the number to Trainwreck as he jot it down, then sliding the card back into my pocket as if it might explode, “at least now I can buy Sophia something that isn’t cafeteria food before the PRT makes her do paperwork. Oh..I can use this to pay Danny for manpower too.”

  Monica flickered. “Would you like another siphon cycle, Commander?”

  “NO!! L-lets not be hasty with it.”

  “Very well,” she said with a smirk on her hologram face. Her projection dimmed and vanished. That cheeky little bugger.

  Trainwreck nudged me with his elbow, metal on metal since I was still in partial suit plating. “You realize you’re basically a millionaire now, right?.”

  I folded my arms on the table and groaned.

  “I’m a guy who wanted Dinner and accidentally committed international financial micro-warfare.”

  He shrugged. “Welcome to Tuesday,” he said. Leaving to get his pay-per-view of Inception.

  “Fuccccckkkk…It is still Tuesday Night,” I said lamely.

  I left the canteen still feeling the weight of that stupid plastic card like it was radioactive. A few cents from every criminal syndicate in the world, what could possibly go wrong? Nothing, apparently, according to Monica. Everything, according to my anxiety. Hat lady better not make a surprised Mothafucka behind my ass when I’m in my shower bathing…

  No, I dont need that image of Contessa Peek a Boogieman, my ass when I'm in my birthday suit. Fuck that.

  The air inside the Command Centre tasted faintly of ozone and metal, fresh construction, and that sterile hum of Terran tech running in perfect sync. It always felt strangely comforting. Like living inside a factory that secretly cared about me.

  I stepped onto the lift and rode it down toward the barracks.

  The new barracks. Smell all that Terran Ingenuity. Smell like progress!

  A building that hadn’t even existed twenty-four hours ago. A building a day keeps the Endbringer away! something something. insert funny wormverse joke here…but nobody gets it cept me. Sigh.

  My Isekai sensibilities not working in this multiverse.

  Barracks was designed using minimalist structure architecture, the clean lines of neosteel catching the overhead lights, windows tinted with that faint multi-spectrum shimmer that made them look thicker than armoured plating. Because they were. Literally. I built them. Reinforced with Neosteel and soon will be refurbished and redesigned with Mk2 Neosteel armour.

  Twenty-two SCVs had worked nonstop, like tireless little construction gremlins, weaving girders and plating like high-tech spiders until the place stood proud and perfect.

  Inside, the smell hit first: industrial solvents, fresh polymer, and that weird plasticky-sterile scent new electronics gave off. My boots echoed on the floor. Row after row of wall-mounted racks waited empty for the soldiers I didn’t have.

  That part still bothered me.

  Tech, I had.

  Buildings, I had.

  Military-grade everything, I had.

  But soldiers? Warm bodies who wouldn’t look at a CMC suit and immediately run screaming? Got the chicken suit but there aint no chicken to wear it.

  Zero.Nada- that’s all about to change tho soon.

  Still, one rack wasn’t empty.

  The Medic CMC unit.

  White armour with red accent stripes, polished and pristine. Sleek, but heavier than it looked. Its helmet had a visor shaped like a hawk’s beak, almost ceremonial designed to look calm, reassuring, and authoritative. I even have the fabricator to make me a light infantry Medic outfit with the combat gear.

  The medigun rig was locked in place on the back, power coils dormant, emitter nozzles like the open petals of a mechanical flower. Ready to heal. Ready to save.

  I approached slowly, like I was meeting someone important.

  The interface screen beside the armour flickered alive automatically, recognising my presence. A clean Terran military UI unfurled and show me some of the stuff I can do to upgrade this CMC armor. I could add a Shield Matrix, or install a Rapid Regeneration Nanoframe.

  Every Meditech tree under Terran Dominion is available. They even have the Elite Medic stuff from Morales and Lisa Cassidy, like the Drone-assisted Triage and even Biosteel Reinforcement.

  Each option blinked with tiny previews—schematics rotating in crisp holo blue.

  I felt… dizzy.

  This wasn’t a toy. This wasn’t even “cool.”This was a fully customizable military-grade medical exosuit, capable of saving lives on a battlefield or repairing someone like Trainwreck mid-fight. All of it sitting here, waiting for staff I didn’t have.

  My fingers brushed the armour. Imagine a whole squad of these. Imagine a proper Terran medic unit in Brockton Bay. Imagine…my brain flickered dangerously at how much the PRT would panic.

  I stepped back.

  Fuck…I totally forgot about those guys. This city needed medics more than anything if things dont change, and Leviathan is a set course towards Brockton Bay by next year.

  The holo menu kept waiting for my decision, and that stupid credit card in my pocket reminded me, in its cheap plastic way, that I now technically had enough money to hire… someone. If I wanted to . But this is tech the ordinary folks won't be able to conceive, even if it is tinker tech. No…I gotta have a Terran. A real Terran Officer.

  “Hey Monica, show me the list of all the clone memory repositories for the resurrection project”, I asked.

  File after file flickered across the holographic display, names of Terrans long gone, their minds compressed into data like digital tombstones. Soldiers from the UED’s early campaigns, scientists from failed colonies, and even civilians caught in the wrong place at the wrong time. A graveyard disguised as a database. No, Jim Raynor. Not even Mira or any of the important characters from Starcraft. Not even Stetman. What's going on here? Or maybe they just dont log them because there wasn't a need to anymore since the war was over? Makes sense,I suppose. Darn… I wish I could resurrect Raynor.

  Then one name stopped me cold.

  I blinked. Leaned in. Read it again.

  Ziegler, Angella M.

  Swiss. Old Earth.

  Affiliation: Project Overwatch.

  Approximate year of death: 2073.

  Neural engram: 74% intact.

  For a few seconds, all I could do was stare at it. The file hovered there, glowing faintly like it knew exactly how ridiculous this was.

  “Monica,” I said quietly, “what the hell is this doing here?”

  Her avatar tilted toward me, hands folded neatly behind her back. “The UED recovered several large data clusters from Old Earth shortly before exodus. Project Overwatch’s archives were among them. Dr Ziegler’s neural imprint was flagged as high-value.”

  I couldn’t help it, I laughed, short and sharp. “High-value? Monica… are you saying the UED somehow grabbed Mercy’s brain on their way out?”

  Is this one of the goddess, Zeus and Sun Wukong shenanigans, or is Starcraft and Overwatch related? I mean, duh..same company blizzard..but I thought they were separate entities and IP.

  “Designation: Dr Angella Ziegler,” she corrected patiently. “But yes. Her medical expertise was considered exceptional, particularly her work with nanotechnology and advanced tissue regeneration that gave birth to the Cadeceus Reactor technology.”

  “This is…so fucking ..this is absurd.” I stepped back from the panel, like putting physical distance between myself and the file would somehow make it less insane. “Overwatch was a game I could go pro with, but decided it wasn't for me, I still played it for fun though and stream it when I retired..”

  “And also a real organisation that existed on Old Earth,” Monica replied. “The UED does not store video games, Jason. It stores resources available data in history.”

  “History huh..,” I repeated. “Right. People’s memories are history. Sure. Why not?”

  The file continued to float calmly in front of me, as if it weren’t turning my entire understanding of this base upside down.

  I rubbed a hand over my face. “Is the engram… actually usable?”

  “Approximately seventy-four per cent,” Monica said. “There is some corruption expected, given the condition of the original archives, but enough remains to reconstruct personality, expertise, and a significant portion of memory.”

  I let out a long breath. “So… theoretically… we could bring her back.”

  “If the clone vats are allocated,” she confirmed. “And if you authorise the process.”

  I stared at that name again. Dr. Angella Ziegler. A woman who should’ve been nothing more than a story, a character on a screen, yet here she was, buried in the UED’s stolen past, waiting in digital limbo.

  “Damn..having Mercy here would change a lot of things,” I whispered.

  “You have expressed that sentiment many times since discovering the file,” Monica observed.

  “Because it is insane, you have no Idea how significant this is, do you?” I asked because she doesn't get it. Nobody gets it! Only an isekai idiot like me gets it!

  “You also said that when you became a millionaire,” she reminded me.

  “That was different,” I said reflexively. “That was just you stealing from criminals.”

  “Is this not also stealing from criminals? If Arthurian Mengks still lives, this will not go unnoticed under the Dominion Empire,” she asked with the polite curiosity only an AI could emulate.

  I opened my mouth. Closed it again. “…You win this round. Yeah fuck that guy. Good riddance.”

  The Medic CMC’s blueprint still hovered in the corner of my display, showing dozens of potential upgrades, weapon slots, nanite modules, and medical drones. A system built for war, for saving lives, for both.

  And now I had the mind of Dr Ziegler sitting right there, waiting

  I drew a slow breath and nodded at the console. “Monica… open the rest of the Overwatch-related archives.”

  Her hologram’s expression sharpened. “Some files are fragmented,” she warned. “Others are heavily encrypted.”

  “Can you break them?”

  The small smile she gave me was almost dangerous. “Commander… I am an UED Intelligence. I can break into anything.”

  Data streamed across the screens, symbols, corrupted memories, fractured images on the hologram. I stood there in the heart of the barracks I’d built with my own hands, watching the past unravel in front of me, and couldn’t shake the feeling that opening this archive wasn’t just uncovering history.

  Familiar faces zoomed past. Genji. Soldier 76, Tracer, evenD.VA and the MeKa squad.

  "Monica..Prioritise building the Clone Vat program without a cloning facility; if you will, do it in-house. I just need one vat and continue with the Factory on schedule if you can run them simultaneously. Set the module in one of the empty labs here in the Command Centre. This needs to stay in-house. How fast can you build it?"

  Her hologram materialised beside one of the counters, light blooming like a ghost taking shape. She scanned the room with a slow, evaluating sweep.

  “With current resource allocation,” she said, “I can refurbish this laboratory and install a full clone-vat array in approximately forty-eight hours. Factory scheduling won't be interrupted. It is possible to do both in two days.”

  Two days.

  I blinked. “That’s… fast.”

  “It would be faster,” she added mildly, “if the facility were not built out of scrap materials you acquired from Brockton Bay’s industrial district.”

  I threw up a hand. “Hey, don’t blame me. This trainyard built all of our shit.”

  Monica continued as if I hadn’t spoken. “Refurbishing will require nanite swarming, structural reinforcement, sterilisation cycles, and rerouting of generator output. All simple tasks, though time-consuming.”

  I stepped closer to the centre of the room and sat on a nearby sofa in the barracks, brushing my hand over the smooth counter while watching the holo screen as Monica gave me the update.

  “So two days,” I murmured. “Then the clone vats go online.”

  “Yes,” she said.

  “And you can install the neural imprinting chamber here, too?”

  “Of course. I will require only a minor increase in power during installation. You will experience a temporary blackout in the living quarters for approximately twenty minutes.” Monica showed me the data and the necessary material deposit we collected. It's enough, surprisingly. SCVs have been working hard nonstop.

  “Great.” That’s not too bad since we run on Reactor Energy. But in two days? Full clone vats. Overwatch engrams. And potentially… her.

  “Begin the conversion,” I said finally. “I want this lab operational.”

  Monica nodded once. “Understood.”

  The moment the word left her, one of the empty rooms in the Command Centre shifted.

  Panels in the walls opened with soft hydraulic hisses as swarm nanites poured through like silver dust. They spread across the floor, crawling into vents, sliding under equipment, dissolving old components and reassembling them with quiet, mechanical precision.

  I watched in silence as the lab came alive from the hologram monitor, not violently, but with the eerie smoothness of a machine that had done this a thousand times before. Reminds me of that cutscene where Mengks outfitted Tychus Findlay. All of the robotics is moving in sync, changing an empty room into a cloning lab.

  Counters reconfigured. Storage units unfolded into larger compartments. Sections of the floor sank and reshaped into mounts for the vats. Reinforced tubing slithered into the ceiling. New equipment printed itself layer by layer. New wiring pops up.

  It was like watching a time-lapse, but happening in real time.

  Two days, and I’d have a functioning clone-vat wing.

  In two days, and a certain Swiss doctor’s consciousness might have a body again.

  Two days.

  **********************

  A/N

  Hi, pantser here. I dont exactly plan or control where this is going, if it goes? it goes weeeeee..weeee..weeee! Stuff. I have no stored chapters. This is just me writing on the seat.