When General Thaddeus Ross arrived at the Quantico military base, the intrusion alarm had been cleared.
Yes.
This time, it was truly cleared.
But that didn't end the story.
On the contrary, the lights in the base's command center were ablaze.
This was a truly humiliating situation.
Someone had not only easily invaded their base, but had even destroyed a building, and had gotten away with it.
Most importantly,they had completely lost track of the intruder.
"What do you mean, lost?"
"Lost in the dense forest twenty kilometers south of the base."
"Where's our helicopter?"
"At night, in the dense forest, our helicopter can't even descend."
"Shit!"
The lieutenant colonel slammed his hand on the table.
"Send out all our men, including the helicopters. We have to find this damned guy."
The deputy quickly responded and trotted off.
Just as the lieutenant colonel, hands on his hips, watched the large screen displaying the helicopters and the first-person perspectives of the search teams, a deep voice boomed from behind.
The lieutenant colonel shuddered and turned around subconsciously, only to see General Ross, whose face was now as dark as ink.
"General..."
"There was only one intruder, and you managed to lose him. That's quite impressive,"
General Ross said with a forced smile.
The lieutenant colonel opened his mouth but said nothing.
Instead, he asked the soldier sitting at the computer to view the footage of the intruder's escape.
General Ross looked at the big screen.
It was eye-catching.
The intruder, standing in the smoke, was completely invisible under the searchlight.
Then, with a single bound, he leaped into the forest and quickly disappeared.
General Ross was stunned by the scene.
A second later,he looked at the lieutenant colonel: "You just said that only the Gamma Building was invaded?"
The lieutenant colonel nodded quickly.
"Yes, General. Not long after this intruder entered, the Gamma Building collapsed. We initially thought he was a bomber, but just as I was updating you on the situation, he suddenly emerged from the rubble."
"…"
General Ross remained silent, listening quietly to the Lieutenant Colonel's report while having the surveillance footage of Hawke leaping out of the base replayed.
Solo, clear target, the Gamma Building, inhuman dodging abilities, astonishing leaping ability.
General Ross's eyes flickered.
"Did any other cameras capture the intruder?"
"The technical team is checking the surveillance footage."
"Have they located the intruder?"
"…No."
The Lieutenant Colonel instinctively glanced at his deputy, who had just returned.
Seeing the deputy shake his head, he remained silent for a moment.
Then, steeling himself, he reported to General Ross, "He disappeared in the dense forest twenty kilometers south of our base.
We're still searching."
General Ross nodded.
A second later.
He said nothing, simply walking outside. "Send someone to dig up the Gamma Building as quickly as possible."
The lieutenant colonel shuddered and quickly stood at attention.
"Yes!"
But by the time the large machinery arrived, clearing the rubble and digging out the bodies buried within, it was already dawn.
The helicopter, having flown all night, had returned to base.
While the pilot rested, the helicopter didn't. After a new pilot and a full tank of fuel, the helicopter took off again, radiating out from the base in all directions, searching for any trace of the intruders who had so brazenly bullied the Marines last night, practically trampling on them.
The soldiers at the base did the same.
The soldiers who had returned last night rested, and another group of soldiers was replaced, who also dispersed into the dense forest surrounding the base.
It looked like they were going to search for three days.
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But…
General Ross didn't go back to rest.
Instead, he sat in his car, not far from the ruins of Gamma Tower, leaning back in the back seat, his eyes slightly narrowed.
Just then, the lieutenant in the driver's seat, receiving a call, hummed a few times, then turned to look at General Ross, who was resting in the back seat.
"General, it's the Director of S.H.I.E.L.D."
"...Yes."
General Ross slowly opened his eyes, reached out to take the phone from his lieutenant, and put it to his ear.
"This is Ross!"
"General Ross, I heard Quantico was bustling last night."
"..."
The gloating voice on the other end of the line gave General Ross a headache.
"Talk about it, Nick!"
Nick, wearing a black trench coat and a black eye mask, sat in his seat at S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters, admiring the image of Hawke leaping out of the base on the computer screen.
He laughed heartily at General Ross's words. "Joint operation, how's that?"
"You're dreaming."
General Ross chuckled.
"This is a military case. I'm warning you, Nick, don't interfere. And if I remember correctly, your access seems to have been frozen."
General Ross didn't even bother listening to the snarky guy on the other end of the line.
It was just nonsense, anyway.
He simply hung up and handed the phone back to his aide.
Sitting up straight, he rubbed his brow.
"Have you found any traces?"
The aide shook his head.
"No, sir."
"Haha."
General Ross seemed unsurprised by the result. He chuckled twice, shook his head, and changed the subject.
"Have they excavated the Gamma Building?" "An estimated ten minutes."
"Let's go."
General Ross opened the car door and got out.
"Let's take a look."
Seeing this,the aide quickly opened the car door and quickly followed.
By now, the bodies of the soldiers buried in the Gamma Building had been excavated and were lying in rows not far away.
Their deaths each one different, but in common: the expressions on the faces of those still largely intact were frozen in astonishment, horror, and disbelief.
General Ross glanced at the bodies and said to his lieutenant, "Have the base report the maximum compensation. I'll approve it."
The lieutenant nodded, indicating he'd made a note of the matter.
Ten minutes passed quickly, and the hole, previously buried beneath the rubble, was reopened.
The base's experimenters, who had been waiting nearby, reentered the underground passage.
"Gone."
"All gone."
"Unbelievable! Did he absorb everything here?"
"Jesus Christ, why didn't he become a monster like the Hulk and the Abomination?" Soon, waves of incredulous exclamations rang out from within.
General Ross's eyes lit up.
"Lieutenant!"
"Sir."
"Find him, at all costs!" "
Understood!"
"..."
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