Chapter 162: Rust and Blood
The sub-basement stank of oil, piss, and metal polish. Dim yellow bulbs buzzed overhead, swaying on chains. Boots splashed in shallow water as a squad of Hellfire guards fanned out, rifles ready.
"Spread out! Find the body. Black King said the mutie drowned."
Logan was there. Not on the ground where they thought, but clinging to a ceiling pipe, claws half-unsheathed, muscles tight as coiled wire. His breath slow. His heartbeat quiet. The predator waiting.
One guard stopped beneath him, helmeted head craning side to side. "You smell that?"
Logan dropped.
Steel flashed. The man didn't even scream — claws punched clean through the chest plate, ribs snapping like twigs. Blood sprayed hot. Logan's boots splashed as he landed, rolling the corpse off his claws with a grunt.
"Yeah, bub. That smell's me."
Shouts erupted. Rifles came up. Too slow.
Bullets ripped the air. Logan saw them crawl in slow arcs, thanks to the dual reflex surge. He slipped between them, water exploding around him. He was already on the next man, claws swiping in a horizontal flash, helmet and head parting company in a wet, ugly noise.
The others panicked. Heartbeats quickened — Logan heard every thrum. Smelled the acid bite of terror in their sweat.
'Been too long. I let myself rust. Playing hero with the X-Men. Forgot what it feels like to hunt.'
A guard tried to flank him, blade attached under the rifle barrel. Logan turned with a snarl, elongated claws snapping out, five meters of gleaming adamantium whipping forward like a spear. It punched through the guard's armor, skewering him to a wall. The man gurgled, sagging like a bug pinned to glass.
Two more fired wild. Logan vanished — not invisible, but gone from their senses. The tiger's stealth pulsed through him, every trace pulled inward, every emission folded into his own body. To their tech and their instincts, he wasn't there. Just a chair in a room they forgot existed.
They froze. "Where'd he go?!"
Logan's whisper came from behind them. "Right here."
Claws burst out their backs, hot blood misting the ceiling. Both dropped, rifles clattering useless.
Logan stood alone now, chest heaving, sewer water and gore dripping off his arms. His claws retracted slow, metal singing as it slid home. He glanced at the carnage.
"X-Men fight not to kill. But you boys… you're killers. That means I don't gotta hold back."
He cracked his neck, sniffed the air — more guards above, more hearts thundering, more prey.
"Now…" his lips pulled back in a wolf's grin, "…the hunt begins."
The light overhead flickered, sputtered. Silence swallowed the sub-basement, except for the drip of blood into dirty water.