How long does it take for a building to collapse?
The answer varies.
But at Quantico Base, the damaged Gamma Laboratory—already weakened years earlier during Bruce Banner's catastrophic gamma accident—didn't last long.
A violent blast erupted from underground.
The structure shuddered.
Then the entire three-story laboratory gave way.
In less than five seconds, the building folded in on itself and turned into rubble.
Dust exploded outward, slamming against the metal barricades surrounding the site. Sheets of corrugated steel rattled violently under the impact.
The emergency response team, who had just been preparing to storm the building, scrambled backward.
They watched the laboratory collapse in stunned silence.
A few seconds passed.
Then several of them swallowed hard.
If they'd entered the building just moments earlier, they would have been buried along with it.
Eventually the soldiers turned toward their team leader.
"Command, what now?"
The man stared at the smoking ruins for a moment.
"…Hell if I know."
He sighed and waved a hand.
"Stand down."
The squad blinked.
"What?"
"What do you mean 'what'?" the commander snapped. "The building's gone. What are we supposed to do—dig up the intruder's body?"
The operation had looked like it would become a serious firefight.
Instead…
It ended before it even started.
Right then, a military jeep screeched to a stop nearby.
The lieutenant colonel who had reported the incident earlier stepped out.
"Command Two, stand down," the team leader ordered his second-in-command.
"Yes, sir."
The team leader adjusted the rifle hanging across his chest and walked toward the lieutenant colonel.
Before he could salute, the officer spoke.
"What happened here?"
The team leader gestured toward the ruins.
"Honestly? Not entirely sure. But we've confirmed one thing."
He paused.
"There was only one intruder."
The lieutenant colonel blinked.
"…One?"
"Yes, sir."
The commander quickly summarized what the escaping researchers had reported and explained how the building collapsed just as his team prepared to enter.
The lieutenant colonel's expression stiffened.
"Just one person," he repeated slowly.
"Yes, sir."
"Mother of—"
He cut himself off and rubbed his forehead.
"This makes no sense. One guy breaks into Quantico?"
Security breaches weren't unheard of.
But previous attackers—foreign operatives, extremists, whoever—always came in groups.
And they usually didn't even make it past the outer gates before being neutralized.
Everyone understood that raiding Quantico was a team operation.
But this?
One man attempting it alone?
The lieutenant colonel struggled to process it.
The response team leader shrugged.
"Maybe it was a suicide mission," he suggested. "His target was the laboratory. He probably never planned to get out alive."
The lieutenant colonel thought about it.
Then nodded slowly.
"That's the only explanation that makes sense."
A moment later his face darkened.
"Damn it."
The team leader raised an eyebrow.
"What?"
"I already called the general," the colonel muttered.
If he'd known the attacker intended to die in the explosion, he wouldn't have reported it with such urgency.
Now he had to make another call.
He sighed.
Turning to an aide, he gave a quick order.
"Tell base control to stand down the alarm."
Then he pulled out his phone again and dialed.
The call connected almost immediately.
"Report," came the familiar voice of Thaddeus Ross.
"General, the intruder is dead."
Ross paused.
"Dead?"
Inside the speeding vehicle heading toward Quantico, Ross frowned.
"Explain."
"We don't know his identity yet. But there was only one attacker. The Gamma Laboratory collapsed. It appears the intruder carried out a suicide—"
BOOM.
A thunderous explosion cut him off.
"What the hell?!" the lieutenant colonel shouted.
Across the rubble of the collapsed laboratory, something moved.
Under the sweep of the base's spotlights, a figure burst upward from the debris.
The colonel froze.
Beside him, the response team leader stared in disbelief.
Then he snapped back to action.
"Contact!"
"Open fire!"
Gunfire erupted.
Automatic rifles rattled across the base.
The soldiers who had been preparing to leave immediately turned and unleashed a barrage of bullets toward the figure standing among the ruins.
At that exact moment, the base alarm—just seconds after being shut down—blared to life again.
The piercing siren echoed across Quantico.
Soldiers who had only just begun dispersing looked around in confusion.
Did someone hit the wrong button?
Then the sound of gunfire answered the question.
"Shit!"
"Another breach!"
"Move! Move!"
Meanwhile, Lucas Kane moved across the wreckage of the Gamma Laboratory like a phantom.
Below the rubble, the last trace of energy had already been pulled into his Cosmo.
Mission complete.
Lucas glanced at the soldiers firing at him.
More troops were rushing in from every direction.
In the distance, engines roared as armored vehicles rolled toward the site.
A tank turret rotated.
Above, rotor blades thundered as armed helicopters began lifting into the air.
Lucas raised an eyebrow.
He had definitely stirred up the hornet's nest.
Still—
The job was done.
All that remained was to find a quiet place and process the power he'd just absorbed.
Lucas bent his knees.
The debris beneath his feet shattered.
Then he launched skyward like a missile.
Under the sweeping beams of the searchlights, his body traced a clean arc across the night sky.
A second later—
He landed beyond the perimeter fence, deep inside the surrounding forest.
Lucas straightened and disappeared into the trees.
Fast in.
Fast out.
Now it was time for the next step.