The scene shifted to a cold, cavernous lab. Metal groaned. Monitors flickered. Rows of abandoned prototypes and machinery sat like corpses under thin blankets of dust. A robotic arm twitched in the shadows. The only light came from the screen in front of Dr. Vlad Orlov.
"Signal Lost," the machine repeated in a sterile voice.
Vlad stared.
A heavy breath escaped his lungs, trembling, fractured. He blinked once, as though refusing to believe what he saw.
Then rage swallowed him.
"NO!" he roared.
With a violent sweep of his arm, he sent a nearby table crashing into the wall. Tools scattered. A wrench spun across the floor like a coin, clinking until silence returned. Vlad staggered back, grabbing a monitor, smashing it down. Sparks burst in every direction.
"So close," he muttered, stumbling back toward the control console. "It was mine. It was mine!"
He hit the console again. Another monitor died.
"Damn this cursed fate! Every time—every damn time—it's the same!"
He was pacing now, frantically kicking machines. Glass shattered underfoot. Oil pooled.
"First, you take my legs. Then, my legacy. And now this? The culmination of years of work, the last thread of glory I could've clutched—ripped from my hands again?!"
His voice echoed across the steel and concrete walls like the growl of a wounded animal.
Then silence.
Vlad dropped to one knee, panting. Sweat beaded on his forehead. A few moments passed. A slow, eerie clarity settled behind his eyes. He began to chuckle—low at first, then rising. Then came the laughter, manic and bitter.
"You think this is funny, don't you?" he said to no one. Or maybe to fate itself.
He stood slowly. The laughter wouldn't stop.
"It was mine to begin with," he hissed. "The fame. The revolution. Norton wasn't supposed to stand alone. We were a team. A pair of minds poised to change the world. And then… you took it."
Vlad looked toward an old photograph tucked in a corner of the lab. Two younger men stood side-by-side, arms around each other's shoulders. Norton and Vlad. Smiling.
"I thought—maybe—I could forgive you. Maybe, just maybe, if I unlocked this knowledge, if I transcended this world, we could meet again. As equals. As friends. Like we used to be."
The madness in his eyes softened momentarily.
"But no. Even that's gone now."
He exhaled, long and cold.
Then, his voice dropped.
"Well… good. If fate insists on mocking me, I will mock fate back. If destiny denies me, I will deny destiny. I will forge my own path. One forged in fire, steel, and vengeance."
He turned, eyes gleaming with a manic light, and strode toward the far side of the lab. He passed rows of failed experiments. Cracked tubes. Deactivated drones.
He stopped in front of a rusted steel panel in the wall.
With a hiss of air and mechanical locks disengaging, the panel slid open to reveal a narrow staircase descending into darkness.
Down he went.
The air grew colder, thicker with age and silence.
He reached the bottom. A chamber of red emergency lights greeted him. This room had not been touched for years. In the center stood a towering humanoid figure, shaped like an ancient knight clad in modern warsteel.
Its surface gleamed with a metallic sheen—no ordinary alloy. This was VladSteel, his private creation. A fusion of carbon nanotubes, rare earth metals, and synthetic muscle fibers. Resistant to ballistics, weather, even electromagnetic pulses.
And inside it—his true work: a proto-intelligence core with reaction time and physical capacity far exceeding any soldier.
A semi-robot, semi-android. The hybrid of weaponry and mind.
He approached the figure and pulled out a small chip from the chain around his neck. Without hesitation, he inserted it into the socket at the base of the unit's skull.
The effect was immediate.
The android's eyes ignited—a deep, burning red. Motors whirred to life. The chest plate thrummed. Its body adjusted posture with an eerie smoothness. A new machine, reborn.
"Hello, Karl," Vlad said, his voice trembling with suppressed glee. "You are going to be my welcoming gift for my dear, dear friend… Norton."
Karl stood in silence. But the red glow in his eyes intensified.
A silent promise of war.
Vlad stepped back and looked up at his creation. For the first time in a long while, he felt purpose. No more begging fate. No more waiting. If the world refused to recognize his brilliance willingly, then he would force them to.
"Let the world tremble. Let Norton see what he has lost."
He reached for the master control panel.
"It begins now."
The steel doors sealed shut behind him. Above, the abandoned lab pulsed to life. Machines awoke. Systems rebooted.
And in the depths below, Karl waited.
The future had changed course.
The sun filtered softly through the curtains of Alex's room, casting golden streaks across the wooden floor. For the first time in what felt like forever, Alex woke up not groggy, not grumpy—just... refreshed. Energized. Like every muscle in his body had been tuned overnight.
He stretched his arms with a satisfied grunt, then sat up and blinked at the morning light.
His mother was already in the kitchen when he came down.
"Well, look who's up before the toaster," she said with a smile, plating some scrambled eggs.
"Morning, Mom," Alex said, leaning over to kiss her cheek.
"You seem... chipper today. Did the world not end overnight?"
He smirked. "No, just—had a good sleep, I guess."
She slid a plate toward him and sat down with her coffee. "You sure you're okay? I was half expecting a mopey zombie after what happened yesterday."
"I'm good. Really. I mean, Jenna sucked, but it's done. Besides, I think I made a couple of weird but decent friends."
"Weird friends are the best kind."
Alex chuckled. "You would say that."
"It's true. Normal is boring. Weird is resilient."
They shared a smile as the clink of forks on plates filled the room.
After breakfast, Alex slung his backpack over his shoulder and wheeled his old bike from the garage.
"See you later, Mom!"
"Have a good day, sweetheart. Don't let the weirdos out-weird you."
"Too late," he called back with a grin.