Chapter 54 Not so Happy Ending

The fight didn’t last long.

Even with all their training, all their firepower, Conor’s team was overwhelmed. One by one, they fell—screaming, firing until their guns clicked empty, torn apart by crystal limbs and crystal-bladed claws. Shachiku couldn’t even keep track of who fell when—it was a blur of gunfire, blood, and shattered crystal.

And then… silence.

The room was wrecked. Smoke curled upward in lazy spirals from broken lights and shattered terminals. The floor was littered with bodies, both human and no longer quite human. Ichiban and Kaiju crouched behind what remained of the console bank, shaken but alive. Mike leaned against the wall, clutching his side where blood soaked into his tactical vest. Holtz was curled up behind a toppled cabinet, wide-eyed and trembling. Akarui was out cold on the ground.

Shachiku stared ahead.

Only two figures remained in the center of the ruined hub.

Conor, bloodied and bruised, sat slumped against a fallen beam. His rifle was gone. One of his legs wasn’t moving. One hand behind his back. He looked up, defiant and exhausted, as a shadow moved toward him.

Adam.

The crystal figure moved with slow, deliberate grace. His steps echoed through the chamber like nails tapping on glass. His body glowed faintly from within, as if lit by some strange internal fire. Shards pulsed along his spine, rising and falling like breath. And his face—half human, half crystal—wore something disturbingly close to a smile.

He stopped a few feet from Conor and tilted his head.

Then, in a voice both gravelly and broken—like a memory trying to remember itself—he spoke.

“Ah… humans. Pointless struggle... more of us come soon.”

Conor narrowed his eyes, breathing heavy.

“You… speak now?”

Adam’s head twitched slightly, as if processing the effort. His voice dragged like glass across stone.

“Not… well. Yet.”

He leaned closer. 

“You… small. Fragile. So much noise. So much… fear.”

Conor coughed, spitting blood.

“Yeah? Well, you’re one ugly son of a bitch.”

Adam’s smile grew just a little.

“Ugly… now. Not always. I was… becoming. Not done. Young Kaiju set me free. You interrupt.”

He looked past Conor, toward the others—toward Ichiban.

“I need… her. I know… more… when I consume her.”

He turned back to Conor, and the air seemed to grow colder.

“You stopped that. You… slowed me.”

Conor met his gaze, defiant even on the edge of death.

“Damn right I did.”

Adam crouched, crystalline fingers scraping the floor, and whispered, “But… you’re alone now.”

Conor smirked.

“Maybe.”

Adam tilted his head again, curious. That’s when he leaned in just slightly—just close enough. His jagged face mere inches from Conor’s.

And that’s when Conor moved.

In one smooth motion, he pulled a heavy pistol from behind his back—one he’d stashed the second he fell. Chrome, scratched, and built to end something twice his size. He jammed the muzzle under Adam’s jaw.

"Jackpot, motherfucker!" he roared, pulling the trigger.

BANG.

But Adam moved like lightning—his head jerked sideways with inhuman speed. The bullet tore a chunk from his crystal collar, but not enough. He turned with a shrieking laugh, backhanding the pistol clean from Conor’s hand. It clattered across the floor, sparking.

“Oh,” Adam rasped, mockingly playful. 

“How you humans say it… I dodge that.”

He rose, ready to finish it.

But he didn’t see the second player.

Shachiku stepped from the shadows behind him—silent, composed, auto shotgun braced tight against his shoulder. He didn’t hesitate. He didn’t blink. He pressed the barrel flush against the back of Adam’s crystalline skull.

“Dodge this, motherfucker.”

KAAAAAAAAA-BOOM!

The sound was deafening. The buckshot tore through crystal and core alike. Shards exploded outward in a shimmering blast of red and violet, glowing fragments raining down like shattered glass stars.

Adam staggered forward—arms limp, spine flickering.

He turned his head slowly, cracks spiderwebbing across what remained of his face. For a moment, it looked like he might speak again… but all that came out was static.

Then he dropped—like a sculpture kicked off its pedestal—crashing into the wreckage with a final, brittle crunch.

Silence.

Conor lay on the floor, panting, eyes wide. Shachiku lowered the smoking shotgun and stepped back, chest rising and falling with the weight of it all.

Mike whistled from the side, still bleeding, still alive.

“Well, remind me to never piss you off. I mean, God damn! You ended that freak like a boss!”

The flickering lights finally died, leaving only emergency lights pulsing through the red haze. The blast doors to the surface were still locked tight, but Ichiban and Kaiju were already working the control panel. 

Akarui stumbled over, one arm hanging limply, helping prop up Mike, who was pale but gritting through it. Blood soaked his shirt, but his expression hadn’t changed much. He still looked like he could break the place in half if he had to.

Most of Conor’s squad lay sprawled across the room—groaning, clutching wounds, or unconscious. Alive, but in no shape to move or fight.

Conor himself was slumped against the wall. One leg twisted wrong, chest heaving. His pistol was gone, and his coat was shredded from the fight. He was still alive, still sharp—and watching.

Shachiku stood a few feet away, his auto shotgun resting in both hands, the barrel pointed dangerously close to Conor’s midsection. His suit jacket was torn, ash clinging to the fabric. Sweat streaked down his face, but his grip on the weapon didn’t waver.

Conor let out a dry laugh, his voice hoarse.

“Well? What are you wait, salaryman? You gonna shoot me, right? Fair game, you won.”

Conor’s lip curled, blood on his teeth.

 “If it were me and my men walking out that door first, I wouldn’t have hesitated. You? Dead. Her?”—he nodded toward Ichiban—“Dead. All of you.”

He coughed again, spitting red.

“Your little story? Please. That didn’t fool me. Not for a second. I played along. Let the lie ride. That’s all. Thought I could use you fools to make it out of here. More bodies to distract the freaks."

He slumped further, eyes half-lidded.

“So go on. Be the hero. Pull the trigger. Finish it.”

A long silence followed.

Then Shachiku lowered the gun, slowly. He didn’t smile. Didn’t say a word. Just stared at Conor for a few moments.

“Didn’t think so,” Conor muttered, almost amused.

 “That’s why you’ll always be the guy in the chair, not the one giving the orders.”

“I don’t need to shoot you,” Shachiku said finally, voice cold. 

“The world’s already done it for me. You just haven’t hit the ground yet. Military will handle you and your men.”

Behind them, the control panel gave a shrill beep.

Ichiban stood up, wiping her forehead.

 “Doors are opening. We’re clear.”

The locks gave a thunderous groan as the main blast doors slowly creaked open. Faint daylight pierced the darkness—a broken sunrise at the end of a nightmare.

Soldiers in black tactical gear flooded the room, weapons raised, sweeping left and right in perfect formation. Their visors glinted in the emergency lights as they moved with sharp precision—no hesitation, no panic, just brutal efficiency. The insignias on their shoulders were military, but high clearance—special response unit.

“Everyone stay down! Weapons on the floor!” barked the commanding officer as his team fanned out across the ruined room.

Mike didn’t move. He just raised his arms with a grunt and muttered, “Took you long enough.”

Akarui lowered his rifle and waved weakly at the team leader, “My dad sent you! Right? I'm with you guys!”

One of the soldiers stepped forward, looked at him, then turned to the commanding officer and nodded.

“Escort them out. They’re friendly. Civilian and facility staff.”

Soldiers approached Shachiku’s group carefully, lowering their weapons but still alert. Shachiku locked eyes with the commander.

“Take Ichiban and the vial first. She’s the reason any of this can be fixed.”

Ichiban was already clutching the glowing vial tightly. One soldier gently took it from her hands and placed it into a secure, reinforced container. Another two flanked her, leading her out.

Shachiku, Mike, and Akarui followed right after, flanked on both sides.

Behind them, another squad surrounded Conor and his wounded men.

The leader turned to Kaiju. 

“You. On your knees.”

Kaiju didn’t even protest. He sank down, hands raised, eyes empty.

Conor looked up at the soldiers approaching him, then at Shachiku’s back as he walked away.

“You win, suit,” he said under his breath, almost like a joke. 

“Enjoy the paperwork.”

Soldiers moved in fast, zip-tying Conor’s arms behind him, dragging him and his men out in a separate group. They didn’t resist.

As Shachiku and the others stepped out into the fresh air, blinking against the overcast daylight, a wave of helicopters roared overhead, carrying supply crates, medics, and containment units.

Akarui squinted and turned to Shachiku.

 “Dude! Is it over? My friends will shit their pants when I tell them what I have gone through!”

Shachiku watched as the military swarmed the facility behind them, setting up checkpoints and barriers. His eyes drifted to the container holding the vial as it was handed off to a medical team.

“For now, kid. But trust me. With something like this? It’s never really over.”

Mike grunted behind him.

 “If anyone asks, I’m retired. Again.”

Ichiban chuckled, shaking her head.

 “I just want a real lab. With walls. That don’t bleed.”

The wind shifted. Somewhere, alarms still echoed faintly inside the facility—but out here, it was quiet. Peaceful.

At least for today. 

The end.

[POST-CREDITS SCENE]

Somewhere deep beneath the facility, far below the sealed levels and forgotten labs, flickering lights buzzed in the dark. Static danced on a broken monitor—security feed #98—still operational, still transmitting.

The camera was tilted, half-buried under fallen debris and dried blood. But something moved in the background. Slowly. 

A hunched figure walked through the crystallized wreckage. It stepped past frozen corpses, shards of bone-fused crystal still twitching from time to time. Its limbs weren’t fully human—flesh melded with translucent mineral, veins pumping something that pulsed faintly with light.

It stopped before a wall—no, not a wall. A mirror of sorts. Its cracked surface shimmered faintly.

The creature touched it.

Then spoke.

In a voice that was both male and female, young and old—layered.

"We are not gone. We are not one. But we are coming."

The crystal on the wall began to ripple like liquid, forming strange symbols in a language no human had ever spoken.

"Phase Two... begins."

The monitor fizzled out, screen dying in a final blink of red.