Lyons then pulled out the storage module and handed it to Leon. "All the data is in here, including the virus's backdoor keys."
Leon took the module, his gaze lingering on her face for a second. "You want to save everyone."
Lyons let out a cold laugh. "No. I'm only making amends for the UED's crimes."
She looked to the monitor, which showed the exterior of the base.
Homelander hovered high in the sky, scarlet beams constantly tearing the firmament, and in the distance UED warships were still pouring fire with abandon, paying no mind to the thousands of researchers still inside the base.
"They'd rather blow this place to pieces than let the tech leak." Her nails dug deep into her palm. "That's the UED way."
"Let's go." Leon pressed a hand to her shoulder. "Time to end this."
Mike was already opening a path ahead, Chris bringing up the rear, and the squad rapidly fell back along their ingress.
The base sirens were shrill and piercing, corridor lights flickering like the death throes of some vast beast.
When they burst out of the maintenance passage, the stealth-class ship's retrieval bay door was already open, hovering over the ice plain.
Homelander was still intercepting the last wave of missiles, his red cape snapping in the glare of explosions.
Lyons cast one last look at the steel tomb where she'd once worked, then stepped onto the shuttle without a second thought.
As the hatch sealed, the Antarctic base collapsed behind them with a thunderous roar, blooming into a pillar of flame.
The shuttle's engines thrummed low, climbing steadily in the polar gale.
Lyons stood at the porthole, fingertips pressed to the cold glass, eyes locked on the shrinking base below.
Fire still ravaged the site, thick smoke rolling up to stain the pallid polar sky a filthy gray-black.
Down on the ice, scattered figures staggered and ran—like abandoned ants—tiny and desperate against the endless snow.
"At least… they're alive," she murmured, her voice nearly swallowed by the engine's roar.
Leon stood at her side and didn't answer.
His gaze fell on the fleeing researchers as well, but there was no pity in his eyes—only a cool assessment.
"If…"
Lyons spoke suddenly, her voice hoarse. "If it were your Human Empire today, what would you do?"
Silence filled the cabin for a moment, broken only by the faint shudder of ascent.
Leon considered, then spoke. "The Human Empire wouldn't let this happen."
His voice was steady and sure, as if stating an indisputable fact.
"We wouldn't let our scientists be put in this position, because we have the strength to ensure their safety."
He paused, drawing his gaze from the window back to her. "But if sacrifice were necessary, it would never be to cover for someone's power—it would be for survival, for more lives."
Lyons frowned slightly. "Sacrifice is sacrifice. What difference does it make?"
"The difference is purpose." Leon's voice was low and resolute. "UED leadership would destroy an entire base rather than let tech leak, because they're afraid of losing control. If the Human Empire sacrifices, it's only to protect more of our own, to ensure humanity endures."
There was a hard-edged conviction in his tone, as if he were speaking of a supreme truth.
"Besides…" A near-reverent curve touched Leon's lips. "We have the Emperor."
Lyons blinked. "The Emperor… your Empire's supreme leader—he's really that miraculous?"
"A god walking among men." Leon's eyes went to the porthole again, as if through the void he could see some highest existence. "With Him, humanity will never be cornered."
Lyons fell silent for a beat and then found it absurd.
In her years of study, she had read too much about rulers who styled themselves gods—ultimately tyrants draped in holy robes.
"The Emperor… what is He, really?" she couldn't help asking.
Leon shook his head. "No one can truly say. I only know He was here centuries before I ever served Him, and rumor says His lifespan is far beyond human imagining."
There was awe in his tone, yet it was utterly calm, as if discussing a law of nature rather than a living being.
Lyons wanted to press further, but the view outside had completely changed—
Antarctica's ice and snow were gone, replaced by boundless darkness pricked with distant starlight.
They had broken the atmosphere and entered space proper.
"We're here," Leon said suddenly, cutting off her thoughts.
Lyons looked up to see a stealth-class vessel with optical camo temporarily dropped, floating quietly in orbit.
"All right, Doctor."
Leon drew his gaze back, his tone returning to business. "We can talk about the rest later. For now, priority one is securing the virus samples."
Lyons nodded and said no more.
But her mind churned with questions—
About the Human Empire, the Emperor, and this behemoth that seemed entirely unlike the UED.
The shuttle drifted toward the stealth ship's hangar gate, whose mechanical arms snared and reeled them in with precision.
With a hiss of pressure equalizing, the hatch slid open and hard white light flooded in.
"Welcome back, sir."
A crewman in a black uniform stood in the doorway and saluted Leon.
Leon dipped his head and stepped aside to let Lyons precede him.
She drew a deep breath and stepped onto the unfamiliar deck, knowing her fate had been utterly altered from this moment on.
Lyons followed Leon through the corridors until they passed beneath a blue sterilization field, their boot soles ringing clearly on the metal decking.
The ship was lit in soft, cool-white light, washing the silver-gray composite walls and giving Lyons that peculiar sense of futurist detachment.
Meanwhile, Chris, Mike, and a dozen spec-ops members had already headed for the armory to refit, preparing for whatever came next—stealth, infiltration, or battle.
She also remembered Mike winking at her before he left, as if reminding her to mind her image in front of Leon—a flippant gesture sharply at odds with the precision of his nanosuit.
She smoothed her slightly mussed hair, noticing the frost and grit clinging to her clothes from the escape.
"This way."
Leon motioned her on, and they passed through a slanted passage.
Holo displays lined the walls to either side, updating system statuses in real time.
One screen caught her eye—"Antarctic Battle Status" flashed at the top, and Homelander's red cape burned bright amid the explosions on the feed.
Clearly, Homelander was still tangling with the UED fleet, drawing as much official attention as he could.
They finally stopped before a heavy sealed door.
The biometric scanner read Leon's iris with a soft beep.
"Highest-grade isolation bay," Leon explained. "Built for handling dangerous samples."
The door slid open without a sound. A breath of cold, metallic air washed out.
The chamber was a regular hexagon, a spherical field generator hovering at its center, ringed by three holo projectors.
A technician in an exoskeletal protective suit waited inside, the blue glow on his visor hiding his face.
Lyons drew a sealed container from her coat.
Inside the reinforced glass tube, an eerie green liquid writhed under the lights, shifting shape as if alive.
She took a deep breath and handed the container to the technician.
"Quantum-state virus prototype, codename 'Purifier.'" Her voice was a bit tight. "Maintain minus 120°C. At ambient temperature it will disperse immediately."
"."
The technician didn't answer, merely took the container mechanically.
His mechanical arm set it with precision in the heart of the field generator and, with a soft hum, a spherical stasis field unfolded and enveloped it.
"Don't worry," Leon said at her side. "This field can confine even antimatter."
Only then did Lyons notice her fingers were trembling.
She forced herself to relax and watched the tech key in a string of complex commands. The field's color shifted from blue to deep violet, and the container's outline began to blur.
"Encapsulation complete," the synthesized female voice announced in the bay. "Sample is now quantum-locked."
Only then did Lyons truly exhale.
She turned and found Leon calling up a holo on his wrist computer.
The display showed the real-time battle over Antarctica.
Homelander floated among burning shipwrecks, scarlet beams lancing out to swat incoming missiles one by one.
"What now?"
Lyons asked, her voice tired, with a touch of bewilderment.
Leon tapped the holo and it switched to a strategic overview of the entire Universe 18 solar system.
Dozens of red dots were moving toward Earth—UED reinforcement fleets.
"Now," he said, cool to the point of cruelty, "we make the UED understand they picked the wrong opponent."
The image changed again, rendering the stealth-class ship's full silhouette.
Only then did Lyons realize this seemingly ordinary warship carried terrifying armament—
Antimatter torpedo launchers, phase-cannon arrays, and even a main gun she'd never seen before, its label reading "planetary-class."
"But first—"
Leon closed the projection. "You need rest. The med bay has a nutrient pod ready to help you recover."
Lyons started to argue, then a wave of dizziness hit.
Only now did she realize how much this mission—from forced involvement to willing cooperation—had taken out of her.
Her vision blurred for a second, and in the haze she felt Leon's hand steadying her shoulder.
"Twelve hours from now, the war enters a new phase." Leon's voice seemed to come from far away. "Then you'll see the Human Empire's true power."
The bay lights dimmed in Lyons' eyes. In her last sliver of awareness, the holo beside her seemed to carry the boom of Homelander destroying yet another battleship, and Leon's steady footsteps receded.
Not long after, in the equipment bay;
The hatch sealed behind Leon without a sound, shutting out the ship's other clamor.
The sixty-square-meter room had the classic military aesthetic—
Spartan, efficient, without a single unnecessary flourish.
Tool cabinets gleamed cold along the walls, a semi-circular maintenance platform sat in the middle, and three multi-joint robotic arms hung from the ceiling, standing by.
"Begin doffing procedure," Leon said to the air.
The bay's smart system responded at once. The arms hissed softly as hydraulics engaged.
One arm's tip unfolded into a cluster of precision tools, swiftly and precisely releasing the nanosuit's neck seals.
Leon felt cold metal brush his skin; the nanofiber layer sighed, peeling away from him like a shedding snake.
"Minor damage at the left shoulder joint," the synthesized female voice reported evenly. "Nanorepair initiated. ETA: twenty-seven minutes."
Leon nodded slightly.
He knew the damage came from the firefights on Universe 18 Earth.
With the final latch released, the nanosuit slid off him like a second skin, and another arm caught it neatly.
He rolled his shoulder, savoring the feel of the ship's climate-controlled air on bare skin.
His body was a map of faded scars, each one a record of a brush with death.
A technician in dark blue stepped up and took the suit from the arm.
"Power core needs recalibration, sir," the tech said, inspecting the nanosuit. "Heavy combat and Antarctic conditions degraded output stability."
Leon only grunted in acknowledgment and crossed to a locker, drawing out a fresh black duty uniform.
As he cinched the belt, the bay door slid open again. Chris appeared, already changed into matching black.
"Briefing room is ready." Chris's voice was even deeper than usual. "They're here."
Leon's eyes sharpened a fraction. He nodded without a ripple.
The two left the equipment bay one after the other, following a slanted corridor downward—a passage notably wider and taller than elsewhere on the ship, clearly built for particular physiques.
The biometric scanner flashed green and the doors slid aside.
The operations briefing room beyond was triple a standard compartment's size, a massive holo table at center, ringed by special metal chairs—
Their frames were visibly reinforced to bear far more than human weight.
Most striking were the six giants already seated.
Even sitting, they were nearly as tall as an ordinary adult man standing.
Gray duty uniforms stretched tight over bulging muscle, and the skin left bare was a lattice of savage scars—some plainly not made by any conventional weapon.
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