[LOCATION: PENTAGON BLACK SITE "THRESHOLD"]
The footage played for the seventh time.
Oracle.
Motionless in the inferno.
Not burning.
Not bleeding.
Just standing there—watching the flames part around him like he'd already won.
Stryker's knuckles whitened around his coffee cup. The ceramic cracked. No one commented.
To his left, a live feed scrolled real-time public reaction:
#MutantTortureProgram trending worldwide.
Xavier's Institute demanding UN intervention.
Mutant rights groups calling for war crimes tribunals.
A colonel cleared his throat. "Sir, we're losing control of the—"
"Control?" Stryker said, setting the broken cup down with surgical precision. "We lost that the moment Subject 016 walked through fifty million dollars of ballistic-grade steel like it was wet tissue."
He tapped the console. The screen split.
Intake photo, age twelve.
Current footage, age sixteen.
Same hollow eyes.
But a different kind of hunger.
He turned slowly, letting the image burn itself into every man's mind.
"Project HOUND is reactivated as of now," he said, his voice sharp enough to cut glass. "Non-lethal retrieval only. I want neural dampeners, psionic jammers, and every off-book restraint we buried in the black budget."
A young analyst—shirt soaked in nervous sweat—found his voice.
"General... the public already thinks we're monsters. If we drag him back in chains—"
Stryker smiled.
It wasn't kind.
"Son, do you know why we called him Oracle?"
He took a step forward.
"He knew things. Things no child should. Things no one told him. Things no one could have told him."
He paused.
"Like where we buried the other test subjects."
That shut the room down.
On screen, the footage reached the critical moment—missiles freezing mid-air, caught in a gravity-defying orbit.
Stryker pressed pause.
A single frame.
He pointed at the screen.
"He evolves too fast."
Silence.
Stryker's voice dropped.
"This isn't what the cage was built for. He wasn't supposed to change."
"Four years in our facility — not a flicker of power. No X-Gene flare. No psionic resonance. Nothing. Just a quiet, broken file."
"But the second we lose control—"
He gestured at the burning wreckage on-screen.
"He starts manifesting techniques we don't even have names for."
"Those missiles didn't hit him. They froze."
He scanned the room — slow, deliberate — daring anyone to deny what they'd all seen.
"Do you understand what that means?"
"He's not just a mutant anymore."
A senior analyst hesitated. "Sir… if that's true, he's beyond Omega classification."
Stryker didn't flinch.
"Then maybe Omega doesn't cover it."
A long beat.
"He's adaptive. Reactive. Self-correcting."
"We're not watching a threat evolve. We're watching a being rewrite itself in real time."
He stepped forward again.
And when he spoke next, it wasn't a warning.
It was doctrine.
"We cannot give him breathing room."
"Not one second."
"Every moment he's loose, he learns. Grows. Unlocks something new. And if he ever stops running…"
His voice dropped lower.
"...and starts choosing?"
No one answered.
They didn't have to.
They'd all read the reports.
They'd all seen the fire.
Stryker straightened. Iron in his spine. Ice in his words.
"We don't just capture him."
"We outpace him."
"Smother him in protocols. Drown him in surveillance. Exhaust him until even his evolution runs out of air."
He turned to the tech team.
"Global trace pings. Every 60 seconds. Sweep every off-grid power site. Wind farms, hydro plants, geothermal stations, research facilities — anything that could sustain high-voltage absorption."
"And if he's still learning—"
He pointed at the analysts.
"—then so are we."
He walked to the edge of the room.
Stopped.
Looked back one last time.
"If we lose him again…"
He didn't finish.
He didn't have to.
[Location: Unknown Forest ]
+1 EXP [Six Eyes]+1 EXP [Limitless]+1 EXP [Six Eyes]
His eyes opened. No longer glowing.
Just clear. So clear it hurt.
Vision didn't describe it.
Then—It pulsed.
Soft.
Subtle.
Final.
[Skill Level Up][Limitless – Cursed Technique Lv2 (1/300)]Interferes with atomic-level matter. Governs space .The closer objects get to the user, the slower they move — never able to make contact
.Active Duration: 60 Minutes
He exhaled.
A release.
Then—
Another flicker.
[Skill Level Up]
Six Eyes – Lv2 (1/300)]
Provides 360-degree perception, tracks energy in motion, allows dynamic molecular vision.
He blinked.
And for a single heartbeat—The forest stilled.
Not physically. Not literally.
But spiritually. Like the world itself had paused. Like it knew what had just happened.
Tristin stood.
Not fast. Not slow.
Just right.
The system was quiet.
The air still.
No prompts. No upgrades.
Just silence.
And exhaustion that felt older than his body.
"I didn't even start," he thought again, dull and heavy.
"And I'm already tired."
Tired of hunger.
Tired of cold.
Tired of waking up in places he didn't belong, wearing a name that didn't feel like his anymore.
He hugged his knees tighter. Not for comfort. Just to hold something.
Then—
The voice.
Not from the outside.
Not from the system.
From within.
Rough. Cold. Familiar in a way only pain could be.
"She didn't raise a quitter."
The words landed like a slap.
Tristin didn't lift his head.
Didn't respond right away.
But his chest tightened.
Then—
He whispered back.
"She didn't raise a winner either."
A beat.
His voice cracked on the next words:
"So who the hell did she raise?"
He finally looked up—eyes hollow, barely glowing now.
"Because I should know. I should know that."
"But I don't."
His breath shook.
"I don't even recognize myself anymore."
Silence followed. Heavy. Thicker than the dark around him.
Oblivion didn't speak right away.
Didn't have to.
Because the absence of judgment said more than anger ever could.
Because somewhere, deep down, even Oblivion didn't have the answer to that.
Not anymore.
They both sat in the quiet.
One broken.
One surviving.
Both lost.
And somewhere in the stillness between them—
A leaf finally touched Tristin's palm.