[DUBLIN – STREET LEVEL, 4:36 PM]
Pain blurred everything.
He pushed off the bent lamppost he'd used to reset his shoulder. The jolt had cleared his head for half a second. Now the pain was flooding back in.
His arm hung weird. Dead weight, mostly. But usable. Kind of. Every step jarred the joint. Every twitch reminded him it wasn't right. Not stable. Not whole.
His ribs throbbed with every breath. Deep, throbbing pulses of agony that made his spine lock up. He couldn't get a full lungful of air — every inhale scraped raw. One wrong twist, one bad landing, and they'd crack like twigs.
Diaz was still coming.
Every step cracked pavement. Sparks flared off the power core. Steam vented in short, angry bursts. The heat shimmered in the cold rain.
His breath came in jagged bursts as he slipped behind another half-crushed car. He almost tripped. His boot caught on broken glass. He caught himself with his good arm, barely. Shoulder screamed in protest. The bin he'd pressed against earlier had left blood streaks down his sleeve.
His hoodie clung to his spine like a second skin, soaked and torn. His whole left side was fire and weight. The joint felt like a bag of shattered glass barely held together by string and skin and spit. Every movement sent a warning to his brain: Stop. Lay down. Stay down.
He didn't.
Instead he pushed off the hood of the crushed car. His legs buckled. He stumbled forward. Almost fell flat. Caught himself on a railing, metal slick with rain. His palm slipped. He fell to one knee, coughed blood, wiped it with his forearm, and stood again.
Diaz was closing.
Darren pressed his back to the wet stone wall and blinked away the blur. The street was twisted now — half-burning, half-flooded, half-nightmare. Every muscle screamed. His heart hammered like it was trying to punch its way out of his ribs.
He tasted copper.
The corner of his mouth was cracked. One eye kept twitching. His stomach was tight — from panic or pain, maybe both.
But he still stood.
"Move," he whispered to himself. Then again. Louder.
"Move."
And then he did.
Fast. Desperate fast. Sprinting low, darting through alley gaps, ducking under broken signage. His ribs stabbed with every breath, each inhale a knife between his lungs. His shoulder kept jerking wrong—numb for a second, then blinding. His legs wobbled on every impact, jolts racing through bone and nerve, but they never stopped. Couldn't. Not now.
Diaz roared, "LOOK AT HIM RUN! LOOK AT YOUR 'HERO'!"
Darren grabbed a loose stone and hurled it back. His arm screamed with the motion. It smacked uselessly off Diaz's chest. But it made him flinch. Just enough.
Diaz fired. The weapon roared, purple plasma punching into the stone where Darren had just been.
Too slow. Just barely.
Darren vaulted over a bench. Slipped mid-air. Hit wrong.
Pain bloomed.
His right knee screamed. Something popped. His vision flared white. He collapsed forward, caught himself with his good hand, shoulder almost giving out again. The sidewalk scraped his palms raw. He tasted blood.
He staggered upright. Every joint protested. His head rang. Ribs flared. His breath came in panicked, half-sobs.
He moved anyway.
Fists up. Body screaming. Everything red. He spun into Diaz's blind spot, ducked a hammer-fist blow, drove a brutal elbow into the back of a vent port. Sparks flew. A piece of plating clattered to the street.
Diaz turned, too slow. Darren was already gone, sprinting across rubble, grabbing a loose slab of stone and hurling it like a discus. It slammed into Diaz's shoulder with a heavy CRACK. The dent deepened. The servos sparked.
Darren's lungs burned. He rushed in again. Right hook to the joint. Left kick to the side coil. Diaz swiped—Darren ducked, rolled under, popped up with a jab to the exposed wire cluster on the back.
More sparks. The servos there glitched, stuttering. Diaz roared, movements jerking now.
Darren coughed, almost fell, caught himself. Blood dripped from his nose. His side screamed. But he didn't stop.
He grabbed a steel pole off the ground, ran full-speed and jammed it into the thigh plate. Diaz bellowed, staggered back a step. The leg locked, hissed. Not as fast now.
Darren pressed the attack. Bare fists now. Hammering knuckles against metal. Over and over. Left hook. Right elbow. Open-palm strike to the core.
His knuckles split. Blood smeared the armor. Darren's scream joined the storm.
Diaz grabbed him by the collar and threw him across the street.
Darren slammed into a wall. Crumpled. Coughing. Vision swaying.
He blinked.
He got up.
Again.
Stumbled forward. Limping. Shoulder low. Eyes bloodshot.
Diaz stepped forward, power core flashing erratic now, suit wheezing steam. Glitches sparked down the right arm. A faint whine from the servos.
"YOU SHOULD'VE STAYED DOWN!"
Darren ran.
Straight at him.
Spun under the first punch. Leapt over the second. Slammed both feet into Diaz's chest.
The suit staggered. Sparks burst. One of the chest panels hung loose now. Darren hit the ground hard, rolled through, scrambled back to his feet and dove behind a scorched mailbox.
Diaz turned, gun up.
Too late.
Darren popped out and hurled a car mirror straight into Diaz's eye slit. It cracked. Thin lightning lines etched the lens.
Diaz screamed.
"SHUT UP," Darren growled, voice shredded.
And then, he broke.
Not clean. Not heroic.
Something fractured deep inside. Not strength. Not will. Instinct. Panic. Survival.
I don't wanna die. I don't wanna die. I don't wanna die.
He charged.
Rain hammered the street. His feet slipped on soaked stone. His ribs screamed with every step. His arm was barely hanging on, shoulder half-socketed, nerve endings flaring red. His lungs burned. Everything inside him hurt.
But he kept moving.
Diaz turned, too slow.
Darren launched.
A blur of limbs and blood and fury.
He hit Diaz like a wrecking ball, and they both went down, crashing through stone and steam and broken glass. A tangle of flesh and metal.
The impact knocked the wind out of him.
But he didn't stop.
He climbed him. Scrambled up the dented chestplate, boots slipping on slick plating.
Darren landed on top.
And something inside him snapped.
He screamed as he hit him.
Once.
CRACK.
Twice.
CRUNCH.
Again. And again.
His fists were ruined. His hands slick. Blood everywhere. Knuckles gone. Skin in strips.
He didn't care. Didn't even notice.
The world was red and white. His vision pulsed. His ears rang. There was nothing left but the fight.
He couldn't stop.
Couldn't think.
Could barely see.
Just kept swinging. Kept screaming.
The suit hissed. Diaz's lens cracked.
Diaz shouted something, garbled, broken through the mask. Darren didn't hear. Or wouldn't. He just drove his fist in again. And again. Blood on metal. Blood on skin.
Darren's teeth were bared, face twisted, animal.
He clawed at the chestplate, grabbed a loose panel, and ripped.
Sparks sprayed his arm. Burned his forearm. He screamed through it. Slid his hand in. Yanked.
Something snapped inside the torso. Diaz jerked.
He grabbed the helmet. Dug fingers into the broken side. Found leverage. Yanked.
Metal shrieked.
And peeled.
He yanked until the whole left half of the helmet ripped off.
Diaz's face beneath, bloody. Shocked. Scared.
Darren saw it for a second...
Then hit him.
Crack.
Once.
Twice.
Cheekbone collapsed. Diaz's head hit pavement with a wet thud.
He stopped moving.
Darren stayed there. Kneeling on the broken armor. Chest heaving. Soaked. Shaking. Blood dripping from his face, his hands, his everything.
He just breathed.
Or tried to.
It came in gasps. Rattling. Gurgling. One eye swollen shut. Blood dripped into the other. His fists were ruined. His shoulder throbbed like a war drum. His ribs felt broken in half a dozen places.
He couldn't even feel the cold anymore.
The rain soaked through everything. Steam hissed off Diaz's sparking core. Blood mixed with water pooled beneath them.
He swayed.
Everything blurred.
He couldn't breathe right. His ribs ground together. His shoulder hung crooked. One eye was swollen shut. His teeth felt loose.
He didn't even feel it at first. Didn't notice until the warmth hit his cheek.
Rain? No—too warm. Too slow.
Blood? Maybe.
Then another drop. And another.
Sliding past the corner of his eye, down over the cuts on his cheek. Into the cracks on his lips. Salty. Sharp. Real.
He blinked, but it didn't stop.
Tears.
He'd won.
But it didn't feel like it.
It felt like bleeding out. He coughed. Spat blood. Shivered.
Sound warped.
Everything felt far away.
The street tilted. Light flared, then dimmed.
His body felt wrong. Heavy. Shaking.
The blood on his tongue was warm. Or maybe that was just the tears.
And as the dark finally came...
A voice, distant, crackling through the static in his ears:
"...Subject 4-1B... target secured..."
Then nothing.