The transport's engines roared as it touched down in the steaming jungle. Six armored figures stepped out into the rain, visors glowing faint blue against the dark canopy.
> "Team Turtle, move out," Captain Rhea Holt ordered. "Mission is simple — locate Subject-07, alias Jack. Capture if possible. Eliminate if not."
Their boots sank into wet soil, the smell of blood thick in the air. Ahead, the remains of the last squad lay scattered — torn by something that didn't care about weapons or armor.
"Jesus…" whispered one of the soldiers, Voss, scanning the nearest corpse.
The device in his gauntlet blinked red.
> "Captain, this one's readings are all wrong — internal organs dissolved, like… eaten from the inside."
"Keep moving," Rhea said, voice hard. "We find the source, we end this."
They followed the trail until the heat signatures on their visors spiked. The ground trembled beneath them.
That's when a voice came from behind. Calm. Cold.
> "You shouldn't have come here."
They turned. Jack stood at the edge of the smoke, half-lit by the flames around him. His skin was cracked with black lines that pulsed red, and the air shimmered with heat.
"Target confirmed!" shouted Voss. He fired a burst.
Vines shot from the ground, intercepting the bullets midair, melting them to slag.
Another soldier, Kane, lunged forward, air coiling around his fist.
> "Air Burst!"
His strike hit like thunder — but Jack caught it barehanded. The air folded inward and imploded with a sharp pop.
Jack's other hand slammed into Kane's chest.
A red glow spread through his armor, veins lighting up like fire beneath his skin. His scream echoed through the jungle as his body hardened, black rock crawling over his flesh, horns splitting through his helmet.
Then Jack threw him — straight into a boulder that shattered on impact.
"Fall back!" Rhea shouted. The team regrouped, weapons drawn, formation tightening.
But the vines around Jack's feet began to pulse, and shapes rose from the ground — beasts made of fire and bone, hundreds of them.
> "Captain!" Graves yelled. "They're everywhere—heat signatures off the charts!"
Rhea's eyes narrowed behind her visor.
> "Everyone, shields to max! Right now!"
Her armor glowed as she activated her core module. Blue-white energy raced across her suit like lightning.
> "On my mark!"
Jack stepped forward, monsters roaring behind him.
Rhea clenched her fists, and the ground itself began to hum.
> "NOW!"
The squad slammed their shields into the ground. Energy domes flared around them. Rhea raised her hands and brought them down like a hammer.
The jungle vanished in white light.
A massive pulse of energy blasted outward in every direction, vaporizing everything — roots, trees, monsters, even the soil beneath their feet. The air screamed as the wave flattened the landscape, turning the forest into a crater of molten glass.
When the light faded, silence returned — heavy, suffocating.
Steam rose off the glowing crater.
The squad's shields flickered but held, armor scorched and trembling. One by one, they looked up from their cover.
"Status check!" Rhea barked.
> "We're good!"
"All shields at twenty percent!"
"Kane's vitals flatline!"
Rhea's breath slowed. "Copy. Sweep the area."
They moved cautiously, scanning the smoking ground — until a shadow shifted in the haze.
Jack was still standing.
Unburned. Unbroken. His skin cracked open further, glowing like magma beneath. He smiled.
> "That was… impressive."
Rhea's suit hissed, servos locking, power channels recharging. She rolled her shoulders, cracking her neck.
> "Alright," she said, stepping forward. "Let's finish this."
Rhea's boots scorched the ground as she charged forward, her armor glowing with residual heat from the pulse blast. Every step sent a ripple of blue energy across the cracked earth.
She lunged, fist first. The blow struck Jack's chest with a concussive boom, light bursting from her gauntlet.
Then another.
Then another.
Each hit came faster, sharper—miniature shockwaves lighting the rain in flashes of blue and red.
Jack reeled, blocking, countering, his fists wrapped in fire. The air between them bent from the force of every impact. The battlefield echoed with the rhythm of war—metal against stone, flesh against power.
Rhea ducked under a flaming hook and drove an elbow into Jack's ribs, following with a knee that cracked his side. Sparks and blood hissed in the rain.
> "You're not untouchable," she growled through her helmet.
Jack's eyes flared molten red. "Neither are you."
His next strike hit like a meteor.
It smashed through her guard, slamming into her abdomen. Her shield shattered in a shower of light, and the blow sent her flying backward, skidding across molten rock.
Her breath hitched—suit alarms screamed.
Before Jack could close in, Tessa, the squad's sonic specialist, raised both hands.
> "Back off!"
A pulse of violet energy rippled through the air — a sonic bomb. The shockwave tore through the clearing, hitting Jack full-force. The blast was so strong it lifted him off his feet, hurling him through the trees and out toward the ocean.
"Target airborne!" Graves yelled, watching his sensors flare. "Trajectory—south quadrant—he's headed for the coast!"
Jack hit the shoreline hard, carving a trench through the sand. The waves hissed around him. He groaned, raising a hand to his neck.
> "Enough…"
He slammed his palm against his throat.
A bright blue light erupted, wrapping his body in a column of energy. The ground trembled. Bones shifted. Muscles melted and reformed. His scream warped — turning soft, melodic, alien.
When the light faded, the body that rose from the surf was no longer Jack's.
She stood barefoot in the shallows, skin pale and gleaming like pearl. Her eyes shimmered turquoise. Strands of hair drifted in the sea breeze, and faint scales glimmered along her arms and legs. A siren—beautiful, dangerous, otherworldly.
Back in the jungle, Rhea's squad was helping her to her feet.
> "Captain, are you good?"
"Armor's cracked, lungs bruised—but I'm standing," she said, spitting blood into the mud.
"He's at the ocean. Moving fast," Graves reported.
"Then we finish this before he comes back inland. Move!"
They sprinted through the wrecked jungle toward the coast, the air thick with heat and mist. When they reached the shoreline, the waves were unnaturally calm — glassy and still.
"Where is he?" Voss whispered, scanning. "No visual, no movement."
Then Tessa froze, eyes wide.
> "Wait… there."
A figure stood in the shallows, half-submerged.
A woman, radiant and still. The water shimmered around her as if drawn to her skin. Her gaze met theirs — calm, haunting.
"Jack?" Rhea breathed.
The woman smiled faintly.
> "Not anymore."
Her voice was music and thunder all at once, vibrating through the air and the soldiers' bones.
The ocean behind her began to churn — the surface twisting, bubbling. A shadow grew beneath the waves, massive and rising.
The woman's eyes glowed like sapphires.
> "He gave me his body… now I'll take what's mine."
From the depths, a colossal squid burst from the sea — tentacles the size of trees, eyes like glowing moons. It roared, water cascading off its body as it reached for the squad.
> "Open fire!" Rhea shouted, raising her arm cannon.
The sky filled with light and thunder as Team Turtle unleashed everything they had.
The Siren only watched, smiling as her monster rose higher, blotting out the sun.