The air inside the Thorne Tower's sub-basement was thick with the smell of scorched ozone and the sterile, clinical scent of a high-end medical lab. Xavier stood before a glass cylinder, his hands wrapped in 'Thornium-infused' bandages.
"Master," Valkyrie's voice was now perfectly clear, her processing speed doubled by the solar energy surge she had absorbed during the attack. "The 'Nanite-V' prototype is stable. By utilizing the 2050 CRISPR-Delta sequencing, we have successfully programmed the nanobots to identify and dismantle malignant cells in less than forty-eight hours."
"It's not enough to just cure them, Valkyrie," Xavier said, his eyes reflecting the blue glow of the tank. "The vaccine needs to be Reactive. If Marcus Volkov tries to release a viral pathogen—like the 'Black-Mist' virus of 2045—these nanites need to form a biological firewall."
Claire entered the room, looking exhausted. "Xavier, the 'Thorne-Health' announcement has crashed every news site on Earth. A cure for cancer? People are calling you a God. But the World Health Organization is demanding 'clinical trials' and 'transparency'."
"They'll get their trials," Xavier said, a cold smile playing on his lips. "But they won't be on mice. We're going to start with the 'Incurables'."
The Miracle at Mercy Hospital
April 12th, 2026.
The lobby of Mercy Hospital was a battlefield of cameras, desperate families, and stone-faced government observers. Ten patients, all in the final stages of terminal illness, had volunteered for the first 'Thorne-Health' treatment.
Among the crowd stood a man in a lab coat, his ID tag reading 'Dr. Aris'—the university doctor Xavier had intimidated weeks ago. But today, Aris wasn't there to argue. He was there to witness a miracle.
Xavier walked through the doors, flanked by security drones. He didn't carry a briefcase; he carried a single, glowing silver vial.
"Ladies and gentlemen," Xavier said, his voice broadcasted to the billions watching via his Valkyrie-net. "Today, we don't just treat symptoms. We rewrite the source code of the human body."
He injected the first patient—a six-year-old girl with an inoperable brain tumor.
On the giant monitors behind him, the girl's neural-scan was displayed in real-time. Within minutes, the dark mass in her brain began to shrink. The nanobots were working like a precision-guided army, 'Face-slapping' the disease out of existence.
By the end of the hour, all ten patients were sitting up, their vitals returning to perfect levels. The hospital erupted in tears and applause.
"How much will this cost?!" a journalist screamed.
"It's free," Xavier said, looking directly into the camera. "As long as you are a citizen of a country that recognizes the Thorne-Privacy-Act. But I have one warning: This vaccine is sentient. If you attempt to reverse-engineer it for biological warfare... it will simply dissolve your DNA."
The Face-Slap: The Chimera's Visit
Midnight. Thorne Tower.
Xavier was alone in his office when the temperature suddenly dropped. The air didn't just get cold; it turned heavy with a metallic tang.
Thud.
A body slammed against the reinforced glass of his balcony. But it didn't fall. It gripped the crystalline structure with claws that looked like they were made of obsidian.
The creature—a man, or what used to be a man—smashed through the glass in a single burst of superhuman strength. He was seven feet tall, his skin a mottled grey, his eyes glowing with a feral, red light.
"Xavier Thorne," the creature hissed, its voice a discordant rasp of three different vocal cords. "Marcus says... thank you for the 'Vanguard' tracking data. It made it so easy to find your weakness."
The Chimera-01. Marcus Volkov's first bio-augmented assassin. In 2050, these things were the nightmares that haunted the slums.
"You're early," Xavier said, not moving from his chair. "Marcus hasn't perfected the 'Neural-Bridge' yet. Your motor functions are lagging by 15 milliseconds. And your adrenal glands are burning through your heart muscle. You have exactly three minutes before you explode."
"Three minutes... is enough to rip your head off!" the Chimera roared, lunging across the room at subsonic speeds.
Xavier didn't dodge. He simply tapped a button on his desk.
"Valkyrie. Execute 'Bio-Lock'."
Suddenly, the 'Thornium' floor beneath the Chimera's feet turned into a massive electromagnet. But it wasn't targeting the creature's armor—it was targeting the Nanites Xavier had 'accidentally' released into the building's ventilation system.
The Chimera froze mid-air, suspended by an invisible force. Its muscles bulged, its bones creaked, but it couldn't move an inch.
"You see," Xavier said, standing up and walking slowly toward the beast. "You're using 2050 biology, but you're powered by 2026 chemistry. Your 'Chimera' serum uses iron-rich enzymes to accelerate muscle growth."
Xavier reached out and touched the creature's forehead.
"I just turned your own blood into a series of tiny magnets," Xavier whispered. "Every time you try to move, you're literally fighting the planet's magnetic field. How does it feel to be a puppet of the Earth?"
"Kill... me..." the creature wheezed.
"No," Xavier said, his voice turning ice-cold. "I'm going to send you back to Marcus. But first, I'm going to give you a 'Software Update'."
Xavier plugged a data-cable into the creature's neural-port.
"Valkyrie, upload the 'Vanguard-Virus'. When Marcus tries to 'recycle' this thing's brain, I want my code to jump into his main server."
The Message
Ten minutes later, a jet-black helicopter—unmarked and invisible to radar—swept past the tower, retrieving the unconscious Chimera via a winch.
Xavier watched them fly away, a cup of coffee in his hand.
[VALKYRIE]: Master, the virus is in transit. We have a 78% chance of breaching the Pacific Northwest bunker within the hour. But... I have detected a new signal.
"From where?"
[VALKYRIE]: From inside this room.
Xavier turned around. Sitting in the chair he had just vacated was a young man, no older than eighteen. He had messy blond hair, a friendly smile, and was wearing a university hoodie.
"Nice trick with the magnets, Xavier," the boy said, spinning a pen between his fingers. "But you always did overthink the hardware. You forgot that the best way to hide a ghost is in plain sight."
Xavier's heart stopped. He recognized the boy. This wasn't Marcus Volkov.
This was Marcus's son. The boy who had killed Claire in the original timeline.
"Hello, Uncle Xavier," the boy smiled. "Daddy says hi."