DC: Rise Of The Kryptonian Tyrant

Negative fourth floor, in a small command and monitoring room.

Each floor of the underground research base had its own monitoring command center, each overseen by a major. However, as the colonel and the overall commander of the facility, Slade held authority over all the floors of the research institute.

A burst of static crackled from the walkie-talkie in Slade's hand.

'Zzzzt...'

The garbled noise was punctuated by Slade's heavy breathing. His face was ashen, his jaw clenched, and the tension in his body was palpable. The knuckles on the hand gripping the walkie-talkie had turned white.

"Barmulodi!" Slade growled, his voice seething with anger.

From the very beginning, Slade's instincts had screamed danger. Bardi wasn't just a foreigner from another planet—he was a predator. A manipulator. A cunning, lethal beast.

Slade's thoughts raced, connecting every interaction, every lie, every subtle manipulation.

Using Jenny's emotions to his advantage… pretending to acquiesce by letting himself be paralyzed… it had all been part of Bardi's calculated plan to lull them into a false sense of security.

Feeding them scraps of scientific knowledge, just enough to make them believe he was cooperating, all while studying them. Reading them. Exploiting their weaknesses.

He had toyed with every single one of them—Jenny, Bori, himself, even Vic. All of them had been played like fools.

Even confined to a wheelchair, seemingly helpless, Bardi had worn an air of calm confidence, as though he had already won. Pretending to accept his imprisonment, feeding them carefully curated details of Kryptonian culture to appear docile. All to make them lower their guard.

But now, it was clear.

From the very beginning, all Bardi had wanted was sunlight. To bask in the rays of Earth's yellow sun. To awaken his dormant genes. To regain his strength and freedom.

'Boom!'

Slade's fist slammed onto the steel console in front of him, his rage exploding outward. His gray eyes burned with fury.

The sudden outburst startled the soldiers stationed in the room, as well as Bori, who stood nearby. The sharp metallic clang echoed in the tense silence of the command room.

"Seal off all passageways, stairs, and any connections to the surface from the negative floors!" Slade barked, his voice cold and commanding. "Shut everything down and prepare to release Vickers gas!"

His order sent a chill through the room.

The soldiers froze, hesitant, their faces paling. Releasing VX gas—Vickers gas—was a measure of absolute last resort.

VX toxin was one of the most lethal chemical agents known to man. A single tablespoon, vaporized into the air, was enough to kill eight people on an open street.

Releasing VX gas in a confined space like this underground base would guarantee total annihilation.

Not just for the negative fourth floor, but potentially for the entire facility. Even the military base above ground could be wiped out if there was so much as a minor leak.

It was the ultimate death sentence.

Bori's face drained of color. Panic flickered in his usually composed expression.

"No!" Bori protested, his voice rising with alarm. "Colonel, you can't—there's still time! We can escape! We can—"

He gestured wildly as he tried to reason with Slade.

"Listen," Bori continued, his tone desperate. "Bardi is still on the elevator. We can take the stairs! If he comes down, we'll go up! If he heads for the stairs, we'll use the elevator to get out!"

His voice trembled, but he pressed on. "Jenny is still in there! General Vic won't want to lose her or the research we've already gathered! Think about the gene serums we could create in the future! No matter how strong Bardi is, we can recapture him!"

The elevator and the stairs were at opposite ends, so Dean Bori's reasoning was sound and irrefutable.

Jenny wasn't dead, she was still breathing.

On the surveillance feed from the warehouse, Jenny was seen clutching a small red box with a ring inside, holding it as if it were a precious treasure. She lay curled up in a pool of blood, appearing utterly miserable and desolate.

The footage also showed her mouth moving, seemingly talking to herself, while blood and tears streamed from her eyes.

Major Larry, standing nearby, looked horrified. "Colonel, there are still a lot of scientists and soldiers on the first floor!"

Slade took a deep breath through his nose. It was as if the words from the two men woke him up, prompting him to cancel the order that could lead to the destruction of the entire military base.

His mind was in turmoil.

Bardi had outmaneuvered him. He had been cautious, vigilant, yet Bardi had still succeeded in leading him astray. Now he found himself teetering on the edge of unleashing chaos.

"Slade, we need to leave immediately. Bardi is coming down here to kill us. We can trap him on the negative fourth floor, and sooner or later, he'll be captured," Dean Bori said hastily, his voice trembling with fear. Bardi's actions on the first floor had terrified him, bullets couldn't harm him, and in just seconds, dozens of soldiers had died. The sight of Bardi's rampage in the surveillance footage had left everyone frozen in shock, struggling to even breathe. Bori's panic only grew.

"Shut up!" Slade snapped coldly.

His sharp gaze shifted to the only functioning monitor on the lower floor. The footage showed Jenny in the warehouse. During the earlier chaos in the lobby, Bardi had deliberately left this one monitor intact, destroying the others.

It wasn't random—Bardi wanted them to see him.

Slade watched as Bardi, surrounded by soldiers, stood tall like an indestructible force of nature. His posture was so unshakable that the soldiers didn't dare act rashly. It was as if Bardi had left the monitor untouched to showcase his terror, his dominance, and his methodical, step-by-step killing spree.

"Why would he head down to the fourth floor?" Slade forced himself to suppress his rage, regaining his usual composure as his sharp eyes glinted with suspicion.

"He's coming to kill us! We imprisoned him, experimented on him," Bori said without hesitation. "Is there anything to think about? Anyone who's been locked up for over a year, drained of blood, forced to share the knowledge in their head, and denied freedom would want to kill us all."

Slade's icy gaze made Bori shudder.

When Bardi first basked in the sunlight and stood up, Slade had immediately recognized him as someone with a singular focus, a person who never acted without purpose.

Were the things they had done to Bardi heinous? Absolutely. But compared to the value of freedom, such hatred was insignificant to someone like him. Bardi had endured over a year of torment, meticulously planning for this moment. Killing them was a trivial matter in comparison to his ultimate goal.

Slade considered another possibility: if Bardi realized that an elite team was waiting for him on the surface, preventing any chance of escape, he might have shifted his plans. Could he now be coming down to slaughter them in revenge? Slade dismissed the thought.

No, he didn't believe it. Bardi wasn't that stupid or impulsive.

If Slade were in Bardi's position, he would seize even a one-in-ten-thousand chance to reach the surface and escape, rather than waste time on vengeance underground.

Slade's mind raced. Unless...

Unless there was something on the negative fourth floor—something that could help Bardi escape.

"Dean Bori," Slade said, his voice as cold as ice, "Bardi's spaceship. Is there anything left that he could use to get out of here?"

The old man visibly stiffened at the question. Frightened by Slade's piercing tone, Bori shook his head frantically. "His spaceship was so severely damaged, there's nothing usable. You know this, Colonel Slade! I've gone through everything myself. I can't imagine what he could salvage from that wreckage."

"I'll go check again. Maybe... maybe there's something there that can make Bardi hesitate, something we can use to bargain with him," Bori said anxiously before hurriedly leaving the command room.

As he walked away, Bori slowed his pace, his expression growing solemn. Reaching into the pocket of his white lab coat, his fingers brushed against the cold metal of the key hidden inside. He exhaled sharply, his breathing uneven, and his eyes flickered with indecision.

He had a strong suspicion.

What Bardi wanted was this "key."

Bori's eyes reflected his internal struggle. The question wasn't whether he should hand it over, the real dilemma was whether keeping it might save his life. Could he use it to beg for mercy and secure his survival?

Meanwhile, in the command room, Slade remained deep in thought, his expression dark.

Could it really be the spaceship? He'd seen the remnants before, picked through some of its components, and found nothing that seemed valuable enough to be Bardi's goal. If the ship held nothing of use, was Bardi really so enraged that he'd come down to the fourth floor just to kill them all?

Slade's eyes narrowed with cold resolve. His gaze returned to the surveillance footage on the first floor, where Bardi was now holding Major Atherton like a ragdoll. Soldiers had surrounded Bardi, but none dared move.

Slade activated the broadcast system for the first floor and issued a sharp order.

"Soldiers! Fire!"

*****

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