Chapter 231: Parting Ways
Lynn nodded in satisfaction and put away the contracts.
He snapped his fingers, and a portable medical pod automatically floated to Bucky’s side. Its robotic arms extended, carefully lifting him and placing him inside.
A soft green light illuminated the pod as its life-support and trauma-stabilization systems activated.
Lynn walked over to Bucky’s severed cybernetic arm, bent down, and picked it up.
“According to the agreement, this arm will serve as collateral toward the medical expenses. It will be recycled and disposed of by the clinic.”
Steve stared at him in disbelief.
He opened his mouth, but ultimately said nothing.
Right now, all he cared about was whether Bucky survived.
A system notification sounded clearly in Lynn’s mind.
[Ding! Treatment initiated on near-death target: James Buchanan Barnes.]
[Hydra Mind-Control Conditioning: Activated State Detected.]
[Masterful Copying initiated…]
[Copy Progress: 100%!]
[Ding! Copy complete!]
[Successfully copied A-Rank Talent: Mind-Control Resistance!]
Lynn immediately sensed a subtle change in his consciousness.
Not bad.
Another useful foundation for his growing collection of abilities.
He first walked over to Steve and treated the internal injuries caused by Tony’s armor, then used specialized biogel to stabilize and accelerate the repair of his fractured ribs.
Afterward, he approached Tony’s immobilized armor.
The faceplate opened.
Lynn took out a syringe he had prepared earlier and injected it into Tony’s neck.
“A sedative and muscle relaxant. It’ll help you sleep and, incidentally, calm your severely overstimulated nervous system.”
Tony felt the cool medication enter his bloodstream.
An irresistible drowsiness immediately overwhelmed him.
His vision blurred.
The ruined missile silo spun around him before everything finally faded into darkness.
While this extremely expensive post-battle cleanup continued inside the silo, T’Challa silently watched from the shadows near the entrance.
He had followed them to Siberia.
He had heard Zemo’s confession.
He had watched Tony and Steve nearly kill each other.
He had seen one of the world’s most powerful teams tear itself apart because of vengeance.
And as he watched, the hatred that had driven him since Vienna finally began to fade.
T’Challa remembered his father’s teachings.
Vengeance had consumed Zemo.
It had nearly consumed Tony.
And it had nearly consumed him as well.
He retracted his vibranium claws and turned away.
Outside, among the snow-covered ruins, Helmut Zemo sat with a pistol beneath his chin, preparing to end his own life.
T’Challa stopped him before he could pull the trigger.
“The living are not done with you yet.”
He restrained Zemo and prepared to turn him over to the Joint Counter Terrorist Centre for prosecution.
By the time T’Challa returned, Lynn’s treatment was nearly complete.
Amid the freezing Siberian wind, Steve abandoned the identity that had defined him for decades.
He left his vibranium shield behind.
Then he took Bucky, still unconscious inside the portable medical pod, and disappeared step by step into the swirling snow.
His silhouette was lonely, but resolute.
Tony remained behind in the ruined HYDRA facility.
Alone.
Exhausted.
The Avengers had finally broken apart.
Lynn checked his system one last time.
All outstanding payments and IOUs had been successfully registered.
Seeing the long string of zeros attached to the accounts brought a faint smile to his face.
Satisfied, he turned toward the still-open golden portal and stepped through.
The portal closed behind him.
The Siberian wind howled across the abandoned HYDRA base like the final elegy for an era.
Thus, the Avengers were effectively defunct.
…
Time passed quietly amid the fracture of the superhero world.
While global attention remained fixed on the implementation of the Sokovia Accords, the Avengers’ civil war, and Captain America’s disappearance, another crisis was taking shape in the shadows.
One capable of threatening the entire planet.
Deep beneath LexCorp Tower in Metropolis, inside a top-secret laboratory built around technology recovered from the crashed Kryptonian scout ship, the atmosphere was almost ritualistic.
Lex Luthor stood alone before a massive Kryptonian genesis chamber.
One of the most brilliant minds on Earth now looked increasingly unhinged.
His hair was disheveled.
His eyes were bloodshot.
A manic smile stretched across his face.
The conflict among the Avengers had given him precisely what he needed—a window in which the world’s attention was focused elsewhere.
Lex stood before the enormous incubation chamber and cut open his palm.
His blood dripped slowly into a prepared genetic solution.
Inside was the Kryptonian genetic material Lynn had sold him for five billion dollars—material extracted from General Zod.
Lex stared into the chamber.
“God is all-powerful.”
His voice was almost a whisper.
“But if God refuses to serve humanity, then humanity must create a god of its own.”
He introduced Zod’s Kryptonian genetic material and his own blood into the genesis chamber.
“Go forth, my child.”
“Born from Kryptonian power, human intelligence… and hatred.”
Lex slowly spread his arms.
“Let us create a new age.”
The genesis chamber activated.
The ancient Kryptonian system immediately began processing the forbidden genetic combination.
Cells multiplied.
Mutated.
Recombined.
Inside the murky fluid, a grotesque humanoid organism rapidly began taking shape.
Its body grew at an unnatural rate.
Bone expanded beneath gray flesh.
Muscle fibers thickened.
Jagged protrusions began forming across its body.
Alarms erupted throughout the laboratory.
Energy readings climbed beyond the calibrated limits of LexCorp’s instruments.
Lex merely stared.
Entranced by his creation.
He failed to notice something else.
Something hidden much deeper.
Within the fundamental structure of the creature Lynn knew would eventually become Doomsday, an invisible safeguard had already been embedded.
Using Dimensional Domination, Lynn had left behind a concealed dimensional backdoor—something neither Kryptonian biotechnology nor any conventional Earth technology could detect, much less remove.
“BUZZ—!”
Suddenly, the Kryptonian scout ship’s systems released a deafening alarm.
A massive surge of energy erupted from beneath LexCorp Tower.
Above Metropolis, the previously clear sky rapidly darkened.
Clouds twisted unnaturally over the city.
Purple-white lightning flickered through them without thunder.
Across Metropolis, electrical grids began fluctuating beneath the immense electromagnetic disturbance.
Streetlights flickered.
Buildings lost power.
Entire blocks alternated between darkness and light.
Deep beneath the city, the creature inside the genesis chamber continued to grow.
And at the same moment—
High above Earth, beyond the atmosphere, the solitary figure floating silently in space suddenly opened its eyes.