Chapter 1 – The Scapegoat
"Why are your hands shaking? Pass me the forceps."
Leo's grease-slicked fingers dug into Snake Eyes' thoracic cavity with unsettling familiarity, more like a butcher sorting meat than a trained surgeon.
Lynn tightened his grip on the hemostats until his knuckles blanched.
His eyes were locked on the exposed heart—still beating, but weakening. Slower. More irregular.
Something was wrong.
Very wrong.
Leo's scalpel had deviated.
It wasn't a minor slip. The blade had cut too deep, too far laterally—severing a coronary vessel near the pericardial margin. Blood surged instantly, dark and forceful, rapidly flooding the operative field and obscuring everything.
"Leo, you've ruptured a coronary artery!" Lynn snapped, his voice low but sharp.
Leo froze.
For a fraction of a second, panic flickered across his face.
Then it vanished.
Replaced by something colder. Detached.
He stepped back.
Didn't clamp.
Didn't suction.
Didn't even attempt hemostasis.
"Too late."
His tone was calm. Clinical. As if announcing an inevitable outcome rather than causing it.
Lynn's pupils shrank.
Too late?
"You didn't even try?!"
He lunged forward, abandoning restraint. His hands plunged into the chest cavity, searching blindly through blood, pressing down in a desperate attempt to compress the ruptured vessel.
Warm blood spilled between his fingers.
The heart trembled weakly beneath his palms—
Then stopped.
The cardiac monitor released a long, continuous tone.
Flatline.
Lynn froze.
The warmth on his hands faded quickly, replaced by the chill of exposed air. The metallic scent of blood filled his lungs, heavy and suffocating.
Snake Eyes was dead.
"Step away."
Leo's voice came from behind him.
Cold. Controlled.
Lynn turned—
—and found himself staring down the barrel of a Beretta.
The pistol was steady. Unwavering.
Leo's face was expressionless. Not shocked. Not afraid.
Prepared.
"Leo… you—"
"Quiet."
The word cut cleanly.
This was no accident.
No surgeon who had just made a fatal error would behave like this.
"Stay where you are. Don't move. Don't speak."
Leo tilted the gun slightly toward the corpse on the table.
The implication required no explanation.
Lynn said nothing.
Not out of courage—but calculation.
A loaded firearm eliminated discussion.
Leo backed toward the door, never lowering the weapon.
"Click."
The iron door locked from the outside.
Footsteps receded.
Then came the faint sounds of movement—drawers, metal, a safe being opened.
Preparation.
Moments later, the rolling shutter rattled open and shut.
An engine started.
Then faded into the night.
Silence swallowed the clinic.
Complete.
Lynn stood motionless, staring at the sealed door.
Three seconds.
Then awareness returned all at once.
He ran.
Gripped the handle.
Twisted. Slammed. Shouldered it.
Nothing.
The reinforced door didn't budge.
Leo had replaced it himself—external lock only. No internal override.
A trap.
Lynn turned to the walls.
No windows.
The operating room sat buried within the structure, enclosed by thick masonry. The only outlet was a narrow exhaust fan mounted high above—far too small for escape.
Even a child couldn't fit through.
He inhaled slowly, forcing his breathing to stabilize.
Think.
Call the police.
His hand went to his pocket—
Empty.
Leo had taken his phone before surgery. "Sterility protocol."
Not protocol.
Preparation.
Lynn's brow furrowed.
A plan?
When had this started?
He began searching.
Systematically.
Cabinets. Supply shelves. Sterilization trays. Storage compartments.
Nothing.
No communication devices. No hidden tools.
Leo had stripped the room clean of anything useful.
Still, Lynn continued.
Drawers opened one by one—gauze, sutures, expired anesthetics, corroded instruments—
Then—
A manila envelope.
He paused.
Picked it up.
Opened it.
Inside: a complete surgical record.
His eyes moved to the header.
Surgeon: Lynn
Assistant: None
Anesthesiologist Signature: Blank
His expression tightened.
He flipped to the consent form.
Signed.
In his name.
Forged.
The date—
One week ago.
A week.
At that time, this operation hadn't even been scheduled.
Lynn's hands began to tremble.
Not fear.
Clarity.
This wasn't negligence.
It was design.
Every detail aligned—the missing phone, the sealed room, the deliberate "mistake."
Leo hadn't failed.
He had executed.
Snake Eyes was never meant to survive.
And Lynn—
Was the fall guy.
But why?
Snake Eyes wasn't just another patient.
He was tied to Kingpin.
Killing him meant inviting retaliation from one of the most dangerous figures in the criminal underworld.
Leo had operated in this territory for years.
He knew that.
So why do it?
Why take that risk?
Why disappear?
It didn't add up.
But the logic no longer mattered.
Because when Kingpin's men arrived—
They would see exactly what Leo intended.
A failed surgery.
A dead enforcer.
And one disposable culprit.
Trapped at the scene.
No escape.
Lynn slammed the file onto the floor.
Then resumed searching.
Faster now.
Desperation replacing method.
Every drawer. Every panel. Beneath the table. Behind equipment.
Even the seams between bricks.
Nothing.
Forty minutes later—
He stopped.
Slowly, he slid down against the wall.
Across from him—
The blood-soaked operating table.
Above—
The relentless hum of fluorescent lights.
Around him—
The sharp blend of disinfectant and iron.
On the table—
Snake Eyes' body had already begun to cool.
Three days.
That's how long he'd existed in this world.
A world filled with beings like Superman, Batman, Iron Man—
Figures of impossible power.
Irrelevant.
He was nothing.
No money.
No identity.
No support.
A dropout forced into illegal medical work just to survive.
And now—
Locked in a sealed room with a corpse that would condemn him.
Outside—
Kingpin's territory.
By dawn—
They would come.
And when they did—
There would be no trial.
No explanation.
Just a bullet.
Or the Hudson.
Lynn closed his eyes.
So this was the end.
Not in battle.
Not in catastrophe.
But in a filthy underground clinic.
Set up.
Disposed of.
Like an insect crushed in darkness.
Unseen.
Unremembered.
His fingers loosened.
The last of his strength draining away—
Then—
Without warning—
A cold, mechanical voice echoed in his mind.
[Ding!]