The heavy fist descended like a falling studio light, aiming directly for Yoo-jin's skull.
Yoo-jin didn't raise his arms to block the brutal strike. He simply kicked his boots hard against the floor, rolling the leather executive chair violently backward. Gravity handled the stunt work perfectly.
Subject 735's massive fist completely missed Yoo-jin's face. Instead, the clone's knuckles smashed straight through the master console's main glass monitor.
The thick screen shattered instantly. A blinding shower of sparks exploded across the dark broadcast room like cheap stage pyrotechnics. Shards of jagged glass rained down onto the bloody concrete floor, brightly illuminated by the sparking, exposed wiring of the ruined monitor.
"You coward!" Subject 735 screamed, ripping his bleeding arm out of the ruined console.
The clone spun around, his identical face twisted into a mask of pure, unscripted hatred. His knuckles were shredded, dripping dark blood onto the floor tiles. He lunged across the small room, kicking the rolling chair out of his way with terrifying force.
Yoo-jin scrambled backward, his boots sliding uselessly in his own pooled blood. The gunshot wound in his shoulder throbbed with a sickening, wet heat. His physical pulse was weak, his breathing ragged, but his mind remained terrifyingly calm.
He didn't see a monster trying to murder him. He saw an incompetent extra ruining the blocking of a scene.
"Your choreography is sloppy," Yoo-jin stated aloud, his voice perfectly steady despite the agonizing pain in his chest.
Subject 735 froze for a fraction of a second, completely thrown by the cold, analytical critique.
"What did you say?" the clone snarled, stepping carefully over the sparking wires on the floor.
"You telegraph every punch," Yoo-jin continued, his eyes locked objectively on the clone's tense shoulders. "You rely entirely on raw power because you don't understand timing. You're an extra trying desperately to steal the lead."
The insult hit the clone harder than a physical blow. Subject 735's jaw clenched, his bruised face flushing with pure, unadulterated humiliation. His fragile ego, built entirely on the promise of being the perfect replacement, completely shattered.
With a furious roar, 735 charged forward, throwing a wild, looping right hook aimed directly at Yoo-jin's jaw.
It was exactly the predictable, uncoordinated attack Yoo-jin had scripted.
Yoo-jin ducked beneath the heavy swing. He planted his boot against the clone's knee joint, pushing hard. 735's forward momentum carried him past Yoo-jin, sending the massive clone crashing awkwardly into the metal equipment rack bolted to the wall.
"Cut," Yoo-jin whispered softly to himself.
He didn't waste time trying to hit back. He immediately reached for the secondary audio control panel mounted on the wall beside him. His bloody fingers flicked the master microphone switch upward, routing his audio feed directly to the bunker's internal PA system.
He didn't turn on the microphone to call for help. He turned it on to publicly humiliate his attacker.
"Subject 735," Yoo-jin's cold, echoing voice blasted through the overhead speakers in every hallway of the underground facility. "You are missing your marks. Your performance is entirely unbelievable."
In the broadcast room, 735 spun around, his eyes wide with shock as Yoo-jin's critique echoed back at him from the ceiling speakers.
"Shut up!" 735 screamed, grabbing a heavy metal microphone stand from the floor and swinging it like a baseball bat.
Yoo-jin threw himself backward, the heavy metal stand whistling inches past his face. It slammed into the concrete wall with a deafening clang, leaving a massive dent in the plaster.
"You lack screen presence," Yoo-jin continued over the PA system, his voice dripping with icy condescension as he dodged another wild swing. "Dr. Oh programmed you with perfect physical specs, but he forgot to give you a personality. You are entirely replaceable."
The psychological warfare was working perfectly. 735's attacks were becoming wilder, faster, and completely devoid of tactical discipline. He was swinging blindly, completely consumed by his massive inferiority complex.
Suddenly, the heavy steel doors of the broadcast room violently boomed.
Someone was slamming a heavy battering ram against the reinforced metal from the outside hallway. The massive door hinges groaned under the impact.
"Stop hitting him, 735!" Dr. Oh's voice suddenly blared over the room's internal comms, completely stripped of its former arrogant polish.
Yoo-jin glanced at the peripheral, unbroken monitor on the far wall. The live stream chat was still flying in a blur of red text, demanding answers. Below it, the bunker's biometric dashboard flashed a massive, blinding red warning.
Yoo-jin's heart rate was dropping below thirty percent.
"His vitals are crashing!" Dr. Oh screamed over the speakers, his voice cracking with absolute panic. "The database formatting protocol has initiated! Zenith's entire catalog is deleting! Stop hitting him!"
Yoo-jin's bloody lips curved into a tiny, victorious smile.
The arrogant director was no longer trying to cancel him. Dr. Oh was now actively trying to break down the door to save Yoo-jin's life in a desperate bid to preserve the multi-billion dollar clone database.
Subject 735 completely ignored the director's frantic orders. The clone was too far gone, entirely consumed by his desperate need to erase the original.
"I don't care about the catalog!" 735 roared, dropping the bent microphone stand and lunging forward with his bare hands.
Yoo-jin didn't dodge this time. He deliberately weaponized Dr. Oh's panic.
He let 735 tackle him around the waist, allowing the massive clone to drive him backward across the small room. Yoo-jin's boots slipped on the bloody floor as 735 slammed him violently against the far concrete wall.
The impact knocked the remaining wind out of Yoo-jin's lungs. His vision fractured into static at the edges.
But he had landed exactly on his mark.
Yoo-jin was pinned directly against the heavy metal breaker box he had ripped open earlier to activate the ventilation fans. The exposed, high-voltage wiring hummed angrily against his back, sending a terrifying, vibrating heat through his soaked shirt.
He was setting a final stage trap, using his own failing, fragile body as the bait.
Subject 735 lifted Yoo-jin completely off the ground by his torn, bloody shirt collar. The clone's massive hands tightened around the fabric, cutting off Yoo-jin's airway.
"You have no cast left to save you," 735 spat, his face inches from Yoo-jin's perfectly calm, bruised features. "Your show is cancelled. Any last directorial notes, Original?"
Yoo-jin stared dead into the clone's unhinged, furious eyes. His amnesiac brain rapidly calculated the exact voltage of the industrial current running directly behind his spine. It was a massive, lethal amount of electricity.
"Just one," Yoo-jin whispered, his voice a broken, bloody rasp.
He reached blindly behind his back with his uninjured right hand. His fingers slipped inside the open breaker box, searching past the plastic switches. He found the thick, heavy main power cable feeding the broadcast console.
"Cut," Yoo-jin commanded softly.
He gripped the rubber housing of the main power cable and violently yanked it entirely out of its socket.
Sparks exploded in a massive, blinding shower behind his head. Yoo-jin thrust his hand forward, driving the exposed, sparking end of the live wire directly into the thick pool of fresh, wet blood soaking Subject 735's chest.