Chapter 9: Forms and Consequences
POV: Adam
Three months of restraint finally shattered against the weight of unfinished mastery.
Adam stood in the abandoned warehouse at QZ's edge, surrounded by rust-stained walls and moonlight filtering through broken windows. Detection painted the building as empty—no heartbeats within a hundred meters, no FEDRA patrols scheduled for this sector until dawn. Perfect training ground for techniques that belonged in fiction.
Form Four: Volcanic Rock - Rapid Conquest. The knowledge burned in his muscle memory like a fever, demanding expression. Every night he'd felt the incomplete power gnawing at his discipline. Every infected encounter reminded him that half-mastered abilities meant death when margins disappeared.
The scavenged machete hummed with Stone Breathing energy as he settled into stance. Total Concentration breathing filled his lungs with power that made reality feel negotiable. The warehouse around him suddenly seemed fragile as spun glass.
First sequence: five rapid strikes targeting imaginary Runners. The machete carved precise arcs through empty air, each cut generating small shockwaves that made dust dance. Stone energy flowed through his enhanced muscles with surgical precision.
Second sequence: ten strikes with increasing force. Concrete chunks flew from the practice dummy he'd constructed. The sound echoed like thunder, but contained within reason. His breathing pattern held steady, power building with each controlled strike.
Third sequence: twenty rapid strikes unleashed with full fury.
The machete blazed with golden energy that hurt to look at directly. Stone Breathing channeled through seventeen separate cuts in four seconds, each strike carrying enough force to shatter armor. Reality bent around the weapon as physics struggled to accommodate anime techniques in a world governed by natural law.
The concrete pillar he'd targeted didn't just crack—it exploded.
Chunks of reinforced concrete launched in every direction like shrapnel. The warehouse wall collapsed in a thunderous cascade of masonry. Sound echoed across three sectors with the volume of artillery fire, rolling through Boston QZ like an earthquake's announcement.
Adam's Detection lit up immediately with signatures converging from every direction.
FEDRA patrols abandoning their routes to investigate the explosion. Civilians jolting awake in terror, thinking the walls had been breached. And worst of all—infected stirring in tunnels throughout the eastern sectors, drawn by the dinner bell he'd just rung with catastrophic enthusiasm.
"Fuck. Fuck. Stupid, selfish, arrogant—"
No taking it back. No pretending the warehouse had collapsed from natural causes. No hiding the fact that someone had just demonstrated superhuman abilities in the middle of a populated quarantine zone.
Fifteen infected signatures approached from tunnel entrances—Runners and Stalkers attracted by the sound. Thirty civilian heartbeats showed panic in nearby tenements. FEDRA squad six minutes out and closing fast.
Adam's only option: save everyone before discovery exposed his abilities to military scrutiny.
Stone Skin activated as he burst from the warehouse ruins, meeting the infected horde in the street between collapsed building and civilian housing. His enhanced durability turned Runner claws into scratches across living armor. Enhanced strength let him batter through Stalker ambushes with the machete still glowing from residual power.
First Form: Serpentinite Bipolar decapitated the lead Runner with surgical precision. Second Form: Upper Smash launched a charging Stalker thirty feet backward into a brick wall. Third Form: Stone Skin held defensive positions while civilians fled toward his location—the safest place in an infected attack being directly behind the man who could kill monsters barehanded.
But stamina drained with every technique. The Form Four exhibition had consumed more power than expected, leaving him operating on reserves that wouldn't last through extended combat. Detection showed more infected approaching—his own noise drawing additional threats faster than he could eliminate existing ones.
The final Clicker died as FEDRA vehicles rounded the corner, soldiers spilling out with weapons raised and questions ready. Adam collapsed against a lamp post, breathing ragged from exertion and adrenaline crash.
"This is it. They're going to see the impossible and connect it to me. Everything ends here."
Tess appeared from shadows like a guardian angel armed with improvised lies.
"Structural collapse," she called to the FEDRA officer approaching. "Old explosives cache went off. Brought down the whole building."
The officer—Captain Morrison, Detection provided from scanning his elevated stress levels—studied the ruins with professional suspicion. Half-true explanations covered some evidence, but couldn't explain everything.
"Explosives don't explain the infected response," Morrison said, scanning Adam with eyes that missed nothing. "Or how one civilian killed fifteen of them without proper weapons."
"Adrenaline," Tess replied smoothly. "Amazing what people can do when they're fighting for their lives."
Morrison's attention focused on Adam like a targeting laser. "You seem familiar. Have we met?"
"Medical records. Blood work anomalies. FEDRA's been building a file."
"Don't think so," Adam managed, playing injured civilian with perfect authenticity born from actual exhaustion.
"We'll be watching," Morrison said finally, gesturing for his squad to sweep the area. "This sector's now under enhanced surveillance. Any more 'accidents' get reported immediately."
As the soldiers departed, Adam realized the full scope of his operational security failure. He'd almost exposed everything for training impatience. Nearly revealed supernatural abilities to military personnel who would disappear him for research. Endangered every civilian in three sectors for the selfish desire to master one more technique.
Tess didn't lecture as they moved through back alleys toward their current safehouse. Her silence carried more weight than accusations.
"Say it," he finally prompted.
"You're powerful," she said quietly. "Not invisible."
The lesson carved itself into his enhanced memory with surgical precision: power without discipline was liability. Every ability carried consequences. Every technique risked exposure. The line between helpful and catastrophic measured in decibels and structural damage.
"I need to develop subtle techniques or restrict practice to truly isolated areas. Form Four works, but only when collateral damage doesn't matter. In populated zones, restraint beats raw power every time."
Lying in their safehouse afterward, Adam's Detection showed him FEDRA flagging the warehouse location for investigation. Structural engineers would find evidence that explosives couldn't explain. Enhanced surveillance would track anyone approaching the site. Another clinic location burned, another safe space compromised.
Always running. Always hiding. Always paying prices for power that came without instruction manuals.
Stone Breathing Forms were devastating but loud. Every use risked exposure to enemies who would exploit his abilities or destroy him trying. The catch-22 of supernatural enhancement: needing to train to stay alive, but training itself threatening survival through discovery.
"I'm stronger than ever. And more vulnerable than I've been since the first night."
Outside, Boston QZ settled back into uneasy sleep, citizens unaware they'd been saved by the same person who'd endangered them. The mathematics of heroism in an apocalypse: every rescue created new risks, every power came with hidden costs, every choice to help meant choosing who couldn't be helped.
The warehouse ruins would be investigated for weeks. FEDRA would find concrete pulverized in ways that violated material science. Questions would be asked that had no safe answers.
And Adam would keep running, keep hiding, keep saving people while staying one step ahead of consequences that grew heavier with each impossible miracle.
Author's Note / Promotion:
Your Reviews and Power Stones are the best way to show support. They help me know what you're enjoying and bring in new readers!
Can't wait for the next chapter of [ Breaking Bad: Shadows of the Desert Empire ]?
You don't have to. Get instant access to more content by supporting me on Patreon. I have three options so you can pick how far ahead you want to be:
🪙 Silver Tier ($6): Read 10 chapters ahead of the public site.
👑 Gold Tier ($9): Get 15-20 chapters ahead of the public site.
💎 Platinum Tier ($15): The ultimate experience. Get new chapters the second I finish them (20+ chapters ahead!). No waiting for weekly drops, just pure, instant access.
Your support helps me write more .
👉 Find it all at patreon.com/fanficwriter1