The footsteps echoed louder now. Slow. Deliberate.
Thud... thud... thud.
The sound bounced off the steel walls like thunder in a coffin. Wade's eyes, the only part of his body he could move, shifted toward the source of the noise.
Then came the light.
A vertical seam split open in the wall with a hiss of hydraulics. Cold, white light spilled into the dark chamber. A silhouette stood at the threshold, framed by the glow like some grim reaper wearing a government-issued jacket.
He stepped in slowly.
Black combat boots. Tactical pants. A long, weather-beaten trench coat that swayed with his every step like it had seen too many wars to count. He wore a black turtleneck beneath body armor, a holstered pistol on one hip, and a strange multi-function tablet on the other.
But it was his face that stood out.
One eye — sharp, calculating, and cold as steel — stared straight into Wade's soul. The other was covered with a matte-black eyepatch strapped diagonally across a deep, jagged scar. His skin was weathered, his jaw locked tight with the kind of authority that didn't come from politics — it came from years of commanding people who don't come back.
It was Nick Fury.
Not a man. A warning.
He stood at the foot of the bed like he was already preparing for an interrogation.
"i thought you wouldn't wake up," he said, voice like gravel under boots. Calm, but with a subtle edge — the kind that didn't ask for answers; it demanded them.
Wade blinked, his throat dry. He still couldn't speak. His muscles refused to obey.
Fury stepped closer, his boots silent now on the metal floor. He pulled a small device from his coat — rectangular, black, blinking softly with red light.
"You weren't supposed to wake up at all," he muttered, mostly to himself.
He gave Wade a long, unreadable look before beginning to circle the bed.
"You were part of the same program that made Logan," he said. "Weapon X."
His voice echoed around the room, slow and precise.
"They gave you the same healing serum... and something new. Something even they didn't understand."
Fury held up the device in his hand. Inside, suspended in a cracked glass vial, a faint shimmer of golden fluid pulsed like a heartbeat.
"X-Syrum. Still classified. Still a mystery. They put it in you. Then everything went silent."
Fury's boots stopped.
"You didn't wake up like the others. No vitals. No movement. They assumed it failed."
He looked at Wade again.
"They throws you out"
He turned slightly, tapping the tablet on his hip. A hologram lit up, showing the aftermath—an aerial view of a crater smoldering in the earth.
"Ten days later, our sensors picked up a life signal. Faint. Inconsistent."
He reached into his coat again and pulled out a thin, jet-black needle-like tool.
"This was still lodged in your skull," he said quietly. "Neural inhibitor. Keeps the subject unconscious until activated remotely. Weapon X wasn't ready to unleash you."
With a flick of his thumb, he powered it down.
A faint electrical click echoed through Wade's spine.
Heat. Energy. His nerves buzzed to life.
Fingers twitched. Jaw unlocked. Eyes blinked faster.
A breath.
Then another.
Wade turned his head slowly, his neck stiff but moving.
Fury gave a slight nod.
"Good. You can move."
In Wade mind countless thoughts are running, because man before him. Single mistake it will leave him in deep shit.
So he speaks the most common.
Wade's voice rasped out, hoarse and dry.
"---- WhoAm -I?"
Fury looked at him for a long second, then spoke with grim certainty:
"That's what we're going to find out."
-----
To be continued…