Back in the infirmary, Hartman hovered over Dante like an anxious storm cloud about to break. His eyes flicked between the monitors and Dante's still form on the medbed. Pulse paced near the far wall, fists clenched, jaw tight—fury barely contained.
"They threw you in with him?" Hartman's voice was a mix of disbelief and frustration. "Already? After everything we warned them about?"
Dante lay there, chest rising and falling steadily, the sterile white sheets drawn up to his waist. He said nothing. The silence was heavy.
That shadow he'd faced wasn't just fast—it was impossible. More than invisible. It was like it existed outside reality's rules, slipping through cracks in Dante's senses. Even when he glimpsed it, his power, his Adaptation system, failed him. It couldn't replicate or predict this Phantom. Nothing in Dante's experience or data bank matched it.
"He didn't show up on any heat scans," Pulse muttered, voice low and tense. "Even the cameras? Static. Total blackout during your test run. That wasn't scheduled. Voss went off-book."
Hartman's gaze sharpened. "She's using Dante as a live test subject. Field-testing him like a weapon. Like we feared."
Dante pushed himself upright, blinking against the harsh fluorescent light. His breath came slower now, controlled. "What was he?" His voice was rough, but steady.
Hartman's expression darkened. "Codename: Phantom. No official records. We believe he's an early Echo prototype. Something went wrong during his creation."
Dante's brow furrowed. "What do you mean?"
"He doesn't mimic powers like you do," Hartman explained. "He erases them. Not just abilities or signatures—sometimes people. He's designed to be off-the-grid, off the radar, a ghost in every sense."
Pulse stepped forward, eyes intense. "You said your power adapts, right? That you learn from what you see and sense. But Dante… you need to start learning from absence, not presence."
Dante cocked his head, confused.
Pulse tapped the side of Dante's forehead. "You rely on energy input—all the data, power signals, and movements. What if you trained yourself to read the void? The negative space? The gaps where there's nothing? What happens there?"
Dante's eyes widened as the idea clicked.
"Negative space," Hartman repeated slowly. "Black Widow, Daredevil—they don't fight by reacting to what they see or hear. They fight by feeling what isn't there. Silence. Absence. The space an opponent occupies but refuses to fill."
Dante nodded, a slow resolve settling in. "No more reaction. No more mimicry. I need to anticipate. Predict the void."
Hartman's lips curled into a slight smile. "Exactly."
That night, Dante found himself standing before the entrance to Echo's black zone—the Vault.
It was an abyss beneath the ocean's depths: a zero-tech, zero-sensor combat dome buried miles below sea level, designed for the most brutal, rawest form of combat training. No cameras. No communication. No energy readings. Just absolute silence.
Dante stepped inside alone.
The heavy steel door groaned shut behind him.
Then, the lights snapped off.
Complete darkness.
Dante froze. His heart hammered, but his breathing slowed, measured.
Nothing moved.
Then—
Movement.
He dropped instinctively as a blade sliced through the air where his head had been seconds before.
No warning. No signal. Just an attack.
He rolled, twisted, and countered with a strike behind him where he felt the presence. His blow met air, but he heard something shift—a whisper of motion.
Phantom was here.
Dante's muscles tensed, but this time he didn't think. No calculations. No system prompts. He listened—not with ears, but with his energy memory.
The static that never sparked. The air pressure suddenly dropped. The faint wrongness in the environment.
He struck again. Missed—but closer.
Another strike. A feint. A counterattack.
Then a sharp hit grazed Dante's side—a clean, precise strike. Instead of recoiling, he let it guide him. Like flowing with a current rather than fighting it.
And suddenly—
He saw him.
Not clearly, but a flicker of shape.
Phantom's form shimmered briefly, a ghost of a silhouette.
Dante summoned every ounce of his remaining stored electricity, channelling it straight into the space where Phantom's energy should have been.
A scream echoed through the dome.
The lights flickered back on.
Phantom staggered—revealed, if only for a moment, by crackling electric arcs dancing over his armour. A shadow framed in blue sparks.
Dante surged forward, faster than he ever had before.
His Adapted Form ignited—electric energy coursing over his skin, muscles moving with supernatural precision.
[CURRENT STRIDE: STABILIZED – PHANTOM LOCK DETECTED]
The system confirmed what Dante already knew—he had adapted.
With surgical precision, he delivered three rapid blows: centre mass, shoulder, and jaw.
Phantom dropped to one knee, breathing heavily.
Before the enemy could vanish again, Dante stopped, fist raised and steady.
"You're not unreadable anymore."
Phantom's eyes, dark and unreadable, lifted slowly.
"Then maybe you're ready," he whispered, before dissolving into nothingness once more.
But this time—
Dante could feel the phantom's departure. Not as a ghost or trick of light, but as a real opponent. One he could finally chase.
Back on the observation deck, Voss and Hartman watched the data feeds.
"No sensors worked. No cameras. Nothing," Hartman muttered. "And yet, he still learnt."
Voss didn't take her eyes off the screen. "He's not just adapting to power anymore. He's adapting to absence. To the unseen. To the gaps we can't measure."
Hartman folded his arms, voice low. "We've just changed the game."
Voss's lips twitched into a thin smile.
"Then it's time we show him what's coming next."
Her screen flickered, revealing a file stamped with a red banner:
[TARGET ALPHA-01: COPYBREAKER]
Status: Active
Mission: Terminate Subject Echo-17
Hours later, Dante lay on his medbed again, muscles aching but mind ablaze. His system pinged softly, a quiet confirmation of progress.
Adaptation Level: Incremental.
New Trait Unlocked: Void Awareness.
Next Target: Copybreaker Protocol Activated.
He clenched his fists, feeling the electricity coursing just beneath his skin.
Phantom had been a ghost, an impossible riddle. But now, Dante had learnt to hunt the shadows. To fight the unseen. To embrace the void itself.
He was no longer just Echo-17. He was becoming something more. Something that might just break the rules of the game.
And whatever came next? He would be ready.