American comics: I am full of martial virtues and I love to be kind to others.

The Blackbird's engines awoke with a deep, rumbling roar. The sound wasn't sharp and piercing like that of a typical jet engine; it was more like the first gasp of a slumbering beast—deep, long, and carrying a bone-chilling tremor. The entire aircraft began to shudder slightly, the vibrations transmitted directly to the spines of every passenger.

Then the blackbird took off vertically.

Lynn's stomach felt like it was being pushed down by a hand in that instant. He saw the hangar walls outside the window plummeting—no, they were rising rapidly—the ground turned into a hazy gray-green patch in a second, the lights of Westchester flashed at the bottom of the clouds and disappeared, and then the entire plane plunged into the clouds, and outside the window became a swirling gray-white fog.

Three seconds later they emerged from the summit.

A scene Lynn had never seen before appeared in the cabin window—forty thousand feet above the ground, the curvature of the atmosphere faintly visible at the edge of the horizon. The sky was no longer black, but a deep, profound indigo. The stars no longer twinkled, but were fixed firmly to the dome like nails, each emitting a hard, stable, cold light. Below, the clouds stretched out like an endless white ocean, their surfaces illuminated by the high-altitude moonlight with an almost fluorescent silvery-white glow, as if someone had spread a whole bed of cotton between the earth and the sky.

"Entering acceleration mode." Scott's voice came through the cabin's loudspeakers, as calm as announcing the next subway stop.

The acceleration felt like a giant hand shoving from behind. Lynn's body was pressed into the seat, the nylon webbing of the seatbelt digging into his chest, and the veins in his temples throbbed under the pressure of the acceleration. A gray haze began to appear at the edge of his vision—a temporary narrowing of vision caused by G-force—and he clenched his teeth as Scott had instructed, pressing the back of his head firmly against the headrest.

About twenty seconds later, the acceleration subsided. The oppressive feeling disappeared, and vision returned to normal.

"Cruising speed Mach 3. Altitude 62,000 feet," Scott's report came over the loudspeaker. "Target arrival time approximately 3 hours and 45 minutes. Everyone can relax, but do not unfasten your seatbelts."

Lynn turned to look at Pedro. Pedro was gripping the armrests of the chair tightly with both hands, his knuckles white, and his expression was somewhere between ecstasy and impending death.

“Didn’t you say you wouldn’t throw up?” Jason handed over a vomit bag from the side.

"I didn't throw up. I was just considering whether or not to. Two different things."

Logan sat opposite him with his eyes closed, his posture as relaxed as if he were sitting on his own living room sofa. Taylor sat next to him, his face pale, but his mouth tightly closed, his hands clenched into fists on his knees—his fingers were normal, unchanged.

Ororo sat in the seat closest to the cockpit door, her short white hair gleaming ethereally in the cabin's blue emergency lights. Her eyes were half-closed, and her lips moved slightly, as if she were reciting something—or conversing with a cloud thousands of miles away.

Time seemed to warp strangely at 30,000 Hz. Lynn had the illusion that he was being simultaneously compressed and stretched—his body compressed into the seat by the speed, while his consciousness was stretched to its limit by everything that awaited him ahead. He closed his eyes, trying to make sense of the final details of his actions.

First flyby—reconnaissance. Jane conducts a mind scan to confirm the location and number of people on the island.

Return to standby position – analyze the data and formulate the final assault route.

Second flight—landing. Ororo summons a bolt of lightning above the communications facility. The assault begins.

Two parallel lines of action are underway: conventional forces are suppressing the mercenaries, while mutants are dealing with mutant security personnel. Simultaneously, an infiltration of the test subjects' residential area is being conducted to rescue them.

There are at least three possible ways to go wrong at each step. But for each possible way to go wrong, he has at least one solution in mind.

That's enough. I can't think about it anymore. Continuing to think about it will lead to overanalysis, and the end result of overanalysis is paralysis.

He opened his eyes and glanced down at the woven bracelet on his wrist. In the dim light of the cabin, the red, blue, and white colors were almost indistinguishable, blending into a deep, dark knot.

Three hours and fifteen minutes later, Scott's voice came through the speaker again.

"Begin deceleration. Midway Atoll is visible 300 kilometers ahead. Descend to 1,000 feet in preparation for the first flyby."

The vibrations of the fuselage changed—from the steady hum of high-speed cruising to a more violent shaking during deceleration. The scenery outside the window was also changing rapidly—the indigo stratospheric sky was gradually replaced by a low-lying gray-white canopy, the clouds rose rapidly from below to above, then broke apart and dissipated, revealing a vast expanse of the Pacific Ocean, almost inky blue, suddenly appearing below the window.

The sun had just risen above the eastern horizon—around 177 degrees west longitude, six time zones ahead of New York. The morning light streamed in at an almost horizontal angle from the horizon, illuminating every ripple with intricate details of light and shadow. Seabirds circled low overhead—the greyish-white silhouette of a great albatross flashed past the airplane window, its wingspan almost as long as a person's height.

Then he saw Midway.

From a thousand feet above, the shape of Midway Atoll is even clearer than in satellite photos. White sand beaches surround emerald-green shallow lagoons, beyond which lies the deep blue ocean, with the shadows of coral reefs appearing and disappearing underwater in the transition zone between the two colors. At the eastern end of the atoll—where the complex is located—several low gray buildings look like a die casually scattered on the sand.

“Jane, begin scanning,” Scott said from the cockpit.

Jane didn't answer. Or rather, she didn't need to answer with her voice.

The cabin suddenly became unusually quiet—not just any quiet, but a quiet with substance and density, as if something invisible was spreading from Jane's direction, forming a barrier between everyone's eardrums and skulls. Lynn's temples tightened slightly, as if someone were pressing two gentle fingers against his temples.

This sensation lasted for about forty seconds.

Then Jane's voice came through—not from a speaker, but directly into Lynn's mind. The experience made the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end—not out of fear, but an instinctive reaction to an unknown power far beyond his comprehension.

"Scan complete."

Her voice was as clear in his mind as if they were speaking face to face, but with an added layer of strange echo, as if it came from the depths of a marble palace.

"There are a total of fifty-one consciousness signals on the island. Thirty-seven are concentrated in the strip-shaped building area—the test subjects. Seven are on the first floor of the main building—likely the mercenaries' rest area. Three are in the monitoring center on the second floor of the main building. One is near the helipad next to the runway—appears to be a technician or pilot. Two are in the communications facility building. One is in the southwest corner outside the barbed wire fence—possibly the outer patrol post."

Lynn quickly did the math in his head. Fifty-one minus thirty-seven subjects equals fourteen guards.

The manual says there are twenty-four mercenaries plus three mutant security guards. Fourteen is far less than twenty-seven.

"Jane, are you sure there are only fourteen?" He didn't know how to "answer" with his thoughts, but he tried to organize the question in his mind.

“I’m quite certain. Fourteen non-subject consciousness signals,” Jane’s voice replied. “And of those fourteen signals, only one possesses a mutant characteristic I can recognize—a unique psychic spectrum fluctuation. That signal is in the monitoring center on the second floor of the main building.”

"Only one mutant?" Lynn blurted out.

“What?” Pedro turned to look at him.

"Jane said there are only fourteen guards on the island, and only one mutant's psychic signal was detected."

"Wait a minute—the manual says twenty-four plus three. How come it's more than half short?"

The Blackbird had already flown over the atoll and was climbing northwest. Scott brought the plane to an altitude of two thousand feet and began a wide circle about five nautical miles outside the atoll.

Jane walked back to the cabin from the cockpit and sat down in her seat. Her face was paler than before, and there was a fine layer of sweat on her temples. The mind scan had clearly taken a toll on her.

“Tell me more.” Lynn leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees.

Jane closed her eyes briefly, taking a few seconds to organize her thoughts. “The guards are in a very… relaxed state. Of the seven in the rest area, five are in a semi-sleep state—their consciousness fluctuations are very low, close to light sleep. The three in the monitoring center are awake, but their attention is scattered—I can sense an underlying feeling of ‘just another boring day’ pervading their consciousness. The one on patrol outside is thinking about lunch. The two in the communications facility are talking about baseball.”

"Is there only one person on the entire island who is on alert?"

“Even that one isn’t entirely accurate. The technician next to the runway was the most alert, but his attention was focused on a helicopter engine—he seemed to be performing some kind of routine maintenance, paying almost no attention to his surroundings.”

"And that one and only mutant? Can you tell if it's 'The Forge,' 'The Prism,' or 'Silence'?"

Jane shook her head. "Mind scans can only identify a mutant's genetic traits, not their specific ability type. But judging from his mental state—he's relaxed. He's not on guard or in an activated state."

Lynn leaned back in his seat, his fingers unconsciously rubbing the stubble on his chin.

Fourteen people. One mutant. This means that the twenty-seven-man security force described in the manual has been reduced by nearly half. There could be many reasons—budget cuts, personnel reassignments, the Brotherhood's operations elsewhere requiring manpower—but whatever the reason, the result is the same: the base's defenses are far weaker than they anticipated.

“They think they won’t be discovered,” Diana said, echoing Lynn’s thoughts.

“Yes.” Lynn’s voice held the composure of a hunter spotting his prey dozing off. “This base is built on an abandoned military facility in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, with no human settlements within a thousand miles. Their operations went undetected by any law enforcement or intelligence agency—at least until Kevin stole the data. Over time, they became complacent. They reduced personnel, lowered patrol frequency, and security became a mere formality.”

“A classic case of complacency.” Jason’s tone carried a professional calm—he’d seen too many cases like this. “Every criminal organization that thinks it’s hidden well eventually falls into the same trap—not because they’re defeated by the trackers’ abilities, but because of their own sense of security.”

“This is good news for us,” Pedro said, patting Remington on his knee. “Half of the fourteen are asleep, and the ones awake are talking about baseball. I thought it was going to be a tough game.”

“Don’t let your guard down—that’s exactly the mistake they made.” Lynn pointed at him. “Although we’re outnumbered, those mercenaries are professional soldiers. Once they’re alerted and organized, their reaction time won’t be much slower than a regular army. Our advantage lies in surprise and preemptive strikes, not in overwhelming strength. Once we lose our surprise, fourteen men will be enough to give us a run for our money.”

“I understand.” Pedro’s smile faded.

“The updated plan.” Lynn stood up and paced a few steps in the confined cabin space. His mind was racing, each new piece of information being integrated into the existing operational framework in real time. “The number of guards is almost half of what it was expected, and the mutant security detail has been reduced from three to one. This changes our troop deployment.”

He turned to Ororo. “The attack plan for the communications facilities remains unchanged. On your second flyby, you will deliver a precise lightning strike on the communications antennas from the air, while simultaneously creating storm noise in the landing area to cover your descent.”

Ororo nodded.

"Scott, Jane, you're in charge of the monitoring center on the second floor of the main building. That's the nerve center of the entire base—the terminals for the surveillance cameras, the control consoles for the internal communication system, and the only detected mutant security personnel are all there. Before entering, Jane will use telepathy to pinpoint the exact location of everyone inside. Once Scott is inside, he'll use lasers to suppress any resistance."

“How many entrances are there to the monitoring center?” Scott asked.

"According to the floor plan, there are two. A main staircase and a side emergency exit. Seal one, and you clear the other."

"receive."

"Logan, Taylor—"

Logan, who was in the corner, finally opened his eyes.

"You two are responsible for the subject living quarters. Three strip buildings, thirty-seven people. Your mission is to protect them—ensure that no bullets or any form of attack reach those buildings during the firefight. Taylor, if anyone tries to rush into the subject area, you use your abilities to stop them. Logan—"

“I’ll handle what can’t be stopped.” Logan’s voice dragged across the stone slab like a blunt, unsharpened knife. (End of Chapter)