A/N: While waiting for the release of Mortal Kombat 11, I'm whiling away the time by putting one of my most anticipated fanfics into writing. I'm pretty sure everyone knows MKX by this time, so there's really no need for spoiler alerts. But there is this warning of character deaths. This one's loosely based on the canon version ( I don't know specifically which one, because of so many retcons ), so expect a plot detour every now and then.
As always, the usual disclaimer. I don't own Netherrealm's MKX or its respected characters, just my OC's.
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The Black Dragon.
They were like a skyrocket screaming across the sky, loud and bright but quick to burn. Total anarchy was their goal, to sow chaos across civilization. In turn, they welcomed ruin as the ruling government of Earth turned its attention on them. Pursued relentlessly across the globe, each of their leaders were cornered and executed, their followers scattered to the four winds and soon the very foundations of the shadowy organization fell apart.
They lacked the patience of the Red Dragon, and so their time was doomed to be short from the start.
On this night, the Special Forces have finally tracked down the last of the elusive Black Dragon members to a backwater village in the jungles of Myanmar. Following up on the latest intel, General Sonya Blade ordered all routes of escape to be cut off, leaving only one exit open to funnel their quarry in case the ground team would get sloppy. Their targets were three very dangerous, and very skittish Black Dragon leaders.
One was Viktor Neiman, a notorious pirate and murderer, which pretty much sums up the category that befitted all members of the Black Dragon Clan. An enormous bounty had been placed on his head from both worlds, Earthrealm and Outworld.
Next on the list was Jeda Harkoni, an opportunistic black market arms dealer, drug and human trafficker, and another detestable animal that needed to be put down.
And lastly was the enigmatic Catlyn Rosarius, arguably the only reason why the three managed to fly under the radar all this time. A former covert ops specialist in the old government, Catlyn's loyalties shifted after her handler gave the order to have her neutralized, following a series of missions ending with heavy collateral damages. She killed him in return.
Catlyn was put on top priority category, due to some intel pointing to her as a possible lead to General Blade's longtime nemesis- a ghost named Kano. After the events of the Invasion, Kano went dark and stayed that way for a very long time. This seemed like the only shot the Special Forces could ever get to Kano, and finally bring some closure to a lifetime of pursuit for General Blade.
"Copy that, command." Ground Team Leader Perry acknowledged, "Hounds unleashed, moving to position. Overwatch, how copy?"
A quarter of a kilometer away from the village, nestled deep within the treeline, a sniper peered down his scope and paused to push a thumb against his communicator. "Solid copy, Team Leader. I've got your six."
The Ground Team, under the cover of night, weaved through the empty streets and split into two groups as they reached the warehouse, four men on each to cover the exits. But as they approached, the loud chatter of gunfire and frantic screams of dying men tore through the stillness of the evening air!
Perry informed his superiors, "Command, picking up weapons discharge. Proceeding with caution, over."
Back at the treeline, the sniper shifted his weapon sights and peered close at the open windows of the old warehouse. A fight had broken out, at the expense of the Black Dragon fugitives, "Team Leader, I've got eyes on the target. Third party's engaged Priority One. Looks like they've got one pissed off client."
Inside, Catlyn hunkered down behind a stack of crates as a grenade detonated close to her, sending body parts and debris flying in all directions. Her chest heaved, and she steadied herself to return fire at the unwelcome visitor who suddenly barged in and attacked the safehouse.
She saw him, blocked by the immense bulk of Viktor Neiman as he grappled at the man. She couldn't get a shot, and it seemed like Viktor was losing this battle.
The enemy was quicker, stronger, and had a robotic arm to his advantage. With this prosthetic limb, he slammed blow after blow that soundly shattered Neiman's ribs and crushed his chest. Afterwards, he punched in the battered man's throat and collapsed his windpipe, causing him to drown in his own blood. Neiman went down, and Catlyn took careful aim with her sidearm. A squeeze of her finger and the gun jumped in her hands, but the bullets bounced off some sort of deflector shield emitted through the man's upraised robotic arm. Nevertheless, she kept firing until the gun clicked empty.
The man lowered his arm and flashed her a savage grin. Catlyn had only to look around and she saw that she was the only one left alive in that warehouse. Jeda was nowhere to be seen, probably the backstabber who led this assassin to her and Neiman in the first place!
"You've come to kill me. I won't make it easy on you." She promised, drawing her knife.
The man merely grunted and stomped towards her. Catlyn jabbed at him and sliced at empty air. He had slipped past her like vapor, and avoided her strikes like she moved through water! The man wrapped his massive arms around her waist and flipped her over her head, hitting her neck-first against the hard ground.
Catlyn felt a sharp pain shoot up and down her spine, luckily her neck didn't break. She scrambled back up and thrusted her blade forward, aiming for her assailant's throat. She felt his fingers close on her wrist, and Catlyn cried out as the metal hand crushed the bones down into splinters!
She withdrew, holding her injured hand in the other as she backed up to a corner.
The man kicked, his foot connecting with the side of her knee and sent her down on all fours. Catlyn howled in agony, then glared up at her soon-to-be killer. "Go on then! Finish it!"
His robotic hand made an audible whir as it yanked her head back by a fistful of her hair. Catlyn yelped as his face came within inches of her own, "Not just yet." His breath was hot against her ear as his mouth closed in, "Where's Kano?"
She wouldn't give him the satisfaction, "Fuck you!"
He dropped her back to the ground in a heap. Catlyn looked up, then saw him reach for the valve of the fuel tanker behind her. He then yanked on the piece and sent a torrent of gasoline pouring over her body. Just then, the doors of the warehouse burst open, and in came the soldiers of the Ground Team hitsquad.
"Special Forces! Everyone down on the ground!"
The man chuckled and lit a match, "Last chance."
"Go to hell!" Catlyn spat.
"Very poor choice of words." The man said as he shook his head, and down flew the lit match. As soon as it touched the green fluid, flames flared up all over Catlyn's body and the woman screamed as her skin boiled and shriveled like a dried fruit! The flames danced about the stream that poured from the tanker, and leaped into the bountiful sea of fuel within, causing a chain reaction that blew half the warehouse clean and knocked everyone else to the ground.
The assassin shook off the effects of the explosion and raced out the open doors of the warehouse, passing free from the clutches of the Ground Team and leaping onto the seat of a waiting dirtbike. With a kick to the starter, he set the ignition of the bike's engine and shot out into the night.
"Command, all targets have been neutralized by a third party freelancer." Perry coughed into the communicator, "He's taken the funnel route on a dirtbike."
"Copy that, Team Leader. Chopper in pursuit."
A pursuit helicopter was quick to shed the floodlights on the fleeing assassin, intent on pushing him into the net they prepared at the end of the funnel route. It was always meant for their quarry to have a false sense of direction to safety should they take the route, and it seemed to work for this freelancer as well.
The dirtbike's wheels were shot at by skilled marksmen, and the assassin tumbled down to the dirt. Humvees carrying troopers roared into view, surrounding him and pinning him at the crossroads. Realizing he was trapped, the assassin activated his communicator. Amidst the roar of the helicopter ahead, he spoke and heard from his unknown companion. "Did you get him, at least?"
A cheerful, sultry voice answered. "Affirmative, dear brother. Our friend Jeda was a talkative one. Shame he had to die, would've made an excellent storyteller. How about you? Will you be able to talk your way out of this, or should I plan an extraction?"
The assassin got on his knees and put his hands behind his head, "Do you have the location?"
"Of course. You still haven't answered my question."
"I'll be fine." His eyes shot up as the men approached him with shackles at the ready. "I won't need an extraction."
The base was abuzz with activity, due in no small part to the conclusion of the Burma Op. The interloper, brought to Home Base for interrogation, had killed their only lead to the last Black Dragon clansman and the most elusive of them all. When news reached General Blade of the assassin's interruption of a carefully planned operation, to say she was livid would be a monumental understatement. A change of plans was in order, she would have answers.
Her footfalls were like repeated snaps of a rawhide whip, and all in her path stood aside and gave her the due salutation. Sonya ignored them, her face red and fuming as she kept up a brisk pace. Her entourage scrambled to keep up, both in step and detail as she tossed question after question. "Did he say anything yet?"
"No, ma'am. Our best are on it as we speak."
The doors to the 'box', the pet name for the interrogation chamber, slammed open. In walked the general, and she paused to take a deep breath as she regarded the man in the other room with deep resentment. Sonya nodded for the others to continue, and so they did. As the men talked on, Sonya walked over to the table where the prisoner's belongings were placed in neat little rows, and ran her hands over the various tools responsible for all that trouble in Burma.
A combat knife, two flash-grenades, a standard-issue Glock g45 with an entire vest filled with six mag-pouches of 10 mm rounds, and a composite-metal arm with a matching leather sling to clasp over one's shoulders- a prosthetic limb they had taken off of the prisoner as a precaution. Sonya studied the combat knife and realized that there was a faded name scratched onto blade. It was unmistakable, it belonged to Kano.
Sonya looked up and studied the prisoner.
Still young, into his late twenties. He had to be of Middle-Eastern descent, with those black and oily locks of hair swept neatly over his head, naturally tanned skin and eyes of deep brown that seemed to stare deep into one's soul. Sonya hated those kinds of eyes, especially since they reminded her of her annoying ex-husband. Green eyes made you feel special, blue eyes creeped the fuck out of you, but brown eyes...
Brown eyes seemed to undress you just by looking at you, not in a creepy way, but definitely in a way that made you feel vulnerable.
Sonya cleared her throat, and thus cleared her thoughts before it went elsewhere. Johnny can go to hell, and so can anything else that made her miss those old days. Job comes first, as it always did.
"Give me a moment with the prisoner." Sonya told the guards, "I want to try something."
She went in as soon as the interrogators were gone, and the door slid shut behind her, locking her with the assassin. Sonya's gaze fell on the stump from his right shoulder where the prosthetic had been taken. The scars looked like a shark had savagely torn the limb free from the socket, bone and flesh. Their eyes met, and a strange, calming feeling slipped over Sonya's skin as those puppy brown eyes looked her over. Like a dog, whose demeanor belied its true predatory nature, he let her make the first move, as if studying her.
Before he could peel her layer by layer till there was nothing left but the core, Sonya spoke first. "You killed our only lead to a very dangerous man."
He nodded, "I killed a traitor that let evil men run free through the world. She needed to die, they all did." His voice was disarmingly soothing, the kind that could easily make your skin crawl or make you wish it was a warm blanket to wrap yourself in the coldest of nights. Sonya dispersed these distracting thoughts and kept her head together. He had a slight aussie accent that added flavor to his every syllable, and Sonya began to wonder if he was connected in any way to her quarry.
Sonya dragged the chair out from under the table and sat on it, opposite of the prisoner. "True, but I needed answers first. Now, we're left with you. I'll give it to you straight. If you don't cooperate with us, we'll have no other choice but to assume you're useless to us. This ain't the old government, justice is done swiftly around here, especially when you've interfered with Special Forces operations. No lawyers, just a judge and an executioner. You will be condemned and summarily executed. Do you understand?"
The prisoner nodded once, but seemed to let the threat pass unnoticed. He was focused on something else, "This 'dangerous man', you want him that badly? I couldn't help but notice, you said 'I' in needing answers, not 'we'. Any fool would've ignored that tiny detail." His eyes lit up with a strange fire, "But I think we can have some progress here."
"So you're ready to talk?" Sonya leaned forward.
"Maybe, if you're ready to listen. But first, a question of my own." The man said, "What did Jeremiah Kane do to earn your hatred?"
Sonya's brows furrowed upon hearing the true name of her nemesis. Only a handful of people knew what lay behind the alias Kano, and most of them were dead. This man knew a lot more than he let on! "He killed my partner, a friend, back when I was still a recruit here in SF. Been hunting him down ever since, both of us taking scars from each other over the years. It should go without saying that it's a personal matter for me."
"Then you know..." The man breathed, smiling strangely. "We share a common goal."
"And why do you say that?" Sonya asked, genuinely curious. "What did he do to earn yours?"
The table rapped soundly as the assassin's fingers tapped on its metal surface, slightly annoying the general as the man gave his answer. She bore it patiently to hear him out, "Many years ago, in a small town Down Under, a boy and a girl were raised by a loving mother. Life was harsh in the wilderness, but the little family bore it with a grin, for they had each other and that was enough. Then, a strange man with an evil red eye came at night and stole the children from their mother, taking them with him far far away into the jungles of some distant land. He wanted to leave a lasting impression on the world, to leave his legacy that would carry his name long after he was dead, in the only way he knew how.
Through pain and suffering, he stole the children's innocence and turned them into his little killing machines. But the boy missed his mother terribly, and tried to escape his captor's clutches. Each time he failed and was punished severely, but still he kept doing it in spite of the wounds mounting on his fragile little body. Then, the day came when he got free and disappeared into the jungles below his prison. Although the efforts of the lad were commendable, the evil man prepared for this attempt long ago and set traps all over the jungles in order to ensnare his escaped captive. Sure enough, the lad was caught, pinned by the arm over a pile of logs and rocks.
He watched and smiled at the suffering boy as he pleaded for help to be freed. His answer was a knife thrust to the trapped arm, and with one savage twist he tore the limb free from the boy's shoulder."
Sonya's face contorted slightly with pity, for she as a mother herself could not bear a young one to suffer. The story may have been fiction, but the way the man told it in such detail proved the former false. But why was he telling her all this?
"He left that boy in the jungle to bleed out, opting to focus all his efforts on the girl back in the prison. But he did not die." The assassin smiled, "That boy remained very much alive, and he remembers the red eyed man."
The room was silent for a moment, and Sonya watched as the man leaned back and made his proposition known. "I can give you the location of Jeremiah Kane, provided that you allow me to kill him myself. A simple deal, and one I hope you honor once made."
Not too bad a deal. Sonya preferred to get her hands personally on Kano, but it seemed someone else in that room deserved that right better than her. "What's your name?"
"I'm Aethan Kane, and just like you, I want my father dead."
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