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Chapter 103: Aneurysm Simulator
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"And today," He concluded with another soft chuckle, "It seems I am the main course."
Then, his face changed. The amusement drained away, replaced by a chilling, stone-cold neutrality. His eyes seemed to darken, pinning the audience in their seats. "It's all true."
A collective intake of breath.
"I did work with Magneto."
The silence became absolute, brittle.
"Speaking of which," Adam continued, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial, menacing whisper that the microphones picked up perfectly.
"He's here. Right now. And his intent… is to do what he does best."
The air in the hall didn't just grow cold; it seemed to be sucked out, replaced by a vacuum of sheer, primal terror. Faces paled. A journalist in the front row dropped her tablet.
The livestream chat, which Adam kept up with through his technopathy, exploded into a tsunami of panic emojis, question marks, and all-caps screaming.
Then, as swiftly as it came, the oppressive chill vanished. Adam's icy expression shattered into a boyish, mischievous grin. He let out a laugh, bright and shocking.
"Terrorism! Hah! I'm just joking!" He laughed again, shoulders shaking, thoroughly enjoying himself. "Oh, come on! I bet I got you! I saw the fear in your eyes! Priceless!"
He shrugged, the gesture utterly dismissive of the psychological whiplash he'd just inflicted. The audience sat in stunned, trembling silence, a mix of relief, indignation, and profound confusion.
What kind of CEO, facing ruin, jokes about collaborating with the world's most wanted mutant terrorist?
[What in the actual Fuck? Crazy much?]
[The sheer, unadulterated BALLS on this man.]
[People actually pissed themselves. I saw it.]
["I'm just joking!" HE'S A MENACE!]
[He actually gives no fuck, and I don't think any backlash would do him bad, no?]
[Well, Mephisto concluded that Adam feeds on that shit, so no.]
[I see the vision, I was afraid Adam would have to pussy out since he's a ceo and all, and be more measured, but thank god.]
[My friend, what fucking show are u watching? Even without any benefit, Adam would've still said some insane shit.]
[Oh... Mmm, yeah yea true.] [+1] [He's batshit insane, so yea.]
[Is he thought? To me, he feels too sane] [I get ya, I see it too.]
[It's the super sane theory, no?] [You know, that makes sense.]
Adam gave no fuck. His primary goal was ascension, the Absolute. A close second was happiness.
What was the point of existence if not to experience joy and satisfaction? He wanted to taste everything, and he was happiest being himself; chaotic, unpredictable, utterly beyond conventional norms.
A normal CEO doing this would be committing career suicide. Adam Cypher was painting a masterpiece on the ashes of a normal career.
"Luckily for you all," He continued, his smile turning sharp, "I'm also greedy and selfish. So I'll use this lovely… Attention… To show off a couple of new products from Cypher Enterprises."
"They're so world-changing, they'll make even the vultures salivate. Today's show will be like none other! We start with a showcase. Then, a Q&A."
He snapped his fingers.
The hall plunged into utter darkness. A wave of fresh panic rippled through the crowd; a visceral reaction to his earlier "joke." Had he been telling the truth?
Then, with a dramatic thrum, the lights snapped back on, brighter, more focused. A compartment in the stage floor sizzled open.
A mechanical pedestal rose with theatrical slowness. Atop it, gleaming under the lights like a sacred relic, was the V-shaped core of the Null-Suit.
Adam gestured to it like a proud parent. "This wonder. You've no doubt seen the pictures. My 'superhero suit,' as the tabloids call it. I built it as a research platform."
"My own two hands and tools weren't enough for the projects in my head. It's been… invaluable." He walked around it. "Most importantly, it opened a new door."
On cue, the suit unfolded. It was a symphony of distinct, hydraulic motion.
The six mechanical arms unfurled from the core with a series of sharp clicks and hisses, rising and settling into a ready stance behind him, making the assembly look like a vast, metallic spider poised at his back.
The audience gasped, a wave of genuine awe crashing over the lingering fear. The spectacle was exquisite and shocking.
It's one thing to see it in pictures. It's another to see it in person, and in person, it looked that much more majestic.
"It inspired me," Adam said, his voice taking on a lecturing tone. "The neural interface, the articulation, the feedback systems. It moved the entire field of prosthetics forward a decade in my mind."
He paused, his expression turning mock-somber. "And it just so happened that while fighting a secret, world-destroying criminal organization called Hydra, I lost my arm. A tragedy, yes. But also… an opportunity to experiment."
The name Hydra landed in the hall like a lead balloon. To most, it was a historical footnote, a Nazi science division crushed in World War II.
A few knowers who were watching live felt a chill that had nothing to do with Adam's theatrics.
They knew a thing or two about Hydra, and it's not as if after their defeat in WW2, Hydra stayed totally undetected.
Even SHIELD had some persistent, ghostly engagements with Hydra's remnants.
But hearing it stated so blatantly, connected to a mutilation and a cutting-edge tech demonstration, was profoundly disorienting.
World-destroying? The livestream chats filled with "???", "Who?", and "HYDRA???"
[TF? HE JUST NAME-DROPPED HYDRA ON A GLOBAL LIVESTREAM!]
[I bet so many people are having a collective aneurysm right now.]
[Fury and Hydra must be losing their minds.]
[But what the fuck is he doing? Is he planning to go public?]
[Go public with what? He's not gay my dude.] [?????]
[Tf are u talking about? I meant going public about Hydra's existence.]
[Man, I think u think about gay check too much, try a gay bar to test if you have the symptoms.]
[Tf?] [??????] [...] [?] [...]
Adam didn't let them dwell. With a showman's flair, he peeled off his right glove, revealing a perfectly normal human hand. Then, he removed the left glove.
It was not human.
It was a seamless construct of polished, gunmetal-grey titanium, articulated with impossible delicacy.
He didn't stop there. In one fluid motion, he shrugged off his suit jacket and tossed it aside.
Then, he unbuttoned his dress shirt and let it fall to the stage, standing bare-chested and unselfconscious under the blazing lights.
He raised his left arm. It was fully cybernetic from the shoulder down; a masterpiece of engineering, sleek, powerful, and as sci-fi as it can get.
He grinned. "Cool, no?"
Sections of the arm lit up with soft, customizable RGB lighting, cycling through a spectrum of colors.
"Especially cool with the party lights."
He proceeded to demonstrate. He made a fist, then splayed the fingers, each moving with independent, fluid grace.
He threw a few shadow boxing jabs and hooks, the arm moving with the natural kinetics of a biological limb, the whir of servos barely audible. The audience was mesmerized.
"But a demo needs data," He said. The Null-Suit's storage compartment opened, and a solid steel calibration sphere, the size of a baseball, was tossed to him by a mechanical arm.
He caught it in his cybernetic hand.
"The prosthetics we aim to provide will be constructed from advanced composites; titanium, aluminum, carbon fiber. Stronger than natural limbs. But not like this lovely babe."
He held up the steel ball. Then, with a sharp, crunching SCREECH of tortured metal, his fingers closed.
The solid sphere deformed like putty, flattening into a compressed disk. He held it up, then casually tossed it to the edge of the stage.
"For that, you'd need to be a superhero. Or have a very understanding insurance company."
The hall erupted. Not in panic this time, but in a frenzy of questions and excited whispers. Cameras zoomed in on the crushed metal disk. Adam's voice cut through the noise.
"This is only the beginning. Unless you want to miss it, quiet down."
He had them. Completely.
"I'm happy to announce that Cypher's 'Aegis' line of prosthetics will be available at all Stark Industries certified facilities, starting late next month." The screen behind him lit up with the logo, details, and a map of locations.
Stark facilities? Not Cypher's?
"I'm a very good friend of Tony Stark," Adam explained, as if reading their minds. "Best friends, some might say. We've been collaborating on several projects."
"This is the first fruit. The neural interface, the manufacturing scalability; none of this would be possible without Tony and Stark Industries. The beginning of a lovely partnership, I hope."
It's a win-win. Tony doesn't lose out, and the reality is that Cypher Enterprise is brilliant but still an infrastructure-poor startup, and needs to be aided by the established industrial titan.
After letting that bombshell settle, he moved to the next act... The next bombshell is special, and it's all thanks to his imaginary friends.
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[ 1000 Power Stones For An Extra Chapter! ]
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