Lahat ng Kabanata ng Bad Medicine: Kabanata 101 - Kabanata 110

For a long time, neither of them spoke. The only sound was the hum of the engine and the faint static from the laptop, replaying the frozen image — her duplicate standing beside a broken Jax.Sienna stared at the screen until her throat ached. It was one thing to see Jax alive in that lab. It was another to see herself there too, cold and mechanical, looking down at him like he was nothing but a test subject.“That can’t be me,” she whispered.Chase didn’t answer right away. He looked from the screen to her and back, his brows furrowed. “It’s not you,” he said finally. “It’s something made to look like you.”“But how?” Sienna’s voice cracked. “My neural data was never supposed to be in their hands. The merge happened after I destroyed the primary core.”“Unless,” Chase said quietly, “someone copied it before you did.”Her eyes widened. “You think my father—”“I think your old man’s always been three steps ahead. He knew what you were capable of. Maybe he left himself a little insuranc

The platform kept sinking.Not smoothly, not like an elevator—more like a half-dead lung pulling in one last, rattling breath before giving up. The metal groaned, cables whining overhead, and every so often the whole thing shuddered hard enough to make Sienna grab the railing.Jax didn’t bother with the railing. He stood center-platform, breathing slow, eyes fixed on the darkness yawning below them. Too still. Too calm.Chase stayed behind Sienna, one hand hovering near the knife clipped to his belt, the other gripping the ceiling grid like he was one slip away from falling into hell. Honestly, he wasn’t wrong.No one spoke.Because what was there to say?Her father—her dead father—had summoned them.His voice still echoed in Sienna’s ears like a ghost refusing to fade.I’ve been waiting, Sienna.She didn’t trust herself not to shake.Jax finally turned his head, eyes catching the faint glow from the emergency lights lining the shaft. He saw her. Really saw her. And he didn’t look con

The glow from the neural cradle cast eerie shadows across the room, highlighting every cable, every server, every trembling panel. My stomach twisted in knots. I could feel the countdown vibrating through the floor, through the very air around us. Two minutes felt like two hours.Jax’s hand found mine instantly, firm, grounding, and yet there was a tension there I hadn’t felt in months. His eyes were sharp, alert, and broken all at once. He wasn’t looking at me the way he usually did. He was calculating. Planning. Balancing impossible odds. And somehow, somewhere, he still wanted to protect me.“I don’t like this,” I said, my voice trembling. “This… this isn’t a game. He’s not just trying to win—we could die.”Jax exhaled, running a hand over his face. The golden glow from the cradle reflected off his skin, highlighting every scar, every line, every story I’d slowly been piecing together about him. “I know,” he said softly. “And he’s made sure of that. But it’s not just death we’re fa

The new cradle loomed like a silent predator in the corner of the room. Its amber glow was softer than Jax’s golden one, but there was a cold precision to it, a calculated menace that made my stomach tighten.Jax exhaled slowly, his hand still gripping mine, anchoring me to reality even as his body pulsed faintly with residual energy from the merge. “I’ve seen enough of him,” he muttered. “Enough to know this isn’t going to be easy. Whatever’s in that cradle… it’s more than just code.”Chase’s eyes never left the second cradle. “It’s a hybrid neural unit. Part human brain, part AI. Your father—he’s been preparing this for years. He didn’t just want a weapon. He wanted a replacement.”Replacement. The word struck like a blade. I could feel my chest tighten. The thought that Jax could be overwritten—completely erased—made my hands tremble.I swallowed, forcing my voice steady. “Then we stop it. Together. We can do this. You’re still you, Jax. I know it.”Jax’s blue eyes flickered with a

The hybrid’s new form hovered before us, a perfect, terrifying reflection of Jax and me. Every thought I tried to hold close—every fear, every memory—was mirrored back at me in real time. Its amber-gold glow pulsed in perfect sync with my heartbeat. It wasn’t just mimicking us anymore; it knew us. Every hesitation, every instinct, every spark of emotion was laid bare.Jax’s jaw was tight, hands clenched into fists as he stood shoulder to shoulder with me. “This isn’t a fight we can win with brute force,” he muttered. “We have to outthink it… outfeel it… but how do you outthink a version of yourself?”I swallowed hard. “Then we don’t. We—”Chase’s voice crackled in my ear. “You need to destabilize its mirror core. But be careful—if it synchronizes fully, it can overwrite both of you. It’s not just learning—it’s absorbing. Any direct assault now, and it could replace you.”I looked at Jax, whose blue eyes burned with determination. “Then we do it smart. Not hard. I can feel a weakness i