Apocalypse Days: I Rule with Foresight and a Powerful Son
Chapter 204

Chapter 204: 204

Winter sat in the room quietly stewing. He looked down at his wrists. The cuffs sat snugly against his skin—sleek metal, faintly humming. Dampeners. He could feel their suppression like a lead blanket on his chest. He was stronger than most men—faster, sharper, more than he should be—but with these things latched onto him, the world was mud and iron. Still, even now... he could feel the quiet power beneath. Slumbering, but not gone.

His knuckles were raw, skin split over scar tissue and dried blood. Bruises bloomed like poisonous flowers across his ribs, his jaw, his left eye. He welcomed the pain. It kept him present. Reminded him he was still alive. Still dangerous.

They thought the cuffs would keep him docile. Inhibitors—they pulsed faintly around his wrists, nullifying the core of what made him terrifying. But they’d underestimated how much damage he could still do with just teeth, fists, and fury.

He spat blood onto the floor, watching it slowly soak into the grime like ink into parchment.

Somewhere behind his swelling eye, the memory burned bright:

"Talk," the suited man had growled. "Or next time, we take the kid first."

Winter had smiled with red-stained teeth. The kind of smile you gave just before a war. Then he lunged.

They had to carry the man out on a stretcher. Multiple fractures. A concussion.

Three of them had tried to subdue Winter. Even with the cuffs, he’d made them bleed.

But they’d left him alone after that. Just four walls. Cold concrete. Thin air. No Zara. No Leo.

His chest tightened, not from pain—but from absence.

He closed his eyes. The thought of Zara, pale, tired, bleeding. Passed out on the ground as he was dragged off because he couldn’t fight with Leo in the line of fire, made his chest burn.

Fuck.

They were separated.

He hadn’t seen her since.

Please let them be okay. Let them be whole.

He took in a deep breath through his nose—sharp, dry air. There was no sound except for the hum of weak fluorescent lights and the faint tick of metal expanding in cold.

The silence was unnatural.

Then—movement.

Muffled voices carried through the thin vent grates up high on the wall. Just whispers at first. Then sharper. Urgent.

Winter tilted his head, straining to hear.

"—how the hell did he get out—"

"—no, no, the kid was right here five minutes ago—"

More yelling. Thudding boots. Someone slammed into a wall down the corridor.

"The kid’s missing!"

Winter’s blood turned to ice as a sharp pang of dread twisted in his gut. The kid. There was only one child in this godsforsaken place that mattered.

Leo.

Winter surged forward, cuffs clinking against his thighs as he pressed his ear to the steel door.

He saw the boy’s face in his mind—round cheeks, soft curls, too-wide eyes filled with fear. The tunnels. The shadows. The boy had clung to him then, trusting him completely. And Winter had sworn, if only to himself:

No one touches the boy. Not while I’m breathing.

He clenched his fists.

What did they do? What if they

Boots pounded against the floors. Lights flickered once. Twice.

Then everything went red.

The facility’s alarms activated. The emergency lights turned corridors into veins of flashing crimson. Shouting erupted beyond the door—scrambling orders, rising fear. The entire compound was in disarray.

They’d lost control.

Good.

He stepped back, breathing hard. His cuffs were still on, yes, but the panic in the halls was the kind of opening a man like him could turn into a reckoning. He took another breath—deeper, steadier.

They’d taken Leo.

And Zara—she would be beside herself, clawing at walls, screaming.

Winter felt the fury uncoil in his chest.

He stepped back from the door, looked around the room. Blank walls. One cot. A security camera in the corner. It had stopped moving. The little red light blinked erratically, then died.

The facility was cracking.

He breathed in slow and deep. His muscles coiled. Even with the cuffs, he wasn’t helpless. They thought he was contained. Tamed.

Wrong.

He took a step back from the door, measured the distance. Then he started banging—fists like hammers against the steel. "Hey!" he shouted. "HEY!"

A beat of silence. Then footsteps.

Good.

The door hissed and slid halfway open. A single guard stepped in—stun baton in one hand, tranquilizer in the other. Too casual. Too late.

"You want more sedatives, freak? I—"

Winter lunged.

The guard didn’t even have time to scream. Winter slammed his head into the man’s nose—crunch of cartilage—grabbed the baton before it fell, and cracked it across the guard’s jaw. The body slumped instantly.

Winter caught it before it hit the ground.

He dragged the body further into the cell, stripped him of the ID card, the baton, the sidearm—useless in his hands, but worth having. At least until he got his rifle back.

Then he stepped into the corridor.

Alarms still howled, lights pulsed like a dying heartbeat.

He moved low and fast, keeping to shadows. More guards ran past in the distance, weapons drawn, shouting about containment breaches and missing subjects.

Good. The more chaos, the better.

But he had to find her.

Zara...

He didn’t care about the scientists, the facility, the secrets buried under all this steel.

Only her.

And Leo

He paused at an intersection, peering around the corner. The coast was clear, for some reason, most of the activities were going on at the other side.

Winter turned into a quieter wing—low-security holding.

Fewer lights.

The humming fluorescents buzzed overhead like dying wasps, casting stuttering shadows that crawled across concrete walls.

He could hear sobs, muttering, the shuffle of restrained people.

Zara would never go quietly, he thought. She’d be kicking walls down. Screaming if Leo was gone.

That’s when he heard it.

A voice—raw, furious, cracked from shouting.

"Give me my son! GIVE HIM BACK!"

Winter froze.

His heart thundered once—and then he was running.

That was when he saw them.

Two guards posted outside a reinforced steel door. Big guys. One was picking at his nails like this was nothing. The other smirked, leaning in to peer through the shattered observation panel.

"You keep screaming like that, sweetheart, and someone might think you enjoy being in there," the smirker said, tapping the broken glass. "Want me to put that mouth of yours to good use?"

Winter saw red.

From inside, something hit the door hard. A fist, maybe. Or a chair.

"Fuck off! Where is he? Where’s my son?" Zara’s voice cracked like thunder.

Winter’s world narrowed.

He didn’t feel the burn of his muscles or the clink of his cuffs. He didn’t feel the cold.

Just fury.

"Hey!" the nail-picker said, startled as Winter broke into a sprint.

The smirker barely had time to register what was happening before Winter slammed his shoulder into his gut, driving him into the wall with bone-rattling force.

Air rushed out of the guard’s lungs in a choked wheeze—

—and Winter grabbed his head and slammed it back once, twice, until the man crumpled like wet paper.

"Shit!" the other one shouted, fumbling for his gun.

Winter turned, eyes wild. Even with the dampening cuffs clamped around his wrists, his strength was more than human. Raw, barely leashed power crackled under his skin.

The bullets missed their mark. Winter ducked, caught the guard’s wrist mid-swipe, and twisted until bones cracked like firewood. The scream that followed didn’t even register as Winter kneed him in the gut and dropped him with a punch to the temple.

The hallway stilled.

Both guards groaned on the ground, one unconscious, the other twitching.

Winter crouched, breath heaving, and rifled through their belts until he found a ring of keys and a backup ID card. He jammed the first key into his cuffs. One twist—

A click.

The cold metal fell away from his wrists.

Power rushed back in like a flood. He could feel himself again—his bones, his breath, his rage.

He tried the keys on Zara’s door. None worked. The panel flickered red in refusal. These bastards weren’t trusted with the good access.

Of course.

Inside the cell, something crashed again.

He heard her—panting. Crying. Still shouting. Still fighting.

Winter stood. Blood smeared across his knuckles. His jaw clenched.

"ZARA!"

No response—but he heard movement. Something slamming. Again and again.

He reached the door, planting both hands against it. "Zara—it’s me."

A pause.

Then a breathless sob.

"Winter?"

"Yeah. I’m here. I’m getting you out."

From inside, her voice broke. "Those fucking bastards can’t even watch a baby!

His hand clenched into a fist.

"I know. I know, baby. I heard. I’m getting you out, then we find him. Together."

He stepped back. His eyes scanned the frame. The guard’s stolen ID card was no use here.

So he did what he always did.

He relied on brute force.

"Step away from the door! I’m going to kick it open."

One breath. Two. Then he charged.

Steel met flesh—and groaned.

He backed up. Slammed again.

A crack.

The locks were old. Not reinforced like his own.

Another hit.

The door buckled inward with a screech. Screws popped from hinges.

And then—open.