After following the two police cars for well over ten minutes, Xavier found himself in an abandoned area in North New York, near the Bronx River. Many of the buildings which had once stood there had either crumbled to the ground, or been left alone to rot in its own filth. One building in the area, however, stood out from the rest with its large, semi-spherical roof, and immense parking lot, housing nothing but other than a few abandoned transport trucks, and year-old trash. The intriguing part was the fact the police cars he had been following with the cab - which he had left behind a few minutes prior - had stopped at the edge of the road near the building, with its occupants inside it.

There was a road which closely hugged the establishment and its surroundings, forcing the building to have contained a few more entrances than usual. Xavier knew this would work to his advantage, because if there would have been security, - which he was almost positive there would be of - they would not have been able to stop him from accessing every entry available, giving him somewhat of an easy access to wherever they were holding Eric.

He tried to formulate a plan in order to enter the building safely. He figured, once seeing the large amount of windows, that looking for the actual room Eric was in would help him greatly once inside, instead of roaming around clueless as to where to go. Closely, but cautiously approaching the cool concrete walls, he took a quick look into the first room, seeing nothing, and moved slowly to the next. These steps were repeated for a period of around five minutes, until he found the room Eric was in, on the other side of the building.

He could not believe his eyes. Two things had shocked him greatly; for one, Eric was up, out of his handcuffs, and in his other form. Xavier was not certain why there were no security officers around to stop him, but apparently, it was not a problem; the second thing was that there was a large creature, about a few inches larger than Eric, staring him down, and talking. It looked ferocious with his large body and tail, but resembled a wolf. There was also a table near Eric, in flames, leading Xavier to wonder whether the creature had fire breathing abilities as well. He could not hear a thing they were saying, but he continued to watch the scene unfold anyways.

...

Eric was still in position to fight, studying Tom's new form. He was still in awe over what he had witnessed; he would never have believed something so strange would exist. "What the...", he mouthed, loud enough to be audible to Benson's new ears.

"What is it, Eric?", Tom mocked with a smile. "Thought you were the only one in the world with a funny looking mid-form?"

Eric cringed at the thought of something as repulsive as his opponent in its full form. "What are you?"

Tom eased up, knowing it would take a while. Eric however, did not budge. "Call me... a failed experiment, if you will. I was one of the three people chosen to test the first doses of the TFR injection in 1981. I was taken away from my home at eight years-old one day to meet with two other kids my age, and a man in a white coat, whom we now know as Dr. Omar Hudson. We were isolated in a cage for a day without food, other than a live rabbit. Nothing else was said. We starved to the point of going crazy because of malnutrition, and the rabbits were too rapid for us. Finally, after nearly dying of starvation, the man came up to our cages and injected us with a liquid, and we were chained, hands behind our backs against the bars of our prison. After a few hours, we immediately began to feel worse, each of us yelling in agony over what was happening inside our bodies. The rabbit began to look appealing to us, as we got sick over the lack of food. Finally, one of the other kids yelled at the top of his lungs, to the point of collapsing, eyes wide open, death ridding him of his life. The remaining child and I felt fur sprouting over our whole body, which signaled the beginning of a horrible transformation. The man in the suit went over to the dead corpse and took it away for examination.

"After that, I completed my transformation, broke out of my chains by force, and ate the rabbit in a gulp. I needed more, however, and tried to break free from my cage. I got hungry quickly, and seeing the final kid's dead body in front of me, I literally snapped the bars of the cage out of its place, and ingested it. The man seemed to have disappeared, but I didn't really realize it since my other side was in control. I couldn't get out of its grasp, so it made its own decisions; running out of the location, and killing as many people as possible to satisfy its roaring hunger. Before I knew it, I mutilated many, many people in a few decades, and nearly killed myself a few times as well. After about twenty years, I began to take control again, and surely enough, I regained my human form a day at a time, until I was in complete control at the age of 30."

Eric was confused. Tom was abducted and lost control over everything, but regained control and became head of the CIA? But before he could ask, Tom continued to talk. "After a long period of time, I decided to go to a private school for adults. I studied my remaining school years up to the eighth grade, where I dropped out and applied for a job at the CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia. I started off slow, doing a year sorting out paperwork, participating in our surveillance center for two years, and receiving a leading position in our tracking department. Soon enough, the organization saw my potential, even without a high school diploma, nor a degree of any sort. I was promoted vice president in 2016, officially conducting many things including decision planning for the war of 2009, governmental actions regarding the social conflict after it, and, of course, cases like yours. Hell, I even got married - three times. Around 2019 I was promoted again to the head position, and now, I'm here."

Eric began to recall something. He had heard of the story of a mysterious creature rampaging across North America before. "So, you're --"

"Lucifer?", Tom replied. "Yes, I suppose. I don't mind the name - it definitely represents me." He laughed, in a demonic way, ironically. "Humans are funny, aren't they?"

Eric found that final sentence quite disturbing. "You're sick, you know that?"

"Of course. People have been saying it for so many years, so I'm bound to know by now." Another laugh prevailed. Eric became increasingly annoyed. "Alright, I'm done talking. Time to put you to rest."

In an unexpected move, Tom charged toward Eric. His speed was incredibly high, which did not even allow Eric the slightest chance to move. The punch to his chest was incredibly powerful, and made Eric fly to the ground, sliding all the way to the wall fifteen feet away. Before his opponent had the chance to launch another one, Eric rolled to the side, and pushed off of the wall, to quickly get up. Benson made his way towards his prey, facing it as soon as it turned around to face him. Hands in a jab punch formation, Tom began a series of blows aimed for the head, which Eric considered very painful.

Jab after jab, Eric tried to block them, but with his inexperience in fighting, it was not very surprising to see most of them go through. After a large punch to the head, which threw Eric back a bit, Benson rushed for his chance and initiated a 360° rotation on one foot, in order to gain momentum for a high kick to the chest, which landed dead on. Eric was once again thrown to the ground, but this time, he was not let up; Tom picked him up by the leg, and threw him into the air, which sent Eric soaring five meters vertically, rotating a full turn per second. Realizing he would not have landed very well, Eric deployed his wings and slowed the rotation enough to allow him to start flapping, enabling him to gain sufficient space from the beast. The former, however, managed to jump high enough to claw at Eric's foot, which knocked Eric off balance for a while. This moment was long enough to give Tom the chance to jump up once again and grab his foot, pulling him down due to the large weight. Eric's wings were unfortunately only a few days old, which could only withstand his own body at the time.

As he was dragged down increasingly, Eric finally reminded himself of his tail, and used the sharp spike at the end to slash Tom a few times in the wrist, dealing a few wounds and shedding some blood. The monster finally let go, and Eric took the chance to fly down, gaining momentum, and grabbing the beast with both his arms. He tried his best to fly faster and faster, until he got as close to the rapidly-approaching wall as possible. When that moment occurred, he let go and pulled up, sending Benson flying into brick. He slowed his ascent, and looked down toward his opponent, weary from the collision. Eric subsequently took in a deep breath, and exhaled as much fire as he could release from his system. Most of it managed to reach his target, but it did not seem to affect him very much.

While Eric was spewing fire, Benson took his chance and jumped once more in an angle. Once he reached the dragon's foot, he pulled it along with his momentum, and threw him as hard as he could toward the other side of the room. Eric could not stop the speed, and landed on his left arm. He slid at first, but gained friction very fast, which sent him rolling painfully. The beast approached once more, but did not run. Eric tried his best to get up, but his muscles felt sore. Seeing Benson in such good shape, he knew he would not have succeeded in winning at his rate. He would have needed to repeat the same tactics over and over, which Tom would obviously have begun to counter soon enough. He needed help.

"I'm sorry about earlier", he "thought", which was destined to the dragon. "You were right; I need your help."

The dragon did not respond - it simply took action. The glowing eyes of berserk mode took its place, and before Tom had the chance to make another move, the dragon got up and tackled him with its shoulder, causing him to back up a few steps. The dragon took a few intentional steps back as well, hinting at another exchange of words.

"So, you've decided to use berserk mode, huh? Show's how much of a coward you really are. Look at me; I don't need a stupid berserk mode. I got rid of mine a long time ago."

The dragon replied, indifferent. "I think you'll need one."

With that said, the dragon took two quick steps forward, and jumped a few inches in the air, allowing his wings to continue the motion. With immense power, the dragon took a large swing at Tom's head, which missed, and caused him to fly further than expected. He landed softly, and turned around to face Benson attempting the same maneuver. The dragon blocked it instead of dodging it, which caused the situation to erupt into a fistfight.

Unlike the last, the dragon had a lot more agility and reflexes, blocking most of Tom's throws, and landing some of his own. When the grey monster grew irritated, it broke the fight by issuing a large punch to the opposing force's stomach, and kneeing the bent over victim in the head. With the dragon backing up from the sudden attack, Tom moved forward, effectuated another 360° rotation, and tail whipped the dragon with his short but powerful and sharp appendage. A large gash appeared diagonally across the dragon's plates, which damaged them, but did not hurt - which demonstrated why they were there in the first place. Wound up, the crimson red warrior suffered yet another punch from his opponent, who took the initiative once more. Noticing this, the dragon deployed his wings once more and took flight. He flew high and far in the air, near the ceiling, and to the opposite corner of where Tom was. The former did not consider this a strategic move.

"Come on!", Benson yelled. "This is a fight, not a flight! Don't be such a coward!"

Eric knew exactly what was going on. The fight was getting very hard to manage, even for the dragon. He had never fought against this type of opponent, which made it too much of a challenge to handle; the flight was simply a way to rest before fending once more against him. Tom, however, was beginning to grow tired of waiting. From the other corner of the room, he began to run. At his speed, the forty meter span of the room was achieved in a mere three seconds, and was accompanied by yet another leap, which forced the dragon to move. The fight quickly evolved into a simple goose chase, with the dragon staying high, and Benson staying low, occasionally leaping to try and reach him.

...

Alan Parker, along with several others of his surveillance team, drove toward the site of the fight in Elmhurst, in order to wait for the announcement back at headquarters about the location where Tom was holding Eric for investigation. He had only left five minutes prior, in a black car which belonged to him. Four of his members - a wolf, two tigers and a coyote - decided to come along at Parker's request, since they were the strongest of the eight members of the surveillance team who had revealed to being a TFR.

Not much driving was done when Alan's phone rang. He flipped it and answered rapidly. "Where is it?"

"At the end of Viele Avenue near North New York. We can't tell exactly where they are, however, according to the GPS, they're near to a large building. They should be there. You can't miss it."

"Alright, we're on our way."

Shortly after shutting his phone, Alan noticed they were heading in the wrong direction. He hit the brakes and initiated a sharp U-turn, crossing through a whole avenue, and went north toward his goal.

...

Eric was not very content with where the fight was heading. The dragon grew tired of flying, constantly hitting his wings against the ceiling, all in order to avoid the leaping maniac below him. The same could be said for Tom; the grunt in succession of each desperate leap demonstrated his annoyance as well. Once he had enough, Lucifer stopped completely, crossing his arms.

"You can't fly forever, dragon - but I can sit."

The dragon knew he had a point. There was no use in wasting so much energy in a useless and frantic attempt to avoid a fight. He decided to fly back down, once and for all. Tom seemed pleased to see his opponent back to his height, as he cracked his fingers, ready for another beating. The dragon folded his wings and analyzed his energy. He did not have as much of it as he would have preferred, and it was not very surprising seeing he had fought another battle with the special response unit an hour earlier. Around ten meters separated the two for around ten seconds, until Benson decided to execute the first move.

The oft-repeated charge was initiated at a lightning fast speed, almost catching the dragon completely off-guard. The former did not manage to stop the attack, and barely countered it at all. Eric knew something was not right at this point. Tom continued to throw punches, with at least 75% of them hitting its target. Tom Benson got aggressive as he picked up on the dragon's lack of energy, substituting punches with claw swipes, and then with jump kicks. By the time the dragon finally fell to the ground, Tom figured he had seen enough. He grabbed the dragon by the throat, suffocating him, and pulled him to his face.

"Tired?", he asked, a large smile ranging from ear to ear. "I can help you get some rest, if you wish."

Benson pulled the dragon higher, allowing gravity to increase the pressure on his throat, preventing more and more air from going through. He could barely breathe, let alone reply to the remark. The dragon, in a last-ditch attempt to free himself, tried to use his tail in some way to trip his opponent, but was easily blocked by Tom's free hand. He also attempted to breathe fire in order to blind his opponent, but luckily for Benson, the dragon's methane reservoir - which was, along with oxygen, the main ingredient for his dragon fire - was depleted. He had not eaten any source of meat since his supper with Gerald, and Eric had used the last of it earlier before giving control to the dragon.

With no way out, the dragon brought his hands up to the arm holding his throat, trying to claw at it in order to force him to let go, but to no avail. Eric was forcefully sent back in control of his body, - for reasons unknown to him at the time - as Benson let a devilish laugh escape, watching him suffer a terrible death. However, just before Eric thought he was going to collapse, Tom was hit hard in the back side, sending both bodies to the ground. Once he stopped sliding, Eric took a deep breath of fresh air, and coughed multiple times, attempting to get his blood flowing through his body once more. When he finally looked up, he saw a brown silhouette rush up to him and grab him by the arm, pulling him quickly over to the side of the room. A perplexed dragon gawked at him with eyes winced in order to try and make out the details of the new figure.

"Who are you?", Eric requested, dazed.

"Eric, it's me, Xavier. Get up, we're fighting together."