Kano

The scene cuts back to the present-day refugee camp. Several of the Outworld refugees are waiting in line.

"Why is it taking so long?"

An S-F soldier sitting at a table is taking everyone's names.

"Name?"

"Re'em Adu Kaire."

"Thanks. All right, the second line on your left."

Li Mei, Sonya, and Kenshi are overseeing all the refugees being screened.

"You seem to know this "Kano" intimately."

"Not the word I'd use, but yes. I chased him for years until he escaped to Outworld after Shinnok's invasion."

Kenshi asks, continuing to scan the area

"Why would he return now?"

"All that matters is he's..."

She trails off as she spots the same Outworld woman who was in the body bag earlier, now not sporting Kano's "necktie". A brief flicker on the holographic face confirms her suspicions; it's Kano in a high-tech disguise.

"...caught. Gotcha."

She discreetly thumbs over to Kenshi, who moves off to the side. Sonya walks directly toward the disguised Kano. Seeing her coming, he cuts away from the line he's in but is intercepted by Kenshi.

"Are you lost?"

He turns around, but Sonya bars his way. Seeing that there's nowhere to run, Kano disengages his disguise and reveals himself, causing several refugees to backpedal in shock.

"'Ello, love! Been a while!"

"Not long enough."

She opens a call on her communicator.

"This is General Blade. I need MPs to my location immediately."

"Aww, let's keep this between friends. A trade! Info for freedom."

She gets into a fighting stance.

"I don't negotiate with scumbags."

"Well then, if mother won't play nice, maybe daughter will."

"If you ever—"

"Back off, and all's well. Piss me off, and Cassie's gonna meet Uncle Kano."

"I swear to God I'll kill you!"

They fight. Kano proves to be every bit as tough as he was in all his previous fights with Sonya, and that's not even counting all the cybernetics he's upgraded his body with. But Sonya has tricks of her own she brings to the forefront, and after an epic battle, she once again manages to leave Kano down and defeated.

"No. I'm not done with you."

She strides over to Kano and knocks him flat on his back with a kick to the face. She then mounts him and punches him twice in the face, before wrapping her hands around his throat. Kano is unable to pry her arms away.

"Alright! Alright! Get off me!"

Sonya is in no mood to stop, even with Kano gasping for breath. Johnny pushes his way through the crowd

"Sonya, ease up!"

He tries to grab her, but she pushes him away and keeps on strangling Kano.

"You kill me... never find... amulet!"

The MPs arrive as well and point their guns directly at Sonya. Johnny immediately motions for them to stop. They do but keep their guns trained on her. Johnny desperately looks over to his ex-wife.

"Sonya, we need that info."

She ignores him. Kano's gasps become more and more desperate.

"Sonya... don't make this another thing you'll regret."

She growls angrily, but it looks like Johnny finally got through to her. She lets go and Kano drops back to the ground, taking in deep breaths of air.

"Talk!"

-Flashback-

The scene is a rundown, yet spacious, isolated alleyway, dimly lit by the half-moon, barely working lampposts, and running headlights. Kano hops out of a large black van, stopping in front of a four-door car with tinted windows, with three armed men waiting. One, Kano presumed the leader and contact, was armed with a magnum revolver, and the other two armed with sawed-off shotguns, ready at the hip. Kano whistled a tune as he beckoned the leader towards him, as he walked to the back end of the van. The leader told his men to stay behind as he followed Kano to the now open trunk of the van.

"Like what ya see? Military-grade M16s, ammo as far as the eye can see, semtex-H, the same them Irish use, and surveillance equipment. They couldn't be shitting without yah even knowing."

Kano chuckled as the leader admired the arsenal in front of him. Kano cleared his throat

"Payment upfront and it's all yours."

The leader quickly turned to face Kano and balked

"You're out of your fuckin' mind if you think I'm payin' for this. Nah, what I'm gonna shoot your down undah ass and put you mothafuckin' ass down undah'!"

He brandishes his revolver and raises it to Kano's face, cocking the trigger. The commotion caught the attention of his goons, rushing to their leader's aid. He turned to call them over to help dispose of Kano, but the Aussie quickly grabbed a giant kukri knife from behind his back and chopped off the leader's hand that carried the gun. Blood spurted onto the right side of Kano's face as he grimaced, rushing to grab the leader in a headlock right when the two goons arrived.

"Drop yah guns! Don't want no more blood here, eh?"

The two goons hesitated, their hands on their shotguns trembling as they saw their leader being used as a body shield, steadily and quickly losing blood from his arm stump. Kano held the kukri knife to their leader's neck, tauntingly and slowly running the knife from ear-to-ear. The two men looked at one another before one of them spoke

"What should we do, boss?"

"Get the money out of the trunk before I fuckin' die!"

One of the men runs to the back seat of their car and returns with a duffel bag. Kano motions them to open them up as he tightens the chokehold on their leader, him gasping for breath and desperately clutching the bloody stump of his forearm. One of the men raises his shotgun and yells

"Alright, you got the money, let him go!"

"Fuck it, just shoot the goddamn asshole!"

Yells the leader. The man pulls the trigger of his shotgun, but as anticipated, Kano uses their leader as his meat shield and, with his other hand, throws the kukri knife deep into the goon's neck. He drops his shotgun as the knife is embedded deep into his knife, unsure what to do next as his life slips away as he falls over, dead. The other man readies his shotgun as well, but Kano grabs the leader's revolver and empties all six shots into the goon.

"Damn cunts..."

Kano muses to himself as he looks over the madness that occurred before him. He struts over to the dropped duffel bag with splattered blood on it and rummages through it for any possible hidden tracking devices. Luckily for him, there wasn't one, so he picks up the duffel bag and throws it through the open passenger window onto the seat, and goes to close the back doors of the van. His ears perked up as he heard sirens nearby. He then picked up radio talk coming from one of the earpieces of the man with six bullets in his chest. Was this a setup? Kano thought to himself, but before Kano could get away, a police cruiser sped into the alleyway, sirens blazing. Kano locked eyes with the cruiser, making out two silhouettes as he waited behind a nearby dumpster.

He waited as a tall, broad brown-haired man in a police uniform and bulletproof vest exited the car, followed by a shorter blonde woman, her hair in a high ponytail, in the same get-up. They scanned the area when Kano heard from the man

"Survey the area, Specialist Blade. Scan around to see if the suspect is still around this area. I'll go look around, check inside the buildings and get up top for an aerial view. More should arrive in 10."

He speaks into his radio

"This is Specialist Damiano. I'm checking the adjacent buildings to see if he made his way into them. Specialist Blade is surveying the immediate area for any clues. Damiano, out."

The specialist nods as her partner Damiano readies his pistol as he leaves the alleyway, sure to make way into the adjacent buildings. She takes out a flashlight and readies her own gun. What the light revealed even more shocked her, as she takes in the massacre before her. Three dead, and the suspect is at large. She maneuvers around the puddles and splatters of blood on the floor when she notices a larger figure emerge from the shadows. She shines the flashlight in the way of the figure and raises her gun

"Stop where you are!"

The figure raised his head up, revealing himself to be Kano to Specialist Sonya Blade. Neither had seen one another since high school. Since that fateful day. Sonya Blade noticed Kano's bloodstained clothes and to her horror, Kano's right side of his face covered in crimson. Even before this happened, Sonya could see in Kano's eyes that the years hadn't been kind to him. He looked miserable. He growled at her

"Come to break a guy's heart even more, eh?"

Sonya looked down, shaking her head as she said

"Kano I am so sorry about that."

He looked at her and said

"That's rich coming from you! Specialist Blade. Yeah, don't think I haven't been watching you from a distance."

"Kano, please. I do still care about you, but clearly, it won't work out for us. So, could we please part, on friendly terms?"

He looked at her, seeing honesty in her eyes and he said

"Alright, luv. I'll still be here if ya need me."

Kano approached her as if to hug her, but her partner had not walked in on them and took his comment as aggressive.

"Stay away from her, Kano!"

Specialist Damiano appeared from behind Sonya as he readied his pistol. He took in the situation before him, putting away his gun and drawing his baton instead. Damiano eyed Kano down as he rushed in, intent on beating him unconscious.

"Damiano no!"

Sonya jumped in the way but got knocked in the head by him. She crumpled to the hard cement, rendering her unconscious. Kano dashed over to her, noticing a small scrape spilling blood on her forehead. He gently lifted her into his lap and cried

"Sonya? Sonya!"

Damiano tsked saying

"I knew I recognized that ugly mug anywhere. She should have stayed away from you. Now I am going to have to kill you for getting too close to her again. Sorry, Major Blade's orders."

"Then try it."

Kano said, setting Sonya down gently and entering a combative grappling stance. Damiano stalked closer as he tapped his baton on nearby dumpsters and trash cans. Damiano winded up and swung his baton overhead, which Kano parried and elbowed the specialist in the chin. He dropped his baton, but balled his fist and brought it up into Kano's esophagus, expelling air from the Aussie's lungs. As Kano doubled over, Damiano positioned him overhead into a powerbomb and flung him against the brick wall of the surrounding apartment. Damiano pulled out his gun and cocked it, but Kano was able to kick it out of his hands. The specialist winced before throwing a harsh boot into Kano's face, flooring him down again.

Though Kano had easily taken on and defeated men like Damiano before, seeing Sonya Blade hurt before her devastated him and his psyche. Damiano gave Kano a few more body blows and face punches before dragging him to another brick wall across from them. He grabbed hold of Kano's head and neck and repeatedly smashed Kano's right side of his face into the wall, ultimately shattering his right orbital bone beyond recognition. His vision severely handicapped, Kano struggled to open up his left eye and caught one glance at Sonya again. With newfound drive, Kano gritted his teeth and pressed his feet against the wall, and propelled both him and Damiano onto the hard floor, releasing his hold on the criminal. With Damiano staggering to get up, Kano pinned him down and rained blow after blow on the specialist. His face profusely bleeding, Damiano managed to block one of Kano's attacks and shoved him off. He turned over and saw his gun mere feet away. He began crawling towards the gun when Kano leapt onto his back and applied a rear-naked choke. Damiano struggled, his fingers just touching the handle. Noticing that he was inching closer and closer to having the gun fully in his grasp, Kano, in desperation, snapped Damiano's neck.

Using the last of his strength, Kano mustered himself off of Damiano and limped over to Sonya. He collapsed beside her, groaning as he hit the ground.

"Forever and always I will love you, Sonya. Please don't die."

He said, kissing her forehead before his world went black.

-end flashback-