Things are escalating pretty quickly between Lucious (Terrence Howard) and Hakeem (Bryshere Y. Gray) in the second half of season 2 of the hit FOX series "Empire."

In the promo titled "Revenge is Coming," father and son are seen locked in a fierce standoff. Lucious is telling the younger man that the next time they see each other, Hakeem will die in his hands. While his dad is speaking, Hakeem is showing his poker face, but the next thing he does will surprise the fans. He proceeds to point a gun at Lucious. It really looks Mimi (Marisa Tomei) and Camilla (Naomi Campbell) have succeeded in brainwashing him about his family.

At one point, Hakeem may have lowered the gun and decides to leave the setting of their rendezvous. But Lucious is not yet done heaping threats, as he shouts to his son to watch his back because he always keeps his promises. Will the pair end up gunning for each other? Lucious is obviously out for revenge after what happened to his life. He is no longer the CEO of Empire Entertainment, thanks to Hakeem's vote to oust him. He means to get back at the people who caused his downfall and his son is one of them.

Also in the clip, Cookie (Taraji P. Henson) still has not gotten over the fact that their legacy is gone. It shows her wielding a stick like a weapon, telling an unseen person that he/she is about to experience her wrath. As the next shot shows Hakeem, it looks like the younger Lyon will get a hard beating from his mother, for all the things he has done to hurt their family.

Meanwhile, co-creator Danny Strong shot down the rumor that Oprah Winfrey and Mariah Carey would soon be seen in the show. In an interview, he told The Hollywood Reporter that the two bigwigs are not on the list of the artists that would guest star on season 2B.

"None of those people are going to actually be on the show so I can't control what names all of a sudden take off as being guest stars because they're not," he said.

"Empire" season 2 returns on Wednesday, March 30, at 9 p.m. EST on FOX.