I got into a comfortable position on the rooftop and summoned an eye.
"You can create eyes? I thought it was just hands?" Susan scrunched her eyes in distaste at the hovering body part. A floating eye admittedly looked creepy.
"I can make nearly any part of the body." Leaving it at that, I closed my original eyes.
Through my new vision, I could see about a foot higher than my body currently sat. I turned it toward Susan to see her leaning against an air conditioning unit. She pushed off it and walked to me.
"I'll patrol the area. Keep me updated on the coms. Do not get noticed. Things will become much more annoying if you do." She took off into the air and disappeared into the night. A quick scan revealed an empty sky.
Refocusing my eye, it made its way to the window with the oldest-looking paint. Getting close to the spot that became uncovered, I got a look at the inside.
I was disappointed to find a blank, featureless wall. Nothing else was in sight, so I moved on to another window. A few had recently gotten a fresh layer of paint, leaving no gaps for me to work with.
Returning to the first spot I had tried, I projected another eye on the other side of the glass. A simple thought dismissed the original one, my sight now focused on the warehouse interior. An ear appeared from thin air to help gather information. Both pieces floated up to the ceiling to stay out of sight.
The area they were in was plain with white-painted brick walls. It was a hallway with various doors lined up. The right side had a staircase leading down, while the other had a very familiar door.
Made from randomly collected metal sat a similar entrance to that doctor's lair. Was this where he ran off to? I had assumed he used one of his power-granting drugs to escape, like the yellow that gave teleportation, but maybe it was the door.
Ignoring the other paths, I zeroed in on the entrance. It had a street sign with a different name which told me this wasn't the same door. A summoned hand tried the knob to find it locked. I had to give up for now to maintain stealth, so I tried every other knob and discovered them sealed.
While moving closer to the stairwell, faint noises finally reached my ear. The shuffling of people and the sound of voices echoed to this floor. My miniature spies stuck as close to the ceiling as possible while following the racket down the stairs.
"I'm just saying we could take a couple of injectors, and no one would notice." At the foot of the steps stood two men with machine guns in their hands. Luckily, both were facing away.
"Shut the fuck up, newbie! Why do you think this position was open?" The older man with a beard growled at the other one.
"Dude, calm down. Nobody will know." The one on the right wasn't bothered at all by his friend's blatant anger.
"Am I gonna have to kick your ass to get you to keep your fucking mouth closed?" He took a step toward his partner but stopped as the squeak of a cart caught their attention.
"On your toes, boys. Boss incoming." The glass tubes on the cart jingled while moving down the hall.
The more I saw of this building, the less it appeared to be a warehouse. This operation looked far more organized than the drug den I'd seen before.
This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
An extra eye quickly snuck onto the cart while the three men distracted each other. I couldn't focus on it since two other men came around the same corner as the cart. Unfortunately, they weren't as interested in talking as the guards.
One of the new arrivals wore an expensive-looking suit, while the other dressed more interestingly in green scrubs.
Hiding between the glass tubes kept my second eye out of sight. They were all empty test tubes with no markings or tops. I followed from behind with my primary eye and ear.
We came to a set of double doors that the cart man pushed through. Inside was a room filled with workers moving back and forth. I had to dismiss the original eye and ear out of fear that it would get spotted.
The workers carried racks of the same test tubes to what looked like a wall of stills. There were six of them, but only half saw any genuine use. Instead of alcohol, a different colored liquid came out to fill the empty containers. Red, green, and purple were the only ones I saw before the cart stopped.
Catching a glimpse of the two more important-looking men, I saw them headed to a door on the other side of the room. To stay out of sight, I projected another eye behind a nearby machine and dismissed this one. Continuing to hide like this, I followed them.
The man in scrubs opened the door for his ally, and I had a second to send a copy in after them. It shot upwards to stay hidden. Swiveling around, I searched for the men when a firm pair of fingers plucked me from the air.
"It's not a machine?" The suited man examined my eye.
I tensed up, expecting him to crush it. He seemed more interested in studying his find. He glanced at the new ear I had summoned but left it alone.
"What's that?" The other man asked curiously.
"A human eye. It's been watching us for a few minutes." He turned my eye to point at the far side of the room. "Are you with him?"
A man lay beaten and chained to the floor. He had black hair and wore a hoodie and jeans. His face had received a pummeling beyond recognizability.
"You really shouldn't have tried sending him in." The suited man spoke to me and then crushed the eye, cutting off my sight.
Leaping up, I shot off into the air, abandoning my position on the roof and any form of stealth. I didn't know the man, but I wouldn't let them kill him. I summoned my hand mask even though I was beginning to find it unnecessary.
"Come in, Rex and Susan. There is a hostage on site. I'm moving in now to secure him." I didn't wait for a response and continued toward the ear that still existed in the room with them. I felt the moment they turned it to mush. The feeling of its last location guided me.
BOOM
I produced two super strong limbs in front of me that pierced through the roof a second before I did. Landing in the room, the pair of super-strength arms took up a defensive position around me.
Debris from the impact had scattered around the floor, but the shield created by Crystal's finger left me unharmed. The chained man was the first person I spotted who seemed fine, so I turned to the men by the door.
"I have got to admit I did not expect such overt actions." The man in the suit stepped forward while dusting his clothes off. The newly appeared gauntlets he wore on both hands caught my attention.
The man in scrubs decided not to stick around and retreated to the last room. Rex was rattling off in my ear about standing down and how we weren't ready to fight their gang, but that didn't matter right now.
"If you surrender now, maybe we can work something out." I offered a peaceful solution. It was rarely ever taken.
"I think you're bluffing." He adjusted a few parts of his gauntlets while casually looking me up and down. "I don't recognize you, and there's no way the SID allowed a newbie to take point."
Menacingly, he took a step toward me. The confidence he exuded increased his intimidation factor, but I'd fought much worse things.
"You ran in here without authorization." He smiled while coming to a somewhat correct conclusion. "They won't be happy with you."
"Are you just trying to scare me? I..." My response was cut off by a tidal wave of black liquid pouring in through the door behind the man.
I flew into the air escaping through the hole in the ceiling. The arms that were guarding me grabbed the unconscious and battered man. One snapped the chains while the other lugged him up after me.
"Kill them both. They were rogue. It's too early for SID to know about me." The new ear I had secretly stashed in the room picked up the gauntleted man's commands.
The black water geysered out of the hole in the building's roof. I readied myself to zoom off until I saw the various people seemingly drowning in that murky water.
My arms dashed across the sky to drop off the man they were carrying, then returned to my side. They wouldn't be as helpful fighting against a living puddle, so I dismissed them.
"Let the people go!" My mind raced to find the best limbs for this situation.