It may have just been a second of delay, in-between my own movements and theirs, but that’s all everyone needed to get adrenaline pumping through our systems. The thugs swiftly drew their firearms from their hoisters – much to the gentlemen’s surprise – one of the thug’s aimed at the man that they were negotiating with while the other focused their sights onto me.

The gentleman didn’t seem surprised by the betrayal, or they were just really good at self-defense from the swift backhand to the pistol knocking it out the gunman’s hand.

I was forced to take cover as shots rang through the dock from the second gunman firing at me. In the midst of the betrayal, both of the gentlemen kicked into gear and backpedaled close to their vehicle. They lifted up their opaque masks, suddenly blanketing where they stood in a smokescreen.

“Don’t expect a second chance. We don’t negotiate with turncoats.” One of the gentlemen uttered, and following that I heard nothing. I sensed nothing. The engine of the car no longer hummed in the background and there were no more steps. It could've been because the sound of bullets hitting against the metal of the shipping containers overpowering any other noise, but I could hear the other thug scrambling to pick up his gun — then it clicked.

He ran out of bullets.

I immediately hopped down, racing faster than I have ever ran to intercept the thug who had just picked up his gun. The soles of my feet skid against the asphalt as I forced my body to a steady halt, hitting the thug with a ballpark half the force of my body I could’ve mustered. Upon impact he flew back, I could feel the wind leaving him as he was ragdolled several feet back, and hit against the side of the shipping container. I stopped, and turned to gauge the man’s condition. He writhed in pain, grasping for air for several seconds, and while most definitely something was broken he would at least live.

The reloading shooter was my next target, as he took the time to attempt and reload while charged with panic. A look of fear in his eye, knowing that no regular person could react nor hit quite hard, and that he was my next target.

Then came something else.

Something spiked in the corner of my unobservable vision, as my sense of danger went ballistic, and reacted faster than I had at the sound of steel rupturing and followed by the sound of air being violently pulled apart as something of great size and power soar through the air. My body moved to duck, avoiding immediate messy bisection, as the metal door of a shipping container tore through the air. Its shadow caster over me, as the sound of the container behind me had nearly knocked itself over, and allowed me a moment to pray silently to myself as sweat dripped down my head.

If not for the adrenaline pumping through my veins, I could've dropped from the stress of having survived my second near-death moment this night, and took in a breath.

Yet, I couldn't stop here. My head snapping in the direction to the origin of the attack, it could have been luck, but the decision saved me. The noise of the shipping container and air followed, and I found myself jumping from a sitting position, and slammed against the door of the crate I had avoided as the other parts had began to fly in broken pieces. Darting towards my location with fierce intensity.

I hated myself for not thinking it through, the idea that there could be a key amongst these thugs — especially if they were in the business of trafficking other keys. The regret had sunk, and especially as the container behind me was impaled by two dense walls of metal, and pierced through the container and likely three to four crates piled beside it. In the time I turned my head, another wall was already soaring at me, prepared to fully pancake me rather than bisect me.

Every prayer guiding my actions as I flew forward, guided by visuals, hope, and a hell of a lot of momentum to take the most death-defying stunt of my life.

I jumped and watched the side of the container be caved in by the flying wall of metal— staring down my attacker, the boss of the thugs. Whatever he could do, it definitely wasn’t super strength, unless he had multiple invisible arms to both rip apart and then chuck the pieces of those containers. There wasn’t a second to catch my breath. Another second would’ve meant another onslaught of those metal doors. I didn’t think I had it in me to outrun another attempt on my life. I ran at him and my senses went wild; it was too late to turn.

A BANG rang throughout the docks, a sharp pain bursting through my shoulder. I could feel the wet and warm trail of my blood running down my arm from the back of my shoulder. There was another shot, but now I was more aware of the shooters. I tried for an immediate backpedal to find cover, but was distracted by the grinding noise of tires against the road of the docks. Believing it was just my jumbled senses trying to account for every minute detail in the environment to focus my mind away from thinking about the bullet wound, but I should’ve known better as over a ton of metal had side-tackled me from the periphery of my vision. I was body-checked by a car.

The hit had caused nearly all function in my chest to seize up– the air had immediately been ejected from me, forcing my body to writhe needlessly in pain. If it wasn’t for the warm feeling of my blood on my shoulder, I probably wouldn’t have even remembered I was shot if not from the warmth of my shoulder and the surging pain from a bullet and a car-aided side tackle. I tried to lift myself up, but was greeted by the stinging sensation as my body resisted my attempts all over, as the bright glare of the headlights stared down on me. The engines revved mockingly, the car holding me down with the threat of running me down again. Playing with me before they actually did it. Likely toying with me for making a mess out of his pals.

Yet, before the driver could follow through with his threats by pushing the gas, I heard the sound of the metal tearing and parts of a random shipping container at the back of the docks erupt from the backside of the vehicle, it took a few seconds later for the driver to see what had happened– seeming to just notice the sight of the metallic dense walls come flying down from his rearview mirror at speeds that made his eyes nearly pop and kick the car into reverse to get as far from me as he possibly could before the falling debris had come down. Whatever they were doing, it wasn’t teamwork.

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It gave me seconds, two agonizing seconds to try and force my body to force itself to stand upwards and try to run. I ran toward where the car had reversed–and slipped a couple of feet forward, slamming my body into the wall of another shipping container. Forcing all the pain currently circulating in my body to exaggerate itself tenfold at once. If there was just a scale to how much pain I could receive, it seemed to just increase until I’d go into shock. Yet, there was that feeling that told me to keep pressing. If I’d stop I would’ve just collapsed onto the floor. Everything seemed nearly out of balance, as even my body had just caught up and noticed the odd sight of the parts of the shipping container walls that were just thrown at me were now sticking out of points of the crate I was just held up against. I marveled at it, it looked like an odd arrangement of large sheets of metallic pins just digging into the crates; like a rectangular pin cushion. Supplies from the crates slipped out, many of them bludgeoned but still notable. One crate spilling open to reveal numerous children's toys: small stuffed animals, plastic toys, and the like.

That’s why I had gotten into this situation. To save a kid. Now, I was laying against a shipping container, my arm was bleeding and I was fighting for a reason to stay conscious. What would Jung have said if he were to see me?

Well, he’d probably fire me or turn me in for being a Key.

Though, if I was given a bit of fantasy… I’d want to say he'd berate me for not getting back up and to not take breaks when people need to be helped. That is why I was here: To come and help Max. To bring him back to his mother. I couldn’t do that just laying back against this metal wall.

I tore a piece of the fabric from my sleeve on the bleeding arm and wrapped it tightly around my wound to stop the bleeding. I took a breath, focused, and stood to my feet. Max deserved someone to save him. He needed someone to save him. That had to be me. That’s the thought that raced through my head as I saw the headlights of the car enter the scene once more and drive out of the docks. I took another breath, and I was off, speeding right after the vehicle as if my life depended on it. Max’s did.

I could feel my lungs still trying to recover, along with the rest of my nearly collapsed diaphragm that was just recoiling from the physical trauma. Yet, all my body could do was run. My feet were hitting harshly against the asphalt, which later transitioned to the concrete of the sidewalk as we crossed into the public streets.

There was no point in trying to catch up to a speeding car with a disadvantage in distance and my physical state. Instead, my feet turned to the buildings by the road. I scaled a two-story building in what felt like seconds, still empowered by an adrenaline rush and followed by jumping off rooftop to rooftop in hot pursuit of the vehicle. I knew this road like the back of my hand after the run to get to the docks. I was going to catch them. The car took a sharp turn and my feet forced me off the roof with all that built-up momentum. The fall was hard, elbowing my left shoulder hard into the hood of the vehicle leaving a me-shaped dent in the roof of the car.

My fingers dug into the hood, almost tearing the metal that I used as a support to avoid being suddenly tossed off by a quick turn or impeded by my already unstable consciousness. I wasn’t planning to stay here for long. If only it wasn’t for the panicked scrambling for their items, donning on me once again that these men had firearms. I tried to be quick, trying to pinpoint life with my senses by the voices. Max wasn’t in the back. I could tell that much from the lack of tossing and turning and no audible mumbles. He was too resilient earlier. He had to be with the thugs in the car.

I took another breath, loosening the grip of the hood to roll the moment I heard the sound of a click that accompanied the following gunshots that tore through the hood of the vehicle. Nearly rolling off the vehicle in its entirety, only stopping myself from falling off by another quick saving throw of my left arm latching onto the vehicle’s door frame, digging my fingers into there to keep myself hanging on.

I got a look into the backseat of the vehicle, staring down at the powered leader, the thug holding a gun, and Max who had still been restrained and kept in the middle of them both. It at least allowed me to know what I was dealing with now–however, hanging on the side of their already destroyed car and staring at them through a window was probably the worst way to get them to stop shooting at me as this offered them a more visible target, at the same time giving me a more visible way of trying to avoid their fire. The moment they took a chance to shoot at the window I had already let go, keeping pace with the vehicle on my own two feet and climbed forward from the trunk onto the top of the car once more. I waited out the shots as they tried to figure where my body was positioned before hearing the click that meant they needed to reload their guns. I dug my fingers into the gash I’d made before and pried open the hood of the vehicle with another burst of chemically exaggerated effort.

The driver, stunned, tried to keep his eyes on the road to avoid crashing; the unconscious man riding shotgun; Max sandwiched between the shooter and the leader. They all looked up at me like some oddity, all except for the only other enemy key-holder and Max who still had no visual idea what was going on.

At that moment, I hesitated for some odd reason as the leader raised his hand, gesturing me to stop for just a second. I can’t say why it worked, but that feeling of unease as I watched his hand lay upon the shooter sent something primal down my spine.

“Richter?” The thug’s voice was concerned as his leader reached over to lay a hand onto the man. He was disturbed from the action, visibly horrified as his gun visibly shook in his own hands and his head turned slowly over to the leader, Richter.

“Watch this.” He smirked, following an almost sadistic snicker before my eyes went wide under my mask. I could see it happen in slow motion as the thug’s body suddenly pulled apart in all directions, splitting layer by layer, chunk by chunk, piece by piece. They exploded outward like fleshy shrapnel that orbited around a center. A contained explosion of pure ichor and gore; a man turned bomb. All those chunks then flew towards me. My attempt to evade was just a trip, allowing for nearly three dozen chunks of flesh to pelt my body at high speeds, breaking through the glass of the windshield and up through the hole of the roof. Flinging my body onto the sidewalks of the streets with just the force of the fleshy bullets.

How many times was I going to be laid on my back while trying to remain awake while staring at the moon?

Too many times in one night, that was for sure.