My running turned into a full sprint. I quickly pulled out my revolver from my pocket and readied it in my hands. I began hearing yelling from the room in front of me. Cops, and Red. When I turned the corner, I saw the cop from the front desk shot a taser at Red. Red had nearly collapsed, as I zeroed in on the cop’s head. I saw him give a side-eye, before a brief look of pure fear, and panic. BANG! My shot echoed through the entire building. He fell over on the spot, dead in an instant. Lorenzo pulled the wires off of Red with his gloved hands. Red shook and shuddered for a moment. Then began yelling. “What the hell happened! Where was the damn signal?” “I’ll explain later. Let’s get to the evidence room.” I responded, attempting to stay calm. We began running back down the hallway where we came. Red ran in front of us.

Gunshots rang out from behind us as we sprinted down the hallway, dodging and weaving where we could. We shot mostly randomly behind us. Except for Lorenzo. He didn’t even have a gun out. Typical. I doubt he even brought one. We arrived at the evidence room to see a large steel door with a mechanical lock, it was closed. Red hid behind a corner and reached into his backpack. He pulled out a small plastic bag of reddish powder and a blowtorch. He tossed both haphazardly to Lorenzo, who placed the bag on top of the lock and lit it with the blowtorch. It began burning brightly. So bright I couldn’t look at it. Must’ve been some sort of rudimentary thermite.

We continued firing down the hallway, hitting most of our shots at the least. Adrenaline was running high. I counted in my head how many shots I’ve fired to know when to reload. 1, 2,3, 4, 5, 6. Reload. I took out the casings and began to pull out a speed loader. One of the cops down the hallway noticed and took a shot at me. It hit. I felt a surging pain throughout my left shoulder. It burned like hell. I fell to the floor, trying not to yell. I tried to ignore the gunshots I heard from the hallways. Lorenzo dragged me behind cover while Red continued firing down the hallway. Lorenzo wordlessly pulled out a relatively large drawstring bag from his belt. He pulled out some needles, bandages, pliers, and a few other odds and ends. He injected some sort of numbing agent into my shoulder, and as he was pulling out the bullet from my shoulder, another cop started running down this hallway towards us. I searched around for my gun. It was back where I got shot. Shit.

The cop aimed his pistol. I instinctively closed my eyes and flinched. I heard a loud CRASH! And the boom of a shotgun. I sat there for a few seconds, breathing heavily. I opened my eyes and saw a mechanical arm smashed through the wall, closed fist. The cop was on the floor, his head was obliterated. Little more than a red mist falling to the ground and painting the walls. It couldn’t be, right? But soon I’d met with the familiar face of a young crazed woman, clambering through the now broken wall. Her arms and legs were augmented. She had wide eyes, which contrasted her dilated pupils and near invisible irises. “Jesus Christ! What the hell are you doing here?!” I shouted, with both fear and confusion. “Oh come on! I couldn’t miss the fun! Besides, every party needs a bit of Confetti!” Said the woman in a loud, shaky voice. It was Anaheim, or as some know her, Confetti. She’s the drug fueled, maniac pet of Red-Eye. And the final member of our motley crew. Strangely enough, she’s the nicest person I know… at least when she isn’t on the job.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

Lorenzo got the bullet out and bandaged my shoulder. I got back to the main hallway just as the thermite burned through the lock. Red threw the door open, and we all ran inside. The room was dark with a light on the ceiling and a dim lamp on a desk next to an ancient looking computer, maybe from the 2030s. I plugged in my datajack to it and after a small bout of fighting the firewall to get past the password protection, I got in. I tried to focus while people were shooting just outside the room. Searching through files, cracking encryptions. Nothing on half the databases. Emails I didn’t care about. Still nothing on the file of Penelope Penrose. I started panicking, there was nothing here. Just as I lost hope in the last file, I spun around in the swivel chair with my face in my hands. With a groan, I looked up, about to break the news to everyone. Then I saw it, a metal filing cabinet. No, god no. I opened it and after searching for a minute or so, I saw a manila folder. “Penelope Penrose” was written in bold across it. You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me. I grabbed it and shouted, “Let’s go!” Red looked at me, then the folder. Before laughing for a moment, “Who the hell still uses paper?” He asked with a chuckle.

Before we ran out, Red pulled a small canister from his bag. “Is that a goddamn grenade?!” Lorenzo yelled. “No, no. It’s a gas bomb.” Red said calmly, as if that wasn’t worse. He pulled the pin and threw it down the hallway. Anaheim smashed through the wall opposite of the gas. The sound of coughing and choking got quieter as we all ran out into an alleyway and down the street.

After we got a few streets away, I heard sirens in the distance. “We’re going to the safe house.” Red said, with authority. “The garage?” Anaheim asked chipperly, immediately dispelling any air of coolness Red thought he possessed. The sprint turned to a run, the run to a jog, and the jog to a quickly paced walk as we made our way to Red’s garage.

After roughly 45 minutes of walking, we got to the massive garage. The outside was dingy, paint peeling, a broken sensor was at the top. Red pulled out a small remote from his pocket and opened the garage door. It slowly creaked open, revealing a much nicer kept interior. There was a broken down car on the far end, looked old, I figure it’s just a project of his. There were a few jars of what looked like fermenting ale on top of a freezer. As well there were actual furnishings, a couch, some chairs, a table or two. Hell, even a billiards board. We all turned our cars to autopilot and instructed them to come to the garage. Me, Lorenzo, and Anaheim decided to play a game of dominoes while Red called our contact. I grabbed a drink from a cooler next to the broken down car and sat down. “So, Anaheim, what made you decide to show up when you did?” I asked. “Red said he’d have me on speed-dial in case things went to hell. Then they did. So I saved your asses.” She said with a chuckle. “That reminds me” Red began, from across the room, presumably while on hold, “You need payment for helping out.” Red tossed Anaheim an inhaler. Lorenzo looked disappointed. Anaheim took a hit and set it down. She held her breath for a moment before letting it out. Her pupils dilated again. “Cheers to that!” She exclaimed while downing half her drink.

We continued our conversation for a bit before our cars (and Anaheim’s bike) showed up, followed by a black car, luxury, and none of ours. Stepping out from it was Mamba, one of Red’s people. Her tall, slender figure walked towards us. She was wearing a nice dress that perfectly compliments her dark skin. In her left hand was a black duffle bag. She set the bag down on the table before asking, “Mind if I have a seat?”