There wasn’t anyone near the stairwell, as far as Dylan could tell. He had hoped that his entrance would lead to a gradual trickle of thugs coming to try and investigate the noise / take him out, but that seemed not to be the case. In fact, if there was anybody down on these lower floors, they seemed to have mostly retreated into the higher floors of the building.
As Puncher crept along with Dylan, still staying cautious. Dylan mostly didn’t want to get ambushed for Punchers sake, as the hero wasn’t all that durable, by his own admission. Plus, Dylan didn’t fancy seeing how his armor would hold up to being shot multiple times. Once he was pretty sure there wasn’t anybody in his immediate vicinity, Dylan leaned over, closer to his newfound ally.
“So, what’s going on in here? Do you know who we’re up against?”
Puncher responded almost immediately.
“Uh, well, the super we have to fight is probably Kasha. You ever heard of him?”
Dylan faintly recalled hearing about the villain. He was relatively minor. If he remembered correctly, Kasha’s power seemed to revolve around cutting things supernaturally well, generally by using his hands. Oh, and Dylan was pretty sure he had heard that the villain had been involved in a fight with Calamity for a few seconds.
“Yeah. Did you learn this from the police scanner, or what?”
Puncher cracked a small smile.
“Not exactly. When you’re active as long as I’ve been, you start to develop people you know. Unlicensed heroes and villains honestly tend to run in similar circles, so getting information on this type of stuff isn’t super difficult most of the time. I’d heard that Kasha had been recruiting for the past couple of weeks, so it stands to reason this is his doing.”
The fact that Puncher had seemingly known that this would happen long in advance, and still done nothing, made Dylan question the resolve of his ally. Surely preventing his getting hostages taken by telling the police, or the heroes or something would be better than letting it happen, just to get the reputation for stopping it later. What if someone had already been hurt?
“If you knew this was going to happen, why didn’t you stop it”.
Puncher looked back at Dylan, who had stopped walking with him. He wilted under the stare of the armored figure.
“No, it’s not like that. I didn’t know that he was going to be taking hostages or anything. It’s just that he was the only one recruiting recently, so I figure that this is him. Truth be told, villains tend to recruit henchmen for various things all the time. For all I knew, he just wanted security for a party he was throwing or something. No, I was about as in the dark as everyone else.”
Dylan sat there for a second, processing what he had just been told. While he had no way to verify that it was true, it did make sense. How would one know what a villain was recruiting for? They probably had to do that quite a bit. It’s not like they could really go to the police, and most security companies would likely refuse to work with them, if they knew who it was. Plus, inviting a bunch of people who weren’t “in” to your base was probably a good way to get a lot of your secrets leased.
Dylan walked back towards Puncher's side. He would accept the explanation for now, but he would also stay on the lookout for any new information or contradictions that arose. He didn’t fully trust his partner of convenience, not yet.
Dylan and Puncher approached one of the walls. The light from the setting sun streamed in, casting an orange glow over the carpet. This room part of the building, unlike the others, still had cubicles in it. They were nestled in a little offshoot, two walls making a faux room.
Dylan and Puncher shared a look, before immediately splitting off. Puncher started looking behind cubicles closer to them, whilst Dylan headed towards the back wall.
The first cubicle was empty. So was the second, and the third, and the fourth. It was while Dylan was checking the 5th cubicle that he saw a blur lunge out of the 6th. Dylan turned, startled, and launched himself back. He heard glass shatter, and saw his assailant slump to the floor.
Dylan stared, unsure of what was going on. Did he slip? Was this some sort of ruse? It was when he caught sight of bits of the man's skull splattered on the wall that he realized that his would-be attacker was likely dead. The growing pool of blood helped to confirm this fact.
Just what the hell had happened? Dylan glanced over, and saw shards of glass littering the carpet, trailing away from a freshly broken window. If something came through, just like that… yeah, the hole in the glass lined up roughly with where the man's head was before it had popped like an overfilled balloon.
Dylan crouched down. Who could be shooting at them? Did Kasha have a sniper posted outside? Was this the result of some strange power? Why did it hit Dylan's assailant, rather than Dylan himself? Did the shooter miss?
Puncher quickly hurried over, alerted by the noise. When he saw Dylan crouched down, he ducked too. Quickly noticing the broken window, Puncher moved out of its immediate line of sight.
They stayed like this for a bit, with Puncher gradually creeping closer. Eventually, he saw the body, his face becoming a few shades paler.
“What the hell happened to him? And where did he come from?” the blue clad Hero furiously whispered.
“I don’t know. The dude was hiding in a cubicle before he lunged out at me, I heard the glass break, and saw his brains get splattered all over. Something shot him, I think”.
Puncher nodded, his mouth straightening into a firm line.
“When I was coming over here, I think I saw something in midair, just outside the window. It’s probably what shot this guy. One of us needs to check it out, see if it’s dangerous to us.”
Despite his words, promoting action, Puncher continued to linger, not moving in the slightest towards the windows. Dylan, noticing this hesitation, moved towards one of the unbroken panes of glass.
“I’ll get it.”
Puncher looked relieved.
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“Thanks, man. I would, but like I said, not exactly bulletproof. I’d prefer to keep all of my brain inside my skull”.
To be completely honest, Dylan would rather not check himself. He wasn’t confident enough in the strength of his helmet to want to test it against whatever their mystery attacker was shooting at them, but by the looks of it, Puncher was absolutely unwilling to check. Dylan figured it would ultimately be more dangerous for him not to know what was out than it would be to check. If he was wrong, well.. He hoped his death would be instant.
Stretching up, so his eyes were just above the bottom of the glass. Dylan peered out, trying to make out what had shot at them. He searched around, his eyes meeting mostly empty air, until..
No, it couldn’t be?! Dylan ducked his head back down, before peeking up again. The same impossible sight presented itself to him. Moving towards the broken window, Dylan heard shards of glass crunching under his boots. The unobstructed sight that his new viewport provided showed him the same thing.
His drone was hovering there, its center eye glowing, newly added weapon underneath it. How in the world did it get here? Dylan hadn’t told it to leave his yard. In fact, he had pretty much forgotten all about it when he had heard of the hostage situation.
Turning to Puncher, Dylan spoke.
“My drone is out there. Err, one I made. I don’t know how it got here, I left it in my yard. It’s possible somebody else compromised it.”
Puncher looked taken aback.
“Why would you make a murder drone? Those are like, villain 101 or something. How often do you need to blow people's heads off, to even think of making something like that?”
The accusations stung.
“I didn’t make it to kill anybody, at least not originally. I had just added the weapon before I got the call to come here. I have no idea how strong it is.”
Dylan glanced at the partially headed corpse laying on the floor.
“Well, I had no idea how strong it was. I still don’t know its upper limits. I’m going to try and take control of it. If it starts shooting at me, well, you know it’s compromised. If it manages to kill me, I’d run. I know this suit is at least a little bullet proof.”
Puncher nodded.
“Good luck, man. Hopefully your murder machine doesn’t kill you.”
Dylan peeked his head back above the broken window. His drone was still hovering there, unmoving. He cleared his throat.
“Hey, d-drone, fly over here”.
Despite the awkward delivery of his order, Dylan’s drone obeyed, flying over. It didn’t try to shoot at him.
It didn’t seem like it was under anybody else’s control, but if that was the case, how in the world did it get over here?
Dylan waited a few more seconds, to make sure it wouldn’t suddenly start attacking, before he gave it a new order.
“Follow our movements as we try to free the hostages, and if you find an opportunity to help us while we’re fighting, take it. Oh, try and stay out of sight.”
The drone gave no sign it understood Dylan’s orders, as always. He would just have to trust that it would follow them. There wasn’t anything he could really do about it now, regardless.
Dylan turned to Puncher.
“We should be good. It doesn’t seem to be hacked or hijacked, not as far as I can tell, anyway.”
Puncher looked a little doubtful, but stood up regardless.
“Alright, man. You’re the expert, I guess.”
Dylan tried to cheer him up.
“Hey, it’ll be supporting us as we keep going. Could be a big help against Kasha.”
Puncher nodded.
“Sounds good. He could be a pretty big threat, so it’s probably a good idea. Just, uhh, try to keep it from murdering anybody else, alright?”
Dylan shot him a thumbs up, and they went back to clearing the floor. There was only one other person on it, a man guarding the stairwell. The sentry saw them, one hand moving to the pistol on his belt, the other to a walkie talkie, but Puncher was faster, lunging across the floor in a blue blur, a fist lashing out and catching the man in the head, ragdolling him. It looked like Puncher had knocked the guard unconscious in a single hit.
Once they confirmed he wouldn’t be getting back up anytime soon, they took his pistol,and his radio. The gun, they brought back to the window, at which point they emptied it, tossing the bullets out of the hole in the glass. As for the firearm itself, they hid in one of the empty drawers of a nearby desk. Hopefully, that should keep anybody else from using it, at least for the duration of their rescue operation.
The radio was much simpler to deal with. Dylan simply crushed it in his palm, rendering into a smashed bit of plastic, before letting it drop to the floor. That being taken care of, they turned the unconscious man onto his side, before proceeding up the stairs, and onto the fourth floor.
It was the top floor of the building, and where Kasha and the hostages would be located. It would probably also house a lot more thugs than the few they had encountered. Hopefully they would be somewhat spread out.
Dylan and Puncher started the climb to the next floor. Glancing out the window, Dylan saw his drone, hovering outside, waiting for its opportunity. Good. Dylan was getting tired of being nervous. In fact, he was starting to become a little angry. Kasha would answer for what he had done, Dylan would make sure of it.
There were another two guards at the top of the stairs, who were swiftly dispatched. Dylan and Puncher didn’t feel that they had time to be as thorough with taking these guys out as they were with the thug at the bottom of the stairs, so they went with a faster option.
With a strain, Dylan slowly crushed the firearms between his hands, warping them until they were all but unusable. Trying to fire them in the state that they were left in would just as likely cause them to blow up in your hand as it would be to launch a bullet.
The only question left was what to do with the two unconscious bodies. Dylan and Puncher looked at each other. With a shrug, they hauled the men over to the stairs, before tossing them down, eliciting a series of quiet grunts and exhales as the men tumbled on the hard concrete steps.
Turning back to the top floor, Dylan noted how different it was compared to the previous floors. Whilst the previous three stories had been fairly open, with several walls but no real doors, this level was mostly just a large hallway. There were windows on both sides, with one set showing the outside, and the other showing the interior of a large room. Dylan could barely make out a few forms, kneeling on the ground. The hostages, no doubt. The rage sparked back up.
Puncher turned to look at Dylan.
“I’ll go around the back, and you go in front. Distract Kasha, and hopefully I’ll be able to take him out before he can do anything. Got it?”
Dylan nodded.
They split off. Dylan waited until Puncher was most of the way down the hallway, which took longer than anticipated, as Puncher had to crawl under the windows to avoid being seen, to start moving towards the entrance to the large room. The door was ajar, and Dylan peeked in.
There were about 6 hostages, kneeling on the floor, as well as four men dressed in similarly rough clothing to the thus that Dylan had previously encountered. There was another man, tall, dressed in a black business suit, facing away from Dylan. Kasha.
He was talking to the four men, who were all grouped around him. Dylan couldn’t make out what was being said. He strained his hearing, but no matter how hard he tried, the quiet voices didn’t carry themselves to his ears in any way that was comprehensible to him.
Glancing around, Dylan took in the faces of the captured civilians. A few had red eyes, evidence of previously shed tears, while a few others looked dejected, as if they didn’t have much hope of getting rescued. One person, in stark contrast to the others, looked bored. Dylan imagined that if he had to designate anybody to lead the hostages, it would be that person. They seemed most likely to keep a level head, out of everyone here.
Dylan was broken from his reverie by an authoritative voice, one that carried well, loud, but not a yell.
“You can come out. I know you’re sitting there, watching, so you might as well stop hiding.
Dylan gulped. Shit. He hoped Puncher was ready. Taking a deep breath, he stood up, and flung the door back, stepping into the room with more confidence than he felt.
“If you know that, then you probably also know I’m here to kick your ass.”