With a sharp intake of breath, Ryan jerked awake.
Oh, crap. How long was I out?
He'd been asleep long enough for the effects of the pacification gas to wear off... mostly. The muddled, hazy feeling had receded, anyway, and he could finally think clearly again.
In exchange, he now had a pounding migraine fit to rival his worst freshman hangover.
"...just saying, I don't think it's good for you to be hanging around in places like that!"
"Ugh. Give me a break, Amy. You sound like my mom!"
The ongoing shouting match in the front seat wasn't helping his headache, but it sounded like they'd been at it nonstop since he passed out. He felt certain that hadn't been what woke him up.
No, he thought, something just changed.
At the edge of his awareness, the system notification icon flashed steadily, demanding his attention.
Greetings, Forward-Commander-Two! You have [38] pending notifications.
View notifications now?
Focusing on it, he opened the queue and began reading, starting from the most recent message.
CAUTION: Proximity alert! New contact approaching.
Classification of new contact is [Change Matrix].
...crap.
A map of the immediate area appeared on the inside of Ryan's eyelids. From the central point marking his location, a grid of glowing lines spread out, tracing the contours of elevation changes and terrain features. Streets appeared next, followed by wireframe representations of the surrounding buildings. Colored spots of light popped in a moment later, yellow and purple overlapping his position... and a new black dot blinking just ahead. Speed and velocity calculations scrawled across the display, estimating time to intercept.
His eyes snapped open as he sat up straight in his seat.
"Incoming!" he shouted.
The two women paused their argument to glance back at him. Both pairs of eyes tracked down his body, giving him an unnecessary reminder of his disheveled and entirely-naked state. Amy flushed and looked away immediately. A moment later, she grabbed her friend Syd by the shoulder and spun her to face forward again as well.
"Turn the car around," he urged. "We've got to get out of here, right now!"
"What's his problem?" Syd asked.
"No idea. Drugs, probably. Maybe some kind of mental health issue. I was going to call Cat later, ask if she was willing to take a look at him."
While he was asleep, his ride had made a detour through the rougher part of town. Each block they passed looked more tired and run-down than the one before. Only a few of the buildings had lights on, and even those were boarded up or barred. He hadn't seen a single pedestrian, and he didn't think their absence was due to the still-pouring rain. Piles of uncollected trash bags heaped up on the sidewalks were the only sign that the neighborhood wasn't entirely abandoned.
At the moment, though, his attention was fixed straight ahead. Right in the middle of the road, the sky seemed to waver, like the air itself was trembling. A pinpoint of opalescent light appeared, quickly expanding into a blazing vertical line that hung a few feet above the ground. As he watched, the aperture widened further, and then a pair of enormous hands grasped the edges. Seconds later, a towering, green, ape-like creature had forced its way through the portal and into view.
A Brute, he thought, and it's already transformed.
We're in trouble.
From over the creature's muscular shoulder, a pair of long eye-stalks could be seen peeping out of the portal.
That'll be the Forward-Commander, the analytical part of his mind calmly observed as he was thrown onto his side by the car's sudden maneuver. Didn't expect them to send a Zorvax officer, though. I guess there must not have been anyone else available on such short notice.
In the front seat, Syd screamed as Amy stomped on the brakes. Tires squealed on the rain-slicked streets. Realizing the vehicle wouldn't stop in time to prevent a collision, she threw the steering wheel over, swerving to avoid the unexpected obstacle and sending the cruiser into a skid.
Ryan, with his hands still cuffed behind his back, was thrown against the divider, then bounced off the doorframe as they rotated. After making a screeching half-revolution, the car jerked to a sudden stop, slamming the passengers roughly back down into their seats.
With an irate growl, the blonde woman flicked a series of switches on the dash, turning on the cruiser's lights and siren. Her other hand snatched the black plastic handheld microphone from its cradle and brought it up to her mouth.
"Attention, you in the... green monkey costume!" Projected by the speaker, her amplified voice boomed out across the street. "You are obstructing an intersection. Move out of the street, immediately!"
The ape-like creature gave no indication that it had understood the warning. Instead, seemingly infuriated by the flashing lights and loud noises, it reared up onto its hind legs and began beating its chest.
Shaking his head to clear it, Ryan leaned forward again.
"Officer, you've got no idea how dangerous this situation is –" he began.
"I know exactly how dangerous it is," the policewoman snapped. "Jaywalking? At night, and in these conditions? That man could have been killed!"
Before he could protest further, she'd flung open her door and stepped out into the downpour.
"Amy, wait!" her friend said.
"Stay here, Syd. I'll be right back."
The door slammed closed behind her.
"There's no way that's a guy in a suit," the girl in the front seat mumbled, nervously drawing her knees up to her chest. "What the fuck is that thing?"
Good question.
Analyzing... analysis complete.
Target Identification: War-Form, Simian Brute
Commencing Standard Attribute Evaluation...
Effective Level: 1
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Strength: 28
Agility: 4
Toughness: 21
Endurance: 9
Abilities:
Physical Augmentation (Rank 1)
Threat Rating: LOW
In the course of his off-world Enforcer training, Ryan had seen plenty of Brute War-Forms similar to this one. They tended to be slow, clumsy, stupid... and very, very strong. If you wanted to take one down, he knew, the best bets were long-ranged harassing fire, crowd control Abilities, or attacks that could bypass their physical resistance. The low threat rating assigned by his Implant assumed you had a Changer of your own; trying to fight it without one would be a particularly messy way of committing suicide.
As he considered his options, the Brute dropped back down onto all fours and began advancing towards them. Extending one long arm, it casually hooked a hand under the fender of a much-abused old Toyota Corolla. Then, with an expression of visible effort, it dragged the vehicle away from the curb, pulling it along behind like a child with a toy wagon.
"Alright, that's close enough! Put down the... car..." The officer's voice trailed away as she finally seemed to realize that she wasn't dealing with a drunk hooligan in an out-of-season Halloween costume. She drew her gun, raising it threateningly as the transformed monster shuffled closer. "Stay back!"
Predictably, her increasingly-strident warnings went unheeded. With less than half a block of open space remaining between her and the approaching creature, she dropped into a practiced marksman's stance and opened fire.
Bullets impacted against the Simian Brute's face and chest, each producing a dull thudding noise like a baseball smacking into a catcher's mitt, but otherwise having little discernible effect. The monster hunched down slightly, raising an arm and shielding its eyes, then continued plodding forward once the gun clicked empty.
With a roar of annoyance, the Brute lashed out in retaliation, ripping the passenger door off the Toyota with one hand and sending it careening through the air. Missing Amy by a few feet, the whirling projectile smashed into the top of the patrol car behind her.
The impact buckled the cruiser's roof and rocked it up onto two wheels. Crushed by the blow, the siren managed one last strangled whoop before falling silent. For a long moment, the vehicle teetered awkwardly, before finally slamming back down with a jarring crash.
A hurled front bumper came next, sailing harmlessly overhead, followed by a side mirror that fell short to explode against the pavement.
"Hey! Syd!" Ryan had to shout to be heard over the din of crunching plastic and shattering glass. "It's Syd, right? Look, I can help, but first I need you to get me out of here –"
Wide-eyed and pale, the girl shot him a single disbelieving look before flinging open her door and vanishing into the night.
Well, that didn't work. Time for Plan B.
...which means I need to come up with a Plan B, and fast.
Outside, Amy had taken a few steps backwards while calmly reloading. As soon as the fresh magazine smacked home, she resumed firing.
The fusillade brought the hulking animal's onslaught to a temporary halt. Again, it ducked, protecting its face from the irritating attacks. This time, though, it didn't passively wait for her to finish shooting, instead batting its free arm against the base of a nearby traffic light. Wobbling precariously, the upright bent, then began to pitch over... in the opposite direction from the one the creature had intended. Power lines in the path of the toppling pole were dragged down with it, each throwing out a dramatic shower of sparks as it snapped.
Completely disregarding the police officer who had been the sole focus of its attention just moments before, the giant green ape scowled at the fallen post. It shrieked in incoherent rage, as if personally offended by the inanimate object's role in foiling its simplistic plan, and raised both massive fists into the air. Continuing to hoot furiously, the monster began pounding on the metal pole. A clanging racket like the world's most inept drum solo filled the air.
It's now or never, Ryan decided, turning away from the sight.
Cautiously, he flexed his shoulders, testing the strength of the cuffs on his wrists. The chain joining them together clinked as it went taut.
Okay. He closed his eyes, drew a breath and expelled it. Okay. I can do this.
The metal bands dug into his bare skin as he steadily increased the amount of force he was applying to them. Pitted against unyielding steel, his muscles screamed in protest. Bit by bit, the distance between his wrists increased. He strained harder. At last, with a shockingly-loud gunshot crack, one of the links parted.
He was free.
Free to move around the rear seat of a police car with no door handles on the inside, anyway.
The next part is going to hurt.
Taking another deep breath, he pulled back as far as he could in the cramped confines and hammered his elbow into the driver's-side window. Once, twice. The shock of each impact traveled up his arm, tingling numbness following close behind. He knew that he'd be feeling it later.
On his third strike, the glass cracked. Thin lines radiated out from the point he'd struck like a spiderweb. Switching to his other arm, he renewed his attack. Four hits. Five. The window had splintered, then bulged outward, but the laminated glass stubbornly refused to shatter.
On the sixth hit, the still-intact window finally popped out of its frame, falling to smash on the pavement below.
Ryan gave the opening he'd created a cursory sweep with the cuffs, attempting to brush away the worst of the glittering, razor-edged shards poking up through the gasket. Then, hesitating for only a second, he carefully leaned his still-naked upper body out of the car and started shouting.
"Officer! Officer Reid!" He waved his arms, attempting to draw the policewoman's attention. Pausing with what appeared to be her last magazine half-inserted, she glanced over to determine the source of the interruption. "Listen, bullets can't hurt that thing, you're just making it angry! Let me help you!"
Her eyes darted from the car's missing window to the broken cuffs hanging from his wrists, then back to the colossal form of the Brute still doing its best impersonation of a medieval blacksmith on the opposite side of the street.
"You've got to be kidding me," Amy muttered, loudly enough to be heard over the rhythmic pounding of the monster persisting in its assault on the fallen light pole. "Okay, mister suspicious escape artist exhibitionist. What's your plan?"
"First, I need you to grab that." He pointed through the divider at the center console, and her gaze followed the path of his finger.
"Why?"
"No time to explain. You're going to have to trust me." After a bit of consideration, he added, "There are two of them. Make sure that you get the purple one."
She grumbled something unflattering-sounding that he couldn't quite pick up, but opened the door and climbed over the seat. While she rummaged around in the front, Ryan took the opportunity to let himself out using the exterior door handle.
"I only see a yellow one in here!" she yelled.
...the hell?
A glance at his area map confirmed her statement. The yellow dot remained on top of his location, but the purple was already blocks away, the distance between them increasing with every passing second.
"Your friend must have pocketed it before she took off!" He swore under his breath. That didn't leave them with a lot of options. "Fine. Take the yellow one."
Amy came back into his view with the device in hand. The sight of him now standing outside the vehicle made her do a momentary double-take, but she recovered quickly enough.
"Now what?"
"Just put it on." Ryan tried his best to project reassurance he didn't feel into his voice. "I'll take care of the rest."
In the distance, the Zorvax officer finally worked up the courage to lean out of the still-open portal. Tentacles writhing in annoyance, it began squealing in an attempt to get the distracted Simian Brute's attention. Ryan was too far away for his Implant's translation function to pick up the exact words, but their intent had been clear enough: quit messing around and finish this.
The huge green monster cringed at the rebuke, and reluctantly abandoned its assault on the thoroughly-destroyed traffic light. Directed by the Forward-Commander's screeching orders, the Brute grabbed the largest intact piece of the pole, a twisted length of jagged metal taller than it was. Hefting the makeshift club with a grunt, it spun to face them.
This time, it wouldn't be content to throw things.
Amy tensed as the lumbering creature closed in, one hand drifting towards her holstered pistol.
"Trust me," Ryan urged.
She gave him a long, searching look.
"I can't believe I'm doing this," she said as she pulled the Changer on.
It snapped into place snugly around her hips, and a prompt appeared in the corner of Ryan's view.
Bond Change Matrix to new user?
Confirmed. Bonding Change Matrix to new user...
Change Matrix has been Bonded to new user.
Additional Change Matrix functions are now available.
CAUTION: No entry found for new user in local Enforcer database!
Ryan ducked back behind the car, giving the transformation the standard ten feet of clearance.
"Great. Here goes!"
"...here goes what?"
He activated the Changer.