6: Smoke Break
20 guys. Submachine gun. R-14 Rifles. Great, Jack groans—this is not at all what he expected for breakfast. Men in full armor flank him from all sides, armed and ready. They do not seem much for conversation.
“Y’all serious about doing this so early in the morning?” Jack glances at the biggest and tallest guy out of the group. “I mean, it’s the weekend. Why not move this to Monday, yeah? My schedule’s open.”
Nobody answers.
These guys have some nerves doing this in public. Tsk, Jack quickly glances around. There are few passersby, far away in the distance. Okay, maybe this is not as bad as he thought.
“AAH!” Jack yells as loud as he can at the big guy. He flinches and blinks a bit. The next thing he sees is Jack’s hair on his chin. Jack proceeds to deliver a hook straight to his jaw. The huge assailant keels over and drops his rifle. Jack swiftly dives for it, just as the attackers behind him gasp in shock and open fire. He whirls around the large guy and twists his neck. One down.
The corpse starts falling over, so Jack props him up and uses him as cover. Bullets keep coming at him like there is no more tomorrow. The agent winces, pushed back by the rapid fire. The big guy’s heavy armor proves to be effective at shielding Jack from incoming rounds, but this will not hold forever. Jack returns the fire with ricocheting shots, which hit one man in the leg. This man does not flinch and continues firing. Shit, Jack keeps firing, but more than ever, he needs a distraction. Then, in the corner of his left eye, a peculiar, green canister dangles on the corpse’s belt. A smoke bomb.
Jack begins winding back. Then he heaves the bomb right in front of one man’s rifle.
Boom.
The bomb explodes with incredible might, sending the attackers into a frenzy. Jack raises an eyebrow. That was more effective than he thought. Using this moment of chaos, Jack sprints leftward, hugging the wall until he finds a staircase. The momentum allows him to leap upward, grabbing the metal structure and pulling himself onto it.
Jack steps inside an apartment, glad to find it empty. Taking one round from his belt, he cocks the gun open and reloads. While examining his revolver, he notices a large mirror. He hurries over to it and takes off his coat, scanning for possible injuries. None, as far as the mirror is concerned.
Jack breathes a sigh of relief when his radio suddenly comes to life. “... Agent Jack, come in! We got a situation down on Austen. I repeat. We got a situation down on Austen…”
“Go for Jack. What happened, Lenny?” Jack speaks to the radio, recognizing the voice of his colleague.
“Terrorists. Multiple of them sighted on cam. Me and the boys are driving down right now. You better haul your late ass over here! Over,” Lenny shouts.
“Copy that, out,” Jack straps the radio to his belt. He steps out of the apartment to a long hall. Stretching at the end of the hall is an elevator. It dings. Jack immediately takes aim. The doors open slowly to reveal a… small, elderly lady. His eyes widen in surprise.
“Ma’am!” He calls out. “You should evacuate from this area. It’s dan—”
A hail of bullets whiz straight toward him. Jack dives for the nearest room, tearing down the door. He glances to see the attackers sprinting toward his location, kicking the old lady over, lifeless. They were using her as a cover. Goddamn scums, Jack boils.
A squad of approximately eleven men kick the broken door away and slowly inch their way into the dark apartment. They scan around, but their heat vision does not register a reading of the target.
“See him?” One assailant asks the remaining ten.
“No,” they reply in unison.
“Maybe he escaped, sirAAAAHH!”
The assailant looks down to see in horror as their legs sputter out a deep, dark red. He crumbles to the ground, throat slit.
“UP! HE’S UP— AAAAAAH!”
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“What? Wher—”
“Fire! FIRE, GODDAMNIT!”
The attacker who yelled “Fire!” mows down the room like a madman until his rifle’s out of rounds. He attempts to reload, but before he can reach for his cartridge, he is greeted with death. And death says:
“Boo, bitch.”
The assailants squeal in fear as their comrade keels over, blood sputtering out of his eyes. They begin unloading their full weaponry in the darkness, round after round. The men only stop firing when they feel the full force of a well-worn Bata shoe plowing their skulls open. Their guns are kicked away, and they feel a large, furry object flattening them to pancakes. One disarmed man decides to throw fists at the darkness, terrified of the chaos around him. Upon hearing a shuffle on the left, he jabs straight at it. He breaks out into an agonizing cry as his arm hangs loosely, crushed. He has hit a wall, literally. Another shuffle to his right. This time, he gambles on a kick, but it lands straight on the dining table. The pain, the excruciating pain, causes him to lose balance. His neck falls straight to a knife positioned upward, goring his lungs open.
There is only one remaining man. He lugs the submachine gun, aiming silently from the corner of the room. It is then, that his heat goggles finally pick up on the target—a bloody Jack, casually strutting from the shadows. The light switches open, revealing the bloody mess of a room. Ravaged sofa, with a multitude of corpses under it. Corpse in the sink. Corpse hanging on the ceiling fan. And a talking corpse in the corner.
“Stay back! Stay, the fuck, BACK!” He shrieks.
“Give it up. You’re outta rounds,” Jack approaches slowly.
“NO!” The man frantically digs through his belt to grab a grenade. But Jack has already dashed over and pinned him against the wall, dropping the grenade to the ground. Jack kicks it over to a radio. Scrambled noises can be heard from it. “... Unit 6! Come in. Come in. Is the target neutralized?”
“Now, I know you have some of your men below, waiting for an answer,” Jack whispers into the attacker’s ear. “So why don’t you call off the attack, and kindly tell me who you work for?”
“Fuck off!” Barks the man.
Jack pins the man’s right hand on the wall and positions the kitchen knife on it like a chopping board. He then, without a hurry, singes its blade into the man’s finger. The pain is indescribable. He gasps and pants, shaking profusely. He cries. He bawls. He starts begging for mercy.
“Ya know… I’m reeeeeaal hungry. So why don’t we hurry up with the whole shebang and get outta here?” Jack cuts the finger back and forth to ensure the man feels this as much as possible. “Otherwise, this finger’s your breakfast.”
***
“Uh… What happened?” Lenny looks at the mess of a man.
“Ambush. Might be a bounty or some… rival syndicate with an agenda. No idea. I’ll give the full report later,” Jack looks at the clean-shaven mustached man.
“Well, what happened here?” Jack surveys the carnage around him. “Any casualties?”
“Unconfirmed, unfortunately,” an agent steps out of the rubble. “Target sighted is presumed to use a blade-type weapon evidenced by the wound shape.”
“Are the forensics here? I want this whole area cleaned and surveyed,” Jack struts over to a corpse. The rifle they used seems to be new.
“No worries. ‘Whole team’s coming in five, but Jack,” Lenny walks over to his colleague. “You, uh, seem calmer… than usual, at least.”
Jack does not respond. He stares at the endless distance ahead. Eyes empty, devoid of thoughts. His dry lips are killing him, but Jack does not mind. His mind is elsewhere.
Lenny raises an eyebrow while twirling his mustache in thought. “You were… ambushed, right?"
"..."
"Spare me the self-pitying act. You," he points a finger to Jack's chest, "are not responsible for this, do you copy?”
“... Copy.”
“Lenny’s right. You can’t keep tabs on every citizen and denizen of Earth. If we could, we’d be gods,” the agent emerging out of the rubble earlier puts his gloved hand on Jack, comforting him.
“I’m sure you’re just feeling roughed up 'cuz we haven’t woken up yet. Tell ya what,” he points to a bright orange truck.
“What?”
“I got us some bread in the trunk. You’ll feel a lot better,” The agent makes an “ok” gesture.
“Wait, for real? Why didn’t ya tell me, ya sly fox!” Lenny can feel his stomach grumble, begging for food.
“You never asked! Ahahaha!”
Jack smiles. He digs around his coat for a lighter, when his hand brushes against a familiar object. Ah, right, of course.
“Ay, Rick!” Jack calls to the fox.
“Yeah?”
“Here,” he throws a pack of cigarettes at Rick. He catches it with a surprised look.
“Oh, Oh!” Rick’s face gives way to a wide grin.
“Now the drink’s on you,” Jack winks.
“Ahahahaha!”
With one final look at the scene before him, Jack turns and strides toward his colleagues. He needs all the information he can get. All the grit he can muster. All the manpower. And though the path is not one for the gutless, he cannot falter—not when the city is counting on its protectors to bring light to the darkness.