Bravo One tore his eyes from the rapidly escalating scene in front of him and slithered to the back of the train car, slipping out of the back and onto the defunct tracks. From the sound of things, the howling and laughing wolf pack hadn’t yet reached peak frenzy, so he still had time to get into an advantageous position.
With all of the bikers bunched up in a knot and facing each other as they were, it would be impossible to deal with them without getting into a drawn out gun battle that risked interference from Gull not to mention the potential loss of the innocent women’s lives.
That was unacceptable. Bravo One would absolutely not be the cause of anyone's suffering with the notable exception of supers on his list. Furthermore, he would not stand by while people were victimized if he could help it. That kind of callousness might make it easier for him to bag his bird in the short term, but it would also start him down the well trod path of monsters like Gull and Warlord.
Bravo One had standards.
So, a gunfight was Failure Condition One. Another way this could go pear shaped was if the gang had a direct line of communication with Gull, and they were smart enough to use it. Or maybe one of the men might escape to warn Gull of Bravo One’s arrival in town. Failure Condition Two at least came with less risk for the civilians, but it was still a failure.
The best way to bring about either of these scenarios was to start a direct confrontation. He discarded that idea right away, at least with the gang positioned as they were. On the other hand, Joseph didn’t have time to be particularly subtle.
Bravo One made his way through the maze of rusting train cars around the back of the warehouse he’d cased, the one with the singular container and gaping hole in the back corner. He climbed through said hole to enter the building out of sight and made his way to the double doors that he’d left slightly ajar in his haste to hide himself earlier. He frowned at that. Little things like an open door could have tipped off a less distracted or maybe less dim group of men.
Luck was on Joseph's side so far tonight, but those that relied on luck tended to not come home one day. He made a note to do some detail oriented training when he got home. If he got home.
From his pocket Joseph pulled out a penlight, one normally reserved for reading when it came time to preserve the charge in his goggles. He removed the red filter that fit over the light to increase its visible range then depressed the button three times, shining the little flashlight outside and slightly upward so as not to shine it directly at anyone’s eyes. He needed the gang somewhere in that sweet spot between curious and slightly apprehensive. Anywhere above that and bullets could start flying, leading to Failure Condition One.
None of the men noticed the light, too involved in their little game they played with their intended victims for the night, pressing in around the two women tighter and tighter and issuing exultant shouts of lustful anticipation and throwing half full bottles of liquor into the fire barrels to make them flare. More than once, one of the women’s heads would be lifted above the crowd, born on rough hands, their blank stares firmly affixed to their faces.
Bravo One blinked the light again. One. Two. Three times. This time he held the light higher to increase the angle and the chance the men in the back of the pack would see.
This time it worked. At least one curious face, the short, spindly guy that had escorted the women off of the back of the truck, seemed to stop and pay close attention to the dark warehouse door where he might have seen something. His red skull cap stood out from the chaotic throng in its stillness. Bravo one had him now, had him hooked. The penlight flashed again, only once, lower to the floor and angled away this time, fast enough to be dismissed as a reflection of moonlight or a firefly.
Did the desert have fireflies? Joseph would look it up later.
The short biker hit one of his larger companions on the shoulder and shouted something over the music, causing several others to look toward the warehouse doors. Bravo One did not need to flash the light again, instead he was moving, out of the gap in the back corner and into the maze of train cars yet again.
When he got back into the position to observe the party, Bravo One could hear the raised voices above the music, the words unintelligible but the body language clear enough. Most of the bikers didn’t like having their fun interrupted, but Skull Cap Guy held at least some authority, enough to make them question whether it was wise to ignore him. Skull Cap Guy had a revolver out of his belt and was waving it in the general direction of the warehouse and looking from it to the group, entreating them to join him. Several of the men attempted to go back to dancing with the entranced women, but their attempts fell flat, timidity winning out over lust without the support of the pack.
In the end, the dispute was settled by the older, graying biker in the lawn chair with his back facing to Bravo One’s concealed position. His voice cut through the music quite clearly, its tired, gravelly tone one of unquestioned authority.
“Will you bickering sissies just shut up and go and check it out? If Long says he saw something, he probably saw something. If there’s somebody in there, flush them out. Fritz, get up on the gun just in case. If it’s not wearing our colors, fill it full of daylight. It’s like I’m running a goddamned daycare.”
Well, the penlight trick did split them up. Unfortunately, none of them were dumb enough to go anywhere alone, so things could still get dicey depending on their level of competency and the amount of alcohol they’d imbibed.
The group of eight, led by skullcap guy or ‘Long’ spread out in a rough wedge and made their way slowly toward the open doors of the warehouse. Fritz climbed up into the bed of the truck that was facing the warehouse and grabbed a sleek looking assault rifle to run overwatch for his friends. Meanwhile, the still unnamed leader of the group, lounged in his lawn chair with his hands resting on the back of his head, staring into the firelight where the two women huddled together, clearly holding onto each other for comfort even if their faces still held those placid expressions. Bravo One couldn’t be sure, but their hair and clothes looked slightly more disheveled than before. Perhaps he’d gotten the ball rolling just in time.
This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
Bravo One crouched low and stalked forward, using the long shadows and discarded junk on the ground for concealment as he approached the old biker in the chair from behind, carefully monitoring Fritz to make sure he didn’t turn this way. Long’s group of sweepers had made it to the warehouse door by now and were doing their best impression of a breach and clear while Fritz looked on through the optic of his rifle, a long, overdesigned thing that probably was more kit than anyone outside the truly gun crazy needed.
Inch by inch, Bravo One approached the leader’s back, carefully stepping only on powdery dirt and avoiding pebbles that would grind under his boots, languidly flowing over rusty spools of wire and haphazardly strewn shattered plastics.
Then, just as Joseph was reaching for his knife to go for the takedown, the radio changed, a loud, thumping hip hop track that seemed to really stretch the capabilities of the truck’s sound system, distorting the music until it was a chaotic mess of synth bass and tortured rap lyrics. Normally, this would be advantageous for Bravo One, the noise a welcome cover for what he wanted to do, but the track change seemed to remind the grizzled biker that the radio was a thing. He heaved himself to his feet, looming large and exposing the extravagant needlework on his vest that named the gang as the 44 Reapers and the man himself as Papa.
Papa cursed and strode stiffly toward the truck’s cab, presumably to kill the music. Unfortunately, the sudden motion attracted the attention of Fritz, whose assault rifle swung toward the source of the motion, directly at the ghillied up super that was now in the open with his metaphorical manhood in his hand where the old man had just been just sitting.
The optic on Fritz’s rifle zeroed in on Bravo One, at first slightly above his head then settling down directly on him even as the graying pack leader vacated his chair.
Bravo One didn’t hesitate. He whipped his rifle into a hasty firing position on his shoulder and squeezed off a shot meant to hit the man somewhere in the upper chest or head, the heavy 7.62 mm subsonic round leaving the chamber of his rifle followed by the sound of metal on metal then wet flesh. However, Bravo One didn’t have the chance to confirm the kill, already lunging toward Papa's throat to end things before they could get out of hand.
Demonstrating his probable years of experience with fights in back alleys and smoky bars, the old biker’s hands were already up, seizing upon Bravo One’s wrist and using a calloused palm to direct the blade of the knife away from his body while bringing his knee up into the super’s crotch. White pain flashed in Joseph’s vision as his favorite testicle was put in the press, but his body worked nearly on autopilot, breaking the hold on his wrist with a twist and bringing the knife back across the biker’s forearm as he got back into a fighting stance.
A quiet grunt was all Bravo One got as a reward for his cut, deep as it was, then Papa was on him, not giving him room to bring his rifle to bear or to lunge again with his knife. Steely hands grasped for his rifle and the strap that kept it fastened to his combat harness. The aging brawler used it to bring Joseph closer allowing a nasty elbow to connect with the side of Joseph's head. The world blurred for a brief moment.
However, the attention the rifle received left Joseph's knife hand free. Bravo One dropped, forcing Papa to choose between holding up the weight of a large man in full combat load or allowing himself to be carried to the floor. Papa chose to let go and reach for the silver revolver at his belt, but Bravo One was already tucking his legs under him for another lunge with the knife. By the time Papa’s hand was able to reach the holster on his belt, the younger, sprier super had already slid around to the old biker’s side and jammed his combat knife into the Papa’s gun hand, breaking a few of the finer bones and pinning the limb painfully to the man’s side.
Using his momentum, Bravo One rushed forward, planting a kick at the back of the big man’s knee as he passed, forcing Papa to kneel in the dirt as he vacillated between attempting to staunch the blood pouring out of his side or awkwardly trying to draw the revolver with his off-hand.
Papa never got a chance to draw his weapon though. As soon as Bravo One was clear of interference, he used his now free hand to rack another subsonic round into the chamber of his rifle and ended the fight with a round to the back of the Reaper's head, a fine mist of blood peppering the lenses of his goggles and distorting the night around him for a second before the self-cleaning function took over with a whir.
Bravo One racked another round into his rifle’s chamber and brought his gun up to cover Fritz once more, but there was no need. He was slumped over on the roof of his truck, his weapon laid flat underneath him. The hip hop tune blared from the radio behind him, jostling detritus in the truck’s bed and rattling the windows audibly.
The entire fight must have taken about ten or fifteen seconds. That left Joseph very little time to make his next move.
Letting his rifle dangle on its strap, he loped over to the truck where Fitz laid, reaching into the cab and activating the high beams. The powerful lights cut through the night, stabbing into the dark interior of the warehouse through the open door and bringing a few of the remaining bikers into sharp relief. Bravo One’s vision was unaffected, however. His goggles adjusted for the change in light level so his eyes never had to.
That done, he reached up and tugged on Fitz’s rapidly cooling body, dragging it down into the truck bed and out of sight. The man’s face was a grisly mess with parts of the optic for his rifle embedded into his eye socket and a ragged hole where the bullet had ricocheted into his brain pan.
Bravo One left the dead man where he laid, then he ran over to the Papa's corpse and set about dragging it away into the darkness. Meanwhile the women looked on, following Joseph with their eyes, not making a sound or moving from their spot by the fire barrels.
Speaking of not making a sound, now that Joseph had a moment to himself, he, again, ruminated on the engagement so far. Papa hadn’t called for help even when he got into a knife fight with a super in a ghillie suit. More than likely, the same experiences the guy had with bar brawls and knife fights had some sort of pride or twisted sense of honor attached to them. In the circles Papa had travelled, if somebody tried to shank you, taking care of it yourself probably gained you more status. Perhaps calling for help never occurred to him at all, the impulse having been removed through years of posturing to become the big dog.
Another lucky break for Joseph.
He dropped the man’s corpse and rolled it under an old flatbed train car, counting on the shadows to hide the man until this was over.
“Overwatch. Talk to me,” Bravo One grunted, breathing heavily as he tucked Papa into his semi-permanent resting place.
Three leaving out the back of the building and headed into the train yard. The rest are still inside.
“Perfect. Time for phase two.”
Phase Two, you say? Oh good. There’s a plan, phases and everything. You had me worried you were just winging it this whole time, because you can’t get past your delicate sensibilities and stay on mission.
“I do have a plan,” Joseph said in a low voice, stalking off into the shadows of the train yard and making his way toward his next targets. The music bounced off of the myriad hard surfaces, creating a strange cacophony of phantom sounds that confused his ears even with the compensation of his equipment.
Does this plan extend beyond right here and now?
“Totally,” Bravo One lied, crouching down low to spot the three pairs of legs stacked up and headed deeper into the maze. “Here comes Phase Two.”