The continuous sounds of clashing metal faded into the blaring noises of the server room, as Yata and Agent Cyan crossed knives. The eyes of each combatant were locked on one another. With each stab or swipe, Shindo could see the surgical precision of the trained fighters. Their knives were extensions of themselves, with their free hand swatting the other's knife hand away or they taking small steps back and forward, attempting to pierce the other's defense.

It was a dance of fatal tempo. A clash of master knifemen. Something that could stir awe in the hearts of the unprepared. If this was a formal duel, the audience would gasp at the proficiency both men showcased, for their movement never felt wasted, and the two clashed ever so fiercely. Yet, this was no formal duel.

Shindo interrupted their clash, extending his baton to the polearm setting and swinging it towards Cyan's left shoulder. Reality kicked in for the knifemen, who noticed the third party approaching. Cyan naturally stepped back to evade the blow, for Shindo had lagged behind Yata's tempo. Cyan's sights shifted to the newbie-in-green, annoyance decorating his face. There was no fairness or honor here. This was a battle. A battle to the death or capture. Only fools would think that some petty honor would give them victory.

Without a moment's doubts, the agent retreated even further from the duo. Who could blame him? Shindo had the advantage in reach. Yet he didn't hesitate, following after Cyan with Yata closely behind, as the agent kept backstepping away.

To distract them, Cyan took a left turn, hiding from their sights. This didn't stop Yata, who sped past Shindo to give chase. The nimbleness of the cat hero amazed Shindo briefly, only to be cut short by Cyan, who tackled Yata.

The two flew past Shindo's right, landing on the floor with Cyan on top. He tried to stab Yata's face, but he managed to dodge the deathblow by moving his head to the right. Before Cyan could continue, Shindo swung his polearm, connecting a hit and throwing Cyan off of Yata.

The impact sent Cyan crashing into a server wall. The impact seems to have affected him much, as he released a pained grunt. Yet Shindo wasn't done. He holstered the controller he had in hand and threw three darts at Cyan. His whole focus was set on capturing the agent, but Shindo wasn't stupid enough to use his controller technologhy on a place that could be easily set on fire.

Sensing danger, the agent rolled to the side, quickly landing on his knees as the darts stuck to the servers. He panted heavily, but Shindo had caught him right where he wanted: In range of his polearm. He readied himself to finish the job and swung his polearm downwards... only for him to hit nothing, his polearm passing right through Cyan's head.

As the downwards momentum carried him forward, Shindo only had one question: What happened there? He should've received feedback from the hit! His confusion lowered his defenses, and Cyan took advantage of this. He kicked Shindo's foot right under him. The green-clad man fell. At the same time, Cyan thrust his knife towards Shindo's chest, only for it to be interrupted by Yata, who tackled Cyan away from Shindo.

"What the hell happened?" Yata asked, shifting between an annoyed Cyan and a surprised Shindo.

Shindo spat on the floor before picking himself up. "Dunno. I was wondering the same thing myself."

With one last glance to check if Shindo was doing fine, Yata re-engaged Cyan with renewed vigor, although with a hint of caution. Shindo re-entered the fray too by blocking a blow towards Yata’s side.

This interruption didn't deter the agent. In fact, Agent Cyan only seemed to increase the speed of his attacks, managing a shallow cut on Yata's left shoulder. This didn't stop Yata though, as he finally managed to slip through Cyan's defenses.

Cyan tried to backstep again, but this time, Yata's nimbleness trumped over Cyan's escape attempt. He aimed his knife at his opponent's exposed solar plexus with incredible speed. But like Shindo, Yata's strike never landed. What should've been Cyan and Yata falling to the floor, resulted in Yata going right through Cyan's body, the momentum and confusion causing the cat hero to stumble.

Cyan took this chance to engage the exposed Shindo with renewed vigor. He swiped his knife twice, connecting with Shindo's stomach and chest. The green jacket suffered most of the brunt, but Shindo's black vest managed to block out the slices. Shindo backstepped while swinging his polearm in a sweeping motion. Cyan did the same, but Yata managed to put him in a lock hold. The agent squirmed for a bit, but once again, Yata went right through his body.

"You slippery bastard!" Yata cursed while turning around to re-engage. Shindo tried to stop him, but it was too late. His partner had sent another slice towards Cyan's arm. Yata attacked fervently; swiping, slicing, and stabbing his knife with pinpoint precision. However, like the flick of a switch, Cyan's bloodlust fell on the heroes. His silhouette was the very essence of a killer.

His fighting style had changed too. All his moves aimed to kill his target in any way, shape, or form. Where he would once block Yata's attack, he now lets his phasing abilities be his defense. Whenever Yata tried to intercept his use of the phasing ability, Cyan would rattle him by defending and backstepping, and then re-starting their engagement.

This change in tempo turned the battle into one of attrition. Yata took the brunt of Cyan's attacks, while Shindo tried to follow by either aiding his partner or disrupting Cyan's attack flow. However, this was an uphill fight: the longer it lasted, the faster they were reaching their limits. And Cyan only kept growing faster.

It didn't help that the ruthless repetitive dance taxed Yata's stamina the most, as his moves revolved around his nimbleness and his footwork. Cyan leveraged this. His tenacious and daring moves paired off well with the absolute defensive phasing ability of The Agent. Any and all attacks that would've granted the heroes their win, Cyan would just phase through it and counter.

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With each new failed attempt at ending the fight came more frustration for the heroes, and anger always led to mistakes. Soon enough the pair of heroes started screwing up. Sometimes Shindo would end up in Yata's way, allowing Cyan to catch his breath. Other times, Yata would almost hit Shindo by accident, as they would both find each other mispositioned, which almost earned them injuries from Cyan's knife.

Cyan held every advantage now. Both Shindo and Yata were exhausted by the ongoing fight, each panting heavily as they re-engaged Agent Cyan. Cyan was also fighting at full capacity ever since he revealed his powers, using them with lethal efficiency. And there was nothing they could do about it, because neither of them could fight at their fullest.

For reasons Shindo didn't understand, Yata couldn’t use his powers. No, it wasn’t that. Yata refused to use his powers. Sometimes he would grit his teeth, and glance sparingly at his left wrist. And this made the Cat hero more exasperated than before.

On the other hand, Shindo was limited by too many external factors. Fighting in a cramped hallway with a polearm halved his offensive potential to only thrusts and vertical swings. He was also restricted in his weaponry choice, as all of his controllers could damage the servers in the room. If he also added the factors of him hiding his real fighting style and that his uncontrollable power could hamper him at any minute now; Shindo was no less than a sitting duck.

All this gnawed at Shindo's patience. He could only react when Yata engaged and to suppress Cyan, but he had underestimated Cyan's viciousness. This man knew of their limits, and exploited every advantage he could with his permeability, or at least that's what Shindo decided to call that power.

It was infuriating to see Cyan countering the two perfectly. Yet, in Shindo's eyes, this fight was salvageable, as long as they didn't give into anger and managed to tire the agent down. Sadly, it all depended on how good Yata was at controlling his rage, something which he was utterly failing at.

Like Cyan, Yata's fighting style had also changed throughout the fight. No longer was he using his knife as an extension of himself. Rather, he matched Cyan’s viciousness with a ferocity of his own. Each time Yata thrust forward, his knife showed the fierce anger bubbling in him. His slashes resembled a rabid cat clawing angrily at any who approached it. His footwork became quicker, taking advantage of the enclosed environment through its feral nature.

For a short while, it worked. His feral attacks slowly penetrated through Cyan's lethal movements. He even managed to score a clean hit to Cyan’s shoulder with the hilt of his blade. In short, Yata dictated the rhythm of the fight, while Cyan and Shindo could only follow suit. However, Yata was also -the only one growing frustrated. The tempo of his footwork left little room for Shindo to aid him, to the point he had almost been left behind. The more the knife fight accelerated, the less of a true impact his actions made.

The pressure only served to further aggravate Yata. His speed increased with his anger. Shindo also replied in the same fashion, trying everything in his power to help Yata in this battle of attrition. However, anger made Yata predictable. Swipes that would've caused Cyan to backstep were now countered with ease. More lethal attacks were aimed at Yata, barely being dodged or blocked by Shindo himself. In fact, because Yata's anger had caused him to become predictable, Shindo's support was the sole reason Cyan hadn't managed to kill Yata yet.

This was when a small, gleeful glint appeared on Cyan’s eyes, and Shindo realized what his enemy was doing: Cyan was targeting and exhausting the more aggressive fighter, while using said fighter to suppress the support. What a vicious way of fighting! And with Yata’s whole anger growing the longer this went, Cyan had him in the palm of his hand. He only needed to give Yata one more push to break the flimsy teamwork of both heroes.

"What are you waiting for, Thirteen!" Cyan spoke, taunting Yata. He attempted to swipe at the cat hero, but Shindo intercepted him. Yata didn't respond to the taunt, opting to follow up on Shindo's interception with a few feral swipes directed at Cyan's limbs. Cyan only backstepped more and more.

"So fierce!" He continued mocking, "Can’t hold it in yourself to kill me, huh?"

"Shut it," Yata responded, traces of anger were laced in his voice. With each weaving dodge, Yata came closer to striking Cyan, but as if to taunt him further, Cyan narrowly dodged again.

"Come on, kitty cat! Aren't you going to stop me?" His eyes glimmered in glee.

"Shut up!" Yata stabbed his knife forward, straight at Cyan's eyes, but in a ballsy move, Cyan stood still. The wooden knife went right through Cyan's left eye, but no blood came out.

"I guess you'll do anything to stop me, even kill me." He spouted, his right eye shined with malicious glee.

"ARRGH!" Yata gave a battle cry while launching another attack at Cyan. His feral swipes, stabs, and lunges were filled with one desperate purpose: injure the agent. On the other hand, Cyan was calmer than ever. He reflected everything he was thrown, countering with increased precision.

This was bad. Extremely bad. To the point that it started to worry Shindo. Huffs and Puffs started escaping the cat hero's mouth. At this pace, he couldn't endure another onslaught. Cyan had finally managed to bring Yata to the brink of exhaustion.

The cat hero swung his wooden blade, but the agent swatted his knife hand away. Cyan then pushed Yata, throwing off his balance. He managed to graze Yata's cheek before the cat hero shook his head and licked some of the blood dripping from his cheek.

Agent Cyan continued with his onslaught, pressuring the cat hero away from Shindo’s effective range, and then everything stopped. He managed to lock Yata’s arm behind him, and put his knife on the hero's neck, gaining his final advantage of the fight. Cyan faced Shindo next, putting Yata’s body between the two. Both men were at a throwing distance from Shindo's position, but Shindo didn't dare move. All of them knew what would happen: If Shindo so much as rushed to aid Yata, Cyan would kill the cat hero.

Shindo stood still, weighing his options. At this pace, what could he do now? Use his darts? No. Cyan would use Yata exposed arms and face as a human shield. Should Shindo trust Yata to analyze and free himself from Cyan's grasp? No. Shindo could no longer trust his partner to think clearly. He was too emotionally-driven and ragefilled. So what else, then? What other option did he have?

All sound melded into one as the ex-villain racked his brain to chart his next course of action. Out of reflex, he took out the static controller he had previously holstered. Cyan tightened his hold on Yata in reaction. Shindo looked at the gadget in desperation. He could simply throw it at them, as the gadget could theoretically would reach first, but two variables prevented him from doing so: Shindo didn't know how Cyan's power would react to the static controller formula, and Yata was going to get caught by the electrical surge. It was too risky!

This is when he felt eyes on him. The ex-villain raised his head to see that Yata was giving him a small glance. He slowly looked from Shindo, to the controller in his hand. A small, irritating smirk formed on his lips, as if saying 'Throw it. I'll survive.'

"Of all fucking things," he muttered his annoyance. Shindo hesitated for the briefest of moments, but an irritated sigh cemented his resolve. He was Herttz goddamn it! The man the entire city wanted in chains!

Shindo spun the top of the gadget, the familiar metallic hum announcing it was primed, and threw it straight at the two men.