'That was easy,’ Calvin thought sarcastically as he threw the hundredth’s dulled steak knife down towards the pile of worn utensils below him he’d been using as a chisel.
He sheathed the golden wrench on the loop of his belt before widening his stance and lowering it for balance.
'Now. Just… slowly… and carefully…’
His back against the cutout he made on the ceiling, he pushed upwards with his whole body to take the piece out as gently as he could. A beat was skipped by his heart as the shoddily built stack of furniture he used as a foothold beneath him wobbled.
Nearly losing balance, he steadied himself by pushing harder against the ceiling, inadvertently pushing out the block of stone prematurely.
“Shit!” He jumped to the side and summoned a pebble as a scaffold, watching in horror as the pile of furniture loudly turned into a pile of rubble along with the entirety of the ceiling.
He jumped up and out of the cell and immediately looked around in a panic, breathing a sigh of relief as nothing and no one seemed to be coming. At least, not yet.
'Well, jail cell escaped,’ he mentally ticked the objective in his checklist, 'holy cement hell. What is this place?’
A giant room, almost the size of a football field, was filled with nothing but pillars and columns to support the ceiling that was two stories high. There was nothing else but the ceiling, the walls, and the floor.
'I feel like I’m in a silent film. What is this colour?’
From eighties disco to modern brutalism, the jarring change from the painfully vivid colours to bland and boring grey couldn’t be described in words. Cold and unfeeling cement, unadorned walls and ceilings, un-individualistic columns and supports— every single thing around him was made of cement.
Not a single piece of furniture nor a speck of dust. Just an un-coloured stone.
Except for the floor.
'Disco cells have disco roofs. Who’d have thunk?’
Each cell buried in the floor was coloured differently, with no meaning nor pattern immediately elucidating its contents. There are numbers on top, like proper jail cells, but nothing else to tell what colour meant. If it even meant anything.
He looked down at his own mess of a jail cell, staring at the rubble of pink and grey and glass.
'Should’ve just punched my way out if this shit was going to happen anyway,’ he groaned, looking down at the massive hole made by the collapse of the ceiling. 'Must’ve hit a load-bearing pebble or some shit. How the hell am I going to cover this up?’
Like a kid hiding stuff from his parents, Calvin took out a large blanket and laid it over the hole, taping it on with some duct tape before snapping his fingers and turning it into the same shade of white as the other parts of the roof.
'I can still kinda see it—’, he pursed his lips, squinting and tilting his head at the blanket before shrugging to himself a second later, '—eh, good enough.’
He turned his head sideways, reading the number written on the corner of his cell’s ceiling.
'Four-nineteen. Of course, it’s one off,’ he chuckled. Turning to the other cells, the seriousness of the situation dawned back on him, 'That’s a lot of cells… and potentially kidnapped people— no, find one person first, then find a way out, and hopefully find a way out with everyone. And hopefully— alive.’
He raised his wrist and pulled his sleeve, opening the 'stalker’s best friend’ app that Quinn downloaded into his holowatch. A holographic panel appeared, showing every single holowatch currently connected to a network.
Currently, Batty’s watch was marked.
'Was she unreachable because of this?’ Calvin thought as he walked towards her direction. 'It’s a different network, it kinda makes sense— wait, she’s close?’
He walked faster, watching both the map and the floor in front of him, brows raising as he neared Batty’s mark.
'Cell seven. Lucky number,’ he smirked looking down on the unassuming green-coloured cell, ' That fortune-telling woman did say this was the fastest. Didn’t know it was this fast.’
Calvin took a knee and knocked on the floor. A hollow stone-y thunk rang out, assuring him of the space underneath. He waited for a reply, a knock or a voice, but none came.
'Is she even alive in there? I need to get in… but I’m not chiselling through that shit again.’
He started looking around the cell, trying to look for any sort of alternative way to open it. A lever, a button, a holographic panel.
He clicked his tongue, disappointed in finding nothing even after a moment’s perusal.
'Damn, so it was a power? Does that mean only one person can open all this shit?’ He looked around in disbelief at the amount of cells buried underground. 'That’s a fire code violation. Pure evil. Straight to jail. No question.’
He stood there with his arms crossed, tapping his foot lightly against the floor in annoyance. Gears clanged and banged in his head as he tried his best to think of a way to open the cell below him discretely— and, more importantly, quickly. He didn’t have the time, like with his own escape.
“Fuck!” A loud shout, not his own this time, made Calvin jump.
Literally.
'Whoop—’, he summoned a pebble near the ceiling and hanged off of it, '—did they see me?’
He looked around while mentally counting to ten to make sure his pebble didn’t disappear on him. A man’s stomps could be heard from the hallway, making Calvin relax and release his held breath as he remained unseen.
'That was close,’ he thought, 'I need a better place to hide.’
A couple of quick and quiet uses of [Jumper], to launch and to land, and he was quickly hidden on top of one of the supporting foundations nearby.
'This is good. No one ever looks up.’
He sat and waited, looking towards the room’s open entrance.
A man walked in, undeniably a scrapper by his getup, stomping through like a belligerent goblin grumbling and cursing at thin air.
“I swear I’m going to put him into one of those machines if I find the fucker,” he murmured quite loudly.
'That’s the guy,’ Calvin thought, recognizing the Scrapper, 'the guy with the key.’
As if to prove his conjecture, the man placed his hand on the edge of one of the cells. A glassy sheen covered its surface before breaking apart and folding to the sides, opening the 'door’ and showing him an empty cell.
“Damn fucking rooms with random fucking numbers… how am I supposed to find any shit here? Who thought it was a good idea? Why couldn’t we just use normal fucking jails?” The Scrapper grumbled and moved on to the next cell.
He watched the man below, scratching his chin as he started planning, 'If I kill him…’
Calvin paused, brows furrowing at the thought that had just formed.
'You already killed. Red, and that other guy. They’re all terrorists. Kidnapping, cannibalistic, murdering terrorists,’ he tried to reason with the unreasonably late voice of conscience and humanity popping up to stop his plans.
When his guilt and morality refused to leave his stomach, Calvin almost groaned out loud and entertained its request.
'Fuck it. I guess I can just make him open it,’ he let out a breath, changing his plan ’No to murder, but yes to threats and torture I guess.’
He dropped down, making sure to quieten his landing by negating it, before sneak-crouching towards the man. He navigated the space between the cell’s ceilings, making sure not to step on any of them else he makes a hollow thump with each footstep.
As soon as he arrived, he made his hand flat like a blade and pulled it back, 'Neck chop! Wait, no, I need him awake. Chokehold!’
“Ack!” The man, expectedly surprised by the arm suddenly snaking around his neck, let out a brief scream and a curse, “What the fuck is— who the fuck are you—mmph!”
“Shit,” Calvin cursed as he covered the man’s mouth and tightened his choke, “how about you shut the fuck up when your throat's getting squeezed, huh?”
“Mmph! Mmm!” The scrapper scratched and did his best to pry him off to no avail.
“Goddamn. Here’s what we’re going to do, okay? I’m going to take you to that cell over there— can you stop flailing while I’m talking? It’s rude,” he squeezed tighter, trying to threaten the man, “I need you to do something simple, okay? Just do your thing and open that cell over there and we’ll be good to— did something crack?”
As he asked the question, something unexpected popped up.
Super Absorb
Super Power: Never-ending Stomach detected. Absorb? Yes No
He froze for a second before instinctively releasing his hold and pushing the body away.
“Shit,” he murmured, kneeling down and prodding the man. He checked his pulse, despite the window clearly telling him he wouldn’t have it.
The man was dead.
Worse, the 'key’ wasn’t even his power.
“Focus, Calvin. Hold it in. Find out how he opens the cells,” he muttered, forcefully trying to stop the bug-like feeling in his stomach. “Focus.”
With hurried hands, he went through the man’s pockets.
'Half-eaten granola bar, bundle of lint, cool looking stone— how the hell was he opening the cells?’
He grabbed the man’s shoulder and flipped him over.
Super Equip
Super Gear: Scrap Chestplate detected. Equip? Yes No
Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
'I swear even a random cardboard box strapped to someone’s chest is probably a piece of tinker tech at this point,’ he thought while pocketing the armour.
He searched the body a second time, more thoroughly this time, trying to find even a semblance that could be something. Even a tiny piece of paper saying 'tinker tech’ would’ve sufficed, but all he found were crumbs and unmentionable litter.
'How did he do it? Think… he put his palm on the floor and it opened—’, he checked the man’s hand again, '—no gloves, no bracelets, no rings… not even a tattoo. Weirdly soft and smooth, except for the large scar on… his palm.’
He felt his stomach churn again, but he had to check the immediate thought he had.
Fingers on palm, he pushed and felt it thoroughly. Sure enough, there was something hard there. Not bone or sinew, unless the man’s anatomy was as scrappy as his clothes. It was like a lump of metal, which hopefully wasn’t a form of super cancer.
'Kinda cool, kinda gross,’ he thought. 'Would it still work when he’s dead? I really don’t want to dig it out.’
He dragged the man’s body over to the nearby cell and pressed his palm hard on top. Unexpectedly, a shimmer covered the surface, breaking it apart like someone cracking open an egg made of glass.
The cell below was empty, very much the opposite of Calvin’s relief.
“Haah…”, he dropped the hand and sat back, 'Got kidnapped, escaped, killed the warden, and didn’t have to cut the keys out of his hand. This has all the makings of a good day so far.’
After the brief piece of respite, he took the cadaver into his pocket and jogged back to Batty’s cell. Taking it out again, he did the same thing as earlier.
'Please be alive, please be alive, please be—’, he repeated in his head while the cell opened, only to pause and squint as soon as it did. “Batty?”
“Wha?” A relatively normal-looking— albeit naked— person was chilling on the floor, surrounded by what Calvin could only describe as a druggie’s dream weekend.
Bags of chips, bottles of alcohol, cigarette butts, and a plethora of unidentifiable but unmistakeably-illegal substances.
“I’m… not a bat?” The man replied, the slur in his voice as intense as the waft of debauchery hitting Calvin’s face. Well, mask, but he could still smell it.
He looked back down at his app before squinting at the man again, “Who are you?”
“Who am I? Why? Are you gonna snitch? I’m going to kill you if you snitch,” he threatened unthreateningly as his eyes drooped and his body wobbled to the side. “Listen, man, I’m just taking a break from all the— cult stuff. Okay? Please don’t tell anyone.”
“Break?” He echoed, turning serious. “You a Scrapper?”
“Scr— pft—”, the man snort-chuckled, “Scrapper. Funny name. Scrappa’. Crappa’. Haah… hey, I have an idea. I got some extra moondust… somewhere around here. I’m sure I’ll find it. It’s not as good as the shit they gave the Named, you know the vials and shit, but it’s good enough for me. Tell you what, come down here, close that up, and take some with me. It’s good, it makes the voices quiet and even gives you normal dreams for a bit… just don’t tell people and I’ll give you some.”
Calvin listened to the man’s slurring, trying to decode his words, “Dreams?”
“The dreams, man. You know? The memories, it’s— crazy. It’s making me crazy. I have to—”, his arms flapped to the floor, struggling to even pinch the powder next to him.
Eventually, he succeeded and took it to his mouth, tasting it a bit before fully spreading it across his entire tongue. The man writhed like he was being electrocuted for a moment before relaxing again.
“What the fuck…” Calvin, watching this, couldn’t help but feel disturbed.
“That’s the stuff,” the man murmured after a moment before looking back up at him, “oh, hey man. Nice to know you’re still here.”
His eye twitched, “You were talking about dreams?”
“What dreams?”
Calvin wanted to go down and smack the druggie but he didn’t want to break himself out twice, “Just— do you have a watch?”
“Watch?” The man’s head wobbled to look to the left. “Watch watch. Ah, that watch. Yeah, I do. Not really mine, though. Just stole it, right? Well, she’s not going to need it soon, so I don’t really think it’s stealing if I’m going to get—”
“Where’s the person you stole it from?” He interrupted the man’s yapping.
“Uhh…” the man paused like a computer with twelve kilobytes of RAM before coming back alive a few seconds later, “…they’re two floors down, in the belly of the beast— well, they call it belly, but it’s more like the mouth really, or the spoon… spoons. Spoon room. Funny word, spoon—”
Calvin closed the cell as the man started rambling again. He sighed and stored the dead Scrapper beside him before standing up.
'Goddamn it, it’s never easy, huh?’ He grumbled opening the app and disabling the 'target’ option he used to find Batty’s watch. ’Two floors down… finger’s crossed they have stairs.’
He turned to the only exit in the massive room, the same place the dead Scrapper in his pocket had walked in from, and started his crouched journey to a different floor. From giant jail room, to hallway, to stairwell, Calvin sneaked through carefully and cautiously.
'I have to be an expert with this by now,’ he joked, feeling like this life’s events have had a similar theme so far.
He didn’t dally and explore any of the other rooms this time, as there was no other room— apart from a small pantry. He nicked a few snacks from there before continuing, as was tradition by now.
Finally, arriving at the stairwell, a disappointed click came from his mouth.
'I wasn’t expecting a detailed map, but I was still thinking they’d label the floors— oh, they did.’
Jail.
Four red letters, barely intelligible, painted with non-dominant hands from the looks of it. Simple, efficient, and ugly as hell.
He shrugged and headed to the stairs heading down, immediately overthinking everything as he started planning for when he gets spotted. Which never happened, because no one came by.
'I guess they don’t like downstairs?’
He got to the next floor and immediately felt the goblin inside him wake up as he read the words on the floor.
Storage.
'Maybe I can take a peek—’, The loot goblin and the 'completionist’ inside him waged war against his conscience, only to be smacked down by the mechanic he hated the most— time-sensitive quests.
'The faster I make sure she’s alive, the better I can plan getting out of here,’ he reasoned, un-gamifying his thoughts.
He moved on to the lower level, immediately feeling his decision to be the correct one after seeing the word on the floor.
'Lab.’
----------------------------------------
“Why’s it so dark?”
A man shivered as he took a step into the room, the chill of the underground crawling up his skin despite the thick pelts and metals forcefully donned on him.
His eyes scanned left to right, green reflected from them as he watched the unknown but obviously important gooey liquid float undisturbed in giant tanks. He watched the bubbles, unnaturally floating up and down and in-place like they themselves were as imprisoned as the people soon to be put inside them.
“John,” a gruff voice took his attention away from the spine-tingling liquid. “How’s the rat?”
He turned to the other person in the room. A friend, from before all of… this. He was sitting on a bench he probably dragged from another room since he was sure the last one wasn’t as clean as this.
“Wiped her down and put her to sleep. I’m just waiting for the go from upstairs,” he answered, walking closer and taking a seat beside him. “And I told you, stop calling me that.”
“What? Your name?” The man smirked with disdain.
“One of these days you’ll get caught, and the two of us,” he pointed to the both of them before pointing to the green liquid, “will end up in there. Just because you couldn’t follow the simplest fucking rule—”
“Just think the rule’s bullshit,” his friend interrupted, “we already have names.”
“You know why it’s there.”
“'You’ll get names when you earn it,’” he quoted with a mocking voice, “fuck that. I like my name. I already earned it.”
The man scoffed, “How? By coming out of your mama’s womb?”
“Hey, wasn’t easy, but we did it,” he nodded, grinning at the man. “Look, all I’m saying it— they’re shit at naming people. Have you heard what they gave those three schmucks sent to their deaths? Red, Blue and Green. Fucking Green. Named them like a box of crayons.”
“They’re as smart as a box of crayons,” he agreed, “who knows, you might become Blue later. Saw her getting dragged in earlier.”
“Her? I thought Blue was a guy?”
“No, the last guy before her was a guy.”
“Well, fuck that. I’d rather be Red.”
“Don’t like the sound of Blue?”
“Don’t like the sound of being a human shield. Explosions are cooler.”
“Well, tough luck, heard the guy’s dead. Can’t even get the body back.”
“No shit.”
“Yes shit,” he nodded, “only Blue came back.”
“Whatever, shit names anyway.”
“Shit names, but it’s theirs,” he smacked his friend on the head, “stop calling me mine.”
“Yeah, yeah. I just want a power. We joined earlier than most and we’re still stuck here cleaning people and doing maintenance shit,” he murmured, sinking into the bench, “actually, what’s the rat’s?”
“The rat’s?”
“Her power. What’s her power?
“How do you know she has one?”
“I don’t, but she’s in that room,” his friend raised his brows knowingly, “as dumb as this cult is, I don’t think even they want to risk torturing someone without powers. Even if they were, it wouldn’t last this long.”
“One hatchling is more than enough to deal with.”
“Exactly,” his friend nodded, “So, she has a power, and I just hope it’s something good. Something like Mason’s or— or fuckin’ Boe’s! Can you imagine that? Being invisible all the time?”
He rolled his eyes and shook his head with a chuckle, “Yeah, like they’re gonna give a pissant like you that kind of power. Wouldn’t be surprised if they give you something like an extra arm though.”
“I just want to be up there, not down here doing jackshit,” he laid his head back and looked at the ceiling. “Weird… was the ceiling always this dark?”
----------------------------------------
“That was easier than last time,” Calvin muttered while cracking his neck.
He looked down on the two unconscious Scrappers on the bench, smacking their face to make sure they were knocked out for good. He did forcefully make them ingest a drop of [Dreamless Drops], but who knew if they were faking?
After giving them another light smack, he turned around and sighed at the sight.
“Hello again, weird green goo,” he greeted as if it was an old friend. The tanks filling the other end of the room was a sight he’d rather not have seen, but here he was. “It’s technically my placenta if you think about it in a weird— ugh, yeah, maybe not. Go away thoughts.”
He turned back around and searched the two unconscious Scrappers, surprised that neither even had a piece of Scrap Armour on their person.
“Judging from their conversation, they’re more like staff than henchmen so it makes sense,” he spoke out loud. “Maybe stop muttering. I am on a stealth mission.”
He dragged the two to the corner, put a blanket on them, and camouflaged both the blanket and the corner to make it seem too dark to see anything. Of course, a single flashlight would reveal the illusion, but it was good enough for him.
Calvin carefully peeked out of the room, making sure there was no one there, before moving on to the next door in the hallway of unlabeled and identical doors.
'If Batty was that rat they were talking about, then she’s definitely somewhere here. I just have to keep looking,’ he renewed his motivation and started lightly jogging to the next room and peeking through the gap in the door, “And, of course, it’s another break room. How many freaking break rooms does an evil lair need?”
Despite his whispered outburst, he still went inside and pocketed as much as he could, even grabbing a paper bag with someone’s name on it. At least it looked like a name.
'This guy either has severe tremors or is literally just illiterate,’ he raised the paper bag while munching on the sandwich he grabbed inside, 'good sandwich though.’
Moving on to other rooms was, quite luckily, uneventful. Most were either filled to the brim with more tanks, more muck, or more empty space— another theme he seemed to be seeing with evil bases.
'Why are there so many rooms? Why is everything filled with the same green liquid? Did they buy it in a goddamn wholesale?’
It wasn’t until nearly the end of the hallway that he finally found something that broke the pattern.
“Huh,” he twisted the knob, weirded out by the highly unusual sound it made, “It’s locked? They’re never locked. Why is this one locked?”
The answer was simple: because there’s something important inside. At least that’s what he wants to believe.
“Heh, I can finally try this out,” he smiled like a child and knelt down, taking out a set of tools from his pocket. Lockpicking tools. “Okay… tension thingy on the bottom slot, then hook on top— hoh, nothing on one. A click on two. Nothing on three—”
He did this for a while before losing patience and just opening the door by brute force.
“Fuckin’ whatever. I’ll just get an unlocking power,” he murmured as he twisted the surprisingly weak lock until it broke open. “Fuck you, lock.”
He entered the room, cringing as the door’s hinges creaked like his knees did back on Earth, and closed the door behind him as quickly as he could. He then turned around and was stunned instantly at the sight of someone familiar inside something familiar.
“I was right,” he muttered, “I mean, the green goo and everyone having powers gave it away, but still. I couldn’t be sure until I saw you. And here you are.”
The power-sucking machine.
He didn’t have a good name for it. He didn’t know if it even had a name. He just knew it was it the instant he saw it.
It looked somewhat different from what he remembered. For one, he was decently certain that the last two times he saw it, it wasn’t plated in gold. Nor were there hieroglyphic symbols decorating the frame.
There also wasn’t an unconscious naked Batty floating in green goo.
But it was unmistakably the same machine. In essence, at least.
“You’re alive,” he muttered, walking up to the machine. He tapped the glass, trying to see if she would wake up or even just flinch. “And unconscious. Like the guy said.”
He ticked the objective in his head. Now for the next one: to get her out and get themselves out.
“The short path was the good path,” he said turning to the console by the side, “Let’s see now— man with bucket on his head, crow-slash-person standing with a scythe, or a beetle eating the sun… I wonder which one means 'open’?”
He ignored the console and turned to the glass again, punching it immediately. As expected, it did nothing. Except hurt his hand.
“Hmm… last time, Ina started hatching and the tubes opened by themselves. I don’t even know how to do that even if I wanted to, so that’s a now. The one before that, the first time, I ripped the wires out from the top,” he looked at Batty, currently unconnected to any sort of wiring, “so that’s also a no.”
He circled the machine, the only machine in the room, looking at it up and down. Right at the back, he spotted a couple of peculiarities.
One was a symbol: eight concentric rings, each having a circle in random points and in unpatterened sizes. It was the same one Dox showed the two of them to show who was responsible with both kidnappings.
'The Scrappers?’ Calvin was surprised for a moment before he shook his head. *'That’s dumb. They’re too dumb for that. Someone’s helping them, I’m guessing. Probably those terrorists— maybe the one with the gold beetles made this
He took a picture with his holowatch to show them later before continuing to the second peculiarity— a length wire. And, connected to it, a power outlet.
“It can’t be that easy,” he murmured, walking to the outlet and unplugging the machine.
Immediately, there was a hiss. The tube opened and out gushed the green goo and the naked Batty. Calvin used [Jumper] and caught the woman before she hit her head on the floor.
“It’s that easy,” he smirked, feeling light as something finally went his way. “Now… what to do with this woman.”
He jumped out of the puddle of green goo and placed Batty on the floor, taking out a couple of pink blankets to cover her before squinting at her face. He checked her pulse, relieved she was alive, before opening her eyelids and flashing a light in her pupils.
“Dry and covered. But still asleep. I can fix that.”
slap
“Wake up,” he whispered after lightly slapping her face.
slap slap
“I don’t think this is working.”
slap slap slap
“That’s for making me go through this shit,” he whispered, betting on his un-luck to wake her up at the inopportune time. “Maybe I can’t fix this. Damn it, how do I wake up… ah—”
slap
He smacked his forehead this time, “I forgot about that.”
Super Equip
Super Buff: Smelling Salts detected. Equip? Yes No
'Thank you again, old man,’ he nodded to the ceiling. 'Wait, he’s not dead.’
Calvin popped open the vial, cork in his mouth, immediately getting a waft of the strong odour. He groaned and nearly vomited from the smell, but he pushed through knowing the 'buff’ it gave. Afterwards, he waved it below Batty’s nose, waiting for the effect to manifest— namely, an abrupt awakening via stimulation of the olfactory nerve.
“Ugh…” Batty groaned.
Before he could welcome her back to the land of the awake, his ears picked up the horrifying sound of a hinge creaking behind him.
“—it’s fine, we’ll be quick. Just look— what the hell is this? Who the fuck are you?!”
“Damn it,” Calvin clicked his tongue and immediately blackened himself, Batty, and the entire room, with [Colour Control].
“S—shit!” The Scrapper backed out of the door. “Intruder!”
“What?!” “Intruder?!” “Whoa!” More voices shouted behind him.
Calvin followed, dashing with [Jumper] and immediately punching the closest face.
The man flew back with a pained grunt, straight towards the others behind him.
Calvin stepped out of the room and looked around, stunned at the amount of people he saw. Armoured people.
“Shit,” he cursed, getting a rough headcount of at least a dozen.
One of the goons pointed at him and shouted the most goon thing ever, “Get him!”
A part of the hallway turned into pure darkness, immediately hiding Calvin in his already-black getup. He jumped up and zig-zagged above them, trying to confuse and keep himself invisible.
“He’s up there!” One of the goons pointed straight towards Calvin.
'He can see me?!’ Calvin was alarmed, immediately switching to attacking the man who pointed him out.
He kicked off of the ceiling and sent an axe kick down the man. Arms were held up and immediately broken as Calvin’s strength proved too much.
“Ah!” The man crumpled with a scream. “Mark him!”
'Mark?’ Immediately, he felt something on him. Like an aura of sorts was surrounding him like a wave of heat.
“There you are,” one of the Scrappers grabbed him from behind. “Grab him!”
Calvin pried him off easily, but two others grabbed him again. Before he could even attempt to escape those two, more tackled and grabbed all his limbs and held him against the wall.
“Fucking— get off me!” He struggled, using [Jumper] on his back to push against the people holding him down.
It worked, albeit only for a moment as they were on him once more soon after.
“Fuck!” He cursed, trying harder. A headache stung him, followed by the aura disappearing.
“I can’t mark him no more!” One of the other Scrappers shouted. “What the fuck?!”
“No need,” another Scrapper came up, holding a rather large butcher’s knife in his hands. “Go tell someone upstairs.”
The marking Scrapper immediately shouted, “Don’t kill! That’s meat!”
“I know, but we don’t need all of him, right?” The butcher Scrapper grinned.
'Shit, shit! Think!’ Calvin started panicking as he watched the men discuss his demise. '[Jumper]? There’s too many, they’ll just grab me again. I can try blocking them immediately with pebbles? Shit, what else do I have? That sixth power! No, I’ll pass out… I can’t control that. Fuck, think—’
He stopped panicking. Actually, he stopped thinking all together.
Another person arrived in the hallway.
“But I do.” Another one spoke calmly. “I have a lot of things to ask.”
“I won’t take his mouth then, that’s fine right—” the butcher turned around and froze. “Who the fuck are you?”
“Lightspeed,” the white-masked hero nodded towards Calvin, “I’m that guy’s teacher.”