"Damn rat!" A flash of Insight gave me time to duck down right as a chunk of metal whizzed over my head. My head stayed neutral as I looked back, spotting the gang leader’s outstretched arm, stuck mid-throw. That only lasted a moment before Torren gripped it and twisted the chrome backward like a twig.
The gang leader didn’t scream - maybe a Pain Editor? - but he did grit his teeth and slam his other fist into Torren’s face. Torren barely flinched back as he kept his grip on the other arm. He twisted, throwing the guy onto the ground, and slammed his entire body weight onto his chest in some kind of grapple.
He'd be fine. I hope.
I threw myself into the opened door of the room, my rifle raised and ready. My eyes rapidly adjusted to the dark as I looked around, half expecting to see Feras’s corpse drug out into the main room. Instead, something entirely different lay before me.
The last gang member, this one dressed like a jack-o-lantern, lay down on the ground. The fox, its fur covered in blood, licked its bloody lips as it sat on the guy’s chest. Bits of arterial spray sputtered from the ganger’s torn open throat, bringing back faint memories of that short time I spent with Iris.
The guy attempted one last shift as his eyes glazed over, completely incapable of moving the cute creature as it looked up at me. It looked… significantly less cute covered in its victim’s blood. The fox hopped off the guy's chest, once more taking its position outside the bathroom as it licked the blood off its paw and looked up at me.
The room itself was different than I remember. I could be wrong, but a body halfway through the wall into the next room wasn’t there the first time around. And one of the other corpses was almost torn entirely in half. The other two were in states of dismemberment without heads. Just what kind of drugs was the bruiser on?
I let out a cold breath I hadn’t even known I was holding as I leaned up against the side of the doorway. I swallowed back bile as I stared hollowly at the absolute carnage. “You need help, Torren?”
”Don’t worry about it, princess.” Torren called, his voice straining but entirely confident. “This is the most fun I’ve had in weeks.”
If you say so… I let Cold-Blooded drop, instantly feeling my legs start to go limp. I moved off to the side, right next to the shattered window, and slowly slid down the wall as the strength left my limbs entirely. Something squelched underneath me, but I was too scared to look what it was as I took a moment.
My shoulder burned where the bullet grazed me, sending fiery tendrils of pain blazing outward. It wasn’t the only spot that ached. My ribs and entire chest hurt from the SMG rounds my body armor caught, feeling like sharp ice under my skin. My side bled somewhat consistently as I pressed down on it. Nothing felt broken. I hope.
That wasn’t even mentioning the cold.
So cold.
So very cold.
All of the body warmth had left my body almost entirely, leaving me involuntarily shaking in my boots as I my body tried to generate some kind of heat. Any kind of heat. Even my heart felt half frozen as it slowly tried to pump frigid blood through me.
I wrapped trembling arms around myself, feeling the shakes spread through my entire body, as I ducked under my jacket further. They weren’t the only things spreading. My emotions, finally unmuted, returned with fury as my body started trembling for other reasons.
Had I really just done that? It felt- it felt wrong. Wronger than the last several times. I shivered once more, feeling the ghost impacts of the rifle as my hands squeezed the trigger.
Repeatedly.
I dropped my head between my knees, curling up on myself to keep what little heat I had as the cracks of the rifle replayed in my mind. For a few moments, I couldn’t tell what exactly I felt bad about. Not the murder, I don’t think. They attacked me first. Or they were going to. I just defended myself.
I think- was it because of the Perk? Because I used Cold-Blooded to hide from what I was doing? It didn’t even feel like me pulling the trigger. I almost, almost could convince myself that it wasn’t me. That it was someone else.
It had stolen my hesitations just as easily as I had stolen the gangers’ lives. A tremble went down my spine. Cold-Blooded was far scarier than I thought-
A sharp crackle echoed through the earpiece in my ear. “He’s dead. Feras good?”
I hesitated a moment as I lifted my head and looked down at my shaking body. I couldn’t let him see me like this. See me so weak. That was a death sentence in this line of work. I took a shaky breath and activated Cold-Blooded again, finding twisted solace in its effects.
The hurricane of emotions faded away. As did my attention to the pain and coldness of my body. They were still there, but instead, I just cataloged them and moved on. As simple as that. Once I knew I could talk without issue, I replied, “Yeah.”
“Nova.” Torren sighed. “Are you good? I got the feeling you weren’t quite a combatant when we first met.”
”Preem. Just a bit banged up.” My voice sounded hollow to my own ears. “You?” I had several other questions I wanted to ask the bruiser, like what the hell just happened to him, but now really wasn’t the time to have a fireside chat.
His voice returned to normal. “Content. Feras warned there wouldn’t be a lot of fighting on this one, but this'll tide me over for now.”
I flicked the safety for my rifle and pushed myself off the floor, letting the SB-17 hang loosely as I looked about the motel room. “You like fighting that much?”
”Zuku, there are three things in this world I love. The three Fs.” Torren’s voice doubled for a moment as he stepped into the motel room. The doubled voice stopped as he plucked the earpiece from his ear and turned it off.
Find this and other great novels on the author's preferred platform. Support original creators!
”Oh?” I arched a brow at the guy as a beat of cold crushed the horror at seeing Torren back to normal and absolutely coated in blood. It looked like he bathed in the stuff while I wasn't watching..
He opened his mouth to reply, closing it when he saw me. A flash passed through his eyes, almost like he wanted to ask me something, but it faded as he continued. He looked far more serious than I’d ever seen the guy. “Fun, fighting, and food… So this has been a pretty good gig so far. All I can eat, free food. You’re kinda fun sometimes, I guess. And now this!”
I don’t think I get it, but sure? Gigs were good if they paid well, not if they were fun. This one was mediocre at best. Worse, actually. It had far more danger than what we were originally led to believe, and it didn’t pay all that well. Still, that tech was too interesting to pass up on.
I looked out past the door at the corpses scattered around the parking lot. “Now what?”
”I’ll take Feras to a Medech we know.” Torren shrugged. “And don’t you have a meeting?”
Shit, I’d forgotten all about that. I was supposed to meet Master Telos today for the final fitting. Could I- could I even go to see him like this? I looked down at my blood-soaked clothes - hard not to get bloody considering the amount of it splattered around the motel room - and the bullet holes scattered about my jacket. That wasn't even mentioning my wounds. No, no I couldn’t.
Torren hustled to the bathroom, coming out with Feras in his arms. "What about the loot?”
“Drop him off then take whatever. Assuming it's still here. We’ll talk about it once we actually have a meeting. Chek?”
”Chek.” Torren walked out the door, the fox following him closely. He paused at the doorway. "Thank you, by the way. Probably would've been far worse off getting out of this on my own." He left before I could reply.
Okay, okay… what did I need to do?
Without annoyances like emotional baggage, my mind worked far smoother as a set of actions immediately came to mind. I left the motel and headed for my bike. Without a moment’s hesitation, I drove over to the jammer the gangers had set up.
The jammer looked roughly like one of those twenty-pound propane tanks used for grills and was shaded a pale tan. The entire thing had several jury-rigged wires and batteries strapped to it, making the thing look close to a homemade bomb. They weren't part of the original device considering the batteries were held up with duck tape and what looked like chewing gum, though was probably some kind of epoxy. My guess? The device was supposed to be used in a fixed position originally, so some gonk strapped a bunch of batteries to it to make it portable.
It looked like some kind of KairoTech Global device, at least based on the pyramid symbols all over it and the buttons in a language I definitely didn’t understand. Still, I could recognize a stop button no matter the language. They were typically the big red ones.
I smacked the button and checked my HUD. Back online. I snatched the device up and strapped it to my bike before moving over to the other only thing that immediately caught my interest in this place: the noise isolator.
I found it buried under my first victim's body. I shoved him off of it and picked the device up. It was significantly smaller than the other device. It looked like a data slate with some extra bits attached to the top and bottom. After tapping on the data slate portion, the screen turned on.
Small symbols were scattered about a massive-looking box area. The words Sonic Suppressor sat in bright white at the top of the boxed area. For a moment, I couldn’t figure out what was happening or how the thing worked.
I zoomed in on one of the symbols, recognizing it as a smaller device. Then it clicked that the symbols were small devices set up around the motel, working together with the main data slate to suppress all sound in the area. How exactly was still up in the air.
I checked the time- not near enough to find all the bits and pieces. A frown creased my lips as I saw Torren gently place Feras into his car and head for the driver's side. What to do-
Oh! Hope! I sent a quick text to her and left the Sonic Suppressor close to where I first got it. ‘Fine now, fight over. '
A moment later, a return message came. ‘You alright?’
’Yeah.’ I headed for one of the cars blocking the way, trying to turn it on. No dice. The thing was locked with a bio key, and considering its owner just died… I shifted the gear into neutral and headed for the front.
Torren drove over and hopped out, helping me push the car out of the way. We repeated it for the others, which were also locked with bio keys. No chance of me klepping one without a bypass… and I really wanted a car. They would be so much easier to cart my shit around with than a bike.
Torren gave me a mock salute before heading back for his car with the still-sleeping Feras. Just as he entered, I got another text from Hope. ’Nova. You leaving?’
’Important meeting for the infiltration. Can't miss it.’ I felt a bit bad about the whole situation, but that feeling drifted under the cold. I swung my leg back over my bike and followed Torren out of the Mortas Motel’s sketchy alley entrance. ‘I appreciate you.’
’Yeah, yeah. It’s not like you dragged me away from home to help you on my day off and then leave before I even get there.'
’Thank you.’ I sent back as I split off from Torren and headed to my apartment.
Hope sent back a skeptical nodding emoji, which brought a smile to my frozen face. She seemed quite nice once I got past her resting murder face and dead tired way of moving around.
Without pesky emotions getting in the way, I easily started to analyze just exactly how the fight went as I drove home. One thing stood out as I switched lanes and skirted past a slow car: I needed to be stronger. Maybe when I got some more Perks and-
No, that wasn’t right. I needed to have better decision-making in the first place. More Perks would help, but they would only hide my poor decisions, not fix them. Especially in similar situations. I replayed the mental analysis, nitpicking the fight for what I could’ve done better.
Immediately I noticed an issue: information. Rather, a lack of information. The only way I gathered information was by peeking out the window, which was incredibly dumb. What if I was shot? What if I hadn’t seen everyone? What if there were people just outside the door at a weird angle?
I had several tools for information gathering on me from when I first drove into the motel parking lot - my Scouter and Listener - so why hadn’t I tossed them around? It was literally their entire purpose. Thankfully, it didn’t matter this time or we’d be in an entirely different situation.
That wasn’t the only mistake though. My hesitations when pulling the trigger, although mostly driven off by Cold-Blooded, were objectively a weakness that would get me killed. It was stupid. Not sure how to fix that one though, so moving on.
My aim could use a lot of practice. Especially considering how easily the kick threw me off. I probably looked like an amateur while shooting. If it wasn’t for the advantages of having an off angle, Stalk, and the haze liquid obscuring me, I probably wouldn’t have even gotten one of them. I shouldn’t have gotten any of them. How did Mira do it?
And my body was incredibly weak. I could do better. I had thought about it jokingly in the past, but it was really about time I hit a gym or something after the gig was over. I could think of several reasons not to, but at the end of the day, being able to lift someone and shoot a rifle without too much of a hassle was too important to keep skipping workouts. I could figure that one out later though.
Before I arrived at my apartment, my brain tracked through dozens of smaller details I could’ve done better. Most of them were minor things that would've helped out a bit here and there.
I drove into my apartment’s parking garage as I wrapped up my breakdown of the fight. My biggest flaw about the entire thing was positioning. I shouldn’t have even been in Mortas Motel in the first place. I wasn’t prepared in the slightest when I arrived, and that by far outstripped the other mistakes. I should’ve done some more research instead of just trusting Feras to pick a safe place.
The root cause of all of this though? I’ve grown too lax since getting the interface. This was all stuff I’ve done far better in the past- well, except the actual fighting.
I need to step up my game. And soon. I won't be able to survive the increasingly volatile situations I'm finding myself in otherwise.