35 Fire manipulator

In the main building of the base,

"Where is Tyler?!!" shouted aloud colonel Malcom.

"Sir. He went with the helicopters, to provide support for the other base that is being attacked," said a soldier that was akin to a secretaire for the colonel.

"Who fucking gave this order?!!" shouted the colonel again, enraged that his most trustful ability user went out of the base.

The soldier lowered his head but didn't say nothing, because it was the colonel himself that gave the order for Tyler to go on that mission. The colonel wanted to be the responsible for saving the other base, and gain merits because of that.

The colonel looked at his secretary and asked, "How many ability users we still have on the base?"

"Apart from the two that went with Tyler, we have only three remaining, but with all respect, sir, they are not well adapted to their abilities. They may not be able to hide it in public," said the soldier, giving a file about the three soldiers that had abilities.

The colonel looked at it, and said, "A fire manipulator, one that can breathe underwater and a guy who can read emotions? The heck is that useful for? Apart from the fire manipulator, those other abilities are useless in combat."

"Yes sir, they are deemed important assets, but only under the right circumstances. The fire manipulator is still learning how to control his ability, currently is not a good idea to send him to fight. After all, it's just a riot. We can organize the soldiers and deal with it in the normal way"

The colonel looked at his secretary, and while shaking his head in disapproval said, "That's why I'm a colonel and you still are only a soldier Sanderson, you don't have foresight. Do you really believe this is a normal riot? Made by angry people? Just when another base is being attacked? Not only that, but they also cut off the communications. This is a combined attack from the rebels, and I'm sure they have ability users with them. They would not risk that much without some 'safe guard measures' in place."

"Permission to speak freely, Sir," said the soldier. It was a custom from the army to ask for permission to give opinions on matters when talking with a superior.

"I don't have time for that, soldier. Save your opinions to yourself. You already talked too much and made me lose too much time. Gather all the solders from the building, we are going to the barracks and try to save the situation, leave behind only ten soldiers to guard my office." said the colonel already walking out of his room, while the secretary stood there with an ugly face, "And fucking bring me that fire manipulator!!!"

The barracks were the place where most of the troops usually stood. The colonel wanted to go there for two reasons, one he was without radio and could not command them from his office, and two, it would be the safest place if the rebels were aiming for him. But he doubted that, if it was the case, they would already be trying that by now.

What the colonel truly believed was that the rebels were aiming for the lab, and if he was right, they would set loose that beast that stood jailed inside it, and to fight that monster, there was only one thing that Malcom could do.

'Only an entire platoon will be able to hold that monster, if at least Tyler was here...' thought the colonel while grabbing his own pistol from his holster for the first time in months.

...

In front of the laboratory building,

Jane kept pacing around by the side of the truck they had stolen, it was a military truck, the one they would use to escape.

The plan to escape was simple. They would fake to be leaving with the doctors to protect them from the rebels that had just invaded the base, in the chaos, the soldiers would listen to the one with higher command, and that's why Jane was using a captain insignia that she stole. It was a rank enough to have command but not too high to cause suspicion.

"They are late!" said Jane, looking at the clock in her pulse.

She could not hear any shots, and the lab was weirdly silent from outside. This was not how things were supposed to be. "What went wrong?" asked herself. She knew things could go wrong during the invasion of the lab, but this was not something going wrong, it was something going unexpectedly.

All this tension and the wait were making Jane nervous. She stopped pacing around and grabbed a cigarette from her pocket. "Damned addiction," cursed her aloud while lighting up the cigarette, but the moment she was going to take the first drag of smoke, she heard the noise of glass shattering coming from the laboratory building and looked at it.

~thud~

"The fuck?" shouted her, almost choking with the smoke when seeing a body hitting the ground, she looked up and saw a window with broken glasses and a man almost naked standing in front of it, the man was on the fourth floor of the building, and the dim light that came from behind him didn't show his face.

Jane threw away the cigarette and grabbed her rifle. She didn't know who that man was, but it was not one of them.

"Everyone get ready," said her aloud, but the six guys close to her were already on alert, with their rifles pointed at the man on the fourth floor.

The man looked down at the dead body on the ground and suddenly jumped from the window.

~thud~

No one expected for the man to just kill himself suddenly, but once they saw his figure standing up on the ground, without even kneeling, they knew they were doomed. That man was an ability user.

"Err... Is not that Mark?" said John, from inside the truck, because he recognized the green eyes that his friend had recently gained.