Mission Complete?

"Huh? Did the light flicker?" Seamus asked before quieting down.

It was silent.

But how could that be? Moments ago something had been rolling down the flight of stairs announcing its great and weighty presence? Now it seemed as if even breathing had been outlawed.

Even after both Seamus and I finished trying to come up with descriptors in our heads, there were still no noises to be heard.

"Why, why did he stop?" Seamus turned to me and asked confused. His expression was a mix of worry and confusion. I knew he wasn't worried about Smith, however.

I approached the door with great skepticism.

"Hey!" I shouted facing the sturdy metal door.

No reply.

"Yo! Smith!" I continued to ask. I was sure the overly friendly attitude would have pissed off the man right into replying. Did he disappear into another dimension realizing that he would never bust down our door? If he did, he would have to reconsider his critical thinking skills.

"Dan…" Seamus called out causing me to turn around.

"Should we open it?" He asked warily. I heard what he said and ruminated on it for a good bit considering my options.

"No" That sounded very unwise.

"What if he is just pretending" I continued before pressing my ear against the door.

Still silence.

"Seamus, check the cameras" I said while perking my ears. Could Smith exhibit such great self-restraint? I knew for a fact I would at least scratch my ears.

Seamus nodded and sat down at the wall of monitors.

"The cameras… they seem out...." Seamus said carefully observing the screens in front of him.

"It wasn't like that a moment ago…" I muttered weighing the possibilities.

Bang

The door was suddenly banged on causing me to flinch.

"Hel…." The faint sound of a pleading voice. I felt a cold shiver down my spine.

"He- Hey Seamus… We- We should stay here a while longer…" It was a very perturbing scenario.

"Seamus?" I asked again before turning to look at him.

"Hey" I continued noticing that Seamus was only intently watching the wall of screens.

I grit my teeth and ran towards him. Approaching slowly would only make me more terrified!

I grabbed Seamus by the shoulders and shook him.

"Hey!" I shouted causing Seamus to jolt.

"Wh- What happened?" He said startled. I could only stare at him dumbfounded.

"Eh? The cameras are back" He then suddenly exclaimed causing me to turn to the cameras. There were many rooms covered by this monitor wall.

Some cameras appeared to have been cracked or broken in an attempt to disarm them by the gangs but a feed still came through for most.

"Wait… Are those government soldiers!?!" Seamus exclaimed in surprise.

"F*ck Dan! Let's get out of here!" He shouted before bolting it towards the door.

"That's-!" I wanted to stop Seamus but I was too slow to react. He unlocked the door just as I reached him.

"DAN! STOP!" Seamus shouted.

"NO! You stop! Are you crazy?!" The anomaly with the cameras earlier had disappeared but that didn't mean it was safe!

In fact, the metallic scent of blood entered my nostrils from the slightly ajar door. I finally stopped struggling with Seamus but he didn't open it. Not right away anyway. It seemed he realized he was being reckless.

"I will, I will open it" Seamus said before sighing and mustering up the courage.

Clang

The metal door was made ajar with a creak. But for Seamus, the area was pitch dark. The light from the ajar door was not enough to see what was in the stairwell.

He flung the door open.

"He is dead…!" I exclaimed with a mix of surprise and terror.

There were bits and pieces of charred flesh dotted about that left my stomach churning. To make matters worse, I could see some of his body parts were missing, perhaps turned to ashes by whatever seared him.

"Snap out of it, Dan" Seamus shot me a glance and said.

"I'm- I'm ok!" I had already seen Seamus butcher a body so I could hold my own, I just needed a moment to recover. The dark red pool of blood from what used to be a man in his 50 was simply too much to take in.

Splash

Seamus trudged forward. The pool of blood did not impede him in any way. I ignored my urge to gulp and simply followed after him.

With my shoes now slippery, I tried my best not to fall while following Seamus up the stairs. Fortunately, the trek up was surprisingly smooth. There weren't even any real signs of the stairs being damaged.

"I wonder what that was all about…" I muttered as we continued up.

By the time Seamus and I exited the secret stairwell we were met by the sight of a dead mutant and knocked out gang members.

The lizard-like beast had its mouth wide open revealing missing teeth and egregious internal wounds. Its scales were fractured in multiple areas making for quite the surprise.

"Hey!" Seamus called out to one of our members. Did the worst which he was suspecting really occur?

He ran up to Rohawk's middle-aged body slumped on the ground dyed red with blood.

"He- He is breathing!" Seamus said with surprise and glee. I also checked some other gang members and found that the same had occurred.

"We need to get out of here quickly!" There was not even time to loot the mutant!

"Hey Dan what- What are you doing?!" Seamus exclaimed seeing that I was approaching the mutant.

I flexed my hand for a bit before pummeling it right down the throat of the beast.

"You- You want the crystal?" He asked and I nodded.

"I don't know if you got one from Professor Requiem's corpse last time but…" I said as I continued to dig into the beast's body.

"This one has eaten plenty and has been around for a good bit, it should have something" I continued as I clawed through the beast's body with one hand. Its exterior was tough but not its inside, especially not after it died.

Finally, after entering even my head into the maw of the beast I managed to grab onto something.

"A crystal" I pulled out a crystal after all causing me to smile.

"You got it so let's scram! Take one or two people quickly!" Seamus said to me. I nodded and looked for someone.

I soon found Hawk and for the other person, I jumped out of the secret tunnel and entered back into the office.

"Ah! Ah…" I found Jimmy but… I could tell there were more than a couple of bullet wounds in him. Worst of all, I couldn't say he died peacefully. His face was frozen with an expression of unyielding ire.

Seamus had climbed out of the hole by this point carrying Malcolm, as well as Rohawk. He also pulled up Hawk.

"Make an exit and then grab Hawk!" Seamus told me pointing at a wall.

I blinked for a bit before turning to him as if to ask if he was really asking me to bust through a wall.

"Sigh…" I grabbed the crystal from my pocket. I couldn't possibly crash through this wall without killing myself under my current state.

"Are you-? Now?!" Seamus asked, dying a little inside. He must have thought we would get caught for sure.

But I absorbed the crystal all the same. The mutational energy from the crystal started gushing into my arm causing me to tremble from the searing pain.

"Argh!" Feeling pained, I looked at the wall in front of me and winced.

"Let's go!" I ran towards it while maintaining a firm hold on the diminishing energy in the crystal.

CRASH