The Fight (1)

But as the small toss had proven, this was not an impossible battle. The weapon weird laser gun was definitely capable of harming altered individuals and mutants but that was the entire extent.

PEW PEW PEW

I ran horizontally skipping about and even rolling madly. The man seemed to be unwilling to move from his spot as he only shot at my dancing figure.

The main office was not plainly adorned. It was a circular room. As soon as one opened up the double doors they'd be facing a desk. There was however also some couches, chairs, and small tables darted elegantly about.

The paintings, the flower pots, there were many things I could throw.

PEW

I threw over a rose. It wasn't very aerodynamic but my timing was off and the shot was unbelievably close to me when it hit the flower.

"Ah, that burns…" The shot failed to dissipate entirely and the surface area of the flower was not an exact one-to-one match. My shirt was burned through and my skin was red and sizzling.

I'd be lying if I said it didn't hurt.

I sprinted over to a couch, grabbed a pillow, and jumped behind it.

"Owens, a couch can't protect you" The man's gruff voice said appearing to draw nearer. That damned bast*rd knew my name.

I could hear him approaching when suddenly...

PEW PEW

The weird weapon started to shoot out round after round on my previous position and melted into the nice wooden boards that adorned this office.

"You know my name but not my abilities" I said holding a scorched pillow. The altered man could not help but frown noticing that something had gone awry.

It was simple really. I just thinned the pillow's presence making him disregard the fact that I had grabbed it. Not only that, my own position must have seemed distorted.

I then tossed the pillow directly towards the man's face and he who wanted to fire another shot was unable to. He could shoot again, but he wouldn't.

"Too hot huh!" I yelled brandishing my knife and lunging towards the man's neck. Something shooting off radiating hot stuff like that was bound to overheat giving me the perfect opportunity.

"Urgh-!" The man winced in pain my knife managing to make it just past his armor.

"Huh?!?" But then my body was immediately hugged by the man.

"AAARRGH!!" He squeezed my body making me grunt in pain. My face was twisted so I took the hint and twisted the knife at the man's neck.

That dealt some damage as the man pushed my body away from his almost instinctively. I stumbled back as a result but I quickly recovered. My body had fallen off a building, this was child's play.

"F*ck!" The man cursed blood flowing out of the wound. It was a surprise he could even remain standing. His altered grade was definitely higher than mine but by how much?

Not high enough was how much higher it was.

Rather than charge in recklessly, I covered my knife in the black ink like fog and hurled it at his head.

PEW

But he fired another shot.

The knife was miraculously struck by the wincing man giving me the stink eye but he forgot something.

BANG

"You- You had a gun…!" He said in complete surprise.

"Nope" I replied while watching him stumble forward and finally hit the floor with a thud.

"Dan, are you good?" Seamus said putting down his weapon.

"I've been better. Not by much. But definitely better." I told him resulting in him replying with a grin. I ignored this and walked over to the corpse to grab the shiny new weapon off of him.

"You are fine!" He said before some more footsteps came from behind Seamus.

The double door opened up and a bunch of the gang members entered.

"Shut the door!" Rohawk shouted to the last one in.

"Damn bring over some furniture!" He added in between labored breaths.

I wasn't sure what was going on but the other members numbering about 15 all nodded and pushed objects in front of the door.

"Those Vigor gang f*ckers are insane!" Rohawk said before continuing with a cursing tirade.

"What happened?" I asked with curiosity while tapping the black armor of the guard to test its durability.

This question made Seamus's expression immediately turn grave but he did respond.

"I don't know what the hell they used but one of them turned powerful and started helping the damn mutant" Seamus explained with a hint of aggravated annoyance.

I nodded slowly in understanding while pocketing the weird gun for myself.

All the different gangs that had received the library mission must have been rushing over. The leader of the vigor gang must have used the thing provided by Rook or another employer to get an edge.

"How did you all escape then?" I said this time expressing confusion while stripping the body of its armor slowly but surely.

"HEY, HEY STOP THE CHIT CHAT AND HURRY THE F*CK UP!" Rohawk shouted at me and Seamus. The other gang members were searching every corner of the office for papers on the planetary party or just Smith's location as we spoke.

"I'm searching this body" I said before Seamus shrugged and started to walk towards some shelves.

With the leisure to loot his body, I paid attention to the noises outside the office. There was still the sound of gunshots but the frequency seemed to decrease.

"I don't think we'll find him here" Someone muttered interrupting my focus on the outside.

I started to think about their words which sounded logical but didn't make much sense to me given the context of a sudden assault

"Unless they moved Smith out of his office in the first place…" I muttered audibly but no one spared me an ear.

"They were expecting us, but it's also unrealistic for them to stop Smith Moral from getting any work done" If they moved him out of the office they should have moved out all the important papers archived here.

"What's that pile?" I stopped equipping some armor gloves and asked noticing that a pile was being formed on a desk amidst the chaos.

"The things we thought important! Why?!" The member answered before starting to tap on walls looking for a secret stash.

I walked over and grabbed a couple. I took off the gloves and paged through them briefly. The legal jargon made my brain hurt but I could tell they were papers pertaining to Termina. While not incriminating, these papers were definitely important.

"There must be a secret passage" I said causing Seamus not too far off to shoot me a look that suggested I was stating the obvious.

"If you are going to be making such pointless deductions why don't you get some f*cking work done?" Hawk who happened to be walking was a lot more vocal about it, however.

While I wasn't knowledgeable, I didn't think I was too stupid. Naive if anything. I didn't know much math but surviving practically on my own I had to learn to think and be crafty.

Assuming that this secret passage wasn't prepared beforehand, the materials couldn't be too strong.

"Let's blow a hole in the floor" I suggested causing many of the gang members to flinch. It was just such an odd thing to randomly blurt out.

"Can't do, we spent our explosives fighting the mutant" Rohawk said shaking his head as he approached me. This reply caused some others to become bewildered as he didn't shoot down my suggestion.

"Then we should just do it manually" I had no doubt that a panic room existed and long as it was connected to this office it would have to be connected via the ground. It made no sense to place it on the second floor since it wouldn't protect from bombs, earthquakes, collapses, etc.

"Not bad…" Rohawk said perhaps tearing up secretly. I was taking a page out of his book.

"I can't believe you've volunteered yourself for such a task" He continued causing me to flinch. Volunteer? Although I had taken a page out of his book I never volunteered.

"Umm… You can't bust through the floor with a human body" I cautioned him. The floor was harder to break than the walls since it was difficult to build up momentum.

"Of course not!" Rohawk said not offering an alternative, however.

"We need the mutant!" I said hearing a flurry of footsteps outside the barricaded double doors.

"""WHAT?!?!""" "HUH?!" The members that heard me blurted out.

KNOCK BANG

The double doors were then furiously banged on causing some members to look over there instinctively. They had run out of time to search.

"AAH OPEN THE DOOR! OPEN THE DOOR!!!" Someone shouted pitifully from behind the double doors.

RATAT- Click BANG BANG

The sound of hysterical gunshots was what followed and shortly thereafter, the double doors were suddenly burst open tossing aside the piled-up furniture and sending a couple of bodies flying in.

It was the mutant!