Strike At Midnight

"This kid is ridiculous. At such a young age, he already unlocked so many ways of using GN particles. He disrupted the helicopter, traveled underground, controlled a coated arrow..."

"Disruption, elemental resonance, coating, and psychokinesis, and holy f*ck, the summoning at the end... How is this kid just crimson-tier?"

The two gold-tier innovators communicated telepathically through their brainwaves. Innovators could use GN particles to send messages telepathically and communicate directly on a brainwave level. Usually, it would take someone of a lot higher level to decrypt the conversation of two innovators, and...

"I don't appreciate you guys calling me a little kid." Suddenly, a voice sounded in both of their heads, interrupting their conversation.

They felt a chill down their spin, and their spirit essence core was sucked out of their body.

After the massacre, the young man in the white cloak effortlessly picked up Alex's body and disappeared, leaving the other guy alone in the helicopter.

...

On the road, Elon was driving the truck towards their mom's place. Everyone was silent, and Christian was trying to reach their mom on the phone. It was already midnight.

"Let's turn around and ambush their reinforcement," Jay suddenly said.

Christian: "Are you crazy? We just got out! And what about Mom?"

Jay: "What about Alex?! We need to interrogate these guys. Mom hadn't been picking up for a while now, it might be already too late for us to do anything! But Alex, he was just taken, they probably didn't get far nor do anything to him yet. We still have a chance to save him. Elon, you be the tiebreaker."

Elon immediately turned the wheel and drifted the car back on course towards the police station. It was already too late into the night to be doing this trip all the way down to Homestead. A trip like this would only place all of them in more danger.

Prepared their weapons, the squad stopped their car at about 3 minutes away from the destination, where they then got off and traveled back towards the police station on foot.

From the night-heat vision binoculars on Jay and Elon's Vanguard and Shadow equipment set, they saw three Cadillacs with two military convoy vehicles parked in that area. The people were in full combat setup; some people seemed to be from the US military and the people in Cadillacs seemed to be from a private military company.

"It will be 3 against 20. You sure about this?" Elon asked Jay reluctantly.

"I won't be able to forgive myself if we don't do anything to try and get Alex back," Jay slowly said. He was hesitating too. He had been proven to be a great squad leader with a calm mindset to tackle whatever comes their way, but not anymore in this situation. He knew the sensible decision would be leading their squad back to Sunset Islands and fortify there to prevent further casualty, but would he be able to forgive himself?

He didn't want to live his life in regret, yet he would also hate to put his brothers in more danger.

"Don't worry, we are going to be fine. Remember how we usually do it in PUBG? Two marksman snipe and providing cover fire from afar while the other two infiltrate into enemy territory to execute while they are distracted? This time, I can be the infiltrator. You two spread out, take turns drawing their attention while buying each other time to change location. I will get into position, wait for my command," Jay was just about to turn around as he finished talking when Christian grabbed him by the elbow.

"I have the tank suit, I will go with you and tank."

"Yo, haven't you been listening to the reasoning behind my gameplan for PUBG? We need at least two people on the outer range or whoever's on the outer range would be in great danger if the enemy's sniper locks onto you. That's why I'm telling you to-"

"To take turn firing and moving to a new position, it will make it hard to pinpoint you two. I know. But that's the same reasoning for having two infiltrators. Otherwise, they would try to focus you down the moment they spot an enemy in their vicinity. You don't have anyone to help you drop aggro," Christian immediately interrupted.

"Don't worry, you saw how I fought earlier. I will just channel the girl inside of me if anything. I'm stronger than you think, and you will only be dragging me down if you come because I will have to try to cover your ass too. Just listen to your big brother," Jay freed himself from Christian's big hand and left as his voice faded.

Elon, who had been silent for the whole time, finally said through the earpiece, "Don't tell us to run first this time. We will be right behind you."

"Let's f*ck them up." After a brief silence, Jay's voice came out of the earpiece.