Chapter 9: If You Want Blood 1/2

Author's note: All properties belong to their respective owners, Marvel, Respawn Entertainment, etc.

Okay, full disclosure, I really like how this chapter turned out. It more or less reads exactly how I pictured it when I was first brainstorming it. Hopefully all of you out there enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. The title is another AC/DC track, in case you had any trouble guessing my favorite band. This track is off their classic 1979 album Highway to Hell.

(5/19/2020: Updated, because I'm annoyed with everyone hating one particular part of this chapter and, truth be told, it wasn't up to scratch. Hopefully it's better now.)

Power Without Question – Chapter 9: If You Want Blood

You get nothin' for nothin'

Tell me who can you trust

We got what you want

And you got the lust

If you want blood, you got it

"It's too quiet" murmured Cooper as he looked at his target at the far end of the street with the magnification and Night Vision features of his visor, turning his whole world shades of green. "BT, any police chatter in the area?"

"No pilot" responded the Titan instantly. "Analysis of camera systems indicates pedestrian and vehicle traffic is down 39% from the average." Matt grimaced at that figure, he scanned the area again, besides the street lights and a few lit windows, the area was dark. Even the light reflecting off the thin layer of snow didn't make the area seem less dead. "What is your status pilot?"

He disengaged the magnification and tried the IR view, but didn't see anything suspicious. The range was too great, he would have to get closer. Because the helmet was connected to him by neural link, all he had to do was think to disable the visor mode as color returned to the world. "RTR buddy" he reported as he picked up the X-55 Devotion LMG. Before BT could ask him for clarification he added "Ready to Rock."

With that, the SRS Pilot fired his grapple at a fire escape on an adjacent building and pulled himself to it, firing his jump kit and releasing the hook to ensure he shot past and maintained his momentum when he began running along the building. Leaping across the street, he activated his stim and left a distinct blue contrail as he went even faster before leaping back to the original side and rapidly closed in on his target.

Just as the boost ran out, he planted both feet and launched himself at his objective, pulling himself up over the railing of the fire escape and shouldering the energy actuated LMG. The Lawton offices were on the ninth floor, three above his current position. Taking the stairs two at a time, the Marauder quickly ascended the fire escape until he reached his Insertion Point. Peering inside the window he saw the hallway was clear and bashed it open with the stock of the weapon before carefully entering. The hallway was empty, Matthew pausing as the Devotion swung from side to side. The pilot pushed forwards slowly, waiting for the no doubt dozens of guards to jump out at him from one of the side rooms.

"Still too quiet" he muttered as he hurled his pulse blade down the hall and waited as the pulse traveled down the hallway to reveal that he was, in fact, alone. "Something's not right, Cat's intel better not have been wrong" he grouched as he tried one of the door knobs to find it unlocked and pushed open the door. "Nothing, shit" he cursed as he saw the empty room.

He repeated the process to the exact same results three times before reaching a locked door. Without hesitation he lifted his leg and slammed is boot into the wood just beside the deadbolt and knocked it open. The long-barreled gun swept the room and found it clear, but not empty. At the center of the barren space was a simple four-legged table with a cellphone resting on it. Matthew grimaced inside his helm, the hairs on his neck were standing on end, and if he gripped his weapon any tighter it felt like he would deform the grip. After a few tense moments, he pushed past his stress and turned to move on.

And then the phone began to ring.

The Marauder went rigid at the sudden tone and had a momentary internal debate before letting out a sigh and turning back to the table. "Unknown Caller, who else?" he muttered as he accepted the call, put it on speaker and set the phone down.

"Mr. Marauder" said a deep, commanding voice over the phone. "The mysterious party crasher. You are most troublesome, even more so than Spider Man" rumbled the voice. "Destroying my facilities, killing my associates, and instilling fear amongst the criminal underworld. Not bad, for a mercenary."

A faint smile crossed Matt's face before he answered. "Errr, sorry Fisk, wrong guess. Wanna go for double jeopardy, where the scores can really change?" he said, though he thought he could hear the sound of a door opening outside.

There was a brief silence on the other end of the line. "Who are you then?" he asked, still calm, but the demeanor seemed to shift into one of genuine interest.

"Just a fly in the ointment, a monkey with the wrench, a pain in the ass" he replied as he heard more activity and looked back at the phone before he switched his comm channel. "BT, link the call to my helmet and trace the source" he commanded curtly before he heard a faint tinge of static indicating the channel had been linked.

But there was no reply, though Cooper didn't like the situation, he was beginning to feel like this was a trap. Checking the hall, he let out a sigh of relief when he saw it was clear and began to move briskly back towards the window he had entered. "Mr. Marauder" said the Kingpin again as he Cooper balanced speed and stealth to hopefully slip away undetected. "Are you still there?"

"I'm still here" answered Cooper as he turned back towards the sounds of approaching steps, lots of them. "Unless you want to come out here and talk face to face" finished the Pilot dryly.

"Oh no, I'm afraid not" replied the Kingpin, Cooper swearing he heard the sound of jet engines over the phone. "You have me at a loss, you know my name, but who are you?" asked Fisk as Cooper suddenly heard the footsteps stop, but there was a commotion outside. "Just another misguided man who saw too many action movies as a child? Another orphan of this miserable city who thinks he's John Wayne, Rambo, or Marshall Dillion?"

"I was always a bit partial to Roy Rogers, gotta love them sequin shirts" shot back the Marauder as he stepped out of the window and back onto the fire escape.

Only Matthew quickly realized he wasn't alone, the entire street was filled with cars, police cars, officers standing behind them, their weapons trained on the building, the odd sound he heard revealed itself to be a police helicopter that was hovering overhead.

The chopper activated a spotlight that shone directly on the vigilante. "NYPD! Drop your weapons and keep your hands up!" thundered a PA system.

There was a confident, rumbling laugh on the line. "Do you really think you stand a chance against us, Mr. Marauder?"

Cooper's face turned into a snarl, artificial and natural adrenaline began to seep into his veins and his body tensed like a spring. "Yippy Ki Yay Motherfucker" he growled before hanging up. "Alright Cooper, fine fucking mess you've gotten yourself into."

Inside the building, the SWAT team that had been ascending the stairs bust through the door and was charging down the hall. "Drop it! Drop it!" ordered the lead one as they all pointed the weapons towards where the Pilot was.

He was too exposed on the fire escape, even if he was safe from the SWAT team for the moment, but he would need to get back inside the building if he was going to have any chance of escaping alive. His left hand slowly dropped from the fore-end of the Devotion, fingers subtly twitching as he tried to steady his nerves before he activated his phase shift to try and get past the SWAT team.

Just as the SWAT team was about to get close enough, there was a distinct 'whoosh' sound form a building down the street. A fiery projectile streaked through the night and slammed into the helicopter, blowing off the tail and sending it into a fiery spin.

Right towards him.

"Oh fuck" cursed Cooper as he activated the wrist mounted device and leapt through the window, scampering across the floor to get as far away from the incoming wreck as possible. Quickly getting to his feet, the Militia Pilot sprinted down the hallway before he felt the air crackle and ripple around him, and he was taken back to the original New York. The hallway he was back in was distinctly different, the groans of wounded and disoriented SWAT members filled the hall.

The sounds of a massive gun battle were ragging outside, punctuated by the 'thunk thunk' of a grenade launcher followed by the resulting explosion. The police were fighting back, but they were hopelessly outmatched. Cooper reached the staircase the police had used and began sprinting up, going two at a time between uses of his jump kit until he busted out of the door at the top and onto the roof. He quickly saw the extent of the situation. The Police, who had surrounded the corner structure he was on top of, had themselves been surrounded. Kingpin's men were laying in ambush in nearby buildings, the distinct flicker of muzzle flashes indicating the windows they were firing form.

Even worse, two tractor trailers blocked the only roads out of the kill zone. The NYPD was boxed in, and they were being shredded. "Time to even the odds" growled Cooper lowly as he swapped to the EM-4 'Cold War' and took aim at the nearest tractor trailer and the group of armed goons hiding in and around it.

With a faint whine, the four round burst bullpup energy grenade launcher began raining its 4.73x33mm explosives down on the unsuspecting gunmen. The resulting explosions of red gore mixed with the blue of the energy rounds covering the truck and street as Cooper rained down the pain before the weapon. His entrance into the now three-way gun battle attracted attention from both sides, a barrage of gunfire was directed towards the Marauder as he dove away. Pulling the charging handle, Cooper prepared to stand when he saw the distinct outline of a helicopter coming along the street. Before Matt could wonder whose side it was on, there was a pair of twinkles beneath the body. "The fuck?" he wondered aloud before the distinct sight of tracer rounds lit up the street, the underslung machine guns unleashing a torrent of lead as their chatter echoed off the buildings.

Swapping back to the X-55, Cooper squeezed the trigger and felt the gun spool up as the blue tracers were walked onto the chopper as it approached him. Sparks on the body soon became black smoke that belched from the craft as it got closer and the 55 round mag ran dry. Instead of reloading, Cooper fired his Grapple at the bird as it passed overhead, the hook finding its mark and yanking the Pilot from the roof. "Oh shit" he shouted as he tried to swing to the side and avoid an antenna. Only partially successful, he glanced off and felt a rib crack as he was continuously pulled closer to the chopper as it circled around.

Reaching out with his free hand, Cooper pulled himself up on the skid and hooked his leg over it. His left hand hanging on to the fuselage while he balled his right into a fist and began punching the glass on the door, causing it to crack after two hits and shatter completely after five strikes. The Marauder then produced a frag from his web gear and pulled the pin before tossing the explosive inside the hole he had made, much to the utter terror of the pilot inside. Only then did Cooper realize that he didn't have an effective escape route, the chopper was flying low due to damage. The area surrounded was filled with antennas and water towers flying by so fast that Cooper couldn't jump.

Before he had an opening, the grenade detonated, the blast was absorbed by the cockpit, but the chopper pitched up violently before it started to spin. Faced with no better option, Cooper threw himself from the doomed chopper and fired his jump kit, trying to land on a nearby roof.

Only he fell short.

15 Minutes Earlier…

In full Black Cat garb, Felicia Hardy silently scaled the walls of the building that was home to the condo of one Orson Perrault. She had been planning this heist for a week, over the course of the planning, she learned he wouldn't be home and why. She had used this piece of information to ensure the three parties who would thwart her fun would be otherwise occupied.

Spider man was told of the location of another Lieutenant that was also working on the same project Perrault was, she didn't pay attention to the details about whatever scheme Kingpin had concocted. All she cared about was that her ex would prioritize it over her fun. Likewise, the Marauder was more than happy to bull rush in and make sure that Perrault wouldn't be around to pursue her after she was done. If she had sent both of them to the same place then there was the possibility that they would be so busy fighting each other that Perrault would survive and figure out he had been robbed, and Felecia hated having to watch her back, always preferring to look ahead.

And she had tipped off the police so that they would have their hands full with the more violent vigilante and be unable to mount any sort of response to her crimes, ensuring she would have all the time she needed for her heist. She had absolute faith and confidence that Cooper could take care of himself despite only knowing him for a short time. It had to be him, calling them about Spider-Man wouldn't have generated nearly the same level of response.

Reaching the small balcony, she athletically flipped over the railing and came to a silent crouch outside the window. With practiced precision, she ran her claw down the gap in the sliding door until she found and sliced through latch securing the door. Slowly opening the door, the cat burglar slipped her leather clad form inside. Finding herself in the living room, she began to get her bearings as she searched for the study that housed the most valuable items.

She faintly registered the sound of a door opening farther ahead, the thief reflexively taking cover behind the sofa to stay out of sight. "…patio alarm got tripped, go check it out" said a burly voice from the hallway ahead of her.

"Probably nothing Russ, damn thing probably short circuited again" grumbled another man in return as Hardy stalked along the back of the couch and turned the corner of the L-shaped piece of furniture.

There was a click as a flashlight was turned on and she heard footsteps approach. The thieves mind had gone into overdrive, the condo was supposed to be empty, had something changed? Moving to short breaths as the guard approached, his flashlight scanning the dim room as he neared the door, Black Cat let him pass. "The hell?" he muttered as he reached the patio door and saw it ajar as he opened it completely and stepped outside. Retracting her claws, the Thief stepped out from behind the sofa and stalked up to the guard.

The guard looked around the patio and went to remove a radio from his belt, but not before the Black Cat could pounce. With a savage kick, she slammed her heeled boot into the back of the man's knee, knocking him down as she wrapped her arm around his neck and locked him into a sleeper hold. The guard struggled to stand as oxygen was cut off from his brain, standing and trying to claw back at the Black Cat as she wrapped her legs around his stomach and squeezed until he finally ceased his struggles.

Slipping back inside, Felicia closed the door and advanced down the hallway to where the guard had come from. Removing a stun grenade from her belt as she reached a door with a bit of light coming from the edge at the bottom. Slowly opening the door, she heard "Just nothing right? Sorry about that" said a man before she rolled the sphere inside and smirked. "What the…"

Whatever the man was about to say was cut off as the stun detonated, blinding and disorienting the three men inside. With practiced ease, she glided inside and set upon the nearest man to the door. A rapid series of strikes left him reeling as the other two tried to react. Hardy swept the leg out from the first as the second swung drunkenly at her, still half blind and deaf, the attack had no chance as she rolled away and grabbed the assaulting arm. With a brutal twist, she pushed it to the brink of breaking, causing him to wail in agony before she used the arm to vault herself up and wrap her leg around his throat, choking consciousness from him.

As she rolled off of the man, she gave the one she had tripped a kick in the head to ensure he stayed out cold before hogtieing the three men and exiting the security room. "What's that racket?" barked another voice, one she recognized and truly hadn't expected to hear. "Report damn it!"

"Perrault?" questioned Hardy, her heart racing quicker as she sprinted out of the room, jumping and using the wall to launch herself at the syndicate lieutenant, a flying knee connecting with the bottom of his chin.

The obese man staggered back, and his girth rammed into the wall where Felecia pressed her forearm against his throat. His fat hands tried to dislodge the arm to no avail. "What are you doing here?" hissed the Black Cat. "Answer me."

"The…the Marauder was going to come after me" he stammered out as he struggled for breath. "I had to go somewhere else."

Hardy's mind raced, how did Kingpin learn about that? Pushing those thoughts aside and fighting to maintain her aura of calm, she applied more pressure against his windpipe, threatening to crush it on a whim. "How did you know? Don't lie to me" she threatened darkly.

The man's color was starting to change as he fought for air. "The cops…we got an inside source. When the police got tipped off, so did we." The tub of lard began to laugh between coughs. "We set a trap for both the pigs and the vigilante…fuckers don't know what they're walking into." For whatever reason, that remark sent the Black Cat over the edge. She took her arm off his throat, giving him a brief moment of relief before she elbowed him in the face and broke his nose. Before the lieutenant could even bring his hands up to the bent feature, Hardy delivered a knockout spin kick to his temple that sent him crumpling to the floor.

Grinding her teeth in frustration, Hardy began to head back towards the balcony, unsure exactly why she felt the need to go to Cooper's aid. A small golden glint caught her eye, her head instinctively twisting to catch sight of a set of brilliantly polished golden coins. "I'm sure he has everything under control, this won't take long" she reasoned before strutting into the room to help herself.

"What the fuck do we do Captain?!" shouted Johnson as Yuri jammed a fresh 15 round magazine into her Barretta 92. "Who the fuck are these guys anyway?" asked the blonde woman as Watanabe grit her teeth, able to hear the rounds ping against the car she was hiding behind.

Before she could answer, she heard the distinct 'thunk' of a grenade launcher as stood in time to see the explosion as three more officers were knocked off their feet, Yuri able to see a wayward arm fly away from its owner. Raising her pistol, she saw the shooter silhouetted in a window and fired, hammering the trigger as she saw the man stagger before stumbling forwards and falling out of the window. "Looks like Kingpin's guys" she replied through grit teeth. "The whole thing must have been a setup."

"No shit…chopper!" barked Martinez as he dove under a car and the criminal vehicle unleashed a hail of bullets on New York's finest. Watanabe watched the helo with dread, only to see a stream of blue tracers rise up to meet it.

"Looks like the Marauder's still in the fight" she shouted over the gunfire as the helo passed overhead. "We need to get out of here before that chopper circles back around" she shouted. With that, the three began to weave through the wrecked cop cars towards the north, staying low.

They nearly reached the end of the assembled vehicles when Johnson cried "Look out! The Helo's coming back around!" Yuri looked up to see the chopper approaching, a trail of black smoke behind it and flying erratically. Just as it went overhead, the cockpit exploded, and it pitched up violently before it began to fall.

"GET BACK!" ordered Yuri as all pretense of safety was abandoned and the three cops sprinted away. Watanabe looked over her shoulder to see a flicker of blue propel something towards a building, only to slam into the side of it and tumble down, bounce off a car and come to a stop on the sidewalk as she slid behind a SWAT truck.

Kingpin's men were in nearly every window of every building overlooking the street where the Police had been boxed in. They were in a perfectly set up kill zone. Yuri knew that the police were in a tough spot, and their only hope for getting out of this alive had just fallen 15 stories from an exploding helicopter. "There's still a way we can get out of this" she said to Martinez and Johnson, who returned puzzled looks.

"How the hell are we going to do that Cap?" asked the older man as he tended to a wounded officer.

Watanabe nodded towards where the helicopter went down. "The Marauder, if anyone can clear a way out of this clusterfuck, he can" she responded.

"Are you FUCKING NUTS!?" howled the blonde Detective Johnson. "Captain, he's a goddamn killer! Why the hell should we trust him?"

"Because detective" responded Watanabe darkly, "right now, a killer is exactly what we need."

Cooper's eye's fluttered open, the fog that clouded his mind still slowed his reactions. The fire from what he slowly determined was a downed helicopter illuminated the street and several tightly packed, bullet ridden, cop cars that filled it. Rolling onto his stomach, he crawled towards his weapon and picked it up before shoving a fresh box into it, ignoring the cacophony of sound his addled brain slowly recognized as gunfire.

Pressing himself against a car, he took deep breaths as his memories flooded back to him. The whole damn thing had been a trap, now it was a three way shootout between the NYPD, Kingpin's Syndicate, and the SRS Pilot. "BT, I need a way out" he ordered, there was nothing to be gained by slugging it out. "BT?" Reaching up, he pried his comms module off of the side of his helmet and examined it. "Toast" he muttered as he shoved it back into place and jammed a bio-gel needle into his thigh, hoping the drugs would be enough to keep him on his feet. "Think Cooper, think" he ordered to his hazy mind as he scanned around him.

A group emerged from an alleyway near the smoldering chopper wreck, purple sweatshirts under ballistic vests and cradling AKMs. Recognizing the colors, Cooper rolled away from the car and came to a crouch, triggering the Devotion and spraying a burst at them, causing them to dive in every direction as he held down the trigger. The ones still in the open were cut down and he began firing single shots at them before boost sliding behind a mailbox when his mag ran dry. Ignoring the pain when a round pierced the thin metal and hit his armor, he stood and fired his reloaded weapon, killing two more.

"Shit" he growled as he had the wind knocked out of him, a bullet slammed directly into his side, followed by a second, and a third, before the fourth grazed his arm below his shoulder pad. Matt immediately dropped to the deck and spun towards his assailant, fighting to bring the big X-55 up when he saw the balaclava covered head snap forward, brain matter spewing from his now shattered skull.

He instantly recognized the figure who replaced the goon, the oriental woman holding her pistol steady as she scanned the street before coming to Cooper's side. "Marauder are you alright?" she asked.

"I'll walk it off Captain" he responded through grit teeth as he got back to his feet. "The fuck's going on?" he asked simply as the four moved into cover behind an overturned patrol car.

Watanabe gave a sardonic smile. "We got a tip you'd be here tonight, thought we could bring you in" she replied, still having to shout over the gunfire. Her expression growing more tired by the moment. "We weren't the only one's it seems" she muttered. "I'll be honest, we're getting slaughtered out here, unless we can take some of the pressure off then none of us are making it out alive. We need your help."

Cooper pondered the request, he should just disengage, cut and run, save himself for the inevitable battles to come. He turned to tell her that, but at the same time, he couldn't leave them to die. "What makes you think I'll help?"

"I don't buy into the rhetoric that you're just a heartless killer; or some maniac with a gun and a grudge" responded Yuri. "You're smarter than people think, up to something. Hell if I know why, but you're doing this for more reasons than to just build up a body count." Her look became somber and serious as she stared straight into the M-COR helmet visor. "You wouldn't have run back into a burning building to save my ass otherwise."

Cooper snorted, but knew she was right. He was out here fighting this fight so the Police wouldn't have to, and he had unwittingly dragged them into this shitstorm. "Got any ideas Cap?" he asked.

There was a hint of a smile on the woman's lips as she pointed across the street. "Kingpin's guys are concentrated in three buildings, those two over there and one right here. If you can clear those two out, we can handle this one" she explained.

Cooper nodded, "alright, sounds like a plan" he replied as he offered the Devotion to Watanabe. "Go ahead, take it, you're going to need it a hell of a lot more than I will." After a bit of hesitation, Watanabe holstered her sidearm and took the LMG, struggling for a moment with its weight. Cooper quickly removed the associated webgear holding the ammo for it and gave it to her, the Captain slinging it over her shoulder and fastening it, so it looked like a bandolier across her chest. "This too" he said as he tossed a Knock Knock and its detonator to the darker skinned Hispanic man. "Should help you get inside" he explained. The man nodded as he took the charge while Cooper examined the Cold War. While the weapon had broken his fall, it had broken in the process. Stowing the grenade launcher, Matt drew the Smart Pistol and turned to the cops. "Ready?"

They all nodded, with Watanabe motioning with the big X-55. "You go first, I'll cover you" she said.

Cooper nodded before he stretched his neck and steadied his nerves. "And Captain" he said, causing her to look at the Pilot. "Good luck."

There was a faint smile. "Good luck to you" she answered before her expression became serious and determined. "On three, one…two…THREE!" she shouted.

With that, all four stood, Cooper activating his STIM as he jumped up, running along the wall. Behind him, he could hear the distinct shriek of the Devotion as it spooled up, the stream of blue tracers slicing through the night. Firing his grapple at a lamppost, the M-COR pilot slinghotted up and around the pole and towards his target. Raising the MK6, the targeting picked out four different enemies in the windows and locked on. With a single trigger pull, all four were dispatched, with Cooper flying through a now unoccupied window and sliding across the room barely a second later.

Not wasting anytime, he went room to room, kicking down the door and gunning down anyone on the other side. With one floor clear, he made his way towards the stairs at the end of the hallway. Using his jump kit to bounce form wall to wall and ascend, Cooper soon reached the top steps when the door suddenly opened. The Syndicate enforcer who did it got the shock of his life when Cooper didn't even bother locking on, instead slinging a pulse blade right between his eyes. "An AA-12, don't mind if I do" murmured the Pilot to himself as he picked up the fully automatic shotgun and the spare drums the thug had on him.

His pace quickened considerably, with precision going out the window, he simply sprayed down each room in a storm of buckshot from the assault shotgun. Before he knew it, Matt was back at the stairs again and climbing up to the final floor being used. This one wasn't composed of individual rooms, but rather was a large conference hall that had Cooper unleash a full 20 round drum against the thugs inside.

With one building down, Cooper leapt across to the second and began going top down. This one was all small apartments, forcing him to go room to room again. The first four were cleared without incident, but the fifth and final one held an RPG team of three men.

Without mercy, the Marauder gunned down two, but when he swung the shotgun around to the third, the magazine ran dry. Matthew tossed the empty gun to the last enemy, startling him as he tried to catch it, dropping his own SMG to do so. Using the opening, Cooper keyed his jump kit and threw himself forward. A haymaker connected with the man's chin, sending him staggering back.

The enforcer recovered quickly, coming back with a vengeance, with a sudden swing, the butt of his weapon hit Cooper in the stomach, the Pilot's armor absorbing the blow before the AA-12 was swung like a baseball bat, Cooper ducking to the side and took it on his shoulder pad as he drove his foe into the wall. Matthew brought a knee up into the thug's stomach that doubled him over before drawing his axe and slamming it into the back of his head, killing him. Before Cooper could gather his bearings, he felt more rounds slam into his back, by reflex he activated his phase shift and vanished as he drew his Smart Pistol. When he returned, he planted a shot into the knee of the startled man before a second went through his brainpan. After taking a brief moment to catch his breath, Cooper was now on the move again, dropping straight down the stairwell to the floor below, throwing his pulse blade to see if there were any surprises waiting for him.

Indeed there were, the entire floor had pulled back from their windows and were lying in wait to ambush him in the hallway.