New York City - 2:31 A.M. - A random car park
In the darkness and cold, two cars pulled into a desolate car park. After driving three floors up, the explosive fury of the cars' engines died with a whine. Five men, stepped out of the shadowy interior of their car. They were dressed dark clothes, with no defining features save their dark obsidian helmets that had been shaped and twisted into the visage of the black mamba. The other party, a group of six men, exited their car as well. They were not quite as flashy clothing-wise, opting to wear street clothes instead of snake heads. The two groups conversed for a minute. The voices of the snake-heads were nearly unintelligible, as if they had some kind of voice changer in their helmets. The conversation ended, as one of the snake-heads pulled a military grade assault rifle from the backseat of the car he and his fellows had arrived in. Malicious grins crossed the faces of the street rats.
None of them had seen me yet, but all of them were now in possession of weapons powerful enough to pierce my armor and kill me in a couple of shots. Surprise would be everything.
Hi. I'm looking for the illegal weapons deal. Is this the right place?
Well, they certainly looked surprised.
They all scrambled for the weapons inside the car, except for the snake-head already holding his weapon, who merely issued a haughty laugh that was audible even through the garbling sound of his voice changer, before turning the weapon towards me and... I was a blur. Before the snake-head could react, my fist had already met his throat with a good deal of force. He, obviously stunned by the blow, staggered back. Rushing forwards, I snapped his neck, before turning to his friends. They, obviously shaken by my sudden appearance and the equally sudden death of their snakey friend, cocked their guns, but hesitated for a split second. That was a bad move. On them in an instant, I threw a quivering palm strike into the side of a street rat's neck. Two down. An inertia strike to a snake-head's stomach. Three down. A precise shot to the baroreceptor of the carotid sinus of a street rat. That made four. An unceremonious slamming of a snake-head's into a car hood. Five incapacitated hostiles. A one-inch punch to the solar plexus. Smashing two heads together. A nerve strike to the nape. A punch to the face. And then there was one. One brave snake-head who was, in reality, not very brave at all.
St-stand d-d-down! I-I-I'll kill you!
Because you've done such a great job of killing me so far.
Y-yeah? Well I-I've got a clear shot n-
I shot forwards and slapped the gun out of his hands, before grabbing him by the neck and slamming him to the ground, shattering his mask into crystalline shards that bit in the back of his neck. He cried out in pain.
A quick tip. When I ask,"Where is she," don't reply with,"But if I tell you she'll kill me," because I believe I have made it quite clear that I will make you wish you'd have never been born if you screw with me. And I haven't even pulled out any of my toys yet.
Go to hell!
I let out a long sigh.
They always want to do it the hard way.
Suddenly, volts of electricity flowed from my fingertips into the former snake-head's neck. As the electricity spread to the rest of his body, he let out a long anguished scream. Keeping one hand on the man's neck, I withdrew my other hand into my cloak, before pulling out an orb filled with a colorless liquid.
Do you know what this is?
AAAAAUUUUGH! STOP! STOP IT!
That's right. Its a pellet designed specifically to contain a very powerful acid.
NO! ARRRGH! IT HURTS!
Now, I've always wondered what would happen if I shoved one of these down a human's mouth. My bet? It would eat through your throat on the way down. That would make you quiet down a bit.
NO NO NO! PLEASE! GAAHHHH!
Of course the whole unpleasantness of having volatile acid shoved down your gullet could be avoided if you truthfully answered one little question. Where is she?
SHE'S IN THE SEWERS! IN A PANIC CHAMBER THEY WERE BUILDING FOR THE MAYOR THAT WAS NEVER FINISHED! I'LL GIVE YOU THE COORDINATES! JUST PLEASE STOP!
Mairi, is he telling the truth?
As far as I can tell, he's being one-hundred percent genuine.
I took my hand off the man's throat. The electricity paused its rampant surges, as the man gasped for air. The bitterness of the night caused him to choke on his own spittle.
Well it appears you're being truthful. Give me those coordinates, and you can get back to whatever you were doing.
The man erupted into another coughing fit, before managing to fight off the coughing and bite back the tears it had brought to his eyes. Then he listed off a string of numbers and letters. The coordinates. As I turned to leave, the man's curiosity got the better of him.
Y-you ain't gonna stop the weapons deal?
Nope. I'm pretty sure I'm done here. Have a nice life.
B-but you killed two of my business partners and one of my cl-clients.
Would you rather I stopped your deal?
No... No! Just keep walking.
Then I heard it. A faint scraping of metal on concrete. The idiot was going for his gun. Before he could pull the trigger, the world around me slowed. Right on cue Mairi sent me a digital sonar reading of the space I was in for a split millisecond. The millisecond gave me enough time to review the map six times. As the sonar reading showed the bullets slowly emerging from the gun, I instantly read the tactic my assailant was going for. He was trying to fire everywhere he could, so at least one of the bullets would meet its mark. Spray and pray. Almost pitiful. Time zoomed back into motion as I flipped into the air and, engaging my gravity manipulators zoomed behind the man with the gun, neatly avoiding every bullet, as if I had had enough time to calculate where every last one of them would be. As I landed behind the man, I swiftly drew my particle pistol.
I-I'm sor-
Bang. The particle shot blasted through the top of my attacker's head. He didn't even have time to scream. I holstered my pistol and walked away.
New York City - 3:20 A.M. - The lair of Madame Mamba
I stalked through the dank, dark sewer tunnels to the location of the coordinates I had been given. My footsteps made no noise. Echoing drips of water in the distance and the occasional roar of a car engine pierced the sound of silence. Finally, I arrived at the location the coordinates pointed to. All that was there was a moldy ramshackle concrete wall.
Eli, I'm getting eighteen life-signs from behind that wall.
Interesting...
I walked over to the far side of the wall, before applying an acid pellet to it. As the acid slowly burned its way through the concrete, I slowly began to be able to see the interior of my target's hiding spot. It was fully furnished and completely finished, if a little dark. Obviously, Mamba had finished the incomplete panic room and turned it into her base of operations. The other thing I noticed as the acid finished chewing through the wall, was there was a person, who wore a top very similar to that of the snake heads from before, leaning against the wall with their back to the small hole I had made in the wall. I applied more acid to the hole, making it slightly bigger. Soon it would be big enough to fit a fist through. Then it would be big enough for a man to fit through. This was going to be easier than I thought.
New York - 3:29 A.M. - The lair of Madame Mamba
A large explosion sounded through out the sewers, as I blew a hole in the wall between me and Mamba. As I stepped into the room, I saw her in all her glory. At an oaken desk sat a woman with snow white hair and striking green eyes. She was dressed in all black, much like her followers, and had two slits where her nose should have been. As I stepped into her lair, she gave me a slight hiss. A forked tongue darted from her mouth.
Madame Mamba, I presume.
Ahhh. The Venator. The Hunter, if you are well versssed in Latin. I sssuppose you've come for the bounty on my head.
Nah. I came to your secret sewer base to stare at the scenery.
Heh. Well, I'm afraid you'll have to leave disssapointed. I am not that easy to kill. Minions! Destroy him!
I stood there waiting. The good Madame had a rather surprised look on her face. In seconds, surprise turned to anger.
Minions! Ssstop goofing around and kill the intruder!
Napping on the job? Just goes to show you how lazy this generation is. By the way, you should probably get better lighting in this place. They couldn't even see me coming.
Madame Mamba's face contorted into a picture of pure rage. For a moment, I believed she was going to scream. However, she quickly regained her composure and released a hissing laugh.
Do you believe that my thugs were my only weapons? I'm afraid not...
In a split second Madame Mamba's jaw unhinged and acid sprung from a strange looking sac in her mouth. I was caught off guard and it was too late to slow my time perception. As the acid hit me square in the chest, I went down screaming...
Or did I?
Madame Mamba continued her hissing laugh, too busy to notice the man she had "killed" with her acid had faded from existence. It was only when she felt the sword on her neck that she realized the severity of her situation.
I unraveled the hologram I had spun around myself and my invisibility ceased.
What!? How?!
Oh, I do just adore holograms. Don't you?
You were a...
Hologram? Yep. Pretty much the whole time you were talking to me, actually.
But the explosion...
Never happened. It was also a hologram, aided with a rather convincing explosion noise provided by my voice changer, which can reproduce any noise I can think of. I believe that's checkmate, my serpentine friend.
I'd heard you were good...
I like to think I'm the best.
But I also heard you had disappeared without a trace. Most of the criminal underworld thought you were dead.
I'm afraid not. I just got rather caught up. I was doing some additional training, testing the capabilities of the sentient supercomputer in my brain, re-purposing some alien technology, and just relatively enjoying my time away from murdering people for money. But now I think I can officially say...
I cut through her neck without hesitation. This was, perhaps, the easiest seven-thousand bucks I had ever made.
I'm back in business.
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