Making Supers 1, page 7
“Then you’re losing out on nothing,” I said, “and you get a distraction to draw Bullrush away from you. He pounds me into hamburger, and you’ve still got a good window to get out from under the cops and public scrutiny.”
“Cool it, Billy,” the big guy said, and held out his hand to me. “I’m Chuck.”
“Nice to meet you,” I said, and grasped his hand with a firm grip.
Billy leaned over to the driver and called out some indistinct instructions.
The van veered left around a sharp corner. We kept our balance as best we could, and the driver put his foot down again. The van had to be a custom engine job. I’d never been in anything as large with so much acceleration. Billy pinned me with a glare as Chuck and I braced ourselves against another sharp turn.
“I don’t like it,” Billy said sharply. “He’s playing us.”
“What possible reason do I have to lie?” I demanded.
“Could be a trap. This might all be a setup to get us out into the open,” he said stubbornly. “You really expect us to believe that you were the one to whack Darkstalker? And that you’re somehow able to take a supe with nothing but your bare hands?”
“I mean, I wouldn’t say no to a gun,” I replied.
Chuck raised a hand to stave off Billy’s protest. “He’s our best chance at cutting Bullrush loose, at the very least. And, hell, if he’s sincere, then he might just be the kind of crazy that we need with us. Where’d you put the Scrambler?”
“Chuck—” Billy said, warningly.
Chuck pinned Billy with a glare. “Look, do you want to wait until the van runs out of juice and Bullrush stomps us? Or do you want to get out of here in one piece? Because you know what Gwen said about—”
The mention of this mysterious Gwen was enough to galvanize Billy.
The lean merc turned, tugged open a rolling drawer on the floor, and pulled out a black case of simple plastic. I’d have picked it as a storage container for a drill, but when Billy pulled the locks open, I realized it was part of their cover. Which made sense.
The inside of the van was filled with tool chests, cases, and other apparently random odds and ends that were perfect for disguising a crew of well-armed, well-trained mercenaries.
Billy opened the case and lifted a space-age revolver out of a foam bed. Three thumb-sized bullets sat nestled beside it, and the merc opened the weapon’s cylinder with a sinister click.
The pistol wasn’t exactly low-profile. It was a big hunk of well-machined metal, thick with an ergonomic grip and stabilizers, and looked like the kind of gun you used to hunt tanks, rather than people.
Billy slid in the enormous rounds with extreme care before he closed the cylinder. He offered it to me with a grimace and a flash of dark, angry eyes.
“Lose that, and they’ll never find your body,” he warned me.
“Anti-supe rounds?” I guessed.
“They’re experimental, and we haven’t had time to field-test them yet,” Chuck said. “None of us are ever all that excited about getting close to a supe, but you’re crazy enough to put it through its paces. So make sure that you tell us how it goes.”
I took the revolver, and my hand dipped at the sheer weight of the thing. It was a snub-nosed design, had a double-action trigger with a cockable hammer, and probably weighed half a ton.
I clicked on a manual safety on the side of the pistol and nodded my thanks.
“Anything I should know about it?” I asked.
“They’re armor-piercing, and have a built-in shock function,” Billy said. “Supes are made of tougher stuff than us meat-based lifeforms. So the bullet should punch into them, deliver a high-powered charge, and scramble their brain. Emphasis on should.”
I hefted the gun, impressed. “Nice bit of gear.”
“I built it from scratch,” Billy said. “So if you lose it, it’s your ass.”
“I’ll make sure I get you a receipt.”
The indistinct figure of the driver waved behind the frosted-glass divider, and Chuck hauled the door open. Air rushed into the van.
I peered outside to find that the clean, corporate streets of the Commercial District had vanished. Warehouses, car sales yards, and workshops flashed past us in a blur.
The driver slowed the van down to manageable levels. I tipped Billy and Chuck a salute with the enormous revolver and shifted to the side of the van.
My gaze whipped over the scenery, and I spotted a stretch of grass long enough to break my fall.
“Meet you back at the cafe,” I told them.
“Best of luck!” Chuck called.
I heard Billy start a sentence with ‘Javier’ as I threw myself out of the van and hit the grass feet-first. Momentum took over, and I rolled into a clean tumble. I tore up my shirt and newly-purchased jeans, and came up in a crouch with a new collection of bruises.
And a fucking big gun.
The van disappeared around a corner.
I glanced over my shoulder.
Bullrush skidded around a corner like a truck. Rippling haze leaked off his armored suit, and the asphalt tore up under his boots as he fought for control of his momentum.
His blood-red eyes locked onto me, and I gave him a cheery wave. The supe ducked his head again and charged toward me.
I sprinted into the closest parking lot I could find and dove for cover behind a truck, and the supe smashed through it like paper. Metal screamed and crunched, but the supe missed me narrowly.
He razed a path of destruction through the cars, until he crashed into the steel fence. The sheer concussive force of his head bent the inch-thick steel bars like putty, and he staggered away from it with a crazed laugh.
Instinctive shivers rippled down my spine as I pulled myself to my feet and backed away from him.
“Fuck,” Bullrush cackled, “you’re a tricky one, aren’t you?”
I stopped my retreat in the center of the parking lot.
Trucks lined the available spots around us, along with a smattering of personal vehicles.
Bullrush stalked forward with Terminator-like confidence. His gaze fixed on the huge pistol in my hand, and another crazed laugh rolled out of him.
The guy was clearly a psycho, but I doubted people had the balls to call him out on it.
He was reckless, didn’t give a shit about property damage, and had a hate-boner for me.
Bullrush started to circle. I kept my eyes on him as he prowled around like some kind of lunatic, serial-killer predatory cat.
“If by ‘tricky’, you mean ‘lucky’, then yeah,” I said. “I’m the trickiest there is.”
“I’m gonna break every bone in your body,” Bullrush snarled. “And then I’m gonna drag whatever’s left back to Pinnacle, and they’ll promote me for bringing in a terrorist.”
“Must be hard getting out of C-tier when all you can do is headbutt stuff, right?”
“Funny,” Bullrush sneered. “What can you do? Talk shit? Wave guns around?”
“Actually, I steal people’s powers and give them to other people.”
He laughed again. “That’s bullshit. No one can do that. Not even Pinnacle.”
“Well, I warned you.”
Chapter 10
Bullrush lunged forward. The force-field rippled to life around his body, concentrated around his helmet.
I dodged to the right at the last possible second, but a wall of force still clipped my side and spun me into the asphalt like a toy. I hit the ground with a grunt, rolled up into a crouch, and brought my huge pistol up to bear.
Bullrush smashed headlong into a pickup, crumpling the tray like a newspaper and screwing up the steel beneath. He hauled himself out of the wreck, and I shifted into a Weaver stance as he spun back around to face me.
I’d seen his attack pattern a couple of times now and figured out his general rhythm.
Bullrush was hell on wheels in a straight line, and he could turn cars into modern art with a single face-smash. He didn’t corner well, and he didn’t have much control once his momentum hit critical mass.
I could play bullfighter all I wanted, but he’d chased a van halfway across town and didn’t even look out of breath.
Charge by charge, bullrush would wear me down, until I ran out of gas and got pulverized.
I cocked the pistol. The gun’s action ratcheted back and primed the trigger. I lined up the barrel on Bullrush’s lower mass.
I couldn’t let him get his momentum-shielding up again, but the lunatic seemed content to watch me draw a bead on him. He opened his arms out in a mocking gesture and flipped me off with both hands.
“I’m a fucking superhero!” he called. “You think your little peashooter can do anything to me? I’ll eat the bullet and shit it out after I’m done with you. You can’t do shit to me!”
“Hope you know what you’re doing, Billy,” I whispered.
I pulled the trigger.
The muzzle roared. The gun bucked in my hands and launched its experimental round in a flash of fire and smoke. It smashed into Bullrush’s left thigh and spun him back against the ruined pickup with a scream of agony.
Hope, excitement, and new tactics rushed through me.
I sprinted across the parking lot like a madman.
I had to get in close, take away all his most dangerous weapons, and neutralize the supe before he could do any more damage.
Bullrush hauled himself up to his feet, spat a string of curses, and threw himself into a superman punch.
It was a desperate move, poorly trained, and I saw it coming from a mile away.
I slipped the punch, caught hold of Bullrush’s arm, and shot a knee into his bad leg. He screamed in pain and fell back against the mauled truck. Taking advantage of the opportunity, I shot a kick into his helmet with everything I had. The supe’s skull clunked off the ruined chassis, and it stunned him for a second.
He tried to claw his way back up to his feet, but I slammed a roundhouse kick against his wounded thigh and ripped his feet out from under him.
“—what the fuck?!” Bullrush howled.
I backed up with an exhilarated grin and watched him struggle to rise again.
I wasn’t about to get cocky, but this fucker had it coming, and after what he’d pulled in the Commercial District, I wasn’t above indulging a little shit-talk.
“Feel it?” I asked. “What it’s like to be outclassed?”
Bullrush sprang off the truck’s ruined rear with a surprising amount of energy and aimed his helmet straight for my chest. I wove around the headbutt, snaked an arm around his neck in a basic guillotine, and dropped his face to the asphalt in a bone-shaking DDT.
Bullrush’s helmet cracked into the ground like a gunshot.
I disengaged from him with a quick shoulder roll. The supe laid motionless for a second, and after a second, he struggled shakily to his feet again.
I’d rung his bells with the last move, but there was new, fresh energy in his movements.
The magic bullet had done its work, but it was more akin to a taser than a proper killing tool. It’d scrambled his powers, but I hadn’t managed to get a purchase on his skin to take his powers away yet.
There was, however, a slight worry in the back of my mind that what I’d done to Darkstalker was a one-time thing. That I was going to go skin-to-skin with Bullrush and find myself shit out of luck.
I pushed the worry to the back of my mind, where it belonged.
Rippling haze buzzed around Bullrush’s upper body, and he wheeled around to face me. He dropped into a half-crouch, like a sprinter waiting for the starting pistol. The asphalt cracked under his feet as tension rolled into his muscles.
I gave him the starting gun, right into his good leg.
The gun bucked in my hand and blew through an armored plate and the shin underneath. Blood fountained out of the point of impact. The hazy forcefield dissolved as Bullrush rolled over from the sheer agony of the gunshot.
I dived onto him, slammed a kick into his stupid helmet for good measure, and pinned him into the ground with my hips.
Bullrush threw a useless punch up at my face, and I scooped the proffered arm under my armpit. I shot my legs around his head and chest, leaned back, and snapped his arm the wrong way with a quick jerk.
Bullrush howled in pain, and I released his busted limb. He rolled over into the fetal position and cradled his busted limb. I drove a knee into his ribs as I transitioned over to his banged-up legs, avoiding his pathetic kicks with practiced ease.
A couple of years in Brazil and a winter holiday in Russia had taught me plenty about grappling, while Bullrush seemed to have skipped the hand-to-hand section of Pinnacle’s training regime entirely.
I used the barrel of the pistol and my legs to hyperextend one of his legs before I hooked his heel to add torsion to the technique.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck—” Bullrush moaned.
“What was that about breaking my bones?” I asked.
“You’re fucking dead, I’ll fucking kill you—”
“Not without an ACL, you won’t.”
I shattered his knee with a quick jerk and swept up his opposing leg. I broke every ligament I could get my hands on, dusted up old techniques I hadn’t touched in months, and hit the jackpot. One of the bullets had dislodged an armor plate, torn through his skintight spandex, and left bloody skin open to the air.
I rammed my fist against the injury.
Bullrush spasmed in agony as I maintained contact with his gun wound. A notification window appeared in my vision a small eternity later, and excitement hit my brain like lightning.
Transfer Complete
Bullrush Powers Stolen
I untangled myself from Bullrush, straightened up, and glanced down at the huge revolver in my hand. I had to give Billy props. The guy had given me the perfect tool for the job. The gun had worked to slow Bullrush down, giving me the edge that I needed to finish him off up-close.
Bullrush stared up at me as I tapped the revolver against my thigh.
“What the fuck—” His breath caught, and I heard him fight off a wave of pain. “What the fuck did you just do to me? Who the fuck are you?”
“I did exactly what I said I would do. Took your powers off you.”
“That’s impossible. You can’t do that, I’m better than you—”
“I’m not the guy lying on the ground crippled. Looks like you bit off more than you could chew, Bullrush.” I dropped onto my haunches and rested the gun against my thigh. “As for who I am? I’m your worst fucking nightmare.”
“They’ll find you,” Bullrush muttered. “Pinnacle will hunt you down like a dog—”
“They’d better send tougher guys than you then,” I interrupted.
I lifted the gun and leveled it at his skull. He cringed away from me.
I couldn’t see his face, but I knew he was terrified. I’d taken a borderline invulnerable superhuman, who had never had a proper fight in his life, and systematically disassembled his body and mind.
I’d taken everything away from him. He’d need months of physical therapy and surgery to recover.
That was if I let him live.
Two dead supes in two days would be a huge blow against Pinnacle, and it’d give me plenty of rep with the Basement. More than I already had.
I held the gun on his head for a long moment, thinking hard about it.
“Please, man,” he begged, voice breaking. “Don’t kill me.”
“Do you know how many people you’ve killed?” I asked quietly. “How many regular civilians you’ve mowed through? How much property you’ve damaged, swinging your dick around in the middle of Empyrion? Like you own the place?”
“I didn’t mean to, it just happens, I can’t—”
“Control it? You expect me to believe that? You never fine-tuned your skills, or learned any discipline. Fuck, they treat you people like you’re the paragons of society. Like you’re their one savior against all the bad things in the world.”
“Please, I’m begging you.” He started to cry under the cracked helmet.
I straightened up and let the gun fall to my side.
A combination of emotions battled for prominence in my gut.
Excitement at the new potential powers.
Disgust for the former supe at my head.
Anger, running hot.
And a cold, visceral satisfaction from going toe-to-toe with a so-called superhero and humbling him down to a human level.
“You get to live,” I said. “Although you’re gonna wish I killed you.”
“What?”
“How good is your medical insurance? I tore up both of your knees. Even with the magic shit they have, do you really think that Pinnacle is going to want anything to do with a depowered supe that doesn’t make them money? That failed to take out a serious threat?” I shook my head. “You’re human, you’re crippled, and you’re on our level now. And you’re going to spend the rest of your life doing some good in the world. Because if I hear a whisper about you, anywhere, I’m going to hunt you down and finish you off.”
He cried under the helmet again and curled himself up like a child.
* * *
I started out of the parking lot, leaving the crippled former-superhero on the ground behind me, and eyed the enormous revolver in my hand. I didn’t exactly have a holster for it, or any way to easily hide the weapon, short of stuffing it down the back of my pants.
I considered my options for a second, then clicked open the cylinder and slid out the two empty shells. I pocketed them and tugged out the live round. It went into my pocket with the others, and I tucked the hand-cannon into my waistband, just below the small of my back. It wasn’t perfect, but I wouldn’t do myself any favors waving Billy’s mini-bazooka around in my hand.
I walked quickly, though without obvious hurry, through the streets of the Industrial District.
A bus stop sat outside a car dealership, rundown and heavily-graffitied, and I waited for a ride back into the city.
A bus cruised by, and I flagged it down without a fuss. The driver miraculously accepted cash, and I took a seat behind two old ladies and a half-asleep bookish-looking guy with a shock of messy hair.
“Cool it, Billy,” the big guy said, and held out his hand to me. “I’m Chuck.”
“Nice to meet you,” I said, and grasped his hand with a firm grip.
Billy leaned over to the driver and called out some indistinct instructions.
The van veered left around a sharp corner. We kept our balance as best we could, and the driver put his foot down again. The van had to be a custom engine job. I’d never been in anything as large with so much acceleration. Billy pinned me with a glare as Chuck and I braced ourselves against another sharp turn.
“I don’t like it,” Billy said sharply. “He’s playing us.”
“What possible reason do I have to lie?” I demanded.
“Could be a trap. This might all be a setup to get us out into the open,” he said stubbornly. “You really expect us to believe that you were the one to whack Darkstalker? And that you’re somehow able to take a supe with nothing but your bare hands?”
“I mean, I wouldn’t say no to a gun,” I replied.
Chuck raised a hand to stave off Billy’s protest. “He’s our best chance at cutting Bullrush loose, at the very least. And, hell, if he’s sincere, then he might just be the kind of crazy that we need with us. Where’d you put the Scrambler?”
“Chuck—” Billy said, warningly.
Chuck pinned Billy with a glare. “Look, do you want to wait until the van runs out of juice and Bullrush stomps us? Or do you want to get out of here in one piece? Because you know what Gwen said about—”
The mention of this mysterious Gwen was enough to galvanize Billy.
The lean merc turned, tugged open a rolling drawer on the floor, and pulled out a black case of simple plastic. I’d have picked it as a storage container for a drill, but when Billy pulled the locks open, I realized it was part of their cover. Which made sense.
The inside of the van was filled with tool chests, cases, and other apparently random odds and ends that were perfect for disguising a crew of well-armed, well-trained mercenaries.
Billy opened the case and lifted a space-age revolver out of a foam bed. Three thumb-sized bullets sat nestled beside it, and the merc opened the weapon’s cylinder with a sinister click.
The pistol wasn’t exactly low-profile. It was a big hunk of well-machined metal, thick with an ergonomic grip and stabilizers, and looked like the kind of gun you used to hunt tanks, rather than people.
Billy slid in the enormous rounds with extreme care before he closed the cylinder. He offered it to me with a grimace and a flash of dark, angry eyes.
“Lose that, and they’ll never find your body,” he warned me.
“Anti-supe rounds?” I guessed.
“They’re experimental, and we haven’t had time to field-test them yet,” Chuck said. “None of us are ever all that excited about getting close to a supe, but you’re crazy enough to put it through its paces. So make sure that you tell us how it goes.”
I took the revolver, and my hand dipped at the sheer weight of the thing. It was a snub-nosed design, had a double-action trigger with a cockable hammer, and probably weighed half a ton.
I clicked on a manual safety on the side of the pistol and nodded my thanks.
“Anything I should know about it?” I asked.
“They’re armor-piercing, and have a built-in shock function,” Billy said. “Supes are made of tougher stuff than us meat-based lifeforms. So the bullet should punch into them, deliver a high-powered charge, and scramble their brain. Emphasis on should.”
I hefted the gun, impressed. “Nice bit of gear.”
“I built it from scratch,” Billy said. “So if you lose it, it’s your ass.”
“I’ll make sure I get you a receipt.”
The indistinct figure of the driver waved behind the frosted-glass divider, and Chuck hauled the door open. Air rushed into the van.
I peered outside to find that the clean, corporate streets of the Commercial District had vanished. Warehouses, car sales yards, and workshops flashed past us in a blur.
The driver slowed the van down to manageable levels. I tipped Billy and Chuck a salute with the enormous revolver and shifted to the side of the van.
My gaze whipped over the scenery, and I spotted a stretch of grass long enough to break my fall.
“Meet you back at the cafe,” I told them.
“Best of luck!” Chuck called.
I heard Billy start a sentence with ‘Javier’ as I threw myself out of the van and hit the grass feet-first. Momentum took over, and I rolled into a clean tumble. I tore up my shirt and newly-purchased jeans, and came up in a crouch with a new collection of bruises.
And a fucking big gun.
The van disappeared around a corner.
I glanced over my shoulder.
Bullrush skidded around a corner like a truck. Rippling haze leaked off his armored suit, and the asphalt tore up under his boots as he fought for control of his momentum.
His blood-red eyes locked onto me, and I gave him a cheery wave. The supe ducked his head again and charged toward me.
I sprinted into the closest parking lot I could find and dove for cover behind a truck, and the supe smashed through it like paper. Metal screamed and crunched, but the supe missed me narrowly.
He razed a path of destruction through the cars, until he crashed into the steel fence. The sheer concussive force of his head bent the inch-thick steel bars like putty, and he staggered away from it with a crazed laugh.
Instinctive shivers rippled down my spine as I pulled myself to my feet and backed away from him.
“Fuck,” Bullrush cackled, “you’re a tricky one, aren’t you?”
I stopped my retreat in the center of the parking lot.
Trucks lined the available spots around us, along with a smattering of personal vehicles.
Bullrush stalked forward with Terminator-like confidence. His gaze fixed on the huge pistol in my hand, and another crazed laugh rolled out of him.
The guy was clearly a psycho, but I doubted people had the balls to call him out on it.
He was reckless, didn’t give a shit about property damage, and had a hate-boner for me.
Bullrush started to circle. I kept my eyes on him as he prowled around like some kind of lunatic, serial-killer predatory cat.
“If by ‘tricky’, you mean ‘lucky’, then yeah,” I said. “I’m the trickiest there is.”
“I’m gonna break every bone in your body,” Bullrush snarled. “And then I’m gonna drag whatever’s left back to Pinnacle, and they’ll promote me for bringing in a terrorist.”
“Must be hard getting out of C-tier when all you can do is headbutt stuff, right?”
“Funny,” Bullrush sneered. “What can you do? Talk shit? Wave guns around?”
“Actually, I steal people’s powers and give them to other people.”
He laughed again. “That’s bullshit. No one can do that. Not even Pinnacle.”
“Well, I warned you.”
Chapter 10
Bullrush lunged forward. The force-field rippled to life around his body, concentrated around his helmet.
I dodged to the right at the last possible second, but a wall of force still clipped my side and spun me into the asphalt like a toy. I hit the ground with a grunt, rolled up into a crouch, and brought my huge pistol up to bear.
Bullrush smashed headlong into a pickup, crumpling the tray like a newspaper and screwing up the steel beneath. He hauled himself out of the wreck, and I shifted into a Weaver stance as he spun back around to face me.
I’d seen his attack pattern a couple of times now and figured out his general rhythm.
Bullrush was hell on wheels in a straight line, and he could turn cars into modern art with a single face-smash. He didn’t corner well, and he didn’t have much control once his momentum hit critical mass.
I could play bullfighter all I wanted, but he’d chased a van halfway across town and didn’t even look out of breath.
Charge by charge, bullrush would wear me down, until I ran out of gas and got pulverized.
I cocked the pistol. The gun’s action ratcheted back and primed the trigger. I lined up the barrel on Bullrush’s lower mass.
I couldn’t let him get his momentum-shielding up again, but the lunatic seemed content to watch me draw a bead on him. He opened his arms out in a mocking gesture and flipped me off with both hands.
“I’m a fucking superhero!” he called. “You think your little peashooter can do anything to me? I’ll eat the bullet and shit it out after I’m done with you. You can’t do shit to me!”
“Hope you know what you’re doing, Billy,” I whispered.
I pulled the trigger.
The muzzle roared. The gun bucked in my hands and launched its experimental round in a flash of fire and smoke. It smashed into Bullrush’s left thigh and spun him back against the ruined pickup with a scream of agony.
Hope, excitement, and new tactics rushed through me.
I sprinted across the parking lot like a madman.
I had to get in close, take away all his most dangerous weapons, and neutralize the supe before he could do any more damage.
Bullrush hauled himself up to his feet, spat a string of curses, and threw himself into a superman punch.
It was a desperate move, poorly trained, and I saw it coming from a mile away.
I slipped the punch, caught hold of Bullrush’s arm, and shot a knee into his bad leg. He screamed in pain and fell back against the mauled truck. Taking advantage of the opportunity, I shot a kick into his helmet with everything I had. The supe’s skull clunked off the ruined chassis, and it stunned him for a second.
He tried to claw his way back up to his feet, but I slammed a roundhouse kick against his wounded thigh and ripped his feet out from under him.
“—what the fuck?!” Bullrush howled.
I backed up with an exhilarated grin and watched him struggle to rise again.
I wasn’t about to get cocky, but this fucker had it coming, and after what he’d pulled in the Commercial District, I wasn’t above indulging a little shit-talk.
“Feel it?” I asked. “What it’s like to be outclassed?”
Bullrush sprang off the truck’s ruined rear with a surprising amount of energy and aimed his helmet straight for my chest. I wove around the headbutt, snaked an arm around his neck in a basic guillotine, and dropped his face to the asphalt in a bone-shaking DDT.
Bullrush’s helmet cracked into the ground like a gunshot.
I disengaged from him with a quick shoulder roll. The supe laid motionless for a second, and after a second, he struggled shakily to his feet again.
I’d rung his bells with the last move, but there was new, fresh energy in his movements.
The magic bullet had done its work, but it was more akin to a taser than a proper killing tool. It’d scrambled his powers, but I hadn’t managed to get a purchase on his skin to take his powers away yet.
There was, however, a slight worry in the back of my mind that what I’d done to Darkstalker was a one-time thing. That I was going to go skin-to-skin with Bullrush and find myself shit out of luck.
I pushed the worry to the back of my mind, where it belonged.
Rippling haze buzzed around Bullrush’s upper body, and he wheeled around to face me. He dropped into a half-crouch, like a sprinter waiting for the starting pistol. The asphalt cracked under his feet as tension rolled into his muscles.
I gave him the starting gun, right into his good leg.
The gun bucked in my hand and blew through an armored plate and the shin underneath. Blood fountained out of the point of impact. The hazy forcefield dissolved as Bullrush rolled over from the sheer agony of the gunshot.
I dived onto him, slammed a kick into his stupid helmet for good measure, and pinned him into the ground with my hips.
Bullrush threw a useless punch up at my face, and I scooped the proffered arm under my armpit. I shot my legs around his head and chest, leaned back, and snapped his arm the wrong way with a quick jerk.
Bullrush howled in pain, and I released his busted limb. He rolled over into the fetal position and cradled his busted limb. I drove a knee into his ribs as I transitioned over to his banged-up legs, avoiding his pathetic kicks with practiced ease.
A couple of years in Brazil and a winter holiday in Russia had taught me plenty about grappling, while Bullrush seemed to have skipped the hand-to-hand section of Pinnacle’s training regime entirely.
I used the barrel of the pistol and my legs to hyperextend one of his legs before I hooked his heel to add torsion to the technique.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck—” Bullrush moaned.
“What was that about breaking my bones?” I asked.
“You’re fucking dead, I’ll fucking kill you—”
“Not without an ACL, you won’t.”
I shattered his knee with a quick jerk and swept up his opposing leg. I broke every ligament I could get my hands on, dusted up old techniques I hadn’t touched in months, and hit the jackpot. One of the bullets had dislodged an armor plate, torn through his skintight spandex, and left bloody skin open to the air.
I rammed my fist against the injury.
Bullrush spasmed in agony as I maintained contact with his gun wound. A notification window appeared in my vision a small eternity later, and excitement hit my brain like lightning.
Transfer Complete
Bullrush Powers Stolen
I untangled myself from Bullrush, straightened up, and glanced down at the huge revolver in my hand. I had to give Billy props. The guy had given me the perfect tool for the job. The gun had worked to slow Bullrush down, giving me the edge that I needed to finish him off up-close.
Bullrush stared up at me as I tapped the revolver against my thigh.
“What the fuck—” His breath caught, and I heard him fight off a wave of pain. “What the fuck did you just do to me? Who the fuck are you?”
“I did exactly what I said I would do. Took your powers off you.”
“That’s impossible. You can’t do that, I’m better than you—”
“I’m not the guy lying on the ground crippled. Looks like you bit off more than you could chew, Bullrush.” I dropped onto my haunches and rested the gun against my thigh. “As for who I am? I’m your worst fucking nightmare.”
“They’ll find you,” Bullrush muttered. “Pinnacle will hunt you down like a dog—”
“They’d better send tougher guys than you then,” I interrupted.
I lifted the gun and leveled it at his skull. He cringed away from me.
I couldn’t see his face, but I knew he was terrified. I’d taken a borderline invulnerable superhuman, who had never had a proper fight in his life, and systematically disassembled his body and mind.
I’d taken everything away from him. He’d need months of physical therapy and surgery to recover.
That was if I let him live.
Two dead supes in two days would be a huge blow against Pinnacle, and it’d give me plenty of rep with the Basement. More than I already had.
I held the gun on his head for a long moment, thinking hard about it.
“Please, man,” he begged, voice breaking. “Don’t kill me.”
“Do you know how many people you’ve killed?” I asked quietly. “How many regular civilians you’ve mowed through? How much property you’ve damaged, swinging your dick around in the middle of Empyrion? Like you own the place?”
“I didn’t mean to, it just happens, I can’t—”
“Control it? You expect me to believe that? You never fine-tuned your skills, or learned any discipline. Fuck, they treat you people like you’re the paragons of society. Like you’re their one savior against all the bad things in the world.”
“Please, I’m begging you.” He started to cry under the cracked helmet.
I straightened up and let the gun fall to my side.
A combination of emotions battled for prominence in my gut.
Excitement at the new potential powers.
Disgust for the former supe at my head.
Anger, running hot.
And a cold, visceral satisfaction from going toe-to-toe with a so-called superhero and humbling him down to a human level.
“You get to live,” I said. “Although you’re gonna wish I killed you.”
“What?”
“How good is your medical insurance? I tore up both of your knees. Even with the magic shit they have, do you really think that Pinnacle is going to want anything to do with a depowered supe that doesn’t make them money? That failed to take out a serious threat?” I shook my head. “You’re human, you’re crippled, and you’re on our level now. And you’re going to spend the rest of your life doing some good in the world. Because if I hear a whisper about you, anywhere, I’m going to hunt you down and finish you off.”
He cried under the helmet again and curled himself up like a child.
* * *
I started out of the parking lot, leaving the crippled former-superhero on the ground behind me, and eyed the enormous revolver in my hand. I didn’t exactly have a holster for it, or any way to easily hide the weapon, short of stuffing it down the back of my pants.
I considered my options for a second, then clicked open the cylinder and slid out the two empty shells. I pocketed them and tugged out the live round. It went into my pocket with the others, and I tucked the hand-cannon into my waistband, just below the small of my back. It wasn’t perfect, but I wouldn’t do myself any favors waving Billy’s mini-bazooka around in my hand.
I walked quickly, though without obvious hurry, through the streets of the Industrial District.
A bus stop sat outside a car dealership, rundown and heavily-graffitied, and I waited for a ride back into the city.
A bus cruised by, and I flagged it down without a fuss. The driver miraculously accepted cash, and I took a seat behind two old ladies and a half-asleep bookish-looking guy with a shock of messy hair.
