Trump Card
Part Twenty-Three: Serial Escalation
Tattletale's voice crackled in my helmet.
"We're nearly done here. What's happening up there?"
I was still tapping her power, so I was able to answer with a fair degree of certainty. "Lung's outside, but he's not trying to get in. Which means that he's either ramping up until he's certain of getting in quickly, or he's waiting on backup."
"
Which means Oni Lee."
"Which means Oni Lee," I agreed.
"
I don't like that idea."
"Pretty sure that none of us do."
"
I'm thinking that we should go with Plan B. Like, right now."
"Plan B will put us not all that far away and the teleporter makes for a nice big flash when it arrives. If someone notices, they could easily catch up with us while you're doing your best to manhandle me, in unpowered armour, out of there."
"
Yeah, I had noticed the flash. So you're thinking Plan D?"
"The boys have armour too. We'll lead the fight outside, then you can evac with the panicked mob. Once you're away, we'll disengage."
"
Easier said than done."
"If I can zorch Lung before the fight starts, it should -"
In the next second, there was a loud BANG, and a splintered hole appeared in the door at about head height, four feet away from me. I jumped, staring at the hole. In my earpieces, a medley of voices all demanded to know the answer to the same question; what had that been?
"Shotgun," I answered shakily, gleaning the answer from Tattletale's powers. "Solid slug. Missed by a mile."
"
Keep away from the door," Tattletale warned.
"They may be trying to get you."
"It was only the one shot," I replied. "If they were trying to probe for me, they would have fired more." But something was nagging at me;
they're trying something, but what?
My HUD was currently running the targeting reticule for the stun rifle; on instinct, I flicked it over to the cape detector, and jumped again. "Shit, there's a cape just outside!"
"
Who is it?" demanded Über.
Before I could answer, before I could even decide to pull the light-spot from Tattletale and place it on the cape outside – who my borrowed intuition was telling me was Oni Lee – it happened. Between one eye-blink and the next, the cloaked form of Oni Lee was standing right in front of me; I couldn't see his face due to the red-and-green-painted demon mask he wore, but I did see the round black object that he dropped from his hand.
"
GRENADE!" I screamed, not caring who I deafened, hurling myself backward and away from the innocuous-looking object. I could leap some distance in the armour; unfortunately, I was still in midair when the grenade went off. I may have been flung further back; I wasn't sure. My hand came up instinctively to protect my eyes from the blast, then I hit the floor with a tremendous crash.
At least, I got the impression that it was a tremendous crash; I felt the impact, but my ears were ringing badly from the detonation. Rolling over, I tried to get to my feet; it took me two tries. Vaguely I saw, through my one good lens, Über making a kicking motion; a second or so later, the cashier's cage disintegrated from within. L33t was swinging at Oni Lee, but the ABB cape was already collapsing into the white ash that was his trademark.
Where's he gone? I looked around, saw him at the door, undoing the heavy locks. I brought up the stun rifle, tried to trigger it, but all I got was a HUD full of error messages. Either the grenade or the leap to safety had jarred something loose and the stun rifle was now out of the picture. And then it was too late; the door was open.
Lung stepped inside.
<><>
I took a deep breath and flicked the light-spot to Oni Lee; if I could harness his teleportation the way he did, it might assist greatly in the fight. But the concussion from the grenades going off must have affected me more than I had thought, because before I could focus on the powers, Lung was right there in front of me.
He was already grown to about eight feet tall and was starting to cover himself in the metallic scales which were his trademark. His eyes were visible behind the metal mask that he wore. I could swear that they were glowing with an internal fire.
His fist came around and I reacted too slowly to block it; the impact smashed me in the ribs, driving me across until I hit the wall. If I hadn't been wearing the armour, I would have lost all the ribs on that side of my body; as it was, the breath was driven forcefully out of my lungs. Error messages sprang up in my single working HUD lens, detailing problems with my armour.
Dragging myself to my feet, I forced my thoughts to focus. My head was still swimming from the blow, but I couldn't let him pin me down where he could rip my armour apart. There was another explosion, but I didn't see where it was or if the boys had been hurt; Oni Lee was standing in the doorway. Then he crumbled to ash once more.
Have to use his powers.
I looked at them properly for the first time and shuddered.
No. Not like that. Every use had a price; infinitesimal at first, it gradually eroded his intellect and his will, making him duller and less intelligent as time went on.
Lung slashed at me with razor-tipped claws; I deflected the blow with difficulty, but I managed to do two other things at the same time. The first thing I did was switch the light-spot to Lung. The second thing was to switch over the teleport disc to its secondary function; teleport
jamming.
<><>
Lung was more than a little surprised when he realised the identities of the three thieves in his casino. Über and L33t were no more than a step above common street scum in his estimation; they had lost out so many times in their career that the authorities did not have the heart to put them away for good. Of course, since they had gained their third member, their fortunes had turned around. He hadn't thought them suicidal, however.
Oni Lee had done his job well, getting Lung into the casino. From this point, of course, he was to keep two of the three busy while Lung engaged and defeated the third. It would only be a matter of time before all three were either dead or at the mercy of the ABB; the result would the same in the end.
The armour that they were wearing came as another surprise, but he supposed that it was to be expected; L33t was a Tinker, after all. That the armour had not exploded or failed to work altogether was a step up from L33t's usual capability, but Lung saw no real difficulty in winning the fight. The armour could only be so tough, after all. He would win. It was merely a matter of time.
<><>
Lung's power surged into my body. My head cleared almost instantly, the lingering pain in my ribs clearing up as if by magic. Across the room, on the other side of the ruins of the cashier's cage, Über's plasma rifle went off, followed by an explosion. I heard it clearly, because the ringing in my ears had finally cleared up as well.
