Bloody Board

"You still need to talk to the Chief."

"John. Adam's my band mate. I was with him when he keeled over. I need to make sure he's okay. Please take me with you!"

She gave him the most feminine beseeching look she could, playing female charms as high as the dial could go.

John sighed. "Okay. Come with me, but you have to go back and talk to Chief when we're done."

"I promise!"

She and John went back to the General Hospital in his blue chevy truck. As he dropped her off, he quickly reminded her. "You go find out where they've held him while I go park this car. I'll meet you inside."

Jasmine made her way into the lobby area of the General Hospital.

It was two o'clock on a lazy afternoon, a time when all lunches had been taken and all were hunkering down to work the final stretch of the workday. Aside from a few isolated stragglers here and there, no one was around.

Left alone, Jasmine's feeling of paranoia returned. Her eyes darted around the empty hospital hallways, taking stock of every movement within her range of vision.

She walked towards the desk marked 'information' and asked a distracted bespectacled receptionist what room Adam Stuart was in.

Since she was the one who had checked him in, she had the hospital check-in documents in her hand. The woman typed in Adam's name and barely glanced up at Jasmine before giving her the floor and room number in a bored, distracted tone.

"He's on the ninth floor honey, room 912."

Jasmine glanced up at the information board above the front desk. Ninth floor was the psychiatric ward. What the hell was Adam doing in a psychiatric ward?

Thanking the lady, Jasmine went across the hallway to the elevator and pushed the up arrow.

It took two minutes for an elevator car to reach ground level.

During those two minutes, Jasmine stood in the hallway alone, but when the shiny chrome and steel elevator doors slid open with a whoosh, Jasmine was immediately flanked by two men from somewhere around the corner.

She barely had a chance to look up at them when one of the men grabbed her arm, shoving her into the elevator cabin.

Taken by surprise, she struggled for a second, but there were two of them and only one of her. In seconds, one of them had wrapped his hands around her mouth, cutting off her screams for help.

Jasmine struggled and managed to bang on the elevator button for the ninth floor before being pulled back by one of the men.

Suddenly, one of the men got thrown to one side, hitting the back of the elevator with a heavy thud.

The shiny stainless steel metal wall caved in on impact, causing a depression in the otherwise perfect metallic surface.

Before he could rise, something stomped on his face, knocking his front teeth out. He howled with pain as bits of teeth and blood sprayed onto the floor.

Again, he tried to rise but one more THWAP across his face and he slumped down unable to move again.

«Congratulations. You have gained 10 power points from: Andy Tai. Active Aggressive Transference.»

It happened so fast that the other man who had been gagging Jasmine did not even have a chance to intervene.

Taking advantage of the momentary diversion, Jasmine whipped her mouth over his open palm, bitting down hard on the hand that was over her mouth.

"Aaaaahhh!!!" The man screamed and released his bloody hand from her face which was now stained with the blood spilling from her lips.

With just barely enough of an opening between the two of them, she brought up her leg and kneed him in the groin—hard!

He grunted in pain and sank to the floor of the cabin.

At that moment, the elevator door opened and she ran out leaving behind the two men inside the elevator.

Before the elevator doors shut, the second man had slumped to the floor. His eyes were oozing blood and his nose was broken. His face had been bashed in by something hard and blunt.

«Congratulations. You have gained 10 power points from: Loi Kim. Active Aggressive Transference.»

"Dude!" Luis exclaimed with a loud shout of laughter as he high-fived Terry. "I can't believe you nailed both those suckers with that wooden board!"

"Hmmmph!!!" Blake sniffed as he threw the bloodied wooden sign back into his weapons cache. It was the only weapon of the four in his cache that was actually of any worth.

Along with the guy he had strangled at the red light, these two elevator dudes had gained him another 30 points, which totaled exactly 37 red Aggressive points for three dead mofos.

Lucky for him, Luis had been at the scene and had gifted him with 20 green passive points so he could take out the men and protect Jazzie.

Since he had used his hands to kill the first guy, it hadn't cost him any green points. Unfortunately, it was a much slower, more risky operation so he could not go the cheapest route all the time.

Using the board to beat up on the other two guys cost him 2 points each, so he had only expended 4 green points to kill three bad guys.

Blake snarled.

He needed a better weapon than this damn wooden board and he wasn't about to swing his beloved guitar at any degenerate.

The painting was useless and so was the ginger jar. He needed to figure out how to delete weapons he didn't want. Perhaps if he asked the system…

Beside him, Terry was thinking the same thing.

"You need a better weapon, man." Terry muttered, staring at the two dead men.

"Yeah well all I got is a bass guitar, an oil painting, a small ginger jar, and that old board." Blake responded with exasperation.

Terry's green eyes glinted with something maniacal. "What you need is an ax."

Blake turned to him. "Why an ax?"

Terry laughed. "You're not trained in swordsmanship. All you know how to do is swing something at someone using your considerable strength. An ax is perfect for you."

Luis expelled an exasperated breath. "What about a gun? Isn't that easier?"

Terry scoffed. "Nah man. How much energy is it gonna take if he has to keep looking for bullets to fill the gun? He needs something simple he can use right away. The local hardware has a good selection—"

"You gonna take him to a hardware store?" Luis turned to Terry with a hard gaze. "He don't need no hardware store ax, man. Listen."

He leaned in closer to Blake and Terry. "I know where there's a good ax for him."