Chapter 11: The Good Fight

The main hall of the Hollow had gone silent, a stark contrast from the hustle and bustle of just a few minutes prior. I ran through the crowded, silent room, gun drawn. The room had unbearable tension as everyone stared at the entrance, waiting for whoever would come down the broken escalator. 

The Hollow is supposed to be a sanctuary, I thought to myself, I'm not letting anyone break that, especially not these Blackthorn coggers.

When I got to the front of the room I crouched down and listened for footsteps. The faint clicking of dress shoe heels got louder as the men approached. I closed my eyes for a moment, mentally preparing for what I was about to do and the consequences of my actions. 

If I kill them and they find out I did it, they'll come for me, I thought. I can't be seen as I do this. 

In a moment of quick thinking, I reached into my pocket and retrieved a surgical mask. I wore it when going on hunts that required me to enter abandoned buildings, but now it had a new purpose. The mask fit my face snuggly as I tied it behind my head. When the two men got to the top of the escalator, one of them audibly cocked his gun and shouted down to us.

"If a man named Cipher is down there, send him up. We don't want to hurt any of you, but we will if you don't do what we ask."

They got nothing in response. After a five count of complete silence, they spoke again.

"Last chance, know that there will be consequences."

Nothing.

Without another word, they began walking down the escalator to come take Cipher. Thankfully, by this point, he was long gone and there was no way they were going to find him. I rose to my full height and stood flat against the wall, arm extended and my gun pointed at the doorway. When the first man shuffled through the doorway I pulled the trigger of my handgun, sending a bullet careening through his skull. He fell to the floor in a heap, dead before he touched the ground. The blood from his head sprayed against the wall and my face, splattering onto the mask and making it impossible to breathe. I grabbed at the earloop on it and peeled it off my face, sucking in a breath. The second man, not wanting to make the same mistake as his partner, stepped back and hid on the other side of the wall I was using for cover. 

"They're gonna get you for this!" He shouted, panic setting into his voice, "We have eyes everywhere!"

I neglected to respond, deciding that he wasn't worth wasting my breath on. I couldn't shoot him through the wall, as it was made of sheet metal. I tapped on it with my metal finger, and it made a hollow dinging sound. It sounded thin, thin enough for me to try something. I stepped back from the wall and putting as much force as I could behind it, I sent a haymaker towards the wall with my left arm. My titanium fist ripped a hole in the metal. I pulled my arm back through the wall, which now had a gaping hole big enough to see the other mercenary. He looked up at me and bolted, realizing that his cover was blown. His wooden heels clicked against the metal escalator as he ran, skipping steps to go as fast as possible.

"Fuck, he saw my face!" I shouted to nobody in particular as I sprinted out the door and up the stairs after him.

The man, now at the top of the stairs, had unholstered his gun and begun firing shots in my general direction. None of them came very close to me, but I still ducked instinctively. I returned fire, sending two bullets up towards him, but I missed the mark. The bullets hit the handrail of the escalator and ricocheted upwards, lodging themselves in the ceiling and sending sparks flying. The man didn't wait for me to fire again and continued running. Trying to catch up, I sprinted up the stairs and gave chase.

By the time I was outside, the man was about fifty feet from me, running south towards the city. I began to gain on him, putting all of the energy I had into running as fast as possible. My breaths became ragged as we ran. When I was within range, I fired another shot at him, which was accurate enough to graze his arm. He cursed and turned right onto another street, trying to shake me. When I got to the street he had turned onto I couldn't see him anymore, but my enhanced eyes caught the small splotches of blood on the ground, which gave me the ability to continue to chase. I followed the blood trail into an alleyway and out the other side where I saw him again, running for his life. I fired one more round at him, this one going through his right leg. He crumpled to the floor, groaning in pain and unable to run any longer. He continued to try to crawl away from me, but I had already closed the gap between us. 

"You should have known better than to break the rules of The Hollow," I said to him simply, stepping on his injured leg to stop him from trying to get away.

"I was just following orders," he cried, "please don't kill me."

I bent over and retrieved his gun, which he had dropped during his fall. I ejected the magazine and threw it as far as I could, then pulled the slide back and ejected the bullet he had been saving for me in its barrel. His plea for mercy struck a chord with me, and I considered letting him live. I didn't want to kill him, but if he told his higher-ups at Blackthorn that it was me who had attacked them, they'd send more mercenaries after me. The smart choice was to kill him and try to forget about it, but I didn't want to.

"If I let you live, more of you will come after me," I said to him.

Realizing that I was going to kill him, he reached for a knife tucked into the pocket of his suit and tried to swing at me. I stepped back and kicked his arm, breaking it and sending the knife clattering across the pavement. He screamed, a primal mix of pain, fear and anger. I felt bad for him, but I had made my decision.

"And here I was considering going against my better judgment," I sighed.

I pointed my Mk. VII down at the man's head and looked away. A single gunshot rang out, echoing through the streets of warehouses. Realizing I had to act fast, I grabbed the corpse by the legs and dragged it backwards. I had seen a dumpster in the alleyway and planned to put the merc in it. It wasn't a dignified way to send him off, but I didn't exactly have a choice. 

I got the man up onto my shoulder and dropped him into the bin, his body sinking into the pile of black garbage bags. The dumpster's lid fell back down, hiding the body away from view. Now that the adrenaline was starting to wear off, I was feeling a bit wobbly. I pulled a cigarette from my pouch and sat down on the ground next to the bin. 

"Mom never liked it when I smoked around her," I said to myself, thinking about her as I let the end of it and took a drag. 

As I smoked, I checked through my contacts and realized that Lyra had responded to my message.

"Badger! Good to hear you're still kicking. I do want to know more about this whole situation, so if you want to drop by tomorrow to debrief I'm not doing much."

I typed up a quick message confirming that I'd be there, then closed the interface and leaned back against the cold brick wall behind me. When I finished my cigarette, I stood up from my spot and trudged back to the lot that I'd parked my bike in. When I got back to it, I got on and rode home. I was in desperate need of a shower and some sleep. The face of the man that I'd killed kept appearing in my head, but I tried my best to shake it off. 

"I did what I had to do," I continued to tell myself as I made my way all the way back to my apartment.