Mistrunner - Chapter 57 - Actions and Consequences (Patreon)

Trust is the most difficult gift I’ve ever had to give. It goes against my every instinct, trusting another person. Because I know just how selfish, self-centered, and dishonest people can be. And I can’t shake the feeling that, eventually, that’ll be the end of me.

Jeremiah Braddock III

Mouth agape, I watched the video on the shard. There was no sound, but I didn’t need it, either. All I needed was to see Nora shaking hands with one of the Enforcers. I had no idea if money had been exchanged or if there was some other reason behind her betrayal, but I didn’t care. I had all the evidence I needed.

But I went further, delving into the files I’d downloaded from the security terminal. And what I saw painted a very telling picture. Gradually, I gathered the various pieces until I could fit them together into a coherent explanation. Even after I’d examined everything a few times over, I wasn’t certain that I wanted to know what I now knew.

“It was my fault,” I muttered, retrieving the shard from my port. I handed it back to Pick, who’d remained silent the whole time, and he made it disappear. Obviously, he had something like an Arsenal Implant, though I suspected that it was far more limited in scope than the one I depended on so heavily. Either way, I wasn’t really thinking about his kit. Instead, I was wholly focused on all the mistakes I had made.

The first, and the one that had kicked off the whole thing, was taking the Tier-7 Nexus Implant in the first place. The moment I had, my uncle’s fate had been sealed. He just hadn’t known it yet.

“What are you talking about?” asked Pick, his throat raspy. Absent mindedly, I retrieved a bottle of water from my own Arsenal Implant and handed it over. He greedily downed the liquid as I thought about how I was going to answer his question.

“The only reason they didn’t kill my uncle sooner was because they knew he had what they wanted,” I said, not wanting to get into specifics. I wanted to trust Pick, but what I’d just discovered told me just how dangerous that was. “They just didn’t know where it was. When he gave it to me, they had no reason to keep him alive anymore. Nora told them. She painted a target on his back.”

“That doesn’t make it your fault,” he said, shifting to a more upright position. “I don’t know what it was, but –”

“Then, he disappeared with me,” I went on. “Dipped under their radar. They wanted to find him, but they had no idea where to look. Not until Jack came to them. I could have killed him. I had every reason to. Plenty of opportunity. But I chose to let him live. And he disappeared; nobody knew that he’d gone to tell the Enforcers that my uncle was here in Mobile.”

Pick didn’t know the whole story there, so he remained silent. I could tell, though, that he wanted to dispute my claim. To rob me of blame. I refused to let him. So, I continued, saying, “But Uncle Jeremiah, he was always hard to pin down. One day, he’d be here, and the next, he would be gone. So, they turned to Nora, who…insisted on training me. I thought it was because she wanted to help me. I thought she cared about me. But…b-but she just wanted to be here so she could let them know when my uncle was around. And she did.”

I took a deep breath as tears flowed down my cheeks. They weren’t driven by sadness, though. Instead, they were based on anger. With myself for setting the whole thing in motion. With Nora for her betrayal. With Jack for being an unrelenting scumbag. The Enforcers because they were the instrument by which everyone had been killed. Even the people of Mobile like the Amigos, who were supposed to have protected the civilians.

I clenched my hands into fists until my knuckles went white. “They laid in wait,” I said. “Just…just waiting for an opportunity, and when Nora told them he was there, they let loose. Now, everybody’s gone. Dead. Because of me.”

“You couldn’t have known…”

“But I did!” I half screamed. “I did. I knew…I knew they would be after us. My uncle said it a hundred times. He went on and on about how selfish people were. But I let Jack live. I trusted Nora. And everyone else paid the price…”

“I…I don’t know what you want me to say…”

Nothing. There was nothing Pick could say that would make me feel any better. The only thing that might assuage my guilt was to continue with my original plan. Fortunately, my Time Bomb Ghost had had plenty of time to spread and affect most of the base, which would clear the way for me to exact revenge.

Or at least part of it. But Nora was already gone, and dealing with her would be a task for another day. For now, I needed to put one proverbial foot in front of the other, lest I become enmeshed in so much guilt that I couldn’t force myself to move. If that happened, I would die, and all of Jeremiah’s sacrifices would have been for nothing.

So, I stood, wiped the tears from my cheeks, and asked, “Can you walk?”

Pick nodded. “I can, but not very fast,” he said.

I reached down and helped him up. With that done, we both left the room; when we passed the prone Enforcer, I quickly ended his life with a decisive sword stroke and gathered his pistol, which I handed to Pick. “I hope you can use that,” I said. “Cover my back. Shouldn’t be many of them still upright, but some of them might’ve been powerful enough to resist my Ghost.”

Stepping forward, I placed a series of demolition charges on load-bearing pillars and walls. I was no expert, but I’d received a little training on how to best bring a building down. I put it to good use as I rigged the entire basement to blow. Then, we moved up to the first floor, which received much the same treatment. However, we also ran across a few groups of enforcers. I didn’t go out of my way to kill them, mostly because I wasn’t sure how much longer my Ghost would last. If I stopped to execute every one of them, I’d run out of time. It was better, then, to bring the building down on their heads.

Like that, Pick and I finished placing every demolition charge I had in my Arsenal Implant. I was aware that it was probably overkill, but I figured it was better to use too much than too little. This was a job that needed to be finished the first time because I knew I wouldn’t get a second chance.

Finally, after finishing on the fourth floor, we descended the stairs and quickly found our way to the entrance. I could’ve done it quicker by myself, but Pick refused to be left alone. Probably for good reason, given his lack of pertinent combat skills and the recent trauma he had been through. Understandable as it was, though, I couldn’t help but become a little annoyed when we took long enough that, when we passed the groups of Enforcers on the first floor, they’d begun to stir. The Ghost, I knew, wouldn’t last much longer.

“Stay behind me,” I said, approaching the doors. At one point, they’d been glass, but after the Initialization, that had been replaced. Then, those replacements had been further reinforced by the Enforcers. So, I had no idea what was waiting on the other side. I retrieved the detonator for the charges from my Arsenal Implant, then handed it to Pick, saying, “If there’s anyone out there, I want you to run to cover as soon as I engage. The moment you’re clear, bring the building down.”

“What about you?” he asked, watching as I checked my various weapons. I knew they were all still fully loaded, but it never hurt to double check.

“Don’t worry about me,” I stated, holding my Kicker. “Just bring it down. Don’t hesitate. I don’t want to have a bunch of Enforcers flooding out of the building while I’m trying to deal with whatever’s out there.”

“Might not be anyone out there,” he said.

“There is.”

“How do you know?” he asked, gesturing to the solid doors.

“Intuition,” I lied. In fact, using Observation, I’d already heard movement. And given that everyone else was dead, it didn’t take much logic to come to the conclusion that there were some Enforcers out there. I had no idea how they’d avoided being infected by my Ghost, but at this point, it didn’t matter.

I asked if he was ready, and I received a nervous nod. He gripped his pilfered pistol so hard that his knuckles had turned white. With the other hand, he clung to the detonator like his life depended on it. And it did. Without that, we’d be overwhelmed.

Not for the first time, I wished I’d have just gone to the top of the building and started picking people off. It was a losing strategy, not least because of the sheer advantage in numbers the Enforcers had, but at least it would have been more straightforward. Besides, I wasn’t entirely sure I wanted to live in a world where everyone I knew and loved was either dead or a traitor.

But I was committed now, for better or worse. And I wasn’t burdened by some naïve desire to keep my body count to a minimum anymore. That lesson had been an expensive one, but I had learned it well. Leaving enemies alive was a recipe for disaster.

So, I took a deep breath, slid to the side of the closest door, then reached over to open it. The moment I did, the air was filled with dozens of gunshots. I’d expected as much, so I didn’t even flinch as I summoned a flashbang and tossed it outside. I quickly followed it up with a smoke grenade, then relocated to another one of the doors. By the time I reached it, the air outside the building was obscured by a thick, white smoke that cut visibility down to a couple of feet.

For them, at least.

For me, with Observation on my side, it wasn’t very effective. I darted out of the building, strafing to my left as I peppered the area with one burst from my Kicker after another. I couldn’t really see much, but with all my senses working at a superhuman level, I knew precisely where my enemies were. Each burst found their mark, and I was rewarded with a series of grunts, a couple of groans, and even one startled scream. It was music to my ears.

To my surprise, the area was occupied by at a dozen Enforcers, each one at least Tier-3. A dozen were Tier-4. And there were even a handful of Tier-5’s out there. Knowing what I faced, there was no way I was going to underestimate them.

I continued my assault until I reached the cover of a sizable pile of rubble. I crouched behind it, summoning another grenade from my Arsenal Implant. Then, I tossed it into the smoke. However, it exploded harmlessly well before it hit the ground; clearly, they’d deployed a drone system to take care of any more grenades. That meant I’d have to finish things manually.

I didn’t mind that. As much as I loved explosions, there was something visceral about ripping someone apart with bullets.

Knowing that the Enforcers were homing in on me, I shot off a couple more bursts before relocating. As I moved, I stayed low, exchanging a spent magazine for a fresh one as I slid behind an overturned and burned out skeleton of a car. I was just about to pop up to continue my assault when my instincts went wild. I don’t know if it was my Combat Focus, Observation, or simple battle experience, but in that split second, I knew that if I didn’t move, I was going to lose my head. So, I ducked and rolled away; my caution was rewarded when I heard a sword clang against the metal wreck.

I gathered myself just in time to block the next attack – an overhand slash meant to cleave me in two – with my Kicker. I kicked out at my assailant’s knee, but she – and the figure definitely belonged to a woman – pulled her leg back at the last moment. Then, she aimed a jab at my face. I tilted my head forward, taking the punch in my forehead; the resulting impact hurt like crazy, but it was just pain. I knew there would be no real damage.

I used that brief moment to fire off a burst that took my attacker in the stomach. She staggered backward, which gave me plenty of room to take aim and fire at her head. Even at such close range, it didn’t explode like I might have expected. Instead, I heard a distinctly metallic clang of subdermal armor. However, whether the bullets penetrated or not was largely irrelevant, because the impact staggered her even further. As she fell against the car’s remains, I unloaded my entire magazine into her. And even her subdermal armor couldn’t hold up to that. She dropped dead before my magazine ran dry.

But the damage was done. During my brief battle, the smoke had begun to clear, and the rest of the Enforcers had homed in on my location. I dove back into cover just in time to avoid a hail of gunfire. I hunkered down, but the car’s metal was thin enough that it couldn’t block everything. After only a second, I felt the bite of a gunshot in my shoulder. Then another in my calf. I covered my head and curled into a ball, but the barrage of gunfire was ceaseless. The car was quickly torn to pieces, and my injuries began to mount.

As I lay there, my body bleeding and my end drawing near, I couldn’t help but feel bitter. After everything I had been through, I still wasn’t strong enough. My uncle had given me everything, and yet, I hadn’t lasted a single month after the conclusion of my training. Certainly, there were good reasons. Few people in the world could have stood up to an entire battalion of Enforcers. But then again, I had every advantage, didn’t I? And I had squandered that.

In that moment, I remembered all the times I’d slacked off. I thought about all the poor decisions I’d made. All the mistakes that had led me there. It was enough that I came very close to just giving up. I was already dead, wasn’t I? I just needed to wake up and realize it.

Suddenly, I thought about my uncle. Not about his life. Instead, I thought about his death. He’d fought to the very end. They’d had to literally tear him limb for limb to kill him. And even then, when he was only a head with a bit of a spine attached, he hadn’t immediately succumbed. More than that, he’d never given in. He had never stopped fighting. So, what kind of a person would I be if I didn’t do the same?

My fingers tightened on my rifle’s grip and I focused on Observation. Even as my wounds – usually from ricocheting bullets – continued to pile up, I ignored them. Instead, I focused on my assailants. On their footsteps. Their smells. The subtle shifts in the air that came from their movements.

Two squads. Four on the left. Five on the right. All Tier-4 or better, mostly armed with rifles or submachine guns and backed up by the skills to use them. But they hadn’t worked like I had. They’d trained, sure. That much was clear. But they hadn’t spent the better part of three years pushing themselves to the very limits of their endurance.

I had. I was better than them. It was time I showed them how much of a mistake they’d made by messing with me and my family. And even if I ended up dying, I wasn’t going to go down without a fight.

So, I stowed my rifle and summoned my nano-sword. Then, even as the gunfire continued, I found the left-most target, who turned out to be a slender man in one of the Banshee uniforms. I used Engage, and in a blink of an eye, I’d covered the thirty feet between us. Even amidst the gunfire, I heard his gasp as my blade descended, cutting into his neck. I kicked out with every ounce of strength I possessed, and he went tumbling through the air, leaving a spray of blood in his wake. I knew from experience that it was a fatal wound.

I was moving again before any of the other Enforcers could react, and I got similar results with the next man in line. With the third, I changed tactics, slicing at his knees and gripping him by the back of his shirt before slamming my blade through his spine. By then, the rest of the Enforcers had reacted, but because I was using him as a riot shield, their bullets never reached me.

I dismissed my nano-bladed sword and replaced it with Ferdinand II. I whipped my arm around the bullet riddled human shield and rapidly fired into my next victim. My pistol was loaded with armor penetrating rounds, so the Enforcer’s subdermal armor was largely useless. The bullets took her in the chest, but they didn’t have enough penetrating power to come out the other side, so they just rattled around inside. She didn’t survive the onslaught.

Rushing forward, I rammed into the last member of the left-most squad. He let out a surprised scream as I trampled him, and I made a point to stomp down on his throat along the way. It took two blows to crush his spine.

I was just about to turn my attention to the next squad when something rammed into me. My human shield went skidding across the rubble-strewn ground. I lost my grip on my pistol as well.

Pushing away, I suddenly felt the barrel of a gun on the back of my head, followed by a familiar voice, “Nuh, uh-uh. Let’s not get too feisty.”

I splayed my fingers and stopped struggling as a knee dug into the back, pushing my cheek into the gravelly ground. I didn’t need to look up to recognize the voice as belonging to the apparent leader of the Enforcers. Not only were they capable of concealing their identity from me, but they’d snuck up on me as well.

“What do we do, boss?” came a gruff voice. The other squad was still alive and well. My gambit hadn’t been successful. However, instead of going out with a blaze of glory, I’d been taken prisoner. And given that the leader had already threatened me with a Slave Implant, I didn’t think they’d execute me. No – I was too valuable for that.

“I need you to –”

Suddenly, a deafening sound swept through the area, followed closely by a shockwave that sent my captor sprawling. Because I was already on the ground, I managed to escape the worst of it, but even then, it rattled my bones. A split second later, a billowing cloud of dust and debris filled the air.

I couldn’t help but smile. Pick, it seemed, had finally come through and brought the building down.