NOVEL NEXT Chapter Five: Let The Bodies Hit
I always thought that killing a person would be hard, like getting stuck on the bones or something but as the four of them hit the floor the only thing difficult is looking at Bubbles horrified face. Not much time to dwell on that though. I turn around and run back into the office.
I try to jump on one of the tables to get to one of the guys. But I go way higher than planned and hit my head against the ceiling. Lucky for me it was one of those weird office ceilings with the plates that just move when you hit them. but it makes me miss the table and just land on top of the guy behind it. We roll around on the floor for a bit. I managed to spring up fast. But I dropped my sword and one of the office workers managed to pick it up before me. And he is now pointing it at me.
“Lyssa give me a better pointy stick now!” I shout out
New Purchase: Raven Claws stinger
Points reduced to... 18
A new sword appears in my hand this one considerably shorter than my claymore. This sword is just a little bit longer than my forearm and has fancy blue patterns over it similar to that of a circuit board. And it’s a lot lighter as I can easily swing it around, compared to my opponent who is struggling with the claymore.
I reach past his guard and slit his throat. I am only momentarily amazed at how good I have gotten with wielding a sword. I hear some weird sizzling from the sword but I ignore it for now. I stabbed the guy I used for a landing pad as well; our little tumble seems to have cracked a few of his bones, so he is still on the ground.
I then run towards the remaining guys. They seem to have not gotten what is happening just yet. So I easily stab the next guy through the heart. The guy after that is less of a deer in headlights and actually tries to block. Too bad for him samurai swords are very sharp. Why does that sound weird? Samurai sword? It’s like a knight with a katana, weird image. Anyway, his block managed to save his life but not his arms, as they were cut off at the elbow. Somehow I always thought bone was harder than this. When I am thinking about this totally relevant point, I feel something impact my back and start hearing sizzling. I turn around to see that Bubbles has her super soaker aimed at me.
“YOU MANIAC!” she screams at me “What do you think you are doing?”
After checking that my back is still intact and not melting off on me, the new shield was worth every point, I give her a look. Then I remember that I am wearing my mask.
“What does it look like? I am killing them,” I say, while looking down at the man missing his arms and crying on the floor “At least I was trying to.”
At this point, the last guy starts to run for the door so I throw my sword at him. I wish I could say I hit him, I did not. Instead, I hit some shitty calendar two meters away from him. After that he runs past Bubbles and disappears into the hallway.
“What the fuck is your damage?” Bubbles says while giving me a look that screams bloody murder.
“Huh, what do you mean I sent you the information, did I not?” I say, now confused, I am pretty sure I sent her the data package.
Lyssa would like to make a small correction, you did send the package, the problem is that she has all incoming data coming from you blocked.
“Ahh, so you have the best anti-virus AI in your brain, and you're still afraid of a virus,” I ask, a bit annoyed, at this point, she looks a bit guilty but still very angry “Well, in short, 135.000 credits that was the closing bid”
“Closing bid?” Now she just looks confused, and I get a ping from her requesting a data transfer. So I sent her everything plus a GIF of a disappointed cat shaking its head: “What were they selling?”
“uhm, well, that was your price,” I say while grabbing my claymore from the ground. “These people, they are human traffickers. They sell people ”
She was quiet after that, but the way her eyes moved suggested she was reading something. So I put the last guy out of his misery and started to investigate the wall that had been bothering me for a while.
“This is not real, right?” she asks. “Not after the Hamburg disaster. stuff like this should be illegal”
“I don’t think the zeppelin has anything to do with the legality of this situation,” I say.
“The Hamburg, not Hindenburg disaster,” she says while looking at me like I am some kind of little kid “You know where some Corp kidnapped a samurai and made them produce weapons, and after a while, the samurai likely had enough and got a self-activating bomb and blew up an entire city block.”
“I understand, but I don’t see why that matters, that just means they are going to be more careful with the next one they grab, they won’t stop.”
“Well, that is a scary thought,” she says. “So what are you doing anyway?”
“Something is not right here,” I say while indicating the wall. “On the building plans, these two walls are not there. It's like there is a hidden room,” I say while noticing some weird coloration between the filling cabinets.
“What do you mean? It is not strange for a landlord to do this take a little bit of space here and there, and you can rent out an extra room,” she says.
“Sure, but nowhere in their data a storage room is mentioned. So where do they store their, let’s say, product?” I say as I push the cabinets aside, revealing a hatch that has an old-school lock on it. ”You have seen some keys somewhere?”
“Yes, Arabella had a key ring. I thought that was kind of weird; I will go and get them,” she says as she walks out into the hallway.
A bit later she comes back with a ring full of different keys and gives them to me. After trying a few keys on the lock I finally find the right one. I open the hatch and inside is a little room with what looks to be eight chained-up women. They seem to shy away, trying to get as far away from the opening as possible. I come inside a bit to check things out. I note that, luckily, none of them seem physically in any danger; they are all a bit on the thin side, and their clothes, well, calling them rags would be too kind. As I see their eyes, the only emotions I see are fear or dread; some of them are even crying. I crawl back out, grab the key ring, and throw it inside.
“What are you doing? ” Bubbles asks “Aren’t we going to help them?”
“Of course we are going to help them,” I say. "But they don’t know that. To them, we just look like the next group of pricks coming in there to beat them up or worse. Give them time to come out at their own pace. Let us clean up the bodies first, then make a plan to leave, and if they have not come out by then, we can take some different action.”
With that we start looking around. We first gather all the weapons they have and put them on one of the desks. They had one assault rifle of some kind 5 pistols and a bunch of knifes. Then we start moving the bodies into the hallway. Bubbles told me she had some kind of solution that could melt the bodies down so the antithesis can’t use them anymore.
As I am about to pick up one of the bodies, I hear a loud clank of something heavy hitting the ground. As I turn toward the noise. I see that one of the girls has come out of the hidden room and tried to grab my claymore. The problem is, for some reason, mine is rather heavy. So she looks rather awkward trying to lift it. I slowly stand up, grab one of the pistols off the table, and approach her, trying to be as non-threatening as possible. I point the gun handle toward her, making sure to hold it by the top of the barrel.
“Take this it's lighter,” I say in a soft voice.
She looks at me with big brown deer eyes full of confusion. Verry slowly she takes the gun, then takes several steps back and aims it at me. I play along and raise my hands.
‘Lyssa that new shield better stop bullets.’
Lyssa would advise asking these types of questions before you give people a weapon in the future. But it should, taking a step back is still recommended.
I take two steps back. Then, the woman checks the gun. Like full-on American style, half disable the pistole check every cavity. So that was unexpected, the girl knows how to handle a gun. You know what I take it, anything to make this situation better. So I lower one of my arms and point it at the assault rifle. She looks at it, then back at me, then slowly walks to the table, making sure to keep aiming at me. Once she reaches it, she lowers the pistol and starts doing the same checks on the rifle. She suddenly stops as she notices the dead body I was attempting to drag out. She then walks up to it and gives it a hard kick. At this point, I don’t know if it is the nerves or something, but I burst out laughing.
“FUCK, YOU BLOODY MANIAC!” I hear Bubbles shooting from the hallway ” You scared the living daylight out of me. I dropped one of them, and now I am splattered.”
“Sorry,” I managed to get out between giggles ”Can you wait in the hallway for a bit?”
“Sure, I can, but why?” she answers
“Well, one of the girls came out,” I say
“ooh I see you don’t want me to come in because I will spook her.”
“No, it is mostly because she has a gun, and I would prefer you not to get shot.”
“Fuck, are you okay?” she asks with concern in her voice “How did she get it anyway?”
“Ooh, I gave it to her.”
“You gave it to her. You. Gave. It. To. Her. You maniac, what is wrong with you? why?”
“Uhm to give her more power, that is at least what I would want in this situation.”
During this conversation, I have been paying attention to the lady. she looks warry but does seem to relax ever so slightly as my conversation continues. Then she points the gun at the entryway while making some kind of head motion that I interpret as a request to let Bubbles inside.
“You can come in now,” I say “But slowly, preferably with your hands above your head.”
“What, and you want me to give you my wallet too?”
“You still have one of those?” I say in confusion. “Never mind, are you coming or not?”
“Yeah, yeah,” she says as she slowly walks into the office. The gun lady looks at her and then lowers her gun. Then shouts something in a language I do not recognize or speak. After that, more of the girls come out of hiding and start to take in the scene. Most of them try to look at me or Bubbles. The gun lady is still talking to some of them.
‘Lyssa, in my combat clothing thingy, is there something that allows me to give these people some better clothes?’ I subvocalize to my inner demon
There are some simple garments you can purchase for only 1 point per person
‘Well do that then’
New Purchase: Complete Urban Survival Outfit Merchandised x8
Points reduced to... 10
2 stacks with 4 boxes each appear in front of me. I hear several gasps and see several big eyes looking at me. So I take one of the top boxes.
That one is for the girl directly to the left.
‘Well okay,’ I subvocalize while giving the box to the right person ‘What is the difference between them’
Other than a few colour changes Lyssa made sure to get the shoesize and their basic height measurements correct.
‘Ooh, I see so which box belongs to who?’
As I am in the process of giving out the clothing I find out what my brain rot has cooked up this time. All of them have some simple socks and sneakers some loose-fitting jeans and a hoody with the word maniac written on the chest in some kind of gravity-font.
“So maniac huh?” Bubbles says “It fits you”
“Oh fuck off, really, that is what we are going for,” I say, not knowing to be sad or insulted.
“As the only other samurai around, it is my right to come up with your samurai name,” she says, smugness radiating off of her.
“I see. Then who came up with your name?” I ask
She goes completely quiet and starts to fidget, then some boxes appear nearby ”I have gotten food for everyone, help me hand it out?”
“This is not over,” I say as I pick up a few of the containers and start handing them out. When that is over, I sit down with my own portion and start the complicated task of eating with my mask on.