Getting Away With Murder
At admiral Davidson's insistence, Cole and Kuo started slow. There was no kick in the doors and shoot anything that moves policy. They'd save that for when they had a confirmed target and sure that no innocent bystander would be caught in the crossfire. Sporting civilian attire, Kuo and Cole blended in with the crowd, or what was left of it. Out of the 32,000 or something residents, a meager 1500 were still alive. The Beasts havoc had taken a clear toll on the population and now the plague was cleaning up the leftovers.
It didn't take long before they got an idea of what was going on. True to the Empire City scenario, the city had gone down the drain. Two Conduits; Rose and Albert, were fighting over food, water, territory and blast shards. From what they could tell, Rose appeared to be a Sasha-like Conduit. She used some sort of illness to drain people and use it to heal herself. Albert was more like an Alden type, but he wasn't using telekinesis. Instead Albert used wind to move things around, creating miniature tornadoes at the snap of his fingers.
Cole and Kuo sure had their work cut out for them. If things had been like this for about a month, Cole was doubtful that they'd change just by talking it over. It was still worth a try, but Cole wasn't expecting much and was already thinking of what they could do for the suffering population. Figuring they'd start with the worst, Kuo and Cole headed over to where Rose usually hung out. According to Sonya, Rose had fortified her position in the city hospital. Cole remembered how the Empire City hospital looked like after the blast, both on the outside and inside.
Petersburg hospital was no better, in fact it was much worse off. The whole building screamed sickness and death. «Okay, should I ring the bell or do you want to?» Cole asked Kuo as they stood a block away, looking at the battered hospital. «Let's ask one of her thugs to introduce us.» Kuo sighed, apparently just want to get this over with. Asking one of the guards to let them in wasn't easy, but Kuo managed to get a break by promising blast shards. «We don't have any.» Cole pointed out to her with a whisper as they were lead into the hospital. That didn't seem to bother Kuo too much.
Rose didn't have Sasha's tar, instead she had this thick and disgusting smog that she seemed to create by simply exhaling. Its stench was a repulsive mix of dead fish and open sewers. «Give me the rocks and get out of my face.» Rose told them arrogantly as she sat on a worn and damaged hospital bed. «Couldn't we stay a while and chat?» Cole suggested carefully, struggling to keep a straight face because of the smell. Rose gave a quick nod to one of her goons, who smashed the rear end of his shotgun into Cole's guts. It brought Cole to his knees, vomiting up his breakfast. That got Rose's attention.
Sliding off the bed, she walked over to Cole as if she was on a catwalk in Paris. Kuo was right by Cole's side, kneeling down and rubbing over his back. «You're rather well fed, aren't you?» Rose smirked. «And what interesting little toys you have!» She giggled loudly, snatching Cole's Amp. Rose walked around the room, swinging the Amp around like a baseball bat as if she was testing it out. «Is THIS how you use it?» She laughed, hitting Cole smack in the forehead. «Stop it!» Kuo cried, putting herself between Rose and Cole. The two women locked on each other in a stare down.
«No rocks, huh? Who let them in?» Rose sighed with disappointment. The guard that had let them in nervously raised his hand. «Shepard was it? No matter. Take out the trash!» Rose commanded, pointing a finger at Shepard. Three other guards jumped him, stripped him of his guns and gave him a solid beating. After a few rounds of that, they lifted him up and walked towards the window. «Wait a minute, you can't be serious! We're on the 7th floor!» Kuo protested. Rose raised her hand, making her goons stop. «She's got a point boys, take him to the roof.» She told her goons, whom complied.
Cole managed to get back on his feet, his forehead bleeding from the hit Rose had given him. «Listen! I'm sorry okay, sorry we got here without the rocks, but you're going to kill him and not us?» He told Rose. She thought it over for a moment and then just nodded with a simple smile. «Sonya, do you read? Land and unload as much gear as you can, I need you to pick up a man they're going to throw off the hospital roof.» Cole said into his radio. Kuo gave Cole some support as he was staggering the moment he started to walk. «Need to get my Amp back...» He groaned. The two of them followed after Rose and the small parade that was tailing her.
Climbing the stairs was an effort, but Cole sucked up the pain and pressed on. Having Kuo by his side made it somehow bearable. «We can't take her head on inside. The smog thing she creates, it weakens us. If we can get her outside and try to take her out from afar, she'd be an easy match.» Kuo whispered. Cole had to agree, but right now he was in no condition to fight even if he got Rose at a distance. Finally they got on the roof and unlike in the movies, where the bad guy holds a 45 minutes long speech about how great his master plan is, they went straight to the main event. In the blink of an eye, Shepard was thrown over the edge of the roof, to the sound of a cheering mob.
The mob did fall silent when the realized that Sonya had caught Shepard in mid air and gently lowered him to the ground. Guess Sonya didn't have the strength to take a grown man and fly him away, at least not yet. Not a major victory, but at least the guy wasn't killed. In the baffled confusion that followed, Kuo saw her chance to teleport over right next to Rose, smacking her elbow in the side of her face and snatching the Amp from her hand. It happened so fast that by the time her goons had spun on their heels and pointed their guns in Cole's direction, Kuo was already back by his side, handing over the Amp.
Rose was furious, twice in a few seconds she'd been had and humiliated in front of her followers. Expecting a fire fight, Cole brought up a Frost Shield before starting to take a few steps back. «KILL 'EM!» Rose shrieked at the top of her lunges. True to their master, the goons opened fire to no effect thanks to Cole's Frost Shield. It was however too small to cover two people. «Kuo, get out of here! I'll be right behind you.» Cole shouted, noticing in the corner of his eye that some goons were fishing out grenades from their pockets. With an audible fizzle sound, Kuo was gone and Cole fired off an Alpha Blast to stun his enemies long enough to make an escape with Lightning Tether to a nearby building.
After getting some comfortable distance between them and Rose, the three met up on a rooftop after been given directions by Zeke. «I don't know if that smog is like Sasha's mind-controlling tar or if she's keeping her goons together with fear of being killed.» Cole reported in to Zeke, admiral Davidson and Moya. Kuo confirmed that it had a strength draining effect on them, but it didn't seem to have any effect on their powers. Zeke was worried that Rose could spew out the smog to drain bystanders for strength, then use it to become like the Hulk, ridiculously strong and near impossible to actually hurt. It was weird how they were using super hero comics for reference when discussing Conduit powers, but that was the reality that they found themselves in.
«We still have to get some more intel on this Albert character. According to the residents, they've been at each others throats pretty much since day one.» Kuo supplied, giving advice on their next course of action. Moya was interested in Albert's apparent ability to manipulate wind. She argued that he could be a useful ally, to disperse Rose's smog in order to make it less concentrated and thus, in theory less effective. If they both turned to be unstable, Moya advised that Cole and Kuo would play the two up against each other, so they'd destroy or at the very least weaken each other.
Admiral Davidson was against that plan from the start. He argued that Rose and Albert had fought with each other for a good month and had reached a stalemate rather than mutual weakening one another, let alone destroying the opponent. «What about the Rayacite?» Sonya asked. That was another issue that they'd forgotten in the middle of all the stuff that had happened. One of the main things that Rose and Albert had fought over was Rayacite, or rocks as Rose called them. It was safe to say that they both knew what they did and it was unknown how many they gotten their hands on.
Kuo suggested that they'd take a different approach with Albert. Rather than promising Rayacite, they'd heal and help people inside Albert's turf. «Hearts and minds, huh?» Cole replied. Kuo nodded with a serious expression on her face. It had worked with Laroche, even if it didn't go entirely as planned. «That Rose bitch isn't getting away with murder.» Kuo sneered. Something told Cole that Rose was rubbing Kuo even worse than Nix had done. It was rare for Kuo to loose her cool, no pun intended. The gang agreed to get to work right away, taking shifts on guarding against Rose's thugs and helping Albert's men.
Throughout the following night, Cole healed everyone he could. Many were beyond his help because of the radiation sickness, but he did what he could nevertheless. Sonya's warm personality and people skills came into good use, not to mention that she was excellent with kids. Just the sound of children laughter went a long way in raising people's spirits. Kuo did some discreet fishing around to get more information on Albert's character, but came up short. It could mean that Albert was just as bad as Rose and people didn't want to talk out of fear for the consequences. Or it could mean that Albert was a good guy, but people were skeptical to outsiders because of Rose and would not risk exposing their protector to danger.
It wasn't until late in the afternoon the next day that there was hints of a rumor about Albert being curious of the recent events. Finally getting their break, Cole and the gang was allowed to meet with Albert. Kuo reported the good news back to the Ike and managed to get shipments of food, water and antibiotics shipped to their location, as proof that they were serious about helping out. Sonya decided to stay behind once the supplies arrived, getting things organized and distribute the aid. One of the senior members of the camp guided Cole and Kuo to where Albert stayed.
From the main streets, to side streets and residential areas – until they reached their destination. As far as Cole could tell it was something akin to a school and it was, all things considered, in very good shape. Kuo pointed out that because of all the toys outside, this was most likely a kindergarten. A strange place to settle down, but perhaps it was chosen because of its close proximity to the houses and that it was in relatively good shape? Cole could even sense electricity from the neighborhood. «Come right this way.» The senior camp member said with a sore voice, limping away on his crutches.
The inside of the kindergarten was much like the outside, worn and dirty, but more than decent for a shelter. «Please wait here, I'll let Albert know you're here.» The senior camp member told them. Kuo and Cole glanced at each other before looking around more closely. «You suspect a trap?» Cole asked. Kuo disagreed, while not ruling out the possibility completely she found it hard to believe. Albert seemed to be the real deal, caring for those around him and protecting them. Cole nodded his agreement. This might not be so bad after all. Once Rose is taken care of, maybe Albert will join in and admiral Davidson can do his logistics stuff, this city might have a chance, Cole thought.
Who Albert really was, wasn't a truth that neither Cole or Kuo was prepared to face. It was remote, it at all, present in their minds. Albert wasn't some young, strong, knight in shining armor. He wasn't even a old, crooked and kind grandfather. Albert was a kid, nothing more than 5-6 years old. His eyes were all milky white and if being blind wasn't enough, both his legs appeared to have been crudely amputated just under the knees. Even if he was stuck to a wheelchair, Albert sat on it as if it was his throne. Kuo let out a small gasp, folding her hands over her mouth, before closing her eyes and turning away from the tragic fate the young boy represented.