One Punch Man: Attitude Adjustment
Ch.12: Critical Condition
It was getting late as Randal sat alone in his apartment, his eyes fixed to his cellphone as it sat in front of him on the coffee table. He wanted to call Kathy or someone at the association and tell them about the meeting he had with Spade a few hours earlier, but he was worried about how either of those choices would react. Even though he went out of his way to show he was a changed person, it was naive to think that Spade going so far as to show up himself to convince Randal to switch sides wouldn't be met with suspicion. Spade's threat towards Kathy and the others also weighed on his mind, there was no way to be sure about how sharp the enemies eyes were.
He hoped that going through most of the scotch Spade left behind would help take his mind off things, this turned out to be wrong. Randal had the T.V. on as a distraction, but all he could think about was whether or not the kids were safe.
Jeremy was at the apartment he bought close by to where his parents. After staying there for dinner and a movie night, he returned to his own place to have his after dinner snack. After that, he put on his favorite Hip-Hop album and then got lost in his work on various sketches for upcoming spray-paint projects.
Kathy and Mia were still at the hospital, but a few phone-calls made by Kathy made their stay a comfy one. Five star meals were delivered, along with a small basket of sweets and three Amai-Mask movies. Mia sat beside Kathy's hospital bed, both wearing silk pajamas as they contentedly watched the cheesy but still very good-looking actor/Hero/singer.
"How much do you think he spends on hair and make up?" Mia asked while enjoying another bite-sized cupcake, she figured Kathy would know a thing or two about expensive cosmetics.
"Probably more than most people spend on their rent." Kathy replied, chuckling before dipping another strawberry in chocolate.
While the two kept enjoying themselves, they were unaware that a handful of cars were pulling into the hospital driveway. Most of the vehicles were fairly plain, but a gold-plated Cadillac stuck out in the middle of the group. Some of the men who stepped out of the cars wore flashy suits, others wore casual outfits. Just like his car, the man who stepped out of the Cadillac stood out the most. He was the only one wearing a golden suit in a crowd of a dozen men. He even pulled out a matching, gold-plated Desert Eagle pistol as he addressed the others surrounding him. All of them were armed; some with pistols, some with shotguns and some with Uzi Sub-machine guns.
"Alright boys, we're gonna do this nice and easy." Tommy Escobar declared with a thick Cuban accent, looking around to make sure everyone was listening. "Most of you run inside, get people scared. You two are gonna stand by till we get the room number and you two are gonna stick around to watch my back in case things go hell." He said while pointing at his men to assign their roles. "You get me? Good...then quit standing around!"
With their orders given, seven men rushed into the hospital. Two of them fired shots into the ceiling to get everyone's attention. Some tried to hide, others just froze in fear but the nurse working at the reception desk was unlucky enough to catch their attention.
"Which room is the Hero girl in?" One of the men said to the shaking nurse. "You deaf or something? Tell me the room number or start bringing out body-bags!" He said with his pistol pointed at her face.
Kathy and Mia heard the gunshots and looked at each-other with similar worried faces. Mia sprang out of her seat, Kathy tried to do the same but was held down by Mia's hand on her good shoulder.
"How's the arm?" Mia asked.
"It's...not great." Kathy said reluctantly, she tried to move her left hand but could only wiggle the fingers a bit.
"You stay, call Jeremy and Randal." Mia said in her rare no-nonsense tone of voice.
"Fine...just be careful." Kathy replied.
Mia nodded her head in response before rushing out of the room, leaving Kathy alone as she took out her phone. Staying back while others do the fighting didn't sit well with her, but she also knew that fighting injured was probably a bad idea.
"Oh...hey Kathy." Jeremy said, his head nodding along to the music. "Whoa, slow down...what's happening?!" He said as Kathy explained the situation. "Crap, Crap, Crap I'll be right there!" Jeremy said frantically while grabbing a few spray cans and running out the door, he hung up on Kathy and immediately started dialing another number. "Dad, get the car! I need another ride!"
Randal was just starting to fall asleep until the phone ringing woke him up. When he saw Kathy's name on the caller I.D he answered it as fast as he could. Kathy was explaining everything before he even said hello. A rush of dread went through Randal's body, he knew why the hospital was being attacked.
"I'll be right there..." Randal said with restrained anger, he hung up the phone and then stood like someone ready to go to war.
While Jeremy and Randal hurried to the hospital, Tommy was leaning on the side of his car. His phone rang, it was one the henchmen he sent into the hospital.
"Gracias amigo." Tommy said with a very pleased look on his face before hanging up the phone. "Give me the pad thing." He said to one of his other men, who reached into his car to pull out a tablet. "Alright...third floor...room five..." He mumbled while looking through the detailed layout of the building that Rose provided. "Got it, right there in the corner."
Tommy pointed at the far left side window on the third floor. With their target pointed out, two more henchmen moved towards the hospitals with guns that seemed to be pistol shaped grappling hook launchers. A large cigar was pulled out of Tommy's coat pocket, one of the henchmen that stayed behind as protection lit the cigar for him.
"I said stay down!" One of the thugs inside the hospital said, making a doctor and nurse stay cowering in the corner as the rest of the henchmen made their way upstairs.
Mia could hear them getting closer and closer to the third floor, she didn't have much time to put a plan together but then noticed a tray of small surgery tools and got an idea. She waited until she could see the shadows of men running up the stairs before tossing scalpels and forceps into the lights above them. Suddenly being in the dark put the henchmen on edge, their guns scanned the room and they were ready to shoot anything that moved. One of them seemed to be in charge and used simple hand signals to tell the rest stop, be quiet and spread out.
Two of them went down a hallway until they heard movement coming from one of the rooms beside them. The door was kicked open and they walked inside to find another doctor hiding behind her desk. Looking at her kept their eyes off Mia, who suddenly struck a pistol out of one of their hands with a metal tray before smacking him right in the face with it. He stumbled out of the room and over the other henchmen before falling to floor, holding his bloody nose. The other man tried to point his gun, but was kicked in the chest hard enough to dent the drywall his body slammed into. Mia used a crane-fist to make sure the Henchmen stuck in the wall stayed unconscious before leaving the room to do the same to the other.
"There!" Shouted another henchmen, he followed the sounds of the struggle and spotted Mia in the hallway.
Mia ran from a hail of bullets and managed to run into another small room, closing the door behind her. The four henchmen in pursuit stopped at the door, the man in charge told one of the others to kick it open. One hard boot was enough to break the lock on the door. The lights were off inside the room as they entered, each one of them carefully stepped inside to search it. There were large cabinets filled with sanitation equipment and a small counter in the middle of the room but no sign of the Hero they were after.
One of the benefits that came with being somewhat small is that Mia could fit in places most could not. She tucked herself into the space between the top of one of the cabinets and the roof, waiting for the right moment to make her move. The henchmen closest to her had his back turned, so she rolled off the cabinet to quietly land on the floor behind him. Before the others could react, the henchmen was pulled in by his shirt collar to get hit the back of head by Mia's forearm. Her next target was the men to her left, as the other henchmen tried to shoot Mia she gracefully slid on the floor just before they pulled the trigger. She tripped the henchmen to her left, making him fall head fist into the side of the counter. Mia had only a second to see how far away the remaining two were standing from each-other before she decided to try something desperate. Springing to her feet, Mia used the counter top to jump in between the henchmen and knock both of them out with a well timed split-kick in mid-air.
After landing on the floor in a crouched position, Mia checked to make sure all the henchmen were unconscious. After a moment of relief, Mia heard a nurse scream for help close by.
"Get out here girl!" The last henchmen in the hospital said, he saw the others get taken down easily and decided to go with a different tactic. "Do it or she's dead!"
A terrified young nurse was being held hostage, one arm was wrapped around his neck while the other had a pistol pointed at his head. Mia knew what was going on and slowly walked out of the room with her hands up. She felt complete disdain for the man threatening an innocent person, and did not bother hiding it.
"Please just let me go!" The nurse pleaded.
"Shut it!" The man holding him hostage yelled, taking his eyes off Mia.
Mia was nervous, she had only done this sort of thing while training with her father but only had a second to get over the nerves and act. She a scalpel tucked into the back of her pajama pants. In one swift motion, she grabbed the scalpel and tossed it into the hand that was holding the pistol. It went through the palm, making the henchmen drop the gun and also drop to the ground to cry out in agony.
"Are you okay?" Mia said as she approached the nurse.
As the nurse was nodding yes, two more gunshots rang out through the halls. Mia was terrified. the shots sounded lie they came from the same direction as Kathy's room. After helping the nurse sit down, she did a full sprint towards Kathy's room.
"Hmm...sounds like they found Mia." Kathy said with a smirk after hearing Mia start to fight the henchmen, she was confident in her friend's skill.
Kathy's good mood was ruined when she noticed two grappling hooks being shot to the roof through the window. Not knowing how many were outside or planning to come up made cutting the ropes dangerous, so Kathy decided to try something else.
Using their grapple guns, two henchmen quickly ascended the hospital walls until they got to Kathy's window. One of them had a hammer and was able to hit the right spot on the window to make most of it shatter. They could see something under the blankets on the hospital bed but something wasn't right. There was no movement even after they broke the window and whatever it was didn't look the body of a person. It was actually just two pillows, but they both heard the sound of a revolver clicking beside them before they could notice.
"You get one chance..." Kathy said with annoyed scowl as she stepped away from the curtains beside the window, she had a snob-nosed pistol in her good hand that was smuggled in by the people who work for her parents. "Drop your..."
Both men didn't bother listening and turned to shoot, but Kathy had the quicker hand. One henchmen went down with a bullet to the arm, the other was hit in the shoulder. They both fell to the floor and Kathy made sure to squat down to slide their guns across the room. With that done, she put her back to the wall next to the curtains before slowly peaking her head around to look out the window. Three similar looking men were in the parking lot, one of them was looking directly at the window with a pair of binoculars.
"Well...looks like they screwed the pooch." Tommy said with disappointment as he looked through the binoculars. "Any word from the rest?" He asked one of his guards.
"Nothing." The henchmen replied, shaking his head with a cellphone to his ear.
"Ridiculo..." Tommy mumbled in Spanish as he walked to the trunk of his Cadillac. "If you want something done right..." He said after unlocking the trunk.
Kathy was still watching and her eyes went wide with panic as she saw Tommy Escobar pull an RPG out of his trunk. She ran out of the room as fast as she could, just in time to see Mia running towards the room.
"Are you okay? I heard...Whoa!" Mia tried to saw until Kathy scooped her up by the waist with her goof arm.
Kathy and Mia got far enough away to not get hurt by the explosion, but the force of the blast still knocked them off their feet. The nearby hospital staffed screamed in terror as fire and smoke bellowed out of a what was left of the room.
"Hahaha! I freaking love fireworks!" Tommy yelled out with glee, not caring at all about the two henchmen he just killed. "Time to go boys!"
He put the RPG back in the truck before getting back into his car, the two bodyguards got in as well. As they were driving out of the parking lot, Tommy was suddenly blinded by a large cloud of purple smoke. Not knowing where he was going, Tommy drove the car into a street light. After shaking off the impact, he took out his gun and popped his head out of the car window to find out who attack him. Then he looked at his rear-view mirror and saw Jeremy sprinting towards them from down the street.
"We got a live one boys, light him up!" Tommy said to his men with a cocky grin.
One of the henchmen opened his car door and another sat on the window to aim over the car's roof. Both them fired a spray a sub-machine gun bullets that made Jeremy have to dive behind into an alley for cover. They kept firing on his position as Tommy backed the car away from the street lamp and then floored it down the street to escape.
"Adios cabron! Hahaha!" Tommy yelled out the window as they drove away.
Jeremy saw the car getting away and wanted to go after it, but when he looked back at the hospital and saw the smoking hole in the wall he ran inside. He went to the third floor as fast as he could and let out a huge sigh of relief when he saw Kathy and Mia. They both seemed to be okay and were helping all the civilians who were on that floor as well.
"Hey...sorry I'm late." Jeremy said, his breathing heavy after running up three flights of stairs.
"That's alright, Mia and I were able to handle most of them." Kathy as she sat with one of the doctors. "Did you see the one down below?"
"Yeah...tired to catch them but it didn't work out." Jeremy said with an annoyed look as Tommy's mocking last words came to mind.
"At least we're okay." Mia said after checking in with the nurse that was taken hostage again.
"For now..." Jeremy said pessimistically. "If they came after Kathy they could come after any of us, Maybe even our families..."
"My families got plenty of security and anyone who tires fighting Mia's dad is gonna end up regretting it. I'll get Mom to organize some bodyguards for Carter and Sadhil." Kathy said to ease Jeremy's mind.
"Sounds good, better than just me keeping them safe." Jeremy said, nodding at the idea.
"What about Randal? If he's on his own they could gang up on him." Mia said with concern.
"I just called him again, he'll be here soon. After that, we can figure out the best way to take the fight to Spade again." Kathy said with hardened determination; she wasn't going to be scared by this attack, if anything it just showed how desperate the bad guys were getting.