I started moving across the street at a brisk pace, not as fast as I could move, but still quick. My heels rolled killing the sound of my sharply cut business shoes on the hard ground.
Coil, or rather Thomas Calvert as he was currently out of costume didn't notice, he walked right up to the door pried open an access hatch jamming his thumb into place.
The door opened with a echoing 'CLACK' of heavy steel bolts sliding out of place, and I stepped up my pace to catch it before it slammed shut behind him as he seamlessly slid inside.
My fingers jammed into the crack at the last moment, steel biting at them softly, like it was pressing through a glove. I pushed and it opened back up.
I stepped inside and found Calvert halfway through getting his jacket off, a black nearly featureless mask already overtop his head, like some seamless black hood stylized with a silver snake.
Finally he noticed, head tilting towards me.
I didn't freeze, imprinted knowledge and instincts completely overwriting my original natural impulses. I closed the gap in three suddenly massive strides, lifted up, and fired off a jumping snap kick.
The strike I used is called a snap kick because of how you move your leg; you lift it up with knee presented, and only then extend the leg, 'snapping' it like a whip, adding tremendous force and speed for a kick.
The normal version was dangerous, both to the user and the unfortunate sap to be on the receiving end. Like all kicks it had some significant build up to telegraph presenting an opening and as expected it also left your footing unstable, vulnerable. When you launched it from a jump it became all the more so. You went temporarily went ballistic and aimed high, adding further complications to what was already a difficult attack to land.
Even if your enemy somehow failed to see it coming and preformed the relative minimal motion needed to evade, It was very easy to miss. You were also wide open in the execution and attack itself, left with no way to evade, or adjust for any counter attack. A million and one things could go wrong.
On the other hand, by jumping you added even more momentum to your striking leg. The jumping force adding directly to the power already exploding from the kick. There was so much more force in fact, that the move was banned in a pretty much any martial arts tournament even mildly concerned with the participants safety.
Because, if it hit someone in the head, like it had Coil... Well, you see, then It gained an entirely new reason to be called a 'snap' kick.
His jaw smashed up into the roof of his mouth with a loud crunching crack of teeth bursting out of place. He mandible snapping under the force, a noise echoing out just loud enough to completely mask the similar, but softer 'crack' of his vertebra detaching. His body visibly lifted and sent flying a half foot back from the sudden force of the blow.
Mind you it looked much more impressive then that when he slumped bonelessly the rest of the way, neck tilted at a very unnatural angle.
And like that I had taken a man's life.
I should have felt something, disgust, distaste, relief, even simply cold. Coil was scum, the worst sort, but he was still human. That was just basic reflex.
Instead... nothing. Not even the numb nothing of shock, instead I found myself quickly moving through his pockets as I looked for things of immediate value.
I kept forgetting that my reflexes weren't exactly 'basic' anymore. I'd given up my humanity when I accepted Navigators Deal after...
I didn't really have time to think on that right now. Looting and getting clear was more important. My face wasn't my own, but that would only help save my reputation, not my physical health.
Keys, cellphone and wallet were all still on him, as was another gun, this one decidedly not your typical handgun, but something that on another earth would have been thought as a movie prop or a really expensive toy.
Tinker tech, probably a laser, his men used lasers right?
I undid the holster fast, that at least was just like it's equivalent for firewands, easy for me to do.
That done I opened up the Cellphone. Tattletale would be able to do a lot with this.
And speaking of that... I recognized one of the names on the list.
I hit the call button as pocketed both the holster and the pistol in opposite jacket pockets, sliding the wallet overtop my own fake one.
No response. No signal in the room of course. I switched to text and sent a quick 'It's done'.
Then I left.
Right into chaos.