Nikon studied the blade he had been given through the lens of his mask, activating the trigger to channel electricity through it.
"…that bastard," he whispered, his reflection only showing him that gas-masked version of himself he met that vision. "Diana carries my work with her, of course I would die so she would live. But why…why is he so eager to die for her…"
He sheathed his sword, finally resting his mind to a question he'd been pondering. "Doesn't matter. Selfless fools are still fools. I will get Diana back, no matter the cost."
He looked down the street, sizing up the guard barracks he was meant to assault. He had three possible avenues to assault it: the roof, the sewers, and a secret guard's entrance on the northern side of the building. Each option carried its own form of risk, but he would have to evaluate them as the situation progressed.
He lit a cigarette, sighing. This was going to be a long night.
He walked back into the apartment building he had entered, the rest of Kallisar's men stationed there for the attack. Irving was the leader of the attack, and he seemed particularly eager to get started. He was checking the explosives near the map of the barracks, tightening the bundles together.
"You got any ideas, doctor?" inquired the bulky man.
"Three, but I'll need to be in the field first," said the surgeon calmly. "Also, if I hear explosives before I give the signal, I am going to be really pissed at you."
Irving smirked. "Don't worry, my men are trained well-enough not to go crazy. We'll keep an eye out for your signal."
Nikon pointed to the map, specifically at the schematic of the roof. "If your blueprints are correct, this hatch up here has no lock and can be opened from either side. It is constantly monitored by a total of four guards, two on the roof and two stationed below it. I will do my best to attempt my entrance and exit from this point."
He gestured to the sewer systems. "If not, I will go through the basement and into the sewers towards the south, where the guards will be less thick."
He pointed to the guard entrance on the northside. "This is my absolute last choice, but if need be, I will attempt to force my way through."
Nikon sighed, crossing his arms. "Unfortunately, if I need to be carrying these two, that will limit my options. I am under the assumption they are conscious and capable of independent movement, but that may not be the case if they were tortured extensively. That will necessitate I go through the basement or guard entrance, but it would be beneficial for you to start your attack while I'm rescuing them if such a thing was the case."
"Well, I'll leave that decision making up to you," stated Irving. "I need to worry about making sure my guys don't die out there. You can head out whenever you're ready."
The surgeon nodded, adjusting his darkened coat. "No point in delaying then."
He walked onto the balcony, seeing another nearby balcony across the street. He grabbed the imaginary ball in his left hand, breathing in deep.
"Outsider, this damn well better work."
He tossed it.
He caught the ball on the other balcony, panting in excitement from the millisecond of speed he felt. He had practiced the ability before going out, obviously, but he was pleased it had worked so well in a trial by fire.
"Okay, good so far," he muttered looking further down the street. "Let's keep going."
He made his way down the street like that, landing on balconies and rooftops to hide his movements from the guards patrolling on the street. He studied the way they patrolled, keeping tabs on where they would round corners or turn back.
He stopped right next to the guard barrack's roof to finish writing down the notes he had taken before turning to the roof itself. There were two guards seated near the hatch itself, and they appeared to not be drinking. Amazingly, they seemed to be one of the few guards that actually took their job seriously.
"Fuck," grunted the surgeon. "Can I take them out before they alert the others?"
He imagined the scenario in his head. Every single time he did, he could only imagine himself dying or creating enough noise to make his efforts null.
"Distraction tactics? Unlikely, these are clearly not gadabouts. They'll raise the alarm instead of look around like idiots. Ranged attack with crossbow? Cannot guarantee my aim."
He paused, hearing something. He concentrated, determining that it was some sort of ringing noise. It seemed to be coming from below him, through the concrete of the building's roof.
"This apartment building…I'm pretty sure it's occupied," he murmured. "But what's making that noise?"
He moved over to the edge of the roof and found a balcony with an open door. He dropped down, quickly determining that the apartment he had just entered was occupied by a single person. It was a young woman, cooking something on the stovetop. The ringing was loudest here, so he determined that whatever it was, it was inside this apartment.
First things first, he dealt with the woman. When she turned back to the stove, he struck out and grabbed her by the neck and covered her mouth. The woman screamed, grabbing the pan and trying to swing at him. He ducked the hot iron and slammed her bodily into the wall, dazing her and letting him continue to choke her.
Once she was limp, he set her down, making sure she was still breathing. He didn't want to kill a civilian, and to his relief he found she was alive. He set her down gently on her couch and put a blanket over her, before returning to the reason for his intrusion.
Nikon searched the living room, before determining that the noise was coming from a small hanging glass case on the wall. Inside the case was a circular bit of whalebone with a familiar black symbol etched into it, and it seemed to vibrate inside its casing.
"Damn Outsider," grunted the surgeon. "He really is everywhere."
He opened the case and took the rune out, studying it. It had been hand-carved, and it appeared to have small dabs of blood and ink all over the surface. Obviously, whoever had crafted this was into the occult arts, and clearly had put a lot of effort into it.
He looked up, startled. He was now in the Void, the living room effectively torn to shreds inside the ethereal realm.
"Goddamn it."
"You called?" asked the Outsider stepping out from behind the couch with the unconscious woman lying on it, dusting himself off.
"Not really, but I figured you lead me to this rune for a reason," argued Nikon.
"Fair enough. Yes, I did. I wanted to talk."
The Outsider sat next to the woman. "Hmm…this is intriguing. You are the Nikon who chooses to kill, and yet, you still show mercy."
"Men are not black and white," snapped the surgeon. "Also, that little illusion of yours? I'm not buying it."
"First, it was not an illusion," argued the Outsider. "Second, what do you mean by black and white?"
Nikon sighed. "…it's simple. In a large field of science, things are and are not. A stomach, for example, is a stomach, but it is also not a heart, or not a brain, or any number of things. For mankind, it works a bit differently. A man is not good and he is not evil, but somewhere in the middle. Human beings do not work binarily. If you ask the common man if he would kill a stranger, he would decline, but if you asked him to kill a murderer who harmed his loved ones, he would assuredly agree. Does that qualify the common man as a killer in all circumstances? No, it does not."
"A realistic philosophy," complimented the Outsider, "yet there is a flaw. If anything cannot be labeled as one extreme or the other, how can you label anything at all? Is everything just shades of grey, doctor? And if so, how is one shade darker or lighter than the other? You criticize the ideology behind labels, yet offer no rebuttal."
"Maybe there are no labels," argued the surgeon. "We attach these things to others to justify our actions and discredit the actions of our enemies, and yet I have always found them tiresome and unnecessary. Nothing is justified, there is no greater good or evil. Things are, and that is all. I act because I decide to, and my enemies act because they decide to, and our goals contradict, hence why we are enemies. I stand on no higher ground than them just because of that reason."
The Outsider nodded, scratching his chin in contemplation. "Yes…that is indeed valid reasoning…"
He appeared beside him, holding out both of his hands. "While I think of a reply, I have two gifts to give you. The first, is to aid you in your travels to find more of these runes."
"Oh great, more philosophical debates," grunted the surgeon.
"Now, now, the runes have an additional benefit. I can give you new powers for your journey. But first, you have to find them."
He placed his hand over Nikon's, snapping his fingers.
The surgeon felt a weight appear in his right hand, looking down curiously. Then he recoiled in shock and revulsion.
He was holding some sort of human heart in his hand, a combination of flesh and metal like it had been yanked out of a human automaton. He was not disturbed by holding a heart, as he had done a few autopsies before, but it looked far sicklier and grotesque than any he had seen before.
"…whose heart is this?" asked Nikon nervously.
"…someone important to you," answered the Outsider cryptically.
The surgeon gave the heart an experimental squeeze, then to his eternal astonishment, heard a voice in his head.
"It's so cold here," whispered a feminine voice right into his mind, as if it were a part of his own consciousness.
Nikon had a few guesses on the heart's owner, but decided that the best idea was to ignore it. "What's the second thing?"
The Outsider extended his other hand, twirling his fingers.
The surgeon felt his left hand burn, grunting as he held it up to notice the Mark of the Outsider flare up again. Then his hand disappeared from his sight, allowing him to see the floor straight through it.
He recoiled, looking down upon the rest of his body to see it too had become invisible. He knew it was still present, as he could feel the cold on his neck and the hairs on his arms standing on end, but he could not see it any longer. Then he moved, and it returned to his sight.
"It's called Stasis," explained the Outsider. "Much like Fling, it's a power from the Void. As you can see, it allows you to turn invisible as long as you are standing still. I imagine you can think of a few uses for that."
Nikon nodded, experimentally trying to activate the power. He found if he mimed the same motion the Outsider did, extending all of his fingers on his left hand in a star-like fashion, would make him invisible so long as he did not move the rest of his body.
"…interesting," whispered the surgeon, looking back at the heart. "…this heart is Diana's, isn't it?"
He looked up, before noticing the Outsider had left him, taking the Void with him.
"Typical," grunted Nikon rolling his eyes. He held up the heart, feeling its metallic beat beneath his fingers.
"Diana…I seriously doubt you can hear me through this," began the surgeon, feeling sillier by the moment, "but if you can, hang on. I'm on my way."
He tucked it away and was about to head out before he realized he hadn't really tested his new power. Deciding that it was a good idea to experiment, he quickly went over a few things.
After about ten minutes, he had the finer points of Stasis figured out. It only worked while he stood still, but he found he could still move his head side to side without the effect breaking. The effect lasted for around ten seconds before he could maintain it no longer, and it seemed to need to "recharge" for about as long as the duration was before he could use it again. He tested to see if it worked while in mid-air, and found it did not, as well as not working while sliding across the ground.
"Okay, pseudo-scientific method gone over," he murmured deactivating Stasis. "Time to go."
He gave one last glance at the unconscious woman, the Outsider's words ringing in his ear.
"…I'm sorry," he whispered, though he had no idea why he was apologizing. It simply felt like the right thing to say.
He exited the building and returned to the roof, eyeing the guard barracks once more. The two guards at the roof hatch maintained their vigilance, watching out for intruders.
"Okay Outsider, let's use these gifts of yours."
Nikon activated Fling, tossing the invisible ball in his hand as he mentally aimed. After a moment, he threw it.
The surgeon teleported right behind a barrel on the edge of the roof, apparently where the guards smoked judging by the tobacco ash nearby. He glanced out from the barrel, cursing. There was almost no cover up here besides this barrel, and he had a large distance of about five meters to cover.
"…it is sort of dark," he pondered. "Maybe I can use that."
He activated Fling again, watching the guard's eyes. His entire body was still, ready to pounce like a cat.
He saw them glance to the right, so he tossed the ball to the left.
He teleported low to the ground, immediately activating Stasis.
"Huh?" spoke one of the guards, glancing right at where he lay invisible. "You see that?"
"What?" asked the other.
"I…I saw something move…"
"Probably a crow or a rat. There's nowhere to hide up here. You're getting jumpy."
Nikon breathed hard as he lay stock still across the ground, panic having unconsciously filled his veins. He was counting down the duration, hoping against hope that the guard turned back around for him to move again.
"10…9…8…7…" he whispered, sweat rolling down his face.
The guard mercifully turned, and he struck then. He threw Fling right behind the two, having deactivated Stasis with the movement.
"What the fuck?!" shouted the guard, glancing back where he had been once again.
"Oh come on, relax!" ordered the other. "There's nothing there, see?"
"I'm telling you, there's something fucking with us here! We need to…!"
He turned back around, before noticing his companion's throat as slit, blood gurgling and mixing with his blood as it pooled across his shirt.
Nikon leaped out from behind the dead guard, stabbing his sword clean through the guard's chest. The skeptical guard grabbed the blade, breathing heavily as the pain ran through his body. Then he died, the blade having pierced his heart.
The surgeon stood, wiping the blade against their uniforms. He sheathed his sword, moving back towards the roof hatch.
"Hang on Diana, I'm on the way."