As they moved on from the room, leaving the victim of their mind-probing behind, they hoped that they would be able to move faster and make up some time on their quarry. That illusion was swiftly shattered, though, as they reached the next landing and a group of four teenagers came at Aswon and Shimazu with broken bottles, shouting obscenities at them. Aswon fended off the first with a quick parry before driving his staff into the nose of the second, sending a spray of blood into the air as he smashed his nose back into his skull, before recovering and swinging the staff hard into the temple of the first, knocking him senseless and sprawling into a wall. The other pair were less fortunate, taking on the skilled swordsman with their jagged bottles with predictable results. While both of the teens that had attacked Aswon had a good chance of recovery, it was certainly not the case with the second pair.
Up a half-flight of stairs they went, along another grimy and mildew-filled corridor, lit only by a single emergency light that barely lit up a few metres of passageway. It was enough, though, to reveal another pair of assailants, rushing towards them – this time with meat cleavers dripping with blood and gore. There was no sign of other victims, but based on their experiences so far, it was entirely possible that even here on the upper floors there was still an abattoir tucked away, processing fresh and not so fresh meat. Aswon defended against the first – concentrating on his own safety more than taking out his opponent, knowing that in only a second or two Shimazu would have dealt with his opponent and would move in to support him.
It was demoralising, and somewhat depressing. The people here were gaunt and had an air of desperation about them, and were clearly living on the very edge of poverty. No doubt the word had spread quickly enough that there was a fat and juicy reward for dealing with them, enough to drive people into a murderous rage…but they had no idea of just how badly they were outmatched. Certainly anyone that came in range of Shimazu was just a walking corpse waiting to happen, and Hunter was no slouch with his blade either, though his strikes were less finesse and more driven by a huge amount of muscle and attitude. That was of no difference to the people he engaged, though, as they ended up just as dead. Marius was picking his shots carefully, aiming now for single shots to the head or chest rather than blazing away, conserving his ammunition carefully as he was already running low.
Without the benefit of planning and preparation time, they were light on supplies – normally Hunter would have his assault rifle and a huge amount of ammunition festooned on his tac-harness, and they would all have been wearing a lot more armour for an assault like this, but instead they were in their suits, with the Kevlar-reinforced form-fitting undergarments to bolster the defensive power of the high-tech ballistic cloth that made up their business attire. Kai still didn't have a weapon at all – not that he was that fussed about the situation, being entirely happy to stay in the middle of the team and keep an eye on things.
Corridors and rooms, openings and residences, all blurred into a jumble as they drove onwards, following the mental map they had scavenged from their enemy, fighting off stupid and desperate assaults in a never-ending barrage of attacks. They grew tired of the slaughter, and Shimazu had taken on a somewhat remote glaze to his face, his normally inscrutable expression becoming a stone-like mask of non-expression as he tried to abstract what he was doing from his conscious mind. There was no honour in these fights, no foe worth fighting for him – just sheep to the slaughter, coming in what felt like endless waves of hopeless hatred.
Moving through the workshops and businesses were the most dangerous, where people had access to sources of heat, acid, hot liquids, tools, cutting devices or just dangerous raw materials. Nail guns, saws, winding spikes, bats – their foes had endless sources of improvised weaponry that they used with no real regard for their own safety, just rushing headlong at the team to try and earn the favour of the Triad that ruled this place with an iron fist.
As they jogged along a corridor, the floor underneath them heaved, sending them all staggering to the right. The walls shook, lumps of plaster breaking free and dust cascaded down from the roof as some explosion savaged the building many floors below. A few metres ahead of them, the concrete groaned and creaked, then suddenly snapped, sending out shards of material in all directions, giant cracks splitting outwards and running up the walls. The hideous sound of stretching metal rang out as the rebar laced throughout the concrete was strained and elongated, holding the walls and floors together only tenuously. From far below came a boom, then a rushing of hot air, rising though the new chasm in the floor.
"Come on! Move!" Aswon yelled out, then stepped across the gap quickly. As he did, he glanced downwards, seeing a fiery chasm fit for a disaster movie, burning rubble and flames floors below, spreading quickly as it rose. Fortunately the gap was less than a metre wide here, and the team easily traversed the obstacle without incident, heading further along the passageway.
"It's hopefully pretty obvious – but that's bad news. This building isn't exactly built to code!"
"Well, it's not fallen down yet."
"Only because it's propped up by the piles of drek on either side, Aswon. Whatever just blew down there has taken out structural walls – it must have done, to make the entire building sag like that. We may need to evac quickly if that gets worse – either to the buildings on either side, or just out the windows. If we find any. Or the walls. Or something… How do you feel about making us fly, Tads?"
"Not good, right now. The distortion in astral space is no fun at all. But if it's a choice of certain death in the building or a chance of flying out the window… well, I'll see what I can do."
Onwards and upwards they went, gradually climbing through the floors of the building. Sometimes they were able to climb two or three floors at once before they found a stairwell blocked by someone building over or through it, having to traverse back and forth along the same level to an alternate route. But as they climbed higher, there was no real increase in quality or change in style – the building was just as run down and decrepit, and just as full of desperate people willing to throw themselves at the team in a futile attempt to stop them as it had been on the lower levels. A grim miasma had settled over them, and even the normally irrepressible Kai had stopped grinning now. All of them were bloody and stained – though not with their own fluids, and they'd seen entirely too much violence to be able to make jokes about it or find humour in any circumstance.
As they climbed, they found smoke starting to seep through vents and risers, sometimes picking up on hot-doors facing into the corridors or passages, indicating that the fires from the lower levels were still burning and might be spreading – though the tightly-packed and compartmentalised structure actually seemed remarkably robust at containing them, at least for now.
Aswon pushed open a door at the end of a short corridor, just after they entered the fourteenth floor, entering a large room – by far the largest room they'd encountered so far. He was somewhat expecting it, having had the mental picture of their route supplied by the mind-probe and mind-link spell provided by Tads – but that still wasn't a perfect representation of what was to come, and it reminded him that everything they saw was always filtered by their own expectations and experiences. As he entered the room, though, he'd barely had time to make out the huge size – at least based on their experiences so far, when he spotted something far more important. A number of men were also present, waiting behind desks and wall pillars, and they all had weapons drawn, aiming in his direction.
"Ambush! Charging!" he called out over the tac-net, and then put actions to words. His powerful legs drove him forwards, charging into the room rather than ducking back into the hallway behind him. He was certain he'd be backed up by the others, and going backwards would only bottleneck the doorway, making it harder to get into the room. Besides – if he charged in, it was likely he'd draw their fire and attention, and that would make it easier for Shimazu to follow up.
The thoughts flashed through his mind, barely formed, as he accelerated into the room, running across the short side in massive loping steps as his muscles went to work. Head down and arms pumping he crossed the distance fast, surprising the ambushers with his incredible burst of speed. The air behind him was filled with the zip and crack of bullets as they fired at where they thought he should be – but he seemed to be a step ahead of them all the way.
The room was just over twenty metres long, and a little under ten metres wide – a huge space to have a single contiguous room here, and the compromises needed to make it happen were obvious in the room itself. A few remnants of the old walls could be seen in places, brick or concrete walls that rose from floor to ceiling, a few courses thick and jagged, some running north-south, and one east-west. The walls themselves changed colour several times, going through a variety of finishes and materials, and the floor was not level, stepping up and down several times in different areas of the room. A double row of concrete pillars had been installed, running down the room lengthways, roughly one third and two thirds of the way across, supporting the upper floors and stopping the roof from collapsing down as separate units had been merged into a larger space.
Twenty large desks were laid out in two parallel rows, each with a mass of equipment on top and a small wooden stool to one side, nestled up against the roof support. The room was also brightly lit, clearly powered either separately or on a different circuit to the one that Hunter had broken, illuminating everything brightly and evenly. The lights were long strips of LEDs, spread out along the entire length of the room, and their distribution ensured there were no shadows or darkened areas anywhere in the area.
The hail of bullets were getting closer to Aswon as they adjusted their aim, so he kicked out his legs from underneath himself, letting himself skid and slide forwards, landing on his hip as he shot towards the roof support column and the desk closest to this end of the room. The unexpected change in height took the shooters by surprise, and several rounds lanced through the air exactly where he should have been horizontally, but now a metre over him vertically.
He caught a flash of movement out of the corner of his eye, watching as Shimazu rounded the corner from the corridor, sword in hand and powering his way across the open space towards the closest shooter. Behind him, Hunter was rounding the corner, pistol in hand and already looking for a target.
The scene descended into bedlam, as the ambushers swung in and out of cover, aiming their pistols at the team as they poured into the room, unleashing a fusillade of fire at them. Aswon's initial charge seemed to have thrown them slightly off balance though, with some of them still aiming fire his way, trying to keep him suppressed – perhaps not realising that he didn't have a gun of his own to return fire with.
Shimazu sprinted forwards, driving off each foot as he zigged and zagged across the intervening distance, before his sword sliced upwards and across the first of the assailants. It wasn't a killing blow – he was focussed far more on not being shot by both this man and those around him, but it was a serious cut that opened up a wound from shoulder to hip, making him drop his gun and crash to the floor with a scream of pain.
Behind him, a man aimed his pistol at Shimazu's head, and as the bodyguards hyper-accelerated reactions focussed in on him, he could see the finger whitening on the trigger as pressure was applied – before the man seemed to explode in a ball of flame, spinning on the spot and sending the gun tumbling through the air. To his rear, he heard the rumbling thunder from Hunter's pistol, then again as a second shot smashed into another target across the room, all while Hunter strode forwards, aiming for one of the odd-shaped sections of wall remaining from the original build.
Marius piled through the doorway, following up behind Hunter, not firing yet as he hustled into cover, but ready to support Hunter in his next bound forward. Tads followed through next, flattening herself against the wall adjacent to the doorway, trying to keep a low profile as she moved after Marius, looking for targets ahead, before finally Kai's head appeared at the doorway. A quick check around and then he ducked back into cover, aware that there wasn't anywhere decent he could reach in a few paces to stay out of sight.
From further back in the room, a barrage of gunfire rang out, and a hail of bullets sliced through the air around Shimazu, still trying to duck down into cover after taking down his first foe. Several rounds whistled past his head, but a few thumped into his chest, staggering him back a few centimetres as the impact of the rounds spread over the ballistic fabric of his suit. None seemed to penetrate though, and he managed to get into cover behind a desk, flipping it over to shield himself and ignoring the sounds of shattering glass and tumbling equipment as the materials fell from the surface.
Aswon didn't wait for friction to stop him, but instead bent his knees up as far as he could, letting himself almost turn into a ball and rolling over his feet before driving upwards, performing a combat roll that any gymnast would have been proud off, then bursting into a fresh sprint, around the benches and along the northern wall of the room, heading into cover behind another section of the older supporting walls that had been left in place.
Marius slid into place behind Hunter and took a knee, and as Hunter started to fire slow methodical aimed shots at the opponents in the centre, he took on the right flank, punching round after round into targets and taking them down. Shimazu continued to work down the centre, being the loud and obvious target, but slaying anything that got in range of his sword, while managing to absorb the return fire that was sent his way, thankful that his suit slowed down the bullets enough to do nothing more than leave bruises and tenderness behind them.
Aswon made it into position on the north side and leapt out into combat with one foe there, who had just turned to engage Shimazu in the flank – a swift rap around the face with the end of his staff got his attention, then a jab to the nose sent him reeling away in shock. He followed up the assault with a smash to the opposite temple, sending the man reeling, punch drunk from the rapid flurry of blows. Aswon followed up and grabbed his shoulder, spinning him on the spot and then pushing him forwards, steering him with his collar and using him as a body-shield.
Half the assailants were dead or downed now, but as the team moved forward, their foes showed no signs of giving up. They were all men, probably in their mid to late twenties, dressed in their own armoured suits and wielding pistols. Their hardware was a much lighter grade pistol though, the kind of thing used by security guards and relatively discreet, able to be easily concealed and with a decent capacity of 9mm subsonic rounds, unlike the heavier 12mm pistols in use by both Marius and Hunter which had a lot more stopping power.
Shimazu took another few shots to his chest, and staggered back a step, his face contorting in rage as the suit was shredded, transformed into disintegrating fragments and threads around the impact site. He yelled and swung his sword, sending a blast of power radiating down it towards the shooter, the blast of elemental mana shredding the man's chest in response and staggering him back.
Aswon flinched as his body-shield was shot and killed by his own allies, discarding the corpse and diving for cover, his own suit deflecting a pair of badly-aimed shots as he did so, tucking himself into the space behind a concrete pillar to get out of line of sight, even if only for a moment. Two more shots rang out, and his assailant was taken out by simultaneous shots from Hunter and Marius, one to the chest and one to the head, dropping him in an instant, letting him roll out of cover and sprint across the remaining distance between himself and the last gunman, stunning him with a staff-shot to the gonads before he struck back and then forth across the face to disorient him before stabbing him in the throat and hitting the button his taser staff, sending him crumpling to the ground.
Tads stood up slowly, her eyes scanning back and forth for danger. She'd made it about halfway down the room, and Kai was a little behind her – but it appeared that Aswon on her left flank, Shimazu ahead, and the pairing of Hunter and Marius on her right had taken down all of the opposing Triad gunmen. She waved her hand in front of her face, trying to clear the cloud of dust a little and gave a cough as it tickled her throat.
"Clear!"
"Clear."
"One left, crawling…" Shimazu took a few steps to his rear until he stood over him, pushing down with his blade while he scanned around the room some more. "Clear."
They took stock, checking the room out and confirming that every one of their foes was either dead or incapacitated. Kai moved around and checked over everyone, making sure that nobody was wounded or bleeding. Shimazu seemed to have taken the most shots, the front of his suit definitely the worse for wear, but he didn't seem to be injured directly. Between the two layers of armour, he had only bruising and a little tenderness, and was otherwise fine. Aswon had two small bullet-holes in the outer layer of his suit, and the rest of them were untouched.
"Kai – do you want to grab one of the pistols? We should be able to scrape together a few magazines from between the rest."
"Don't you want them, Hunter?"
"Pfft, not these little pop-guns. I'll stick with what I've got." He checked his own pistol and his belt, then frowned. "Speaking of which, I've got one full mag and three rounds in this partial. How about you, Marius?"
"Similar. One full magazine, four rounds currently loaded."
"Well drek. Ok, sticking to the sword. Though grab another one of those pistols when we grab the body – we should take something to give to Spook when we find her."
"Are you ok, Marius? Your heart is still racing?" Kai frowned at their pilot, resting two fingers lightly on his neck while he continued to check over him visually."
"Ja. I am unwounded."
"Well your pulse is racing… should be slowing down now out of the fight…" Marius shrugged, then deliberately took a half step back, moving out of contact with Kai and slapping his partial magazine back into his pistol and checking to make sure a round was chambered.
"Oh… I know why." Hunter took another sniff, then moved over towards one of the benches, examining the broken glassware and the small pools of liquid and white powder. He cautiously sniffed at each in turn, then made a circling motion with his hand and pointed at the only other door leading out of the room. "We need to move. This is a drug lab – not sure on the particular variety, but this is some kind of meth-amphetamine derivative. And there's a drekload in the air from the shootout. So yeah… we're probably starting to come up. Life's gonna get interesting!" He grinned, then frowned as he saw Shimazu looking speculatively at some of the intact vials of white powder lying on the edge of one of the desks. "Don't even think about it."
"I wasn't."
"You bloody well were… come on, out!" He looked around. "Same for everyone, we need to move." Glancing over he saw Tads holding a patch of spare fabric over her nose and mouth. "Won't do any harm, but probably won't help much. Come on, we need to go!"
"Checking the door – just in case they've rigged it with grenades or something." Aswon moved over and started to carefully check over the door, examining the handle, hinges and crouching down to try and look under the door in the tiny gap between the door and the frame. "Ok, looks clear – I think." Cautiously he opened the door and to his relief there was no explosion or sign of ambush, just another corridor leading to a small set of concrete steps that turned and ascended out of line of sight.
Hunter moved to the side of the door and ushered everyone out, taking one of the guns and a magazine from Kai as he passed and stashing them for later, leaving the other in Kai's hands, then nodding at Tads as she passed with her own liberated weapon. He didn't rate the pistols for effectiveness, but against the kinds of foes they were facing, they'd probably do the job – even if he'd have felt insulted if someone had asked him to use one. "9mm," he scoffed under his breath, then waving as Tads stopped to look at him, wondering what he'd said. "Nothing – move on up!"
The team resumed their advance, with Marius carefully closing the door behind them, letting out a conspicuous breath as he did so.
Aswon paused for a brief moment at the next corner, listening intently. He filtered out the sounds of Shimazu and the others moving up behind him, then tried to identify any other noises, trying to detect if there were other people waiting to ambush them – clearly the Triad was not only aware of their presence, but was also trying to mount a more serious defence now.
"Anything?"
"No people, Shimazu. Just… fires. Things burning. Can hear it through the air vents and stuff. Getting out might be interesting."
"Well, from how built up it was, we should be able to cross into other buildings up the top. Or get out. It'll be fine." There was an absent-minded confidence in his voice that belied Aswon's own impression of the situation, but it did buoy his spirits somewhat.
They pressed on through the nightmarish labyrinth. Nothing made sense about the architecture – no common stairwells or building cores built around lift-shafts, no decent geometry, no common materials. Over a hundred years of organic, unregulated, cheap and unorganised construction had turned the place into a scrap-heap for construction. How the residents managed to move around successfully was beyond them – even Hunter and Marius were struggling to keep the layout straight in their heads. One thing that was common though was the assaults, which continued as they climbed higher and higher. They found fewer residents here, but more determined young men and women, suited and armed with lightweight pistols, ambushing them wherever they could.
The team rushed them when they were detected, the fearsome speed of Aswon and Shimazu throwing their enemy off their stride. Unaware of what had happened to any of the previous ambushes, the same tactics worked over and over, with the two melee combatants rushing in to draw fire and advance to cover, letting Hunter and Marius move in behind them to take careful shots to down some targets, switching their attention back, then only realising their mistakes when Aswon and Shimazu burst into their positions and took them down.
Around floor fifteen, Hunter got down to his last magazine and holstered his pistol, swapping over to his sword exclusively. It made closing harder, and he took a few rounds for his trouble, but nothing he couldn't handle – and he was determined to have some firepower for whoever or whatever they faced at the top of the tower.
As they climbed, Tads felt the aura of the building continue to degrade, becoming more and more twisted. Reaching floor eighteen, she called a halt for a few moments, warning them that the corruption had reached a dangerous level.
"If this gets much worse, we'll be in a mana warp. That means no spells, no magic healing. Your powers are probably going to stop working." She gestured at Kai, Shimazu and Aswon. It's nasty… really nasty. I don't know what's going on up there, but we need to be very careful, ok?"
"But that is where Spook has been take…"
"I didn't say we should stop, Aswon. I just said we need to be careful. And I'm probably not going to be slinging any successful spells, just trying with this for range and my staff for up close." She waved her captured pistol about with a clear lack of confidence. "Alright, let's go. Just… expect something weird up there. Nasty."
They climbed again, killing another dozen members of the Triad. Marius was as careful as he could be, while Kai and Tads blazed away with their light pistols to try and scare the opposition, or at least force them to duck, scavenging ammunition from the bodies to replace their profligate usage. Up and up they went – until they neared their destination. Floor nineteen saw the most serious assault yet – a full dozen of the Triad members rushed them, not that it made much difference in the end. After raiding the bodies for ammo, Marius checked his own situation.
"Six rounds remaining."
"We're almost there… in fact…" Aswon looked around, checking out the colours of the walls and the layout, "yeah… round that corner, up the stairs and the door on the left – that goes into the boss' room. At least it should do." He looked around and got several nods from the others as they confirmed his memory from the mind-link.
"I'm getting some signal back, though." Hunter looked up and around. "Yeah – GPS locked on again. And I got a bit of signal on the commlink. How about you?"
"I have some communication with the drone – I am not sure I would risk jumping in, though. It is still somewhat patchy." Marius did however check his remote deck for a status update, and triggered a few extra commands, queuing them up to execute in order. "Do you want some holes in the roof?"
"NO!" Aswon said as firmly as he could. "Spook is up there, probably. And so is her kid."
"I should be able to make tactical holes, as required."
"Maybe once we're up – if we get to negotiations, and you can move into a good position. But until we can see them it's no good. We've got more chance of gunning them down ourselves."
"The room has windows on one side, right? That way?" Kai gestured, then looked around the passageway they were in and corrected his pointing arm ninety degrees around.
"Yeah – big couple of windows, facing in towards a light-well or courtyard or something. But open space. That might be a good place to bring the drone down, for more firepower?" Aswon suggested. Marius nodded at him, then entered more commands into his remote deck, sending the requests out to the drone flying somewhere above.
"Kai – do you wanna call Grandfather Fan? Now we got signal back, and we know what's going on a bit. I don't think he'll be pleased with them stealing his girl. Or maybe he will… but that'd be good to know, too." Aswon turned on him, a look of outrage on his face but Hunter just calmly continued. "Look, we don't know the politics. Maybe he's decided to sacrifice her. Maybe she's expendable. I hope not – but these people ain't exactly the mamas club are they?" Aswon swallowed, then nodded his head in agreement. He didn't like it, but he had to concede that it was possible.
"Alright, fair point, Hunter. And I agree – maybe you can pick something up from his voice, or how he acts. While you do that, I'm gonna check the corner. I hate the idea of going in the front door. I'm gonna see if we can go around. Or up through the floor, or something else. Maybe the windows and up the outside."
Kai called on his commlink, while Aswon did as he'd described, moving to the corner and trying to work out a better route up to the room above. The situation didn't favour him though – they were coming from the middle of the building towards the inner edge, and they didn't seem to have easy access to the room under where they were trying to get to – and he'd already experienced the convoluted and nonsensical layout of the place. They could spend far too long trying to work around and through the neighbouring units to get to where they wanted to – and that was time Spook might not have.
"I hate it – but I think the front door is the way to go. I can't see a quick or easy away around it, and the longer we wait, the more time they have to prepare. What did Fan say?"
"Call waiting or something. But he's not answering. I left a brief summary."
"Crap. I really don't like this. No finesse, no real plan – just kick in the door and storm the place. That's a terrible plan."
"I have a suggestion, then. I will strafe the roof – very shallow angle, trying not to penetrate. Maybe just shoot up any equipment located there. But something loud, and very obvious. Make them think that there is an airborne assault. It may only buy us a few seconds, but that could be enough."
"Alright… it's better than nothing." Aswon shook his head, and then gestured, and the team moved around the corner, dropping speed to a stealthy walk, climbing the steps as silently as they could and stacking up on the doorway. Marius was at the back, watching as Aswon counted down on his fingers, and got ready to send in the drone on a strafing run, locking the guns to a five-degree declination to try and limit their ability to punch through the roof as much as he could.
Aswon and Shimazu were both taking deep breaths, super-oxygenating their systems and getting ready to perform whatever bursts of speed they needed to, to get in and clear the doorway. Aswon pointed to himself and signalled left, Shimazu and right, then Hunter and straight-forward, getting nods from the others in response.
Hunter pulled out his pistol, easing the slide back carefully just far enough to confirm he had one in the chamber, ready to go, then verified the sword was where it should be. Tads and Kai were behind him, holding onto their own pistols and looking somewhat nervous – especially Tads. Every time she glanced at astral space she recoiled from the jagged distortions and feelings of vile malevolence, the twisting strands of toxic energy trying to ensnare her mind and pull her into the abyss.
Aswon held up his hand, showing all five digits, then clenched his hand shut.
Hunter released the slide carefully and nodded, as much to himself as anyone else.
Four.
Kai and Tads shared a look, then took a deep breath of their own.
Three.
Shimazu closed his eyes, exhaling deeply and bringing the sword up to a vertical position in front of his face, a wave of calmness radiating throughout his body.
Two.
Marius sent out the mental command, and overhead the drone turned sharply on its thrusters, speeding towards the roof, the guns safety system flicking off and getting ready to fire.
One.
Aswon's foot raised, then started to descend, getting ready to kick in the door and breach into the room…