Uncharted Limits: America
Chapter 5
"Boss, the runt's been in that cell for a while. Shouldn't we off him before the cops find out?"
In the dim environment of this abandoned building, a group of darkly-dressed men surrounded an iron dais. On top of this metal podium was a throne of thick brown leather and fur, decorated with exotic feathers. Seated on this throne was one man, whose broad form was double the size of any of the others in the room. Shirtless, one could see the numerous scars that adorned his body, which seemed almost feral in nature. And above all else, one could not ignore the faint glowing green that emitted from his irises, almost illuminating the darkness of the room.
The man's tone was deep, grainy, and soaked in malice. "Fool, they'd take days before finding any trace of this place. I'll savor this plentiful time as I please, tormenting that ignorance existing in that cage."
"If you say so, boss," the same man who asked stepped back into place, returning to the silence that the others shared.
For a while, they all just stood there, menacingly staring into nothingness. Were one to ignore the fact that each and every person in this room was and is beyond capable of slaughter, the sight alone could be perceived as merely aura farming. Though, this moment of seriousness would not last long, as someone bursted into the room, flooding the darkness with light.
"RAH!" the man on the throne roared in pain, shielding his eyes from the blinding light. "WHAT DID I SAY ABOUT KNOCKING?!"
"Sorry boss, but it's bad news!" the one who entered said, scrawny and panting heavily from a marathon. "T-The kid's out his cage! He's on the loose!"
"What?!" the large man seethed, instantly standing up from his throne with gritted teeth. His fists clenched, enough to cause the rings on his finger and the watch on his wrist to twinkle in the light. He was momentarily distracted from the ice on his wrist before shaking his head. "Men, do not let that vile child leave this facility! Lethality if necessary, but keep him alive to your greatest abilities!"
"Yes, sir!" Like a swarm of robots, all the men in the room saluted on que. And just in synchrony did they all leave the room, expanding out as they hunted for their released prisoner.
This place was weird, that much I could say.
Getting out of the cage was easy, a lot easier than I first made it out to be. I was sort of scared of trying to reinterpret my quick into time-manipulation since it would be my first time doing something like that, but with such a dire situation I couldn't really think of any other option (though I'm sure there were better approaches). I just went with the simple idea of "slowing down time to the point where I could freely move without worry of anyone noticing." Sure enough, I kinda got those results, but with the only exception that it wasn't time itself I was slowing down, but I was rather accelerated to the point where everything seemed to slow down to me.
So, yes, I instead turned into a speedster, and the results were pretty severed. Didn't mean to gut punch the guy that badly.
Well, in any case, I found myself wandering through the corridor. I changed my quick into an invisible quick, since it was one of the few that I couldn't get wrong with. As I wandered around, I quickly noticed that I was in what appeared to be an abandoned facility of some sorts. And judging by the different machinery around me, it was either a factory for metal or some other constructive resource. I can't remember anything like this in my town.
'Just how far did they take me… us…' I frowned, reaching a split in the path that forked into three directions. I stared at it for a while before sighing. However, as I was seconds from blindly wandering into a random path, I paused and thought. What was my purpose of escaping? Well, it was to find my family and get out of here, but more importantly was it to find my family. So… I couldn't be doing such a stupid thing. I needed to track either my mom or Esther, and wandering only wastes precious time. Though, I'm not sure how…
…
… ok, let me try a tracking quirk.
Silently, a small portion of my bubbles returned from invisibility, exchanging their colors from a cloudy white into a translucent lime green. From there, I felt a tingle in my eyes, and then I was able to weakly see a green-tinted fog forming in the air. The fog expanded outwards as if it were alive, continuing on through the middle path in front of me. Giving it no mind, I resumed my trip, following the green fog.
And yes, even with my brand new green fog tracker quirk, I was still completely invisible. I hope. How, though? Well, it's a small fact of my quirk that I overlooked explaining. Another thing that I could do with my bubbles is produce multiple quirks simultaneously. Mhm, yeah, it goes even to that extent. Therefore, I could dual, quad, hexa, and even octo wield quirks.
However, as broken as this sounds, it had its drawbacks, and by that I meant that the more quirks I produced at once, the weaker the actual results are for each respective quirk. See, I can allocate a certain percentage of my bubbles towards a specific quick, making it slightly stronger, but it still wouldn't be 100% of that specific quirk. And even though I did say that I could produce bubbles indefinitely, the ratio doesn't really change with volume. The quirks I produce will have 20% power if I give it 20% power, regardless if I make ten or three hundred bubbles.
That said, I only allocated 15% percent of my bubbles towards the tracker quirk. I was still 85% with invisibility, which in all honesty should be fine if I keep practicing my sneaky approach…
… just hope I don't do anything stupid.
I was getting close, I could feel it.
It took a minute, but I eventually found myself facing a flight of stairs, which went even deeper into the factory place. It didn't help how pitch black it was, and so I unfortunately had to shift 5% into making a night vision quirk. An abysmal outcome, really, but it served to aid me.
Walking down these stairs for a while, I eventually found myself facing a door. My tracker quirk was going haywire, meaning that beyond this door was where they were keeping my mother. So there was no way I could just open the door all fine and dandy. I had no clue who or what was in the room.
'...could probably do a mixture of invisibility, permeability, and silence…' I thought to myself, pressing my lips. Eventually, I came to terms with my idea and tried it out. The green fog disappeared and so did my night vision. Once I felt a shift in my body, I knew the quirks were done. With nothing else to do, I crossed my heart and walked headfirst into the door.
Author's Note
Short and sort of half-assed chapter, but I just wanted to push this story a little bit further as I keep thinking of where it is heading, and what is the purpose of this story. For now, the main focus is saving his family.
I added more into Kevin's quirk. What do you think, is it OP? Next chapter we'll see some more hands on action. I wonder how he'll handle it? Until then, have a good day/night!
