Chapter 5.B

Hank was hesitant to trust this new power. He spent another twenty minutes watching employees enter the town hall. Most of them gave him some kind of inclination of what he assumed was good or evil. Some of them he got no feeling from whatsoever. He wasn’t sure if that meant they were neutral morality wise or if they were immune to his new found power. How was this power judging who was good and who was evil? Was it using Hank’s own sense or morals or something else? The person’s thoughts, was he somehow reading their mind? Or was this intention based? Would someone who wants to kill the person their spouse is having an affair with be considered evil? Because Hank didn’t really have a problem with that. Actions matter more than intent, wanting to do something doesn’t make someone evil, you SHOULD want to kill the person your spouse is cheating on you with. You aren’t evil until you actually commit an evil deed. These are some of the thoughts that were running through Hank’s head. So to say he didn’t completely trust his new power would be an understatement of epic proportions.

Lost in his own thoughts, Hank was following the implications of his new ability down the rabbit hole. His musings were so consuming that Hank almost missed the small convoy of five black SUVs coming down the road. The only thing that alerted him to the presence of the convoy was the strongest feeling of evil he had encountered yet. It was overwhelming and it actually made all of the muscles in his body involuntarily strain. There was something seriously sick in one of those cars. And the rest of the cars were filled with evil as well to a much lesser degree. They didn’t bother heading to the parking garage, they pulled up right on the fire lane directly in front of City Hall. Who do these clowns think they are?

A small army of private security stepped out of the SUV’s followed by an overweight man in an extremely expensive suit, with fingers covered in gold rings. That was the one putting off the biggest evil aura, it felt like an invisible evil rope on fire was pulling him straight at that man. Hank took a few more steps closer to the street but stayed on his side of the road, he was trying to get a better a look. Wait a minute, is that Eugene? Hank had to get closer and make sure. The man just looked so different than the Eugene he remembered who was an athletic young teen in a Letterman jacket. Hank started crossing the road, it was a small town and the traffic was light so no one really minded they just gently swerved around the crazy person who hated crosswalks and muttered obscenities, it was that kind of town.

The private security noticed Hank’s hulking demeanor and large frame immediately and clocked him as a threat. They spread out around Eugene and two moved forward to intercept him. One of the two that came to intercept him was calm. “Sir you are going to have to turn back around and go to the crosswalk down the road a bit.” said the calmer of the two. The second one, the hot head, couldn’t wait to get his hands on Hank. He reached out to grab Hank’s shoulder, and when he did Hank felt an aura flare from his evil intent. Hank grabbed the man’s hand before it could touch him and he snapped the wrist. The man fell over in a clump cradling his injury. The second guy knew Hank was a serious issue at that point and reached into his coat to draw his firearm. Hank pinned his arm to his chest and then gave him the headbutt from hell, all without stopping or saying a word. He didn’t even wait to see if the man would fall over, he did of course.

The rest of the security team lost all pretense of calm and drew out an assortment of sub-machine guns and pistols. They formed a protective perimeter around Eugene and backed up to the lawn of the Town Hall. Hank kept coming, he walked between their parked SUV’s and only stopped when he was about ten feet out from them.

“I need a word with the man you are protecting, I’m unarmed,” said Hank so calmly that it started to freak out some of the security team. Who was this brute who had just taken down two of their own like he was knocking down dominoes. Hank heard of series of bolts being pulled and actions being worked on the small myriad of guns. Why do bad guys insist on walking around without their weapon being ready to fire… amateurs.

“Open up a small hole I think I recognize this one,” said a nasally voice from somewhere inside the circle of security. The two men in front both wielding sub-machine guns squarely pointed at Hank’s chest each peeled off to one side so Hank could see inside of the circle. Sure enough it was Eugene, and he had gained a ton of weight and lost a lot of hair. All of the hair on the top of his head was gone. He had one of those pedophile haircuts where the hair just rings the outside of the head leaving a shiny bald spot on top. He also had a visible gut that his expensive suit couldn’t contain.

“WOW, you did not age well. You truly look like shit Eugene.”

“Oh Hankey boy that’s no way to talk to your betters, besides if you don’t play nice I might have one of my men here accidentally shoot you.”

“On the front lawn of town hall? Even you don’t have that kind of clout you beady-eyed little shrimp boast bastard. I fucking dare you,” said Hank with his arms held wide.

“Oh I don’t need to shoot you, I could if I wanted to of course. I’m pretty sure I do actually have that kind of clout. No, I mean to make you a desolate vagabond. First I’ll take your business and your land. I’ll fire every employee you have and make sure they never get a job in this town again. Then I’ll pay off some corrupt cops to plant drugs or a gun on you and I’ll throw you behind bars. I don’t have to lift a finger to ruin you. If you had any semblance of a brain you would have ran away screaming or begged me for mercy by now. I have my hands in everything here. The people in that building behind me are my puppets and there isn’t a damn thing you can do about it.”

Hank couldn’t help but laugh at the short fat man lobbing empty threats at him. Hank was either going to be dead or he would be off this planet within the week. Besides Hank has never been afraid of Eugene, before this Hank knew Eugene as the young man who was too cowardly to fight on his own merits. Now Eugene was the fat balding man with a lot of money who was still so cowardly he couldn’t fight on his own merits. Eugene was absolutely livid that Hank was laughing at him. Eugene’s face had turned the most interesting shade of red, and he had a vein in his forehead pulsing so fast that it was liable to explode. Hank casually wondered if he could get Eugene angry enough to have a heart attack and then he could avoid this whole Killdozer business and hop on the yellow donut spaceship and try and find out of his genitals were compatible with Cerulean’s.

“Hey Eugene, do you like rare vehicles? I see you came here like a coward today in those SUV’s, but I mean when you aren’t being a rat-coward. Do you like rare vehicles?”

“What are you blathering about moron?” Eugene said condescendingly.

“Just stay here, I’ve got a vehicle that you would absolutely love to see. I promise you have never seen anything like this. I’ve got it parked just over yonder.”

Before Eugene could respond Hank turned his back on him and started jogging back across the street. He could hear Eugene yelling behind him.

“Hank goddamnit! You don’t walk away from me! I don’t care about whatever small town hick-mobile you are restoring!”

Eugene’s frantic insults only made Hanks smile grow bigger and wider. Hank rounded the corner into the alley with giddy excitement. He ripped the tarp off of the Killdozer and hopped up into the cab. He didn’t want Eugene to walk away or enter town hall so he had to hurry. Hank fired up the old engine and was surprised to feel it come to a smooth idle so quickly, was that the Sword at work? He gunned it forward into the street and aimed it straight at Eugene and his men. Hank had to give Eugene’s security team credit, they didn’t waste any time in opening fire. Hundreds of rounds were landing on the armor of the bulldozer. The slugs were being dispensed amongst the gravel inside the armor pockets. The sound it was making was a very satisfying ding-crunch.

Eugene’s men quickly realized the bullets weren’t working and started retreating. They were scrambling in all directions, some were haphazardly firing over one shoulder as they ran. Hank knew it was now or never. He slapped the bulldozer into a higher gear and gunned it into the crowd of them. He had the blade about half a foot off of the ground and a few of them got sucked under the dozer while the blade broke their shoulders and cut into them. After the trouncing by the blade the lucky ones were quickly silenced under the treads as they were squashed into shithead pancakes. The unlucky ones were only partially squashed, an arm here, a leg there. Only to be left for dead behind the dozer with injuries sure to kill them. Hank noticed the ones being left for dead and decide to drop the ripper a few times hoping to catch a few of them with a piercing attack. A Ripper is a large spike kept on the rear end of some bulldozers, there are many types of rippers. Hank had a single point ripper installed, imagine a giant scorpion tail except aiming downwards. Normally it is used to till soil or tear up old roads, but it works pretty good on criminal’s faces as well.

The screams of Eugene’s security team filled Hank with an almost childlike glee, these men weren’t ignorant about who they worked for. These guys knew Eugene was evil and they helped him and protected him anyway, enabling him to hurt more people. These shitheads needed to die. That was what Hank’s logical mind was telling him anyway. His Arbiter intuition was screaming that he needed to rip these men to pieces and eat their souls. Hank’s knuckles were white on the controls of the bulldozer as he fought to keep his rational mind in charge of his body. Hank didn’t like this feeling of having to fight against himself. In fact it distracted him and caused him to lose track of Eugene’s whereabouts.

Hank tried to recall through his blood-thirsty haze if Eugene had been in the crowd that he had smooshed as he scanned the remaining fleeing security men who had been quick enough on their feet to avoid the initial onslaught. It was hard to get a good view of everything through the security camera footage on the little 13-inch TV. Hank stopped the dozer and grabbed the Remington 870, a long-barreled shotgun. It was loaded with alternating rounds of buck and birdshot. He checked the feed on his rear camera to make sure there was no one behind him who would shoot him in the back, and then he cracked his armored door open. He gripped the top of the door and pulled himself over the edge of it, he braced his shotgun on the ledge and looked down the sights. He scanned the town hall grounds and saw all the dead and dying he had left behind. He could still see security men running everywhere and civilians were trying to evacuate the town hall as well. Some of them were still confused and were just trying to get a good view of what was going on. Hank could hear sirens in the distance.

There, Hank spotted Eugene climbing the steps of town hall. He was cowering behind two members of his security team. Hank took aim and let off a few shots at them with the shotgun. The Remington 870 is a pump action so you can fire it as fast as you can work the action. Some people like to get flashy and rack it so fast their hand becomes a blur. Hank was the opposite, slow and methodical, he took careful aim for center mass before firing his rounds. One of the security men went down and he swore he saw Eugene get clipped on his side somewhere as well because he had visibly staggered, hopefully from a hit rather than fear. The last security man with Eugene turned around and fired on Hank as Eugene ran inside the building. Hank had to take cover. He closed the door to his cab and revved his engine. He aimed the bulldozer at the front steps of town hall where Eugene had entered the building and where one of his security men was still taking pot shots at him, and he gunned it forward. Hank hoped the man shooting at him would be dumb enough to stay still. He pulled his blade up high so it wouldn’t get caught on the steps and he began to climb them. Once the bulldozer leveled out on the landing he could see his hopes were for not because the last security man and Eugene were gone, they had escaped somewhere inside the depths of town hall.

He had a decision to make, it didn’t take him long. This was the same building where the town council unanimously decided to steal his land. Hank never really understood the logic of legislatively stealing shit. Whether you are holding someone at gunpoint to rob someone, or voting for it on a ballot alone in your home, stealing is still stealing. Hank never understood how that was morally or legally allowed in the modern world. Oh well, this was the building the thieves operated out of, fuck em, and fuck this building. Hank gunned the Killdozer forward into town hall crushing everything in his path. The long standing walls of the building crumbled to the might of the dozer. Someone in a white shirt and tie tried to dart out of a side room to get away from the collapsing area of the building. Hank got a strong feeling of evil from him so he gunned it forward and made sure the man was swallowed by rubble.

He kept pushing through the building, concrete and debris were piling up on top of the bulldozer and it sounded like he was unleashing hell. Drywall dust started drifting in through his peephole slots and he could hear people screaming in other parts of the building as he continually knocked down wall after wall. Hank occasionally rolled up a bureaucrat or two, crushing them with the insane amount of rubble he was pushing. Hank couldn’t help but feel elated and accomplished at how many evil souls he had destroyed.