The stale air of the building danced across my lips, making them dry. I felt my heart thundering within my chest whilst I licked my lips in anticipation. It’d been ages since I’d hunted, or been the prey for that matter.

My Echo-Sight stopped rippling for a few seconds, then began anew, with two different ripples. One ascending and the other coming towards me. They separated. Not like I didn’t expect this. But I didn’t expect to fight fifteen of these bastards.

I had the high ground, but they had the numbers. If I had started a firefight, and missed a few of them, they would’ve probably tossed a grenade up here, which would’ve left me in a seriously in a bad spot…plus I didn’t know if the building could handle an explosion.

The third, fourth and fifth motion sensors chimed off above me and I heard the voices behind me whisper, loud as day, “If he’s not there, then where is he?”

Right in front of you.

I could see the ripple waves flooding towards me, as I backed the Hannya Boys against the pillar. I couldn’t guess how many men were there because too many ripples were fluttering around, but thanks to Echo-Sight I gauged where the majority of them were. On my right, the middle and to my left.

I shifted to the right from behind the pillar, BZ Scorpio hugged tightly, and squeezed the trigger. Two Hannya Boys dropped to the ground from headshots, and I slid back into cover, behind the pillar.

A loud boom followed, flaking the pillar in which I hugged tightly. Shotgun round, I snapped in my incendiary clip and fired blindly hoping to hit one of them.

The scorching bullet hole seethed through one of the pillars on the other side, but I wished it hit them. Three down, Twelve more to go. I thought.

I slid to the other pillar, whilst they hid behind their own. The hollowness of the room made me feel small, like a mouse being swarmed by cats, not my smartest move to make, but it’d have to do.

A wave of bullets raked into the pillar, flaking and shattering it in one fell swoop. The flakes from the pillar stung my neck as I cowered, but after the bullets stopped, I pinpointed my target, using my echo-sight and fired an array of bullets.

The bullets seethed through metal and flesh, leaving the metallic scent of blood, slowly coursing through the air, with the added stench of rat shit and rotted food.

Eleven left.

By my count, five Hannya Boys were in this room, whilst six were scrambling towards me from the third floor. Chipped concrete grazed past me like buzzing flies hovering around my ears, annoying and scaring me at the same time.

I switched from Echo-Sight to Thermal Vision, noting the noise from their submachine guns made it too difficult to decipher, whilst I pressed against the pillar. hunkered down.

A loud snap croaked to my right, and I fired blindly, but then an array of bullets followed, ricocheting off my cybernetic arm.

“Damn it! That anchor is pinning me down,” I realised, feeling frustrated by the suppression tactics they were using. The anchor would suppress me, whilst the other two would slowly converge on me.

“We don’t have to do this, Cypher,” The Red Hooded Hannya Boy shouted, “Drop the gun…we just want to talk.”

We are talking, Dipshit.

I picked up one of the biggest pieces of chipped concrete at my disposal and lobbed it in the air, to the far right of the room. It was the best I could do because going in the open was suicide. I hoped the anchor would hesitate before riddling another wave of bullets.

A loud thud echoed, I waited, noting that nothing had happened and fired blindly to my left hoping to hit an encroaching Hannya Boy, but only heard thuds of concrete.

“WHAT ARE YOU DOING? JUST CHARGE HIM!” Someone else shouted, from the staircase, I snuck my left hand out, firing an array of bullets till the clip went dead and brought it back hearing the deflections rattling against my cybernetic arm from the left.

I pulled my Teleari-X from my waist, and fired blindly to the right, hitting two Hannya boys in the neck and back, watching as they flopped to the ground, dead.

I heard the ruffling on the ground and stimulated my SMB to change back to Echo-Sight. The Hannya Boy to the left had retreated, but the anchor was still there, damn it.

I dove to the right, back to my original spot, feeling bullets ricochet off my flak-jacket and left arm as I slid across the ground.

The Hannya Boy to my left, got bold, hooked the corner, and felt a bullet from my Teleari-X penetrate his forehead. “THIS IS BULLSHIT, STEVITH. HE’S KILLING US AND AKATANI WANTS HIM ALIVE…I SAY LET'S KILL HIM.”

Ten.

“You could try!” I growled, “but I can tell you came off the milk two days ago.”

I slipped from my pillar, sliding across the ground pushing a mannequin and shattered concrete as I fluttered to my left. A wave of bullets followed and sank into the two Hannya Boys I just downed. I picked up one of their submachine guns, slipped their clip into mine and fired rounds at my two o’clock.

I brandished my Teleari-X once more, watching as many shots seethe the pillar, in which the anchor laid behind. The Hannya boy at my two o'clock head stuck out from behind a pillar and I left a hole between his cybernetic eyes, before sauntering back into cover.

Nine.

The Hannya Boy Anchor shifted to my right, doing his best to keep his distance. Well, that’s the impression I got from his hurried steps. I fired my submachine gun only to hear clicks, and by the time I raised my Teleari-X, he was already back in cover, the bastard.

I then slipped in the armour-piercing rounds and knew full well that these were my last chance to end this or die trying. There was no way I was being taken in by some low-level criminal because he felt slighted that I caught some kids. That was just absurd.

A loud crack groaned its way towards me, hitting my cybernetic arm in multiple places. “Damn it!” I said.

The smoke smelt acidic as if it were burning away…metal. My arm! The corrosive pellet slowly ate away the anti-piercing armour. Damn it!

I re-holstered my Teleari-X and fired a wave of bullets once more at the assailant behind me. I couldn’t afford to allow him to sneak up.

A wave of ripples erupted to my left, in the form of footsteps based on the pace that the strides were bombarding the ground. I bent to the side, making myself small and fired three shots at the scuttling feet.

The Hannya boy dropped to the ground with a groan, hitting hard with a solid smack. I couldn’t see his face, but the back of his head was clear as day. The Hannya horns that protruded from his temples made him seem like a goat.

A dead goat.

I squeezed the trigger twice, leaving six bullets in the back of his head. The blood seeped from the back of his head and I saw the shattered SMB ingrained into his brain, pink matter and blood flowing smoothly through the hole.

Eight left

The position where I fired the submachine gun blocked me from the anchor's view, so I pulled myself up, feeling my abs and sides tense instantly. I ground my teeth forcing the pain in my side to resign from its torment, but it wouldn’t relent.

“Not now,” I complained to myself. “Not now.”

Not one to rest on my laurels, I brandished my Teleari-X once more and emptied my armour-piercing rounds and watched as the Hannya Boy with the shotgun fluttered to the ground.

“That’s for fucking up my arm, you bastard.” I snarled.

I re-holstered the Teleari-X, feeling the heat from my nozzle penetrate my flack-jacket and warmed my side. I peered at the display on the submachine, noting there were only eight bullets left, and seven men. Luckily, they all seemed scared.

“Are you sure you want this fight…boys? I mean, half of you are already dead. Is this what your leader sent you to do, die for him?” I said, coldly.

“Shut up!” one of them said, voice scared.

“Listen to me, Kid, you don’t wanna do this. LOOK AROUND, HALF OF YOU ARE ALREADY DEAD!”

“He’s right,” one of them agreed.

A bullet shot flew across, but not flakes of pillar came bristling b. A Hannya Boy dropped to the ground dead. “You BASTARD! You’re trying to kill us.”

It wasn’t me.

They’re betraying each other. I thought, hearing two more rounds offed and two more bodies dropped to the ground. I took the opportunity to angle myself better by going left. Even better, I picked up a pistol from one of my pursuers, firing the entire clip into two of the Hannya Boys.

Three

I hugged the pillar, firing burst shots of two, watching the bullets seethe through two Hannya Boys, they dropped to the ground, hissing and clunking like heavy pieces of metal.

The Adrenaline that flowed through made me feel invincible. The pounds in my heart were like drums on a battlefield, but when I felt the heat from the nozzle of a gun pointing in my temple. I knew I messed up.

“Got ahead of yourself there, Cypher,” The Red Hooded Hannya Boy said. “Don’t move or I'll end it. Tonight.”

“Ya got me,” I said, tone calm as I possibly could keep it.

“No. Actually. Move, Cypher, I want you to, so I can tell Akatani that you killed yourself.”

“Like you did your men?”

“You think you’re important, Cypher? I’m more important than you. The boss trusts me.”

“Listen, Kid, I don’t know anything about your boss and why he’s fixated on me.”

“That’s not for you to know, but you’ve messed up his plans. Big time.”

“Then I’m sorry about that…because it’s about to get worse for him.”

I ducked out of the way, knowing full well, Red Boy couldn’t contain himself. I drilled my elbow into his chest, sending him flying towards a crumpled pillar. He recovered fast though, enough to raise a defensive boot to my chin, making me stumble.

I used the momentum from my stumble to re-orientate my body to a lower centre of gravity, then sweep him off his feet. He cried out. I slammed my cybernetic arm into his chest, the moment he landed on the ground.

The ground cracked beneath him, leaving a crevice splintering across the mannequin that filled the room. The wheezing sound he croaked sounded painful as if his lung had collapsed. Good.

“You should’ve left me alone, Kid. Petty revenge gets you nowhere. Look around.”

The red hooded Hannya Boy’s cybernetic face tried to make a wailing expression, but the enhancement he had couldn’t express such a thing.

I pushed myself up from the ground, feeling the weight of the world pressing against my knees. I truly thought I was done with these battles, who knew, petty criminals had vendettas?

As I walked towards the staircase. The Hannya Boy shrieked and creaked, making every sound and emotion available to him to get my attention. I turned around and looked at him. He couldn’t say anything. So I shook my head and left him there to die.

I exited the building and felt the cold, damp wind of the night caress my neck and fingertips. It made me feel more lethargic than ever. “Bring the car, Nova,” I said gruffly, barely having enough voice in me to speak.

I crashed on the sidewalk and waited for my car to come, then saw ripples emanate to my right. The way they fluttered seemed like footsteps, so I snapped right, BZ Scorpio, hugging against my shoulder.

“Whoa, Mister!” a bald old man said. “We don’t want no problem, we just tryna get back to our home,” he said.

“Home?” I asked.

“Yes. Home. We heard shots upstairs and hid.”

“Oh sorry, dead bodies now reside there,” I said, pointing upstairs.

“I see,” The old man said. “Come on fellas” The old man continued, “let's loot before we move!”