- Sergeant Murph
- |
- Noble Legendary Member
Yo! I've finally gotten to throw in the action-packed chapters we've all been waiting for. No more introductions. This is Darkwing.
It is a little on the long side, so if you do not want to read it all in one go, that's cool. Take your time.
Your eyelash-batting-review-longing friend,
~Murph
Chapter Five
Early-Out for Good Behavior
When the two operatives entered into the main lobby, Pulse and Lucifer quickly scrambled to find cover behind a screen of tall, ostentatious-looking plants. It seemed as if whoever had built the lobby had made an industrious effort to make it resemble a five-star hotel, complete with a small lounge with leather couches, a fireplace and several outdated magazines.
As if the guests here needed to feel welcome.
"Report?" Pulse whispered into his chatter, straining to hear over the cries of guards rushing for the gaping hole in the west side of the ovular building. The explosion had been only to divert their attention, leaving the main entrance wide open for a quick, stealthy break-and-take.
Phase's voice crackled in from his safe-haven back at headquarters. His combat prowess was mediocre, which he often was mocked for, but his technological skills were unmatched, so it had been reluctantly decided that he should stay back and work behind the scenes.
"Guards are all heading for the detonation site. Let me see." There was a short silence while Phase punched something in on his overly large computer monitor. Another thing he was teased for. "The objective is being held in the East Cell Blocks, cell H to be exact. Area schematics say to take a hard left just up the hall."
Pulse was about to sign off when, suddenly, he heard a gasp from behind him. Groaning in exasperation, he whipped around.
It seemed that two guards had stayed behind to patrol the lobby, and one of them turned to sound the alarm while the other charged the two operatives, drawing his handgun as he ran.
"Damn!" Pulse exclaimed as the first shot ricocheted off of the plant pot, shattering it. He rolled to the side just as Lucifer shot out from the opposite corner of the room and snapped a vicious kick at the unsuspecting guard's neck, making him tumble like a pile of bricks.
The alarm that sounded moments later nearly deafened them. Pulse nodded to Lucifer, who gave a slight shrug in reply and led them down the hallway, now in a full sprint.
"Hands up!"
Pulse hadn't even turned around to meet the two guards pouring out from the side corridor before Lucifer slammed both of their heads against the wall with a brutal yet refreshing crack. Jesus, he's good at that. It wasn't every day you came across a guy that could wound or kill three grown, trained men in less than three seconds.
More guards hustled from their posts down the adjoining hallways, yelling, and instinctively Pulse tossed two smoke grenades to either side of him, issuing a burst of grey fog that momentarily halted his pursuers.
"You need to move, Pulse!" Phase ordered. Weird how he was in more of a panic than Pulse. Actually, now that he thought about it, it wasn't that unusual. It took a lot to make Pulse lose it. "Six more coming in from behind; make your way to the cell block, or we'll have to--"
"We're not backing out of this operation, whether they send six or six hundred," Pulse retorted through clenched teeth. He turned hastily to Lucifer, who had already drawn his submachine gun and was poised to fire.
"How much time can you buy me?" Pulse demanded of the vague, dangerous Darkwing operative. Lucifer didn't look at him when he answered.
"That depends how long you can live."
A bit surprised by his comrade's witty remark, Pulse narrowed his eyes, nodded slowly, and turned to rush through the smoke, barely avoiding crashing into a wall, and made a quick left. Out of the corner of his eye he thought he saw Lucifer quirk a rare smile. Not of happiness, of course, but of greed. Lust. Will to murder.
Was that supposed to bug him?
As he rounded the corner and paced down the next corridor, the blaring sound of a submachine gun and several cries of pain reverberated all around.
"Hang a right just ahead, you're not far now," Phase intoned. Pulse obeyed, quickly skidding to a start and starting down the next dimly lit, white-walled hallway. He passed several cells, some empty, some with morbidly discontent prisoners rattling the bars, screaming pleas or threats toward him, their eyes sharp as daggers. In each deathly glare there was hatred and vengeance. No remorse. This was the house of monsters.
"Sorry, boys," Pulse muttered lightly, trying to keep from grabbing one by the neck and showing him some manners. "I don't take hitchhikers."
He ignored the passionate swearing being tossed out from behind him as he strode down the hall, whistling casually, glancing into a cell every now and then to examine its raging inhabitants. He passed by one two-person cell, where one of the convicts was speaking quietly to his inmate, who lay against the wall, his mouth full of blood and his eyes vacated. Lovely.
He was about to arrive at cell H when a peculiar prisoner caught his glance, sending it back with matching defiance. Pulse stopped in his tracks and turned his head slightly.
The girl didn't look much older than sixteen or so, and she did not look to him like a criminal of any kind. She had long, luscious black hair that hung over her right cheek, short and slim, with the iciest pools of blue eyes he'd ever seen. She hadn't been banging at her bars, either. Instead, she was sitting calmly in the corner of the dark cell, alone, her knees to her chest. Their gazes met, and for a moment Pulse felt his heart leap into his throat. There was something terrible about this girl. Something sinister. At first glance she may have looked like a princess, but Pulse new now that he was staring into the eyes of a figure of evil.
Pulse shook his head and quickly strode ahead, and the girl did not try to stop him.
Finally he came to a stop in front of cell H, manufactured for only one person, but the way Brad Volker was curled up in the corner, twenty could have fit in there.
The boy looked younger than he'd expected, but that might have been simply because the grief had gnawed away at him. Made him weaker. Caused all of his senses to implode upon themselves until he was a frail, defenseless mess of sorrow and resentment.
They'd all felt it before. Even Pulse, the bravest, most reliable operative Darkwing had to offer, had once been struck with that same sensation of sadness after he'd made his first kill. To the organized mind, taking the life of a human being brought with it an inimitable mournfulness, even to the sickest of killers. Except maybe Lucifer, but he had probably been an abominable nutcase from the womb.
Pulse kicked the bars quietly to get the boy's attention, but he would not look up. His eyes had turned a deathly grey, and they were looking absently out into the distance.
Pulse sighed. He'd break through to him sooner or later. Now, he tuned in to his COM again, immediately connecting with Phase.
"Pulse here. You in yet?"
"I think I've got the correct override codes," Phase explained. "Cell door should be opening in approximately ten seconds." There was a pause, and then he added, "Does he look promising?"
Pulse glanced over his shoulder at the boy, who was now shivering wildly, as if he thought Pulse was here to do something less-than-kind to him.
"Looks like a keeper to me."
Just then, the automatic cell doors divided from either side and swung open. As Pulse stepped forward to retrieve the objective he'd gone through plenty of trouble for, another rather alarming sound alerted him and made him freeze on the spot.
"Phase?" Pulse said slowly, trying to hide his rising rage. "I don't suppose you could have accidently overridden all of the cell doors?"
"Huh? Well, chances that I retrieved the incorrect codes are slim, but-- wait, why?"
Pulse gritted his teeth and whirled around as the wave of unleashed criminals flew toward him with all speed, shouting, bloodthirsty. Damn, sometimes that genius is an idiot, he thought.
"Pulse? What's going on?"
"Nothing," he replied darkly, bracing himself for the swarm of lunatic convicts that were nearly about to trample him into the ground. "Just getting to know the locals."