Built Different [Cyborg Superhero ProgFant]

It was easy to believe that the World Government had come woefully unprepared. They thought they could stop superheroes with half-rate mercenary groups and ill-thought out schemes. Certainly, our history digging around the local groups trying to get their tendrils into Goldarch didn't paint them as masterminds.

Perhaps this was simply another decoy. A distraction. Or a layered trap where we had only just begun.

Either way, none of that particularly mattered at present. With another burst of super-heated air, Roxy blew out the floor beneath us. This was the third one in a row without bothering to investigate through the maze of wards, waiting rooms, and storage closets.

The Natural Disasters had caught up with the half-burned group of plant people I had ditched and finished them off in short order. Belle was elated with the recovered revolvers left by the restrained Fading Storm member and had gotten the weapons to work with her own magic. There was some confusion over how to deal with the criminal, but I delegated it to them in full.

I had my hands full following the super down through the building, layer by layer. We were throwing caution to the wind, hoping to deal with these trials in as little time as possible. I longed for our bed.

"Clara was right." Roxy paused to stretch out her hands and arms. "The rest of the assholes are probably on floor two and lower."

[Set up for me if I had walked up to the front entrance.]

She shook her head. "Dumbasses probably saw you have the Meteor, and expected you to hightail it here to find Boss."

I imagined that they might have had more assets at hand than just manpower. It depended on how much time they had to set up. Didn't really matter right now. They had to be ready for us to drop in from a random ceiling.

"How are you holding up?"

[I'm more concerned about what happens after this. This isn't the only problem in the city.]

Roxy gave me a brief shrug. "We can't do everything, you know? Let the S-Ranks and others earn their keep."

Perhaps it had been selfish of me to dive into the obvious trap to find Boss. With Kingston's location unknown, and Chevalier somewhere waiting to pounce, this wasn't the best use of my all-or-nothing adrenaline binge. Consider me successfully baited.

[More fool me for taking things personally. Let's find something to destroy.]

Roxy raised a fist and then struck the floor. The brickwork shattered, dropping us downward once again. A large ward now filled with broken rock and swirling dust. I turned my head to see a surprised group of mercenaries. By their positioning, it looked as though they were set up expecting us to land on the other side of them.

As they turned to reorganize, the super grabbed hold of me by the arm. With a short step forward, she pitched me as if I were on ice. My metal fist burst through the torso of the first, and I fired a steel ball through the one behind. A molten rock struck the merc next to me in the head, right before Roxy landed among the carnage.

The rest was a quick procedure that left the ward in quite a mess. Although ranged weapons were our weakness, there was nothing they could do within the confines of the hospital. We were too quick. Immediately in our comfort zone before they could hit us with enough bullets to even slow us down.

Maybe it wasn't even that the Government had underestimated us. It could be the expectation that heroes didn't act the way that we did. The model League employee was placated. A dull tool that lived a comfortable and uncomplicated life. They had to fight and prove their worth, sure, but Goldarch's setup was designed to maintain the status quo.

Third parties sent in by the Gov weren't beholden to any of these rules. Didn't care about the balance. Had to live in the real world where they weren't so coddled. Most heroes in the city had never killed, aside from the occasional accident. With that in mind, a small army with light firearms could overwhelm most heroes - even some of the more experienced A-Ranks.

But we were not like most heroes. With the things we had done, it wouldn't be too out of line to consider us villains. Worse, even. Tearing our way through such large groups was a staple of our out-of-city exploits. Whether this was Kingston's overall plan for us or not was beside the point.

//Clara: Eastern staircase is blockaded. They want to filter you through to the western one.

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//Clara: Approaching the west interferes with my drone, however.
//Clara: Suspected electromagnetic interference.

Roxy tutted. "Do they think you're part robot?"

I shrugged and looked around the dead mercs for anything useful to plunder.

[EMP can partially affect me. More of a daze than a disable.]

//Clara: Correct, Gunquake.
//Clara: Your gun-arm functions via magic, an ancient artefact, and direct connections to your brain.
//Clara: Estimated slowdown from a sufficient level of EMP burst: 20%
//Clara: Something consistent might be worse.

Sounded survivable, either way. The drugs struggling to maintain my conscious form probably boosted my reactions by about the same amount, so it all worked out in the end. Assuming all things remained as they were. If they knew how I was currently functional, then hitting me with sedatives would probably work best.

"Should we go along with their plan to make us use that staircase?" Roxy scowled. "We haven't been playing by the rules up to this point."

I checked the map. Utilizing our shortcut had gotten us to the third floor. Two more above ground before we hit the basement. There was some merit in playing to expectations. Some sweetness in showing them their plan was woefully unprepared. Not that I cared about teaching them a lesson, even if they were deserving.

[I'll be going down the staircase.]

They were expecting me after all. I had to stick to my role. After discussing my plan with Roxy, I gathered up the fractured parts of my sanity and held them tightly. Took my feet over to the staircase and descended.

I felt the hum of the electrical field almost immediately. It was like walking through a wall of dense static. The air was thicker. My lens flickered, the map on the left running with lines before vanishing. Unlike my cybernetics, it was a more basic technology. The door to the second floor was barricaded and closed. I continued on, around the corner, to head to ground level.

Every step slowed my legs slightly more. It was an interesting feeling, like trying to slog through deep water. Despite my limbs becoming sluggish, my brain was aflame. Incensed. I took this personally. My current existence was a gift, and these intruders sought to ruin me and take that away.

There was nothing but burning ire in my eyes as I plodded slowly down the last couple of steps into the main lobby of the hospital. Perhaps the largest room I'd seen in the building so far. Most of the furniture had been removed. Light pooled in from the right, the large windows looking out to the city partially blocked by two mounted auto-cannons that were now facing my way.

Around fifty or so plant mercenaries sat behind metal barricades in rows. Unlike the group I had just melted through, these were all facing the correct direction. Right at me.

I stood in the open space where the stairwell door should be, somewhat amused that they hadn't opened fire already. Foolish, and I was willing to bet it was the overconfidence of the man standing in the middle of them that was holding them back.

Another important member of the Fading Storm. A man in his forties. Cigar in his mouth, light stubble, and a dusty cowboy hat. The grenade launcher in his hands wasn't a design I was familiar with, but it was the shit-eating grin on his face that most unsettled me.

That, and it felt like a near-impossible task to move my limbs through this oppressive air.

"What's the matter, big guy? Need some fresh batteries?" He growled at me, switching the cigar from one side of his mouth to the other.

[Just frozen in shock by your abject stupidity.]

"Eh." His smile sank into more of a snarl. "Mouthpiece still works, then. Unfortunate. I was hoping you'd come nice and quiet like."

[You seek to detain me?]

"You were a mercenary once, eh? Pay is better if you're alive. Dead is easier, but if Carmella couldn't put you down, then I wasn't about to waste my energy." He pulled the cigar from his mouth and tapped some ash away. "You didn't kill her, so I knew you'd be a little too soft. Let's just do this the easy way."

There were many instances in my recent life where I wished I had the capacity to smile. A mouth to move and express how I felt inside. The grin that would be on my face would be rather manic at present, but would probably clue this jerkoff in to the fact that not everything was going to go his way.

[Easy way? How do you plan to restrain me?]

"Got three guys with net launchers. A high-powered tazer.. Deployable leg traps." The merc took a long drag of his cigar and left it in his mouth. "Failing that, we'll just hit ya in the head with something hard."

[I can tell you're a professional.]

"Yeah. Enough to know that this has been enough chatter." He shot me a wink. "Not going to make a fuss, are you?"

[There's just one thing. Care to crack a window? It's getting remarkably hot in here.]

"Real cute," he began, but the rest of his sentence tapered off to nothing. His eyes went to the side as a bead of sweat ran down the side of his face.

He lowered his weapon and scowled over at the sunlight coming in from the side, as if it was because of some freak weather incident. I watched as his eyes went across the rest of the mercenaries, who showed no signs of discomfort due to the supposed heat.

But he couldn't deny it, for more lines of sweat ran down his face. The second to last place he sought answers was me. Now clearly irritated, as if I had personally tricked him into feeling warm with just my words. Or a spell, I supposed.

"Neat trick." He pulled his cowboy hat down and threw it to the floor. "Guess we'll be doing this the unconscious way. I tried my best to be pleasant."

One of the last mistakes he'd make, I was certain. There was some irony in his leniency being his downfall. Most villains like to posture and were driven by ego and arrogance. A built-in weakness for heroes to exploit. Neutral parties could be a mixed bag between pleasant efficiency and straightforward ruthlessness.

His desire for a few extra credits for sending me off to the Government alive was a deep-rooted flaw in his plan.

[Don't be so negative. I'd say… things are looking up for me.]

I laid it on so thick I wondered if the debilitating electrical field weighed on my vocabulary. It had the intended effect.

The merc's eyes went up to the ceiling as amber cracks singed the white paint like a match-wrought spiderweb.