Chapter 89 SRC’s Goons

The smell of baked dough and cheese filled the air, a quiet promise of normalcy. The pizza arrived steaming, the box heavy when the man behind the counter slid it across. “That would be five hundred marks.”

Before I could reach into my pocket, John’s hand was already out. He handed over a thousand-mark bill. “Keep the change. You can have the rest of the day.”

The man blinked, flustered. “I’m sorry, sir, but—”

John’s gaze bore through him with a promise of violence like a hammer. His shoulders stiffened, his lips faltered into silence, and he shrank into himself like a scolded child. Whatever words he had died in his throat. He scrambled to grab a few of his belongings and disappeared through the back door without another word.

Onyx smirked, folding her arms as she leaned into me. “Interesting technique. I could feel it. Focused anger, precise, like a scalpel. He made the man wilt with just his empathy.”

Silver, wide-eyed, murmured softly, “I didn’t know you could even do that with empathy…”

John turned that same piercing stare on me. The weight of it pressed against my chest, threading into the cracks of my mind, demanding submission. But I knew how to parry. I layered intangibility over my empathy, bending the current of his intent around me like water over stone. His will slid off me, unable to stick.

I picked up the pizza box and set it on the table. “You’re not getting any younger, John. I suggest you be smarter about this.”

His jaw tightened. “You’re coming with me. I just want to help you. Spend your time in the Box, and I’ll petition for privileges. With your powers, you could do more good on the side of heroes. If that doesn’t suit you, then there’s always the SRC. Either way, you’d have structure, purpose.”

The Box. I’d read about it. Heard whispers. The prison where they sent people like me, those too dangerous for chains or cells. Nations shipped their monsters there, all under heavy surveillance, locked behind walls that bent reality itself. Few ever left, unless it was in a body bag.

I slid open the lid, steam rising in the air, and pulled out a slice. The crust crunched under my teeth, the melted cheese stretching in thin threads. I chewed slowly, deliberately, meeting his gaze.

“When you say time…” I said, licking grease from my fingers. “How long?”

“With the murders you committed, we’re looking at life, maybe a death sentence. But trust me, and we can work it out. Villains get rebranded. The Council hates wasting personnel. With your potency, you’ve a shot at favorable treatment.”

I chewed twice to stall, letting the empyrean hum of his words slide under my skin. He sounded sure. Empaths sounded sure. Empaths could lie to other empaths. I didn’t believe him, not fully.

“Don’t I get leeway?” I asked around a mouthful. “I killed Royal, the Captain, Crow… those aren’t small things. Isn’t that worth something?”

John’s face went tight. “The Council doesn’t like that kind of destabilization. You broke the status quo. Mundanes pulled. Gangs bled. Opportunists moved. They won’t reward chaos.” He didn’t finish; the rest filled with implication. He wasn’t lying. Maybe he couldn’t be, or maybe he could make me feel he wasn’t. Either way, his words landed cold in my spine.

I finished the last slice. Box empty. Grease on my fingers. Onyx, eager and petulant, whispered, “What’s the point? You gonna turn yourself in?”

I tossed a look at her and Silver and said, “No.” I was buying time to eat. That was all.

In a blur, I fed the pizza box with my intangibility, my powers humming as I hurled the ethereal grease-bomb straight at his throat, aiming to crush his windpipe before he could blink. But he was already moving, foreseeing my desire for violence. He bounced up from his seat with impossible grace, sticking to the ceiling like gravity was his bitch, standing there upside down, his face calm and inverted as he looked down at me.

"Predictable," said John, voice echoing from above. "But we could still talk this out."

He pointed an index finger at me like a judge calling for a verdict.

Onyx hissed, “I have a bad feeling about this.”

I rolled backward just as a gunshot cracked the air. The seat I’d been in burst apart, a hot nick grazing my ear.

Silver snapped, “Telekinesis!”

I phased into the floor and dove left, reappearing a few steps away. Invisible bullets tore the furniture apart in a stuttering hail, splinters flying like shrapnel.

John dropped from the ceiling and landed in front of me, eyes sharpened to murder. “I’ve regretted not killing you then,” he said, voice iron. “I thought I was doing the right thing. I knew you were dangerous, but I let time soften me. Should’ve trusted my instincts. Should’ve trusted what I saw in your rage.”

He stepped closer. “Now I see you again. You’ve mellowed. I thought I could help you. But clearly, I can’t. I won’t make the same mistake.”

He raised both hands, fingers like gun barrels. Telekinetic bullets spat from every fingertip. I sprinted right and phased through the wall.

Onyx barked, “How’s his telekinesis hurting you? You’re past the level where force and gravity matter—”

Silver cut in, “Not really. It takes him a lot of focus, and the last time he fought with something like this was against that Pride Telekinetic… This John probably has higher ratings.”

Behind me, the wall shredded apart as John walked through it as if it were paper. A cold prick of hostility spiked the back of my neck as my empathy screamed, and I dove again. A bullet tore a neat hole where my head had been.

Onyx shouted, “That bullet’s got nullifier properties, Nick. Run!”

I aimed for Silverside and phased down through the ground, thinking of phasing back to the motel. Mid-phase, a cluster of needles stabbed into my mind, cold and burning, trying to melt my brain.

“Aaagh!”

I snapped back into reality a few meters away, gasping. I threw my empathic defenses up like walls to blunt the psychic pressure. My back hit the side of a parked car as another shot cracked past my skull.

“You’re surrounded,” called John, voice low and sure. “Surrender.”

I regretted the pizza all at once, specifically at the heat in my gut that had nothing to do with hunger. But indigestion was a courtesy compared to a telekinetic bullet through my skull.

John raised a hand, all five fingers leveled at me. His empathic signature folded with something cold and clinical, a homing lattice that traced intent and found it. It explained why his shots hit even when I phased. He hadn’t been firing blind; he was seeing the pull in my existence as my emotions flared.

“Interesting,” commented Onyx. “Bastard got an aimbot…”

Silver added. “You can do this, Nick… We believe in you…”

I shoved a breath down into my chest and rewired my body. Enhancer ratings cranked my heartbeat into a drum, and I let my empathy crawl inward like poison-turned-medicine. It was Onyx’s trick of using empathic nudges to spike hormones, to make strength bloom where it hadn’t been before. Pain dulled to an edge. Focus sharpened like glass.

I ran. Not a graceful run, but a savage one, every tendon and joint singing as I rushed John. A bullet tore through me, a hot, hollow punch of wind… and for a second the world stuttered. However, the truth was, I’ve never been shot or rushed at John in such a suicidal manner. It all had been a lie.

In reality, John flinched, his head tilting as if the motion had been unexpected. He’d seen the intent, then rechecked the math. That was my window.

My hand closed on the car door behind me. I phased it, not fully gone, not solid. Intangibility as a blade: you could shove it through meat and bone and still have it cut. I whipped the door like a thrown slab and hurled the thing with all my might.

Telekinetic bullets shredded it into a spray of nothing before it reached John. It brought me time as I ripped open the passenger side, fingers finding ignition wires by muscle memory. Another sniper barked behind me; the concrete hiccupped where the bullet struck. I hotwired the bastard like my life depended on it, because it was.

The engine caught with a curse and a roar. I slammed my boot down, felt the transmission bite, and pushed the car into the street. John’s fire chased me, invisible teeth that chewed the air where my head had been. Telekinetic shards hit the hood, telescoping into the engine bay with sparks like rotten stars. I twisted the wheel hard, gravel spitting into my face, and the car shuddered as bullets and Telekinetic bullets met metal.

Onyx’s voice was a blade of exhilaration in my skull. “Drive, you idiot. Drive like the world’s on your heels.”

Silver’s was tight with fear. “Get to the bike. Don’t stop.”

I left John in the dust as I swerved hard on the corner, tires screeching. Sniper fire cracked against the asphalt behind me, relentless. Through my empathy, I felt eight hostile presences hunting me. I had already confirmed three from John with his murderous intent, the telepath still clawing at my skull, and the distant sniper who had shitty accuracy because fuck him. The other five hid well, but their outlines pressed against the edges of my senses like knives waiting for the right angle.

The fourth showed himself soon enough. A hulking brute with gray skin barreled into my path, too fast for his size, a wall of muscle and intent charging straight at me. I slammed the accelerator, phasing myself and the vehicle in one desperate move. We ghosted through each other in a blur of metal and flesh, and I released the phasing just as the car re-solidified around him, just as I slipped beneath and reappeared a short distance away

Most capes would’ve been ripped apart with their head split from their body and organs scattered across steel. But not this bastard. The brute roared and ripped the car apart piece by piece, shrugging off what should have been his death sentence like it was nothing more than cheap paper. My empathy caught his lack of fear and his cold efficiency. He knew what he was doing.

I bailed out, running at the wall of someone’s house. A family of four was starting breakfast. Faces turned pale as I barged through. Someone screamed. A child sat at the table, dealing out cards in a lonely game of solitaire. He looked at me with wide, confused eyes. I plucked the cards from his tiny hands without a word.

“Hey, that’s mine!” he cried, but his voice barely registered.

I moved past them like they weren’t even there, stomping up the stairs, empathy stretched taut as a wire. At the window, I peeked out. The gray brute stood where the car had crumpled, muttering into his earpiece. His stance wasn’t defensive; he was waiting for orders. I phased through the opposite wall and dropped into another house, boots hitting hardwood with a thud. Three men stirred in a tangle of sheets, naked and hungover. They blinked at me, confusion turning into curses.

Before they could move, the door creaked open.

A figure stepped inside, a woman in a crisp gray blazer, her face hidden beneath a paper bag with two neat eyeholes cut out. “Hello, Eclipse,” she said, voice smooth, almost playful. “I believe you owe me an apology.”