Chapter 9: The Triple Threat

The gang continues their hunt for Mike and eventually catches up, unknowingly discovering more than they bargained for.

Eventually, we pulled into a public lot not far from the SUMC. Before any of us got out of the car, we patiently sat there and waited, watching as the hippie van we'd been tailing for the longest time pulled behind the building, before its two occupants crept around the side. I saw the man who held Mike hostage force his way into his pockets, before digging around for a spell, presumably for an ID to scan his way in.

"Okay, there they are," I said at last. "Time to see what they're up to."

"And while we're at it, why don't we take out that other guy too?" Xavier added.

With that, each of us took turns staying inside the car and changing into our armor while the other two remained outside. Once we were all done, a public bus stopped at just the right spot for us to lose sight of our targets.

"Move! That! Bus!" Tequila called out.

As if on cue, the bus left. The three of us didn't hesitate to sprint over towards the building our targets had entered, just barely able to slip in through the door before it locked itself again. However, by the time the three of us were inside, the two men we were after had vanished without a trace.

"Ah s**t, where'd they go?" Tequila looked around. "Oh hey, look."

Xavier and I followed her extended finger towards a nearby door. There was a sign on it that read 'Security Room'. Without wasting another moment, we turned the knob, discovering that it was already unlocked, and entered. As the only ones in the room, we immediately proceeded to stare at the numerous screens, trying to figure out what part of the building Mike and his captor had gone to.

"Wait, what the f**k? Why is there a security camera in a child delivery room?" I asked, focusing on one of the cameras in the top row. "Geez, and I thought Donald Trump memorizing the appearance of Bill Gates' daughter was creepy, but this?"

"Yeah, aren't these moments supposed to be all sacred, and-? Ooh God! Yeesh, that looks traumatizing!" Tequila grimaced, starting to look away. "Yeah, nope! Now I officially do not regret getting my tubes tied!"

"And fun fact: all that comes after roughly thirty hours of labor," Xavier chimed in, before suddenly pointing towards another screen. "Oh, look over there!"

Without a word, I pressed a button to zoom that camera in.

"It appears that Mike's getting his stitches removed in... the basement?" I raised a suspicious eyebrow.

"And according to the schematics of this place, there should be an elevator not far from that room." Xavier checked his phone. "...and the elevator on this floor is at the opposite side of the building. If we want some answers, then I think we'd best make haste."

"Say no more," I replied.

---

As we approached the chamber that Mike's gurney was in, we were able to spot two doctors leaving through an entrance on the opposite side of the room. As soon as their door closed, we immediately hustled in, but not before I heard some faint smacks and slashing sounds, quickly followed by equally faint screams.

"Did you guys hear that?" I asked.

"Hear what?" Tequila and Xavier asked in unison.

"I could've sworn I heard some sounds not far outside this room. Like someone was getting hurt or something," I explained.

"Well this is a basement. Places like this tend to be pretty echoey," Xavier replied, scanning the gritty room around us, complete with copper walls and a sparse variety of pipes here and there.

"If you say so," I replied, before I heard a few drowsy grunts coming from a corner of the room.

Turned out that Mike was coming to, albeit slowly, no thanks to the IV by his bed having been removed by the time we showed up. The stitches in his left ear had been removed, and all that was left was the lump with a small scar on top. Slowly but surely, he managed to sit up, struggling so hard to move his arms that he accidentally toppled off the bed, revealing his hands to be cuffed behind his back.

"Who did this to you?" I asked, marching up to him.

"Go burn in hell, and maybe rot down there too," Mike replied coldly.

"Wrong answer." I switched my boots to cleat mode and kicked him hard in the stomach, knocking him onto his back, before stomping on his chest a couple of times.

I then squinted my eyes, using X-ray vision to examine his body.

"Hmm, by my count, you still have four ribs left intact," I threatened. "You want me to break the rest, or will you talk?"

"Break 'em. S-See what I care!" Mike continued to resist.

I scanned him again, revealing something else of note.

"Oh, and it seems you have a pacemaker as well." I yanked him up by the neck and switched the glove on that hand to heat mode, before switching my other glove to electric mode and drawing back a fist. "What say I supercharge that for you? Have you ever been curious as to how five-hundred beats per millisecond feels?"

"You wouldn't!" Mike replied, only to scream as I kneed the last of his ribs. "Alright, alright! For years I've been trying to get revenge on Mark Simmons, but after my most recent defeat at his hands, I decided I'd take a different approach and take revenge on someone close to him, that being you three."

"What? But why-?" Tequila asked.

"Because when Gonzalez was elected president, that was the one time I managed to notch a victory over Mark, and you guys ruined it for me!" Mike continued. "I was actually the largest donor to Gonzalez' campaign, and I even gave him the money needed to rig the system. It was an idea I had when I discovered that Mark was running for president."

"You still didn't answer my question," I continued.

"Not long after I got back to America, I stopped by the nearest prison, and I found this young inmate who also wanted revenge on you folks," Mike continued. "I thought we'd make a good team, but he took over the operation and used my riches to provide the bounty that those assassins are fighting over. And he controlled me with that same device Gonzalez used, using me as his patsy."

"Okay, and what's his name?" Xavier asked.

"His name is- Aaaaaggghhh!" Mike abruptly screamed, shaking violently as though he was being shocked.

"Well now, I think you've said more than enough, eh?" that same mysterious Tejano voice rang out.

The three of us looked back to see a man about as old as my friends and I, strutting into the very door we'd entered through. As he stepped out of the shadows and into the dim light, I could make out pale tan skin and a jet-black fro-hawk, alongside a pair of reflective aviator sunglasses. A massive lichtenburg scar covered the left side of his face, presumably from having gotten electrocuted there. He was clad in a snakeskin overcoat, worn over a baggy silk two-piece outfit with an ornate design, much like the ones worn by R&B acts in the 1990s. On his hands were vinyl gloves with at least three platinum rings on each finger, each ring crowned with a different type of jewel. Stalking over to us with his hands clasped loosely together, the guy put on a brash smirk and chuckled a bit.

"Why if it ain't my old pals from the 'Looks Don't Matter' movement," he said.

As he spoke, I briefly thought back seven years into the past, replaying vivid recollections of this same man engaged in a heated fist-fight against my teammates and I, and that despicable, loathsome grin on his face as he shot Second dead with an assault rifle.

"Ugh, you again?" Tequila rolled her eyes and scowled. "You just don't know when to get out of my hair, do you?"

"How about we skip the pleasantries, Garbanzo?" I dropped Mike to the floor and stepped slightly ahead of my team. "I'm gonna make sure you receive every single ounce of pain you deserve for what you did to my best friend!"

"Sheesh, it's been seven years and you're still not over his passing? Talk about pathetic," Garbanzo taunted as I tightly balled my fists. "Wouldn't surprise me if you're still crying yourself to sleep every damn night over the death of your pathetic, whiny harlot of a mother!"

"Y-You'd better watch it!" I warned.

"Plus, what did I tell you about calling me-?" he continued, only to be caught off guard as I fired my handgun at him.

He recoiled as the shot was fired, only to examine himself as he discovered he wasn't hurt. This gave me the opportunity to uppercut him in the jaw and spin-kick him in the stomach, slamming him into the nearest wall. I ran up and grabbed his neck, before pointing my gun right at his heart.

"Call off your goons, or I'll shoot! And it won't be a blank this time!" I warned again.

"Not a goddamn chance!" Garbanzo spat in a voice oozing with nonchalance. "You knew what you signed up for when you barged into my father's office and sent him to the fanciest White House in the sky! If there's one thing you ought to know, it's that if you mess with my dad, you're messin' with me!"

I nudged his ribs with my gun again.

"I won't ask again," I threatened, readying my trigger finger.

It was then that Garbanzo spat again, but this time literally. I recoiled as I wiped my face off, giving him enough time to punch me away, sending me tumbling along the floor for a bit.

"So now that that's out of the way, I've got business to attend to! Hasta la vista, baby!" he jeered as he hurried out of the same door that the doctors had left through.

"Quick, guys! After him!" I told my friends.

However, right after Garbanzo slipped through the door, I was suddenly knocked back by a pair of legs that had been hidden just above the outside of the doorway as I tried to follow him. Backflipping into the room was a slim, lanky Hispanic man in tight cowboy attire, including a brown stetson hat. He dropped into a primal pose on the ground, hissing as he lashed his tongue at us.

"Diamondback," Xavier commented.

Without a word, Diamondback lunged at each of us, wrapping his gangly, snake-like body tightly around as as he slithered at rapid speed, before abruptly kicking us and leaping to his next target and repeating the process over and over again. After he briefly leapt towards the wall and kicked off of it, I was unprepared as he came after me with a midair roundhouse kick. The kick itself missed me, but the spurs on his boots didn't, resulting in a small slice mark across my left cheek.

I immediately yelped in agony, before the feeling of exhaustion quickly washed over me as I dropped to my knees. Slowly, I brought a finger across my cut, glancing at the fresh blood on my gloved finger.

"Wh-What did you do to me?!" I asked in a rapidly evaporating voice.

"You may think of it as... the grand finale to your short-lived life," Diamondback taunted in a Salvadoran accent, standing up straight for once.

"Jasper!" Tequila called out in alarm as Diamondback gradually moved closer to her.