Raid the Police Station
After Kid G dug into the earth and vanished, Valkyrie's heart hammered with dread.
Is this really okay? Was this the only way? Sh-should I call them back right now and say we're going after him again? Once the fog clears the seniors will interrogate me—what am I supposed to say? Th-this is basically treason against the Union and the government… Wh-what do I do now? If the evidence that bastard Kid G promised turns out to be nothing… what am I supposed to do then? Can I even go back to the way things were?
Her first real act of rebellion had been anything but minor. Anxiety, impatience, doubt, and pure confusion tangled together until Valkyrie was sliding into a full mental freefall. Raised from childhood on relentless government indoctrination and ideological training she had always accepted as absolute truth, she was only now feeling the delayed terror of the backlash her defiance might bring.
She had never once stepped off the rails laid out for her. The first time she tried to derail, fear had her trembling—and then the fog Eve's power had created finally began to thin.
"The fog…!"
With visibility restored, Jumper and Iron Fist scrambled to regain control of the situation and locate Kid G.
"Dammit, finally clearing! Comms back up?"
"Hey, Han Juyeon. Operator, you reading me? …Shit, still dead."
"Where the hell is that Kid G… Wait—over there. Valkyrie and the Union Leader's daughter?"
The two heroes headed straight for Valkyrie and Kim Sejin. Barely restraining their fury, they spoke in voices sharp enough to cut.
"Valkyrie. Union Leader's daughter. What the hell do you think you're doing? Sabotaging your own side? Do you even understand what you're pulling?"
"I-I'm sorry, seniors…"
"Why pull a stunt this ridiculous? Fine, the Union Leader's daughter is one thing—but you, Valkyrie? What were you thinking? Have you lost your mind? What's the reason for this?!"
"Excuse me, 'one thing'? What's that supposed to mean?!"
"…"
Kim Sejin bristled, but Valkyrie stayed silent.
"Clamming up won't fix this. Once the op's over, both of you are heading to HQ for interrogation and disciplinary action. Especially you, Union Leader's daughter. You've already got a prior. The Union won't just sweep this under the rug."
"Urgh…"
"I-I'm sorry… I just… I really wanted to catch Kid G with my own hands… but with the kill order I couldn't join the operation…"
Valkyrie answered in a voice that barely made it out of her throat. Having no idea it was pure cover, Jumper and Iron Fist exchanged a glance and heaved sighs deep enough to collapse the ground.
"Ha… We knew the media painted you two as rivals, but getting that deep into it? Kid's temper or not…"
"I don't even know what to say… Anyway. Fine. Where did Kid G go? Did either of you see?"
"I-I'm sorry. We lost him… Didn't see which way…"
Neither hero imagined for a second that this Valkyrie would lie. They clicked their tongues and decided to resume the operation immediately.
"Both of you wait somewhere safe. After the op ends, you're coming with us to HQ."
"Yes…"
"Tch. Of all the days… Iron Fist, we split up and search. I'll check outside. You take the station interior just in case."
Iron Fist nodded and strode into the police station. Jumper fitted a scope and leapt for a nearby high-rise.
Alone again, Valkyrie fretted and gnawed her nails. The lingering doubt in her chest, the stubborn thread of belief that the government and the police here couldn't possibly be that rotten, and the childish hope that Kid G would still deliver a clear answer—everything mixed together. She no longer even knew whether she wanted him to succeed or fail.
After putting a little distance between myself, Valkyrie, and Kim Sejin, I cracked open the station floor from below and started snatching the ankles of the police officers on high alert inside, burying them into the ground and locking them in place.
"Urgh! Hands from under—!"
"G-get on the desks! No—second floor!"
"Open fire!"
Tat-tat-tat-tang—
Every time I popped up the stationed officers blasted away like it was a whack-a-mole game, but none of the rounds hit, and even if they had I was an ability user—a few bullets weren't going to put me down. My base combat power might have been pathetic next to other ability users, but I was still one of them.
"Looks like the chief parked his subordinates as human shields and hid somewhere nice and safe, huh? Typical of the higher-ups."
"Khh, you bastard…! Call the heroes outside! Tell them Kid G's inside the station!"
"Yes, sir! Right away—huh?! Wh-why won't the door open…?"
"No use. That 'door' isn't theirs anymore. You all know what my power is by now, right? Doors open—but they also close."
The station's front entrance was still right there, yet no matter how hard the officers pushed or pulled the handle, the door might as well have turned into solid wall. My power had already relocated the door somewhere else and sealed the original shut.
I left only the greenest-looking female officer standing and dropped the rest one by one with a stun gun. Watching her seniors foam at the mouth and collapse from the shocks, the woman clearly thought they were dead. She shook violently and burst into terrified tears.
"Hiiiik… p-please spare me…"
"That depends on your answer. I'll ask once—answer carefully. Where's the chief?"
"Th-the, the chief is… B2, the records room…"
"Good."
Zzzt-crack—!
"Kyaaaaah!"
I stunned the last officer unconscious and headed for B2. Just as I opened the floor to slip underground, Iron Fist noticed the doors wouldn't budge and smashed through a station wall with his fist—but I was already a step ahead.
"Eve, how many people on B2?"
- Interference is too strong. Can't get a clean read that deep. Master will have to handle it yourself.
"Tch."
The police had prepared thoroughly enough that even Eve's abilities struggled below B2. I needed to finish before both heroes got inside.
I resurfaced into the corridor and sprinted toward B2 with the blaring internal sirens as my soundtrack.
RECORDS ROOM
Spotting the sign on one of the corridor doors, I casually unlocked it and stepped inside. The stench of oil hit me the moment I crossed the wall. A middle-aged man was frantically dousing the room—already stacked floor-to-ceiling with file folders—in more oil.
"Huff… huff… Dammit, two A-class heroes and they still can't catch him… Better just burn this place—"
Bang—!
"Guhk!"
I put a round through his thigh. Caught completely off-guard, the man crumpled to the floor, blood pouring from his leg.
"Aigoo~ Chief, sir, so busy with important work—terribly rude of me to interrupt. But burning this place down would be a real problem for me."
"Khh… K-Kid G!"
"Ugh, the oil reek. Light a match and the whole archive goes up. What if some of your subordinates can't get out?"
"Fuck… Didn't you brag about never hurting people?! Ugh… shooting first thing—"
"Ah, that still holds. I don't want to hurt people, and I definitely don't want to kill anyone."
"You call this—"
I walked over, planted a boot on his lower back to pin him, and grinned.
"But you're not a person."
"!!!"
I touched the floor under his arms and legs, opened it, stuffed his limbs into the tiny doors, and sealed the ground again.
"Urgh…! Wh-what are you—!"
Pinned face-down with all four limbs buried, the chief thrashed with everything he had, but ordinary human strength wasn't getting him free.
"Strain too hard trying to yank free and you'll tear your own limbs off. I was thoughtful enough to leave circulation intact—don't make me regret the courtesy."
I dug through his pockets and pulled out his phone.
"One secured… Eve."
- Crackle… …ster… in?
Reception was garbage.
"Can't hear you. I'm on B2 right now. Get down here immediately and blanket the area in fog."
A few seconds later—
Shwoooom… KRAAANG—!
From high above, Eve plummeted on a diagonal. A tremendous crash roared overhead as she smashed through the B1 floor and landed on B2 beside me.
"I've arrived, Master."
"Good. Fog, please."
"So many demands. What a troublesome Master."
"…Save the venom for later and hurry up."
Milky fog billowed from Eve's hands, flooding B1 and B2. No pursuers appeared—she'd shaken Jumper off outside cleanly enough.
"Eve, scan every file in here related to corruption cases involving pro-government corporations and media executives. Remember the keywords I gave you? Also secure every scrap of investigation material tied to Club Freezing Moon. And this phone—restore every call log, text, messenger history, especially the Telekilo chats. Can you do it?"
"How bothersome. All of it is possible, but the list is excessive. I will require a minimum of fifty Cookies & Cream Blendeds."
"Fine, just do it."
Hearing the orders, the chief realized exactly what I was after. Still buried to the shoulders, his face went corpse-white.
"Y-you… you can't be—! N-no! Not that! If that gets out—"
"A little public humiliation won't be the end of it, will it? You might even find yourself committing an unexpected and mysterious suicide."
"No, no! P-please, just this once! No—please, I beg you!"
"Whether you get a pass isn't up to me. The world will decide once this spreads. Eve, knock him out."
"Not kill him?"
"No. Especially not this one."
"From start to finish, such a bothersome Master."
Thud—!
"Kh…"
Eve stepped up to the prone, restrained chief and cracked him across the cervical spine. He went limp on the spot.
"Time to secure and restore everything?"
"About ten minutes. I need to concentrate, so if you cannot help, at least do not interfere."
"Y-yeah…"
Red laser light flared from Eve's eyes as she began scanning every oil-soaked investigation file in the room.
Click— click—
"?!"
Footsteps. Eve and I both spun around. Even through the thick fog, whoever owned those steps was walking straight toward us.
"Eve, combat rea—"
Whoosh—!
Before I could finish the order, someone rocketed out of the fog at blistering speed, closed the gap in a blink, and slammed both of my arms against the wall.
"?!"
The attacker forced my arms overhead, pinning both wrists with one hand so I couldn't open any doors, and pressed the other hand over my heart. Even with her power deliberately throttled, she had moved so fast Eve never reacted. I knew who she was the instant she locked me down.
Blonde hair coiled into a neat military bun. The woman who should have looked beautiful and gentle now stared at me with a face colder and more merciless than anyone else's.
"I'd been personally curious who you really were… and it turns out this isn't our first meeting. You visited Myeongdong last time, didn't you?"
She was simply too strong for the Recognition Deterrent Chip to do more than tickle her. Having already seen my unmasked face, she recognized me instantly even behind the mask.
"I never imagined you were Kid G. That means I saved a villain without even realizing it."
Someone who absolutely should not have been here—one of the three pillars of the Korean Hero Union, S-class hero Nightingale—had me completely pinned.