Lilac Ward (2)

The rusted door creaked open as Eve pushed it with a trembling hand, her pink hair quivering. She had finally escaped the lab where the stench of blood and piss still clung to the air from the researchers Ban had smashed headfirst into a cabinet, turning their skulls into meat paste.

"F-follow me. If we skirt around the intersection up ahead, the waste disposal passage is right there."

Eve scurried down the corridor on quick, nervous steps, eyes darting everywhere. Every stride made her torn clothes flutter, her massive breasts jiggling wildly beneath the white lab coat. Whoa, shit.

Ban shoved his hands into his pockets, a cigarette dangling from his lips, and followed at a lazy stroll.

"Okay. Nav performance is solid, nice! Hey, client. You catching this? I grabbed a navigator and we're taking the VIP route straight there."

Ban tapped ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠his earpiece, but only garbage static answered.

"Hey. Sniper. Speak clearly. I can't hear shit."

The bunker's absurdly thick outer walls and lead shielding were finally showing their true power. The deeper they descended, the more the signal got physically choked off.

The transmission died completely in a mechanical screech that nearly burst his eardrums. Ban yanked the earpiece out with a curse and stuffed it in his pocket.

"Ah, fuck. This is exactly why I hate basements."

"Huh? What did you just..."

Eve spun around in a startled flinch, eyes wide. She was so jumpy she looked like a baby rabbit.

Ban scratched his head in irritation, then flashed his usual sly grin.

"Nothing at all, Miss Navigator~ So how much farther? This place is safe, right? I'm getting kinda nervous, you know?"

This guy definitely had multiple personalities. His mood swings were insane.

"Eek...! I-I know! We're almost there!"

Eve pointed frantically at an old iron door crammed into an inconspicuous corner beside the emergency stairs.

Eve swiped her keycard. The door groaned open with a heavy scrape. Pitch-black darkness greeted them, along with a nauseating wave of rotten blood and formalin.

"If we drop down this vertical shaft, we'll land in the fourth basement incinerator. But… how do we get down?"

Eve stared into the black hole. Ban glanced down, then smirked. Ah. That smile. Something about it felt really fucking ominous.

"Okay. Hold on tight. Unless you want to bite your tongue off."

"Huh? Hold on ti—"

Before she could finish, Ban's thick forearm hooked her waist in a rough yank. He scooped her up like she weighed nothing and hurled both of them into the pitch-black shaft without a shred of hesitation.

"Kyaaaaaaaaaah!!"

The stomach-dropping freefall made it feel like her guts were about to shoot out of her mouth. Eve screamed at the top of her lungs and clung to Ban's neck on pure instinct. Her enormous breasts smashed mercilessly against his chest. Lucky bastard.

In the darkness, the sealed iron doors of each floor whipped past in a blur. One. Two.

Right before their speed became uncontrollable—

BAM—!!

Ban twisted midair and slammed his combat boot into the concrete wall. The insane power in his legs carved a crater into the surface and changed their trajectory. Bounced to the opposite wall, he seized a thick protruding pipe with his free hand in a death grip.

SCREEEEEEECH—!!!

The rusted pipe couldn't handle the weight and momentum. It tore completely out of its wall mounts. Sparks exploded as metal scraped metal. That brief, heavy resistance killed most of their lethal speed.

Using the ripped pipe as a stepping stone, Ban kicked off the wall once more and finally crashed down onto the trash heap in the B4 incinerator.

THUD—!!

He absorbed the rest of the impact with perfect knee spring and rose lightly to his feet.

"Ah, shit. Scraped my palms raw."

"Cough! Hack— ugh… haa…"

Eve had collapsed onto the floor, coughing violently. She patted herself down with shaking hands. They had fallen from that insane height and not one bone was broken.

"How about it, Miss Navigator? I'd call that express delivery with no toll fee. Pretty fast, right? Alright, next stop. This place smells like absolute shit. Let's move."

Ban wiped his bloody palms on his pants and jerked his chin for her to lead again. Eve snapped back to reality, forced strength into her trembling legs, and stood.

The terror of nearly dying was nothing compared to the hundreds of times worse fear of being abandoned in this sewer pit because she fell out of that crazy problem-solver's favor.

"T-this way. Once we clear the incinerator corridor, the control zone checkpoint is right there."

Eve picked her way carefully across blood-spattered tiles.

"But Miss Navigator, I've been wondering. Isn't the control zone heavily guarded? Sounds like a pain in the ass to break through."

"That's the problem! It's not normal guards—it's the Cleaners."

"Cleaners? What, aunties with brooms wiping up blood?"

"Stop joking! They're the useful failures from the biological experiments. The ones that mutated. They get brainwashed with drugs and turned into combat weapons. They don't feel pain and won't die from a couple bullets. To get past them..."

Eve was still trembling through her briefing when—

Thud. Thud. Thud.

From around the corner came the sound of something massive scraping across the floor, accompanied by ugly, ragged breathing.

"Eek...!"

Eve panicked and yanked Ban behind the wall. Her breasts squished firmly against his hard forearm. Ban peeked around the corner with an irritated scowl.

In front of the checkpoint where red emergency lights flickered, three hulking monsters over two meters tall stood guard. Just like Eve said. Their veins bulged grotesquely like they were about to burst. Their eyes were completely glazed from the drugs. One carried a vicious chainsaw, another a modified heavy machine gun.

"Hey, Number Two. You dump all the meat from Sector Three into the incinerator? You see that new bitch yet?"

The bald leader in the middle drooled black saliva as he spoke in a gravelly voice.

"Yeah, Boss. But we gotta stay stuck here, don't we?"

Number Two smirked while stroking his gun.

"Those professor fucks are drooling all over themselves. Can't wait to crack her skull open. Hehe. They're gonna slice her up without anesthesia anyway. Her screams are gonna be fucking amazing."

Number Three with the chainsaw joined in, and all three started cackling like lunatics. Their disgusting conversation echoed clearly down the hall.

"...Sigh."

Ban, still leaning against the wall and chewing on his cigarette, let out a long breath. Sense of justice? Fuck that. A guy who'd survived this long in this world didn't have any of that crap left.

But hearing those animal bastards talk, it was obvious the situation had gone to complete shit. Cutting her open without anesthesia? If they were saying stuff like that, it was serious.

Besides, they were in a corner of the B4 incinerator where all outside signals were dead. Even if gunshots rang out and alarms blared, it would take the upstairs heavy response team at least ten minutes to breach the shutters and get down here.

And the client they were hired to rescue was about to be turned into ground meat. Was he really supposed to crouch here playing hide-and-seek?

Fuck that. Sneaking mission terminated.

Ban spat his cigarette onto the floor and crushed it under his boot.

Click—!!

He drew the massive twelve-shot custom revolver—thick as a grown man's forearm—in one hand and his favorite combat knife in the other. These were the real toys of a problem solver. The cheap researchers earlier hadn't been worth pulling them out for.

"Hey. Miss Navigator."

Ban's voice had gone ice-cold.

"Y-yes?!"

"Cover your ears. It's no-brakes firepower from here on out."

Before Eve could stop him, Ban stepped around the corner with both weapons dangling at his sides and walked straight into the middle of the checkpoint.

"Hey, you junkie fucks. Ugh. You lot are goddamn ugly."

At Ban's blunt entrance, all three Cleaners snapped their heads toward him.

"I don't give a shit what you animals were doing, but that girl happens to be our client's merchandise. So stop blocking the road and put your heads down quietly, yeah?"

"What the fuck is ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠this bug bastard?! Where the hell did you crawl in from?"

The bald boss glared with bloodshot eyes. Number Two lifted his heavy machine gun and squeezed the trigger.

BANG—!!! CRACK!!!

The cannon-like gunshot tore through the air. Number Two's shoulder and collarbone exploded in a shower of gore.

"KRAAAAAAGH!!"

The oversized bullet from Ban's revolver shredded the drug-enhanced muscle like paper. Ban flowed with the recoil and leaped forward.

"Wasting bullets on your tankiness is bullshit. Ammo's expensive, you know?"

In the blink of an eye he was behind the boss. The blade weighted with his full body weight sliced clean through the thick hamstring behind the bald man's knee.

Even monsters that couldn't feel pain would collapse if you took out their structural support. The giant bald Cleaner dropped to his knees with a heavy thud.

Ban pressed the revolver muzzle against the back of his skull without mercy.

"Sweet dreams, you animal fuck."

BANG—!!!

The armor-piercing round at point-blank range punched through the bald man's skull and shattered the concrete beneath. Brains and black blood fountained out.

"YOU CRAZY BASTAAAAARD!!"

The last one roared and revved his chainsaw. The vicious spinning teeth screamed toward Ban's waist.

Ban didn't dodge. Instead he raised his blood-dripping knife at an angle and met the blade head-on.

SCREEEEEEECH—!!! CLANG!!

Steel ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠screamed against steel, throwing off a fountain of sparks. He had stopped a spinning chainsaw with a combat knife.

What kind of insane—

Without hesitation, Ban swung the revolver in his other hand and smashed it full-force into the bastard's jaw.

CRACK—!!

The jawbone shattered. The monster's head snapped back. Ban planted a brutal kick into his solar plexus, knocked him flat, then mounted his chest and shoved the muzzle against his heart.

BANG! BANG! BANG!!

Two shots into the one beneath him, the third into the head of the already-fallen Number ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Two.

Situation terminated.

What the hell is this guy? Eve thought.

To her—someone whose head was packed with Red Cross biological experiment data—this man looked like a finished product of human enhancement.

"Ugh~ These bastards already look like shit, but why is their blood so fucking black? Just like Walkers."

Ban wiped his knife clean on a corpse's clothes, sheathed it, then reloaded the revolver with a metallic clatter. He jerked his chin at Eve from the middle of the blood-soaked slaughterhouse.

"Hey, Miss Navigator. Small fry's cleaned up. Come open the door. Let's finish this quick and go the hell home."

At the end of the blood-drenched corridor stood a massive iron door sealed with a heavy double lock.

Eve crawled forward on shaking legs, face deathly pale. She slid the duplicated master keycard into the terminal with trembling fingers.

The requested item was right beyond this door.

Ha, fuck. I just want to go home.