Kade held the hexagonal crystal and watched the prompt update:
[Energy Activator x1 acquired. AllSpark energy capacity increased by 1,000. Recovery rate increased by +1/sec.]
[AllSpark Energy (Stage 1): 234/2,000. Recovery rate: 2/sec.]
The faster recovery was immediately noticeable. Energy trickling back at double the old rate. Good. But Kade was already looking ahead.
[Sensory Gauntlets: 200 AllSpark energy. Base material: Ferromagnetic metal. Functions: Heat insulation, ballistic resistance, retractable blade (one per gauntlet), moderate arm-strength enhancement.]
Cheaper than the Pulse Pistol. More utility tool than weapon. But Kade frowned at the description.
"Heat insulation, blade, strength boost. What part of any of that has to do with sensing anything?"
He almost laughed. Even interdimensional alien technology wasn't immune to clickbait.
The energy cost was manageable. The material requirement wasn't. Ferromagnetic metal meant iron at its most basic. Simple enough in theory. In practice, Kade scoured the apartment and came up short. Every piece of iron he could find, hinges, nails, a bent curtain rod, wasn't close to enough for even one gauntlet.
The Sensory Gauntlets would have to wait.
He shelved his frustration and did what needed doing. Cleaned the place. Several hours of it, raising clouds of dust that would've given a health inspector a stroke. Old military habits. Everything squared away, surfaces wiped, corners swept, gear stowed properly.
When he finished, the apartment was spotless. It was also almost completely empty. One sofa. One bed frame with no mattress. No wardrobe. No table.
Then a horrifying realization crept in.
Do I have to wash my own clothes? Sweep? Cook? Do the dishes? ALL of it? MYSELF?
Kade liked things clean. He did not like being the one responsible for keeping them that way.
He'd figure it out. Later.
Evening came. Kade showered, changed, and headed upstairs to Mrs. Cardenas's place. Foggy was already there, settled into a chair like he owned it.
"Sorry I'm late," Kade said.
"No worries. Dinner's still cooking, and my colleague hasn't shown up yet."
From the kitchen, Mrs. Cardenas called out: "Oh, could someone run out and get baking soda? I'm all out."
Foggy was halfway out of his chair when Kade waved him back down. "I'll go. Want to get a feel for the neighborhood anyway."
"At night?" Foggy's face creased. "The area isn't exactly safe after dark. Maybe I should..."
"You can't babysit me forever, Foggy. I'm probably better at looking after myself than you are."
Foggy got the message. He sat back down but couldn't resist: "Just be careful."
Kade headed out. The baking soda was secondary. What he really wanted was scrap iron. Enough ferrous metal for the Sensory Gauntlets. A junkyard, a construction site, even an abandoned car would do.
He didn't expect Hell's Kitchen to show its teeth this fast.
Seven o'clock. Sun barely down.
Before he'd made it one block, he passed a junkie slumped against a stoop with the tourniquet still on his arm. Two women were tearing into each other in the street, blood running from a split forehead, fighting over territory or a client or both. And at the end of the block, a full brawl had spilled out of a bar. Machetes, bats, at least a dozen men going at it for real.
Kade kept his head down and kept moving. Ducked through a side street, cut through an alley, and found a kid with a butterfly knife blocking his path.
Nineteen, maybe twenty. Wiry. The knife danced between his fingers like he'd been practicing since he could walk.
"Hey. Tourist." The kid grinned. "Wrong neighborhood. Everything in your pockets. Now."
"Tourist." Kade sighed. "That's the best you've got?"
"The hell did you just say?"
"I said you might want to put that knife down and rethink your career choices."
The kid's grin turned into a snarl. He lunged. Low thrust aimed at Kade's kidney, meant to cripple if it didn't kill.
The blade made it about halfway.
A black shape dropped from the fire escape above and landed on the mugger like a sack of concrete. The kid hit the pavement face-first, pinned under a boot. Before he could scream, a fist hammered into his face. Left, right, left, right. Seven or eight shots in rapid succession, each one landing with the wet crack of skin splitting on bone.
The mugger went limp.
Kade watched with clinical detachment. Excessive, he thought. A bullet would've been cleaner. But the man standing over the unconscious mugger clearly had a different philosophy.
Tall. All black. Long sleeves, cargo pants, boots. A half-mask covering everything from the nose down. The kind of outfit you threw together when you wanted to hit people without being recognized.
"You shouldn't be outside at night." Deep voice, deliberately roughened. Disguised. "This neighborhood has a problem with crime. And with people who don't like outsiders."
"I'll manage." Kade reached behind his back and drew the Colt M1911 he'd taken from Tony's lab. Tony kept full sets of military firearms in his workshop for armor research. Kade had swapped the conspicuous Pulse Pistol for something that wouldn't raise eyebrows. "I've got this."
He couldn't see the man's eyes behind the mask, but he felt the shift. Tension that hadn't been there before. Not aimed at Kade, but at the gun. The specific hostility of deep moral conviction.
"No one has the right to take another person's life," the masked man said. "Not even in self-defense."
"What are you, an abolitionist?"
It came out before Kade could filter it. Growing up in a country with functional gun laws and then serving in a regiment where killing was part of the job, he genuinely struggled with this kind of thinking. In his experience, people who said things like "no one has the right to kill" fell into two groups: saints who'd earned the authority to say it, or comfortable idealists who'd never been in a situation where the alternative was dying.
But this guy wasn't on a keyboard. He was out here in the dark, in a mask, beating muggers unconscious with his bare hands. Whatever his philosophy, he was putting his body behind it.
Probably a saint, Kade thought. Even if I think he's wrong.
The masked man had more to say on the subject, but Kade cut him off.
"Agree to disagree. But before we continue the philosophy seminar..." He tilted his head toward the far end of the alley. "We might want to deal with this first."
Engine noise. Growing louder. From both ends of the alley.
Ten, maybe twelve men came out of the shadows. Some from the street behind Kade, some from the intersection ahead. Machetes. Bats. One length of chain. They took one look at their associate lying unconscious in his own blood, and came forward without a word.
They were all together.
PLZ Throw Powerstones.