Open RP No Coincidences

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Sulphur’s lip quirked up at the side in frustration. He had no idea if his shot had landed. He squared his shoulders, listening to the fight inside– Right up until they came crashing out of the apartment through the wall and straight into the hallway wall. His eyes went wide in a moment of surprise. That was definitely unexpected.

So Coldcall seemed intent on lethal damage. Sulphur licked his lips as he readjusted his stance, rising, gun held low in front of him. He had a split second to make a decision. He didn’t want Cryptid dead. He wanted him alive, so he could take him back, so they could break him apart the way he had Jasper. There was no way he was going to let this other meta, Coldcall, kill Cryptid. He sighed.

Gun or gas.

He could shoot the man, shoot him in the head from this angle with minimal risk of shooting Cryptid as well. That had the risk of the bullet not piercing the man’s skull, however, or hitting Cryptid in some lethal spot. He had no idea what Coldcall could do. He had enough strength to take Cryptid through a wall, and at this range, even Sulphur with his dulled senses could feel the cold pouring off him. A brief thought ran through his head of the only other meta he had ever heard of like this. A red-haired girl out in Columbus, with strength, with a heat that burned anything it touched. But Samantha hadn’t been invincible. Ethan had killed her with a well-placed attack.

He lifted the gun again and stepped into the space that the other two metas occupied. He loaded the second bullet, the gun audibly clicking as he lifted it to Coldcall’s head, holding it just slightly away. At the same time, he began to disperse and fill the hall with his faintly grey gas, the one that he had learned through trial and error made people weaker, made them fall unconscious with enough exposure and a dense enough cloud. It was scentless but had a slight taste of tang, faint enough that most people, without heightened senses, wouldn’t even notice.

“I’m going to need you to take your hands off of him, if you would be so willing to oblige. I’d rather not have to shoot you. My boss is against us eliminating metas. I will not hesitate to put a bullet through your skull if you do not comply.”

Sulphur’s voice was low but soft. He was a soft spoken man and preferred to keep his voice devoid of emotions. But just then, he couldn’t help the twinge of anger that colored his voice. He kept his eyes on the man in the red puffer coat, his hands steady on his weapon. He had all the air of a man willing to carry out his threat. No, not a threat. It was a promise. A promise of death unless Coldcall removed his hands from Cryptid.​
 
The debris from the wall had scattered all around the pair, ice forming at Coldcall's feet and along his hands, spreading across Cryptid as he was held in his inexorable grip. But something would come to disrupt his grapple after all - the advancing fog that emanated from third person in the hall, the person whose gun now tracked Coldcall's movements rather than the other meta's. Before, he couldn't tell who he was trying to shoot. Now he had closed the gap between them while Coldcall strangled Cryptid, a soft voice nearly devoid of emotion finishing one, no, two, no three sentences - a demand - to relinquish the masked avenger - and with each step, the fog enveloped them as he continued to speak, the gun barrel moving closer toward him as he watched out of the corner of his eye.

With the firearm leveled against him, Coldcall ducked low, pushing off against Cryptid to whirl into Sulphur's space. The unknown man would have been at an advantage staying further back - but as he closed the distance between the two, just as Cryptid had, that reduced the amount of space that Coldcall had to cross in order to strike. He didn't fear a gun. His ice was faster.

He tasted something. Not blood. It had an ennervating quality to it. He couldn't stay here, in this cloud. The man who produced it out of his very skin - he and Cryptid were in an alliance now.

With his hold on Cryptid released, Coldcall moved with seemingly preternatural speed honed through years of close combat experience, looking to use one fist to batter aside Sulphur's outstretched arm, moving in close to wrap the other hand around his neck. Even with his strength sapping by the second, Coldcall grit his teeth and tried to find purchase on Sulphur's jugular - threatening to turn, at a touch, the very blood within to ice. Simultaneously, the pressure exerted by his strangulating grip would threaten to - quite simply - pop his head off. This was what those who had witnessed it before called the freeze-n-squeeze, an innocuous name for a truly gruesome way to die. He didn't waste his precious energy talking. All that there was, was reaction. After all, he'd need to be very fast before Cryptid had the chance to retaliate.
 
The cold had reached somewhat of an equilibrium in Cryptid’s body. The hand around his neck was a problem, but the cold itself was met by even temperatures. Staying locked like this for longer than a minute would actually get to him, though. And Sulphur was–

Right there. Todd blinked, his brain trying to focus through the cold, and Sulphur’s voice was right on top of them. With his body already in overdrive, his healing factor was probably making up for whatever-it-was that Sulphur was pouring into the air. Or maybe the cold was keeping him from feeling any effects on his muscles and bones. But the faint tang that was coming from Sulphur also carried the scent of anger that told him just how much the man from Slate was holding back in giving a warning. A warning that was actually about to save Cryptid’s life, though now that he was watching, he saw the precision movements. Someone who used sticking as his preferred method of killing knew exactly where the carotid and jugular were.

While Sulphur was here to kill Cryptid, Todd had no interest in watching Sulphur die.

His entire body was still shaking, the steady tremble of someone left out in the cold too long, but there was still strength in his body, and he had the height advantage. He moved as soon as his feet were under him, a second or less after watching Coldcall’s attack. One arm moved to wrap under and over the arm still outstretched from knocking the gun aside; proximity like that was going to be a bitch, but it was hopefully enough of an unpredictable move that Cryptid could pin Coldcall and dig his claws backward into the parka at the same time. Though, even if he couldn’t cut through, that helped him brace for the follow-up with his other arm: a punch to the shoulder joint. Even if he had armor on under the impractical coat, the force of the hit would still hurt, and even with the cold starting to rip back through him, Cryptid was in proximity to do a lot more damage the second he figured out how.

He realized after a second that if he hadn’t had his mask on, he might’ve gone in for a bite. That was… really bad. He’d just eaten; temptations like that shouldn’t be slipping through now. Had he burned through that much energy already, or was he just still recovering from his slip into the hunt? It was hard to say. He hadn’t felt his eyes shift back just yet, so he still had enough energy to maintain form. He needed to adjust, though, to avoid doing something stupid. He needed… something. Something human, something to soften the edge for himself. His lungs burned, but – well, that’d be easiest.

“You should – chill out.”

Once he had the man secured, he could start pulling him back – or maybe he’d just get slammed into or through the wall behind him, which would also suck, but would give Sulphur the space to shoot if he actually wanted to follow through on his threat. Granted, he could also shoot Cryptid in the head instead. But Todd could hope they could get over their differences long enough to take care of business first. Even if he didn’t want Coldcall to die, he didn’t exactly want to die, either – and he didn’t know what he’d do if he got Obisidan’s other brother killed, no matter how much Slate wanted Cryptid dead.

What happened next was out of his hands. As he closed his body on Coldcall’s, he was doing quite literally everything he could in the moment. That had to be good enough.
 

When he lost his grip on the gun, it skidded across the ground. It didn’t go far, just a few feet, but his looking for it for a brief second was almost fatal. He turned his attention back to the man– and cursed his dull senses as he suddenly felt biting cold on the side of his throat. Coldcall’s hand was closing in around his neck, was brushing his skin, and he felt ice forming on his skin, burning his weak nerves, and he was gone for.

Until he wasn’t.

The hand quickly disappeared and it took Sulphur only the blink of an eye to realize what Cryptid had done. Cryptid had saved him. Cryptid had restrained the man, keeping him from deep freezing Sulphur’s throat.

He was going to have to repay that.

He kept his gas pumping out into the area, which was slowly filling with the grey almost smoke. It wasn’t rising as high as he would have liked, but was at least face height now, swirling heavily from the cold. He moved quickly, dropping low to swipe his gun up, and then spun on the spot, gun clasped in both hands. He lined up his shot– although not as cleanly as he could have, or should have– and took aim for Coldcall’s thigh, aiming for his femoral artery. A double tap there would have him bleeding out fast enough that between blood loss and his gas and Cryptid’s attacks, Coldcall would go down soon.

It took him less than five seconds in total to move, swipe up the gun, spin on the spot, and fire. He fired twice, aiming for the bullets to carry right through his leg, or to embed themselves in the bone. As soon as he fired, regardless of if he hit or not, Sulphur would back up, taking himself a few feet away from the two metas fighting. He’d learned his lesson about being too close to Coldcall. Whether the bullets hit him or not, that was entirely in fate’s hands now.

Then, Cryptid’s words broke through the fast cycling of move, fire, back up and made him lick his lips and chuckle. “You have no sense of self-preservation, do you, you monster?”​
 
Coldcall's outstretched fingers scraped against Sulphur's neck in a last-ditch effort to kill him. But the man slipped away, a hard thud from Cryptid's shoulder punch making each digit twitch. Even through the numbness that using his power created, he felt the blow rattle him. While he closed in on the man emitting the gray gas, he was pulled away, Cryptid throwing all of his weight into holding him back.

And then he was shot in the leg. Whether this was a career-ending injury, he'd have to wait and see. The result was simple: the juggernaut who moved like an iceberg simply buckled, slipping to the floor with a grunt as he tried to intuit whether the shots would leave exit wounds, or whether the slugs had embedded themselves in his thigh. The tension in his form evaporated as the trifecta of opposing forces weighed him down. Between the ennervating smoke cloud, Cryptid's clearly enhanced strength, and the bullets in his leg, there was no way he could remain standing, let alone keep fighting.

The testament to his resilience was that he maintained consciousness. Falling against the hallway wall with his shoulder, he slumped awkwardly to the floor, his busted leg stretched out before him. Part of him wanted to wrap the wound, but he didn't have the energy for that. Instead he fought to stay awake. To formulate a plan. These two had history, but even he couldn't tell what it was. He was missing too many facts.

For now, he just grinned.

"You missed."
 
It worked. In close quarters, Sulphur’s gunshots made Cryptid’s sensitive ears ring, but it worked. Coldcall went down, and Cryptid disengaged immediately, backing up with slow, stiff steps until he found the wall. He felt like all his limbs had been replaced with tingling ice, and he needed to recover and conserve energy before Sulphur inevitably turned that gun on him.

“That’s a weird way to say ‘thanks’, but I’ll take it.” He chuckled, hoarsely and strangled, but his voice was too rough for even him to recognize it as his own.

He was so focused on finding a shred of warmth somewhere inside his body that he didn’t notice the outside – how as his muscles relaxed, his eyes faded from black to ice blue.

As the cold subsided, Todd realized just how much blood he could smell. Sulphur might’ve missed the femoral, but two shots to the thing was still a mess. He shifted his attention back to Coldcall, the laughter fading from his eyes. It was a good thing Sulphur had gone for the leg. The man couldn’t run, and so Todd’s predator stayed caged, and he could think clearly enough to shift gears.

THe damaged was two injured people and a broken wall. He’d need an excuse to check on Lefty, but more than that, he just… didn’t want anyone to die. An ambulance – and probably an arrest – was in order, but for now… for now he pushed himself up off the wall. He jutted a thumb at the apartment door, and looked at Sulphur without quite looking at him, trying not to trigger his own fight response again when he’d just calmed down.

“I’m sure Lefty’s got something lying around I can use as a tourniquet. You kids play nice until I get back.”

And unless bodily prevented, he’d slip into the apartment. Even if Sulphur got trigger happy, it was pretty clear he wouldn't be giving Cryptid a swift, clean execution. For the moment, at least, he was safe enough to go look for a t-shirt and some rubbing alcohol, and check on the normal human caught up in the middle of all of this.
 

Sulphur didn’t want to take his eyes off Coldcall, but for just a second, he looked up at Cryptid’s mask to say something sarcastic in response. He froze, taking in a sharp breath before forcing his eyes back onto Coldcall, gun still ready to fire again in his hands. There was a moment where his mind raced behind his steely hazel eyes. Still, he kept his gun trained on Coldcall, ready to fire again should the man try to move at all.

He paid just enough attention to the outside world to make sure that he wouldn’t miss Coldcall moving. Inside his head, however, he was spinning wheels and cogs and forcing them to try to come to some solution that would explain what he had just seen. There weren’t any reasonable answers that presented themself to him. Nothing except for the one that made the most sense. After all, there were no coincidences in this world.

Cryptid had Todd’s eyes. Sulphur knew those eyes, and he knew they were Todd’s. He had spent the last few weeks with the kid coming around the Diamond. He had looked into those eyes dozens of times, had memorized the way the darker blue centers spiked out through the rest of his ice-colored irises. He would recognize those eyes anywhere. It was unlikely that some other shapeshifting, people-eating, blue-eyed monster existed out there.

That left Sulphur with an uncomfortable fact and a few options. Todd was Cryptid, and Cryptid ate Malachite. Not only was Todd Cryptid, but Ethan most likely knew, and their entire story had been a lie. That was fact. It was uncomfortable and it hurt, but it was fact. It was fact and Sulphur had to accept it. He had to accept it because he had to make a choice. And he had to make it now.

As he watched Coldcall and waited for any excuse to put a bullet in the man’s skull as he bled out, he thought about his options. The first option was the one his anger called for. He could shoot Todd right between his blue eyes and have it out with Ethan about it later. He could follow through on his rage, the rage he so carefully concealed, and just kill him. The second option was trickier. He could bag Todd and bring him back to the Diamond, where they could get the rest of the Pack and then head out to the new house outside the city. It would be the perfect, quiet place for them to torture him until they were all satisfied, Ethan be damned. The third option was to let Todd go. Let him go and have it out with Ethan.

Sulphur decided on the fourth option.

He sighed and stared at the man on the ground, at the pool of blood that was slowly spreading. He was still using his gas, and intended to continue to do so until the man passed out. He’d be a lot easier to manage, whether they left him here or drove him to a police station, if he was unconscious. And since Todd had apparently developed an immunity to the gas quickly, he felt free to pump the air until it was thick with it. He could taste the metallic tang of it himself already. So with his thoughts in order once more and a decision reached, he clicked his teeth together and straightened out slowly, rising to his feet, gun still held and pointed in Coldcall’s direction, hopefully safe in his distance.​
 
Awake. Awake. Awake.

Pain radiated up through Coldcall's leg. Ironically, it might have been what was giving him the adrenal boost to stay conscious. His limbs refused to move, but he could still flex his fingers back and forth. Rhythmically, he cracked the knuckle on each finger at a time on his right hand as it lay at his side, squeezing each digit with his thumb until it popped while the world faded in and out. Things were still happening in his peripheral vision and he did his best to focus on everything he could as his eyes swam. He'd been shot before, and the pain was worse then than it was now. Years of frost had worn away at his nerves - that was the leading theory. Personally, he'd never felt as affected by his power in that way as a physician had once said. He was more just...tough.

He was aware that Cryptid was going to find him a tourniquet, which amused him greatly, on the inside. His bad luck had a silver lining. There wasn't a prison in the world that could hold him, and it looked like that might be tonight's worst case scenario - not death. His reputation would take a hit here, but that was recoverable. He didn't care about losing a tussle. Other masks had egos. Not him. Ego got in the way of accomplishment.

Coldcall's eyes shifted over to the unknown man with the gun, who was emitting the knockout gas. Against his instincts, Coldcall was taking very shallow breaths, only through his nose - rather than gulping for air, as his leg screamed for him to do. Instead, he sat against the wall like a monk, tilting his head up at his current captor.

He watched him, closely. The way he took in a sharp, pointed breath. The tension in his neck muscles. Just like at the mechanic shop earlier that day, Coldcall was watching for anything he could take in. He had no idea what was going on between the two. But now, it clicked that the man emitting the gas had called Cryptid 'monster,' with no sense of self-preservation. No sense of self-preservation because Coldcall had been going for the man's neck, and Cryptid had saved him. And this man - with the gun - had engaged Coldcall because he was battling his enemy, Cryptid. Cryptid, who appeared, by all accounts, unaffected by the toxic gas - and who had nothing to fear from a pistol.

Ahhhh.

The gears turned in his head very quickly. He grunted, then clicked his tongue at Sulphur as Cryptid left the pair.

"You can't take him," he whispered slowly, a white smile cracking from beneath his lips, "But I can, when he comes for my leg. And alive."
 

There was a moment of silence after Coldcall’s suggestion. After his offer. The offer to bring Cryptid– Todd– in alive for him. He flicked his tongue over his lips and gave the man a smile that made him look more like a lion than any human had the right to. A chuckle even managed to slip out his lips. His body relaxed a little, while still tense enough to react quickly if he needed to.

“If you had offered that five minutes ago, you would have had yourself a deal.” The blonde man shook his head ever so slightly. This wasn’t a choice he was making lightly. He still had the anger burning that said to bring Todd in alive for his pack, that said to even just shoot him on the spot. That anger wasn’t likely to go away without a really good explanation from someone.

But no. No, Sulphur wouldn’t be doing either of those things. He wouldn’t be doing anything like that, not tonight at least. Despite all the temptation and the ease with which he could do these things, especially with Coldcall’s help, he just couldn’t bring himself to do these things. Not without one hell of a conversation first.

“If you had said that five minutes ago, your answer would have been yes. But no, not now. I must decline your offer.”​
 
"Yeah, yeah, heard you the first time, pal," he coughed, sparing a glance at his leg.

He turned his thigh experimentally, teeth clenched. This would be a limper once he got away.

The conversation was hard to carry on. That was the gas doing its work, taking him out of the picture. He closed his eyes and leaned his head back, feigning unconsciousness for now, doing whatever he could to conserve his energy.
 
Todd had kept busy in the apartment, but he took his time. As soon as he was out of sight he worked his shoulders, and shook out his limbs to try to disperse the external cold as his body rekindled its inner furnace to drag him back above hypothermia. Before he went looking for anything, he checked on Lefty, who was a lot less coldproof than he was. There wasn’t much resistance as he carried the ex-cop to his own bed and layered blankets on over him.

He found a t-shirt in the dresser drawer, aged but clean. He stepped into the bathroom, and caught his own reflection in the mirror as he saw a flash of blue behind his mask. He paused long enough to adjust his face back. If Sulphur had seen that – well. He’d probably already be on the halfway carpet bleeding out a shot to the back of the head. He needed to focus, to maintain control.

With the t-shirt in one hand, and the bottle of rubbing alcohol in the other, he went back to the main room and located Lefty’s phone. He opened it to the emergency line, and shifted his voice several octaves deeper, into a Montana drawl. Police and ambulance, and an address. And then he hung up.

Work finished and feeling considerably warmer, he stepped back into the hallway.

“Oh, good. You two didn’t kill each other.”

He held the bottle up for Sulphur to see, then crouched down next to the unconscious Coldcall – or mostly unconscious, anyway, judging by the breathing. The gas must really be doing a number on his system. Cryptid sighed, taking a soft breath of the gas himself, then unscrewed the cap on the bottle of alcohol. This was going to sting like a bitch, but the gas seemed to be a natural anesthetic. Hopefully it kept the uncomfortable part of this whole arrangement at bay long enough to wash out the wound and tie off the blood flow.
 
No new information availed itself to Coldcall before Cryptid's return. He didn't bother keeping his eyes closed during the medical treatment, letting the heavy lids slide open as the vigilante knelt over him. A bemused grin broke through his features as the alcohol ran down over his leg. Scarred nerves that dulled what would've been pain tingled.

"Why not just carry a first aid kit, if you make a habit of this?" he chuckled derisively.

Part of him wondered when Cryptid and Sulphur would ditch him to finish out their little dance.

What would become of the police that led him away? Surely, they had to be thinking about that. Right?

Superheroes. God bless 'em.
 
“You know, for someone whose life is currently being spared, you aren’t very grateful. If it weren’t for Cryptid here, you’d have two bullets in your head right about now.”

He kept the gun out, but he lowered it. It would remain out until they were out of the building. Only then would Sulphur feel safe enough to holster it again. Todd shouldn’t cause him any problems. Not really. The kid didn’t want to actually hurt people. He just had to. This explained a lot, though, about why Todd and Ethan’s story never quite lined up.

When he got home, he and Ethan would be having a long, long conversation.

But first, he had to actually get home. So Sulphur waited, waited until Todd had finished bandaging up Coldcall, and then he walked just a little closer to where the two of them were. He looked between them, and then, in a clear and stern voice, he said, “Cryptid. Walk with me to my car. We have some things to talk about. I think you’ll find what I have to say… interesting.”​
 
Cryptid shrugged, shifting his coat as he tied off the tourniquet. “Pockets aren’t big enough, sadly, and I’m a lot less intimidating if I’m carrying my Hello Kitty backpack around.”

He wasn’t sure why his instincts said humor. Maybe he was trying to ignore the weight of Sulphur’s gaze, or the fact that as soon as they walked away from here, he was probably extremely fucked. It crossed his mind for the first time that Sulphur might not be alone. Ethan probably wasn’t sending anybody out alone, at this point, even if there wasn’t a crazed cannibal serial killer vigilante looking to take them out one by one, personally.

Or maybe the humor was to deflect from the seriousness – or at least, playful brutality, of what was behind his eyes. Black again, sharp, more suited to the violence that he was saving until the shirt was tied off and the bottle set aside.

He ignored Sulphur for a moment, studying Coldcall’s face, and then grabbed the front of the red parka and held until he felt the man’s eyes on him through the goggles.

“Anyone else dies here tonight, Coldcall – ’specially Lefty in there – and you’re not getting a third chance from me.” His voice was strange – not quite joking, but not a threat, necessarily. A warning? Or a promise? That remained to be determined.

And then he stood up, smoothed his coat, and looked back at Sulphur. He really wanted to meet the statement with snark – who the fuck are you? was a good question for the situation, if he’d never heard of Sulphur before. But that wasn’t smart, because Mal had said Sulphur’s name, and he couldn’t let his lies cross like that. He had no good reason to say no, but his instincts warned him against saying yes, either. It was a pickle.

Then, he looked at Sulphur’s face, and knew it wasn’t really a question. One way or another, they’d be going downstairs together. He glanced at Fletcher one last time, then nodded.

“Sure. Cops are coming anyway, so we’d better make it quick. Lead the way.”
 

Sulphur took one last look at Coldcall, his lips curling up slightly as he did so. If it were up to Sulphur, he would take the chance to make sure Coldcall never fucked with them again. He’d put three bullets straight through the man’s head and walk away. Unlike Ethan, Sulphur had never had a problem with killing fellow metas. It didn’t sit well with him, killing anyone, but metas or humans, neither was more terrible to him than the other.

It was for Todd’s sake alone that he walked away without killing the man. He holstered the gun back under his arm as they walked down the first flight of stairs. And as they walked down the second flight, the man sighed and ran a hand through his fluffy hair before turning to look at the serial cannibal next to him.

“Todd, Todd, Todd.” He said the younger man’s name softly, shaking his head and looking at the ceiling. They were far enough away now that there was no way that Coldcall could hear them. Not unless the man had hearing like a dog on steroids, he wouldn’t be able to hear what Sulphur was saying. “Todd, tell me why I shouldn’t put a bullet through your skull and see if you can regenerate from that. I’m begging you to give me even one reason.”

He didn’t stop moving, and he wouldn’t. Not until they were back to the Rover, parked one block over and away from the actual crime scene. This was supposed to be a boring transaction, a debt collection, and yet, and yet here he was now, walking side by side with the Cryptid that had killed his brother.

Sulphur didn’t want to kill Todd., He wanted any reason to not kill the man. Any reason at all. Hopefully, Todd could give him that reason, and he wouldn’t be forced to kill who he knew was Ethan’s only real chance at someone understanding him and helping him to change.​
 
Cryptid froze, one foot halfway between steps. He’d followed Sulphur so far under the impression that there’d be almost immediate violence when they got outside, or expecting a bullet to the back as soon as he was given the chance. He wasn’t expecting to hear his own name.

And he was ready to pull that foot up and start backing up the stairs if Sulphur so much as flinched toward his gun. If he could get to higher ground before Sulphur could even draw, then he could use the angle to protect his head. Maybe not his spine, or the legs he intended to use for running, but he could get lucky, and –

He stared into Sulphur’s eyes, then blinked to check his own eye shape. Like a muscle held tense, he could feel that they were still shifted. But – they hadn’t been, all night. Sulphur must’ve seen that. Sulphur, and Coldcall.

Fuck.

Well, Coldcall wouldn’t be a problem for a while, and Sulphur was a problem right now. Or he was going to be, if Todd didn’t have a good answer. A hundred different responses flashed behind his eyes, one at a time, as he took a deep breath. What constituted a good reason? Mal wouldn’t want it didn’t feel true, even to Todd, even if he didn’t have evidence to the contrary. You haven’t killed me yet, which gives me reason to believe you don’t actually want to felt like tempting fate. And for Ethan’s sake felt manipulative. None of the serious answers were – well, they were good enough, but with Sulphur’s attitude about it, they were all too heavy.

Then again, I haven’t really had the chance to find out about the bullet thing was just plain stupid. Sulphur wouldn’t find it funny. He was–

Ah.

“I mean, you’re the logical one.” Just like that, he unfroze. Fluid again. He didn’t increase his pace to catch up with Sulphur, just resumed like he’d never stopped at all. He held up two fingers, showing off the claw between them. “So two reasons. One, you don’t have all the facts. Two, this is a terrible time and place for a cold-blooded murder.”

Casual. All the sudden fear and tension was gone, put aside and packed away. The gun was a threat, as was Sulphur’s gas, but nothing insurmountable. Especially since he’d been given a warning.

After a moment, he held up a third finger.

“And three, if I hadn’t showed up before you, you would’ve had to deal with Coldcall and whatever the fuck that was on your own. I still can’t feel my bicep completely.”

He rubbed it with his opposite hand, for effect. The smile was in his eyes, but he was glad the shadows of the mask hid the strain of his jaw as it clenched.
 

“If it hadn’t been for you being there, I would have shot Coldcall in the head and moved on with my day. Though I suppose I do owe you my life after that. You did save me. I’d hate to turn around and kill you after that.” Sulphur kept moving, a small, stifled sigh leaving his lips.

There were some options here. He could draw the gun and turn around, placing it to the side of Todd’s head, holding it there until he talked. That seemed like a bad idea. Todd was stronger than Sulphur by a lot. He would have no problem knocking the gun aside and slicing him into ribbons if he wanted to.

He could try threats of a different nature, or maybe even his paralytic. But Todd had metabolized the nueorrelaxant almost instantly. So there was nothing that would suggest that or the scopolamine gas would even work on him. Besides, that might just aggravate him as well, and then Sulphur would never get the answers he wanted.

So talking. Sulphur could do talking. It would be annoying, but he could do it. He sighed again, fully this time, and ran a hand through his hair, pushing it away from his face. A few of the strands that had come loose fell back forward in front of his eyes. He huffed and looked back at Todd.

“Are you going to give me the answers I want, Todd? I’d rather this not become a problem.”​
 
“The ones you want? Probably not.” Todd kept his tone casual, but his eyes were serious. Even hearing Sulphur laugh hadn’t alleviated the seriousness of their situation. Before Sulphur could decide that was the wrong answer, he continued, “The truth, I can give you. But it might not be what you want to hear. I learned the difference a while back.”

He slipped his hands into his pockets. It was a deliberate decision, basically incapacitating his only weapons, but he was making a point. He didn’t feel like he needed to be intimidated by Sulphur, because at least for this part, he was bent on being absolutely honest. It wasn’t going to be pleasant, because he had a feeling the questions wouldn’t have pleasant answers, but he’d done more unpleasant things in the last few days than undergo a willing interrogation.

“If that isn’t a problem for you, I’m ready to start whenever you are.”
 
Fuck just happened to me.

Either the heavy gas had been working as a painkiller, or his adrenaline was subsiding. Whichever it was, pain surged through Coldcall's leg. With this, he'd need to call off the robbery. He had always healed fast, but he could tell that he would be in no condition to pull a job in the next little while. He'd have to lay low and take a loss on the money he'd spent assembling the heli crew. He could keep the copters, but the window to use them would have closed. A flash of rage welled up inside him, but it cooled almost instantly.

He reached out to pat Cryptid's impromptu tourniquet, then rose to his feet. Yep - a limper.

Ka-clunk. Ka-clunk. Ka-clunk.

He made his way over to Lefty Doyle's room and looked around. There he was, cocooned on the bed, shivering.

"What a world, huh, Lefty?" he muttered, shaking his head. He'd have to save his strength instead of using his powers.

With a sickening snap, he cracked the man's head to the side.

Sighing, he limped over to a window at the back of the room, unlatched it, and slid it open. Two floors up - fall could still kill him, or incapacitate him. He hoisted himself partially out the window sill and pushed off, leaping to a fire escape on the other side, upper body crashing into the metal to break his fall. With a grunt, he dropped down into the alleyway, and made for the car that - unbeknownst to him - Cryptid had inspected earlier that very same day.
 

Sulphur didn’t miss when Todd slipped his hands into his pockets. It let some of the tension in his shoulders drain. Todd didn’t want to fight him either. They could handle this civilly. There was a long moment as they walked where Sulphur didn’t say anything. It wasn’t until they rounded the corner of the street and Sulphur saw the Rover that he started to speak again.

“Todd, I want to know what happened. And I want you to start with Malachite.” He turned his suddenly tired eyes onto the young man. There was a heaviness to his stance now, as though he was finally letting something out, letting it be seen. The tall and stark figure now had sloped shoulders.​
 
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