The Perfect Run

Ryan went straight for the killing blow.

“CIA!” His hand moved inside his trench coat, and brought out a fake badge he had prepared for this day. “Arrest this man! The senate impeached hi—”

Adam didn’t let him finish, and instead pressed his cannon’s trigger. A black sphere came out of it, forcing Ryan’s group to disperse. The courier instinctively dived down towards the Street Fighters arcade game, desperate to protect it, while Livia and the moved to the other side.

Though the cannon’s black projectile moved slowly, it shredded the bunker’s metal walls like paper, absorbing anything in its path like a tiny black hole. Ryan briefly mistook it for a Black Flux weapon, but on a closer look, the projectile simply pulled things towards itself.

A gravity gun.

Did it have something to do with Dynamis’ secret weapon to deal with Augustus? Food for thought.

Sarin immediately followed her boss’ lead, unleashing a shockwave at Livia. The seer saw the attack coming before the Psycho even pulled the trigger, and stepped out of the way. The let out a fearsome roar and charged at Big Fat Adam, claws extended.

“See?!” Ryan looked at Frank while waving his badge, who was slightly confused. “He doesn’t respect the democratic process!”

But to his surprise, Big Fat Adam happily played along. “See, that’s what I told you, Frank,” Hannifat Lecter said with joviality, before backhanding the so hard the manbear tumbled backward. “The storm is here. The CIA is taking over, trying to kill me as they did with Kennedy. They slew my vice-president, like they’re going to kill all the senators.”

“They won’t get to you, Mr. President!” Frank swore, his fists raised so high that they hit the ceiling. “The White House will not fall!”

“You have to protect democracy, Frank,” Big Fat Adam continued to brainwash his bodyguard with a sinister, televangelist’s smile. “If you fail all is lost.”

Frank let out a roar of rage, grabbed the recreational area’s bar counter, and threw it at the The poor manbear couldn’t dodge, the heavy projectile exploding on contact. Though it didn’t kill the seven hundred kilos bear, it stopped him dead on his tracks, and allowed Frank the Mad to bull rush him. The whole atrium shook with every step of the iron giant.

The fatass had anticipated someone might use Frank’s delusion against him, and prepped him up accordingly. That damn, cunning bloody bastard...

“You know, of all the foes I’ve fought in my long life, you’re probably one of the most dangerous,” Ryan confessed to Adam. Augustus was far more powerful, but Hannifat Lecter more than compensated in cunning and sheer depravity. “And that’s really saying something.”

“What can I say, mate? If a man is a man, he knows what he wants and gets it. And what I want,” He raised his gravity cannon at Ryan, “is to make you squirm.”

Ryan stopped time, the projectile stopping in midair. Good, a Black Flux weapon would have still worked.

Speaking of Black Flux, Ryan rushed at the false president to introduce him to his minority’s rights. Tossing his false CIA badge aside, the courier punched the cannibal in his stomach. Having managed to rattle Augustus in the previous loop, Ryan expected to inflict some damage. Big Fat Adam’s carbon skin was way less resistant than Lightning Butt’s body, as the latter tore through the former like butter.

The Ogre didn’t even flinch. If anything, the blow seemed to damage Fisty’s pistons more than the Meta-Gang’s leader.

Why? Why didn’t it work? Had his encounter with Lightning Butt been a fluke? Had Ryan only managed to hurt Augustus because the Plushie softened him up first?

Unless… unless Ryan needed to focus his powers first? The courier could only produce visible Black Flux particles while wearing the power armor, after all.

“I need the Saturn armor to use that power?” Ryan muttered to himself, right before time resumed. Hannifat Lecter’s projectile demolished the Street Fighters game, much to the courier’s dismay. “The arcade!”

This was it, if his Plymouth Fury getting drowned in garbage hadn’t ruined this run, that tragedy did!

“You tell me, mate,” Big Fat Adam replied, wielding his cannon with one hand and trying to smash Ryan with his other fist. He didn’t have time to do much, as a coil gun shot him in the left eye, blowing it up in a brief shower of blood. “Argh!”

Ryan took the opportunity to leap back to safety, glancing at his savior. “Thanks, I guess the two of you didn’t see eye to eye.”

“Oh, right, I’m supposed to quip,” Livia said, wielding the coil gun and aiming to finish Big Fat Adam’s bullet surgery. “Anyone in favor of safety glasses, say ‘eye’!”

Ryan groaned, but forgave her weak pun-fu.

She fired another projectile at One-Eye Adam, but he protected his face with his hand. The bullet bounced off his carbon skin, though it pushed his palm back slightly. “Sarin!” he snarled, trying to wipe the blood off his face. “Kill that one!”

Sarin unleashed a shockwave at Livia. Though she failed to hit the Augusti princess, her assault forced Livia to fall back to behind the ruins of the bar counter. The wasn’t in a better position, the much bigger Frank having tossed him against one of the atrium’s walls.

Hazmat Girl turned at Ryan to blast him, and the courier decided to use his secret weapon.

“Bianca.”

Sarin froze in place.

“Your boss isn’t working to find a cure, but I am,” Ryan pleaded, a hand extended. “We can make you human again.”

She unleashed a shockwave, and he dodged by leaping to the side. “Are you a Blue or some shit?” Sarin asked angrily. “A telepath reading my brain?”

“You’ve got air for neurons, how could I read it?” Ryan asked, though all it did was infuriate the Psycho. “You must have seen it too. He’s throwing you at this base’s orbital command center, not at the Elixir labs!”

“He’s distracting you,” Adam said after wiping off the blood from his face. His only remaining eye glared with malevolence as he raised his gravity gun at Livia’s hiding spot. “Don’t listen and power through.”

“It’s true,” Livia said from her hiding spot. “Ryan!”

Realizing her intention, Ryan rushed at Sarin, just as a chill went do—

Time skipped forward a few seconds, and when it resumed, Ryan had slammed Sarin to the ground. Holes had appeared where Livia used to hide, and where Hannifat Lecter’s remaining eye should have been. The cannibal screamed in pain, while Livia kept hitting his head with bullets; the had managed to free himself from Frank’s grasp by returning to human form, and then shifting back into the powerful animal.

“Look outside, we aren’t here to kill anyone!” Ryan told Sarin, before adding a caveat. “Except Psypsy and your boss, but they’re asses! The rest of you, we will cure!”

Sarin’s gauntlets vibrated, and she aimed for the courier’s head. A shockwave hit the ceiling, causing concrete and pipes to fall in

have to show for it? Nothing! He doesn’t want to save anyone, and deep down you know it too! You think you will be able to return to a normal

him off her. Both rose back to their feet, with

he argued, dodging another volley. “You don’t deserve to be trapped in that suit, unable to touch, to smell, to taste. You

what it feels to be me, jackass!” Sarin snarled back. “I don’t know how you can read my memories,

ground to increase the size of her jumps, soaring above the room until she almost reached the ceiling. She bombarded Ryan from above with repeated short blasts, but the courier dodged each one. “I don’t want to hurt you, Bianca!” Ryan pleaded, showing one of the guns he kept in his

she couldn’t even finish her sentence. The bullet grazed her mask, right near the point where it combined with the rest

when Sarin landed on the ground, she didn’t immediately attack. She touched her mask, and gazed silently

said, glancing at Adam. “But

me,” she said,

will die. But it’s

shitstain?” Sarin let out a hiss

tossing the Fisty Brothers and his gun to the ground. Sarin flinched in response, perhaps expecting a trick, but

chance. Your last, last chance at

at his head. “I won’t

defeat,” Ryan bluffed. “You’ve been on the losing side long enough.

raised her vibrating

And hesitated.

fire, and her gas mask was as impenetrable as ever. Yet she didn’t attack. Ryan’s words had planted the seed of doubt in her mind, and now she didn’t know what

of bullets,

Augusti’s projectiles had slowly pushed him against the elevator’s doors. “His power only protects his skin, but

rasped angrily, trying to detect her by sound. When he did, he lunged at her with nightmarish speed, mouth opened and hands raised. The

in the frozen time, and pulled her out of the way. Big Fat Adam’s sharp teeth closed on nothing but air, and Lightning Butt’s

her, her fingers holding him by the sleeve.

may rescue me

Frank tossed the wounded aside and moved towards Livia

away, Livia faced

“Stop, Vladimir.”

and so did Frank. The giant flinched, as if he had been

name is Vladimir

Psypsy had said in a previous loop, Frank

He was Russian.

with his hand as if he could block Livia’s voice. “I was born in

farm wasn’t in Arkansas.” Since Livia couldn’t hit the giant physically, she targeted his fragile mind. “It was in

the courier froze time to move out of the way. The giant’s fist

ground below Frank, part of the floor collapsing below the giant’s weight. The self-hating

“Sifu, get down!”

Adam had recovered and tried to flank him; the blinded madman must have detected them by listening to their exchange with Frank. Suffering from

pandawan tackled the ogre before he could get anywhere near his master. The two brawled for a second, but the more experienced Adam quickly grabbed the bear’s hands with his own. The Psycho opened his mouth, to reveal a syringe full of

Elixir, but not a Mechron-made one. This was the same Blue Elixir the cannibal had attempted to turn Ryan into a Psycho with after blowing New Rome to kingdom come. And true to

to blink in

Elixirs couldn’t bond to animals, that one must have detected the human beneath. The green Genome switching back and forth between his two forms as his body absorbed the liquid. Big Fat Adam pushed

you,” Hannifat Lecter gloated

you did,” Livia replied with

seem concerned? Why didn’t she fall back? Unless… unless she had seen this event in a vision, and let it happen?

settled back in his animal form, did Ryan

the syringe’s shards crushed beneath his mighty feet. Instead of

of people

The cannibal heard him coming, but

her father could take two Elixirs with

hue, Ryan felt a moment of religious awe. A Gregorian song echoed at the back of his mind, and he could almost see holy light shining into

God existed, and He had

could a giant bear fly like this, Ryan would never understand, but he did. Perhaps Big Fat Adam might have dodged, if he still had eyes, or maybe he would have been paralyzed in awe too. The shouted his attack’s name,

“Soaring Panda!”

something so ridiculous

crashed on the ruins of the arcade, while the victorious

the Ogre, he did not rise up again. And hopefully, he

attempted to free himself to no avail. His body absorbed the metal

pointed

the communists’ infiltrators!” he

answered, “No, Frank.

then Frank was

have been, for Ryan’s words were the coup de grace. The giant looked at his chest, scratching at it as if he could exorcise the Marxist-Leninist evil that infected him; but when he couldn’t, he slammed his head against the

a minute of respect, as he watched this proud giant, this loyal bodyguard that perished protecting

past?” Ryan asked Livia, as Sarin lowered her gauntlets, still on

looked for a future where I won the fight,” the mafia princess

as busted as your best

kettle black,” Livia chuckled. “Speaking of best

triumphantly, sitting atop a crushed Big Fat Adam’s stomach. “I got

complete. When Ryan met him, the had been

he was a