Dan floated in t-space, seething with rage.
Soone had just shot at him! At his friends! At his house! Possibly several soones! His first instinct was to jump next to the car and do his best to murder the inhabitants within, damn the consequences. He clamped down on that, hard, before his navigator could follow through on the errant impulse. Appearing beside or within an SUV containing an unknown number of n with guns would almost certainly earn Dan a bullet to the face. And every body part below it, just for good asure.
No. Dan needed to be smart about this. Or, failing that, at least not actively stupid. He had all the ti in the world to think and to plan. He'd stay in t-space until he ca up with sothing reasonable and responsible. His friends weren't going anywhere, and they were safe besides.
Abby was fine. She was in the kitchen, far away from the danger. Connor had managed to drag both himself and Freya inside the house. Bullets would be flying, but Dan's ho was bulletproof! It'd take more than a few dickheads with Uzis to damage his castle! He just needed to shut the door. It opened inwards so Dan only needed to boot his friends out of the way and slam the thing shut. Then everyone would be safe.
Well, for a few monts anyway. Who knew what kind of firepower was packed away in that SUV. Upgrades threw everything out of balance. Mutates were even worse, to say nothing of naturals. Literally anything could be waiting in that big black suburban. Dan couldn't even guess. There was no motive here that he could see! Who wanted to kill him? Especially while standing next to a pair of police officers?
Or were they the target? Connor and Freya. So kind of political hit, because of the clout of their families? To throw a candidate off balance, perhaps? Wasn't that a little too extre? When even were the local elections? Too many questions, and too few answers!
Calm.
Dan closed his eyes, and let the numbness of the gap fill him.
Focus.
What were his priorities?
Safety. That could be achieved in monts. He would reappear, and slam the door shut. That would buy him so ti. Guns wouldn't suffice. Would the attackers give up? Would they flee, or switch to sothing more lethal? They'd clearly rushed this assault; Connor and Freya had noticed them, and they'd panicked. What if they had sothing deadlier, that took ti to engage? So powerful upgrade or mutation that could plow right through the fortified walls of Dan's ho?
What then?
He could fight back? But he had no weapons! No guns, despite living in Texas. The laws were a little more strict, here, and Dan hadn't felt the need. Why bother, when he could escape into t-space faster than he could ever produce a weapon? Why waste ti taking safety courses that he'd already taken, to acquire sothing he'd never realistically use?
He was cursing his rationality, now. He wanted to be able to shoot at these people, even if that was entirely the wrong decision. Yet still, he had no gun. No weapon at all, except his 5 Eldritch-Bane Frying Pan of Death. He doubted that would have any real effect on his attackers.
So, what did he have?
Well, he had his veil, as he always did. There was a thought, there in the back of his mind. A way to weaponize things, that he'd been pondering ever since he'd discovered the ability to fall in t-space. He could grab sothing heavy—That anvil, at the mall!—and wrench it into the Gap. It wouldn't take any ti at all. An instant, a blink, a single heartbeat. He could pull it close, and fall and fall and fall until it was moving at highway speeds.
He could drop it on the car. He could launch an anvil at them at the speed of sound. It wouldn't even be hard. His navigator could drop him over the car, then pull him out nigh-instantaneously. He just... wouldn't take the anvil back with him. What kind of damage would that do? Surely nothing would survive.
The consequences, though. Dan wasn't sure he could handle them. He'd certainly go to jail for that. It might not be straight murder, but it was certainly a violation of the Vigilante Acts, committed in front of two cops no less. An explosive crater, in plain view, in the middle of a neighborhood. No way around it, no way to hide it. It was a citizen's duty to disengage. Fighting back was a last resort. No castle doctrine in this Texas, not when upgrades ca into play. If the gunn advanced on Dan's ho, it was his responsibility to hop a fence and haul ass in the opposite direction. Not to sar them across the concrete because they'd pissed him off.
So he'd call that plan B.
What, then, should he be doing? That one was easy: he should call the police. There were two officers literally under fire in his house. Two rookies at that. Help would co roaring onto the scene in minutes. That was the correct, responsible course of action. Especially if the attackers lingered.
So he had his plan. Drop back into reality next to the door, shove his friends out of the way if necessary, and slam it shut. Next, blink into the kitchen and have Abby take cover, then call the cops. What happened after that would depend entirely on the aggressors. If they stayed, moved in or started throwing around so heavy artillery, Dan would either flee or engage the anvil, depending on how much danger his friends were in.
He hoped it wouldn't co to that. He hoped the gunn would flee once it beca obvious that they'd have to resort to more than firearms. It seed like a reasonable assumption. They were in a car, after all. That implied a certain amount of 'running away' baked into whatever the hell their plan was supposed to be.
Dan closed his eyes, and pictured the scene. The car swam into view in his mind's eye, the details that his brain had stored without conscious effort. The windows were too dark to make out how many were inside, but it was a full sized SUV. His gaze wandered down, past the engine, towards the grille. The car had plates. What kind of moron brought a car with plates to a drive-by? Was it stolen?
A6X JCD
Dan morized it anyway.
What else? Ti inched forward in his mind. The window rolled down, the steel barrel of a gun, held by pale hands. A jerk on his collar and his view tilted. He saw a dark sky, filled with clouds. Heard the roar of automatic fire, a broken staccato that indicated two separate sources. Beneath that, sothing brittle and sharp. Glass breaking? Not from his ho, but the car. At least one person hadn't bothered to roll down their window before opening up. Then, the squealing of tires.
The SUV was two houses down, to the right. They were moving towards Dan's house, but the angle was poor. Their bullets would hit the bulletproof glass windows and the reinforced brick. The angle of his ho ant they'd need to be almost dead center before they could put bullets through the open door, so he had a few monts.
The police cruiser would help. It might be tall enough to impede their aim and they'd have to steer around it. It was parked pretty much exactly where they needed to be. Dan would have ti. His people would be safe.
He was going in circles, now. It was ti for action.
Dan breathed in deep, and waited too find his calm. The cold of the Gap filled him. The numb clarity it provides draped around him like a cloak. His veil settled into his skin, ready for action, ready for orders.
He opened his eyes.
The world slamd back into existence, and Dan moved.
He reappeared in his doorway, standing just to the side of Connor. Ti seed to slow, and the gunpowder drums beat in tune to his pounding heart. Dan grasped the door, ignoring Connor's jerk of surprise as he left his grip. The younger man was already twisting upright, service weapon in hand. His partner fell into a roll, cast to safety the mont they cleared the doorway. A series of sharp cracks danced along the sidelight glass. Flattened lead rained down on Dan's porch, alongside bits of brick and ejected debris.
Dan slamd the door shut.
Connor finished his draw, and pointed his pistol at the closed door. He blinked, processing for a quick mont, before more gunfire peppered the entrance. The rookie twitched towards Freya, before noticing the spiderwebbing along the entrance.
"Bulletproof glass?" he asked incredulously.
Dan didn't answer; he was already moving. He appeared in the kitchen, dragging a startled Abby to the ground. Only her power's deep familiarity with him allowed the action to succeed, and he still almost earned himself a broken jaw from a reflexive elbow. She stared at him from where he'd tackled her behind the counter, surprise quickly morphing into sothing cold and certain. This was no longer Abby, his bubbly, cheerful girlfriend. This was the granddaughter of Anastasia Sumrs, trained and trusted to survive alone out in a very dangerous world..
"What's happening?" she asked.
Dan pressed his phone into her hands. "No fucking clue. Call the cops. Be right back."
He reappeared in the hallway beside his foyer. He could just about see into the entrance from where he stood. Connor and Freya had taken cover behind the staircase, and Freya was shouting sothing unintelligible into the radio on her shoulder. Connor had tipped over one of Dan's heavy wooden tables, and was sighting his pistol on the door from behind it. Intermittent gunfire still rained down on the front of Dan's house, but it sounded lighter, slower. Semi-auto.
"You okay?" Dan shouted over the noise.
Connor's eyes flicked to him, and he motioned Dan away.
"Take cover!" he bellowed back. "Backup is on the way! Just stay down until it's over!"
No sooner than the words had left his mouth, the gunfire stopped. Dan's ears caught the sound of lting tread, as the SUV burned a path away from his ho. Tires squealed, as it rounded a corner, then silence.
Dan crouched down, glancing in confusion at Connor. The younger man glanced back, then slowly slid his makeshift cover forward along the ground, until he managed to peek through the window. He stared for several seconds, then turned to Dan.
"Lock your back door, then find sowhere to bunker up. I don't see them, but that doesn't an they're gone."
Dan nodded, knowing there was no ti for hesitation. He reappeared in the kitchen, next to Abby, still huddled behind the kitchen island. She held his phone up against her ear, and was rattling off their address to a dispatcher. He crouched beside her.
"It's quiet for now," he said. "Go hide in the basent. I'll lock the doors, then join you."
She nodded without argunt, and moved past him, stopping only to briefly mash her lips against his. Dan watched her go, then blinked to his back door. He drew the shutters closed as quickly as he could, then turned the lock. His next stop brought him back to his foyer, where Connor and Freya waited, still gazing outside.
"I've got a hidden basent," Dan said. "Abby and I are gonna hide. You two coming?"
The two officers held a silent conversation, before Freya finally said, "Protocol is to wait for backup, not pursue. We should play it safe."
Connor grinded his teeth together, looking as furious and Dan felt. "Fine. Let's go."
The four of them hid in an ex-vigilante's safe room for about three minutes before backup arrived. Dan kept them apprised of what was going on outside through his doorbell cara, and when a SPEAR Team van drove right up onto his lawn, he knew it was ti to exit. They crawled out of his hidden room, as the van disgorged a cadre of heavily ard, armored and angered cops. Connor barely managed to call out to them before they took down Dan's door with a battering ram.
People sward Dan's ho, searching the premises. Dan and his friends were shuttled outside, under heavy guard. They were parked inside the surprisingly roomy SPEAR transport, and covered in blankets. One of the officers stayed with them, checking them for wounds.
Finally the all-clear was sounded. People dispersed across the lawn, to photograph evidence, and pick up discarded brass. One of the n peeled away from the group and approached them, removing his helt and mask.
Cornelius Graham stared at the group of friends, his expression sowhere between worry and blood-chilling rage.
"What the hell happened here?"
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