Cane was visiting the home of his first victim.
Well, the first person on the list, to be exact. Surprisingly, or perhaps, unsurprisingly, there weren't many people who owned bear-type mechs. In fact, there were only three people.
The first man was a large, towering, heavy guy named Mikhail. Funnily enough, he was even known to his friends as Heavy. Cane was pretty sure that the guy wasn't the one who'd sent that mech to kill Noelle and the others. After all, Mikhail, aka Heavy, reportedly used this bear mech for home training - hand-to-hand combat.
Despite this, he decided to check, just in case.
And so now, Cane was deciding on his best course of action. After all, The Art of Sneaking Into Other's Homes was not an easy one to master. Especially because Heavy was a Warrior rank awakened. At the Warrior rank, one was 81 times more powerful than an ordinary person at the minimum. This also extended towards their 5 senses, which would be greatly increased.
Thus, Cane began to create his distraction. It couldn't be a suspicious distraction, as - while it might grab one's attention briefly - it'd make the person more wary and suspicious.
Thus, Cane needed to lower Heavy's guard.
Knowing this, Cane quickly sneaked in and entered the window of a neighbouring home, timed just as the man inside left his door. Cane then quickly ran for the Messenger, which was by the door.
A Messenger was a small, handheld box. It had two buttons - one for contacting law enforcement, and one for contacting the closest hospital. That was it. There were no other functions.
One Messenger was mandated within every room, as well as on their person. In this way, everyone had a Messenger on them at all times, as well as within any room in the City.
Cane pressed the law enforcement button.
"Hello, what is the reason for this call?" It was a law enforcement operator.
"Yes. I'd like to report a domestic abuse case? I keep hearing arguments with the couple in the house over, and objects are always getting destroyed over there. Just last night, I heard a scream! I think the husband might be hitting his wife." Of course, that little narrative which Cane had cooked up was a bunch of lies.
"I see. Well, we already know your location, so we'll be sending a team over now."
However, the law enforcement had no way of knowing, and could only send a team to check out the situation. Cane patiently waited.
A few minutes later, a group of police swarmed down the street. They first knocked on Cane's door, to which he opened.
"Over there, officer Bradley!" Cane quickly pointed at Heavy/Mikhail's door. The man leading the charge nodded, though his name wasn't officer Bradley. Well, whatever.
As they moved toward Heavy's door, Cane shut his own, climbed out the window of the house. He then scurried along to the window of Heavy's house, and waited for the police team to knock on the door.
Knock, knock!
"Police, open up!"
The lumbering man inside heard the knocks and the voice, so he went to open the front door.
Cane then quickly entered through the window into Heavy's room. Once he did, he noticed immediately - there was a boxing ring with a powered down bear mech inside. He also noted the scattered boxing gloves around, each of them with strange names.
The Killing Gloves of Boxing, The Apoco Fists, The Gloves of Running Urgently. There was even a pair of metal gloves, The Fists of Steel, as well as a pair of festive mittens called The Holiday Punch.
He looked around one final time, noticing a minigun.
Wow. I've actually never seen a minigun before... Cane marveled at the sight, touching the barrel here and there. Then, he quickly escaped.
This man still has his mech. This isn't the right house.
...
Meanwhile, as Cane left the house and headed to his next target, the police had figured out the confusion.
They had already found out that Heavy was single, and went to check on the building which called the cops on him. No one was inside. Thus, Heavy was let go.
Once he came back inside, he immediately noticed handprints on his minigun.
"Oh my god, who touched Sasha?!" Heavy peered at the barrel of his minigun. He lifted his head up. "All right. WHO TOUCHED MY GUN!!!"
...
Cane was currently scouting out his next target, a mech creator named Henry Emelly.
This one would be a tricky one. After all, the man reportedly had tens of mechs lying around his house.
Cane specifically bought an intense, powerful taser, capable enough to disable rank 2 mechs permanently, as well as stun rank 3's and 4's for up to 10 seconds.
As he entered the house, he noticed the multitude of mechs scattered around the place, each with animal themes.
One mech looked like a red-coloured fox with an eyepatch, another looked like a yellow bird wearing a bib.
Then, he finally saw the bear mech, brown in colour, holding a microphone and wearing a small top hat.
What a strange man. These mechs look perfect for some sort of horror game.
Cane could only ponder to himself. There should be quite a few more bear mechs... I believe there's 10 in total?
He paced throughout the house, noting down the number of bear mechs he saw. As long as Cane found all 10, that would mean the only person who could've killed Noelle and the others... must be Senhei, the final owner of a bear mech.
Four... five...
Cane moved through the bedroom area, where small speakers could be found. I wonder what these are used for.
After a while, he finally found all 10 mechs. His face hardened at the realisation.
"So... Senhei. It looks like you are the one who I need to kill."
Cane's ominous words were cut short as a small cupcake mech pounced on his face, biting and scaring the life out of him.
"Damn it!" Cane first grabbed the cupcake, slammed his other fist into it, then took out his taser and unleashed over 80 billion volts into it. He watched the cupcake twitch and turn off.
"Heh, looks like lightning is the only way."
Annoying thing. I should leave before the other mechs do anything.
...
Cane was now outside of the building where Senhei could be located.
He'd also realised his idiocy while on the walk to Senhei's building.
Stupid, STUPID! Of course it's Senhei, why would the other two try to kill a group of people they don't even know?
Indeed, in hindsight, there hadn't been a need to visit the other two people. After all, Senhei was the only person who dealt with The Black Markets, thus meaning he was a shady guy who wasn't above doing illegal things.
On another note, he was also the only person with sufficient motive. After all, his business relied upon a supply of monsters, which could usually only be sourced from the Border. If there was anyone who'd have a grudge with Cane and the others on the Border Control teams, it'd be him.
Wait, does that mean I visited those other two houses for absolutely no reason??? Cane could only reflect back. As Cane pondered to himself, a poster flew by and hit him in the face.
It read: "There's always a reason..."
Cane threw away the poster. He then climbed the wall to the building, using Steal on the camera, which unplugged it from its power source. He climbed to an AC unit.
Entering the vent connected to it, he began to crawl through and occasionally poke a finger through the thin metal. It couldn't do anything to stop his 9x strength, and he used the hole to peek through.
After he was done, he'd use the Omnitool to grasp the splayed metal and bend it back into shape, effectively fixing the hole.
What was Cane looking for? First, he was looking to check his direction. Senhei's office was on the top floor, and while Senhei himself had no awakening powers, he still had bodyguards - many.
The second thing Cane was looking for was people who were alone by themselves, preferably out of sight. That was his next part of a plan. And...
He'd just found one.
Cane grinned darkly. Then, he used Steal on the cameras. The man below noticed, but before he could do anything, Cane had already punched through the vent and landed on the man's back.
He pinned the man to the floor, covering his mouth and letting the Omnitool enter his nose. From there, it directly blended the man's brain into mush from the inside, before continuing to travel throughout the man's body.
After the process was done, the man stood up once more. But he was dead. What controlled him now was the Omnitool, wrapped around the man's entire skeleton and forcefully moving the man's body like a puppet on strings.
Cane left the building, leaving the puppet man like a hidden bomb. He circled around, entering from the main entrance. It was time.
Cane then began to attack in earnest. Bursting through the door, he began to Steal every camera he saw. Whenever he met someone, or something, be it human or monster, he'd decisively kill them. Cane worked his way through the first floor.
Up above, Senhei noticed the commotion. What? Every camera within the rooms on the first floor are slowly turning off!
He stood up from his desk, pressing a button and sending the building into lockdown. A huge mistake. He thought he'd trapped the mysterious assailant with his guards within the building.
But no. Cane wasn't trapped in there with them. THEY were all trapped in with Cane.
One floor had already been massacred...
Four more floors to go.