Blood continued to squirt out in pulses from the deep neck wound, filling the alleyway with a squelching noise as it spurted out and doused the surroundings. The fallen man coated Kanashima's hand with the same thick ruby red liquid, staining her Adrienne's coat even more. Just hours ago, they watched one of their companions get slammed into by a large vehicle, and now that same person responsible for the tragedy just took another one of their own. As if she was mocking the officers, she used her leg to shove the downed body towards them, a line of blood tracking across the concrete.
The first officer of the now trio to bring themselves out of the initial shock and respond in kind was their assigned partner and protege immediately to the right of them. Redrawing the sleek black pistol from their right leg, the cop brought it up to his watering black eyes, attempting to aim down the rudimentary iron sights. The barrel shook immensely despite being held in both of his gloved hands, even the small movement of his finger moving from the fully extended position to inside the trigger guard took the barrel from the left of her shoulder to the right of the opposite one.
"What the hell are you doing, rook? Fucking shoot her, damnit!"
Her internal circuits flared up to life once more, purple streaks surging through her nervous system once more. Not being able to keep her concealment during an attack was a huge drawback to the applications of her cloak, but the time to dwell on it would have to come later, she had to reactivate it fast to continue her rather desperate attempt at survival. Urging the perk along even further, she allowed her batteries to pump more and more of her precious resource out into her system until it went from normally warm feeling to uncomfortable, and ultimately searing the insides of her own body.
Whatever she did to accelerate the start up for her ability worked just in time, removing her from the lines of sight of the three guns trained on her previous position. Dropping off to the side of the group, one of the bullets blew right through her previous position. If she hesitated for even a second longer, or her cloaking technique took even a hundred milliseconds longer, that single round would have pierced through her heart and done her in.
Oh my God, this is seriously bad.
The past two encounters that ended with somebody's death had been perfectly avoidable, both in situation and in death, but this event's stakes tipped the scales. These police officers were no longer interested in simply detaining her like the first chase, granted that was before the traffic incident. She was truly fighting for her life now, one wrong step could do her in for good, any normal person would be frightened at the mere notion of dying. Taking a couple steps back from the group, her knuckles turned white around the full tang wooden handle, the liquid dripping off of the blade slowly.
Despite the chaos unfolding right in front of her, she was unnaturally, and quite unnervingly, calm. There were no current reservations crossing her mind anymore, they wanted her dead, she wanted to live, that was all there was to this combat. She couldn't justify the two deaths before in this same way, and they were eating at her. It terrified her that she just killed another person a few seconds ago, the circumstances different, and yet it still felt the same. A bad taste was forming on the tip of her tongue, the faces and lifeless eyes of the three humans staring at her. All she could do was stare back. No matter what the circumstances were, how threatened she was, or even how deplorable these fellow humans were, they were still people.
Why am I… so calm right now?
So many words could describe her current mental state. Regretful, tired, shameful, and terrified all crossed her mind several times within the past thirty minutes alone. Usually some normal person would be descending into the depths of madness right now, screaming out into some abyss that won't listen. These moments of clarity were absolutely not natural for a murderer, or even just somebody fighting for their life.
Is the virus affecting my mental? That's… incredibly terrifying. Am I losing my humanity?
Even the people she was facing down seemed frightened, just how she was. Their eyes wide, white knuckles gripped onto their respective weapons, shaking more than a dog after being left out in the rain. These hostiles were trained professionals, officers that had been preparing for encounters with criminals like this, that had experienced so many malevolent confrontations before. This should not have been new to any of them, even if they were a rookie, anybody applying for the police academy knew what they were getting themselves into the moment they looked at the curriculum.
Panicked looks stretched far across their faces, and Kanashima felt like she had to be feeling the same way. That would've been the natural form for her state of mind to have taken during something like this, even the professionals were. Instead, she was quite the opposite, her thoughts calm, but calculating. Moving at a brisk, but steady pace. She could think and consider her options efficiently, perhaps even more efficiently than a more stagnant state and environment. The only thing that came to mind was a cartoon she watched in her childhood.
Is this what those so-called heroes felt in the throes of battle? Some sort of efficient battle trance that enveloped them? I'm nowhere near experienced enough for something like this.
This had to have been one of the many facets of the ALFA virus inside of her, it was the only explanation that crossed her mind that was somewhat plausible with her current information, and yet, it upset her. She heard the horror stories growing up, everybody did, about the people getting lost in the power, losing who they were as people. Everybody had a cousin or a brother or a friend or some other sort of roundabout relationship with a person who succumbed to the humanity drain of the virus. Nobody exactly knew what part of it did them in, or if it was all of it, or even how it affected the person going through the stages of losing themselves to the virus. Was she really about to suffer the same, horrifying fate? How much more does it take until she's no longer truly human?
Despite the realization, nothing she could do in this moment would shake her off the tranquil state of mind. It would have to come later it seemed, after whatever battle art she was inadvertently using wore off, if that really was an ability. There were still three people in between her and some much needed rest, and she was going to get out of this. Originally, she knew what she had to do, but questioned if she, just a fragile and broken girl, had the strength to continue killing others, but this clarity washing over her brain was all she needed. Of course she could, killing didn't require strength. It wasn't smart, it wasn't kind, murder was a stupid blight on the world, and what really took strength were the people that could resist doing it.
I'm not smart. I'm not strong. I am weak, I was destined to be a murderer.
Carefully watching the movements of Officer Blackwell, he was undoubtedly the highest priority of the three cops left. If what she heard from them was true, he was the Jackal, the one that had obtained her electronic signature from wherever and used his ability to track her down. If she wanted to escape, then he would have to go, the other two could get away alive and it wouldn't be the biggest deal in the world. The rookie hadn't seen her face yet, the scarf she bought paying dividends now, but Flamenco still remembered. Regardless, it was the best she was going to get.
I just have to wait for another opening.
A few moments later, an iota of purple light caught the corner of her eye, illuminating a rather large crack in the concrete floor. Blackwell's left shoe managed to catch the crevasse with the tip, pulling his leg downward and halting his step and causing him to lose his balance. Better yet, a cloaked Kanashima was only a meter away from his misstep. If there was ever going to be a better chance, she wouldn't know of its existence. There's no telling when or if it would come.
Stepping forward and out of the cloak once more, she appeared right before the stumbling man, knife drawn back once more. The torso of the falling officer was exposed now, all she had to do was step forward, twist her hip, and throw her weight into the stab right into the abdomen.
The Lover's Lullaby was an excellently crafted blade with a keen edge and point sharp enough to pierce even the toughest of tree bark. It was highly durable and the virus even told her that it was a flawless, tier four armament. The blade clanged off of the metal alloy plate on his chest, directing her knife's direction to the side.
I didn't even notice the armor. How does he still move so fast?
Bringing up the knife once more, she made a second attempt higher up on his body at his exposed neck, but it was already too late. He had already regained most of his footing and made a considerable amount of distance between the two. The keen blade passed through open space like it was nothing. With the battle's tempo reset and no longer in her favor, danger settled into Kanashima's instincts once more.
Goddamnit, what do I do?
The two more seasoned officers were taking a few moments with their hands inside their jackets, looking to be reaching for something, or possibly summoning an armament. Whatever it was, it was taking forever to retrieve, for the time being it would be her against the rookie in a gunfight, and she brought a knife.
There's no time. Just go.
Pushing off of her left foot, she switched the direction of her body and closed the distance once more, now with the newbie. The gun shook in his hands, a purple spark flicking off of his finger right when he pulled the trigger. The young cop pulled the gun far too down trying to adjust his aim on her, and barely missed her neck, clipping some of her hair off. A few hundreds of milliseconds later, the knife was already being brought down onto his left arm, lacerating his forearm and tearing through his wrist. The gun fell out of the single hand still holding on, clattering onto the hard, uneven ground.
Staring into his sweet and desperate napier eyes, Kanashima had never felt more clarity in her movements and mental processing than before. She drew the Loving Lullaby behind her back, raised her aim to not make the same mistake as last time, and exploded forward once more, intent on piercing through the officer.
The rookie cop was not ready to give up just yet, dropping his shoulders to the left and reaching for the ground. His fingers strained, trying to at least get a single digit on the fallen firearm of his. If he just leaned a few centimeters closer, his small hands would be able to drag the grip towards him. A couple shuffled steps, his upper body leaning closer towards the gun, his eyes widened, feeling the textured pistol grip.
Kanashima flipped the knife around in her hand and dropped her arm down right in front of her like a hammer, coinciding with the location of the rookie's head. Leaning over it, she drove her weight down into the downward strike and was met with a tough resistance, then audible cracks. Eventually, the newbie's body stopped rejecting the blade as much, and several more centimeters were able to submerge into his skull, poking the squishy organ inside.
As the sharpened metal made contact with the brain, and thus, his nervous system, the alloyed conductor began to take on some of the electrons coursing through the head. The visible portions of the blade took on a slightly green hue from its normal grey, glistening around and even texturing the weapon. In shock, her grip on the stolen armament tightened, dragging her down to the ground as the body it was attached to went limp. For some reason, most likely relating to the shades of green the blade was taking on, pulling out the blade was a much more difficult task than sinking it in, and her frail muscles were struggling.
Taking a glance up, she found out what was taking the other police officer duo so much time, two handheld armaments of their own now trained on her position.
Damnit, more guns?