While Alex and the rest of the Shane Gang stayed behind, forming a human barricade to hold back the avalanche of hypnotized people without hurting them, Eli Shane didn't waste a single second.
He sprinted toward the fourth-floor glass balcony overlooking the mall's massive drop. Without a second's hesitation, Eli vaulted over the railing.
Gravity did its thing, pulling the young hero down into a deadly fifty-foot freefall.
Alex, who had just fired a containment net, caught the suicidal maneuver out of the corner of his eye. His eyes went wide behind his dark shades.
Wow... Alex thought, genuinely impressed as he watched the kid plummet. I'll hand it to the kid, it takes some serious balls to pull a crazy stunt like that without a parachute.
But Eli knew exactly what he was doing. In mid-freefall, he drew his blaster and fired a Frostcrawler slug straight at the wall of the elevator shaft.
The blue slug burst on impact, instantly creating a thick, gleaming spiral waterslide of solid ice. Eli landed on the icy track with pinpoint precision, sliding down the makeshift ramp at breakneck speed, the cold wind whipping his face.
He reached the ground floor in seconds. As the ice slide ended, Eli launched into the air, executed an expert combat roll on the tile floor to absorb the impact, and rose to his feet in one fluid motion.
He was breathing heavily, but his mind was sharp. He quickly scanned the lower level for the illuminated exit signs. He spotted the heavy metal door of the emergency stairwell: the only route Mr. Saturday could take down.
Eli bolted toward the exit, planted his feet firmly a few yards away, and drew his blaster with a mechanical click, aiming dead center at the door.
He only had to wait three seconds.
CLANG!
The metal door slammed open with a deafening crash. Mr. Saturday stumbled out, wheezing and looking nervously over his shoulder, fully expecting to see the entire Gang tearing down the stairs after him.
When he finally snapped his head forward, he froze. He was staring straight down the barrel of the young Shane's blaster.
"What the—?!" the villain gasped, eyes bugging out. "How the hell did you beat me down here? That's impossible!"
Eli tilted his head, his aim unwavering.
"Took a shortcut," he replied with a smirk.
But Mr. Saturday hadn't become a crime boss by giving up easily. Snapping out of his stupor in a burst of sheer desperation, he raised his own blaster with lightning speed. In the barrel, the Hypnogrif slug was already glowing intensely.
He pulled the trigger.
A thick, unnatural beam of pulsing red light shot straight at Eli's face.
Caught in the most basic human survival reflex, Eli tried to shield his face with his forearm, squeezing his eyes shut, bracing for his willpower to fade and his mind to be broken.
The beam hit.
There was a blinding flash that bathed the entire ground floor in crimson light.
And then... nothing.
Eli slowly lowered his arm. He blinked a couple of times. His mind was still his own. His thoughts were crystal clear. There was no alien voice barking orders in his head.
The hypnotic ray had bounced harmlessly off the thick, tinted lenses of the welding goggles Alex had made him wear. The basic, pragmatic science of the Blakk Industries officer had just saved his life.
Mr. Saturday's jaw dropped. He lowered his blaster with trembling hands, realizing his ultimate weapon was now entirely useless.
Seeing his greatest trick fail miserably against a cheap pair of welding goggles, Mr. Saturday let out a high-pitched shriek of panic. Like a bat out of hell, he spun around and, in a desperate bid to escape, started sprinting clumsily toward the mall's main exit.
Eli didn't even bother chasing him. With the calm precision of an expert marksman, he flicked his blaster barrel and fired a Polero slug.
The creature launched, transforming mid-air into a pair of heavy spheres connected by a biological rope. The bola whirred down the concourse and tangled tightly around Mr. Saturday's ankles.
WHACK! The villain face-planted onto the polished floor, dropping his cane and scrambling against the tiles. He began to struggle pathetically, trying to break free from the organic binds, while Eli approached with a slow, steady pace—like a hunter cornering his prey.
Meanwhile, up on the fourth floor, the situation was far from under control. It was absolute chaos.
"There's too many of 'em!" Kord grunted, gritting his teeth from the strain.
The massive blue Cave Troll had hoisted a heavy solid oak table and was using it as a barricade, holding it with all his might against the relentless tide of hypnotized people pushing against them. His thick arms trembled under the collective weight of the mob.
"The great Pronto is entirely out of slugs!" the Moloid squeaked, backing up against the wall and frantically patting the empty cylindrical tubes on his bandolier. "Would anyone be so kind as to lend a few to your valiant friend? I promise to return them... eventually!"
Trixie, who had just fired her last net to seal off one of the side corridors, looked around with growing desperation. That's when she noticed a crucial tactical absence.
"Where the hell did that jerk go?!" the redhead cursed, scanning the lingering dust cloud for the Blakk officer.
They had been so busy holding back the horde that they hadn't even noticed when he vanished. Trixie clenched her fists. She was convinced the arrogant soldier had used them as a distraction to cut and run, saving his own skin.
Down on the ground floor, the soft, civilized Ding! of the elevator bell shattered the tense silence between Eli and Mr. Saturday.
The polished metal doors slid open slowly.
Alex strolled out of the cab, brushing an imaginary speck of dust off the shoulder pad of his black uniform. With total nonchalance, he flicked his wrist and loaded a Taserling slug into his blaster's barrel, snapping the chamber shut with a satisfying metallic click.
Eli, who had been about to arrest the villain, spun around to look at him, eyes wide with surprise.
"Call me a coward if you want..." Alex announced with a lazy drawl, strolling down the concourse toward the downed Mr. Saturday, "but I'm not jumping four stories into the void when there's a perfectly good elevator. I like my legs intact, thank you very much."
Alex stopped right in front of the villain, aiming the crackling, electricity-laced barrel point-blank at Mr. Saturday's head, and gave Eli a lopsided grin.
"You done with your heroic little foot chase, Shane? 'Cause I already crossed the finish line without breaking a sweat."
The echo of the elevator bell still hung in the air. Eli, relieved to see that Alex had come down to help secure the prisoner, relaxed his shoulders for a fraction of a second.
It was the worst tactical mistake he could have made.
In one fluid, calculated, and lethally fast motion, Alex whipped his blaster up. He didn't aim at Mr. Saturday, who was still squirming on the floor. He aimed dead center at Eli Shane's chest.
And pulled the trigger.
The Taserling fired at point-blank range. Eli didn't even have time to raise his arms.
ZZZAAAP! The young hero let out a choked gasp and hit the floor hard. His muscles locked up instantly as a massive electrical charge surged through his nervous system, leaving him completely paralyzed. His vision blurred, but he could still see and hear what was happening around him.
Taking advantage of the kid's temporary paralysis, Alex calmly walked over to Mr. Saturday. He stepped on Saturday's shoulder to pin him down further and crouched to pick up the villain's bizarre weapon. It was a mechanical aberration: some sort of cane crudely fused with a blaster mechanism.
Mr. Saturday, seeing a glimmer of hope in Alex's betrayal, cracked a repulsive, desperate smile.
"Hey, hey! You work for Dr. Blakk, right?!" Saturday squealed, squirming like a worm at Alex's feet. "Then we're on the same side! Get me out of this thing and together we'll take out these meddling idiots. We could rule this place!"
Alex stopped inspecting the weapon and looked down at the pathetic man with the terrible name. In Alex's dark eyes, there wasn't a single shred of camaraderie; there was only cold, absolute disgust.
"Go to sleep, scumbag," Alex said, his voice ice-cold.
Without giving him time to blink, Alex flipped the heavy, modified blaster and delivered a brutal pistol-whip straight to his temple.
Crack! Mr. Saturday's head bounced off the tile floor, his eyes rolling back. He was out cold instantly.
"I hate kidnappers," Alex muttered, spitting to the side.
Then, he turned his attention back to the weapon. He examined the mechanism until he found a glowing switch on the side. With a sharp click, he pressed the button.
The weapon let out a high-pitched hum and released a spherical pulse of pure white light that expanded silently throughout the mall, phasing through walls and ceilings.
Up on the fourth floor, the sound of mindless grunting ceased immediately, replaced by the confused murmurs of dozens of civilians waking up from their mental lethargy. The people had been freed.
Satisfied, Alex popped open the barrel of Saturday's blaster, pulled out the small, disoriented Hypnogrif slug, and tucked it carefully into one of the empty vials on his tactical belt.
As his own evil Taserling ghoul hopped back into its reload tube, Alex walked over to Eli's paralyzed body and crouched beside him.
Eli, who was just starting to regain control of his breathing, glared up at him with a mix of sheer fury and betrayal.
With a swift motion, Alex snatched the welding goggles off Eli's face and tossed them aside.
"Sorry, Shane. Nothing personal, strictly business," Alex told him quietly, almost apologetically, as he loaded the newly acquired Hypnogrif into his own blaster. "But don't worry about your hero's conscience: the civilians are fine, and they're going home."
Alex aimed point-blank at Eli's unprotected eyes. The slug began to emit its pulsing, reddish glow.
"Sweet dreams," the pink-haired Commander whispered.
As the visual impact of the slug hit Eli, the entire world dissolved into a dizzying spiral of colors. His mind powered down, sinking into a dark abyss.
"Eli! Eli! Eli, wake up!"
Three distant, panicked voices yanked him violently out of his trance. Eli let out a sharp gasp, arching his back as he bolted upright on the floor. With a hard shake of his head, he finally managed to get his bearings back.
Kord, Pronto, and Trixie were kneeling around him, looking downright panicked.
The very first thought that crossed the young Shane's mind wasn't about the traitor, the slug, or even his own health.
"The people!" Eli exclaimed, gripping Kord's arm tightly. "What happened to the civilians upstairs?!"
"Whoa, take it easy, bro, take it easy!" Kord reassured him, placing a massive, heavy hand on his shoulder. "They're all safe. They're confused and sporting killer headaches, but they're back to normal. The hypnosis is broken."
Eli let his head fall back, letting out a long sigh of relief. At least they hadn't failed where it mattered most.
Trixie, however, was livid. Her fists were balled up tight, and she was glaring around like she wanted to strangle somebody.
"What happened to you, Eli?" the redhead demanded, her voice shaking with rage. "We saw a flash from upstairs and came running down! Where's Saturday? And where did that backstabbing jerk go?"
Eli blinked, clearing his vision, and looked over to where the young, pink-haired Commander had been standing. There was nothing. All that was left was the Polero slug and the broken welding goggles.
"They're gone..." Eli muttered, clenching his jaw as frustration washed over him. "Him, Saturday, and the Hypnogrif. He took the whole package back to Blakk Industries."
Eli slammed his fist into the floor. They had won the battle for the people, but Dr. Blakk had just secured a terrifying new weapon for his arsenal.