Raven found a narrow dry cleaning service entrance into the back room, left over from days it shuttled dry cleaning between the store's front and back. She vaulted over the waist-high wall with ease, landing silently on the cold floor of the back room. Dim lighting from generators lit the back room, barely showing rows of piled supplies and broken shelving units.
Without hesitation, she sent a silent mental command to her backpack. Two smooth, circular canisters shot out one from each side rolling in opposite directions across the dusty concrete. The moment they launched, twin clouds of fog began to spew from them.
This fog poison filled the air like a living organism dense, toxic, and fast-spreading. It moved through the racks and crates like a vengeful spirit. The fog was a mixture of concentrated smoke grenade chemicals and a blend of plant-based poisons Raven had made herself. It was designed to choke her enemies to death and cause terrible bleeding from the eyes so the victims would bleed to death if they did not choke to death first.
Activating her helmet's thermal imaging system, Raven took a step into the fog. Her display highlighted shapes in shades of red and yellow. Human images choked and struggled across her vision, Raiders dropping to their knees, eyes bulging, throats held in their hands. She moved to the right, stepping over a man already on his side affected by the fog, fingers clawing uselessly at the air. He couldn't lift his rifle. Blood was running from his tear ducts now, pooling beneath his head.
She hadn't poisoned the front room where the eight captive women were. That area remained untouched by her attack. Her fog poison rolled only affected the back room under her plant powers control.
Ahead, one Raider already lost his grip on his weapon. His fingers scraped uselessly against the floor as he forced himself to sit upright. When he spotted her approaching through the fog, he gasped for breath and raised a trembling hand.
"Please... help me," he said, choking between words. "I don't want to die like this... I was only following orders."
Raven paused. Her rifle lifted slowly, deliberate and without mercy. Her voice, quiet and cold through the helmet, cut through the sound of his choking.
"Why don't you suffer a bit more before you go to hell."
She pulled the trigger. The round shot into his gut and through his liver. The man collapsed, writhing in pain, blood already soaking his shirt. His screams were intermittent, cut off by the poison in his lungs. Raven took a breath and continued.
This is mercy, in her eyes. A very specific kind of mercy to her, the mercy of pain.
She knelt down beside the man and pulled his rusted hand gun up from the floor, as she put it into her system space. Ravem then stood up and continued walking.
Three more bodies struggled in the fog ahead. Heat signatures glowing dimly. These Raiders are still alive but too far gone to fight. Their bodies convulsed as they bleed to death. Raven didn't wait for them to beg for mercy. She raised her rifle and fired.
Pew. Pew. Pew.
Three short shots. All three stopped moving. Brain matter splaterd across the floor, mixing with the blood and fog poison.
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