Interfering in an active Realmguard operation? If the Realmguard was also here for 'Klein', then that meant they already knew about the ordeal on Dragonsfold, which meant that Ren was even more fucked than he previously believed himself to be. Then again, he was thinking ahead of himself. There were too many layers which he had not dissected.
For now, he'd just blow this guy's head off. He grabbed the pistol from his dresser and stood up. "The kid's ours," he grumbled.
"What was that?" Asked the man at the door.
Ren grabbed Parsh's shoulder and shoved him aside. "The kid's ours," he said again. "We're here to find him." He pointed his gun at the man's chest. He wasn't dressed in a Realmguard uniform, which likely made him some sort of undercover agent. Dangerous.
"I don't know anything about any kid, but if he's here, it'll have to wait until the operation is concluded," he explained. "I've spent way too long setting this up to let some scoundrels ruin it."
"Scoundrels," Parsh growled.
"There's more on the line than you know, agent," Ren said. "I don't want to fight you."
"Then leave," he replied immediately. "If not, you're leaving yourself very little in the way of choice." He glanced to his left down the hallway, where a cart could be seen. A housekeeper was busy in one of the rooms. "Keep it powerless. Too many dustless around."
"Tsch." Ren raised his gun and fired it straight into the man's chest, only it didn't hit the target. What!? The man dodged the bullet and grabbed Ren's forearm, pulling him out of the room and swinging him into the adjacent wall. He raised his gun again, firing two more bullets that sailed wide before taking a fist straight to the face. The force of it caused his head to crater into the drywall. His body went limp and he slumped down onto the floor.
"No powers, huh?!" Parsh yelled. He fired half of his bullets at the agent, who dashed out of the way with Void enhanced speed. "Back me up, you fuckers!" He cried into the room before charging into the hall to pursue the enemy.
[Drask Matreya is activating an attribute: Divine grace]
Drask crouched at Ren's side and immediately started to heal him. He had no real combat utility anyways, so this was the best course of action.
Parsh unloaded the rest of his weapon down the straight-shot hallway. The agent ran, turned around, and flipped backwards over the servant's cart, body skillfully contorting around the bullets as he landed on the other side with all the gracefulness of a cat. As he landed, he placed his foot firmly on the cart and kicked it, sending it down the hallway at breakneck speed towards Parsh.
"Lord of gems… Strength!" He bypassed the full incantation, the gem beneath his jacket glowing through the fabric. His newfound strength allowed him to stop the cart dead in its tracks. He heaved his body and jumped on top of it. As he did so, Savra came out of the room behind him. "Give me a boost, Sav!" Parsh yelled.
Savra immediately understood. He enhanced himself and kicked the cart with all of the strength he could manage. Parsh barreled back down the hallway. He gripped the side of the cart to stay on top of it, wind rustling his hair as he quickly gained on the agent who was busy running away.
There wasn't enough time to reload. He needed a different weapon. Looking down, he found a heap of plates on the cart. Why? He wondered. Not enough time to question. With enhanced strength, plates would be enough. He grabbed one and threw it, then another. The agent took two on the back of the head before turning around in anger. They'd reached a right turn in the hallway, putting the agent's back to a wall.
Parsh leapt off of the cart, kicking it with all of his strength as he did. It slammed into the agent and pinned him to the wall. He took the opportunity to grab the few remaining plates and throw them at Parsh, who was forced to put his arms up and absorb the impact. Tiny shards clattered to the floor.
The pistols they used were the high-tech kind from Mirris V that made all of the sound of a mouse. All for the sake of avoiding the creation of a commotion that now most certainly existed. Parsh ejected the magazine and loaded another one while the agent was busy unpinning himself. He raised the weapon and trained it directly on the man's head at the exact instant he heard a footstep from behind.
The servant! If she suspected something supernatural to be going on for even a fraction of a second, the whole area would be swallowed by a new distortion. Therefore, Parsh spun around and put a bullet straight through the woman's head the second she stepped out of the doorway. An unfortunate casualty, but a necessary one. The body thumped to the ground, and Parsh could hear the agent skittering away behind him with a cheeky laugh.
Parsh ran and swung around the corner. It was a straight twenty metres to the other side. The right side was a wall and the left was a wall of windows, the other side of which led into a vast atrium. He trained his sights firmly on the agent's back, only there was no agent. He was pointing his gun straight at some random old lady. She looked terrified, throwing her hands up and damn-near pissing herself.
"What the hell…" Parsh muttered. Was this some sort of attribute? How had he managed to vanish in five seconds flat? Could it be that the agent was a Dualduster like Parsh? Just as he was thinking this, the old lady kicked him in the side of the head.
Parsh's whole body stopped obeying him. He fell into the wall, his weapon wrenched from his hands. The old lady stepped back, body contorting and rippling like illusory waves, her flesh fighting against the form it had taken before eventually regaining what seemed to be its original form. The agent pointed Parsh's own gun at his head.
"And you are?" Parsh joked.
"The cleanup crew," he replied.
"Protect!" Parsh yelled. A gem glowed beneath his jacket as the agent pelted him with bullets. The gem shield was only enough to protect from three bullets, but that gave him enough time to close the gap and take the shapeshifter at the waist. The man grunted, but was overpowered by the unexpectedness of the movement combined with the dying embers of Parsh's strength enhancement.
"Parsh!" A voice was saying. "Don't be an idiot!" Savra – slowed by hesitation, age, and weaker enhancement – came skidding around the corner just in time to see Parsh slam the agent through the window and go flying out into the atrium.
"Get out of our way!" Parsh yelled. The words resounded through the centre of the hotel, reverberating through the floors.
"You're out of your mind!" The agent replied.
Parsh placed his foot on the man's chest and kicked him downwards. The massive hotel pool waited for him below, luckily vacant due to the late hour. It had a deep end that went down to twenty whole feet. A massive deck with umbrellas and lounge chairs completed with a diving board and a waterslide.
Parsh's gun was flying through the air about five metres in front of him. "Pull!" He yelled, an invisible force bringing the weapon into his hand. He immediately pointed downwards and fired at the agent, whose body was already submerged in the depths of the pool. The bullets struck the water rapidly but stopped before hitting their target. Seconds later, Parsh himself struck the water and his whole world turned blue.
His body was straight. There was an instant of nothingness, sharp pain, and then his feet hitting the bottom of the pool. He opened his eyes and kicked with all of his might to return to the top of the pool, the outside feeling out of reach now. Sure enough, the agent was in his way. Parsh flailed uselessly as his neck was gripped. He was pinned to the bottom of the pool with surprising force. Bubbles leaked from his mouth as the remaining air escaped his body.
This would be a really stupid and random way to die, of that Parsh was certain. Even so, the agent seemed intent on letting him drown. The world started to go black as the last oxygen in his body was expended and he was made acutely aware of the fact that he was running on empty. Parsh thought of very little in what may be his final moments. He had no one that would miss him, only people that would celebrate his death. That was all the more reason to live.
[Parshenam Klearna is activating an attribute: Broker.]
It was a grand irony that Parshenam — a renowned cheater who was masterful with his movements and slight of hand — was granted a main attribute that drew cards at complete random with no way to influence it as far as he knew. Attributes always tailored to the individual somehow, whether that was for or against them. An ethereal deck of cards appeared and fanned out around him. All of the cards were flipped upside down. Parsh desperately reached out and grabbed one at random. Please. He flipped it over to reveal a card with a picture of a bomb and a single word. "Burst".
The agent pressed down on Parsh's throat desperately.
Parsh smiled. He wasn't dying today. The cards had just dictated that he would be the victor. No cheating, just pure unfettered luck. Parsh was never lucky. When he was, it was something to be savoured like a luxurious meal. He held the card and crushed it in his hand, then exploded with power.
He found that he wasn't under the water any longer. The force of his Void energy banished the pool around him. The agent as well backed off and leaped away, soaring into the air above the pool. His clothes were flaming, his face slightly scorched, caught in the heat of the Void energy explosion. Parsh got onto a knee and looked upward, body exploding with energy. Flames licked his limbs, a mask covering his eyes. The water of the pool formed a cylinder around him, halted and pushed back by the pressure of his energy.
[Burst timer: thirty seconds.]
With any luck, that would be enough.