Chapter 6: Adam & the red theater
——————————————————
Adam cocks his hand-cannon back, readying
to fire, then rapidly pursues Darren.
Upon seeing this, Darren jumps back, forming into a puddle of black ink as ink-based paper cranes shoot out from the puddle, now moving along the theatre's floor at high speeds; Adam shoots three orbs: two towards Darren as he moves around in between the seats, and the third Lands around the ceiling lights up above the theatre.
While dashing towards Darren, he twists his body at an abnormal angle, opens his hand, and blasts pure hollow energy from his fingertip, compressed to its absolute limit; the bullet drives into Adam's abdomen, flooding him with intense pain; however, he keeps pushing, and with his left hand, golden hollow energy sparks gleam brightly for a few seconds, forming a golden mantle around his body in the form of a hooded cloak.
The golden cape extends to his shoulders. It sits firmly on his body, while a circle of interconnected crosses wraps around Adam's right wrist, and a golden halo appears atop his head, glowing with otherworldly light.
From his left eye, a deep orange hue shines. Adam aims his index & pointer fingers, clicking his thumb back and pulling the trigger as he fires; both bullets strike directly at the formless ink body, creating a warp effect as both shots drill into Darren, blasting out his backside and sending him reeling into one of the theater's massive pillars.
BOOM!!
Darren flies into the pillar, and it crashes loudly. Part of his body is still manifesting in black ink, his eyes darting in and out in confusion, then flicking over to a man wrapped in gold, a shining halo above his head gleaming with radiance.
"You're one shiny motherfucker."
Darren places his hand on a destroyed pillar, infusing it with his own hollow energy; the object morphs into a deep shade of ink, reshaping into a long, serrated whip to slash at Adam.
"I came here to get information mostly, but seeing as you want to cause unnecessary trouble to others, I'll be sure to end this as efficiently." Adam places his hand toward the ground; his eyes go digital for a few seconds, and he says, "complex configurum." And hundreds of Adam's recon drones gather around to protect him as he follows up with a command.
"Protect all non-threats and secure target."
The robots' eyes go green; they all turn to Darren and charge at him. Raising his arm, he swings the whip forward, cleaving through hundreds of recon drones; Adam, on the other side, dodges the attacks despite the increased speed, his senses fine-tuned for high-stakes situations.
In the midst of the battle, other recon drones were dashing past the two fighting and began grabbing people who were either hiding behind stands or the chairs in the audience seats and quickly leaping outside, landing in the city streets; the citizens who were injured by falling debris or Darren random ink splashes, the drones opened their robotic mouths, releasing technological healing gas in the area to help repair damage to the bodies of the civilians who were caught in their crossfire inside & outside.
Still whipping, Darren increases his hollow energy output; he's been using it to strengthen his muscles so he can swing faster and hit more often.
Without losing momentum, Adam whips his golden mantle to the side, blocking the incoming flurry of powerful whip swings; the ink whip shatters on contact with his mantle, sending intense vibrations through Darren's hand.
Now recovered enough, Darren uses burst flow, hastily boosting himself up to the second stage of red theater, and quickly jumps behind the stage to give himself cover away from Adam's finger gun; two more shots ring, blasting through the long, hanging red and white curtains, following up his attack. The young bounty hunter blitzes to the side of the ink-controlling irregular to shoot him.
" I know you're more than just a messenger; you've got connections to who I'm looking for, the four-star and five-star bounties that the federal alliance placed out to find."
Darren, with a confused expression, turns to look at Adam, his arm still ringing from the pain of the destroyed weapon. A second later, the young man pulls himself back together, his deep black ink fully reforming, then reshapes his body into a mini motorbike and speeds off to escape Adam's grasp.
However, despite his speed, Adam kept a comfortable pace with Darren, utilizing precise burst-flow movements to bounce off air surfaces with ease. From above, the orb turned light yellow, falling and exploding into a frozen burst of time, freezing the bottom half of Darren's body into the ground as his ink wheels stiffened.
With his upper body still unfrozen, he reshaped his two arms into giant hammers, then sent them out and furiously smashed the seats and stands alike. Adam continued to dodge between his hammer strikes.
'Dammit, why can't I hit this guy? He's only using burst flow, but his movements are too acrobatic.'
Before Darren could gather his thoughts anymore, he felt stinging pain in his chest and saw a thin blue line of hollow energy connecting him to Adam's chest. The golden-eyed bounty hunter pulled the trigger once more, releasing two shots into Darren arms, causing them to fall and droop for a few seconds
Blood spewed from his lips as he was still healing the damage he'd taken from the bullets Adam shot at him; his face twisted into a fit of shock, wondering what effect this thin line of hollow energy was now having on him:
'I can sense my output fluctuating after every shot I've been hit with involving his gun. I'll need to avoid him as best I can, make my way out of this place, then call extra security to help deal with this. Maybe I can call upon one five-star potential.'
Darren opened his mouth, unhinging his jaw as copious amounts of ink poured out, creating a massive pool of Black ink.
His voice now gargling and filled with terror:
"Damnit!! Fine! I'll tell you what you want, but first… you'll have to catch me first."
The young man tore his upper body from his bottom half, which was still frozen in time from Adam's yellow free orb, as he landed in the pool of black ink he spewed from his body; within the puddle, elongated hands pour out from the ground, forming into giant creatures made up of black ink. They have sixteen arms in total, covering their backs and sides, and two separate heads that constantly bleed black ink from their empty eye sockets, low-hanging mouths & four legs for walking.
Adam jumps back for a second while shooting; his golden mantle shines brightly, blasting a blinding light from his finger gun that stuns the monster for a few more seconds before it can attack the other recon drones still securing lives.
Immediately after, Adam materializes a maroon-colored orb, which he calls "picture crash." It quickly forms in his free hand; he aims it with a finger-flick motion and fires it toward the ink beast at immense speed.
The orb pops, then forms a large picture frame behind the ink creature, showing a beautiful painting of a deep, unfathomable ocean with endless space beyond what the eye can see; the painting warps, then spills open, causing a massive wave of water to drop onto the beast, making its form rattle & collapse as it tries to reform.
Without a second lost, Adam, through hollow energy manipulation, finely controls his manifestation of a picture frame and sinks it, capturing the entire ink monster in one swoop of motion. A second later, he condenses the picture, crashes it down to fit into his palm, and crushes it into fine maroon mist.
Slowly, he turns to look up and realizes Darren managed to escape while he was trying to protect the civilians outside.
"I still have ways to track you down." Adam opens his hand again and activates his complex configurum, forming a swarm of small firefly-sized recon drones, sending them out from the red theater to follow traces of blood and hollow energy, like lingering aura leaks and residuals.