Telepathy (Tier 1).
I looked at the floating husk. I smiled.
"No," I said.
I pushed back.
I drove a spike of Tier 1 psychic energy directly into the tank, piercing the glass and slamming into Godolkin's consciousness.
Fuck you, I thought, projecting the words with the force of a tidal wave.
Godolkin's body in the tank convulsed. The fluid bubbled. His mouth opened in a silent scream.
WHO ARE YOU? his mind shrieked, fear replacing the command.
I'm the janitor, I replied. Just cleaning up the trash.
I raised my hand.
Biokinesis (Tier 1).
I reached out to the withered biology inside the tank. I accelerated the decay.
The reaction was instantaneous. Godolkin's skin began to liquefy. His muscles detached from his bones. The water in the tank turned cloudy and red as he dissolved.
The psychic pressure in my mind vanished, snuffed out like a candle.
I watched for a moment as the last of Thomas Godolkin turned into soup.
"Disgusting," I muttered.
I turned and walked away, leaving the tank bubbling in the dark.
…
The city lights of New York were a blur beneath me as I stood on the roof of a high rise apartment building in the Upper West Side.
My next target lived here.
Stormfront.
Or Liberty.
She was maintaining her cover, living among the people she secretly despised, building her social media following, waiting for Edgar to give her the green light.
I adjusted the shield on my arm. I cracked my knuckles.
I jumped from the roof, dropping down to her balcony on the penthouse level below. I landed heavily, cracking the expensive tiling.
The curtains were drawn, but I could hear music inside.
I smashed through the glass doors, the shards raining down onto the carpet.
Stormfront was in bed. She was naked, tangled in sheets with two men… athletic, blonde, nazi ideals of physical perfection. They scrambled back in terror as the glass exploded inward.
Stormfront rolled out of bed, grabbing a silk robe and wrapping it around herself in a blur of motion. Her eyes, crackling with electricity, locked onto me.
She froze.
The lightning arcing between her fingers died down. Her mouth opened slightly.
"No way," she whispered.
I walked into the room, my boots crunching on the glass. I looked at the two terrified men cowering against the headboard.
"Get out," I growled.
They grabbed their clothes and sprinted for the door, scrambling over each other to escape the room.
The door slammed shut.
Stormfront stared at me. "Soldier Boy," she breathed. "You look... good. For a dead man."
"Liberty," I replied. "You look... cheap."
She laughed, a jagged sound. "I go by Stormfront now. You know how it is."
"Where have you been, Ben?" she asked, her eyes narrowing. She was scanning me. "We heard stories. Russia?"
"Russia," I confirmed. "It was cold. The food sucked. And the hospitality left a lot to be desired."
"And now you're back," she said, taking a step toward me, her hands sparking again. "For what? A reunion tour?"
"Retirement," I said. "Yours."
She sneered. "You think you can just waltz in here and threaten me? I'm not the same girl you knew in the 70s, Ben."
"You're just a Nazi bitch," I said flatly.
She screamed, a sound of pure rage and launched herself at me.
She flew across the room, a bolt of purple lightning trailing behind her. She hit me square in the chest, the impact driving me backward through a wall.
Dust and drywall choked the air. I shook my head, standing up in her living room.
My chest plate was scorched, but the skin underneath was untouched. Tier 1 Super Defense.
"Is that it?" I asked, dusting off my shoulder.
She hovered in the hole in the wall, her hair floating around her face, electricity arcing from her body like a halo.
"You arrogant bastard," she hissed.
She unleashed a torrent of plasma. It was a continuous stream of high voltage energy. It slammed into me, engulfing me in purple fire. The heat was intense. The carpet caught fire. The furniture melted.
I lowered my head and walked into the storm.
I forced my way forward, step by agonizing step. The plasma pushed against me, a physical wall of force, but I was immovable.
I reached her.
I grabbed her ankle.
"Gotcha," I grunted.
I slammed her into the floor. The impact shook the building. The floor cracked.
She shrieked and blasted me in the face, point blank. My vision went white.
I punched her.
My fist connected with her stomach. She folded, gasping for air.
I grabbed her by the throat and threw her across the room. She smashed into a bookshelf, sending books and trophies flying.
She tried to fly up, to regain the high ground. I threw my shield.
CLANG.
The brass edge caught her in the shoulder, shattering her collarbone. She dropped out of the air, crashing onto the coffee table.
I walked over to her. She was trying to crawl away, one arm hanging uselessly. She looked up at me, blood streaming from her nose.
"You..." she wheezed. "You're supposed to be old."
"I aged like wine," I said. "You aged like milk."
I grabbed her by the hair and hauled her up. I slammed her against the wall, pinning her there with my forearm across her throat.
I felt the heat building in my chest.
Her eyes widened. She felt the temperature rising. She saw the glow beneath my skin.
"Ben, wait," she pleaded, her bravado cracking. "Wait. We can... we can work together. I have influence. We can rule this place. Just you and me. Like the old days."
"The old days are dead," I said. "And so are you."
I released the blast. A point blank detonation of nuclear fury.
The wall behind her evaporated. The ceiling blew upward.
Stormfront screamed as her skin blistered and peeled away. Her regeneration factor tried to fight it, tried to knit the cells back together, but the radiation was too much.
It attacked her on a genetic level, stripping away her powers, burning the Compound V out of her blood.
And then, it burned the rest of her.
The blast wave threw me back. I landed on my feet in the center of the room, smoke curling from my suit.
When the dust settled, there was nothing left of the wall. The night sky was visible through the gaping hole in the building.
And on the floor, amidst the rubble, was a blackened husk.
I walked over. I nudged the remains with my boot. They crumbled into ash.
"Auf Wiedersehen (goodbye)," I whispered.
I turned and walked out of the apartment, leaving the fire to consume what was left of Liberty.