"Hold on, comrade! I'll help!" the Russian yelled, then attacked Fino with surprising precipitousness, flailing his arms and legs around. Drops of blood that had been running from his nose flew through the air. It even seemed like he'd managed to give the gangster a jab in the chin.
"Why, you little . . ."
Fino's punch sent Roman flying all the way back to the desks.
The Russian's body fell, his limbs limp and motionless. He didn’t move anymore.
Blinky Palermo laughed. “Russians sure didn’t win the Battle of Stalingrad this time.”
Fino and Ford positioned themselves on either side of Hagen. Ford tried to get behind him to grab his arms. Hagen saw through their maneuvering and kept stepping back so as not to let anyone outflank him, all the while blocking Ford’s long-ranged kick attacks. Neither gangster felt like rushing him head-on—Hagen’s fists were to be reckoned with.
Billy Palermo lost his patience. “Are you really as dumb as Roman said? Why do you dance around him? There’s two of you! Grab Blueeyes, knock him to the floor, and start kicking the shit out of him!”
Fino and Ford kept elbowing each other forward, as if to say, You go first, and I’ll do all I can to help you.
“Get going, or everybody gets a month of solitary confinement! Two months!”
Fino and Ford dashed toward Hagen.
His fists slid off their bodies without doing much damage. A second later he found himself on the floor. One of the gangsters’ sneakers got him in the ribcage. Another was aimed at his head, but Mike managed to block it. It took him an enormous effort to grab Ford’s foot and twist it. Mike had meant to drop him to the floor, but only managed to take off his sneaker. Still, he’d gained enough time to rise and assume a fighting stance.
Warning! You have less that 20% HP left!
Quit the battle...
To hell with these messages!
At that point, the system gave Hagen another buff that had initially seemed idiotic. He’d already experienced it during his battle with Sylas aka Ken.
Last chance!
Severe danger of fatality! Quit the battle immediately!
+10 to Agility for 10 seconds
Hagen felt gripped by impotent fury. This was no time to wait for a chance occasion to change the course of the battle. He was in prison, and the only way out would be whatever the law would allow. And there was no law here but Blinky Palermo.
Hagen had been holding his Tactical Pause ability in reserve all the while. He was happy now that he’d invested a few points in it, disregarding Dem’s advice. He’d been meaning to whittle down his opponents’ HP as much as possible so as to knock one of them out guaranteed during the pause.
But what if he used it while under the effect of a buff that boosted his Agility?
There was no time to calculate probable outcomes. On the other hand, there was time. It had just stopped.
Tactical Pause, Level 2
+29 to Perception (2.5 seconds)
+29 to Intellect (2.5 seconds)
+29 to Agility (2.5 seconds)
+1300% Metabolism (2.5 seconds)
It felt so nice and quiet. Blinky Palermo had been as noisy as a whole stadium of fans.
A mystic light lit up the darkness of the workshop. Mike could even see the dog-ends on the floor and the shiny screws in the wooden stools. The guards around the ring were immobile dark silhouettes.
Mike saw a fragment of night sky through the window, amazed by the number of stars. All of them were incredibly bright. The sky wasn’t dark, either—dark blue, rather, the way it was at dawn. His regular vision showed him the stars with such clarity that it seemed he’d been looking at them through a telescope.
Inhale...
He turned around to face his adversaries. Ford froze in an awkward pose trying to pull his sneaker back on. Fino was standing in a wide stance, trying to punch Hagen in the forehead. His fist froze about an inch away from Hagen’s face.
Perfect. Since he’d already dealt some ostensible damage to Ford, the most dangerous opponent would now be Fino. Or would he? Obviously not.
Exhale...
Hagen turned around to face a frozen Blinky Palermo. That was the most dangerous enemy here. And he needed to be taken out first.
Hagen instantly crossed the distance between himself and Blinky, swinging his fist to punch the much-hated warden in the face.
He stared into the old man’s colorless eye. He registered the fact that Blinky’s only pupil was dilating from terror. He must have realized something extraordinary was going on.
Hagen restrained himself from punching—that would extend his sentence to twenty years, or life. He’d been ready to kill the warden, after all. Instead, he just gave him a flick on the nose.
Inhale...
Mike was back in the ring in a split second.
Exhale...
He’d seen enough. He deflected Fino’s punch, then gave him a straight jab to the face.
Damage dealt: 35,200 (Punch)
Mike followed up with a left hook to Fino’s temple.
Fino dropped onto the concrete floor.
Mike didn't even need to turn toward Ford who'd already had his sneaker on and rushed to help.
Mike kicked out with all his strength, just like he used to do back when he was still learning the skill from Wei Ming. He was holding on to one of the desks that had stood around the ring instead of a chair this time, though.
Damage dealt: 19,200 (Kick)
Mike got him right on the bridge of his nose. Ford fell to the floor, sliding across it like a rock star on stage, and buried his face in the desks.
There was a silence.
Or, rather, Hagen realized it had been silent in the workshop for a while.
The silence was only broken once when one of the guards swore under his breath, mentioning the Devil, and instantly offered a brief prayer, ending with an exclamation,
“Blessed Virgin Mary, Our Lady of Guadalupe! What was it?”
The worst had happened to Blinky Palermo rather than the defeated gangsters. He seemed to have stayed in Tactical Pause mode. The warden was still sitting on his chair, completely frozen, a thousand-yard stare in his only eye.
His cigar had fallen from his fingers a while ago.
Hagen took a step back, still looking at the warden, and then felt the earth slide from underneath his feet.
He plonked himself down onto one of the desks. The system bombarded him with reports of victories, available points, and serious debuffs resulting from the use of Tactical Pause. Even Demetrious sprang back to life, wryly telling Hagen to expect a substantial decrease in his cognitive abilities for the next twenty-four hours.
Roman had already come round and was now supporting Mike, helping him stay upright.
Blinky Palermo remained motionless.
His cloudy eye became even cloudier. The old man’s mouth started to stretch open as if to scream, but no sound came out.
The guards remained confused, but Hagen had already known it. Augmented Reality! Platform never made mistakes.
Blinky “Cloudy Eye” Palermo
HP: 0
Current status: Dead
As if letting Hagen finish reading his stats, the warden finally tilted over and slumped to the side. The guards panicked, gathering and rounding them up while trying to get Palermo up.
Dr. Borkowski turned up out of nowhere too.
Roman and Hagen were promptly handcuffed and taken away. They heard Borkowski’s voice behind them say,
“A heart attack. He’s a goner.”
Nevertheless, the doctor told the guards to get Blinky to the medical room.
Once they got back to their cell, Roman suggested they leave discussing everything that had just happened till the morning and sleep on it in the meantime. It didn’t take Mike much persuasion to agree.
It took a while for sleep to come, though, but once it did, Mike fell into some bottomless abyss.
He woke up in
a place he couldn’t recognize. It felt like dawn. Whatever it may have been, it wasn’t the prison for sure. It looked more like a forest, albeit a really weird one. Colors raged all around—orange, purple, and blue, as well as every shade of the three. The tree trunks were about ten foot thick. Some creature was hanging from one of the boughs... a snake? A two-headed snake?
The creature hissed. Mike started back, jumped up, and took a few hasty steps to the side. Then he looked around. He stood at an enormous white stone. The small glade around it had unusual vegetation growing on it, but looked more or less normal.
As for the sky... There were myriads of stars shining so bright they seemed within hand’s reach. And there were two suns rising over the horizon, no less. One was larger than what he’d considered normal, and the other, around the size of the Moon. Only the Moon never produced such a glare.
He’d been dressed in his usual clothes—just like the kind he’d used to wear before prison. He had no injuries nor scars—it felt as if he’d never fought against Fino and Ford simultaneously.
It was a strange dream. The fact that it was a dream had seemed obvious to him, but he was amazed by how clear and realistic everything looked.
“Dem?” Mike called the assistant, feeling even more panicky, but there was no reply.
He heard the bushes behind him rustle. As Mike turned around, he saw a man in a spacesuit emerge from the woods.
The stranger touched his own helmet. The visor slid back, revealing his face. Hagen’s first impression was of youth, but the pain in the man’s eyes seemed too profound for someone as young as he’d seemed.
Mike gave a start. “Who are you?”
“Phil’s the name. Don’t worry, I won’t harm you,” the stranger said gruffly. “You’ve just respawned, haven’t you? What life are you on, worm?”
Hagen gave a vague shrug. Uncle Peter had always taught him that if one misunderstood a question, it made sense to ask for clarifications, but the advice didn’t seem applicable to this situation.
What Mike had initially mistaken for a spacesuit turned out to be something else—a matte black military outfit of some sort. The man had a dagger in each hand. One had green slime dripping off the blade, and the other billowed black smoke into the sky.
Someone armed like that was best approached cautiously. Provoking the stranger with a show of ignorance or dimwittedness would be inadvisable.
“Are you Björn?”
Before Mike could answer, the man decided to ask a more specific question, “Is your name Björn, worm?”
“Björn?” Mike was surprised; the stranger seemed well-informed. “How did you know? Actually, Mike’s the name. Mike Hagen. And I’m definitely not a worm.”
“You are the worst kind of worm, Mike Hagen! A useless nobody who’d managed to cling onto his pathetic life, while those much worthier than you...”
Mike got royally pissed off. Who did this Phil think he was? Armor and daggers... So what? He’d crushed many a tougher foe.
Mike clenched his fists... only to wake up drenched in sweat. Roman snored on his bunk, and they both were in the same old prison cell.
Chapter 27. Shiny Automobiles
Only the insane equate pain with success.
Alice Madness Returns
IN DUE TIME, Hagen was transferred to his hometown’s corrections facility.
He had never imagined he’d return like this. Anyway, he’d only have to spend some two weeks here, and the conditions were drastically different from those in Binky Palermo’s empire. Everything was permitted here. They had mobile phones, Internet, and unlimited access to weightlifting machines. There were local kingpins too, of course—petty criminals of the sort that still stole car stereos—but they soon realized they’d be better off leaving Hagen alone. He didn’t get too cocky, either, preferring to serve his term to the end quietly.
Gonzalo sent him a message a few days before the date of his release.
Hey, cuz, I’m real sorry I won’t be able to meet you. But guess where I am. In Vegas, no less! Would you believe it? That’s right, and I also received an invitation from Luke Lucas, and will take part in the screening tournaments. So, I’ll be waiting for you here. I have already rented an apartment, so you needn’t worry about accommodation. Just come over as soon as you can.
Next Gonzalo send a selfie taken against the background of a sports facility with a UFC logo and a poster announcing the date when screening matches would begin. This peaceful picture of a friend somehow became a symbol of the end of the nightmarish prison period to Hagen.
One evening he heard the clangor of prison doors behind his back for the last time and found himself a free man.
He felt the same inside. How odd.
On the other hand, there was the system message:
Life or Death: quest completed!
Congratulations! You’ve received a new ability level!
Ability name: Insight
Current level: 2
This was followed by a description of Mike’s new skills and abilities. The gist of it was that there were more of them now, and there were interface enhancements to boot. He didn’t have time to read it all at once, but some things became accessible instantly.
This peculiar ability provided a mini-map with icons of all living creatures within a range of three hundred feet. The range would expand as his Perception leveled up. There were two green icons across the road—those stood for friendlies. One was Uncle Peter, and the other... Could it have been Mr. Riggs?
It was indeed. The ex-cop was all dressed in black, wearing shades and holding a toothpick in his teeth.
Hagen had a feeling that a map featuring everyone in a certain range with detailed stats was far from being the only new element. However, he would sort the details out later. He waited for the traffic to pass, and then ran across the road.
Once Hagen had given his uncle a proper hug, Riggs took him aside.
“I won’t go into all the details, but this money is yours.”
Hagen was looking at the thick wad of dollar bills that Riggs had stuffed into his bag in some confusion. He felt even more confused to see the legend $30,000 in the corner of his vision. Augmented Reality! Platform was now taking care of his budget, too.
“Where does the money come from?”
“Call it a present from Alexa Hepworth, hah hah. The girl’s real mad at us, though. You’ll be best off leaving this town because she won’t let you get on with your life here.”
“I didn’t intend to live here in the first place. Why should she be angry at us in particular? Also, why did she give me this money in the first place, and where do you come into all this?”
“Do you really care? You don’t need thirty grand? Fine with me. I’ll take it back, then.”
Riggs pretended to reach for the money in the bag, but Hagen jerked it toward him. He’d need the money for his journey to Las Vegas.
“Hah, look at your reflexes now, kid! You know what’s good for you at last, don’t you? Anyway, I just wanted to say goodbye. I’m leaving , too. My brother in Louisiana keeps pestering me to go fishing every year. Time to take him up on it. He also talks about restoring a nineteenth-century windmill and turning it into a hotel.”
Mentions of Louisiana, fishing and windmills made Hagen shudder at the recollection of old Charlie Evans. All his stories with tragic endings were set in Louisiana. The prison impressions were still too fresh.
Riggs was about to head toward his SUV when Hagen asked him,
“Sir... Lexie... I mean, Miss Hepworth. When did you last see her? How’s she doing?”
“Hah, son, the last time we met she was furious. But the girl is doing all right in general. While you were in jail, she was busy encroaching on Howell’s business. He’s her pageboy now, running errands. But the only way she really wants the old man to run is toward retirement. Incidentally, should you ever feel nostalgic, stay away from DigiMart.”
“Why is that?”
�
�It’s gone. They’re building a shopping mall on the site now. I’m telling you, once this Lexie girl had gotten herself some clout, she changed everything in a blink of an eye.”
Riggs said his goodbyes and drove off.
Hagen stood there for a while as if trying to remember the taste of those old half-forgotten words and images—Lexie and DigiMart. There was nothing there but faint shadows. They all seemed completely unimportant now.
It hadn’t been that long, though. When did it all change? It felt like a long time ago, but Hagen had been counting days like any prisoner. It was just a little over two months ago that he’d been transported to that maximum security prison on a bus. There he became just another felon in a bunch. When Hagen received his uniform and his number, he finally realized that he had transformed from a free US citizen to the property of the Department of Corrections.
It would take some time for him to re-adapt.
“Watch out, Mikey!” his uncle shouted suddenly.
Hagen saw a disheveled Latino approach them, pointing at Hagen with a knife.
Mini-map presented him as a blinking red “unit.” Without a hint from the system, Hagen would never have recognized this emaciated junkie as the formerly terrifying Lorenzo aka Brix.
It sure didn’t take him a long time to turn into this pitiful creature.
“So you didn’t expect me, you bastard?” Lorenzo yelled, waving his knife about. “And I did!”
“You mean, you’ve been expecting yourself?” Hagen made a swift comeback.
“What? You, I’ve been waiting for you! Think you’re a funny guy, you bastard? Let’s see who’ll be laughing now, güey!”
* * *
THERE WAS NOTHING to laugh at, however. You didn’t need to be a psychic to see what had been going on with Lorenzo. He got hooked on smack right after he’d left the correctional facility. Prison must have been all that had stood between him and self-destruction. Hard drugs were near-impossible to score there.
Level Up- The Knockout Page 41