He froze, then nodded once, slowly. He had yet to make an offensive move toward me. “So, David—hope you don’t mind if I go on a first name basis with you, since you’re trying to kick my ass—you’re all alone in the big city, you’re supposed to hunt down a girl, and so you decide to murder a couple of locals to draw out the group she’s hiding with, get a bead on them and follow them back to where they work, am I right?” He nodded. “But something happens you couldn’t possibly suspect—they actually bring the girl with them! What fortuitous luck! You must be having the best day.” I stared him down. “What a contrast with your life thus far.” He was frozen in place. “What’s the matter, David? Wolfe got your tongue?” I smiled at him wickedly.
That lasted about two seconds before he grabbed at his belt and threw something at me. It was small and circular, and I flipped back as it sailed only an inch over my nose. I hit my back and sprung to my feet like Mom taught me, already in a fighting stance. I heard a strangled cry from behind and chanced a look.
Kurt and Zack had made it through the crowd and were standing behind me. While I had dodged what he threw, Hannegan hadn’t. It was a collar of some sort and it had caught him perfectly, locking around his neck. He was shaking like a cartoon character caught in an electrical current, screaming, and I could have sworn I smelled urine and worse. Zack took a step toward him, but stopped, afraid to touch him as the big man fell to his knees.
I turned back and dodged another thrown collar. I watched it sail by and as I got back up, Henderschott charged at me. I jumped on top of the planter closest to me, vaulting up and running down the side of it toward him. I came off in a running jump side kick, the kind I used to break boards with Mom. I hoped the heavy sole of my boot would protect me from hurting myself on his helmet.
It mostly did. I hit him where his face would be and I felt the shock of the impact up my leg. It hurt, but not too badly. My knee was locked into place and it held. He had been barreling toward me full steam when we hit and the strength of my kick lifted him off his feet, delivering him on his back as I landed just past him. My leg buckled when I hit the ground, but I managed to stagger and recover, keeping my footing as I swung around to deal with him.
He was flat on his back, legs and arms in the air as he tried to rock to his side. “So, who are you really, David?” I said as I took a couple steps toward him. I reached down before he could roll over and grabbed him by the bottom edge of his helmet. I hoped two things—one, that Wolfe hadn’t lied to me, that his skin wasn’t going to unstick to his helmet while I was doing this; and two, that I was strong enough to pull off what I thought I could. “Just some asshole working for the same people as Wolfe, hunting down innocent metas who don’t stand a chance against your superior experience?” I heaved him up and swung him by the head like a hammer at a track and field tournament (thank you, Olympics).
He flew twenty feet through the air and made solid contact with the wall, crashing through the plaster and leaving a massive hole. I knew I had to press the attack now, while he was dazed, or risk getting stomped when he got his bearings again. I didn’t know if he was stronger than I was, but he certainly didn’t take damage like I did, not with his armor on. I stepped through the hole and saw him on the ground against a concrete wall. We were in a passageway only a few feet wide, with lights overhead.
“Or are you just some sick douchebag who got a hard-on reading Iron Man comics as a kid?” I grabbed him by the leg, dodged the kick he aimed at me, heaved him into the air a few feet and brought him down on his forehead. “Were you the kind of guy who got way too excited at the thought of being Tony Stark? You know he’s not a real person, right?” I repeated the process twice more, producing a satisfying clang of his face meeting the concrete before he managed to twist and kick, sending me flying back.
I blasted through the drywall and hit the floor out in the mall. With a cringe, I rolled to my feet.
“You okay?” Zack appeared at my side.
“I’ll be fine once I mash this comic book geek into paste in his own suit.” I rubbed my chest where the kick had landed. “How’s fatboy slim?”
“He’ll live,” Zack replied as I walked to a nearby wall and opened a box containing a fire extinguisher and pulled it out. “What are you doing?”
“I’m on a roll with these things. Shhh.” I held a finger up to my mouth and positioned myself next to the hole in the wall after I pulled the pin out of the spray mechanism. I waited and sure enough, Henderschott didn’t disappoint, sticking his head out of the opening. I jumped out and yelled “BOO!” mostly for effect, and depressed the trigger. Foam shot out, covering his face, the slit for his mouth and the eye holes—which was the point. He staggered back, clawing at his face. I ducked through the hole and went beneath his flailing arm to get behind him. Once I was, I put my back against the wall and jumped as he edged backward toward me, using the strength in both my legs to give him a hearty shove.
He went sprawling back through the wall and landed facedown with a clang, his metal chestpiece landing on the tile floor. He ripped at his mask and I smiled; he couldn’t see a thing because I had covered his eyes with foam. “Looks like you need some glass coverings on your helmet with some little windshield wipers.” I grabbed him by the helmet again and lifted him over my head, slamming him to the ground. Fragments of tile shattered and flew everywhere; I saw Zack dodging away from us. I lifted him again and started to bring him down but I felt him slip out of his helmet on the downward arc.
Henderschott bounced and landed on his hands and knees, his head exposed. His hand came up to his face and wiped the powdery film of the fire extinguisher away from his eyes as he rose to his feet and his hands dropped to his side. His face was scarred, hideous, with scars from his forehead to his chin. One of his cheeks was sunken in, like the flesh had been stolen from it. His teeth were jagged, what of them were left, and his jaw hung at a funny angle.
I cocked my head and looked at him, pretending to appraise. “You know, I liked you better with the helmet. Here.” Without telegraphing I threw it at him, as hard as I could. He didn’t dodge in time, didn’t even get a hand up. The helmet hit him in the nose and a geyser of blood erupted as his head snapped back. He staggered, moaned and his hand came up to his face. After a second of trying to clench his nose with his metal encased fingers I saw him drop one of his gauntlets to the ground. He held his hand over his nose, but it didn’t do much good. He was bleeding badly; it was slick down the front of his armor.
He looked to be unsteady on his feet and I pulled my gloves off one by one, tucking them into my pocket. He looked at me, his eyes watering. In the distance I could hear police sirens. Henderschott heard them too, his eyes flicked around and he turned and ran into the department store to the side of us. I took off after him in spite of a shout from Zack. “Get Kurt out of here!” I yelled back to him. “Pick me up outside!”
I saw Henderschott running through racks of clothing, flinging them aside, metal and fabric all around me. There were shouts and screams as people tried to get out of his way. He was slower than I was but he made good use of the obstacles in the store to slow me down. He heaved a circular rack that was five feet in diameter at me and I was forced to dodge to the side, pulling a stroller with a kid in it along with me.
I landed on all fours, staring at the face of a very scared baby before jumping back to my feet and returning to the chase. I heard a scream of gratitude from the kid’s mom and the beginning of a serious cry from the kid as Henderschott blasted through the glass exit doors feet first. I wondered why he had jumped through them that way until it occurred to me that with his head unprotected he’d get sliced like lettuce if he had plowed through the glass in a shoulder charge.