#chekhovs bolt cutter

[echo-goes-mmm]

Old Friends #4

Masterpost

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Note: Charlie, the doctor, uses they/them pronouns.

Warnings: implied past starvation, violence

Laith picked at the food on the tray. He’d been stuck in the complex for a week, and there was no end in sight.

Techmaster had wheeled in a tv and dvd player a while ago, but Laith had already exhausted the stack of movies and there was only so much on Netflix he was interested in.

Currently, The Two Towers (extended edition) was humming along on the screen as he pushed around the potatoes on his plate.

He wasn’t hungry, but he should probably eat anyway. The doctor, Charlie, had told him he was nearly fifteen pounds underweight.

Nightclaw had always been stingy with food.

Laith scratched at the power dampener on his ankle. It was at an awkward place; he’d rather it be around his arm or something. But he wasn’t going to ask.

The other restraints had been removed, but Guardian didn’t want him using his powers to slip away. 

Begrudgingly, Laith could see how it made sense. He had information; they weren’t going to let him go. 

He ate another forkful of potatoes. At least the food was okay.

___________________

Theo sat back in his chair, twirling a pen. He was barely watching the upload progress on the computer; it had been three days and it was still stuck at 68% progress.

He hated the waiting game. He’d run out of things to tinker with, his desk a mess of screwdrivers, wrenches, and a bolt cutter.

He didn’t feel like working on his big projects either.

Theo stared up at the high ceiling. Mateo wasn’t taking care of the cobwebs like he said he would.

The computer beeped, so suddenly he nearly fell out of his chair.

He righted himself. The progress bar shuddered forward in a lurch, and there it was.

Nightclaw’s entire server system, available right at his fingertips. Theo settled his hands on the keyboard.

Where to start?

___________________

Nightclaw’s filing system was clean and organized, which made it easy to navigate. But the sheer volume of notes and documents was overwhelming.

Power dampeners, power, p, p, p…

Power dampener was not under ‘P’. Or ‘d’. Or even ‘w’ for world domination. Not that Nightclaw had a folder named ‘world domination’.

What was under ‘P’ was ‘Pictures, Laith’. The tiny pixelated icons splashed with red and pale peach dots, blood on skin.

Theo hovered over the icon of an image, hesitating. 

He clicked the back button. Laith didn’t need more invasions of privacy.

___________________

Theo had thought about worst case scenarios when Beatrice told him Nightclaw was experimenting with power dampeners, but his imagination apparently had nothing on the supervillain’s. 

He scanned the blueprints. 

From what he could tell, one of the designs was explosive, throwable dampeners. When they hit a target, the dampender exploded, covering the victim in a fine powder that stopped their abilities.

Temporary, but enough that Nightclaw could kill or capture whoever he wanted.

The other design was a much nastier version of Laith’s shock collar. There was no lock, designed to be soldered onto the neck. Tiny, needle-like spikes poked towards the flesh of the wearer. The metal had been switched out for a sturdier alloy.

He zoomed in one of the lines of notes, but the screen went black.

White text appeared on the screen.

Catch me if you can, before Clarksville gets leveled. Two hours. XOXO

___________________

Laith caught them just before they left.

“It’s a trap,” he warned. “He’ll kill you.”

“He’s tried before,” shrugged Beatrice, “and hasn’t managed it.”

“Yet,” muttered Laith.

Theo pulled on his kevlar. “We’ll be fine,” he said, but this time he was unsure. Those dampeners looked flawless. It was only a matter of how long they could dodge.

“Be back soon,” winked Mateo, scooping up Theo and climbing up into the sky.

___________________

“Come on,” said Charlie, “we’ll watch on the computer.”

They led Laith over to the massive desk, pulling up the feed of Clarksville news cameras.

Laith never understood the fascination of watching superpowered people thrash each other. He looked away from the screen, his eyes falling on the bolt cutters and wrenches on the table.

Charlie pulled up a tab of another news station, and then another, until they could see the fight from four different angles.

Laith looked up.

It was going well, it seemed. Three on one, until a boom sounded in the distance. From the shake of the cameras, it must have been a huge blast.

Guardian zoomed off to save lives, and it was just Warrior and Techmaster dodging Nightclaw’s weapons.

Laith watched the blurs on the screen move. He bit his nails in worry.

Nightclaw threw a- a something at Warrior, and this time she wasn’t fast enough.

She went down, cratering towards the earth.

Techmaster shot a grapple towards a skyscraper, intercepting her fall. Laith let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding.

But with Warrior down, and Guardian busy with yet another bomb going off, Techmaster was alone.

Nightclaw advanced on him, twirling his blade. 

Laith knew the specific stalk of the supervillain. He was aiming to kill.

Laith snatched the bolt cutters off the desk, severed his dampener, and left for Clarksville, Charlie’s shouting still in his ears.

___________________

Laith stumbled out of the shadow. The air smelled of smoke, and there was screaming in the distance.

He was on the right street, certainly. In fact, he’d landed exactly between Nightclaw and Techmaster.

What was he thinking?

Nightclaw stared at him, dumbfounded, before his face curled into a sick twisted smile.

“Aw, here to join the fun, darling?”

Laith scrambled to his feet.

“Get out of here!” shouted Techmaster behind him.

Nightclaw flexed his grip on the blade, a horribly familiar gesture that made him want to run.

He didn’t have the energy to teleport away, using all his juice to get there in the first place.

Nightclaw made a single step forward, and Laith turned and bolted.

___________________

“Bea, come on,” he muttered, shaking her by the shoulders. He managed to get off most of the powder that downed her in the precious few moments Laith had bought them, but those moments were almost up.

He didn’t want to find Laith dead on the pavement, but the more he waited for Beatrice, the more likely that would be.

She groaned, still groggy.

He couldn’t wait for her any longer.

Theo grappled into the skyline, scanning as he vaulted across the rooftops.

The streets were empty, but the smog still made it hard to see.

But then, he saw a blurry figure on the ground.

He ziplined down.

___________________

Nightclaw’s fist dripped with blood, but he didn’t stop hitting Laith until Theo tackled him.

Nightclaw shouted in surprise as they rolled on the ground. He shoved him away with his super strength, and narrowed his eyes at Theo’s interference.

A chill ran up his spine at the expression of hatred on Nightclaw’s face, wholly different from the detached “my-toy-is-no-longer-amusing” demeanor he was used to.

Laith pushed himself up to his knees. “Don’t, Master,” he whimpered, tugging at Nightclaw’s cloak.

Nightclaw kicked at his hand, stomping it into the ground. Laith cried out, and Theo watched in horror as Nightclaw’s boot heel twisted into his hand.

Theo took a step back as Nightclaw stepped forward. He tripped on a pothole, falling backwards to the ground, and Nightclaw took a blade from his side.

Theo’s heart pounded in his chest. He knew what to do, logically, but fear prevented him from reaching into his belt for a weapon.

Nightclaw made another step forward, raising his dagger.

Laith leapt up from the pavement, slamming into Nightclaw. He wrapped his arms around the supervillain’s neck, and they were swallowed up in shadow.

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#i never said i could write action #but i try #chekhovs bolt cutter #my writing #whump #villain whumpee #villain whump #hero whump #old friends