Raj arrived at the high-rise building and went in to see an impatient-looking lady in the reception area. She had dark circles around her eyes and from the looks of things it did not seem like she was getting any sleep. She had Sunkissed skin with freckles and looked absolutely stunning in her green dress. She looked to be around his age.
"Hi, I am Raj, are you here about the Electric rat problem?" said Raj showing her his ID to confirm he was the one who talked to her.
"Hi, I am Jenna, I was the one who reached out to the job board for the extermination request. My apartment has a rat infestation, and the building management is taking its time to resolve this. I have been living in a nearby hotel for some time now. I need my place to be cleaned up. My mother told me you would be coming in to clean the place." Jenna went on a rant, it looked like she was on her wit's end.
"Ummm Yeah. I can help you with that, let us go to your place and clean the rats out. Do you know how many rats are infesting the place?" Raj asked as he tried not to get lost in her emerald eyes. Something about Jenna seemed to ring bells in his head. He was sure he would remember her if had seen her before.
"There are about 5 rats the last time I checked my security system in the house." She said almost shuddering at looking at the vermin.
"Lead the way, let's take a look at the problem." Raj gestured at the lift. Her name and her face still nagging at the back of his head. There was something so familiar about her, yet he could not connect her to anybody he saw before.
Raj chanted to himself to keep cool as they made their way to the lift. He also reminded himself to keep his eyes focused on the back of her head and not let them stray down. After about a minute they reached her apartment, and she checked her security system to see the rats frolicking around in the living room.
"See what I am dealing with, I have school tomorrow. I am already late enrolling after my transfer and now I must deal with these vermin. I almost can't take it anymore" Jenna replied as he took a shuddering breath to control herself.
"It looks like there are about 7-8 of these rats in here now. Let me send in some recon to check the exact number" replied Raj. He kept having a nagging feeling about Jenna. She felt so familiar.
Raj let the 3 of his micro drones take off from his backpack and initiated surveillance. Before they could take off, he let his Syn cells hitch rides on these drones and camouflage them. Slowly three of his drones entered her living room through the vents in her apartment. He could overlay the display of these drones on his vision using his latest HUD tech. It showed, three drones flying in her apartment, and they started tagging each of the rats they found. At the end of it, he found about 9 of them in the house.
"Looks like there are 9 of them in there. I will be going in and getting rid of them. Please stay outside until I am done with the extermination." Raj said as he pointed at the keypad for Jenna to enter her apartment code. He could have opened it using his powers, but he did not want to come across as a creep. What he did not see was, when he released his drones Jenna's face looked thoughtful as if she were trying to remember something.
Raj entered the apartment, the rats in the view of his drones perked up as if they heard him enter. They started chirping and calling to the others to get into position against the interloper. He could see their short hairs raise and ready their electric discharge. The Electric rats looked just like common rats except they had blue and shiny fur and could shoot these inch-long hairs at you. The hair had sticky oils that created an ion trail which when they shot electricity from their mouths formed a trail of lightning at their targets.
In the end, the effect was that they shot lightning from their mouths. This lighting attack was very strong, and a pack of rats could bring down Grade E or Grade D man down to his knees. Then they would attack the person with their razor-sharp claws until you ran away from them. They were not interested in attacking humans and were more of a nuisance than a threat. But the rats had enough electricity in them to power a block for a day.
These rats were very territorial and left people alone if you respected their territory. As soon as they spotted Raj, they started shooting bolts of electricity at him. When the first bolt hit him, he was extremely nervous. When he realized he was pretty much insulated from their attacks he became more confident. All the rats now joined in sending bolts of electricity at him. The entire group gave him a full course of electricity.
The energy counter on his HUD started showing an increase in the energy it gathered. It was at 3% charge now, his experiments started paying back right off the bat. He let himself soak up the energy as the rats let him have it. After about a couple of minutes the energy bar filled up to 5% and the rats finally ran out of electricity. They ran at him with a vicious glint in their eyes. They were mad at how ineffective their attacks had been.
When the first rat reached him, he was ready for it. He opened his baton completely and swung at it, it skipped to the side and jumped at his hand and bit into his hand. He could feel a slight pressure on his forearm. He also heard ripping sounds near his feet.