The impending sound of footsteps urged Bryce to finish hijacking the security computer, but there wasn't any option to hasten the progress. It was like his fingers where having a speed competition with the footsteps. Both sounds combined created a magnificient rhymth, threatening to drown the listeners in deep anxiety.
He surrendered to the inevitable event of him confronting the alerted men. As one of them forcefully kicked the foor, he used a smoke bomb. After locking the door from the inside he decided to use himself to distract the enemies from halting the hack. The men tried to regain their sight and chased after him. Bryce hid himself into the vent before being caught by the team that was divinding its member to walk separate ways.
Each of the men was on his own track and looked around in order to block him from escaping their grasp. That wouldn't work on something already found its hiding spot though. The hostile men struggled to search for the target that had been given the chance to blend itself into the environment. With that, Bryce would be the one to take the initiative if he decided to.
'Aw god, why had these guys come so early? Did something happen to those three?... Not my problem, they only needed me for the hacking
Bryce's body rested as his mind was occupied with doing its job. So far, the mission had seemed to go well regardless of the alerted men. He had ten more minutes before the hacking would be completed, thus silently taking down the ones eyeing on him would be the best course of action for the moment. Good thing he had more than enough to bullets for the silencer on his hand to deploy.
Carefully loading the magazine, Bryce aimed at an unaware guard's head and shot him. The silencer reduced the gun noise significantly so his scheme wouldn't be caught. The one standing next to the shot guy was alerted but Bryce wanted to make sure that dead man tells no tales. He made the second headshot, taking down a portion of the advantage the group of guardsmen had.
His next step was to lure them steps away from the security room. Bryce decided to let his presence be known and have the men taling him, of course he would maintain the distance. However, the men wouldn't let their pride be trampled by a mere intruder. They each equipped thermal vision goggles and the chase went back to its nature where the prey was at a disvantage.
Bryce wouldn't back down because of that. If they wanted warmth then he would just add some steam into the place by shooting at the pipes.
"Gah! This kid is no joke! He knows how to handle military people."
"He's just a brat while we've been training for years. We'll play hide and seek with him as he wishes."
Bryce kept running even though he noticed that no one was chasing him anymore, which was odd. His worries were indeed true, the guardsmen had blended themselves in the flowing steam. All of them chose to listen to Bryce's footsteps to pinpoint his whereabouts and where he could be heading to.
With each step, Bryce started to feel like he was being watched. Yet he couldn't see exactly where such force was from. Suddenly, three men appeared behind him and tackled him to the ground. Their leader showed up as he clapped slowly.
"You brat gave us quite a trouble there... but a child is still a child no matter what."
The men dragged the captive Bryce along to an office room and two of them were tasked with keeping watch on him. All the usable items were confisicated of the young lad's body. He was tied on to a chair, his limbs could barely move more than 1 inch. He didn't even feel like wasting his breath to make protest to deaf ears. Normally, one should just play along to see how things would go.
Bryce had lost the game of catch, but somehow he knew that the others would easily win in a chase. After all, two young maidens and a guy weren't randomly selected to participate in the heist. Whoever made the call must've have thought a lot before affirming their decision.
As expected, a sound coming from a guard's communicator requesting backup. Bryce chuckled to himself, thinking whether the others came to save him or not, he would make it out in the end. Because he wouldn't want to spend another while being stuck while the bastard who took away what he held dear get to live. It was his oath to be the karma that would come to collect the debts. He had gone so far not to be stopped by the feeble men on duty.
One of the guards noticed Bryce's stern face and chuckled.
"Don't worry, we won't forget about you. We have plenty questions for your circumstance specifically."
"..."
"We won't be taking the silent treatment not so lightly after this."
...
Running and running restlessly, Geofrey along with Mabel were trying to reach out for Bryce. Mabel paid no heeds to the guards threatening their steps and handled them like cleaning pebbles. Some invisible force swiped them on the walls to make way for the three.
Finally they arrived at the door labelled at security but the the door was locked from the inside. Mabel took a few steps back before tackling down the door with a kick. They went inside only not to find him in any corner. Geofrey looked around calmly.
"Perhaps he was already captured by the guards. We should try to strike a deal with the,"
"Uncle G, we should just smash them."
"Lucy, I believe we've already done far more than necessary. I don't want any failure to happen just because of momentary urges."
"Mabel, say something. Uncle G is saying that you should refrain from using your blessing." Lucy protested.
"Uncle, while I feel thankful for your concern but I did not train so hard only to lose to those indifferent organisms."
"..."
"My raw power shall prevent them from doing anything suspicious. Of course I'm not forgetting the mission."
"Very well."
The group of three followed the traces left behind. It seemed like somone was running away from the guards but got captured in the end. They believed it to be Bryce and kept following the traces. The guards watching over Bryce noticed unwanted arrival and used him as a hostage. The group of three looked at Bryce and he just shrugged, nothing more.
"You better not doing the thing you did to our felow mates or this lad will have it."
"Ha!" Bryce grinned. "I doubt that."
"Do you take us for fools, brat. We had you in our palms, your friend don't seem to intend on having you harmed so we have the upper hand."
"Tsk! Tsk! Tsk!" Bryce shook his head. "It won't be them who will save me?"
"What?"
"My... mates are coming for me." Bryce let out a soft chuckle.
At his words, a horde of android with white and blue painted neatly on the artificial homosapiens. They loaded their guns and aimed at the guards, ordering them to release the... admin. The two men were still in shock, they couldn't believe to see the special steel force was deployed without any prior notice. Then it dawned upon them that the mentioned admin happened to be Bryce.
"Damn you brat! The security computer was supposed to be keeping such access hidden. How... did you gain control of them?"
"I don't know, maybe I am a prodigy like Miss Lily once said." He sighed. "Farewell now."
Bryce signaled the androids to take them away. He turned to the three and noticed Lucy holding some shiny golden sphere in her arms, guessing that it must be the artifact they sought out after. He folded his arms while looking around.
"Alright, let's get out of here."
The three nodded at his words. They tried to backtrack all the way back to the place thay came from. More guards appeared and threatened to shoot immediately but Bryce's army of androids were on his side to assist with his escape. With that, the group just let the droids do the attacking and they kept going on their track without delay.
"Young lad, you shouldn't just leave important stuff behind."
Geofrey gestured at the suitcase he was carrying with his left hand. Which was something Bryce forgot in his attempt to survive. The suitcase consisted oh useful tools and others stuff that were not easy to invent. Geofrey said that the head researcher of the organization they worked for would be angry if the suitcase was damaged or something supposed to be inside it missing.
'Whoever they are, they must be something insane.' Bryce thought to himself. Walking so calmly without a care in the world as the droids overwhelmed the guardsmen of the facility, they finally arrived at the exit. It turned out that there was a different way to access to the facility through the museum but it was more of an escape route. Well, used to... to be precise. At the moment the expected chamber containing stairways was filled with guardsmen all over. To make it worse, one of them even revealed some kind of a cassette that prevents the droids from functioning, shutting them down.
"Aw come one, that was a nice trump card to have." Brcye grunted.
"You four over there, surrender now and hand over the sphere. It belongs to this place."
None of them intended to give away the item they were tasked to retrieve. Even though the gunpoint was aiming at them, it wouldn't be the end... yet. Bryce thought about using the artifact itself to open an escape route. But first, they must somehow protect themselves while trying to use it.
Slowly losing patient, the middle-aged man wearing military uniform gave a signal. The men started firing. Mabel knew what to do, she tried to block off the bullets from reaching her group. The bullets ended up repelled back at the attackers, causing many men and the leading man himself to be on the receiving end.
A man holding an RPG was summoned over by the man and he aimed Bryce's group. A laser beam was projected out of said weapon but it didn't hit the group and instead the sphere that slipped away from Lucy's arms, causing it to break. A black sphere was instantly spawned and it devoured anything in sight as it grew bigger and bigger.
Bryce and the others thought that they would die but what each of them saw later on said otherwise.