Fast as fuck boi!
According to the laws of cinema, a static scene should have started now, where the shooters aim at each other, but no one has yet dared to open fire first. Then, depending on the director's talent, there follows either a tense dialogue in the spirit of Tarantino films, or a shootout with firing anywhere but at the main characters.
Alas... the director we got wasn't the most talented, because although there was a slight hesitation before the shooting, the tense dialogue boiled down to shouts: "Drop it yourself, scum!", "I'm going to shoot your fucking head off, bitch!" and "He broke my fucking nose!"
The latter, obviously, was from our loser who risked getting too close to the sheriff. By the way, he also managed to drop his gun, and was now trying to simultaneously stop the bleeding by pressing a bandana to his nose and frantically pick up the dropped weapon.
I used the seconds of hesitation to make the boys drop to the floor and tip our table over on its side—at the same time, I even had to yank the one sitting opposite me, and therefore with his back directly to the showdown, out of his chair and drag him to my side. The table itself, of course, isn't much of a defense, but it might save us from a ricochet; after all, they won't be shooting from Kalashnikovs. But the main thing for me here was that from such a position it would be much more convenient for me to act than if we had continued to sit in our places—and I really hope that I already have enough speed to move outside the perception of the human eye. The time I accidentally walked in on my parents during their debauchery in the living room, Nolan managed to dress himself, dress Mom, and hide the traces of the mess in the room in literally a fraction of a second, so that I didn't even notice anything. Only an unnatural gust of wind in the room and Mom's t-shirt put on backwards indicated the parents' sudden bout of sexual hooliganism. But I am not my father...
The sheriff decided to shoot first, soberly assessing that while one of the robbers was temporarily disarmed, his chances were the highest.
And at the same time as the police bullet went into the forearm of the gang leader, who clearly didn't have time to react, the third criminal also lost his nerve... or he simply calculated quite cynically that, standing almost behind the cop who was aiming at his accomplice, he himself risked practically nothing and could shoot first.
It's time!
I started moving at the same time the cowboy opened fire on the black guy with the gold chain.
It was practically that scene from superhero movies with mutant speedsters that fans like so much, only in the first person, which made it even cooler—for me, naturally. Yes, it's really quite cool—to move in a practically frozen world and see how slowly a bullet flies to its target. It seems my training has borne fruit after all; I feel that I am already fast enough to outrun a bullet, a pistol one at least.
Although this was not generally required of me.
I simply knocked the shooting bandit's gun up from below so that the shots went into the ceiling, cast a quick glance over the scene—it seems none of the civilians are in danger, the leader is wounded, the third criminal hasn't picked up his weapon yet—and returned back even before the second hand on the wall clock finished the next little step it had started simultaneously with me.
This sheriff looked quite confident in himself, so I decided to give him a chance. In the end, he also has a gun; if I just ensure the clumsiness of his opponents, he should be able to handle the rest himself.
Another heart-rending scream of pain filled the diner when the leader caught a bullet from the sheriff.
"What the..." the second shooter was taken aback at the same time, staring in shock at his own hand, which had rebelled against his desire to shoot the cop.
And thereby attracted the cowboy's attention. Turning to the sound, he quickly caught his would-be killer in his sights and, without hesitation, fired. This time into the chest, in the area of the left lung, dangerously close to the heart—this wound could even be fatal. Now whether the guy turns out to be a convict or a corpse depends only on his luck and how quickly everything ends so that doctors can take care of him.
One of the customers screamed in terror at the sight of the body falling, as they thought, already dead. The boys also seemed to freeze, their eyes glued to the masked face that was now writhing in pain and frantically gasping for air through the fabric stuck to his lips with blood.
"He really is good," I couldn't help but note. "For a human, of course."
In literally two seconds, the man fired two quick but accurate shots, and then smacked the poor guy with the broken nose once again. He had only just managed to reach for his gun when the sheriff's boot flew into his face.
And most importantly: no one seemed to notice my absence.
"Turn around!" Will suddenly shouted right in my ear, which I hurried to do.
Son of a bitch!
The wounded leader had grabbed the gun with his good hand and was aiming at the sheriff, and behind him, the manager of Burger Mart had already swung the cash register—this really surprised me, I didn't expect him to have the courage for something like that. Unfortunately, the boss didn't have time to save the cop; the bullet was already heading straight for his head.
Already confident in my speed, I got up again and quite calmly caught the bullet right in front of the cowboy's face, who was just starting to turn in the right direction, after which I returned back.
A gunshot rang out along with the sound of the cash register hitting the bandit's head—I intercepted the bullet faster than the sound wave from the shot reached us—after which the latter fell and was showered from above with loose change from the burst-open cash register. And following that, next to his victim fell the boss, shocked by his own bravery to the point of losing consciousness.
Well, now it's definitely over.
"Huh?!" someone exhaled into my ear.
Turning around, I met Will's shocked gaze.
"You? That was..." I had to cover his mouth with my hand before he attracted the attention of the others.
"Quiet!" I hissed, looking around to see if anyone had noticed, but no, the boys were still staring wide-eyed at the dying man, and the rest of the customers were too far away to hear us.
Making a scary face, I put a finger to my lips, demanding silence, and added in a whisper for reliability: "Not now!"
In William's eyes, which were wide as saucers—or as they would say in my old homeland, "like five kopecks"—the shock was slowly being replaced by realization; for a second he blinked, coming to his senses, until he finally nodded, confirming that he understood me.
How could I screw up like this! Of all people, it had to be Clockwell! No, better him than some random person completely unknown to me, but this is Will—he's a good guy, but honestly, he's a blabbermouth... last time I was lucky that the one he blabbed to was Eve, who already knew my secret, and not some random person.
And back then he was an adult! And now he is, damn it, fourteen—at this time the beginnings of reason are just starting to hesitantly sprout in children's brains. How many fourteen-year-old boys do you know who are capable of keeping such important secrets? In real life, not in children's and teenage books and movies. Yes, there are none, and I need to make sure that Clockwell will be exactly like that; human lives, and possibly the fate of the entire Earth, depend on this, damn it.
It didn't add to my peace of mind that after the incident we never managed to talk face to face. Immediately after the shootout, a commotion began; the sheriff called the police and an ambulance, tied up the two relatively healthy thugs, and began giving first aid to the one he had shot in the back, while simultaneously trying to somehow calm the customers terrified by the proximity of death and convince them to stay in their places. He wasn't doing very well, either at saving the black guy or convincing the hysterical women.
"Quiet now!" I finally shouted at a whining broad about a meter and a half across, who was trying to flee the scene and squealing louder than anyone else. "Look, even the kids are calmer and smarter than you! Have at least a drop of pride and courage!"
I pointed to my friends and, naturally, myself. Ah, how nice it is when you yourself are still a kid and can say what you think without fear that they will try to hound you, calling you an abuser, a racist, and some kind of sexist.
While the cow blinked and tried to come up with an answer and a behavioral strategy that would allow her to regain her lost dignity, I got up and walked over to the sheriff.
"Kid, what are you..."
"I took first aid courses," yeah, during my service in the army and later, while preparing for the space program. "You could use another pair of hands."
The man frowned at first, thinking of telling me to get lost, but at that moment the patient under his hands once again began coughing up blood and blowing bloody bubbles from his nose...
"Then look for a first aid kit, even in a dump like this there should be one..."
"Of course," and I even know where it is, because I worked here in a past life.
---
Through joint efforts, we managed not to send the thug to the next world before the arrival of the ambulance, which, living up to its name, rushed over very quickly, as did a police car. The beaten gangstas were quickly packed up by the sheriff's colleagues and taken away to be treated and to prepare for prison life, while the customers, the establishment's employees, and Lucas himself—that was the sheriff's name—were taken to the station to give statements. Our underage gang went there too, to wait for the arrival of overly worried parents, who were informed by phone that their kids ended up in the thick of an armed robbery and shootout...
In general, the arrival of the mommies turned out to be noisy, and the kids themselves, feeling the pity and attention directed at them, broke down and began to vent their emotional tension with tears.
Only Will and I stood out... and thereby aroused some suspicion among the adults—did the kids suffer psychological trauma? But Clockwell was so actively admiring the hero's coolness—and although he was talking about the sheriff, he would still cast a meaningful glance at me every now and then, the fucking conspirator—that the adults became convinced that the child simply did not realize the seriousness of the situation and the danger to his life. I, with my parents' permission, gave a statement as a witness and retold my version of events—how I heroically tipped the table over and herded all my comrades under it to minimize risks, how I helped stabilize the wounded man, and most importantly: that this very wounded man was the first to open fire on the sheriff. The young and hot female deputy sheriff assigned to me,* who, alas, saw me only as a boy wise and brave beyond his years, nodded smilingly and recorded all my words in the file.
Not only I, but also my parents, in general, our whole family represented a sort of island of tranquility in a mad kingdom of crying children and their parents, who were terrified for their offspring. And it seems that in Nolan's gaze directed at me, there was a glimmer of something... like pride; apparently, my behavior in an emergency situation did not disgrace the standards of his homeland.
Well, the main thing is that he doesn't suspect that I wasn't just sitting at the table during the robbery, and that I've been preparing to kick his ass for three months already. He doesn't suspect, does he?
After giving statements, my parents left their contact info with the police, and we were let go in peace—after all, the main hero of the day was that visiting sheriff, who indeed turned out to be not from our city, but from Pennsylvania altogether, and all the attention was riveted on him. And not only positive attention; he violated something there with his actions, one of the bandits was generally at death's door, and besides, it was unclear who opened fire first—witness testimonies turned out to be quite confusing, and there were no cameras in the establishment. It didn't do him any favors either that the bandits hadn't wounded anyone at all, that the sheriff was white and the robbers were black—I can already imagine how they might present all this in the press, another manifestation of police racism, no less—and the last bullet was completely missing, although the fact of the shot was confirmed by a check of the weapon seized from the leader. It seems my intervention created a couple of extra problems for Lucas, but it's still better than if that bullet had been found in his brains, right?
That day I never managed to talk to Will, as Mom decided to lavish me with extra attention and compensate for the stress I experienced with her care. She arranged almost a festive dinner, then suggested playing a board game as a whole family, which we hadn't done for several years, and at the end even allowed me to stay up late watching cable with Dad. But overall, she reacted quite calmly to what happened; apparently, the experience of being married to a hero who risks his life every day shows. I remember when I got my powers in the previous world, Mom didn't object much either when I started getting into various scrapes and only demanded order and adherence to some rules in the house. Of course, the situation is different now—I'm younger and haven't confirmed the presence of my powers yet—but I am still the son of Omni-Man—a guy who can take a nuclear strike to the head—she subconsciously understands that such trifles cannot be a real threat to me. I even wonder what would have happened if I had been hit by a stray bullet, say, half a year ago, when my powers were still dormant? I'd sooner believe that it would have served as a push for an even earlier awakening of the Viltrumite heritage than actually injured me.
Note:
* All police officers in the Sheriff's Department are called his deputies. This can be anything from a couple of people, at the very minimum in a provincial town, to several thousand cops, like in a large county such as L.A.