The Knife on a stealth mission— || Rescue Nico Operation underway
@nicholas-wolfwood
| 🗡️ 🗡️ 🗡️ | Some time after ensuring Punk was going to be taken care of and given proper medical attention, Knives contemplated the city. He was steadier than before, having let his power settle and rest while he considered his options.
The Wolfwood the puppet had taken was a hostage that none of them could afford to leave in their hands, right? His brother was in no shape to rescue him. His other brother was already in preparations for taking on the puppet and freeing this world’s Vash from the other Knives’s control. Of all the insane stunts he would pull…. But that was for him to worry about, not Knives. He had to move quickly—
Navigating the city was simpler than he’d anticipated. The tower was an easy landmark to navigate to. Getting inside was… not as simple. But, finding a discrete location to stab a hole through had been simple enough. Moving through the facility, it was unsettlingly quiet. There were barely any humans, not surprising, but enlightening. There was little in the way of guard detail. That meant Nai was confident enough in the few he did have in the place, and his own power, to keep people out. His mistake, then.
He stopped and listened often, had killed and hidden one human already, and ignored his usual impulses to just cut a path through the place to find what he wanted. That was something this Nai would do, something hw would have done as well, in the past. But in his current state, he had little chance against this more formidable version of himself. That was a crisis he would stow away in his head to have another time. Caution and stealth would have to do.
Two more dead and hidden. He hoped with chagrin that they would not be missed at their stations anytime soon. He saw much of the facility, both below the tower and sneaking up into the tower. He had to be careful there… The elevator wasn’t exactly discreet, but it was the quickest and least invasive means to reaching the top.
It was there that he felt the pressure of the strange Plants his world possessed. He couldn't hear them like he could hear his sibling at home. But he felt their presence as he drew closer to them. An odd sensation that passed over him like wafts of wind--except not physical at all. If the Wolfwood of this world was kept anywhere, it must be here...somewhere.
Hidden, and waiting, he sensed Nai long before he saw him. He held rigidly still, as if by doing so, his power would go unnoticed in the wash of Nai's own--and the presence of the other Plants all throughout the tower's facilities. The glimpse he saw of him, he had to force down the rising panic and anger--he had the other Wolfwood. Which was advantageous that he found him! But in the clutches of Nai--that could not bode well at all... What if he didn't act now--and Wolfwood was slain--Logic dictated he would no longer be an object to hang over the others' heads but...But to act now.... Knives knew he did not stand a chance against a younger, stronger version of himself... The ideal outcome was saving him, of course, if he could, but going against Nai alone would get them both slaughtered--
He'd wonder later where that idealist thought had come from... it sounded a little bit too like Vash...
Knives did not have to wait long to find Nai was leaving Wolfwood in the facilities at the top of the tower--He'd made out some of their conversation, yet not all. He knew that it was not good for Wolfwood, if his loud protests had been anything. Fury burned inside him, and he clenched down of the power cracking in his hands and chest as blades tried to manifest in the wake of the anger. Not yet, he told himself. Not yet.
The splash of liquid had startled him, but he didn't have time to react before Nai was on his way out. Knives closed his eyes and pushed down on his anger, his power, making it as small as possible. Do not notice me, he thought, like a soft prayer. Another thing he would have no choice but to think about later.
A shuddering wave of pure energy caught Knives off guard--and it felt like Vash--the one they called Vet, the one who had that other presence that had genuinely tried to kill him in July... Something must have happened. He'd recognize that uncontrolled energy burst anywhere...
He had to act fast. If this July was about to have its destruction come upon it, he did not want to see if he could live through it a second time. And he knew, Wolfwood would not.
Nai would be sufficiently distracted with that, and Knives moved silently along to the room he had taken Wolfwood to.
"Ah..!" Knives was looking at a tank--Nai had put Wolfwood into a tank? Had he already drowned? But... it seemed as if... he was still alive...By the time he'd gotten to him, he'd already given into needing to breathe, and he seemed in a sedated state-- Blades had begun to emerge from his left arm, painful and wild in the panic of seeing he might have been too late... By the time he'd gotten to him, he'd already given into needing to breathe, and he seemed in a sedated state-- It was a special substance... Something he had seen used before, William Conrad had used it for attempting to work with the Plants in some exploratory work...
Knives shook his head--no, this was no time to speculate. Breathable or not, Wolfwood would not remain in that tank. Touching the glass-- there was a wash energy that permeated the fluid and the glass of the tank, and by proxy, he felt the echoes of Wolfwood's fear and trauma. An ability he admittedly used to ignore and/or quash because he had no need for sympathy for the feelings of others.
But his emotions infected Knives and ignited his anger. He remembered his own Wolfwood. His Punisher. The one that had... started to be more than a tool to be used. And that made him angrier.
The largest blade he produced heated with blue-white light and drew back, aiming for the tank somewhere above Wolfwood's head, penetrating with a sharp sizzle of energy and the sound of the liquid vaporizing as it came into contact with the flashburn heat. Blue-yellow lightning danced along his arm and blades. He thought another strand or two of hair were turning black, but he didn’t care. Slowly, the heated blade melted the glass, cracks began to spider from the places were the liquid cooled the glass too quickly. The Plant drew back, the liquid began to flood from the slice he made. Slow enough not to be a shock to Wolfwood, but enough that the glass stopped cracking as it cooled. He cut more points into the glass, letting it flow faster. Once it was low enough for Wolfwood to touch the bottom of the tank, he shattered the section in the middle of the slices he made. He was splattered with the liquid but he paid it no mind as he stepped forward to catch Wolfwood from toppling out of the tank. He was pliant and sedated, and something about that continued to fizzle in his smoldering rage.
“Come now,” he muttered, brusquely, checking his eyes and signs of life. “Get that shit out of your lungs—“ Kneeling, he play the human across his leg, encouraging him to cough the liquid out and get air into his lungs.
