Daisy had been thinking about the limits of her vibration radar, and this situation was giving her a clear read on them. Running for extended distances through dense urban terrain — too many surfaces, too many signals, too much interference. Vision, hearing, and vibration sense all bled into each other. She kept losing resolution on individual targets.
Compared to Daredevil's hyper-precise sensory map of the world around him, hers was frankly primitive.
"Fan out, check the other side!" Voices cut through the background noise nearby.
She dragged the unconscious tattooed man deeper into the shadow of a dumpster and left him there. She'd come back for him.
She scanned the immediate surroundings. A plain residential building to her left. She took two running steps, jumped, caught the roofline, swung her legs up — and pulled herself over onto the roof.
She lay flat. Raised the P239.
Footsteps below.
A man with a mohawk appeared at the street entrance. Civilians almost never looked up — their instinct was to scan level ground, forward and back. From here, with him in the open and her in shadow, the angle was completely in her favor. The gap was a little over 20 meters (about 65 feet). Short enough.
She channeled a small pulse of her ability into her wrist for steadiness. Two-handed grip. She aimed for his head and fired.
The shot broke the silence. The man's head twitched upward reflexively — too late. The bullet entered through his left eye and exited through the base of his skull. He dropped and stopped moving.
Daisy rolled to a different position on the roof.
Two signals left. The pair who'd been chasing her reunited over the body of their colleague, visibly rattled. They backed against a wall, weapons drawn, scanning in every direction.
She watched them from a distance and lined up the shot twice — but the math wasn't there. The handgun's effective range was around 50 meters (about 165 feet), and against moving targets the accuracy dropped significantly. Raw physical enhancement helped, but she was nowhere near a trained marksman. The risk of a clean miss was too high.
She stayed still and waited.
The men fired bursts in random directions, trying to flush her out. Then the bald one grabbed his phone.
He didn't get a word out. A single shot. He looked down at his hand — warm and wet. He threw himself sideways in a diving roll, cleared the line of fire, then scrambled upright and turned.
His partner's forehead had a large hole in it, and his blood had sprayed across the bald man's own hand. The bald man stood up and fired several shots in rapid succession toward the direction the bullet had come from.
Daisy fired back once. He'd had a moment's warning and he was far enough out that luck didn't favor her this time — the bullet grazed his left arm and kept going.
He'd spotted her position now. On the roof. He stared at the spot where she was crouched behind a low parapet, processing the information. How had she gotten up there?
He pressed himself into the corner, took out his phone — still bloody — and tried to dial. It wouldn't turn on.
He threw it away. Scanned the rooftops. Buying time.
"We don't have any issue with you," he called out. "Madame only wanted to speak with you. She admires what she saw."
Daisy almost laughed out loud. Do I look that stupid to you?
"I think there might be a misunderstanding between us." The bald man kept talking, eyes moving, mapping the nearby structures for an angle of approach. He was looking for a route to close the distance and get her into a melee.
Which was exactly what she was looking for as well.
Her physical resilience was real, but it had limits — she was nowhere near Captain America's level, able to take a bullet and be back on his feet in ten seconds. Luck was a factor she didn't trust, and one stray round from a desperate man could end the conversation permanently.
She read his position through the vibration feedback, slipped off the roof on the far side, and moved through the back passages to the alley where she'd calculated he'd have to come through.
She crouched in a shadow and waited.
The bald man moved along the wall — left hand holding a knife, right hand holding his gun, eyes sweeping every corner. His breathing was the loudest thing in the alley.
Daisy pressed her palm flat against the floorboards.
What's underneath here?
The man felt the ground shift beneath his feet. The old wooden floor groaned and popped. His attention snapped downward — earthquake? — and in the half-second his focus broke, a single shot finished the question for him.
She walked over. The gun she'd emptied was still in her hand — she tossed it onto the body. He didn't react.
She stood over the scene and felt a cold, unpleasant flutter move through her chest. Up close, with time to actually look at what she'd done, it was harder than she'd expected. She made herself imagine health bars and enemy sprites until the nausea passed, then crouched down and went through his pockets.
This one was carrying: $200, a Beretta 92F, and two full magazines.
She helped herself to all of it. With Madame Gao actively targeting her, having firepower on hand was a reasonable precaution.
She went back and searched the two bodies outside. One gun was empty, and the last man hadn't even brought one. She left the empty weapons and took the cash. Her total assets were back up to approximately $8,000.
Then she picked up a plank of wood from the alley floor and went to find the tattooed man she'd left in the corner.
She woke him up the efficient way.
He came to with blood running into his eyes, took one look at the very clear handgun pointed at his face, and went completely still.
"Who sent you?" Daisy asked. "Why were you following me?"
His eyes flicked sideways — scanning for something he could use.
Really? There's a gun aimed at your head. "You think I'm not a serious threat, is that it?"
A shot through his right foot.
"Talk."
He looked up at her with pure, undiluted hatred and tried to push himself upright.
The second shot went through his left foot.
"Okay — okay, I'll talk!"
He rolled on the ground, clutching his feet. When the gun came to rest pointing between his eyes, the calculation finally resolved.
"It was... it was Madame Gao's order."
"That old woman? I've never even met her before today."
He glanced up at her, then quickly looked away.
"If you'd caught me," Daisy said, "what was Madame Gao planning to do with me?"
His face went gray. His whole body was shaking.
She tilted the gun toward his forehead. The message needed no explanation.
"If I tell you — you won't kill me?"
"I won't kill you. Tell me."
"Madame Gao would probably... sell you. To private buyers. Or put you to work in one of her factories."
Daisy absorbed that. The blood drained from her face. This has nothing to do with the Japanese men at all. A completely random encounter — one that had somehow landed her in Madame Gao's crosshairs.
"Where does she usually stay?"
The man gave her an address, voice barely above a whisper.
"You said you wouldn't kill me..." He was watching her hand.
"I won't."
The words landed like a lifeline. The relief that crossed his face lasted about one second — until the muzzle was the only thing he could see.
The shot echoed off the alley walls.
"Remember this next time," Daisy said to no one in particular, holstering the weapon. "Never trust a pretty woman's promises."
She didn't feel a flicker of guilt. She left four bodies in the alley and walked away with a light step.