John Wick - Chapter 90: A One-Sided Battle (Patreon)

Nate and John made their way to a position about fifty meters from the villa’s front gate.

Nate produced another pistol and several magazines and handed them to John. The Staccato 2011 XC only had two magazines, and Nate was worried that wouldn’t be enough once the shooting started.

“How much time?”

“Ten minutes,” John said.

“Plenty.”

Nate pulled out the AN-94 and checked the chamber.

“I’ll go in first. Let’s switch roles this time. You cover me. Sound good?”

John nodded. “All right. Be careful.”

He patted Nate on the shoulder, took the AWM, and went off to find a suitable sniper position.

Nate slipped behind a tree near the villa’s front gate and took cover.

A throwing knife appeared in his hand. He was about to take out the security camera when he suddenly remembered something.

He still had that data throwing knife.

He’d bought the thing ages ago and never used it.

With a turn of his wrist, a black-and-gold throwing knife appeared in his hand, complete with a little cat head carved into the hilt.

Might as well see what it could do.

Nate flicked his wrist.

The data throwing knife shot forward too fast for the naked eye to follow and buried itself in the camera by the gate.

Two seconds later, the entire villa compound lost power.

“Holy shit. It’s that good?”

Nate stared in surprise.

The guards throughout the property immediately descended into visible confusion.

Then Nate heard two faint sounds.

Whoosh. Whoosh.

The two guards patrolling the rooftop suddenly jerked, then toppled over the edge without making a sound.

The people below became even more frantic.

John was in position.

Time to move.

Nate raised the AN-94 and rushed through the front gate.

The four guards closest to him barely had time to react before he dropped each of them with successive two-round bursts to the head.

He immediately moved sideways, firing as he went.

He didn’t even bother taking cover.

He simply kept advancing, searching for targets and shooting.

Nate tore through the courtyard as though no one there could stop him. The instant he spotted someone alive, he put a two-round burst into them. The moment they fell, he shifted to the next target and fired another pair.

Combined with the AN-94’s exceptional burst-fire capability, the whole thing really did look like something out of a movie.

John’s rifle joined in with a steady rhythm from outside the compound.

Perched in a tree, he had a much wider field of view than Nate. The AWM cracked again and again, precisely eliminating anyone lurking in Nate’s blind spots.

Enemies close to Nate were slowed so badly that most of them couldn’t even raise their weapons before taking a bullet through the head.

Those farther away had another problem.

Their aim was atrocious.

Nate barely even needed to dodge shots aimed in his direction. They simply couldn’t hit his head, and the occasional pistol round that struck his bulletproof suit might as well have been nothing.

Not that it mattered much anyway.

He had Level 6 Gear.

Against nothing but pistols and submachine guns, he hardly needed to dodge at all.

[Intimidation (Max Level)]

[After killing intent locks onto a target, enemies within 10 meters have their movement speed reduced by 30%. Enemies beyond 10 meters have their ranged accuracy reduced by 70%.]

Nate and John worked together almost flawlessly.

In less than half a minute, the dozen or so guards in the courtyard had been wiped out.

They hadn’t even managed to put up anything resembling a proper fight.

John put a round through the head of a guard trying to stick his gun out of a second-floor window.

At almost the same moment, Nate fired two consecutive two-round bursts and killed the pair trying to rush out through the front entrance.

Then the courtyard went quiet.

Everyone still alive had retreated inside and refused to show themselves.

Nate drew his HK P30L and fired three shots into the air.

That was the signal he and John had agreed on.

The courtyard was clear.

Time for indoor CQB.

Nate found some cover facing the front entrance and waited for John.

While he waited, one particularly reckless guard decided to peek out through a window.

Two shots from Nate immediately blew through his head.

A moment later, John came up behind him and tapped him on the shoulder.

Nate took the AWM from John and stored it in his System Backpack. Then he handed John the Benelli M4 and shoved a handful of shotgun shells into his pocket.

For himself, Nate switched to the Rattler short-barreled rifle.

“How do you want to do this?” John asked.

“According to Elena’s intel, there should still be around a dozen inside. We go through the back. I take point, you follow. Once we’re through the door, I cover left, you cover right.”

The instructions were simple and precise.

John understood immediately.

At that same moment, on the third floor of the villa, Santino’s mother slammed her fist against a table, eyes bloodshot with rage.

“I spent all that money, and it accomplished nothing! They haven’t even been hurt!”

“Useless! All of you are useless! There are dozens of you, and you can’t even handle two men! What am I paying you for?”

The bodyguard beside her gripped his weapon, his lips visibly trembling.

“Madam... that’s John Wick.”

“That’s Baba Yaga.”

“And the man with him is apparently just as dangerous.”

He hesitated before continuing.

“Madam... we can’t stop them.”

The woman fell silent.

Her rage and grief over her precious son’s death had blinded her.

She had forgotten what the name John Wick actually meant.

Now her hands began to tremble.

Her survival instinct finally broke through the anger.

And fear set in.

Outside, Nate and John moved around the corpses scattered through the front yard and silently followed the villa’s exterior wall toward the rear entrance.

Nate went first, the Rattler braced firmly against his shoulder and its muzzle constantly covering the next corner.

John followed two meters behind and slightly to Nate’s left, keeping their lines of fire clear.

The rear entrance was a locked wooden door.

Nate tried the handle.

It didn’t move.

He ran a hand over the walls on either side.

Concrete.

Then he focused.

Breathing came from the other side of the door.

Fast.

Nervous.

Nate pointed toward the lock.

John immediately understood.

He shifted to one side, pressed the Benelli M4 against the lock, and pulled the trigger.

The blast was deafening.

A chunk of the wooden door around the lock exploded inward.

Both men instantly moved away from the doorway, taking positions on opposite sides behind the concrete walls.

At least five guns opened fire from inside.

Bullets tore through the wooden door and buried themselves in the opposite wall.

Splinters filled the air.

The shooting continued for four or five seconds before becoming sporadic.

They were reloading.

A flashbang appeared in Nate’s hand.

He pulled the pin and tossed it through the hole blasted into the door.

“Grenade!” someone screamed inside.

A brilliant white flash erupted.

Nate immediately shoved the muzzle of the Rattler through the opening and emptied the entire thirty-round magazine into the hallway.

Within seconds, the magazine was dry.

Screams and the heavy sound of bodies hitting the floor came from inside.

Nate switched to his HK P30L, kicked the ruined door open, and rushed through.

Five men were sprawled across the hallway.

Two more were leaning against the walls, clutching their eyes and blindly firing their guns.

To Nate, even the movement of their fingers tightening around the triggers looked painfully slow.

Their shots had no accuracy whatsoever.

Nate fired twice.

The first man took bullets through the neck and head.

He sidestepped and put another round straight into the second man’s face.

John entered behind him, Benelli M4 aimed toward the far end of the hallway.

A guard leaned half his body around the corner.

John was faster.

He pulled the trigger.

The blast tore through the man’s arm and shoulder, ripping apart his collarbone along with them.

The first-floor hallway was clear.

Ahead of Nate were the stairs leading to the second floor and the entrance to the living room.

He sensed killing intent from three people in the stairwell, clustered around the landing above.

Nate didn’t hesitate.

A second flashbang went up the stairs.

He charged in immediately afterward.

Three men staggered on the steps, clutching their faces.

Nate fired upward in controlled two-round bursts.

Blood burst from heads and necks.

All three men tumbled down the staircase, leaving streaks of blood behind them.

John held the living-room side of the stairwell.

A guard armed with a submachine gun suddenly rose from behind the sofa.

John’s shotgun was faster.

One blast caught the man square in the chest and sent him flipping backward over the couch.

Two more remained in the living room, both hiding behind the bar.

Nate emerged from the stairwell and moved along the wall until he reached the side of the bar.

He extended his pistol around the edge.

Two rounds punched through the side and struck the first man in the thigh.

The guard screamed and collapsed.

A third bullet entered his head.

The other man panicked and stuck his weapon out, spraying bullets blindly.

Every shot went into the wall.

Nate rose.

A throwing knife flashed through the air and buried itself in the man’s skull.

The second floor was clear.

John pointed upward.

More upstairs.

Nate nodded.

They climbed to the third floor.

It was quiet.

There were three rooms.

Nate stopped outside one of them.

Two people were inside.

He could sense their hostility.

And something else.

Fear.

Fear separated from him by nothing more than a door.

Gianna’s mother had to be inside.

Nate signaled to John.

He would breach.

John would cover the hallway.

Nate positioned himself beside the door, took a breath, then kicked it open.

The bodyguard waiting inside was ready.

His gun was already aimed at the entrance.

But [Intimidation] had slowed him dramatically.

Nate could clearly see the man’s trigger finger curling backward as though it were moving in slow motion.

Nate fired first.

Two bullets tore through the guard’s wrist.

His pistol dropped to the floor.

A second two-round burst struck him in the chest.

The last bodyguard collapsed, coughing blood.

Nate walked over and finished him with a shot to the head.

The woman sitting nearby panicked and slid from her chair, one trembling hand reaching toward a drawer.

Nate walked over and pressed the muzzle of his pistol against her forehead.

“We finally meet, ma’am.”

She froze.

She didn’t dare move.

“W-who... who are you?”

Nate smiled.

“The man who killed your son, ma’am.”

“You... it was you!”

She struggled upright from the floor, her voice turning shrill.

“Give me back my son...”

She didn’t get to finish.

Nate slapped her hard across the face.

That still wasn’t enough.

So he backhanded her across the other cheek.

The woman sat there stunned.

John finished checking the other rooms and returned, giving Nate the all-clear signal.

Nate hauled the woman off the floor, shoved her back into the chair, and tied her securely with rope.

From beginning to end, the entire assault had taken less than ten minutes.

Neither Nate nor John had suffered so much as a scratch.

More than thirty enemies were dead.

“John... how much time?”

“A little over a minute.”

Nate pulled over a chair and sat directly across from the woman.

Then he dragged another one over for John.

“You can call Gianna now.”